"Stop Having Fun!" Guys: Difference between revisions

* Destructoid's ''[http://www.destructoid.com/ten-golden-rules-of-online-gaming-64474.phtml Ten Golden Rules of Online Gaming]'' is a satirical how-to guide on becoming the stereotypical online gamer, including many elements of the SHFG and/or [[Scrub]] mentality.

* Several years back, a former tournament-level player called David Sirlin, who's now working for [[Capcom]], wrote an article called "[http://www.sirlin.net/articles/playing-to-win-part-1.html Playing To Win]", which contrasted [[Scrub]]s and [[Tournament Play]]ers with little middle ground. The article made some good points, but the tone made it the poster-child of "Stop Having Fun!" Guys for years. More recently, he followed it up with [http://www.sirlin.net/articles/playing-to-win-part-3-not-playing-to-win.html "Not Playing To Win"], a limited defense of casual play.

* Do you play on anything that isn't part of the glorious PC Master Race? Well, you're wrong, and a terrible person for having fun that way.

* If you're a PC gamer, do you dare to play any game with a controller instead of a keyboard and mouse? You may as well have just raped a baby.

* Do not request CD patches for a game. Ever. Apparently if you wish to play the game without the hassle of swapping discs then you're a baby eating child raping thrill killing monster.

* [[Nintendo]] takes a similar view on emulation. Doesn't matter if you have an old cartridge of ''[[Super Mario Brothers]]'', they would dearly like to make the use of old, out of stock games punishable by death.

* ''[[Mass Effect]]'' has a notorious amount of SHFG. Didn't kill the Rachni queen without metagaming? You're retarded. Didn't keep the Collector base? You deserve to die. Saved the Council? Get off the forum!

** Also, if you don't play on the hardest setting "[[Harder Than Hard|Insanity]]", then as a rule, you're no better than a [[scrub]], because according to the BioWare forums, Insanity is apparently "the difficulty the game was meant to be played on."

* ''[[Penny Arcade]]'' has the story of how Gabe [http://www.penny-arcade.com/2007/07/23/pokemon/ took the mickey out of] a larval-stage SHFG. Also [http://www.penny-arcade.com/2007/07/23/awesome/ a follow-up post] showing why if you are a parent of a young child, you should never, ever let him or her attend an officially sanctioned tournament.

{{quote|It was actually really cool to see how much these kids love ''Pokemon''. I've been so into it recently that I think I'd forgotten I should be having fun. With my pages of hand written math and charts of carefully plotted out EV training regiments I actually felt sort of dirty. These little kids were showing me teams comprised not of statistically optimal Pokemon but of their favorites.}}

* Go to the general board of any ''[[Pokémon]]'' game in [[Game FAQs]], and ask for advice on which moves you should teach to your freshly caught favourite. There will always be someone who will (a) tell you that this pokémon is not suited for competitive use, and point towards better pokémon who outdoes yours in every possible aspect, (b) a variation on the first, suggesting an ineffective moveset because your pokémon does not deserve the good TMs, or (c) copy-paste a Smogon moveset, even if it involves chainbreeding.

* Apparently, you're supposed to enjoy [[Level Grinding]] as well. If you don't, then you just don't know how to have fun in an RPG.

** Averted/Inverted somewhat in ''[[Final Fantasy VIII]]''—level grinding makes the game excessively harder, {{spoiler|because the enemies scale with you.}}

* There is only one [[Player Party|party]] setup worth using. Every other combination of characters is absolutely worthless. Unless you specify otherwise, everyone will always assume you're using that party.

** Very true in the ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics]]'' series. Using a Gadgeteer/Tinker? You're an idiot for using a "garbage" class. No matter how much you try to defend your decisions on what classes you use and how you use them, the "expert" players will just lecture you on how the other classes are so much better than what you use, despite the fact that Advance and A2 are pretty easy to beat with almost any class set up you use.

** Even if it's not a competitive game, don't you dare admit to using certain perks, like the ones that increase your experience gain or reveal all the map locations, because you're a [[Noob]] who needs to level up faster to play the game to win.

