What are your most hated fanfic tropes

[Theman]

In honor of Uma Musume Pretty Derby.

You know what would be great, if a self insert or isekai. Decides to game the system and make money in a funny way/not efficient, and try to get into gambling the outcome of the shonen fights he ends up in. The high's the lows, he wins some, but because of the butterfly effect some fights end up changing things and he might get fucked after losing a bet when he put his mortgage on the line lol.

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[Buggybuggedout]

Something that makes me raise an eyebrow is when the protagonist (or self-insert) from the real world can kill so easily. It shouldn't just be the law stopping someone from killing — personal morality should matter too. I think they should at least show some kind of aversion to the act of killing at first, especially if they've never been in similar situations before or if there's nothing in the story to justify it.

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Probably because people just want to skip to the fantasy part immediately. And people usually complain about it if the character has a breakdown.

I think there are a fair amount of analogues for the whole "skip to fantasy" thing. I'm never able to get over how easily isekai protagonists take to breastfeeding.

Seriously its pretty weird if you stop to think about it, but do those considerations need to exist in power fantasy slop? Probably not.

 

[Marauder_Barriers]

This has probably been written before, but hey, this is a thread for trope that you hate.

1. Self-inserts. All of them. Every self-insert I have read has come off as far too detached to the world. They do not acclimate to the world but rather just chameleon their way into it.

Arrogant and barely conscious towards how people feel in the world that they self insert into. Every self-insert that I've read ironically fits with the personalities and mentalities of the Divine weapon heroes, save for the Shield hero, from Rising of the Shield hero.

I hate that they all just treat it all like a game. Min-maxing everything to the point that it's ridiculous. Really pulls you out of the immersion.

I seriously hate stories where it constantly reminds you that it's fanfiction rather than an actual story.

OCs tend to be better due to the fact that the characters do actually LIVE in their worlds.

How they look too. Brown/Black hair, Brown eyes, and an average face. They're just goddamn Japanese Isekai Protagonists.

2. God Protagonists.

What is the point? They're literal gods. The conflict is either just conflict with other gods and how many women they can bag.
(More to be added in the future.)

 

[Renko]

source: reddit

 

[Theman]

source: reddit

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I mean it depends those henchmen were killed in battle not executed. There is a difference between killing in battle or self defense, and killing somebody after they are defeated and not a physical threat right now.

 

[Fellwinter]

Something I forgot in my first rant. CYOA SI stories where the author picks a ridiculously weak power so that he can show how clever and resourceful he is. In other words, the SI can only win by appealing to and widespread use of bias and the ideotball.
Many annoying Worm CYOA SI games use this.

It also goes hand in hand with people who have no powers in a world of superpowers. I don't care who skilled your character is, how do you defeat a guy with super strength? Like the Badass Normal trope and Non-Powered Costumed Hero were too popular in 1990s anti-hero characters.

 

[Apollo_Man]

Something I forgot in my first rant. CYOA SI stories where the author picks a ridiculously weak power so that he can show how clever and resourceful he is. In other words, the SI can only win by appealing to and widespread use of bias and the ideotball.
Many annoying Worm CYOA SI games use this.

It also goes hand in hand with people who have no powers in a world of superpowers. I don't care who skilled your character is, how do you defeat a guy with super strength? Like the Badass Normal trope and Non-Powered Costumed Hero were too popular in 1990s anti-hero characters.

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Exactly. Like, bro. All of those stories involves Self-Insert (as in, the author THEMSELVES) getting yoinked into the world of Worm/MU/DCU/RWBY/MHA/etc. with either weak powers or none at all. All because they believe themselves as fucking Batman or something, and wants everyone to know they're like him.

Like, excuse me? That's the most dumbest and arrogant shit they can ever mustered. So much so that whenever I came across those kinds of stories or anything similar, I'll be slamming my face against the wall faster than Usain Bolt can outrun a large crowd of people at the time.

What is a krav maga master to a man who can outrun a speeding bullet? What is a woman whose power allows her to see sound to an immortal with claws sticking out of his knuckles? How can a boy who possess nothing but his faith in himself go up against an old man who can control the sky?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

In settings with no superpower, I can see the possibility of an underdog toppling down the strongest but in those with superpower? Bah! Nothing more than a pipe dream, as painful as that sounds.

