[Snail]

So like I was thinking that we could add a little tropes page to the Wiki, similar in style to the FreeSpace Trivia page already there, that lists common storytelling techniques that FreeSpace campaigns use, with a list of examples from user-made campaigns. Ideally, the listing would include FreeSpace-related tropes that are more exclusive to FreeSpace campaigns, rather than general tropes, which already exist on TVTropes (for example, Wings of Dawn and Blue Planet already have pages on there).

To give a couple of examples, I was thinking of more specifically FreeSpace tropes such as "Third Shivan Incursion", "Return to Sol", "Welcome to the Boonies" (the Derelict scenario where the player is reassigned to a random backwater that quickly becomes important), "Home Ship" (eg. Galatea, Aquitaine), etc. rather than more general tropes such as "Big Bad" or "Cool Ship", though those could be listed on the Wiki as well.


I'm asking because of the subjective nature of what I'm proposing, and whether something like this really belongs on a primarily factual resource like the Wiki. There's a possibility of it degenerating into retarded ****-slinging, but I do think there's potential for a lot of fun observations on common FreeSpace storytelling techniques to be had here.

Anyway, opinions?

[General Battuta]

I'm all for it so long as we're allowed to delete anything that comes off as negative about any particular campaign. With the INF team in particular showing new life I don't want any 'hurr durr giant 40 polygon ships is a trope' crap.

[Snail]

I'm all for it so long as we're allowed to delete anything that comes off as negative about any particular campaign. With the INF team in particular showing new life I don't want any 'hurr durr giant 40 polygon ships is a trope' crap.

Definitely, I really don't want this to turn into an opportunity to bash people's mods, though I recognize that's a distinct possibility.

[General Battuta]

Good. We need more peace and love.

[Mongoose]

I'm calling in advance that "Drunk Wingmen"  has to get in there.

[TopAce]

I'm all for it so long as we're allowed to delete anything that comes off as negative about any particular campaign. With the INF team in particular showing new life I don't want any 'hurr durr giant 40 polygon ships is a trope' crap.

Why not include canon campaigns, then? We can certainly find an article worth of tropes. If campaign authors feel like, I have nothing against including their tropes in their campaign articles.

[NGTM-1R]

I find this concept worthy. How shall we proceed?

[Shade]

For the time being, at least, please do not add trope listings to the actual campaign articles. While the idea of listing tropes used in FreeSpace has merit, the wiki is not going to be turned into TVtropes Keep it compartmentalized into one or more stand alone trope pages, and link to those if need be.

[NGTM-1R]

I propose we describe and work on them here, and then start adding them to avoid insanity. This might require a sticky if we maintain the project.

Working on the ones already described, we end up with something like these?

Home Ship: The player is explicitly based off this ship and it plays a major role in the campaign, appearing in multiple missions. The ultimate example is probably the (crap I forgot the Homesick corvette's name) from Homesick. Blue Planet also presents a strong case, where the official campaigns use it in a relatively weaker way. Often there will also be a "Destruction of the Home Ship" mission somewhere in the campaign.

Third Shivan Incursion: FreeSpace 2 ended with the Shivans leaving. They have to come back if they're going to feature in a general sense, but this usually means a third full war against the Shivans in line with the two offical Main Campaigns.

Return to Sol: Exactly what it says, going back to Sol after it was cut off at the end of FS1.

Welcome to the Boonies: named for the Derelict mission of the same name, the campaign opens with the player being assigned to a backwater post that becomes important rapidly.

[Black Wolf]

I'd have no problem with this, personally - probably be quite fun - but I'd agree with Shade that it ought to be compartmentalized. Some ideas:
 - "Plucky Hero Ship" like the GTC Lonewolf,
 - "BoE Mission" for any mission where the player's actions have no consequences like High Noon (assuming you killed all 4 main beams ont he Sath) (Or maybe split it into BoE for big battles and maybe "Living Cutscene" or something for a High Noon-esque mission where the number of ships are small, but the outcome is fixed),
 - erm... some sort of cool name for missions like the Sixth wonder, where the Collossus comes in at the last moment to recuse you, and simultaneously show off how awesome it is. The same thing happens the first tiem you see the Solaris in WiH.
 - "Boss mission" - Something like Good Luck, Slaying Ravanna, the last mission of Silent Threat, that one in AoA where you have to kill the Sath (or the other where you have to kill the Lucy) - any mission where the objective is one big, red ship.