*** Actually, don't even bother admitting to playing or liking ''Fallout 3'' even if it's the ever-buggy PC version. There are many a SHFG who whines endlessly about their dislike for the game and will not allow you to enjoy it on those merits.

** It can be a real problem in some editions if characters are at different levels of [[Min-Maxing|min/maxing]]: the game balance can be shattered. A character min/maxed by a pro and a character made by a person new to the game can have such a gap in power and survivability that anything that would be a challenge for the min/maxed character is likely to destroy the new person's character in one round. A certain amount of balance must be struck in this case where the DM either reigns in the min/maxed character or helps the new player min/max their character somewhat, or a combination thereof. What makes the "Stop Having Fun!" Guy is he will be unwilling to either tone down his character or help the other player beef up his, instead deciding to berate and insist that his character is not the problem at all and expect everyone to play his way.

*** ''[[Exalted]]'' has a similar problem. Unless all the PCs put some effort into being combat-capable, anything that can even remotely challenge the combat-monsters will shred the non-combatants before they can blink.

* There was a time in ''[[Adventure Quest]]''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s history (before a lot of the new quests were released with scaled level versions) when they were all one difficulty. Then ''Fire War'' was released, a low-to-medium level quest against the fire mage Drakkonan. This was immediately followed by a string of level 80+ content. When people complained that they couldn't do any of the new content they were told in no uncertain terms that low-level players had been given one special event and that was enough. Some particularly [[Egregious]] arguments insinuated that even giving low-level players one event amounted to insufferable persecution of hardcore fans.

 

 

** [[Unfortunate Implications|One wonders if, for games like]] ''[[Command and Conquer]]'', ''[[Medal of Honor]]'' and the like, [[If You're So Evil Eat This Kitten|Al Qaeda feel the same]].

* You're not allowed to play ''pop'n music'' with the Beat-Pop modifier. After all, if you want gray and blue notes so badly, why not just play ''[[Beatmania]] IIDX''?

** When it comes to the safety bar, the players can be easily separated into two types: those who support their weight with it [[Challenge Gamer|to achieve the highest score]], and those who [[Self Imposed Challenge|adamantly refuse to do so]] because they think [[Scrub|it's more fun that way]]. Both groups are equally vocal and equally annoying. Some in the anti-bar camp will heckle or even outright smack the hand of any player whom they see reaching for the bar. Even if the player is trying to beat [[That One Boss|That One Song]] or play [[Harder Than Hard|Oni Mode]] (where you have to play 5+ songs in a row without breaks, and missing 4 steps out of 300+ on any one song will fail you and end your game on the spot) or Survival Mode (instead of missing 4 notes max, it becomes a [[Timed Mission]] with only accurate stepping to keep the timer alive for the most part).

** Similar but lesser hate can be directed as a player who uses speed mods or any built-in noteskins to make reading stepcharts easier, [[Wall Banger|even if some of this noteskins are default options on some of the games]]. The only possible exception is the Solo modifier on older DDR arcade releases: due to a bug, if one player chose Solo, both players had to have it on.

* The online game [http://www.jamlegend.com JamLegend]'s score system awards most experienced players a golden "P" (pro) badge. Pray you don't end up in a multiplayer match made up of pros...

** Besides that, most comments on the songs will simply consist of "FC" (Full Combo), sometimes followed up with "Too easy" or "Can't believe someone failed it". The moderator staff deleted them at first, but eventually resigned and let the SHFGs shout out their pride.

*** The cross-server dungeon finder has had the unfortunate side effect of exposing Tichondrius players to the other servers. With shocking regularity when one party member stands out as being pushy, raging at the slightest delay, calling everyone noobs at the slightest provocation, and screaming over their deaths despite having aggroed an entire group while not being a tank, they are from Tichondrius.

*** The Rampage US battlegroup has similar problems with TWO such servers; Illidan and Cho'gall. Don't argue with them. [[Just Smile and Nod]]. Their vision is based on movement.

