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. "![[tup]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thumbs_up_emote.png "[thumb up]"){kind=small}
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
@Wary: It's more my issue with your phrasing rather than any of your (very valid, IMO) points. CM isn't the only trope mandated by criterium (or even necessarily the strictest—see some Flame Bait tropes) it's just easily the most notable. There's an entire sub-culture born from this thread alone.
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
That's fair, I'm still pretty new to tv tropes and haven't looked at too many of the other cleanup threads so I can admit I may have been wrong with most restrictive, although I stand by my overall point
The wifi here sucks
That's what I feel. I really don't like labeling this trope as the 'most exclusive' since it both isn't that hard for a character to qualify all things considered and again, calling it that feels like this is some kind of exclusive club or something. It's a very exclusive trope but the most exclusive.
Edited by papyru30 on Jun 1st 2020 at 4:09:52 AM
Hope your prepared for an unforgettable luncheon
I still have my reservations about these new guidelines/requirements, but I understand that the details of this trope's criteria are meant to be dynamic and I'm willing to play along, at least for the moment.
Edited by ImperialMajestyXO on Jun 1st 2020 at 3:11:58 AM
I would actually argue that treating the trope as elite would be the other way around; trying to get villains on there because they're cool well-known villains would be my interptation of the "badge of honor" point people keep bringing up, while having it be restrictive is making it less of an elite club because it's limiting it to a more specific group of vile villains that likely aren't as popular/desired
Edited by WaryHoglet on Jun 1st 2020 at 3:13:03 AM
The wifi here sucks
I can see where your coming from. I don't fully agree but I get your point. Let's just agree to disagree since this conversation isn't really conducive to the thread anymore.
Hope your prepared for an unforgettable luncheon
I thought sharks were my friends.
Personally I think Magnificent Bastard is a much harder trope to qualify for and much more exclusive. For a CM, it's pretty simple. Step 1, give your work an actual story; step 2, make the villain the biggest bastard with no virtues. For MB? You need your villain to walk that fine tight-rope between "genuine dick" and "lovable scoundrel" all while consistently painting them as a tactical genius.
![[down]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_down.png "[down]"){kind=icon}
Was that for ?
Edited by DelphineTheDelphox on Jun 1st 2020 at 3:18:43 AM
RIP KissAnime.
I was gonna say, if you really wanna talk about this, it might be a good idea to start a new thread or take it to PMs. Don't want things to get too off-topic.
I actually made this point myself once. While more types of characters can qualify for Magnificent Bastard, at the same time, the requirements are more numerous and complex. One example of this is that unlike a CM, which just has a floor, MB has a floor and a ceiling.
Edited by ImperialMajestyXO on Jun 1st 2020 at 3:20:24 AM
Yeah, I'm not sure how conducive to the thread this is at this point.
Goku Black
Could we please move on from this. Please. I think everything that could be said has been said.
Edit : ![[nja]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/user_ninja_2074.png "[nja]"){kind=small}
by mod.
Edited by miraculous on Jun 1st 2020 at 3:20:34 AM
"That's right mortal. By channeling my divine rage into power, I have forged a new instrument in which to destroy you."
I thought sharks were my friends.
Understood.
RIP KissAnime.
Alright.
Now then, any other candidates?
The Draftsman of Doom
Just read the latest issue of Spy X Family. PM for details.
Feels good, don't it?
The wifi here sucks
OK so I have a character I feel like should be cut with the new substantial plot rule, Jacob Berg from Cinquante Nuances de Rouge. Now I was opposed to him going up when he was proposed but people said that the focus on Jacob's psychology kept it from being a mindless gorefest. That I still disagree on since the story more or less repeats the same points of "humans are weak and I am a genius" or "that death was satisfying/unsatisfying" but even aside from that there is no plot to the story other than 'villain goes around and kills people in different ways' hell the story is split into fifty parts just so it can focus on each victim's death.
Hope your prepared for an unforgettable luncheon
I'll have an Elder Scrolls post in a little bit. My final word: I don't really think there's an easy cure to the "badge of honor" mentality or many of the other idiosyncrasies that come as an inevitable byproduct of thread culture. It comes down to individual members of that thread minding those idiosyncrasies and overall treating this thread as it ultimately should be: a cleanup, not a club.
The Draftsman of Doom
Well said. Looking forward to the EP.
Goku Black
You mean this one.
I don't speak or know French. What is it saying ?
"That's right mortal. By channeling my divine rage into power, I have forged a new instrument in which to destroy you."
Here's an English translation. Cut Jacob Berg; I always disagreed with him being up.
The wifi here sucks
I put the story through Google Translate and it gave me enough to understand what was happening. If you read the guy's write up, you've more or less read the story.
Hope your prepared for an unforgettable luncheon
Yeah this has strayed... also if you wanna raise questions about MB, we literally have a thread for it: go there.
Unofficial Wiki Curator for Complete Monster
"If you read the guy's write up, you've more or less read the story." This makes me lean to cutting.
CM Dates; CM Pending; CM Drafts
... who is Jacob Berg?
The wifi here sucks
For any one who's curious here's his write up.
- Cinquante Nuances de Rouge (Fifty Shades of Red): J., real name Jacob Berg, is a psychopathic Serial Killer. Deciding to kill 50 people in different ways to satiate his bloodlust and for the sake of science, J., not above attacking children, nonetheless prefers targeting adults, as children don't have enough maturity to experience the various emotions adults deal with while facing impending death. Seeing humanity as nothing more but a bunch of guinea pigs for his "experiments", J. kills people in extremely gruesome ways, including starving a little girl to death; forcing a child to choose between being poisoned with belladonna or arsenic; killing a teenager and forcing his father to watch, leaving said father to kill himself; starving a dog before giving him a drug addict as food; and then killing the dog once he fulfilled his role in his experiment. When finally captured and confronted by his victims' families, he merely replies that they were lucky it was their loved ones instead of themselves.
Yeah... fuck that.
Cut Not Important