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Ask the Tropers:
openDo Bathroom Search Excuse and Women's Mysteries really overlap?
Perhaps this should be in Is This an Example?, but I'm not talking about a specific example.
On the new trope Bathroom Search Excuse (which is when someone either asks to go to the bathroom but instead goes somewhere else or lies that they were just looking for the bathroom), it says that it can overlap with Women's Mysteries.
But the Women's Mysteries page says that it's defined as "stories, rituals, secrets, etc. which, for reasons of either magic or tradition, only women are permitted to know".
I know that women sometimes enter bathrooms to change tampons (being a woman myself) and I know about the Wondrous Ladies Room and that maybe she's implying she has Morning Sickness? Still odd, though.
Edited by UnicorndanceopenDo I need to do anything about a flame-bait flag?
SPOTLIGHTSTEALINGSQUAD: Originally intended as a deconstruction of a [This example contains a Flame Bait entry. It should be moved to the Flame Bait tab.Mary Sue], Sarah became this to Kain and Raziel before Timestreamer Archimedes stole the spotlight from her.
I really don't want to call the character a self-insert. I'm willing to take other suggestions.
openAn example violating administrivia?
On TierInducedScrappy.LowTiers I found this example:
Every character besides yourself in King Arthur & the Knights of Justice on SNES. They were the definition of dead weight and could barely kill a bottom level rat.
Does this violate the Examples Are Not General rule?
Edited by ATricksterArtistopenQuestion
First, can I remove self-promotion examples I did for my Sonic fanfics because of Old Shame? Such as the "Blood of Beauty" example on Transplanted Character Fic. (I swear I removed that a long time ago, but someone reinstated it shortly afterwards.)
Second, crazysamaritan removed this example I wrote from the same article for Examples Are Not General:
- A good number of Sonic the Hedgehog fanfics are this. There will usually be no robot-smashing action and the only major connection will be the cast of teenage Amazing Technicolor Funny Animals with distinct personalities that can fit them in every premise. Stories range from Sonic and company in Mundane settings and situations and Brought Down to Normal (High School AUs are the most common type) to them as supernatural creatures such as Vampires.
I still see general examples in the article. Are those kosher or not? Could these be moved to an analysis page?
Edited by PrincessPandaTropeopenSimilarly Named Works
While editing, have two films with the same name Seventeen Again and Seventeen Again_ (with a _ at the end of the web address). I'm just wondering if this is something I can correct myself or holler at a mod to fix.
Edited by MegaJopenThe Launch Pad Incident
Hey, so this is Kryppuk‘s older sister speaking.
I will be the one responding to this whole disaster on the Launch Pad page because I don’t want them to get even more upset over this than they already did. I don’t know much about how this page works and I don‘t know where a post like this would go nor do I know if the formatting will be functional, and I apologize if it‘s not.
But I feel like this is something that needs to be explained, so I‘m asking you to hear me out.
My sibling(who is not comfortable with their gender being revealed online, so I‘ll try to keep it neutral) loves analyzing fictional stories and characters and wants to become a writer themselves one day. They are shy and don’t share this passion with a lot of people. And they loved the articles on this page since they were a young teen because of how much of an in-depth look they provided. They looked up to you guys, they really didn‘t mean to mess things up or offend people.
It took them a lot of time and courage to finally write down one of their ideas and actually post it in here. Finally having something that’s ready to post meant a lot to them, they wanted to make sure it was done right, they even had me spellcheck it twice because they didn’t want there to be any errors.
And the text looked fine to me. I‘m not too familiar with this page aside from what they showed me, but I have played some of the games mentioned in the article, so I was able to understand what it was about. And get this: I told them to just post it and not be so nervous about it because surely, your first post ever doesn’t have to be perfect and people would understand that it’s the thought that counts because everything else can still be improved afterwards.
Needless to say, I regret giving them this sort of encouragement.
Cut to about an hour later and they’re a nervous wreck, panicking and trying to „fix“ their article, which just seemed to mess it up more. I know for a fact that the apostrophes did read properly on the original post, so they must have gotten corrupted in one of the following edits. There also seemed to be some interface issues (It may have had something to do with us using a tablet rather than a real computer.) where the text field was partially covered by parts of the page that just added to the stress. I barely managed to get them to let it go for the night.
I don‘t think anyone is really to blame on this one as there were several aspects factoring into it, but it was not pretty and it took such a toll on my sibling‘s mental well-being, they are now considering quitting the page altogether.