** They also whined a lot during the ''Burning Crusade'' and ''Wrath of The Lich King'' major class revamps, commenting the game becoming too easy to play for noobs with little skills that can play with little or no addons. They seem to forget that even with the new changes, it still requires some skill to play classes, not to mention that players have to incorporate the new abilities and changes in their gameplay. This has continued into ''Cataclysm'', with complaints about the new information displays. These mostly consist of giving people information they weren't previously given in the game but which is vital for progression content. Their attitude is apparently that instead of being given this info, they should have to look it up on third-party sources. There is no thought or skill involved in looking up these numbers, it's simply adds to the already extensive busywork of the end-game. But apparently actually providing these fundamental stats is catering to noobs.

** The Random Dungeon Finder combined with the new gearscore attributes have caused a whole new outbreak of "Stop Having Fun!" Guys. It's not at all uncommon to wait some time to get a random group, only to have the tank and/or healer (the two hardest members to find) look at your gearscore and immediately declare they are "not playing with a bunch of noobs" and drop group - even if said gearscore is equivalent to raid-quality gear prior to the most recent raid dungeon updates and you are playing an easy 5-man instance. It can also lead to party leaders voting to boot other party members with "unacceptable" gear scores. An exceptionally petty action when the said low-scoring player is probably still leveling their endgame gear and they just got bumped from the chance to earn tokens to buy better gear, and by getting booted from a random dungeon party, they are now forced to re-queue. The worst bit is that the point at which a gear score stops being too low is about the same point as you don't want any of the gear from the dungeon anyway. If you actually need something from the dungeon you're running, you're not good enough.

* There's been a recent controversy on [[Twitter]], specifically the "TwitterDex", a group of people who like to act out ''[[Pokémon]]'' Tweets that have their own wiki. A recent influx of people portraying characters from the games (such as [http://twitter.com/E4Karen Karen], [http://twitter.com/Champion_Lance Lance], and [http://twitter.com/ChampionSteven Steven]) who chose to portray their characters in slightly different ways than they're shown in [[Canon]] have crossed paths with the "veterans" who think that the Twitter series they're posting "isn't an RP" and that their characters are "out of line". A recent incident involving a party at Steven's house where people drank and had a good time ([[The Rule of First Adopters|some more than others]], though nothing truly explicit occurred) was shut down when Steven reached his Tweet Limit for the day and arguments regarding the portrayal of characters and clogging up followers' feeds with multiple tweets began.

* Forum [[Play-By-Post Games|Play-by-posts]]. Seriously many people require you to have an extreme amounts of actions taken. Of course this may also happen when you are playing numerous characters or [[NPC|Non-player characters]] at once, which would result in a longer post; but if you have only ''one'' character, then you ''must'' match theirs in length and description! [[Wall Banger|Even when you are ''not'' in control of the environment and therefore have nothing else to describe but your character's actions.]] Another case where it goes both ways - some "Stop Having Fun!" Guys will demand that you simply don't overload them with details or introduce them over time, and will enable you to get away with a shorter post, and if you do too much stuff then you're overwhelming other players or are just trying to show off. Bottom line? Either try and balance "Get right to the point" and "Enriching the world", don't add details for the sake of longer posts and don't just say you nod and that's all, or adapt to the type of game you're in.

* ''Efedding''. It's a forum-based writing/roleplaying game with [[Professional Wrestling]] as a backdrop. ''Efedding'' players can generally be broken down into "storyline" (writing short stories and chapters thereof featuring your character(s)) and "trashtalk" (doing like real pro wrestlers do and talk trash about your opponent and the match). "Stop Having Fun!" Guys exist on both ends of the spectrum. Trashtalker SHFGs consider storyliners to be pretentious psuedo-intellectuals who don't know how to play the game. Storyliner SHFGs consider trashtalkers to be uncreative dullards who don't know how to play the game.

* In ''[[Phantasy Star|Phantasy Star Universe]]'', there is a large group of people who will boot you from the party for a number of reasons. Picking up "trash" rare items (even when there is some value to them)? Not having the right Weapon/Armor element (especially at a low percent)? Having weapons that are not grinded (enough)? Having low Photon Art levels? Daring to not play as the "right" race/class combo, ''especially'' as a disadvantaged one (Beast Ranger, Newman Hunter, CAST Force)? Getting most of the ''good'' rares when the setting's on Set Random? Oh Noes! Hell, ''just being there'' at the end boxes on missions is a viable reason to be kicked from the party. You don't have to do much to get booted from the party. Sometimes even nothing at all...

