Subpages cleanup: Complete Monster

Should we go for a rename of this trope as soon as the TRS backlog is cleared? I think now might be a good time to start discussing what if anything this could be renamed to and why.

I'm tempormental to the name Complete Monster, and I don't see how any name change could be objectively better; the Complete is the part I keep pointing to whenever someone wants to add a bad example.

I'm pretty sure a rename has been flat-out eliminated as a possibility by Word Of Mod.

And I agree that it shouldn't be misleading, but I kind of feel that the name is "tainted" enough that if we could rename it, it would help more then it would hurt.

On the subject of Tabletop Games...

Multiple factions from Warhammer 40 K are listed, including the Dark Eldar, the Emperor's Children, the Necrons, and "individual members of the Inquisition." Now I'm not going to dispute the fact that all of those factions are horrifically evil. But a) it's a Crapsack World so what a shocker, and b) how can an entire faction be a Complete Monster? This is my problem—factions aren't beings. They are legions of faceless Mooks most of whom we never get to know. Yes the guidebook tells you they are all horrifically evil. But that's a different trope—Always Chaotic Evil—not this. In fact, I'd argue that if a species is Always Chaotic Evil, than to qualify as a Complete Monster one would have to do something that truly makes you stand out. After all if your species is innately evil, or you are raised in a culture that worships evil, do you really have a choice?

From the original Warhammer, the Skaven and the druchii are listed. Now I don't know much about the druchii (although once again, entire faction?) but the Skaven? Really? They're not just Laughably Evil, they're Played for Laughs most of the time. Seriously, this is an entire of nation of G1 Starscream clones. They're so devoted to being Stupid Evil that their faction can barely hold itself together. Now I'm not saying that individual Skaven can't be scary. The Assassin that appears in the Ambassador series is Nightmare Fuel Unleaded. But the faction as a whole is often treated as a joke. Even the way they speak is Nightmare Fuel Retardant.

Dungeons And Dragons: The mind flayers are listed, and the page talks about how they are unable to feel empathy as a species. Question-if the species is unable to feel positive emotions, are they genuinely evil? Not to mention that they're all enslaved to the Elder Brains which are truly nasty pieces of work. The page itself mentions that their have been isolated cases of Heel Face Turns to boot. Aboleths are also listed. So are the demons, devils, et al, who are Made of Evil. Again, if you're Made of Evil can you actually be evil? Is it even possible to be good under those circumstances? I don't mind listing individual hellspawn who really go that extra mile (Lamashtu from Pathfinder springs to mind) but as a species? I don't know.

From the World Of Darkness. A bunch of factions from Werewolf The Apocalypse are listed, seemingly for no other reason than to say they aren't this; the Nephandi from Mage The Ascension (admittedly that one's hard to argue); the Bale Hounds of Werewolf The Forksaken (who can be run as Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds without violating a single rule); Belial's Brood of Vampire The Requiem (who can be a case of Then Let Me Be Evil); a number of factions from Mage The Awakening; the Illuminated from the Genius fanline, all of whom are cannonically insane; the Hunt Club of Hunter The Vigil (again, kind of hard to argue that one). Not saying all of these should be cut, but I'd like to see some discussion.

There's a few others (including the Rapine Storm of Cthulutech) but the ones I've listed are those I'm familiar with. I'm not saying that those factions don't have large numbers of CMs in them. I'm sure they do and would. I'm just wondering if we should list whole factions, which are of course, made up of large groups of individuals. The listing of especially vile NPCs is great (there's a few from the Slasher book that I'd rather like to add) but I'm just not sure about whole groups. I mean, you wouldn't put down every storm trooper or member of the Imperial Guard, would you? The leaders of those factions, no problem. But I have serious doubts about saying each individual footsoldier belongs on this page, especially if the species/faction/whatever is Always Chaotic Evil.

edited 8th Dec '11 8:11:37 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar

With respect to those "entire faction" entries, I don't see how that's possible under the trope definition. A whole group of Complete Monsters is Always Chaotic Evil. Make sure we're putting things in the right trope.

Edit: All of those can be cut, lock stock and barrel.

edited 8th Dec '11 7:56:11 PM by Fighteer

Well I did the Werewolf entry, removing the Spirals as C Ms (and providing a reason in article for it, which I probably shouldn't have) and adding the Pentex bosses at the end. I could have done a better job explaining why while cutting out the natter.

