Have a question about how the TVTropes wiki works? No one knows this community better than the people in it, so ask away! Ask the Tropers is the page you come to when you have a question burning in your brain and the support pages didn't help.
It's not for everything, though. For a list of all the resources for your questions, click here. You can also go to this Directory thread
for ongoing cleanup projects.
Ask the Tropers is for:
- General questions about the wiki, how it works, and how to do things.
- Reports of problems with wiki articles, or requests for help with wiki articles.
- Reports of misbehavior or abuse by other tropers.
Ask the Tropers is not for:
- Help identifying a trope. See TropeFinder.
- Help identifying a work. See MediaFinder.
- Asking if a trope example is valid. See the Trope Talk forum.
- Proposing new tropes. See TropeLaunchPad.
- Making bug reports. See QueryBugs.
- Asking for new wiki features. See QueryWishlist.
- Chatting with other tropers. See our forums.
- Reporting problems with advertisements. See this forum topic.
- Reporting issues on the forums. Send a Holler instead.
Ask the Tropers:
open Fridge Horror issue with Balrog-De-Morgoth Videogame
The other day I added an entry on Fridge.Hogwarts Legacy about the character Ominis Gaunt and how his family's history of inbreeding was likely the result of him being born blind. To me this seemed like a reasonable deduction considering that hereditary blindness from inbreeding has been scientifically observed, but the user Balrog-De-Morgoth removed my entry and asserted that Ominis' blindness had to be magical in nature because many other non-magic diseases and disabilities have magical cures. However, there have been no specific cases in the Wizarding World canon where healing eyes by magic to restore vision has been shown, as evidenced by the various characters that wear eyewear, including Harry Potter himself.
I re-added my entry again and explained my reasoning above, but Balrog-De-Morgoth removed it a second time, this time citing that Pottermore lists cures for non-magical diseases including cancer, but then claimed that because the character of Mad-Eye Moody has a magical replacement eye, that was also reason enough to remove my entry. This is ignoring the fact that Moody's eye is a replacement, not his original eye which was healed, and therefore completely irrelevant my point. While there is also the fact that Ominis' wand reacted specifically to him being blind, this still does not indicate that his blindness is caused by magic since the way wands work is left very mysterious, and Ominis himself states in-game that he was born blind.
Is it alright for me to put my Fridge entry back up? Plus I also feel that removing a Fridge entry because you disagree with it is bad etiquette.
Edited by ChipGoffOfRORopenTroper adding back potholes to an indice
When checking the wicks for A Date with Rosie Palms (which was recently renamed to This Index Touches Itself), I noticed that a lot of the meaningless 'masturbation exists' type of potholes to it that I'd removed have been readded by Fatter Queens, just changed to the new name. This seems to run counter to the point of turning A Date with Rosie Palms into an index in the first place; is this allowed?
Edited by OrbitingopenSuper-sub trope relationships.
Bit of a weird one, this.
This is regarding a Raven Branwen Hypocrite entry on Characters.RWBY Anima.
Back in July 2021, gjjones initially removed it because the Hypocrite sub-trope Never My Fault was on her page. I added it back because the Never My Fault entry was a completely different example, and there was no sub-trope detailing the Hypocrite entry. They then changed it to Straw Hypocrite, so I started a discussion on the discussion page about whether that was an appropriate move (a straw hypocrite usually doesn't believe the argument they're making, which isn't the case here). They added the entry back to Hypocrite themselves.
They've just removed the entry on the grounds that the sub-tropes Never My Fault and Secretly Selfish are on the page. But, as per last time, these sub-trope entries are about different examples to the Hypocrite one.
So, this guideline about not allowing the super-trope if sub-tropes are on the page. It's about the same examples, isn't it? If Example A for Character Y is under a sub-trope and Example B fits better under the super-trope and not any sub-trope, is it okay to have the super-trope on the same page for Example B? And, if Example A fits better under a sub-trope, you shouldn't have it listed under the super-trope as well. That's what I thought the guideline was, at any rate. What's the right thing to do here about this entry? Is there a sub/super trope thread to ask about this?