** For an even more illuminating case study, look toward the big 0.0 player alliances. Consider "alarm clock ops", where in a game where the potential conflict runs 23/7 in real time, you have players in other time zones setting their alarm clocks to wake them up in the middle of the night to go on them - and if you don't, you're letting your alliance down. And that's just scratching the surface. In 2009, a director in the Band Of Brothers alliance (whom for years had been impossible to destroy), on a lark, created a noob character and got him enlisted in Goonswarm - BoB's biggest competitor and the resident [[Something Awful]] stronghold. Hanging out with them apparently made him realize that [http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/64347 he was sick of the BoB] [[Serious Business]] mentality, so he outed himself and offered to defect. And he did... [http://myeve.eve-online.com/news.asp?a=single&nid=2737&tid=7 taking BoB down with him]. The resulting explosion, fallout and power vacuum were epic.

* ''[[Maple Story]]''. If you don't have the right gear, or if your damage isn't up to par with the (increasingly more) absurd standards set by the "pros" (read: people who spend entire days just merchanting for Meso, the game's currency), or if you're playing one of the least popular classes, or, God forbid, if you play the game for fun rather than for leveling up. (Such as, say, ''not'' hiring a high level cleric to train you, a costly but fast process that lets you skip ahead in levels quickly), you're a noob.

* ''[[Final Fantasy XI]]''. Dear God, ''[[Final Fantasy XI]]''. The game has 20 jobs, of which you can pick a main and a sub. Of those 300+ combinations, there are maybe 15 that are acceptable to the SHFG: Any Melee class that is not Samurai or Dragoon shouldn't even bother leaving the Mog house. Sorry Warriors, Dark Knights, Thieves, etc—you're only going to be invited to a SHFG's party if there aren't any Samurais or Dragoons available. If you are not playing Samurai or Dragoon because you have already taken both to the level cap—you should expect to have one of three subjobs as a melee—either /SAM (for anyone over 60), /WAR (for anyone under 60) and /NIN (for parties with a particularly loud SHFG leader). These are the only acceptable subjobs, all others will be asked to change before leaving town.

** For spellcasters: black mages should either [[Level Grinding|level grind]] solo (which is tricky and works best at higher levels) or party with other black mages in what's called a manaburn party. Likewise, Summoners should [[Level Grinding|level grind]] solely with other summoners, which is similarly called an astralburn party. All normal levelling parties should have a [[The Red Mage|Red Mage]] as healer/buffer/debuffer, and have no need for any other caster. And everyone wants a bard for their wide variety of powerful [[Status Buff|buffs]]. Other spellcasters else should not waste their own time. The others—Scholar, White, and Blue Mages—are unfortunately only useful as subjobs.

** [[Magic Dance|Dancer]], [[Marionette Master|Puppet]][[Lethal Joke Character|master]] and [[The Beastmaster|Beastmasters]] are nearly unseen in parties. Fortunately, all three can solo reasonably well. There are several reasons for this: none of them add anything to a party that other jobs can't do just as well; dancer is a late addition to the game, puppetmaster requires a little [[Difficult but Awesome|more effort, investment and planning]] than most jobs to be similarly effective, as well as relying on an [[AI Roulette|unpredictable]] [[Robot Buddy|automaton]]. Beastmaster is commonly seen as the best job to solo with by SHFG and regular players alike, and their reliable pets tend to either be mediocre or [[Glass Cannon|easily killed]].

** The "Stop Having Fun!" Guy mentality on ''[[Final Fantasy XI]]'' goes beyond choice of job; choice of camp and party style are ways you can "do it wrong" too. Many of the above narrow job choice demands are based primarily on what's optimal in a meleeburn against colibri (or less commonly against puks and [[Lizard Folk|Mamool Ja]]. If you aren't meleeburning colibri, you had better be solo, or in a manaburn or [[Game Breaker|astralburn]] instead; if you're fighting anything else in any sort of way aside from those two, at ''best'' the local SHFG will [[Stop Helping Me!|persistently "gently" remind you how inefficient you are at getting XP and provide "tips for improvement"]], and at worst tear you a new one.

