Basic Trope: A character has a name that describes their exploits, skills, or general badassery. Said name is better known than the character's real name.
- Straight: Bob calls himself the Lion, and prefers his title to his real name.
- Exaggerated:
- Bob has anyone who uses his real name executed.
- Almost every character has at least one name in their résumé, and for good reason.
- Bob has multiple badass names because nobody believes that the same person could have done all of those things.
- Downplayed: Bob will, when referencing his skills, use his well known nickname, but otherwise he just goes by Bob.
- Justified:
- Bob is a feared fighter, and his enemies are so afraid of him that they created a nickname which stuck.
- Bob never stopped to give his name, and no-one can see him as more than a lion-shaped blur in combat, so they called him the Lion so they could refer to him somehow.
- Bob's attire has a lion motif.
- Inverted:
- Atrocious Alias
- The Lion is a superhero epithet, but it's mostly ignored in favor of his real name.
- Bob hates his title and only wants to be called by his real name.
- Bob has the unassuming, and completely non-combat-related nickname of "Newspaper Reader," but he is so fierce and overwhelming in battle that the phrase "Newspaper Reader" becomes one of the Names to Run Away from Really Fast due to association with him.
- Just the First Citizen
- Subverted: Bob asks to be called by his real name, not wanting to lose credit for his achievements.
- Double Subverted: ...but is given a nickname anyway.
- Parodied: Bob, a fearsome warrior, calls himself "The Kitten" or "The Bunny", and demands that everyone call him this.
- Zig Zagged: Bob gains a title for his exploits in battle, using it during war to frighten his enemies. Afterward, he uses it to keep up his self-confidence, although it makes him feel out of place in the postwar world. However, he feels that his war nickname is all he has.
- Averted: Bob has no nickname.
- Enforced: "Bob is a badass, so he should have a cool nickname, like the Lion."
- Lampshaded: "Why does Bob need a scary nickname? He's scary enough by himself!"
- Invoked:
- "As the best fighter on this team, I need a badass nickname."
- Bob hears that the enemy calls him the Lion, and decides to take the name for himself.
- Exploited: Bob is sent on an espionage mission using his real name, since nobody on the enemy's side knows it anyway.
- Defied: "I want credit for my own exploits under my own name, thank you very much!"
- Discussed: "The Lion already managed to kill more than one-hundred enemy soldiers alone in the last month..." "You mean Bob? Heard of that, that's common for him."
- Conversed: "Kinda cool to have a badass nickname."
- Deconstructed: Although proud of it at first, Bob starts to hate his title, which he sees as embodying an unwanted bloodthirsty nature, and eventually abandons it when he leaves war, but others still use his war nickname anyway, driving him into guilt and depression over the deaths he caused as the Lion.
- Reconstructed:
- Bob uses his title to impress and frighten the enemy, hiding as much information about himself as possible, building up an image as a ferocious, wily, mysterious warrior.
- Everyone knows The Lion, but no one knows Bob, so Bob can walk around in civilian life as himself.
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