It’s true that the formatting of their post didn’t look very good on this page. It was fine in the original document they wrote it in, but evidently, it just didn’t translate well. The numbers for one were underneath each other, not besides each other. This didn’t look like it was going to be a problem in the initial posting interface, (which was incredibly narrow by the way, the scrolling for the final spellcheck was a pain) but well, turns out that it is.
But honestly, that’s an innocent mistake, isn’t it? They didn’t know what their text would look like on the actual page because they had never written an article for it. In fact, they knew this would likely be an issue and asked for help.
It’s not even like they just typed random stuff directly into the text field without double checking it, their only crime was that they weren’t sure how to use coding, which I‘m sure all of you were perfectly versed in the first time you posted anything on this page, but they weren’t.
They knew it wasn’t going to be perfect right away and wanted to improve in this regard, but that wasn’t their main point. They wanted to talk to people about this idea they had. They didn’t think the formatting would mean more to people than the actual content of the article and frankly, neither did I.
Turns out it apparently does. I wish I‘d be able to tell them that they just misinterpreted the situation, but no, it really looks like people legitimately weren’t even reading what they actually wrote, with one person telling them to „just tell them what the trope is about“ only to edit their comment admitting they hadn’t even read the part right towards the beginning of the post that literally consists of a numerical list of exactly that. I‘m sorry, poor formatting or not, that’s just plain rude. This kind of criticism is not helping anyone. Both I and my sibling know that not everybody acts like that and that these comments aren‘t personal attacks in any way nor were they the only factor in their panic attack yesterday, but that doesn‘t change what happened.
Now I don’t see myself in any position to judge the article the same way people on this page can, but I did notice that a lot of the examples my sibling gave are not found in the examples section on the „Hijacked by Ganon“ page, which people claimed it was too similar to despite my sibling‘s best efforts to differentiate the two. If their suggestion was redundant, then I would have expected the other page to have at least more than half of the same examples.
Now I don’t see myself in any position to judge the article the same way people on this page can, but I did notice that a lot of the examples my sibling gave are not found in the examples section on the „Hijacked by Ganon“ page, which people claimed it was too similar to despite my sibling‘s best efforts to differentiate the two. If their suggestion was redundant, then I would have expected the other page to have at least most of the same examples.
There are also some things that I just don’t understand, like how is Ganon being used in a page name fine while referencing Bowser is problematic and needs to be replaced with „Big Bad“? I personally don’t have much involvement with this page and don’t know the definition of a „Big Bad“, but I do know who Bowser is, as well as that he is a common culprit of the phenomenon my sibling was describing. If the goal is to make the title more understandable for outsiders, surely it would be more helpful to reference franchises most people are familiar with rather than the internal terminology of articles that people who aren’t active on this page haven’t read?
I would be interested in hearing the explanations behind those since my sibling can’t explain them to me, but that’s just my two cents on the situation.
And before anyone thinks I‘m just some entitled Karen wanting to speak to the manager, this is not about my sibling’s suggestion being rejected and I’m not looking to change the fact that it was. In fact, I don’t think they ever actually expected it to be accepted. They just wanted to write something into the forum to get in touch with people who seemingly shared their passion for fiction. Having people complain about their foreign quotation marks and having the names of bad writing tropes hurled at them on their very first post was not exactly what they planned.
I know some of you will say that they shouldn’t have written a page suggestion for that, and you may be right, but some people, like my sibling, have trouble making connections just for the sake of making connections. They do much better bonding with people over activities, like, let’s say, writing an article on a topic they’re passionate about, getting feedback on how to improve it and talking to people about the contents of the article.
I don‘t think they would have written a page suggestion if they knew of another place on the page to do this kind of stuff. Maybe that one suggestion in the comments about having a „beginner score“ that goes up when making approved additions to pages and allows them to legitimately suggest new pages (completely independent from just bouncing off ideas) only after they‘ve collected the experience to make them formally acceptable to the general public really would be worth looking into for the future.
„Just do it.“ is not a piece of advice my sibling is going to take from me again any time soon, even if the situation seems as harmless as making your first post on a page you really like. Which is a shame because in my opinion, that is something they should follow. They have many good ideas yet never make anything of them because they keep backing out. And now the one time they didn’t, it became an absolutely miserable experience for them.
I‘m sure they’ll get over it, they‘re just very anxious right now. They usually know better than to let stuff on the internet get to them, but this time, it was in a community they really looked up to and that they thought they might fit in with. They met their heroes and it was not in the way they had hoped for. This just went out of hand for them and they panicked, emotionally jumping to the conclusion that everyone hated them and their ideas.