*** It is worth noting that very little of this applies to high level raid-style content, which commonly requires jobs that are considered useless for optimal [[Level Grinding]], especially thief to increase [[Randomly Drops|drop rates]], paladin tanks to survive powerful enemy [[Limit Break]]s and magic damage, white mages for more efficient heals and better [[Death Is a Slap on The Wrist|raises]], and rangers and black mages for long-ranged burst damage. Dancer, puppetmaster, beastmaster and corsair are still rarely seen, however.

** Better yet, no one will tell you what these builds are or where to get the skills needed for them! At most, you'll get the name for the build. As if this is supposed to instantly communicate everything you need to know.

* [[Livejournal Roleplay|Roleplay on LiveJournal]] has a lot of these. Occasionally slip up in your characterization? You're the scum of the Internet and need to gtfo of LJ. The anon meme and Roleplay Secrets community combine this with the [[GIFT]] for extra vitriol, to the point where there are threads complaining about people using the "wrong" ''userpics'' or formatting their comments "wrong." Also, dare to play out a gay couple and you ''will'' be snarked at because according to the "Stop Having Fun!" Guys (or girls), [[Yaoi Fangirl|you're only in it for the sparkly buttsex]] and/or because having a character whose orientation is never mentioned in canon be gay or bisexual is [[Wall Banger|somehow]] OOC.

* A "noob weapon" is defined as any gun that does decent damage and doesn't fire every other shot at your own head.

* These guys occupy ''both'' sides of the debate over snipers. Either sniping is pro and people just need to stop whining (often with additional statements that it's unrealistic that they have to get a headshot to kill in one hit and/or bragging about no-scoping), or snipers are noobs who can't play properly and so have to camp for cheap kills, where "cheap" is defined as killing the player in question.

* Any competitive game in general attracts this, but due to the fact that most [[First Person Shooter]] multiplayer games are pretty much competitive, it quickly deteriorates from simple fun where you wanna come back to a "Win to Live" mentality. If you have more deaths than you do kills, then get the hell off the server and play with a bunch of kids, you noobling! You use anything unconventional? BURN IN HELL FOREVER!!! The mentality of too many players of [[First Person Shooters]] is comparable to if they were actually in war and someone ''does'' die a painful death if someone's goofing around.

* Word of advice: If you're really suicidal, say the words "Maybe I'll use the autosnipe next round" to hardcore ''[[Counter-Strike]]'' players.

** A fairly recent example: Competitive leagues have recently decided they're removing the Sandman (a scout bat which also hits a baseball to stun people), Natasha (A heavy minigun which slows targets down when shot), and the Wrangler (an engineer pistol replacement allowing them to take control of their sentry gun from their next season. While, regardless of the backlash, many people have spoken up and give good reasons (or [[Your Mileage May Vary|not-so-good ones]]), others have decided to say otherwise.

*** Arguably a case of "Let's have some fun guys" as many find those weapons make the game significantly less enjoyable.

*** One word: Demoknights. After the Demoman gained the ability to give up his StickyBomb ability for increased melee potential, players will either complain about either how using stickies is unfair because it encourages camping or that Valve never should have given the ''demolitions'' man an ability completely unrelated to [[Stuff Blowing Up|blowing shit up]].

* ''[[Halo|Halo 2]]''. They're the ones that start crying when you suggest playing Swords or Rockets or anything that isn't a team game. Or when you suggest playing on Beaver Creek. They'll generally only play Capture the Flag, on Blood Gulch, with Heavy Weapons. Or, they'll get on your ass if you use any weapon other than the Battle Rifle...

** Any sniper who uses the Zeller-H is likely to be mocked, as is anyone using a Scope Stabiliser.

* Killing a "crawler" (a zombie without legs) in ''[[Nazi Zombies]]'' will cause torments of nerd fury to come upon you. Granted, the frustration is somewhat understandable, as keeping one alive will prevent the next round from starting, allowing the team to rebuild barriers, upgrade weapons, etc. But others frustrations will go too far.