If I were them, I would make sure to get myself the most OP powers as much as possible just so I can survive being nuked to the fast by the Golden Bitch's stilling blast or even getting my shit shanked by Jeff the Killer.

 

[Nitramy]

Exactly. Like, bro. All of those stories involves Self-Insert (as in, the author THEMSELVES) getting yoinked into the world of Worm/MU/DCU/RWBY/MHA/etc. with either weak powers or none at all. All because they believe themselves as fucking Batman or something, and wants everyone to know they're like him.

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Something I forgot in my first rant. CYOA SI stories where the author picks a ridiculously weak power so that he can show how clever and resourceful he is. In other words, the SI can only win by appealing to and widespread use of bias and the ideotball.
Many annoying Worm CYOA SI games use this.

It also goes hand in hand with people who have no powers in a world of superpowers. I don't care who skilled your character is, how do you defeat a guy with super strength? Like the Badass Normal trope and Non-Powered Costumed Hero were too popular in 1990s anti-hero characters.

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No powers = you're neither Batman nor the Punisher
Weak powers = you're not in Jojo's Bizarre Adventure

My take on this is that you have to learn how to write escalation properly, so your character learns novel and creative ways to use their weak power so they can roll with the heavyweights. Also, if played right, an unpowered hero is basically a game breaker in Worm because they're unaffected by Broadcast. (Also applies somewhat to Jojo since Hamon and the mechanic that manifests Stands are out of shard purview.)

 

[TheMidnightRook]

Something I forgot in my first rant. CYOA SI stories where the author picks a ridiculously weak power so that he can show how clever and resourceful he is. In other words, the SI can only win by appealing to and widespread use of bias and the ideotball.

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It's not just CYOA SI stories, a lot of the "I got exiled from the hero party for being underpowered" manga/LN/anime have MCs who are only seen as underpowered because everybody else in the setting is cursed to have their IQ drop to somewhere below their shoe size when it comes to the MCs abilities

 

[Laath-]

I fucking hate bashing.

If you don't like a character make it a goddam villain or something instead of writting a whole paragraph about the MC berating x character for their shortcomings while the bashed just takes it.

I don't bother with a fic when "bashing" is tag

 

[Bear_Mint]

What is a krav maga master to a man who can outrun a speeding bullet?

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I roll my eyes whenever the SI claims to know martial arts.

It's not just CYOA SI stories, a lot of the "I got exiled from the hero party for being underpowered" manga/LN/anime have MCs who are only seen as underpowered because everybody else in the setting is cursed to have their IQ drop to somewhere below their shoe size when it comes to the MCs abilities

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Banished/oppressed because the MC owning a "weak/useless" power bends itself backward to justify its premise.

I don't bother with a fic when "bashing" is tag

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It's worse when they don't even include the tag.

 

[Apollo_Man]

Banished/oppressed because the MC owning a "weak/useless" power bends itself backward to justify its premise.

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Bet the reason why this kind of stories exist is probably the authors' way of trying to make up for something they lack of.

I'm getting tired of this thing, man. Why can't we have some original shits? Why not, instead of them being kicked out of the group for being weak/useless, it is due to them too overpowered.

That would make a good exploration!

 

[Cultured Priest]

Bet the reason why this kind of stories exist is probably the authors' way of trying to make up for something they lack of.

I'm getting tired of this thing, man. Why can't we have some original shits? Why not, instead of them being kicked out of the group for being weak/useless, it is due to them too overpowered.

That would make a good exploration!

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Ngl I have the habit of reading some jp webnovels on syosetsu and this is definitely the only trope I haven't seen something that is decent. All novels that use this premise are total garbage. It's always the same crap, MC is super OP and gets kicked out of party/guild/group for the most shitty reason ever. I wonder if it is that hard to do a plausible motive for the MC to get kicked even though he is useful. Or make them not crawl back to him saying they didn't know he was vital to their group.

Don't get me wrong, I like revenge novels and alike.

 

[Tera Forma]

Something that makes me raise an eyebrow is when the protagonist (or self-insert) from the real world can kill so easily. It shouldn't just be the law stopping someone from killing — personal morality should matter too. I think they should at least show some kind of aversion to the act of killing at first, especially if they've never been in similar situations before or if there's nothing in the story to justify it.

