Mutually Exclusive Party Members/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Basic Trope: Recruiting one character into the Player Party bars you from recruiting another.

  • Straight: If the player chooses to recruit Ichigo, they can't get Trixie to join their Player Party as well. The same rules apply vice-versa; they can only have one or the other, or neither, but not both.
  • Exaggerated: Every single recruitable character in the game has a corresponding character who gets locked out of the Player Party upon the other's recruitment.
  • Downplayed: You can't have Ichigo or Trixie at the same time in your party, but you can dismiss one to add the other any time you like.
    • Ichigo and Trixie are only mutually exclusive for part of the game; perhaps you later get a chance to recruit both, or they only become mutually exclusive after a certain point where you must choose between them.
  • Justified: Ichigo and Trixie are Rivals who simply can't stand each other. The thought of having to work together, even for a good cause, makes both of them sick!
    • Ichigo and Trixie are two split personalities of a single individual.
  • Inverted: Recruiting Ichigo makes Trixie automatically argue her way into your party as well.
  • Subverted: Though Trixie kicks up a fuss when Hiro asks Ichigo to join his team, she gleefully accepts his invitation to come along as well.
  • Double Subverted: ...However, she only joins with the intent of betraying Hiro later on to The Empire.
  • Parodied: ???
  • Deconstructed: After the player makes their decision between the two, both girls are fleshed out over time and shown to be Not So Different. It's made painfully clear that if not for their Prideful headbutting and refusal to accept each other as anything more than rivals, they could have become good friends and True Companions. But due to their Fatal Flaws (and game mechanics), they're incapable of seeing past the other's mask and connecting with each other.
  • Reconstructed: ???
  • Zig Zagged: If Ichigo is recruited first, Trixie initially invites herself along, but with the intention of stabbing Hiro in the back for slighting her. She can eventually be talked back onto your side, but while attempting this while Ichigo is in your active party offers more dialogue options, it also drastically lowers your chances of success (despite Ichigo seemingly really wanting to save her Rival Turned Evil). If Trixie is recruited first, Ichigo leaves in a huff, but can be recruited later... if Hiro completes a well-hidden Sidequest.
  • Averted: Whether or not Hiro recruits both Ichigo and Trixie is solely up to the player.
  • Enforced: The developers wanted to add Replay Value by keeping the player from recruiting all the possible party members at once.
  • Lampshaded: ???
  • Invoked: ???
  • Exploited: ???
  • Defied: ???
  • Discussed:

Hiro: Are you sure I can't convince you two to put aside your differences and work together?
Trixie: Oh, don't bother trying to spare her feelings, dearie! She's much nastier than she looks!

Ichigo: He's just trying to let you down easy, y'know! [[[Puppy Dog Eyes]]] Right, Hiro-niichan?

Hiro: ...Maybe I don't need a new spellcaster after all...

Ichigo/Trixie: [[[Death Glare]]]

  • Conversed: ???
  • Played For Laughs: Once they realize Hiro's looking to add a Squishy Wizard to his ranks, Ichigo and Trixie start openly competing for his attention, with flashy pyro/frost-technics and dragging him into a dungeon where they're both Guest Star Party Members.
  • Played For Drama: During Hiro's visit, Ichigo and Trixie's Beloved Peasant Village is attacked, and they both run off to defend different parts of it. Whichever one Hiro doesn't help winds up being Killed Off for Real, leaving the other to cry "How Dare You Die on Me!"

Back to Mutually Exclusive Party Members.

Retrieved from "https://allthetropes.org/wiki/Mutually_Exclusive_Party_Members/Playing_With?oldid=1085340"