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Personally I think this discussion has been dragged out long enough and stretched out to too many different places. For example, nobody responded to my proposal for the description in the improvement drive (post here
) and there still needs to be a discussion on the tropes in the list.
Should we consolidate this discussion to a short-term project thread? I realize splitting the discussion can harm effective progress but the conversation is currently split and I think a unified thread is in order.
Some criteria I generally agree on in favor of including a trope to this list:
- The trope must be about writing. This could include characterization, plotting, exposition, dialog. Thus, tropes specifically regarding design, art, or acting are (or should be) excluded.
- Whether or not there is an Unreliable Narrator in play, there is no good reason to play the given trope — where a "good reason" is something like "produces drama," "produces humor," "marks something about the character/situation," or something similar.
- The trope is not generally (or specifically) used intentionally to be bad. The status of "bad" or "mark of bad writing" is accidental, generally.
So, I think Dull Surprise should be excluded. For one thing, it generally regards art or acting, how the characters look. When it concerns description of characters, such as in literature or other texts, the description would mark something off about the character or situation. It would tell the audience important information about who is experiencing the Dull Surprise and/or who is describing the Dull Surprise. Thus, not necessarily "bad writing."
Look at all that shiny stuff ain't they prettyFollowing up (given Septimus's comment): I have started a discussion on the discussion page. Courtesy link.

I intend to remove this from the Bad Writing Index:
This can be used intentionally to show someone as stoic or unemotional. Any unintentional examples are due to poor art or acting, not writing. All Literature examples are constructive uses arguing it's impossible for it to be bad due to writing alone.
There was discussion here
about cutting game design trope from the index as they're not writing per-say, but stalled out. Should I wait until we have a consensus on that or go ahead and cut Dull Surprise as there are many examples of it being used to desirable effect?