For the rest of it, I'd support cutting it.

edited 8th Dec '11 8:14:07 PM by Shaoken

A Complete Monster is always a distinct character. It is extremely rare for one not to be named and given a part. Tabletop RPG's cause some problems with that in that many NPC's are background characters and not necessarily fleshed out in the story unless the GM specifically decides to.

I have gone through the Tabletop Games section (with all the subtlety of someone chopping a tree) and have removed every example that had either a) on page debate or b) was about an entire faction. I have left NPCs, gods, etc. The only faction I left alone was The Hunt Club, since they currently provide the page image, and it's a voluntary group. If someone wants to cut that too, be my guest.

That is a good point, although a few organisations as a whole I think deserve the CM label just by how monsterous their actions are.

Anyway, I've thought about it and here is my revamped version of the Werewolf The Apocalypse entry;

• Werewolf The Apocalypse has the heads of the most of Pentex's subsidaries qualifying. While most of the employees of the various Pentex companies are in the dark about their company's true purpose, the people at the top know they're serving the embodiment of corruption and helping to destroy the planet, and they're all to happy to help. While listing off every specific deed would take up an entire page of it's own, all of them are complicet in producing products that corrupt and infest consumers with spirits of corruption, condeming them to an enternity in Malfaes. All so that when the world is destroyed they can rule over what's left of it.

Went through and did slightly more cleanup on Tabletop Games, including axing another couple of "whole species" versions. There's still a couple of problematic areas, though. The entries for Desus of Exalted, Cyric of Forgotten Realms, and the entire BattleTech entry are highly nattery and filled with "lest we forget" type stuff, but I'm not familiar with any of them enough to cut things down. And I have no idea what to make of this:

There is a third-level bullet below of one who apparently qualifies anyway, but this doesn't really look like an example.

Cut it, can't believe I missed that one.

I think that we should push all of the subpages that are out in the open, especially the Western Animation examples back into its folder.

edited 9th Dec '11 3:21:56 AM by PinkHeartChainsaw

Wondering if we should add something like this to the Tabletop Games section:

Note: A Complete Monster is an individual character, not a collective. Therefore a faction cannot be listed as one. A faction can attract Complete Monsters and can have them among its members, but cannot be one in and of itself.

Added the note. I don't see how renaming it would help at this point without a complete reset of the article.

Thanks. I have further trimmed the page. I cut Desus simply because there was so much natter about him and some of it seemed to indicate a Freudian Excuse of sorts. If somebody wants to fix it that's fine. I cut a couple more factions; the only ones that are still on the page are The Hunt Club (who provide the page image) and the Nephandi who are revolting by definition. If someone thinks they too should be cut I will cheerfully do so.

EDIT: I'm thinking of adding an example to the page, but I wanted to run it here first. Would Kazavon, Bigger Bad of the Pathfinder Adventure Path, Curse of the Crimson Throne be a good example? He's a sixty-foot Blue Dragon who served as the Champion of Zon-Kuthon (God of Envy, Pain, Darkness, and Loss). In life, he impersonated a mercenary and offered to save the nation of Ustalav from the Hordes of Belkzan. He then set himself up as ruler of border area and became Vlad the Impaler in Dragon form. He killed thousands of people, tortured even more, and demanded tribute from the entire region. When the Duke who hired him tried to stop him Kazavon had him publicly flayed alive—something he repeated with every other major enemy that he defeated. When he was finally killed, the evil that was released turned his entire castle into a haunted nightmare. It's worth noting that even death hasn't stopped him—his soul is so corrupt that it's tainted his bones, and transformed the items made out of them into Artifacts of Doom that drive anyone who uses them down a path of madness and self-destruction. He certainly horrifies me, but I thought I'd ask about it here first.

edited 9th Dec '11 10:24:58 AM by AmbarSonofDeshar

Desus has no excuse at all, and even if he did, nothing could justify his atrocities.

No, that would make the pages too long. They were split up to try and cut down on the length to begin with.

From the sounds of it there was a lot of natter. Does somebody want to explain just who the hell Desus is and what his deal is?

I'd say add him based on that, unless he had a really good reason for such attrocities.

EDIT: Also, could we get a lock or something on the Complete Monster Image Links page? People either add characters that have been removed from trope or violate the Just A Face And A Caption rule. It's starting to become a full-time occupation to keep it clean.

edited 9th Dec '11 2:12:53 PM by Shaoken

Like I said above, I don't actually know anything about Desus, but the natter wasn't so much arguing whether he counted or not as it was going on and on about every horrible thing he had done. There was no sign of a Freudian Excuse in there. Someone who actually knows anything about the character might say otherwise, but just from the entry's description, he fits.