 

 

* In any strategy videogame, if you believe the forums, there are exactly two kinds of players. According to the ''other'' kind, these are turtlers, who suck at the game and need to come out and fight and use proper tactics, and rushers, who need to lay off the caffiene and actually try to have some fun. Both are the offspring of the terrible union of [[Satan]], [[Hitler]] and [[He-Man and the Masters of the Universe|Skeletor]].

** That's a consensus shared by the SHFG's and the [[Scrub]]s. The SHFG's take it several steps further by arguing that certain setting are "noob settings" and that if you beat them on said setting, it's because you gained a noob advantage.

** If you post a list containing the most powerful units you can choose (such as the aforementioned las/plas squads), you will provoke an equally acerbic response. Such armies are criticised for not fitting in with the critic's idea of the background material (which will differ from critic to critic) -- and, especially, for being [[Game Breaker]]s and not the 'right way to play'.

** On that last note, tone and background are important factors. Gag armies are typically well-received by good-humoured players ([[:File:Manip IMGP0187.jpg|Joycrons]] being a prominent example), and even in-character for some races (Orks being [[Crazy Awesome|Orks]] are known to do all kinds of crazy stuff). That said, however, many gags or attempted combinations (Chaos Tau or [[Berserk Button|Female Space Marines]], for instance) are [[Berserk Button]]s in certain parts of the fandom, and will throw even otherwise normal gamers into SHFG-worthy rages. Ultimately, it comes down to presentation, sensibility, and the type of people you play with.

* ''[[Heroes of Might and Magic]]''. If you didn't use the Armageddon + magic immune Black Dragons combo you're just completely devoid of common sense.

** Unfortunately (Or fortunately, depending on your tastes) [[Straw Man Has a Point|due to the way the original ''Supreme Commander'' was designed, if you didn't follow the above advice and someone else did, you were almost guaranteed to lose on most maps]]. It wasn't just good strategy: it was pretty much a required set of tactics and it came down to who could do the above tactics better... Fortunately, the expansion, ''Forged Alliance'', added some new units and shook things up a bit, variety-wise, but the tactics still remain ingrained deeply in the community.

* Let's not even begin with ''[[Command and Conquer]]'' itself. Didn't maximize the ore income in the beginning of the game with 3+ refineries? You lose. Didn't immediately begin to spam your basic tank? You lose. You actually bothered with human soldiers? You're so noob it hurts the pro's mother.

*** The best average players (and not only) ''shouldn't'' invoke this trope, since they are far and away worse than the pros. Of course, it still happens. Continuously.

*** They also avert it in that top players are always coming up with very inventive tactics to win matches, to the point that there really has never been one "best unit"

* Five rules for being a welcome member in the ''[[Advance Wars]]'' communities: never mention Snipers, never play in [[Fog of War]], never play with navy, never say you can beat a competent player's [[Zerg Rush|infantry spam]] without CO abuse, and if you don't want to be marked as a [[Scrub]], never ever (in ''Days of Ruin'') choose No CO just because you only have to pay a minor price for the ridiculous boosts you get for COing a unit and surrounding units, or even complain about said ridiculous boosts. In short, ''do not complain about the blatant FakeBalance''.

* If you play ''[[Worms]]'' and you don't use rope every turn, use certain weapon combinations or get to the crates in time, God have mercy on your soul. Playing an online version with a mic (such as the Xbox Live Arcade versions) gets even worse, as you'll get several SHFGs yelling at you for every minor step you take, [[Wall Banger|even if you're winning the match.]]

* ''[[Spore]]'', while rather simple, tends to attract this with its expansion ''Galactic Adventures''. Granted, making an adventure is actually pretty easy thanks to the editor, and yes people should put in more effort to make something that isn't a ''Clark & Stanley'' knock off, however, not everyone likes to make a serious and grim quest or attack-based mission/adventure. In fact, most complaints in the forum that don't regard Maxis/EA are about the fact that there aren't a lot of "serious adventures" (when you have already factored in [[Sturgeon's Law]], of course), even though just about everyone (and possibly every type of gamer) plays this game...

