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SolipSchism Since: Jun, 2014
2015-04-15 09:21:37

I'm not familiar with the game, but based on the character sheet, I'm not convinced he's as minor as you say he is. Video Games are trickier than other works because most characters aren't really expected to do all that much in the plot. But it sounds like he's a party member.

In my opinion, no video game party member should ever be an Ensemble Dark Horse except in a game with Loads and Loads of Party Members, like Suikoden. Regardless of their significance to the plot. I don't think whether they're optional or not is relevant, because a trope's presence in a work shouldn't depend on whether a player chooses to complete something optional. The fact is that he's a party member in the work.

EDIT: Caveat that: Party members who are only around for a brief period of time might also count, like Asch from Tales of the Abyss or Richard from Tales of Graces (the latter comes back for the "after story" portion of the game, but during the main campaign, he's only around briefly near the beginning).

Edited by SolipSchism
NonoRobot Since: Sep, 2010
2015-04-15 09:31:01

Well, a look at the Final Fantasy section left me kinda confused, since there are a lot of characters there who are mandatory party members, who have a major impact on the plot (such as Auron, Balthier and Sazh), and who are still viewed as Ensemble Dark Horse. Also, Magus (Chrono Trigger) is listed there as an Ensemble Dark Horse (while he has a major impact on the plot, this character is in fact optionnal). And I could go on for a while.

Edér in comparison is, it bears repeating, completly optionnal and has no impact on the plot. He seems to fit more the trope than any of the characters I just mentionned (that being said, it makes me wonder if the Ensemble Dark Horse section shouldn't be cleaned up thoroughly).

Edited by NonoRobot
SolipSchism Since: Jun, 2014
2015-04-15 09:43:33

You raise good points, and I'm going to backpedal a bit here.

If the majority of party members are optional, then I don't think their optional nature should matter to whether they are an Ensemble Dark Horse.

If the majority are required and one or two are optional, that is basically a step down from Secret Character, so that could be a consideration.

So that's a point in Magus' favor as an ED. On top of that, if I remember correctly, he can only be acquired relatively late in the game compared to everyone else. He's also the Token Evil Teammate and spends much of the game as an enemy. Take all of those factors together, and I think he qualifies, although I'd like to hear others' opinions on that.

I don't believe Auron qualifies at all. He doesn't constantly affect the plot like Tidus or Yuna, but he is a required party member, is around for the entirety of the game, and is fairly significant to the plot from the very beginming. His influence tapers off once he serves his role of getting Tidus involved in the conflict, but he remains important.

I'm not familiar enough with FFXIII to judge Sazh, and I don't even know which game Balthier is from, so I can't judge them, but I seem to remember Sazh being a primary party member from the beginning of the game, so I doubt he qualifies either.

You're probably not wrong about ED needing a clean-up, though. It's one of those tropes that people really like to just stick their favorite character in.

tl;dr: If PoE has Loads And Loads Of Characters, and they are all or mostly optional, and Eder is a very popular one, then sure. However, if it has a reasonable number of party members and they are all or mostly optional (say, 8 or fewer), then I wouldn't say he counts.

Consider the following questions:

  • How does he stack up in relation to other characters?
  • Is he the only optional character, or one of only a few optional characters? Or is every party member optional?
  • Is he less important to the plot than most of the other characters, or are all of the party members insignificant to the plot?

You can't say "he's optional" and "he's not important to the plot" as qualifiers if every character or most of them are optional and plot-irrelevant.

NonoRobot Since: Sep, 2010
2015-04-15 09:58:25

To answer your questions:

  • Regarding his relation to other characters, he isn't related to anyone important, and doesn't share a past with any of the characters we meet in-game (companions or not). There should be conflict between Durance and him because of their religions (Durance kinda helped to "purge" followers of Eothas, the god Edér is worshipping), but sadly the writing doesn't explore that (it's a shame, really, that would have been the perfect occasion to add tension between the members of our group and explore their personalities).
  • In the game, every single recruitable companion is optional (there are 8 of them). None of them has any real impact on the plot (though there is a special case, but then said case is only explored in the epilogue if you didn't complete his quest), though we can explore their past thanks to their relevant sidequests. The player can perfectly plays the game with only the Player Character, or hire mercenaries (who have no background whatsoever, but can be created like the Player Character, allowing the player to do some min-maxing and make them more powerful than the regular companions).
  • Most of the characters we can recruit are insignificant to the plot, though there are exceptions, namely (spoilers, just in case) Aloth and Durance, the former is actually an acquaintance of the Big Bad and acts as The Mole (at least, for a while), and the latter had a major impact on the backstory of the game, since he nuked (metaphorically) a god.

Regarding the Ensemble Dark Horse section, I wonder if we shouldn't submit it to the "Projects: Short Term" section of the forums. I'm beginning to think we need to treat this trope like the Complete Monster one, which now requires an example to be submitted and approved by the forums members before being listed (because there were too many misuses I think).

Edited by NonoRobot
SolipSchism Since: Jun, 2014
2015-04-15 10:38:19

I doubt it's as extreme as Complete Monster, but it might be worth a TRS thread if you don't want to do the entire thing yourself (which is totally reasonable). Be aware, though, if you try to open a TRS thread, you'll most definitely be asked to do a wick check since the issue is about misuse of a trope.

Regarding PoE, based on your last post, I still don't think he counts; he doesn't seem to be any less plot-significant than any of the other party members. Again, though, I'm not familiar with the game beyond what we've talked about here and some other opinions would be welcome.

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