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If you think that personal morality is a factor here, then I really envy you. The only thing that stops people from killing other people is the fear of being held responsible for it or the fear of receiving a special condemnation.
The most difficult and shitty murder is if you kill someone close. But a stranger? Well, how much do you care about the death of strangers personally? For example, can you laugh knowing that somewhere someone got into an accident, or something like that?
Do you think about it? If you have constant depression, then you will not be able to kill.
And if you know that other people want to kill you, then you will not even have thoughts about holding back against them or regretting their death.

 

[humon]

I wonder if it is that hard to do a plausible motive for the MC to get kicked even though he is useful.

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The reason that comes to mind off the top of my head is that the MC is inexperienced and not ready for real combat. The group would relegate him to a B-squad acting in support, because they don't want him to go out there underpowered and just get killed. But they still want him to come up and join the A-squad when he's ready for it... after he's trained some more and improved not just his abilities, but also his awareness, reflexes, and tactical decision-making (so that when shit hits the fan, he already knows what to do, instead of panicking and fumbling like someone is likely to do in his first ever fight).

Take, for example, an NHL team where they just drafted a 19-year-old kid over the summer who's got some real talent. They're not going to put him on the ice straight away because he can still play in the under-20 league for another season and develop his skills and muscle mass while he's down there. If the kid's not ready for the major league, there's no sense having him skate around and get smashed against the boards all game by guys in their 30s who are 50 pounds heavier than him. It's just going to ruin his confidence and get him injured. Maybe he'll play a handful of regular season games just to get a taste for it, while the team's enforcers are protecting him, and the rest of the season he spends with his team in the junior league, or down in the minor league farm team.


Another reason to kick a talented hero out of a group is if he's arrogant. There are certain personality types that are a net negative to any team, even if their own personal skills are very strong, and when you identify someone like that, if he's not willing to subordinate himself to the team, then he has to go. Those types of characters usually turn into villains, but a heel-face turn is always possible of the leader of the group can knock some sense into him and make him understand his place. Then he can be welcomed back in, after him and the group leader have worked their shit out (think of Cyclops and Wolverine, for instance).

Well, how much do you care about the death of strangers personally?

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There are two things that need to be separated here: Concern for the lives of others, and concern for the violation of moral norms. There are billions of people in the world that I don't know and don't care what happens to, but if I'm put in a position to start killing them, I will refuse to do it (barring self-defence, or a war scenario where I have no choice). Why would I refuse? I don't know them and I don't care about them. I would refuse because I don't want to become a killer. It's not about them, it's about me, about the kind of person I want to be, and about what the world turns into when ordinary men become killers. Because as the saying goes, those who live by the sword die by the sword. Things can get very dark in a hurry if we all decide to abandon our common respect for human life (Rwanda comes to mind).

Of course, some people are born without any respect for human life, we call them psychopaths, and so it's not unreasonable that an isekai protagonist could go from zero to six million in the span of a few pages, if he's that sort of person. But then, he shouldn't be considered a heroic character by any means. He might be an anti-hero, the kind of guy society treats as a weapon and wants to make sure he's always pointed in the right direction, at the enemy and not internally. This was a logic of the Crusades: The pope said, "You crazy bloodthirsty knights! Stop killing your fellow Christians! There's all this land in the middle east that is full of Muslims you can kill instead!"

I also mentioned some exceptions, like if it's a war, or self-defence. If it's a choice between killing the enemy or they kill you, then the logical choice is obvious. A lot of people will still feel conflicted about it--there's a deep instinct in most people not to become a killer, for the reasons I mentioned above--but others will rightly understand that such moral conflict or hesitation is only going to get them and their buddies killed, and so they suppress these thoughts and do what they have to do, as a matter of duty or whatever else. And a few of them will even enjoy it (psychopathy is more common than chance within a population for a good reason).

To elaborate a bit more, there is the old Solzhenitsyn quote:

"The most terrifying force of death, comes from the hands of men who wanted to be left alone. They try, so very hard, to mind their own business and provide for themselves and those they love. They resist every impulse to fight back, knowing the forced and permanent change of life that will come from it. They know, that the moment they fight back, their lives as they have lived them, are over.

