Discussion Characters / HetaliaAxisPowers

Also, should the pictures be oriented to the right or left? Right seems to standard for most pages on this wiki, but the images aren't that obtrusive when they are on the left and it would be more familiar to long-time visitors...

• EDIT: Done! Right-oriented, though feel free to change that. Added an image for Bulgaria. Cyprus seems to be undergoing redesign so I left them alone.
  • I was wondering how consistent the designs have to be. For example, Moldova's image was already uploaded before; it is from Hetaween 2013, although he has images of his official design also available. Seeing this, would it be alright to forgo consistency in design for consistency in quality when new art of the usual uniforms can't be found? I did this with Francis because the FIFA uniform isn't too out there, but some pages (including China on the same page) might benefit if we could use alternate costumes, even if they are a lot more colorful (e.g. from Art Stella, Hetaweens). Not sure which element would give better coherence.
  • The new images are not consistent in dimensions. When I have free time, I'll go and fix them up unless someone else wants to.
  • Also added to the top of every page a link back to the character index, for convenience!
  • Should we add character descriptions in the space below the quote and leading into the individual tropes? I'm not exactly sure what they would say and it would kind of be a big project, but the option is there.

Thanks for changing the character pictures, it looks much better this way!

Writing descriptions for characters is not only a big project (I can participate if we do it), but also troubled because there's so much room for interpretation about the characters. We'd better keep it very short and general. Mention their family relations and important alliances, perhaps the central events in their history. Describing their personality and such can be left to the tropes.

I do think that would probably be a better way of organizing some characters. We also potentially have an Ecuador now, so a Latin America category may be a necessity if that's the case.

Himaruya had posted some mysterious nation designs in the past that he's yet to assign identities to. Then there's also his hint of potentially designing Albania soon, which means that the categories for even just Europe would have to go through some re-organization and expansion. I wish you much luck with that, series with a ton of characters are fun but frustrating to organize trope sheets for.

The proposition has met support on the forum and now here, so unless anyone disagrees I'll get on to it later when I have time.

Okay. Two months, nobody has protested, and I've got the time. Here we go. *fingers crossed*

Half time report!

I've now created the new character pages, but I haven't indexed them yet. I've also created two options for the Asian countries for people to choose from, if they care. So here:

Central Europe (HRE, Hungary, Austria, Prussia, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Hesse, Saxony, Bavaria)

Western Europe (Belgium, Netherlands, Luxemburg)

Southern Europe (Spain, South Italy, Monaco, Portugal)

Southeast Europe (Greece, Turkey, Cyprus, North Cyprus, Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova, Croatia)

Eastern Europe (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Belarus, Ukraine)

Northern Europe (Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Iceland)

Asia (Korea, Taiwain, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Thailand, Mongolia, Tibet, Macau, India)

East Asia (Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, Mongolia, Tibet)

South And Southeast Asia (Vietnam, Thailand, India)

The Americas (Canada, Cuba, Ecuador)

Africa (Seychelles, Cameroon, Egypt)

Oceania (Australia, New Zealand, Tonga)

So notice, there's both option A) all Asian countries (sans Turkey) in one sub-category, or B) East Asians in their own category, and India and the Indichinese countries in their own. This happened because of troubles with categorizing India: he's not East Asian, but there's really no one to group him with but the Indochinese, who traditionally have been grouped with the East Asians.

Other issues:

- I've noticed there's something of a minor edit war going on about Romania and Moldova's placement. Please, please, please talk it through here. I've now placed them to Southeast Europe, where Wikipedia and most other sources put them.

- Central Europe and Eastern Europe are very shady terms, and there's many contradicting definitions for them. Strictly speaking only Russia, Ukraine and Belarus are certainly East European, but that wouldn't be practical for our purposes. Poland is usually counted as Central European, and the Baltic countries and Croatia are sometimes counted such as well. I've used the Hetalia tradition and mere despotism here in placing them.

- I'd like to rename Justice Destiny Strike Freedom as the Allies, to suit better the new system. Is that okay?

- Portugal and Ecuador now have folders for them, but for the time being there's no tropes listed.

Fine. I'll wait for a while if anyone has anything to say, and if they don't, I'll index these new character pages, replacing the old ones. In the mean time I'll hunt tropes for Portugal and Ecuador.

