During the investigation of recent hollers in the Complete Monster thread, it's become apparent to the staff that an insular, unfriendly culture has evolved in the Complete Monster and Magnificent Bastard threads that is causing problems.
Specific issues include:
- Overzealous hollers on tropers who come into the threads without being familiar with all the rules and traditions of the tropes. And when they are familiar with said rules and traditions, they get accused (with little evidence) of being ban evaders.
- A few tropers in the thread habitually engage in snotty, impolite mini-modding. There are also regular complaints about excessive, offtopic "socializing" posts.
- Many many thread regulars barely post/edit anywhere else, making the threads look like they are divorced from the rest of TV Tropes.
- Following that, there are often complaints about the threads and their regulars violating wiki rules, such as on indexing, crosswicking, example context and example categorization. Some folks are working on resolving the issues, but...
- Often moderator action against thread regulars leads to a lot of participants suddenly showing up in the moderation threads to protest and speak on their behalf, like a clique.
It is not a super high level problem, but it has been going on for years and we cannot ignore it any longer. There will be a thread in Wiki Talk
to discuss the problem; in the meantime there is a moratorium on further Complete Monster and Magnificent Bastard example discussion until we have gotten this sorted out.
Update: The new threads have been made and can be found here:
Please see the Frequently Asked Questions and Common Requests List before suggesting any new entries for this trope.
IMPORTANT: To avoid a holler to the mods, please see here for the earliest date a work can be discussed, (usually two weeks from the US release), as well as who's reserved discussion.
When voting, you must specify the candidate(s). No blanket votes (i.e. "
to everyone I missed").
No plagiarism: It's fair to source things, but an effortpost must be your own work and not lifted wholesale from another source.
We don't care what other sites think about a character being a Complete Monster. We judge this trope by our own criteria. Repeatedly attempting to bring up other sites will earn a suspension.
What is the Work
Here you briefly describe the work in question and explain any important setting details. Don't assume that everyone is familiar with the work in question.
Who is the Candidate and What have they Done?
This will be the main portion of the Effort Post. Here you list all of the crimes committed by the candidate. For candidates with longer rap sheets, keep the list to their most important and heinous crimes, we don't need to hear about every time they decide to do something minor or petty.
Do they have any Mitigating Factors or Freudian Excuse?
Here you discuss any potential redeeming or sympathetic features the character has, the character's Freudian Excuse if they have one, as well as any other potential mitigating factors like Offscreen Villainy or questions of moral agency. Try to present these as objectively as possible by presenting any evidence that may support or refute the mitigating factors.
Do they meet the Heinousness Standard?
Here you compare the actions of the Candidate to other character actions in the story in order to determine if they stand out or not. Remember that all characters, not just other villains, contribute to the Heinousness Standard
Final Verdict?
Simply state whether or not you think the character counts or not.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Aug 31st 2023 at 4:14:10 AM
What is the mitigating factor?
EDIT:
Well, this is a case where I cannot even say the character's NAME without major spoilers, I was... surprised to say the least but the heinous standard makes it tricky, I would need a second opinion to make a definite decision.
edited 4th May '18 9:49:48 PM by Knack
I said I'd get around to discussing Black Lightning late, but I've been too busy to sit down and binge watch as much as I wanted. From what I know of the main villain Tobias Whale, he doesn't count due to a number of mitigating factors anyway. With that being said if anyone who's watched the series all the way thinks that a villain from it is worth an effortpost, feel free to do so.
A shame I didn't finish watching by the way, what I've seen has been a lot of fun and it seems a lot more solid than the Arrowverse's current shows this season. :/ I think I'll reserve Season 2 and keep up with that for sure if no one minds.
edited 4th May '18 9:46:43 PM by FriedWarthog
@Elfen Lied Fan 90 In that case I wouldn't bother, if it isn't like any characters where they are corrupted but evil enough from the start or had evil in their hearts(which is a cool method of creating villains) but instead she was good but made evil then it would be a hard sell. I mean, it couldn't hurt but it isn't my decision.
edited 4th May '18 9:57:10 PM by Knack
From Black Lightning, Tobias Whale does not count, correct, but the real bad guy of the first season—Martin Proctor—I think is probably an easy keeper. I've been really anxiously awaiting you covering it, so unfortunately I don't have an EP.
Yeah, it is way better than the Arrowverse, with the possible exception of Legends of Tomorrow (which is outstanding these days), though they might be on equal footing in my mind in terms of quality (despite being way different from each other)...hard to say.
edited 4th May '18 10:26:13 PM by speyeker
Oh in that case? I'll see if I can finish the series over the weekend and effortpost him if he truly counts. If somebody beats me to it though I won't complain: it's my fault for slacking off on it! Plus, I want to stop being a pushy douche over people beating me to effortposting people. It's just a silly thing to get worked up over.
Going to go
to Kanako unless compelling evidence otherwise is presented.
So I said I was going to EP two people from First Edition Scion, and I've just finished reviewing my second candidate. For those who missed my first EP from that tabletop RPG, you can find it here
; it contains info on the RPG and some information on some of the other antagonists that can be used to gauge the heinous standard.
