What Tropes Does Your Tale Lean On?

SoFt 2017-12-27 18:07:23 UTC #1

Tropes. We love 'em. We hate 'em. We sometimes try to avoid 'em, but must accept that there's no such thing as a Tropeless Tale. While I imagine few would admit to building a story atop a well-worn trope deliberately, it is inevitable that some old storytelling conventions will creep in as we write.

So, I'm curious: what tropes does your tale lean on? (And that's a Title Drop xD .) List a few of the ones you find most prominent in your story/stories and drop in a sentence or two about the forms they take therein. Feel free to leave a link!

(For those not familiar with TV Tropes, browse at your own risk =P .)

For Sanguine:

Our Vampires Are Different: They mostly call themselves blackbloods, for one, and they have most of the oldest strengths of vampires with few, if any, of the weaknesses. Also, they rule the world outright.
The Vamp/Femme Fatale: Without saying too much, both Mistress Herabella and her human pet Cat exhibit shades of these tropes in different ways.
Masquerade: Referenced by name in-story, but thus far subverted; it's not yet explicit what blackbloods are hiding or from whom they're hiding it, but they are all obligated to participate.
Shape Shifter Showdown: Referred to as "Merlin's Gambit," it is a common game among blackbloods. Most play it something like Rock-Paper-Scissors, but there are those who delight in actually doing battle as they shift through various forms.

I think four is enough for one post. Anyone else =D ?

UbePie 2017-12-27 18:22:41 UTC #2

9- Circles has some tropes that show up, some on purpose some i just fall into.

Super Soilder: Excuse me but I am a huge Captain America Fan, and so the trope of "Super Soilder' shows up in my story. My main character Dante has super strenght, healing factor and so on. The thing is, he's not a soilder. Not in the sense that Captain America is, but he does use his strenght to do what he believes is right, and he was expermented on by a facility .

Damsel in distress: Though the damsel is a male character and he won't always be in distress, i have falling into this troop. But rather than Virgil (my damsel) being in distress because of weakness he is usually reluctant to use his powers, and has suffered to an extent that he does not wish to cause others pain.

FlashBacks: Everyone hates flashback, but my whole story is built on flashbacks. And just to annoy people more, my flashback are not in chronological order, and just add to the over all confusing mystery of the plot line. I have people actively misinterpret flashback and I do not correct them because they'll have it spoiled soon enough when all becomes clear.

spadesart 2017-12-27 18:30:36 UTC #3

haha i have a comic about vampires too actually

Our Vampires Are Different - where do i even start ? they're not a very old species at all (the oldest vamp is mid-700's) and the situation around turning is viral rather than curse related, they inject the venom that turns people out of the bottom set of fangs, and something that was mixed into the source serum that started it all causes them to have wild hair color changes (one unusual color and then to white)
Immortality Hurts - the ones that accepted the spire mission don't think being turned into a killing machine is a good bargain for living forever
Friendly Neighborhood Vampire - william and alphonzo
Hidden Villain - very literal, we've technically already seen them though
Killer Robot - since they can't be turned, fed off of or affected by hypnosis, humans began producing robots that can hunt vampires in their stead (though non-robotic hunters still have some business)
Good Old Robot - cog
Ambiguous Time Period and Anachronism Stew - spire's world is kind of a hell conglomeration of steampunk/victorian and sci-fi elements (i'd like to think their modern world evolved from a previously high fantasy era)

DiegoPalacios 2017-12-27 18:35:29 UTC #4

Hi ScorpiusNox!

I watch TV Tropes too, i learned a lot from that page.

For Rocky the rock:

-Companion cube: Rocky, the main character is a rock... an actual inanimate rock. He is a companion cube for everyone.

-Parody Sue: Rocky is this. Everyone, except for one character treats Rocky like the biggest hero ever and villains are defeated in spectacular ways by Rocky.

-The chosen one: Rocky, again. He is fated to save the world. Still is not clear how he will save it, but the villains see him as the biggest treat to their plans.

SoFt 2017-12-27 18:40:45 UTC #5

Oh god. I had to add that one to my library xD . Gettin' some good laughs out of it so far. The tone and the narrative style kinda remind me of Captain Underpants.

Y'all got some neat stuff. Keep 'em comin'!

storytimebiondi 2017-12-27 18:56:26 UTC #6

In my current project, I've intentionally added a few, but I'm sure there are others that have snuck in.

Girl in another world: The main hero(ine) is a troubled young lady who finds herself someplace she doesn't expect.

Handsome Prince: This is one I want to subvert. The handsome prince who comes to the rescue. In this case he has ideas of his own.

The Monster Hunter: Well, I included this one because I love the game Monster Hunter, so naturally a few characters were inspired by that.

I know there are others, but I can't think of them at the moment. It's a fantasy tale after-all. Those are rife with tropes.

Im_moron 2017-12-27 19:06:12 UTC #7

(I'm too lazy to look it up)

Chosen one vs the great evil
Prophecy (those two are practically running themes)

Video game world (but not aware of them being in a video game, seeing numbers and stats is practically normal in world)

dawgofdawgness 2017-12-27 19:28:16 UTC #8

Azzi:
Nobody Loves the Bassist
Hates Being Alone
Hates Being Touched
Tsundere (hahahahhahaha)

Francie:
Cannot Keep a Secret
The Ditz
No Listening Skills
Pride

Renee:
No Sense of Humor
The Quiet One

Anton:
Secretly Selfish
Captain Obvious
Believing Their Own Lies

Frances' dad:
"Well Done, Son!" Guy

375 2017-12-27 19:32:55 UTC #9

Haha here's some tropes I used for What is The Price of Freedom!

