Basic Trope: There are four playable characters with different stats: one is at one extreme on the stat-scale, another is at the other extreme, a third is a balance of the stats, and the fourth has a gimmick that makes them different.
- Straight: There are four playable protagonists in the game: Jacques the Jack of All Stats, Mike the Mighty Glacier, Fiona the Fragile Speedster, and Samuel the Squishy Wizard.
- Exaggerated: Mike is so slow, the screen's scrolling moves faster than him, while Fiona is so fragile, a single hit from nearly anything will kill her instantly. Samuel causes the game to shift from a 2d action platformer to a management sim. Jack manages to keep the game stable with his across-the-board, balanced stats for the most part.
- Downplayed:
- The differences in stats between the four playable characters are there, but the differences are so small that they make little if any difference in gameplay.
- The characters are almost balanced, but Mike, Fiona and Samuel have special abilities that make them more useful in their specific areas. Jacques has downplayed versions of them to remain polyvalent without cutting his partners' specialities.
- Justified: Teams of four commandos are the easiest for their faction to transport in terms of logistics, and teams that have three varying specializations and a generalist have proven effective in the past, so their commando teams are deliberately designed this way.
- Inverted: ???
- Subverted: Jacques wields a sword and shield and wears light armor; Mike is fat, wields a huge hammer, and wears heavy armor; Fiona wears a sweatsuit, not armor, and dual-wields daggers; while Samuel is a frail old man wearing a wizard's robe with no armor, either, yet despite these obvious visual differences that imply different speeds and defenses that would fit this trope, the differences are only cosmetic, and they all play identically and have exactly the same stats.
- Double Subverted:
- There are four playable characters whose appearances imply they have stat differences that fit this trope as above, but they all play identically and have exactly the same stats. However, when they got into their vehicles, the fat one is a Mighty Glacier, the thin one is a Fragile Speedster, etc.
- Despite appearances that say they should fit this trope, they begin the game with the same stats. But after you level them up, their stat growths diverge, and they end up fitting this trope.
- Parodied: The stats the game played with are things that are very different from speed/jump height/attack power/magic/range; they are instead things like "Tuba Skill" or "Crochet".
- Zig Zagged:
- Despite appearances that suggest this trope, the characters start out with little to no differences in their stats, but as the characters level up, their stats have the potential to diverge into this trope. However, the player has some control over the way their stats develop, so the characters don't necessarily need to stick to the roles that their appearances would suggest.
- Jacques actually has low stats everywhere, but knows every style of combat, Mike is powerful and mobile but frail, Fiona is a Stone Wall who parries and waits until her opponent is exhausted to counterattack, and Samuel only knows teleportation, but he can use it to kill enemies in an unorthodox way. The four heroes form two pairs where one partner compensates the other's weaknesses.
- Averted:
- There is only one playable character.
- There are four playable characters, but their stats and abilities are identical, and their appearances don't trick you into expecting their stats to be different.
- Enforced:
- Players were dissatisfied with the lack of variety in playable characters the last game and demand choices in this game, so the developers promise to use this trope for this game.
- There were too many choices in the last game that ended with a lot of Scrappy and Master of None characters, so the players insisted the developers narrow it down to four choices that each have reasonably balanced strengths and weaknesses, leading to this trope.
- Lampshaded: Jacques is the newcomer to a team of three, which becomes a team of four as soon as he joins. Upon meeting his teammates, he notes that one other member is faster than him, another is slower but better armored, and yet another has better magic than he does.
- Invoked: A lieutenant who is trying to put together an elite squad specifically asks for four commandos who have a set of skills that falls into this trope.
- Exploited: ???
- Defied: A lieutenant who is trying to put together an elite squad of vehicles considers selecting four vehicles whose stats (armor, weapons, speed, etc) fall into this trope, but he insists upon getting a single type of vehicle for his whole army to keep logistics and training simple.
- Discussed: A lieutenant is putting together a squad of commandos, and when the suggested number of members is four, they discuss what skills or traits to look for in potential members, and one or more suggested squad makeups fits this trope.
- Conversed: In a game within another fictional work, the characters playing or looking at the game discuss how the characters' skills fall into a spectrum in 3 of 4 cases, and in the fourth case, the character has a gimmick that makes them different from the other three.
- Implied: There's a game within another fictional work that isn't shown on-screen, but the cabinet has four characters on it that look like they're the protagonists, and whose appearances suggest they specialize in different roles that would fit this trope.
- Deconstructed: Enemies know the strengths and weaknesses of the characters, so enemies who are fast use hit-and-run tactics on Mike the Mighty Glacier, the A.I. targets Samuel the Squishy Wizard first because he can deal a lot of damage but can be killed faster, etc.
- Reconstructed: The A.I. reacts intelligently to the characters' strengths and weaknesses, but way the game is set up, you are supposed to use strategy and teamwork to cover each others' weaknesses, and this actually adds depth to the game and makes it more fun.
- Played For Laughs: In-game characters will launch quips in-game or during cutscenes at the Mighty Glacier for his slowness, or at the Squishy Wizard for how he goes down in one hit.
- Played For Drama: The cutscenes show the Mighty Glacier barely avoiding an attack that the Fragile Speedster avoids easily, and in another cutscene, the Fragile Speedster and Squishy Wizard take massive damage from an attack that the Jack of All Stats and Mighty Glacier survive easily, requiring months of recuperation in-universe and angst on their part that they're weak compared to the Mighty Glacier and Jack of All Stats.
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