Trollpasta Wiki:Trollpasta Clichés: Difference between revisions

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{{title3|Trollpasta Clichés}}
Hello, new user. As you probably know, trollpasta is meant to be a parody of scary stories. However, lately a few of the other admins and I have noticed that some people don't seem to quite grasp that concept. Most of the time this is because these new users fail to avoid a bunch of painfully overused '''clichés''' which pretty much kill any potential funniness your story may have. Having one or two of these things in your pasta isn't that bad, it depends on how you use them and your pasta won't be deleted just because it has a cliché in it, but if your story incorporates many, it is likely of poor quality. '''Do not rely on nothing else but clichés for comedic value.'''
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Just because this is trollpasta doesn't mean that you can automatically make your story funny or a good parody/satire by making it incredibly bad and hard to read.  Nor does it mean it is impossible to have clichés in Trollpasta. Remember that trollpastas, regardless of how terrible they may be, still must have the basic elements of an actual story and should not be just an incoherent pile of clichés. '''Making the story bad does not make it automatically funny.'''
The following is a list of common Trollpasta clichés. It's important to note that just because they've been used so many times, that doesn't mean you shouldn't use them. A common mistake among Trollpasta writers is the assumption that random mentions of clichés makes the story automatically funny or entertaining. More often than not, pastas will say stuff like "An old man gave me a creepy disc for free and it had scary blood and death in it then I died" and call it day. This is lazy writing. So if you're going to include clichés in your pastas, try and attempt to make them funny/interesting or add a twist that makes the cliché seem fresh. If used correctly, almost all of the clichés listed on this page can be funny.
 
== Satire Clichés List==
Many of these clichés link to categories, illustrating how many times they've already been used.
== =General Clichés ===
 
#'''Creepypasta parodies''': Parodying famous pastas such as Jeff the Killer, Sonic.exe, and Squidward's Suicide. These pastas could sometimes get derivative by just editing the original story and adding/removing stuff from it. These were especially common around Trollpasta's peak.
== General Clichés ==
#'''Lost media''': Pastas about sinister lost/cursed media are perhaps the most common pasta-type. The story usually begins with the main character stumbling upon a strange disc/tape/cartridge of a (usually) kid-friendly show/game they grew up with. They then take it home and document watching/playing the media. The lost media will portray the original media as something evil or creepy, often accompanied by static, eerie silence, blood, violence, and death. Depending on the story, the lost media can sometimes affect real life and make bad things happen to the characters. At the end, the main character will usually attempt to destroy the media and vow to never watch/play the original ever again.
#[[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:Jeffery|Jeff the Killer]] spin-off parodies. We have hundreds of these already. When things like [[JEFF TURNS INTO A GIRAFFE!!!!]] and [[JEFF THE KILLER BECOMES WILE E. COYOTE]] pops up it might be time to stop with these...
#'''Hyper-realism''': Describing something, especially blood and eyes, as "hyper-realistic." This cliché is most common in pastas about media with cartoony art styles.
#[[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:Hyper-Realistic|Hyper-realistic]] (blood). Just plain overused, and it's hardly used in actual creepypastas anymore these days, so why still use it here?
#'''Creepy sellers''': A common trope found in creepy/lost media pastas. Typically, the main character will run in to an elderly person selling a lost piece of media at a yard sale, and sometimes they'll give it away to the main character for free.
#Sonic.exe and other tites ending in various [[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:File Extensions|file extensions]].
#'''Satanic elements''': Many Creepypastas rely on Satanic imagery in an attempt at being scary. For Trollpastas it is mainly used to be ironic, with "666" being a common phrase used.
#[[The Tale of Shrek|Shrek Is Love]] ripoffs. This isn't 2013.
#'''Graphic imagery''': Blood, gore, and excessive violence are some of the horror genre's most popular tropes. They're very common in Trollpastas and Creepypastas as well, mainly used for pastas about cartoony media in an attempt to "shock" the reader.
#[[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:Crappy ms paint drawings|Crappy MS Paint drawings]], especially if they have lots of blood
#'''Death''': Death in Creepypastas and Trollpastas are very common. The main character dying, or everyone in the story dying is especially common in Trollpastas.
#MLG humour. Things like xXx_W4ckY_MLG_n4m3s_xXx, Mountain Dew, Doritos, 420 BLAZE IT, etc. and creating 'MLG versions' of existing stories. The whole MLG thing got old a while ago anyway.
#'''Stopwatch''': Ever find it weird how the protagonist knows the screen has been static for 26 seconds exactly? It's almost like they have a stopwatch...
#Overuse of sex jokes and [[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:Potty Humor|potty humor]]. What are you, 12?
#'''Ending phrases:''' A lot of pastas will end their story with one of the phrases "You shouldn't have done that...", "YOU'RE NEXT", "DON'T LOOK BEHIND YOU", or "AND THEN A SKELETON POPPED OUT."
#Random humour. Just because your story makes no sense doesn't mean it's funny.
#'''Unoriginal characters''': You know Jeff the Killer? Well, this is a new character named Bleff the Killer! These types of characters are usually made to mock Creepypasta characters. Taking a character and putting "XXX" at the end is another thing some pastas like to, as homage to PATRIXXX.
#Making a character whose name ends with "XXX".
#'''Bad MS Paint drawings''': These revolve around taking a screenshot, typically from a video game or a "lost episode", and drawing over it in MS Paint to make it look bad on purpose.
#Putting "[[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:YOU'RE NEXT|YOU'RE NEXT]]" at the end of your story.
===Humor===
#Putting "[[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:And then a skeleton popped out|AND THEN A SKELETON POPPED OUT]]" at the end of your story.
#'''Juvenile humor''': Some pastas will overuse sex jokes and potty humor in order to get a cheap laugh. Though, this can be done right if the writing is good.
#[[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:Excessive Profanity|Excessive swearing.]]
#'''Randomness''': Some will add tons of completely random elements to their story to make it seem more funny. Often times it doesn't work, because being random doesn't automatically make something funny.
#[[:Category:Sucide|Killing yourself]] or [[:Category:Im died|dying]] at the end of the story.
#'''Excessive profanity''': Many pastas will overly rely on swearing in a cheap attempt at comedy. It can be funny if done right, but saying "fuck" a hundred times doesn't automatically make the pasta funny. In fact, it can make them seem obnoxious.
#Putting a serious story in gizoogle.net.
#'''Repetitive gags''': This is usually a single joke that is repeatedly brought up through the pasta. Overdoing it can lead to your pasta being obnoxious to read.
#Expand Dong and BonziBuddy. Even Joel from Vinesauce wanted these jokes to die out after seeing how much people spammed them.
== =Formatting Clichés ===
#Using "le", "teh", "hte", "de" or "da".
#'''Poor grammar and spelling''': A Trollpasta staple, especially in the beginning. Popular misspelling were usually of the word "the" with stuff like "le", "teh", "hte", "de" or "da". Over time purposely terrible grammar/spelling got stale quick, so steer clear of making your pastas borderline unreadable, because most of the time it falls flat and makes the story obnoxious. "1337" text also used to be common, but this has fallen out of practice in recent years, and for the better.
#[[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:Overused Running Gag|Using the same joke over and over again]]. If it wasn't funny the first time, it surely will be the 20th!
#'''ALL CAPS''': A very common gag in Trollpastas is making the entire story in ALL CAPS. It stopped being funny quick, so it's best to avoid making Trollpastas in this style.
 