The moment the men who wanted to be left alone are forced to fight back, it is a form of suicide. They are literally killing off who they used to be. Which is why, when forced to take up violence, these men who wanted to be left alone, fight with unholy vengeance against those who murdered their former lives. They fight with raw hate, and a drive that cannot be fathomed by those who are merely play-acting at politics and terror. TRUE TERROR will arrive at these people's door, and they will cry, scream and beg for mercy… but it will fall upon the deaf ears of the men who just wanted to be left alone."

That a man would resist killing until forced to because he knows that it will turn him into something he can't go back from... I think that's the essence of why most people feel sick at the prospect of killing someone.

 

[Stanley_Jeb]

I wonder if it is that hard to do a plausible motive for the MC to get kicked even though he is useful.

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I'm reminded of a manga, I think it was "becoming the best alchemy dungeon master" or some nonsense, not important, but it's about this once-in-a-generation genius alchemist who gets kicked out of the party and replaced by another alchemist the hero likes more. He then rescues what he thinks to be an elven girl who turns out to be a dungeon spirit. They hook up, he starts up a dungeon, you know the drill, and he kills the first adventuring group because if he doesn't they'd have destroyed the dungeon core and killed him, so self-defense.

On the flipside, everything goes wrong for the hero. He needed a specific potion to activate his special skill, and only the MC could brew it. Apparently. Somehow. It actually breaks the established lore a couple chapters later, but it's betrayal slop, go figure it's not consistent. Things go wrong, tempers flare, and then he kicks out another member after an injury as the rest of the party slowly turns on him, and he gets told by the king's alchemist who happened to be the same creepy dude who originally recommended the MC that he'll lose his hero status to the next guy in line if he doesn't destroy the dungeon which the MC coincidentally inherited. Said next guy in line apparently has some kinda instant-kill skill that can kill every living thing in a single blow, so the pressure to perform's on.

The healer also leaves and finds the alchemist in his dungeon, begs him to come back, he says he won't, and she then proceeds to burn all the bridges with the original hero. Said hero then goes into the dungeon and finds the MC's "daughter", some kinda weird vampire monster he summoned. And upon seeing the boost potion she's got, he realizes why she seems so familiar, since she has the same look the MC's got in her eyes.

Now, why do I bring this up? Because we're now shifting to the hero's perspective, and we come to realize why he kicked the MC out: The MC's a sociopath. That's why the eyes of a vampire, a literal predatory monster, remind him of the MC. The hero's part in the creation of the improved formula the MC had been using was in part as a guinea pig, and the rest of the party wasn't far behind when it came to untested drug trials like that. The MC never cared about saving the world in the same way the hero did, he just wanted test subjects who'd be willing to take any risk to save the world, even if it means potentially dying to side-effects of cheap substitute ingrediends in unproven potions.
That's also why he, unlike the healer, isn't surprised at all that the MC now works for a dungeon: He never cared about humanity to begin with, so why wouldn't he be working for one of humanity's biggest threats? He kicked the MC out because ultimately he didn't fit into the party, not because he wasn't powerful, but because he was mentally and morally not hero-party material.
What caused his downward spiral was that he miscalculated: The healer? The replacement hero? The new alchemist? The injured fighter? None of them ever cared about fighting for humanity. It was always about the glory, the replacement hero admits to it when he and the new alchemist team up to betray him for not "looking enough like a hero", the same reason for which the healer is mad at him. It's why the moment things turned sour, the healer dipped and the new alchemist betrayed him. Only the tank of the original party still works for him and tries to stop the new hero party from killing the alchemist. He fights the replacement hero, gets hit with the instant kill-spell, and doesn't die. Why? Because on his way, he met the MC, someone who the tank, being like one of two decent people in the whole shitshow, still trusted the MC, and the MC gave him a potion which prevented the effect... Except, no, he didn't. Again, the MC does not care for anything but his experiments, so how did he stop the instant-kill move? By poisoning the tank and reanimating him with a lich monster from the dungeon. And that makes sense, because we now know, from the hero's perspective, that the MC is a sociopath who'd think nothing about killing someone who trusts him for an advantage in a coming fight.


All of this makes sense, no? Except for something I omitted... Y'see, the writer couldn't bring himself to make the MC actually evil, so it was just totally a misunderstanding from the hero's side and the MC's only ruthless because of "dungeon corruption", honest!
... Needless to say, I am... Quite disappointed, but all this is to say that it's hardly impossible to have a plausible motive, it's just that the writers are too chickenshit to actually pull through with it.