Sorry for the late reply; I don't always remember to check the discussion pages, and I don't hang out on the forums, so I wasn't aware that this was going on. I'm glad that these pages are getting rearranged, though, as what we have at the moment doesn't really work any more.

I'd prefer option B in terms of the Asian nations, personally. At the very least, it may save us some trouble in the future if Himaruya adds more Asian characters and it becomes too unwieldy to have them all on one page.

In terms of Central vs Eastern Europe... As you pointed out, one source says one thing and the next source you read contradicts it. I'm fine with the groups you've sorted them into here.

Renaming Justice Destiny Strike Freedom makes a lot of sense, so count me in favor of that.

If Hesse, Saxony, and Bavaria are going to be moved to the Central Europe page, should Picardy be moved to Western Europe? He's currently listed on the "Those Who Do Not Seem To Fit Anywhere" page. Or would it be better to make a page solely for the characters who represent regions/provinces/states?

That's a good question about the regions. We could theoretically place Hesse, Saxony, Bavaria and Picardy in it, with the potential future regions. Prussia and South Italy are technically regions these days, but my heart would break a bit if we junked them like that... Or should we? How logical we want to be?

Oh, and what is the consensus in the fandom about the alleged character designs for Portugal and Luxembourg that we got during the last Hetaween? Are those canon, and are they really who we think they are?

Well, Prussia and Romano have had a lot more screen time and influence on the series. Plus, we've seen them at times when they've been independent nations, while the others have always been portrayed as the representatives of part of a nation. Well, the German states were sort of independent while still being loosely under the control of the Holy Roman Empire...

Basically, this series isn't going to make it easy for us to sort the characters no matter what we do.

I like the idea of putting Bavaria, Saxony, Hesse, and Picardy on their own page since they're minor characters, but leave Prussia and Romano where they are. As with the Asian characters, it seems like it might be a good idea to have a separate page for the regions in case Himaruya decides to create characters for more of them (several have been mentioned, like Brandenburg, Bayern, Quebec, Fujian, and Sichuan, so it's possible) and I rather doubt that any of the regions will become major characters at this point, whereas Romano and Prussia have already have stories focused on them and are very popular characters.

As to the possible designs of Portugal and Luxembourg... from what I've seen, fans are already treating the images Himaruya posted as though they are canon, but we're not 100% positive yet.

This is also true about Croatia, by the way. Himaruya never outright stated that the character who appeared was him. http://hetalia.livejournal.com/11829261.html?thread=226219789 As spaceinvaderdude pointed out here, we're pretty sure that it's him, but Himaruya has yet to confirm it.

And there's also the character who appeared in Birz episode 16 with Seychelles. We know she's an African nation, but Himaruya never told us which country. It doesn't feel right to leave her out... we have an entry for Fem!Sweden (who has never even appeared in the series) after all, but since we don't know which country she represents...

Then again, we have entries for a lot of Nyotalia characters who are not confirmed to be canon either. There are several (like Fem!Denmark) that might just be work-in-progress sketches. I've often wondered why they even have entries since A) They may not be canon designs, and B) They've never appeared in the series.

For right now, I think it's safe to add entries for Luxembourg and Portugal, since they've at least made brief appearances in the series. I would just hold off on including images until Himaruya tells us whether or not those sketches are meant to be them, though.

Regions is now created, and Central Europe is edited accordingly. I'm in favor of treating Croatia, Portugal and Luxembourg as if they were canon. It's partially intuitive, but I really got the impression Kishi meant them to be them, and finished designs, not just doodled ideas. It's the timing: would he have teased us with mere concepts at such moment, and while posting them he promised us more characters (Croatia and Albania were mentioned)?

Anyway, HERE'S a suggestion for the new character sheet main page. It makes a distinction between the anthropomorphic cast and other kind of characters. For clarity's sake, and so forth. (Yeah, I made it of the Asia page which - now it seems - will remain unused. The content can be copied as it is to the current Characters.Axis Powers Hetalia page.)

Well, Himaruya does like to be a tease at times, but I agree that there's a very good chance that the Portugal and Luxembourg designs are canon, and that the guy who got into the EU ahead of Turkey is Croatia. So I'm fine with listing them as such. ^_^

The new character sheet looks good to me; it's much cleaner and easier to navigate than the old one. My only nit-pick is the "Things" title which sounds rather harsh. I think something like "Miscellaneous" or "Non-human Characters" would look better.