** And let's not even discuss the [[Internet Backdraft|creations, the way you should play the game, how the game is, or anything of that matter, shall we?]]

* If you don't play ''[[Civilization]]'' at the highest difficulty setting using a build order that has been mathematically proven to be the absolute best then you're a brain-dead sub-human. If you play at any difficulty level below "Prince" then, sorry but you're too stupid to play ''Civ'' and should buy a game more to your level like ''Barney Teaches Numbers'' or something.

** Other ways to have other people call you a noob in ''Civilization Online'': Custom name your cities, chat in the chat box, set the turn timer for ''anything'' under blazing speed, and trying for any victory that doesn't involve military force.

=== Other Video Games ===

* Sparda have mercy on your soul if you admit to playing [[Mercy Mode|Easy Automatic]] on any ''[[Devil May Cry]]'' title, for the [[Harder Than Hard|Dante Must Die]]-demolishing "pros" will have none. Although there actually is a bit of sense in this, since part of the fun is linking together Dante, Vergil or Nero's moves as one sees fit, and the automated combo choices Easy Auto forces on the player detracts from that.

* ''[[Heroes of Newerth]]'', which is a standalone version of ''[[Defense of the Ancients]]'', is this way. Even on games advertised "noob players only" there is usually someone who will complain about their team not doing things "right".

** It does have a tutorial now.

** ''[[League of Legends]]'' suprisigly averts this.

* If you're not coming within seconds of a world record in ''[[Initial D Arcade Stage]]'' or ''Wangan Midnight Maximum Tune'', fellow players will think you're [[So Bad It's Horrible|So Bad You're]] [[Scrub|Horrible]].

* The ''[[Mario Kart]]'' series have been getting this, starting with the DS. Mention the word, snaking, anywhere, and you are bound to stir up a flame war between people who are for it and and people who are against it. If you try to explain how snaking is broken, you are classified as a [[Scrub]] who can't handle better players or just suck at snaking.

* ''Mario Kart Wii'' is no better when it comes to using bikes and certain characters with stat bonuses. If you dare to use anyone other than Daisy and Funky Kong (since they have the best bonus for top speed), any bike other than the Dolphin Dasher, Mach Bike, Flame Runner, or even try to play by just using a kart, pro players will tell you that you will always lose and stand no chance against people using a bike. You're also a [[Scrub]] by default if you even go as far as denouncing bikes for being overpowered. Apparently, no one is allowed to use anything other than the top tiered characters and bikes because it's all about using only the best to win.

** This also applies to custom levels or custom games like rom hacks. If they are too hard and people complain about it, the people that love it will denounce the complainers as scrubs and n00bs who can't handle a challenge.

** Conversely, admit to playing on the hardest difficulty level and being good at it and people will tell you you're not having fun.

** Interestingly, many games ''lock'' the harder modes until you've completed the game on either easy or normal. How have they played only on insane mode without unlocking it first?

*** [[Sarcasm Mode|Well obviously those games all suck and you shouldn't be bothering with them at all.]]

 

== Sports ==

** Really, the "professional level" may in and of itself be an example...

* Children's Soccer. Have you ever seen Soccer Moms in action? It's ''just'' a game, the kids are supposed to be having fun.

** Have you ever seen Hockey Dads? Some of them ''have beaten each other to death.''

** ''The Fast Show''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2x_DI7tzNQ Competitive Dad]" was based on this kind of character.

* Hunting and Fishing have often been known to attract these types. But of course there are quite a bit of people who're willing to give you some slack. Not everyone is really going to be performing at their peak when it's five in the morning, or lucky enough to catch a really big one. But there are people who can be yelling at you for catching ''too much'' fish or getting a kill bigger than they got. Oh you got a bigger trophy than I did? Beginner's luck...I got a bigger one? What finesse! What skill!