 

[Apollo_Man]

That a man would resist killing until forced to because he knows that it will turn him into something he can't go back from... I think that's the essence of why most people feel sick at the prospect of killing someone.

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This sums up the whole reason as to why the Air Nomads from A:TLA chose to be pacifists in the first place. Because the last time one of them ever go demon mode, it led to the great emergence of TOO MANY DARK SPIRITS by the time Avatar Kuruk came into picture.

Like, this all began when Yangchen's beloved air bison got his life privilege tragically revoked by a combustion-bending asshole named Raitei. She wasn't the same girl as before from that point on, and her inventing the sonic scream technique in a fit of anger solidified that.

The worse part is, that wasn't even the last time an Air Nomad went sicko mode. Remember that one scene where the Gaang stumbled upon a room containing what remained of Gyatso....amongst the sea of corpses belonging to the Fire Nation troopers?

 

[humon]

I'm not familiar with that show, I never watched it, so I don't get any of the references. But the simple logic is that if one guy can kill his way to power, then anyone can. And that means nobody is ever safe. It just becomes a game of who can kill whom first, until there's nobody left. Life becomes nasty, brutish, and short. That doesn't mean people should be pacifists, but it does explain why people would be reluctant to resort to violence, because it's like going all-in on a poker hand. And it's why we construct laws and tell ourselves stories about the legitimacy of ruling dynasties or certain forms of government, in order to guard against this sort of collapse into the chaos of all against all. It also explains why a man would sacrifice his own life for his king, someone he's not related to by blood, because that king represents a regime of peace and stability where the man's children and grandchildren can live and be happy. And the alternative is an uncertain future where those children and grandchildren might one day be arbitrarily massacred by a some invading army, local warlord, or violent mob (something like what Russel Crowe said to Marcus Aurelius in Gladiator, that he has seen the world, it is a cold dark place, and Rome is the light).


The other story above sounds like:
> Young man is kicked out of the village because he's an asshole
> Burns down the village to feel its warmth
> Insists he isn't an asshole

Well, it's a valid critique that the writer wasn't honest that his MC is an asshole. But I think a bigger critique was why the writer would identify with an asshole MC in the first place. Was he a self-insert?

It's an understandable thing if so. Hurt people hurt people. A lot of guys get kicked around by life and then write fantasies about what they'd do with power if they ever got it. The story then confirms why it's a good thing the writer doesn't have any power. But it would have been a lot better if these guys had never been kicked around by life in the first place, or if they'd had a positive role model to help them get back on their feet after each kicking.

 

[Nitramy]

I fucking hate bashing.

If you don't like a character make it a goddam villain or something instead of writting a whole paragraph about the MC berating x character for their shortcomings while the bashed just takes it.

I don't bother with a fic when "bashing" is tag

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My take on bashing is that you have to make it make sense in-universe. For example, if I wrote a Naruto x The Naked Gun fanfic, and cast Kakashi as Nordberg, all Kakashi's ridiculous injuries in the fanfic would make sense... because he's playing Nordberg.

 

[Fellwinter]

If you think that personal morality is a factor here, then I really envy you. The only thing that stops people from killing other people is the fear of being held responsible for it or the fear of receiving special condemnation.
The most difficult and shitty murder is if you kill someone close. But a stranger? Well, how much do you care about the death of strangers personally? For example, can you laugh knowing that somewhere someone got into an accident, or something like that?
Do you think about it? If you have constant depression, then you will not be able to kill.
And if you know that other people want to kill you, then you will not even have thoughts about holding back against them or regretting their death.

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It's one thing not to care about strangers. People do that all the time. It's a completely different beast to personally kill anyone.

Even if you can do that it still fucks you up inside. Se a fuckton of psychology studies about killing.

 

[Stanley_Jeb]

But it would have been a lot better if these guys had never been kicked around by life in the first place, or if they'd had a positive role model to help them get back on their feet after each kicking.

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Yeah, but that's require empathy for people down on their luck. You don't have to go much further than a local park to see a good bit of proof as to why that's not true. I'd say you'd see 'em lying on a park bench, but we are so lacking in empathy that we pay to put spikes on those just to make said people's lives that little bit more miserable.