With that, let me EP another member of the Shinsengumi.
Who is Seth Farrow?
Seth Farrow is a Scion of the Egyptian god Set. Seth was always considered something of a "bad seed" in his family, being a sadistic gang leader who also harbored intense jealousy towards his brother Cyrus.
One night, he shows up at Cyrus's home with a gang of thugs, claiming he had a "misunderstanding" with the police and needed a place to hide for a while. Cyrus, not wanting his family to be put in danger, says no, and ends up getting gunned down and killed by Seth. This causes Cyrus's 14 year old son Horace to grab a shotgun and fire at Seth in revenge, though Seth also fires at the kid. Horace loses an eye, while Seth takes a bullet to the groin. Seth manages to escape though, and Horace would eventually awaken divine powers as a Scion of Horus (his true father).
Seth and Kane Taoka eventually meet when the latter saves Seth from a bad situation. Kane offers Seth a chance to live the high life and many chances to indulge his sadism in return to becoming the Japanese Scion's right-hand man, which Seth eagerly accepts. He's one of the few Shinsengumi members that's aware of Kane's loyalty to Mikaboshi, and he keeps an eye on the other members, ready to have them killed if they ever find out and decide to "become a liability."
After Kane's attempt to devastate the world using the primal energies of Atlantis fails and he gets absorbed into Mikaboshi, his band basically splits apart, becoming gods and joining up with their pantheons to help fight against the Titans. Seth goes to the Egyptian gods and claims ignorance of Kane's true plans while professing his loyalty to them. While some of the gods, such as Seth's own father Set and his newly ascended nephew Horace, doubt his claims, there isn't actually much evidence they can use to call him out, and the Titan Aten's vicious assault on their domain means they needed as much help as they can get. Seth joins the front lines and helps the other Egyptian gods fight against Aten's forces...
...and then the gamebook reveals that Set and Horace are totally right. Seth is biding his time, hoping to either hear from Kane or find a way to sneak away from the front lines and returns to the mortal world, where he plans to carve out a kingdom of his own where he can use his new divinity to indulge his sadism, consequences be damned.
Heinous standard?
Seth's end goal is not quite as terrible as the Titans' end goals, but he is considered one of the most sadistic antagonists in the gamebooks, and he doesn't seem to mind that Kane's success would result in the World being destroyed by Mikaboshi. While other antagonists like the Keepers of the World have an endgame that will result in many deaths, at least those deaths are being used to advance what the Keepers think is for the good of the World, while the many deaths Seth plans to cause are just to sate his own desires.
Mitigating factors?
For me, there are two potential mitigating factors.
The first one is his loyalty to Kane. I think it's worth considering that Seth, even as a god, still holds out on the possibility that Kane might contact him again. I think the gamebook implies he would join up with Kane again if the latter asks, which I consider to be noteworthy from someone as selfish as Seth.
The second one is that he really doesn't have much "official" screentime. When it comes to the Shinsengumi, Kane is the one that does the most because he's the leader and he's also the one serving as Mikaboshi's stooge. The stuff I wrote above all come from Seth's character profiles; what he actually does in the adventures themselves is left up to the gamemaster. I don't know if this is a disqualifier or not though, and would love to hear your thoughts.
Once again, if you guys have any questions or I've been unclear on anything, feel free to let me know and I'll try to answer as best as I can.
edited 4th May '18 10:33:23 PM by dragonfire5000
"I squirm, I struggle, ergo I am. Faced with death, I am finally, truly alive."
That is iffy to say the least, if what he does is up to the gamemaster doesn't that mean he could potentially do something good? Like be genuinely polite when talking to his enemies or spare somebody? I mean something mitigating like positive traits. Seems like the same reason why most player characters in video games do not count even if you have the option to be evil, if it is an option than it is not hard to for said character to have positive traits.
edited 4th May '18 10:45:03 PM by Knack
My "what he actually does in the adventures themselves is left up to the gamemaster" sentence was actually meant to be something more along the lines of "how active he is depends on how the gamemaster uses him."
Regarding gamemasters providing mitigating factors from their own personal interpretations, I'm not sure it's a good idea to bring into consideration how a random group might portray him.
edited 4th May '18 10:47:55 PM by dragonfire5000
"I squirm, I struggle, ergo I am. Faced with death, I am finally, truly alive."Going to say yes here, the loyalty sounds like that of a Psycho Supporter
Its game mechanics can be a little awkward and unbalanced sometimes, but I think it has an interesting setting and its take on the Titans is one that I found to be really intriguing.
edited 4th May '18 11:06:51 PM by dragonfire5000
"I squirm, I struggle, ergo I am. Faced with death, I am finally, truly alive."

Yea on Largo and switched no on Kanako.... Ouch
And btw, speaking of the candidates that Austin P Md to Scraggle.... Like I said, I was trying to bring Felice Dunbar from The Kiss to this thread..... But because of the issue, I decided to drop it. Not sure if I want to E Ping her again or not due to one mitigating factor that prevents her to be on this trope
"Making screw-ups and mistakes was I ever really good at. Because everything I touch went to hell."