- Hypocrite: Raven has a problematic view of family responsibilities. She feels Qrow's abandonment of the Branwen tribe is turning his back on family, but he feels she has no business lecturing him when she abandoned Taiyang and Yang. Qrow tells Yang Raven only contacts him when she wants him; once Yang seeks out Raven so she can take her to Qrow and Ruby, Raven complains about family only visiting when they need something.
openNon-YMMV tropes in YMMV pages Literature
YMMV.Xeelee Sequence has three objective tropes in its page, none of them are audience reaction or proper YMMV items.
- Always a Bigger Fish: The Transcendence would be considered as most franchises' god-like race and even they pale in comparison to the Xeelee, who themselves are losing against the Photino Birds. And even these two near-omnipotents are mere insects to the Monads. This trope also applies to out of universe as well, for the Xeelee series is often considered as the gold-standard of overpowered franchises that eclipses other 'traditionally powerful Sci-Fi franchises' such as Warhammer 40,000, The Culture, Ancient Halo and Gurren Lagann by several orders of magnitude. In fact, the amount of franchises that could stalemate or surpass the Sequence in scale could be counted on one hand.
- Cool Of Rule: Part of the reason the Sequence is so awesome is that all of the science is explained, and not just in a Hand Wave.
- Eviler than Thou: The Sequence is pretty infamous especially in versus forums for how atrociously dark and deprave it can get; often making Warhammer 40,000 look extremely PG and tame in comparison.
- Retcon: There's some inconsistencies across the series, mainly between the earlier novels and the Destiny's Children books. Some of it is simply the result of a lot more light being shed on the period between the fall of the Qax and the end of Ring, but (for example) the fact that Xeelee-style FTL drives function as time machines, including the ability to create paradoxes is only revealed in Exultant, when one would have expected it to be mentioned earlier.
While the Retcon and Cool Of Rule entry can be moved to Xeelee Sequence (although it seems like Cool Of Rule is starved of wicks), the rest look like shoehorns to compare with characters and factions from other works, not with characters and factions in the work itself. With that in mind, would it be alright to move Retcon to the main work page and to delete the rest?
open Illiteracy Communist
There's a Darth Wiki page called Illiteracy Communist that is basically a sign-up page for tropers who proudly identify as Grammar Nazis, with many tropers imitating stereotypical Nazis in their entries. I didn't see any hate speech towards any particular minority groups, and the page was created in 2009 when jokingly comparing oneself to Nazis was likely seen as more acceptable, but in this day and age it comes off as incredibly tone-deaf. I'm thinking something should be done about the page, such as a cut or at least a clean-up, but I'm wondering what other tropers think.
Edited by ArgoTheBlankopen Trope Page Question
Recently I've been having problems trying to access the page for Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence because my antivirus keeps blocking the connection with the warning of "URL:Phishing". But what's weird is that this is the only page on the entire site that it does that for, and I'm not sure if it's just my antivirus making a false positive or is there is something going on with that specific page itself.
openEdit War alert
Hours ago
, Crazy Luigi added lone three bullets entry to the part about Blizzcon 2018 in Presentations folder of Horrible.Video Games Other.
I sent them the indentation notifier and remove the entry since it's about the game itself, not the Blizzcon (said so in edit reason). They put it back
, at least without wrong indentaion this time.
openAbout an Edit Reversion Videogame
I was recently sent a warning about example indentation regarding an entry
in VindicatedByHistory.Video Games. Now, I don't disagree with the warning — I actually did make a mistake regarding what I was supposed to do indenting-wise — but since the entry was deleted wholesale, I'm not sure whether re-editing it while fixing the issues would qualify as edit warring.
The edit reason also mentions that a pothole to Condemned by History was misused, which I don't particularly agree with. At the time of its release, if I'm not mistaken, Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U did have a sizable fanbase (including Tournament Play, albeit never as big of a scene as Melee had), and Brawl (which the entry was about) was forgotten by casual players for a while until the release of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate made for 3DS and Wii U's faults stand out in retrospect, rather than being "reviled from day one" like the edit reason says. Am I misremembering?