Nothing is Scarier: You see The Other Me walking, talking, promoting death but you dont know why its there or how it got there or the origin of it. You just know that its there. Always watching. Always waiting.

Through The Eyes of Madness: Hopefully this isnt giving any spoilers but obviously Ratana isnt all there. She sees another version of herself all the time and is being framed for murder by some brat. However, whats not to say that she really is a murderer? There's not proof of anything of whether she is or isnt.

Go Mad from the Isolation: You see Ratana within an empty room with butterflies. There's even a scene where there's a dead body off to the side. She often believes that she is still in that very same room, by herself.

Samuraiflame 2017-12-27 20:02:42 UTC #10

I love tropes. I definitely made my comic to cover a bunch of the tropes I really enjoy. I don't give a what.

Pretty Princess Powerhouse
Celeste is always ready to scrap.

Cast Full of Pretty Boys
Bishonen for days.

Wholesome Crossdresser
Somewhere in the first volume.

Tournament Arc
Half of Volume 2 is dedicated to this haha.

SoFt 2017-12-27 20:23:49 UTC #11

Heh heh. Mad respect xD .

agentfink 2017-12-27 20:55:29 UTC #12

Nothing Exciting Ever Happens Here
"Where is the most dangerous place on the planet to live? Not the city where something exciting is always happening. Not Mordor. Not a Haunted Headquarters. Not the crime-ridden big city. Not even Tokyo. The most dangerous place to live is the small, quiet, unknown town where "nothing exciting ever happens."

Jurisdiction Friction
"-local cops vs. the Federal government (FBI, DEA, etc) is the most common setup."

With a Friend and a Stranger
"The third character will be a stranger to the protagonist and his friend. His or her appearance will often serve to drive the plot, and his unfamiliarity with the characters and location helps justify Exposition."

That was fun!

punkarsenic 2017-12-27 21:49:50 UTC #13

ah feck, i do not have time to scroll through all of tv tropes' tropes, so im gonna list the ones off my head

the chosen one - both my MCs are maybe possibly kinda implied to be chosen ones, and balor particularly has a lot of noise around her from people thinking shes special in some way. the plan is to subvert that trope, which is integral to the plot bc like, hey, its irish mythology. chosen ones abound.

star crossed lovers - cath and balor are from peoples that have been at war for at least 700 years. so like. lol

intrigued by humanity is totally there too. both balor and cath are really intrigued by eachother and eachother's culture.

DiegoPalacios 2017-12-27 21:50:10 UTC #14

About flashbacks: the problem are not the flashbacks themselves. The problem is when flashbacks interrupt an exciting moment like a fight or when it interrupt the flow of the story instead of helping it.
"Is time to have our final showdown lord destructicon, but first i will remember my childhood".

Is more about the timing where flashbacks are used. Flashbacks are cool, they can enrich a story as long as it doesn't interrupt it.

indagold 2017-12-27 23:19:34 UTC #15

I have a lot of tropes in my work:

One Hit Kill/Accidental Murder
Main character can destroy things almost immediately by accident.
Extreme Doormat
Protag also is very passive and weak willed, leading to more bad than good.
Big Bad Friend
Early on he thought the friends he could trust turn out to be monsters.
Religion Is Magic
The main faith of the loras in this world is also linked with their magic
Affably Evil
Most of the evil characters in this world are pretty good natured and charming.

N1ghtm4r3 2017-12-28 00:01:36 UTC #16

i have a decent list of tropes i use in my comic world

super soldier
descibes all my main hero characters
flash backs
used mainly for some world building and some tidbits of information that have repercussions in the main story
great evil
the main villain

there are others but i can't think of others right now

Evan 2017-12-28 00:10:55 UTC #17

My comic is not strictly story based, but I still have a good number of tropes in them:

Running gag - Jetpack powered by Apathy (now exclusive to holiday specials).

Breaking the Fourth Wall - I did a whole story arc on it, here's the start:

Planet of Steves - Quite fitting since all nonessential characters are named Steve or Alice.

Inexplicably Identical Individuals - Speaking of which, all non-main characters look the same.

Reused Character Design - It's actually quite painfully obvious how similar all my characters look and I do it on purpose. On the upside, there are only 4 main characters: one's a cat, one has horns, one has glasses, and the last one has nothing special, so there's not really a problem.
Here's the best panel with all of them I could find:

Zaboem 2017-12-28 03:17:16 UTC #18

Let's see if I can label properly. The MC of my novella is Candide, lifted straight out of the classic novel of the same name. In the classic Candide written by Voltaire, the title character was perhaps the greatest buttmonkey trope of all literature, and I tried to preserve as much of that as I could, but his primary trope is being a Marty Stu because that is why he was selected by the aliens. The aliens themselves (who are all Ancient Aliens) have relationships with each other which varies from friendly rival to frenemy. They use a lot of Indearing Insults to describe each other. There are many more tropes in play, but I simply do not know the names of those tropes.

SoFt 2017-12-28 03:34:21 UTC #19

-slow clap-

Well done, good sir. Well done indeed!

Zaboem 2017-12-28 03:37:35 UTC #20

Are you a fan of Voltaire?