Basic Trope: The main cast is two people who knew each other before the story started and a third who doesn't.
- Straight:
- Alice goes on an adventure with Bob and Charles. Alice and Bob have known each other for a long time, but Alice and Charles just met.
- Alice goes on an adventure with Bob and Charles. Alice just met Bob and Charles, but Bob and Charles have known each other for a long time.
- Exaggerated: On their journey, Alice and her companions run into Dawn and her companions: Dawn's friend Edith and a stranger named Frank.
- Downplayed:
- Alice and Bob have known each other for a long time, but did not really hit it off. And while they have never met Charles, they have heard of him.
- Bob and Charles have known each other for a long time, but did not really hit it off. And while they have never met Alice, they have heard of her.
- Bob and Alice have had a passing awareness of the other for years, but have never really been friends, the only times they have interacted were during school and group projects at work. While neither of them have ever met or heard of Charles in their life.
- Justified:
- Alice and Bob got lost on their adventure and were rescued by Charles.
- Alice got lost on her adventure and was rescued by Bob and Charles.
- Inverted: Alice and Bob, or Bob and Charles, are enemies, not friends.
- Subverted:
- "Bob" is really Bob's identical twin brother George, whom Alice has never heard of. In reality, Alice's companions are both strangers.
- "Charles" is really Alice's friend Charlotte, who pulled a Sweet Polly Oliver. In reality, Alice's companions are both friends.
- Double Subverted: Both of the above subversions happen. Now the roles of the friend and the stranger are reversed, but Alice has all along been with a friend and a stranger.
- Parodied: Alice and Bob have been best friends since childhood, while Charles is a mechanic who follows them around for reasons unrelated to their adventure, and probably doesn’t know their names.
- Zig Zagged: ???
- Averted:
- Alice, Bob, and Charles have all known each other for a long time.
- Alice, Bob, and Charles all just met each other.
- Alice has only one companion, or none at all.
- Enforced: ???
- Lampshaded: "We’ll go on an adventure! You, me, and that guy we just met!"
- Invoked: Alice invites her best friend Bob and Charles the random guy who happened to be walking by, in order to create the perfect adventuring team dynamic.
- Exploited: ???
- Defied: Charles declines to join the adventure, pointing out that he barely knows Alice and Bob, and doesn’t trust either of them.
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: ???
Back to With a Friend and a Stranger
