History Main / ScrappyMechanic

* [[SonicTheHedgehog3 Carnival Night Zone's]] [[GuideDangIt Barrel of Doom]], anyone? One funny thing is that Casino Paradise in ''SonicAdvance'' also features the barrels, but they do ''not work the same way they did in ''Sonic 3.'' If you played ''Advance'' before ''Sonic 3'', you'll be ''even'' more screwed when you reach CNZ.

** [[FlatWhat What]]. You press 'F' and click on their portrait. Repeat until no one wants more food. It takes maybe a minute if you have a full party. Of course it's going to look like
a ScrappyMechanic if you insist on doing it the complicated roundabout way!

*** Or [=MSG3=] where the same button was used for both for "Interrogate" and "Cut the fucker's throat".

** The Lightning Cloud from Mario Kart Wii. You get an item that activates itself, that actually zaps YOU if there aren't anyone nearby, which there probably isn't in a 4-player VS game.

** [[FlatWhat What]]. You press 'F' and click on their portrait. Repeat until no one wants more food. It takes maybe a minute if you have a full party. Of course it's going to look like a ScrappyMechanic if you insist on doing it the complicated roundabout way!

** [[GannonBanned Actually, there's a reason for this.]] Back when the game was first made, pawns could only move one space. People found this too slow, so the rule was modified so they could move two spaces at once on their first move. This meant though, if a pawn was keeping them trapped, which is a legitimate strategy, they could just skip past them. So, En Passant was made so that they couldn't do that nonsense.

*** In ''FinalFantasyIX'', HP is capped just below five digits, and for even the lowest-level characters, HP starts in the triple digits. There are lots of segments where the player has no access to characters with healing or revival spells/techniques, or segments where they do, but the area has an anti-magic field, or where the healing mage is technically available but [[BreakTheCutie "broken."]] Phoenix Downs, in this game, only restore ''single-digit'' HP. SoYeah.

** Let's not forget the [=HMs=]. Moves that are required to make it through the game and access hidden areas. Okay. They also take up a slot of your Pokémon's move pool. Fine. Most of these moves (really all of them but Fly, Surf, and Waterfall [[RescuedFromTheScrappyHeap (which was completely outclassed by Surf until the physical/special split)]] are worth anything by the end of the game) are nigh useless. Not so good. Once learned, a Pokémon cannot forget this move unless it is taken to a move deleter specifically. Oh come on! Then from generation three on, HM use is coupled with an entirely pointless, pace breaking animation that very quickly gets old, cannot be disabled and appears ''every'' time you want to use a move. Goddammit!

** The D20 Mechanic as applied to ''Star Wars'' in general. They took a rolling system that could be explained in one paragraph and replaced it with the unnecessarily complex D20 system. That's fine for AD&D 3e and 4e, which are new games in their own right, but there was NOTHING wrong with ''Star Wars.'' Worst of all? Now you can't find the original goddamn books! Thanks WotC!

* The weapons in the original ''DarkCloud'' -- spending weeks tediously building up weapons for six different {{PCs}}, only to lose all that progress by [[BreakableWeapons having them break...]] especially sucky if you have just managed to clear several levels of a dungeon. This was thankfully fixed in the sequel, where broken weapons simply wouldn't hit, but could be fixed afterwards.

** In [[=FireRed=]] & [[=LeafGreen=]], whenever you used an item on a Pokémon outside of battle, it showed an animation of the item being "used" on it. At least you could skip it...

* ''KingdomOfLoathing'' had a "much-maligned, super-secret hidden interaction between +Monster Level and +Noncombat Chance" (as the creators themselves would later call it) that was added with NS13. Specifically, if you had a positive net +Noncombat Chance, then for every +5 Monster Level you had, it would cancel out +1% Noncombat Chance. Due to the considerable advantage one can gain with even a mere +5% Noncombat Chance, this had the problematic side effect of making anything that gave +Monster Level not only useless, but an active detriment to the player in most scenarios. It was removed a year and a half later.

*** ME2 also has you burning fuel when travelling between star systems without a mass relay. This is seen as a definite step down.

