Is this tropeworthy/Chairs?

That trope had been to TRS earlier this decade, and it's supposed to limited to IUEO.

What does that even mean here, though?

IIRC, it requires some in-universe lampshade that the name is more commonly associated with the opposite sex, i.e. it's not just listing any male characters in any work that's named "Alice", but the example has to be acknowledge that "Alice" is not a common male name in that particular work's setting.

I'm not finding a TRS thread for Gender-Blender Name in Google. Closest I'm finding is a clean-up thread where Sam Curt argued that it should be IUEO, and it came up in the Real Life section thread last year, but I don't know that it was ever actually ruled IUEO.

Got redirected here because I suggested cutting Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me. Because of chairs.

Should we at least turn it into an Index or disambiguate it? Or even detect one tropeworthy theme?

It does seem that lately a lot of the weapon-specific tropes were found to not be tropeworthy, and I just assumed Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me will follow suit.
I didn't even wick my Special Ability Shield to it, and nobody complained about it.

Edited by TMH-Sir-Iron-Vomit on Apr 14th 2024 at 9:55:01 PM

Making any changes is a TRS issue, and first you need to prove it's untropeworthy

It very well may be, but that remains to be decided.

Edited by WarJay77 on Apr 14th 2024 at 4:00:35 AM

The description and Laconic make it sound like just a list of shields being used in fiction, and the examples aren't much better.
This isn't even an old thing, apparently there were some discussions back in 2012, already questioning the tropiness of the examples.

Once again, it could be possible to keep the title and restrict the scope of the page, but as it stands, it smells of chairs.
Compare to the other valid tropes about shields: Shield Bash, Shield Surf, Throwing Your Shield Always Works, Knightly Sword and Shield...

Edited by TMH-Sir-Iron-Vomit on Apr 14th 2024 at 10:10:02 AM

I have to play devil's advocate here, the trope is NOT just "Shields Exist" but rather exclaiming said piece of protective equipment will in fact protect the character.

And that's just "shields are used as intended". A lot of other weapon-tropes has been cut or disambiguated because of this. Basically, it looks like a subversion of Shields Are Useless, but then again, shields are meant to protect you.

Well, I'm playing God's advocate here, I guess.
The trope still counts as chairs for me since we expect shields to be able to defend their user.

Once again, compare the tropes I've referenced previously: Shield Bash is a trope because we don't associate shields as being weapons, no matter how common it was in real life, and it can be used to characterize people as resourceful or brutal; Knightly Sword and Shield is a trope because when we think of knights, we also imagine them with kite or heater shields, and can be used by extension to characterize people as "knightly"; Sword/Shield Contrast is a trope becase swords and shields are opposite to each others; Special Ability Shield is a trope because shields can receive superpowers as well.

,I meant more like the EXCLAMATION makes the trope, not simply using a shield... But nevermind I checked out the page now and it PRETTY MUCH INDEED is just "Shields and or defense items exist". It is so sad, back then this trope HAD a meaning to it and was hilarious. Now its page after page of "Shields exist, that's it." I've never seen a trope do such a 180 and become so utterly pointless. Normally old tropes get immproved over time.

Edited by AegisP on Apr 14th 2024 at 1:22:33 AM

"exclaiming said piece of protective equipment will in fact protect the character" to me is in fact equivalent to "Shields Exist", because that's their entire point. At least the trope page reads like a Wikipedia article on shields.

Edited by Amonimus on Apr 14th 2024 at 11:22:26 AM

I suck at explaining but let me try. I meant that's the whole point, it's an extremely stupid exclamation but it kept happening. The trope, as I understood it was a dumb and corny pointless exclamation that a shield does its job. It even used to have an hilarious quote that amounted to "Captain America Saying his shield luckily protected him is as hilariously dumb a statement as Oh wow luckily my instestines will process the nutrients on that meal I just had"

But I realize the trope is just pointless drivel now anyway. So its better off erased, you win. Alas poor Trope, I hardly knew ye.

Edited by AegisP on Apr 14th 2024 at 1:27:42 AM

So, we do seem to agree that Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me, as it stands, is chairs?

Never seen a chair be more chairsy than that, yes.

So, what should we do with it?
Disambiguate?
Index for proper shield-related tropes?
Or turn it into a real trope, maybe someone who uses shields as a primary weapon instead of in the off-hand, or shields being used against modern weapons?

What do you suggest?

I suggest you check How to Do a Wick Check, because this thread can't make decisions.

So, there currently are roughly 2889 wicks that link Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me to other pages. That's quite high, but I assume a lot of those come from Fantasy or Historical Fiction, where we do expect shields to appear in the first place.

Now, actually sampling and analyzing the wicks? That's the hard part.
But I did already calculate that the batchs size could be 53 or 54 wicks- roughly the square root of 2889.

That's more than enough

Regarding Gender-Blender Name: I stand corrected in this regard. I don't mind if somebody nominates it to TRS, then.

@Aegis P: Not to beat a dead horse, but it sounds like what you thought the trope was was a Stock Phrase without any additional meaning to make it an actual trope.

Edited by MorganWick on Apr 15th 2024 at 3:41:41 AM

I came across Sequential Artist and wondered... why? At best, this is just "Most Writers Are Writers but for comic book artists". And the name makes it sound like "comic book artists exist" (with the same problem as the other "occupation" tropes we've talked about occasionally).

Also, the article ends with the baffling line "A common Superpower for these characters is Art Initiates Life", even though probably the majority of characters listed are just regular, non-powered artists.

Edited by DoktorvonEurotrash on Apr 18th 2024 at 6:35:31 AM

I guess the intent of the trope was the Author Avatar of a comic book artist?

I can see that being a trope, but we already have that trope: it's called Most Writers Are Writers. It feels to me like any tropeworthy content should be a soft-split on that page.

And I just noticed that there are examples from media like Film and Live-Action Television (that aren't based on comics), that are literally just "a comic artist exists in this work."

I'd require MWAW to be renamed first—the title is overly restrictive.