#'''Lowercase''': On the flip side, pastas with no punctuation and capitalization at all is also common.
== Formatting Clichés ==
#'''Wall of text''': Pastas that are a big wall of text with no line breaks whatsoever are common as well. Try to avoid doing this, because it can made reading the story tedious.
#[[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:ALL CAPS|Making your story ALL CAPS.]]
#'''!!!!11''': One of the most common formatting clichés is the excessive use of exclamation marks, which is done to emphasize dumb or satirical moments in the story.
#Making your story a big wall of text with no line breaks whatsoever.
===Fads===
#[[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:LONG ASS TITLE|Giving your story an overly long title]]
#'''Shrek''': Back when Shrek was a big meme, many pastas revolving around Shrek would put him in a creepy, rapey role, where he would often violate the main character. They were usually formatted in green text, a popular post formatting used on 4chan. Many stories with this cliché have been deleted due to their overly explicit NSFW nature. The most popular of these stories was [[The Tale of Shrek]].
#[[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:English Class Failure|Extremely poor English grammar and spelling.]]
#'''My Little Pony''': The MLP fad was extremely popular during the height of Trollpastas and Creepypastas, so dozens of MLP pastas were made across both genres. The Creepypasta stories would involve the pony characters being put in extreme horror situations, such as in the notorious [[Cupcakes (Original Fanfic)|Cupcakes]]. At one point there was an even a category for MLP pastas on the site, but it's since been deleted.
#No punctuation and capitalisation at all.
#'''Meme translations''': From 2013 to 2014 there was a trend of putting a serious pastas through Gizoogle or Bad Translator. Many of the pastas in this style can still be found in the [[:Category:Ghetto Talk|Ghetto Talk]] category.
#Excessive use of exclamation marks.
#'''MLG humor''': References to this meme in pastas were common back when MLG was a very popular internet meme. Several of these elements would be used: xXx_W4ckY_MLG_n4m3s_xXx, Mountain Dew, Doritos, 420 BLAZE IT, creating MLG versions of existing stories, etc.
#Using 1337 text.
#'''Vinesauce memes''': 2014 to 2016 saw the rise of memes like Expand Dong and BonziBuddy, which were heavily associated with Vinesauce. Sometimes they would be used in Trollpastas during the time.
 
[[Category:Meta]]
== Satire Clichés ==
#Bashing the author of the story you're satirising. That's not satire, that's harassment. (It's okay if you're just lightly bantering him though).
#Overreacting to stuff that happens in the story you're satirising. This can be funny if done correctly.
#Making the satire [[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:One sentence|one sentence]] long. A'la [[Sanic.exe.exe]].
 
== Video Game Clichés ==
_WIP_
== Lost Episode Clichés ==
_WIP_
==Examples of bad trollpastas==
#[[ZOMG IZ ZGARIEZED BAZDA LIGE 1337 H4X]]
#[[A SHREK GAME OMFG HAUNTED OR SUM SHIT IDK BUT IT GAVE ME A NIGHTMARE B CUS IT WAS ALL ABOUT SHREK]]
#[[TEH EVIL BABBY]]
#[[TF2.420.EXE]]
#[[Spojbub n pitrck go tu a strep clob.vhstape]]
And pretty much everything else in [[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:Unfunny|Category:Unfunny]]
 
==Examples of good trollpastas==
#[[404]]
#[[Haunted_Gaming_Lost_Episode]]
#[[TEH DAY OF ALL TEH BLOD]]
#[[The Giant, Creepy-Ass-Hairless-Spooky monster.]]
#[[The most cliched pasta in the history of Creepypastas, Crappypastas and Trollpastas.exe]]
See also: [[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:TPOTM|Category:TPOTM]] and [[w:c:Trollpasta:Category:SUGGESTED READING|Category:SUGGESTED READING]].