** Another aggravating part of the flick's viability comes from right-of-way rules. The person who starts an attack (in a normal lunge done by straightening the forearm just before moving) has right-of-way, meaning that if an opponent responds by trying to hit them first but gets hit too the attacker is the one who gains a point. This is based on the idea that doing nothing to defend yourself from a sword thrust qualifies as TooDumbTooLive and should not be rewarded. Flick attacks don't use this motion, being well, flicks, and only straighten their arm at the furthest extension of the downswing, if at all. However, right-of-way is usually granted to them the moment they begin the downswing. A possible interpretation of the rules would be that flick attacks do not generate right-of-way, or do so only at the furthest extension, since they don't use this motion. After all, the rationale for the rule is that one is being faced with serious injury or death if the blow isn't blocked. But a flick attack would be unlikely to cause any serious harm if it connected, and so the basis for the rule does not apply to it.

** Favored class/multiclass XP penalty rules from the 3rd edition. Notable for completely failing at what they were meant to do (a character that takes 1 level in 20 classes takes no hit under them, a character that takes 15 levels in one take and 5 in another DOES take a hit) and acting like a straight jacket on customization, further exotic base classes are rarely supported as favored classes, making them harder to use. Very few groups actually use them.

** [[HitPoints Hit Point]] damage. While this is not normally a Scrappy Mechanic even when coupled with the usual [[CriticalExistenceFailure Critical Existence Failure]] when player damage outputs are relatively low compared to enemy HP without specific and highly optimized builds but the same is not true of enemy damage output relative to your HP your options become 1: Bypass the broken mechanic by not doing HP damage, which [[LinearWarriorQuadraticWizard not all classes can do]], 2: Limit yourself to one of a select handful of builds, as otherwise the enemies will survive to get a turn and thus kill you. 3: Die.

** And, of course, as in any FpS, sniping and camping.

{{Waggle}} is a subtrope. Not to be confused with TheWesley.

* Can a sport have a ScrappyMechanic? If so, the flick of fencing qualifies. Some background: the flick is an attack made by snapping the wrist so the blade whips and bends to strike the target with the tip. It takes advantage of the unrealistic flexibility of a fencing weapon, necessary for safety. Fencers can be roughly divided into three kinds. Historical fencers try to keep alive historical fighting styles and will use weapons and movements which are not allowed in the sport. Classical fencers follow the rules of the sport as they were originally designed, mimicking something which sort of, kind of approximates a duel. Sport fencers, or competitive fencers, are more than willing to break with tradition in order to gain an edge in a game which involves swords, regardless of whether it would make sense in a sword fight. Generally, historical and classical fencers hate flicks and sport fencers use them whenever they might be an advantage. Taken to extremes, you have Scrubs and StopHavingFunGuys in each camp. Flicks became so extreme, the sport's [[WordOfGod governing bodies]] changed the timing of electric fencing to make the flick less practical, but it is still a viable, competitive tactic. And cause a [[BerserkButton classical fencer to rage.]]

-->-- ''BoxerHockey'', [[http://boxerhockey.fireball20xl.com/example.php?id=097.jpg Episode 97]]

***** Or to clarify, You need event Pokémon to unlock them, Celebi for Zorua and one of the 3 Shiny Legendary Beasts that were given away for the [[PokemonPhantomChampionZoroark 13th movie]] for Zoroark, [[NoExportForYou And Event to obtain Celebi is not only Japan only]], [[ItGotWorse But also long passed]].

*** Phone calls in [[VideoGameRemake Heart Gold and Soul Silver]] as well as in the originals. Theoretically these calls should be about useful information like swarms and rematches. But 95% are useless conversations involving the trainer's life. Want to ignore em? Well in Generation II they were unskippable and in Generation IV they were the only way to get rematches (as opposed to the Vs. seeker or Trainer's eyes which allowed you to battle without annoying conversations). ItGetsWorse, due to the high level gap between the Final gym leader and the BonusBoss you will need to grind if you have anything resembling a Balanced team and trainer battles are more effective by far.
**** Actually, this one isn't nearly as bad as people make it out to be. Contrary to popular belief, a large amount of the calls are relevant, either for rematches or for free items; in addition, you can set rematches yourself if you call certain trainers at times of the week. The real problems are that you can't tell the good calls from the spam ones, and that the calls for rematches aren't just for certain days of the week, but also certain ''times'' in those days. For example, in order to rematch Falkner, it has to be Saturday ''morning''; you'll have to rematch another Gym Leader at another time of day.

****Species is decided, but not gender. So you can save before hand and keep restarting until you get a female. Have fun?