This might be the last post written with this account, which is sad because it’s also one of the first, but in the end, it might be better this way. I know they said they wanted to fix their post, but I think it‘s best for them to not deal with anything right now. They‘re not fixing it not because they don‘t care or don‘t want to, but because they need to calm down and get their mind off of things. Don‘t worry, I don‘t think they‘ll actually quit the page entirely, they just need to take a break for a while.
I do apologize for ending on such a somber note. I‘m not exactly the linguistic talent in this family, I just think it’s important to communicate clearly. You‘re looked up to so much more than you know and I know how awkward this can be. Just keep up the good work.
Thank you for reading.
openTitle Question Western Animation
I was in the process of making a trope page for the Herself The Elf cartoon, but am unsure what to call it. Wikipedia lists it as The Magic of Herself the Elf or The Special Magic of Herself the Elf, the latter being its onscreen name, and while checking out its wicks other tropers listed it as just Herself the Elf, which was also the name of the toyline. Any ideas? I was thinking of just going with Herself the Elf since that's the general name of the franchise but am unsure. Thanks!
openYMMV page with many questionable tropes Live Action TV
I just read about the show Shortland Street and decided to look information up here, but when I saw the YMMV page there were many tropes that shouldn't be on that page.
Please look here for yourself: Shortland Street
I also want to know if anyone could clean it up, because I doubt I can do it since I just started with the show and don't know it all too well.
openI Liked It Better When It Sucked possible misuse
On the I Liked It Better When It Sucked page, there are a lot of entries that don't refer to So Bad, It's Good works, or are written in the context of people enjoying the original for unironic reasons. For instance, the entries about the merits of the original graphics for The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Conker's Bad Fur Day don't have anything to due with them being So Bad, It's Good, and while The Transformers is considered So Bad, It's Good, the entry has a lot of unneeded fluff that sounds like it's talking about actual merit. This goes against part of the page which says and I quote: "This is only for fans who honestly felt the original sucked So Bad, It's Good. If the fans didn't think the original sucked, or if they honestly liked features that were removed on their own merits — or if nostalgia means that they just hate change — then that belongs under They Changed It, Now It Sucks! and Nostalgia Filter instead." I would change it myself and I plan to, but first I thought that I should ask you guys first for approval because I feel like going and removing a bunch of entries at once would look bad on my part if I didn't get an ok. Also, am I clear to bold the page that clarifies that it only applies for works where the original work was So Bad, It's Good to reduce misuse?
openHumiliation Conga - Only For Villains?
Is Humiliation Conga only for villains? Because that's what the description seems to be. Tropes Are Flexible though, so I was wondering if it could be used for The Hero to give them sympathy.
Also, does the conga itself have to take place over a short period of time?
Edited by reppuzanopenIs there a process to remove video non-examples?
If a video posted on a page does not, in fact, represent the trope, is there a process for removal? I posted on the ongoing project thread, but it doesn't seem to see much activity. Plus video stuff requires mod involvement.
The video on Samus Is a Girl
It's not an example. At all.
The trope is "A character is shown to be a badass BEFORE being revealed as being female"
It's patently obvious that Eowyn is a woman before she unmasks. Doubly so in the movie proper where this is an established fact long before the depicted scene. The audience knows she's a girl. It's not even clear if the Witch King himself doesn't know she a female, since he most likely uses the term "man" as in the race of man. Not the gender.
Edited by GhilzopenFanfic/OneBigSmash-yFamily
One Big Smash-y Family is in dire need of assistance. There are ZCEs out the wazoo, nearly the entire page is spoiler tagged, and worst of all, that's not a custom title, it was actually created with a hyphen. I'd fix and transport it myself, but I plan on reading the fic and don't want to be spoiled. I'm also not sure if mods can actually cut hyphen pages or not.
openWhat counts as Happy Ending Override?
I made a Trope Finder thread
asking about a trope regarding the heroes earning their happy ending, only for some new threat to come along threatening to destroy everything they worked so hard for that they once again take up arms and combat it. partner555 suggested Happy Ending Override, to which I explained that was only for sequels where it happened inbetween instalments where the heroes fallied, and Tropers/{{4tell0life4}} doubled down on it being Happy Ending Override in conjunction with Immediate Sequel. Happy Ending Override describes itself as the following, emphasis mine:
My query is about works whose sequels, continuations, what-have-you start off in the peace the previous work ended at, and it is in this work that the new threat comes in and tries to ruin it. I feel there's some sort of miscommunication going on, and how both of them seem so sure it's Happy Ending Override makes me wonder how the trope is being used off-page.
