Basic Trope: Through the process of killing a weapon becomes stronger.
- Straight: Bob's ordinary iron sword becomes more effective against monsters as he kills more.
- Exaggerated: Bob's pitiful dull copper sword, through the process of killing millions of monsters, has become a divine existence.
- Downplayed: Bob's masterful iron sword inflicts more damage as it kills, but ultimately isn't special.
- Justified:
- Magic is a passive force shaped by thought and emotion, thus it strengthens Bob's iron sword.
- The entities killed possessed special traits, which Bob's iron sword drains as their blood soaks into it.
- Inverted: Bob's magic sword, a holy symbol of protection from a Martial Pacifist god, dulls in power the more he resorts to deadly violence to solve problems.
- Subverted: Bob's iron sword seems to become stronger through murder, but he's actually just using magic.
- Double Subverted: ...Magic to reawaken the abilities of the blood soaked in his iron sword.
- Parodied: Starting off with a paper mache sword, Bob's blade starts displaying traits associated with life, it literally evolving into a sentient humanoid being Bob awkwardly tries to continue using as a sword.
- Zig Zagged: Some weapons are able to become stronger through murder, others don't and some need their evolution magically activated.
- Averted: Weapons don't become stronger through murder.
- Enforced: "Combat isn't meant to be a major feature, yet Bob's iron sword has to get better somehow. Hey, why not just have it absorb the powers of the bosses?"
- Lampshaded: "How does killing something make your sword stronger? Doesn't it dull at all?"
- Invoked: Bob deliberately hunts supernatural creatures so his iron sword can gain magical powers.
- Exploited: Emperor Evulz uses enslaved innocents as his mooks, hoping Bob's blade will become a demonic weapon in the process.
- Defied: Bob never uses the same weapon twice, wishing to avoid making a Mythical Weapon that evil could get their hands on.
- Discussed: "How did Bob's sword become Terrorender anyways?" "He apparently killed a thousand monsters and then kept going after noticing the emergent powers."
- Conversed: "Why do people make it so weapons 'evolve' through battle? Pretty lazy if you ask me." "Personally I like the idea, it gets you to appreciate your gear and it allows you to skip buying replacement equipment."
- Implied: Bob's iron sword, never stated to have any special powers, is able to harm Emperor Evulz more easily than his less combative allies.
- Deconstructed: Since one can just kill with a weapon to make it stronger, blacksmiths are out of a job and since weapon is a subjective concept just about anyone can end up possessing a weapon of ultimate power. Thus even petty crimes become disastrous grandiose affairs to stop.
- Reconstructed: While just about anything that can be considered a weapon can get stronger, the weapon actually has to physically kill them. Thus one only has to fear melee weapons, and ammunition is counted separately.
- Played For Laughs: Bob, initially starting with an iron sword, kills various bizarre monsters with it. Thus his sword eventually becomes a blade-shape hybrid bizarreness resembling each of these monsters.
- Played For Drama: The rules of the world deeming all murder wrong, all weapons are eventually fated to become demonic bloodlusting abominations.
Back to Evolving Weapon