 

[Karmic Acumen]

I'd say you'd see 'em lying on a park bench, but we are so lacking in empathy that we pay to put spikes on those just to make said people's lives that little bit more miserable.

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No, 'we' did none of that. Some asshole in the public spaces authority or whatever it's called ordered that done, because he decided it was the best way to comply with the mayor office's 'make the city look less like a third world country' directive.

This idea that we should take blame for every bad we know is happening in the world is complete pants on head retarded bullshit that none of us think naturally, it was browbeat into us by moral busybodies who regularly turn out to be hypocrites and degenerates.

You can put that on the list of hated fanfic tropes, but I disdain it everywhere else I encounter it too.

 

[Stanley_Jeb]

No, 'we' did none of that.

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Ah, fair, I guess it depends on the place you live in. My home country tends to make a whole deal about voting those kinda guys in, so this obviously doesn't apply when you don't have control over the matter. I may have overgeneralized there.

This idea that we should take blame for every bad we know is happening in the world is complete pants on head retarded bullshit that none of us think naturally, it was browbeat into us by moral busybodies who regularly turn out to be hypocrites and degenerates.

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Eh, Peter Singer's thesis on the matter does kinda make sense. Provided you're willing to argue that inaction/choosing not to do something can have ethical implications, anyhow. If you don't, I think that's just such a fundamental difference between my view point and yours (not incorrect, I don't want to be implying that, just different) that we're gonna have to agree to disagree on it.

 

[Karmic Acumen]

Ah, fair, I guess it depends on the place you live in. My home country tends to make a whole deal about voting those kinda guys in, so this obviously doesn't apply when you don't have control over the matter. I may have overgeneralized there.

Eh, Peter Singer's thesis on the matter does kinda make sense. Provided you're willing to argue that inaction/choosing not to do something can have ethical implications, anyhow. If you don't, I think that's just such a fundamental difference between my view point and yours (not incorrect, I don't want to be implying that, just different) that we're gonna have to agree to disagree on it.

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Goal shifting, typical.

 

[Stanley_Jeb]

Goal shifting, typical.

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Elaborate?

 

[Karmic Acumen]

Elaborate?

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No, you know exactly what you did.

 

[Megaolix]

Yeah, but that's require empathy for people down on their luck. You don't have to go much further than a local park to see a good bit of proof as to why that's not true. I'd say you'd see 'em lying on a park bench, but we are so lacking in empathy that we pay to put spikes on those just to make said people's lives that little bit more miserable.

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Jeb... Are you baiting about RL again? Really?

Kindly don't derail threads to go into those topics and I won't have to bring out my hammer.

 

[Nitramy]

You can put that on the list of hated fanfic tropes, but I disdain it everywhere else I encounter it too.

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Another fanfic pet peeve: why aren't we allowed to retaliate, even fictionally, against these omnipotent moral busybodies? Too much 'if you kill them you will be like them' copium?

 

[humon]

It probably comes from 2000 years of Christianity imprinting itself on the western English-speaking mind. The fundamental story was that when the Romans came for Jesus in the garden, Peter wanted to fight back, and Jesus said no, we're not doing that. Get behind me, Satan. They killed him and that normally would have been the end of it, but then 400 years later this guy wins in the end. It's a bit of a mystery how that happened, but I hesitate to knock it if it worked. So now, people whose ancestors grew up with that as the center of their culture are inclined to resist fighting back against anyone, even when it would be justified. But they don't really understand why they think that way, so the articulated justifications can be very poor.

It aligns with the Norse proverb, "Wrestle with a pig and you come away with its stink", that it doesn't matter if you were right all along, other people just see two guys fighting and shrug their shoulders.

But it also contradicts, "The winners write the history books", which would suggest that if you are going to fight, you'd better win. If you fight and lose, the fact that you fought will be used as evidence for why you deserve everything that your enemy does to you.

The philosophical problem, then, is if all that matters is winning, and not everyone is going to win, that means most of us are doomed to be losers or cattle, in such a world. So believing that there is a way to win without fighting is very appealing in contrast.

 

[hrepdrep]

But it also contradicts, "The winners write the history books", which would suggest that if you are going to fight, you'd better win. If you fight and lose, the fact that you fought will be used as evidence for why you deserve everything that your enemy does to you.

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"Winners write the history books" is bullshit that has been repeatedly proven wrong with a whole host of examples to the contrary.