[Snail]

For the time being, at least, please do not add trope listings to the actual campaign articles. While the idea of listing tropes used in FreeSpace has merit, the wiki is not going to be turned into TVtropes Keep it compartmentalized into one or more stand alone trope pages, and link to those if need be.

The idea was to keep it all on one page, like the FS Trivia page.

[FreeSpaceFreak]

- erm... some sort of cool name for missions like the Sixth wonder, where the Collossus comes in at the last moment to recuse you, and simultaneously show off how awesome it is. The same thing happens the first tiem you see the Solaris in WiH.

It's called a "Deus Ex Machina"

[Mongoose]

No, silly, that's a campaign!

[esarai]

Well here's one that was brought o so subtly to the forefront by our beloved Axem's Just Another Day series:

Alpha One:  You've just lost half your armada in a surprise attack!  Enemy juggernauts the size of planets are closing in!  You're outnumbered 3 billion to one against!  It'd be better to just bury your head in the sand and take a planet-melting beam in the tush than to keep fighting.  But! all is not lost, for you still have the ultimate weapon, the unnamed, mute pilot known only as Alpha 1.  Somehow, any battle you drop this flaming heap of ass-kicking into turns in your favor.  No matter how dark the situation, no matter how bad the odds, remember:  always count on Alpha 1.

For the grand day-saving arrival of a massive ship:  Overkill Cavalry
You see that warship ruining the shiny paint on your station?  **** it.  **** it and every bomber, transport and chunk of debris near it.  You woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning, and by god they are going to frakking know it.  You're going to blow them all out of existence with the biggest ship you have, with the biggest guns you have, because that punk down there thinks he's all cool and **** messing up your plans and you're not gonna stand for it.  If only you could see the look on his face when in charges the Overkill Cavalry. 

For 'the boss mission':  David and Goliath
The enemy has just one-upped you in the ever-increasing gun-waving contest that is Overkill Cavalry.  So it's time to fall back to the basics.  They may have a scary-as-**** floating hand of death spewing neon-red doomsday beams that'd punch a hole down to the mantle, but you have a few wings of tiny bombers with enough firepower to make the Tsar Bomba look like a nice day at the park.  When you run out of big guns to wave in the enemy's face, it's time to ram fifty-odd world-shattering nukes up their tailpipe.  Send in Alpha One for good measure.

[NGTM-1R]

The Usual Suspect: Any enemy capital craft which the player is intended to treat as a major recurring antagonist. The Lucifer was used this way in FS1. The most one most likely to be remembered aside from that is Transcend's GTCv Generation, but Axem has built a couple of campaigns around this dynamic.

(Yes, I still remember, and actually liked, SoK.)

This One Is Special: A ship that has had its armament changed, special hitpoints activated, or armor tables used to make it much harder to kill or disarm than the standard. Commonly used in FS1 and Silent Threat, much less prevalent in FS2, and near-unknown in campaigns aside from Homesick and Blue Planet: War in Heaven.

[General Battuta]

- erm... some sort of cool name for missions like the Sixth wonder, where the Collossus comes in at the last moment to recuse you, and simultaneously show off how awesome it is. The same thing happens the first tiem you see the Solaris in WiH.

It's called a "Deus Ex Machina"

That's not what a Deus Ex Machina is at all. The Colossus was foreshadowed, for instance.

[Mars]

Cool ship.

Possibly mighty glacier.

[Mongoose]

Awesome, esarai.

[Lucika]

For the time being, at least, please do not add trope listings to the actual campaign articles. While the idea of listing tropes used in FreeSpace has merit, the wiki is not going to be turned into TVtropes Keep it compartmentalized into one or more stand alone trope pages, and link to those if need be.

Maybe a separate child board...?

[Shade]

No. If this grows to a point of needing a child board, then this doesn't belong on the wiki in the first place. And by extension, would not belong here either. Don't forget that this board is for discussing matters which relate to the wiki, not for posting random tropes just for the fun of it.