The part towards the end about how he believes his own hype can and does sound like something of an excuse, at least to people who are unfamiliar with the character. More importantly, as you said, it went on and on and on. If someone wants to do a shorter write-up I'm cool with that.

EDIT: Have added Kazavon. If anyone wants to complain feel free to do so now.

edited 9th Dec '11 5:37:39 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar

I would like to propose an example.

Demon Lord Ghirahim, from The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. He is the Big Bad of the story, though technically subvervient to a master he is trying to revive. The reasons I would list him as a Complete Monster are as follows:

• He promises to do incredibly horrific things to Link, such as saying he would torture Link so bad, that he would make sure Link deafens himself with the sound of his own screams.
• He makes no hesitation to attack anyone in his way. Two examples:
  • The first is when is when he arrives right when Impa and Zelda find the Gate of Time, which Ghirahim is also looking for. He goes straight after Impa and starts wailing away, full out willing to murder her simply for being in the way. He also expresses his hatred towards her as well when describing her to Link in the prior two boss battles. Fortunately, Link intervenes, but this is where Ghirahim becomes so furious that he promises what he said to Link above.
  • The second is when he manages to reach the second Gate of Time that the player has spent the last third of the game trying to access. He kicks the old lady out of the way, steals Zelda away from you, and escapes.
• He begins to use Zelda to revive the Demon King, of course knowing full well that this is really hurting Zelda. Link's on his way, but Ghirahim sends hordes and hordes of Bokoblins and Moblins to stop him. Ghirahim tells them to pretty much send themselves to their death and do whatever it takes to stall for time. They should not fear Link, but rather Ghirahim if they don't manage to stop Link in time.

From the Complete Monster page:

• The character is truly heinous by the standards of the story, which makes no attempt to present the character in any positive way.
  • There are NO attempts at showing Ghirahim in a positive manner. He is an Ax-Crazy Blood Knight Demon who at first is Faux Affably Evil, but then shows his true nature towards the last third of the game. If anything, the ONLY positive aspect about him is his loyalty to his master. I am not sure if that would affect anything, however.

• The character's terribleness is played seriously at all times, evoking fear, revulsion and/or hatred from the other characters in the story.
  • His terror is always played seriously, and with disgust as well. Link is visibly uncomfortable around Ghirahim's Faux Affably Evil act, where Ghirahim ends up being disturbingly close to Link at times. Link also gives him the most serious Death Glares ever, showing his hatred for him.

• They are completely devoid of altruistic qualities. They show no regret for their crimes.
  • And finally, while again, Ghirahim IS incredibly loyal to his master, he shows absolutely NO regret for the evil he's done. Well, the only regret he claims to have had, is not killing Link when he had that chance. But I am sure that would probably count. Also, he is very narcissistic, and says that the one thing he lacks is mercy.

And while he has no Freudian Excuse, the reason for his lust for violence is that he is a Living Weapon, specifically the one of the Bigger Bad. It probably justifies his Blood Knight and Ax-Crazy behaviour. Although, I am not sure if this would affect anything either.

So these are the reasons why I would list Ghirahim as a Complete Monster.

edited 20th Dec '11 10:38:52 PM by xVanitas

Sounds like an example, but I haven't played the game. You might want to wait until someone familiar with the series comments before posting.

I say the last spoiler disqualifies him; if he's a living weapon, then he doen't have free will, therefore he's not evil because he choses to be evil, he's evil because he's made to be evil.

That said, have not played the game.

EDIT: Okay. What the hell. Fast Eddie just went and deleted all links to this topic from every main page of every Complete Monster article except for the ones I put up in each Video Game subpage (which I expect to now be deleted). Without any elaboration on why.

I'm getting mixed messages here; we've been tasked to clean up the Trope Decay and reduce the number of examples to only those that meet the three criteria, but our strategy for doing so is being (probably unintentionally) sabotaged.

edited 11th Dec '11 1:51:15 AM by Shaoken

I've already given my opinion on Fast Eddie's behavior towards this... thing ("trope" is not exactly the right word). It certainly does seem counter-productive to trying to deal with the problem.

Okay, I'm going to PM him now and ask him as politely as I can why he got rid of those links on some pages but not all (he edited Tabletop Games but left it there).

edited 11th Dec '11 1:52:31 AM by Shaoken