PS: I'm sorry for being a serial tweaker. I keep second-guessing myself.
Edited by LendriMujinaopenCan I add a folder here?
H. P. Lovecraft features a really long list of basically everything he ever wrote in the description section (description itself is also pretty long, but that's its own thing to look at). I was going to change the header to a folder, but I noticed there was an index tag there when I went in to edit the page. Is it okay to still add the folder in, or will that break something?
openNattery additions
maxreid had added natter to one of their own examples in Absurdly Spacious Sewer. I sent them a PM over it and then removed the natter (while fixing many other issues in that page). Shortly afterwards, maxreid added another piece of natter in their next edit. I think that one can be salvaged by simply merging it with the example it's put under, but honestly I don't feel like doing it myself. Mostly because maxreid clearly doesn't take the hint, and sending them another PM feels like talking to a wall by this point.
openRats of NIMH example
There was an example on Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH that was removed a long time ago without an edit reason and I reinstated it:
- Interspecies Romance: Mrs. Frisby is a field mouse (which aren't proper mice at all, they're voles), but laboratory mice such as her husband are house mice. Although they have children, the two species aren't closely related enough to breed.
The reason why it was removed may have been that it wasn't portrayed as Interspecies Romance in the story itself, and most likely the author wasn't even aware they were different species. Would it still be legitimate to put it here, or would it be better under Artistic License – Biology?
openDream Episode
I have a question regarding the trope itself. This involves the Video Games section of the trope in question. Does this apply to a franchise as a whole? Like say, Super Mario Bros. 2 and Sonic Shuffle primarily takes place in a dream world. Or perhaps some licensed games such as Mickey's Ultimate Challenge or Bugs Bunny in Double Trouble. Do these qualify as "Dream Episodes" if we're considering franchises as a whole?
Edited by HarmonyBunny2000openConcerns Regarding HardTruthAesop - Bojack Horseman
I have many concerns regarding the "Aesop's" described in https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/HardTruthAesop/BoJackHorseman
. There's a lot of info that could be seen a disparaging to people with mental illness, and perpetuates some opinions on the subject that I personally find offensive. Granted I am fairly emotional about the topic lately, so if I am overreacting please let me know.
The ones regarding suicide in particular are pretty hot-button and could potentially bring up traumatic memories for people (it did for me). The entries do not seem to recognize or even acknowledge that people who are suicidal are not making a decision. Intervention is important, and although I agree that no one should feel obligated to be someone's support, I also don't think we should be encouraging people to abandon their loved ones when they have a suicide attempt. Not that I think that's the intention of this sentiment, but I do see it becoming more common recently as a push back against supporting people with mental illness.
Also, (digression) I personally find this to be a pretty negative Double Standard. I highly doubt a character with a physical illness would be given as much blame for putting stress on others because of their illness. I wonder if there's a better way to explain this without putting blame on mentally ill people, because that's kinda what it feels like. Like by putting more focus on self-care, instead of implicitly criticizing people for attempting suicide.
open Draco in Leather Pants misuse
I've noticed a lot of DILP entries that don't really make the case that fans are downplaying a villain's crimes, but instead act like merely liking or defending the villain at all qualifies as the trope, even if fans still acknowledge that they're the villain. These entries often make aspersions on the work's fandom, or read like this: "[Character] gets this a lot from fans, but this ignores the fact that they [list of the villain's crimes]." Some of these entries also come off as sexist, such as this one:
- The Dark Knight Trilogy: The Joker and the Scarecrow/Jonathan Crane seem to get this a lot in fanfiction for the Nolanverse Batman films. Leave it to crazed fangirls to pick two of the most evil characters in a series that actually has several sympathetic (or in the case of the ordinary mobsters, at least normal) villains to crush on.