** To make matters even worse, there's a subset of tournament players who play in "Friday Night Magic" (the most casual of the game's nationally sanctioned tournament formats) just to boost their player rating. Why is rating important? Because a high rating can qualify you for high-level tournaments that aren't necessarily open to all players, among other things. So these players will farm rating off of any newbie or cash-poor regular who shows up at the tournament looking for a fun chance to play some ''Magic''. As if that weren't bad enough, a common response to beating the stuffing out of the "lesser" player is along the lines of "Well, you didn't lose that much rating anyway, since yours is so much lower than mine." Ignoring the fact that if you cared about your rating at all, the match might have lasted longer than seven minutes, including time to shuffle.

** Dan Shive, of ''[[El Goonish Shive]]'', reports the following dialogue following a game of ''Magic'' (he was the one using the card):

"It's still horrible."}}

** As a contrast to the above points, ''Magic: the Gathering'' can also be played in Limited formats. In such a circumstance, you have less choice about what cards to put into your deck and it is independent of how much money you have. You cannot fill your deck with foreign language cards for "variation", it is difficult to fill your deck with only "good" rares (since most of the cards you will draft will probably be common cards). about "if any card that costs four or more mana doesn't win the game for you on the spot, it should never even be put in your deck", well you won't always be given that choice so a player who "plays always to win" at Limited will need different strategies.

== Music ==

* You can expect to be lambasted by many a rock music fan if you enjoy hip-hop, country, dance or anything that isn't considered "real" music by them. Even worse, every genre and sub-genre of music has its own share of elitists telling you what is and isn't appropriate to listen to. God forbid you enjoy any mainstream hip-hop artists, or don't particularly care for the underground/lyrical rapper types, because if so you are part of the people who are killing "real hip-hop" and don't know what true rap is all about.

* Another music genre that seems to be almost everyone's [[Acceptable Target]] is metal. Especially that which may be found on [http://metal-archives.com Encyclopaedia Metallum]. Tell anyone that you're into such music, and you ''will'' be bombarded with "randomly slamming on drums and belching into a microphone isn't ''real'' music!!" and "how can you listen to anything you can't understand!?".<ref>Perplexingly, no other genre gets this complaint as if everything else used perfectly clean vocals; [[Wall Banger]] indeed.</ref> And this preludes the accusations of being a church-burning Satanist, Wiccan weirdo, virgin who plays Dungeons & Dragons, scary loner likely to shoot up a high school, or all of the above. If you like metal, your best bet is to treat it as an embarrassing secret and keep your fucking head down; to do otherwise would be social suicide.

** [[Heavy Metal]] itself isn't immune to this trope, with the "[[Fan Dumb|True Metalheads]]" bashing [[Nu Metal]], [[Hard Rock]] and *Core fans among other genres. The exceptions for this bashing may be at best [[Thrash Metal]], [[Death Metal]], [[Black Metal]] and classic 80s [[Heavy Metal]]. Oh, and they will ''hate'' you for liking, among other things, ''[[Iron Maiden|"The X Factor", "Virtual XI"]], [[Megadeth|"Risk"]], [[Nightwish|"Dark Passion Play"]], [[Metallica|"Load", "ReLoad", "St. Anger"]],'' [[Helloween]]'s [[Replacement Scrappy|Andi Deris]]'s era stuff, [[Pantera]]'s pre-Nineties stuff, and many other things.

 

== Other ==

* Film preference can be bad about this. Fan or lover of an [[Epic Movie]]? You're a [[Lowest Common Denominator]] [[It's Popular, Now It Sucks|with no real taste or idea]] of what separates the [[True Art|real stuff]] from those [[Cliche Storm]]s that Hollywood belches out... And yes, it even happens here on All The Tropes.

** Hell, just writing fanfic, period, is enough. For every ten fanfic enthusiasts, there's one SHFG whining that they should be writing original fiction instead. Stop having hobbies I don't approve of, guys!

* Any time a thread is started about anything religious/paranormal/UFO/conspiratorial/or creepy-pasta related among said enthusiasts tends to attract condescending, skeptical know-it-alls who insist on making it very clear to you that it's not real/fake/hoax, etc... and that you're a dumb ass for discussing and believing in such things.