Edited by Crossover-Enthusiast
Migrated to Chloe Jessica!
opensomething missing
this entry is from Transhuman Treachery:
- It happens regularly with Dead Apostles: no matter if they turn on their own with the use of magecraft or are turned by the bite of another Dead Apostle, a True Ancestor or even Brunestud of the Crimson Moon itself, by the time the process ends they see themselves as superior to humanity (or saw the Dead Apostle as superior even before, in the case of those who turned themselves) and have no problem at feeding on them. So far, there are only five Subversions: Zelretch, Merem Solomon and Satsuki were powerful enough to skip the usual long and torturing process and their personalities remained the same (even Merem Solomon's adoration of Brunestud fits in, as it was the only one to treat him as a person and turned him as an act of mercy, even giving him a few pointers to better live as a Dead Apostle), Gransurg Blackmoore was a human who had decided to serve Brunestud after being crushed by him in battle and turned himself because it would be more appropriate, and Enhance Defied this by willing himself into retaining most of his humanity before starting to hunt down the other Dead Apostles.
there's, uh, there's no work here. none of those potholes go to whatever work this is. this seems a grave oversight.
openReporting a troper
lugia1 is deleting a whole bunch of commented-out ZCEs with no edit reasons (see A Boy and His X and Abhorrent Admirer). They have also made some grammar and capitalization mistakes, as seen on Abandon Ship and the subpages of Get a Hold of Yourself, Man! (which I fixed). Requesting a revert on the removal of commented-out examples; they're left like that so people can add context, and deleting them is rather rude.
Edited by rjd1922openHe Also Did misuse
Tangentially related to MasterHero's ATT about Relationship Voice Actor, I've noticed an increasing number of Trivia/ pages that feature misuse of He Also Did. Per the page itself, "These are examples of well-known works (not obscure experiments) of creators that are so far out of their perceived niche that often times people don't immediately realize the person behind it." Things like Mel Brooks, the same guy who gave us The Producers, Blazing Saddles, and Young Frankenstein, also being the producer of The Elephant Man and The Fly (1986). Or iconic 20th century science fiction author Ray Bradbury working on the script for the John Huston film of Moby-Dick.
Thing is, I've seen a growing number of Trivia/ pages where He Also Did is essentially treated as a successor to Hey Its That Guy, sometimes for performers and sometimes for creators; in particular, I've seen multiple pages for television series where there are entries for seemingly everyone who wrote or directed an episode with the names of other series they've created or for which they've written or directed, almost all of which are in the same genre (for example, a page for a sitcom simply lists the other sitcoms for which the series' writers have written).
Should a cleanup thread be started to address this misuse? (It looks as though most of them were added by the same troper
, so sending a PM is presumably also in order.)
openVideos not showing?
According to recent videos, there's a video for Never Speak Ill of the Dead approved.
However there's no video on the trope page itself.
openFanFic/KyodainaSentaiManukeranger
So while I was indexing a different fic in Fanfics of the 2010s, I checked out Kyodaina Sentai Manukeranger because the work it was a fanfic of wasn't listed, and hoo boy...
- The namespace is miscapitalized
- There is no work summary, only "Needs Wiki Magic Love."
- What the fanfic is based off of isn't listed either
- The work link goes to some deviant art page for the fanfic and not the actual first chapter of the fic itself
- ZCEs out the wazoo
- A YMMV page with misused Ho Yay and a random out of place piece of trivia about the fanfic
Aaaaannnddd it was last edited two years ago. Help.
openMildly Concerning Attitude Anime
Joining Reaper recently edited the Isekai Quartet page. The edit reason they left is in relation to several weeks ago when an episode of the show came out and they insisted on adding a Early-Bird Cameo entry without confirmation from either Word of God or the show itself that it was the case.
The most recent episode confirmed they were right, but the edit entry they left read as follows: Oh, what's this? Did it turn out that it was Ristarte? Why, who could have told us so? Mayhaps, me', when I told you and you dismissed as speculation?!
This rubs me the wrong way and seems very aggressive. The reason we had the original entry hidden was because it wasn't confirmed.

I've seen some tropers send "Your English is poor" notifiers to me even though I'm fluent in English and tried to write the most grammatically I can. Is this because of the Grammar Nazi mindset they have? I've received these notifiers for AwesomeMusic.Nate Wants To Battle and AwesomeMusic.Club Penguin.
Edited by PrincessPandaTrope