It also doesn't help that the trope page itself seems to attribute the trope to fans finding the villain physically attractive, and states (without citing any evidence) that it's mostly fangirls who invoke the trope. I'm starting to think it might be better if this trope was limited to specific fanon examples, similar to what was done with Ron the Death Eater. Thoughts?
Edited by Javertshark13openPotential misuse of UnfortunateImplications
I found this edit on the Live-Action TV page for What An Idiot:
- Season 8 of the American version of The Amazing Race provided a rare funny example. The season was an experiment with family teams of four rather than teams of two of different relationships. The only non-white family was a black family whose surname happened to be, well, Black. Cue the Cringe Comedy of them always being called "the Black family" both by the other teams and by the show itself. They were the first team eliminated, so at least the unintentional hilarity didn't last.
Should it be removed, given that it doesn't credit an offical and professional source?
openTroper with overly defensive attitude
First a brief background. About a month ago, I once again hunt down This Troper using Google-Fu to track them down among wilderness that's moment pages (good news, I think they're gone from Nightmare Fuel/ and Tearjerker/). I sometime leave "Kill This Troper" as edit reason (as in terminate the usage of the term, in silar fashion to "kill a process") when remove it. A strong word, but I'm certain that it isn't rude (especially when removing this troper).
Today, I got rudeness notifier from Tropers/littlemisstfp2 regarding such edit
(a pure self-insert that has nothing to does with the entry) on NightmareFuel.Transformers Cyberverse. As noted, I don't think it's rude and replied as such. But digging a little more on the page's history reaveal two things.
- they were the one who added it
, and this is as recent as the last year's December (in contrast to most cases I found, which are usually years old).
- This edit
on Awesome.Transformers Cyberverse remove spoiler tag from page quote, which is a good thing, but their edit reason "Here to fix this before Wafer responds with more insults. Heheheheh" suggest a history with another troper.
Maybe I'm bias and reading too much into it (their edits are fine otherwise as far as I saw). And maybe the cultural difference make me misjudge the significant of the word "kill" (in that case, please say so). But I think they're acting too defensive.
Edited by KuruniopenFetishFuel EditWar
I'm self-reporting a slip-up on my part.
On Headscratchers.The Boys 2019, Flash Steps added an entry that troped Fetish Fuel, but it was talking about characters having "in-universe Fetish Fuel". Since in-universe examples are supposed to refer to Fetish, I corrected the link on the 18th with an edit reason explaining that in-universe examples refer to fetish.
I was page surfing today when I noticed the Fetish Fuel pothole, corrected it, and sent a notifier to Flash Steps about which one to use when it's in-universe before recognising which page I was on. I scrolled too fast through the history page and missed both of our previous edits. That carelessness is entirely my fault. On a second look at the history page, I found the previous edits, realised they'd undone my edit and that I'd made things worse by undoing that one.
I've therefore reverted the entry back to Flash Steps' most recent edit and am reporting the pair of us here.
Edited by WyldchyldopenWhen to know a page needs cleanup? Web Original
I've been looking over the page for Hamsters Paradise, as I've been following that particular work, and it seems to me that it could use a little help. Mostly in the grammar department, maybe with the spoiler tagging as well (At the moment it's just the stuff related to the original sketches that spoilered, though it's a little inconsistent. I'm also wondering if it's worth spoilering entries related to the Harmster and Baywulf sagas since they're a little heavier on plot details than the rest of the work).
At the same time, I'm not entirely sure if the issues are great enough that it needs a Cleanup topic, or any discussion at all as opposed to just fixing it myself. Is there a good way to know where to draw the line?

So on Scream VI Repo added
this Ass Pull entry:
Which later had this added to it
by a seperate troper.
Repo later changed
it to this:
However then the whole thing was cut
by Hfxjfrvnn citing "Justifying edit".
Repo then added
this new and nearly identical entry without saying why is the edit reason or discussing it anywhere from what I can tell:
I don't know if this counts or not but I have slightly bigger conern. Is this now an edit war? I'm unsure.
Edited by Bullman