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
"The Juice is Loose."
Yes to Hakudoshi. No to Louis.
Edited by Bullman on Oct 19th 2020 at 9:56:42 AM
Fan-Preferred Couple cleanup thread
Pronounced YAK-you-luss
BTW, I was unable to find any discussion on Rhapthorne from Dragon Quest VIII using the forum's search function. As an ancient demon in a franchise that usually treats demons as Made of Evil (except when they're people empowered and/or possessed by 'true' demons), how did he make it past the usual exemption clause? I don't seem to recall him being anything other than a big fat Anthropomorphic Personification of primordial evil.
Edited by Iaculus on Oct 19th 2020 at 3:02:42 PM
What's precedent ever done for us?
Because nobody discussed him proper. If there's explicit confirmation he's made of evil, well...
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
that could be an issue. Thank you for bringing it up. I’ve never played the games myself so I can’t comment.
Edited by nwotyzal on Oct 19th 2020 at 9:41:44 AM
'If.' I want to make sure it's explicitly confirmed he's made of evil
Pronounced YAK-you-luss
I mean, he's a demon. It's the default assumption in Dragon Quest, unless the game specifically says otherwise. Sapient embodiments of evil are a dime a dozen in that franchise, from regular named villains to mooks for you to chew through.
What's precedent ever done for us?
what I would suggest is to play the game again and make sure if (and I stress the if) there’s anything mitigating or not.
Edited by nwotyzal on Oct 19th 2020 at 8:31:40 AM
Rhapthorne was discussed in these pages:
- https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=6vic3f9h1cy5qivsenw8llok&page=176
- https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=6vic3f9h1cy5qivsenw8llok&page=178
- https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=6vic3f9h1cy5qivsenw8llok&page=179
- https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=6vic3f9h1cy5qivsenw8llok&page=222
- https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=6vic3f9h1cy5qivsenw8llok&page=223
Goku Black
Cant find anything from those about the demon thing and Made of Evil being discussed.
"That's right mortal. By channeling my divine rage into power, I have forged a new instrument in which to destroy you."
I'd just like to see this potential mitigator really scrutinized before we all start laying down cut votes from a few pots about possible agency issues. I'm not dismissing that it might be a thing but let's all get some elucidation on demon morality in the work before the torches and pitchforks come out.
Pronounced YAK-you-luss
Yeah, the thing to understand about the Dragon Quest series is that they're extremely archetypal fantasy stories. Good and evil exist in physical form, independent of the actions of human beings, and while some demons can be amusing and can have Pet the Dog moments, they're still embodiments of evil who need to be cleansed, destroyed, or sealed away. Humans can be turned into demons (either consensually or otherwise), but that simply means they've been taken into a pre-existing primal force of evil, and the question then is whether it can be ejected from them before it consumes everything they are (and whether anyone cares enough to try, if the human was enough of a jerk).
Edited by Iaculus on Oct 19th 2020 at 4:10:12 PM
What's precedent ever done for us?
You could say the same about a lot of fantasy stories with demonic agency, though.
Pronounced YAK-you-luss
Right, but we usually use the Made of Evil exemption clause for those, too.
What's precedent ever done for us?
I’ll just stay out of this because I don’t think I’ll contribute much of worth.
Well, if demons can have Pet the Dog moments, wouldn't that imply that they can make moral choices? Including the choice to become a Complete Monster?
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
Right off the bat them being able to Pet the Dog is making me question cutting him.
Pronounced YAK-you-luss
Ehh, not really. They can do nice things sometimes to a limited extent (like having a Villainous Friendship, having a sense of honour, or choosing to Poke the Poodle), but they can't be good. Being Made of Evil doesn't wholly prevent them from making moral choices, but it puts a sharp upper limit on how moral they can be, and on how moral they want to be. As I said, they're demons in the classical sense, an archetypal force of villainy.
Edited by Iaculus on Oct 19th 2020 at 4:46:17 PM
What's precedent ever done for us?
If they can form Villainous Friendships and Pet the Dog then they're capable of taking good actions, even if they struggle with it and are inclined to evil.
This basically sounds identical to the discussion and decision we came to about Fiends from Dungeons and Dragons.
Think you're tough because you made it through Lord of the Rings? Real men survive The Silmarillion.
Yeah, I'm just asking for explicit confirmation demons are absolutely made of darkness, formed as such and have no choice in agency especially if they're capable of decent qualities.
Pronounced YAK-you-luss
That's extremely reductive. Near as I can tell, we've never required Made of Evil and Always Chaotic Evil characters to be completely devoid of anything even loosely resembling virtue to fit the trope, since most works will depict a (very limited) range of moralities within those groups in order to give different characters different personalities. An innate and severe compulsion to evil as part of your nature is usually enough to get you bumped out of a CM candidacy.
I don't think any Dragon Quest demon has ever gone outside their nature as much as a D&D fiend (there's no equivalent of Fall-From-Grace from Planescape Torment, for instance) - the most they do is being amusingly incompetent, or bonding with other demons over their shared hobby of committing evil.
Edited by Iaculus on Oct 19th 2020 at 4:55:46 PM
What's precedent ever done for us?
I'm asking one more time: where is the proof demons in Dragon Quest are formed of darkness and evil and thus have no choice in their agencies when they are capable of standards, decent qualities and so forth?
The "fantasy archetype argument" doesn't fly when fantasy is chock full of 'evil' races which doesn't bar agency for one reason or another, and even made of evil beings exist in settings where moralities can be altered or selected in certain cases.
Okay, Iac, I get you want him cut but we need to talk this out. What you're saying is valid but on the flip side of the coin we also allow characters who appear to be Made of Evil if there's evidence they can fight their nature, which moments of kindness or friendship would be indicate. It's not "reductive" of me to point that out and I'm not really down for you to just say shit like that when I don't agree with you from the second you wanna say he should go.
Pronounced YAK-you-luss
I'm not exactly sure what you're asking for, because the games simply don't go into that kind of detail and depth over demon morality. They just uphold a consistent standard of 'demon, therefore evil', as part of a persistent pattern of using classic fantasy tropes as narrative shorthand. Some will be more evil, some will be less evil, but they're all evil.
The whole nature of Dragon Quest is that it's cozy, familiar fantasy that's more interested in telling a story within existing archetypes than interrogating those archetypes. They sort of assume that you know what a demon is and why they're bad news. 'What if a demon could be good' isn't really a question they address except in the context of 'oh dear, the demons turned a good person into one of them, we need to change them back'.
Edited by Iaculus on Oct 19th 2020 at 5:07:31 PM
What's precedent ever done for us?
Happy birthday, Libraryseraph.