Changed Things to Miscellaneous, and at the same time also Modern Classics into Ancient Nations to suit better the rest of the titles.

So... is this plan okay?

Looks good to me!

"It's done. It's over."

The new sheet is here, then. I'm left waiting for complaints. In the meantime, what should we do of the old sheet? Pages like Neither Holy Nor Roman Nor An Empire and True Neutral still exist. Should we erase their content?

I think they're supposed to get submitted to the Cut List, but I'm not 100% sure. I do know that blanking a page for any reason can get you banned from the site, though. If all else fails, someone can bring it up at Ask The Tropers.

Oh, apparently he's going in Eastern Europe.

Moved Romania and Moldova into Istanbul Not Constantinopol, as they're historically and culturally more orientated towards the Balkans and the Ottomans than Russia. Romania has long history of fighting against the invading Turks (and Hungarians), while as far as I know Russia is a much later influence, mostly a Cold War era thing.

Last I checked, Romania's been moved back to the Eastern Europe page.

I like the 2P designs, but I think we might be getting a bit silly if we make a page for them, when all we have right now are the original pictures and a couple of extra sketches, with no indication Himaruya's ever going to do anything else with them. I think we should keep it as it is for now, just putting the tropes for them on the page with the normal designs, and if Himaruya goes back to them and does more pictures or strips, then maybe we could consider giving them their own section. But not right now.

He was never shown fighting alongside the other Allies. It's like Hungary, Austria, and Prussia not being in "The Axis" page.

I don't know for sure, but if Canada was with the Allied Forces, it probably wasn't shown because people can never recall who Canada is anyway.

As a second thought: could we add her into the Spanish Empire section? After all, her roots are in Italy and for the longest of time she was under Spain's protection. (She was a protectorate of the kingdom of Sardinia, which was located on Italian lands under Spain's rule.)

As I don't want to start an edit war, I'll leave this idea here for two days and if nobody answers with dissagreement, I'll move her into the Spanish Empire.

I can't think of a reason to object this and, regardless of how much I respect him, Himaruya is an incredible procrastinator so the "Latin American project" he promise might as well be out in two years from now, so that section is pretty useless right now with only Cuba (because we can't put him anywhere else).

Okay, with this mandate... Oh, and Cuba too is included in the Spanish Empire rigth now. Hopefully we'll some day have some Latinos to add there.

After this much meddling with the folders, I'll leave to you guys to decide wether to let the Benelux have their own folder or if they should join Spain and Romano.

Now here is my only current problem: Neither Bulgaria, Romania or Moldova are Mediterranean countries (Croatia, on the other hand, is), what are they doing in the Istanbul not Constantinople sheet!? It doesn't make any sense. (BTW, interestingly enough Monaco is a Mediterranean country, so the other option was moving her there, but is not really important now).

Oh, that. I've understood the "Istanbul Not Constantinople" is a sheet for countries that used to be under the rule or strong influence of the Ottoman Empire (hence the name). This means the South-Eastern Europe (Balkans region), the Near East and the eastern North Africa. Romania and Moldova have been added to this sheet because of their history dominated by their struggle for independence from the Ottomans (and Hungary and Austria). Notice that Bulgaria isn't Mediterranean either, and yet he undoubtly belongs to this sheet.

The western Mediterranen (including Monaco) is a world of it's own, as the kingdom of Spain and the Ottoman Empire used to be rivals, fighting for the control of the Mediterranean Sea.

But yeah, I understand the pain of deciding whether to divide the countries by their geographical location (which would be easier) or by their historic connections (which is more relevant for their "relationships" in Hetalia.) If it was up to me, we'd re-organaize this whole mess into nice little sheets "Western Europe", "Central Europe", "Eastern Europe", "Eastern Asia", "Southern Asia", "Oceania", "The Americas" etc etc.

So if you want to succest we collect all the Mediterraneans into one sheet, I'm all ready for it.

Another second thought: could we really do it? Re-organize them by cold, hard geography? (I don't ecpect this to be a popular idea.)

Well, in some level I think that Asia is a big mess as well. The think is we should think how to fix the Istanbul not Constantinople sheet for now at least because, no mater what we decide to do, we can't predict what Hima will do! I'm still thinking what the hell we're going to try if he decides to introduce a bunch of new African nations. Or Antarctica! He's unpredictable.

What do you want to do about it? I've thought it fills its function of collecting together characters who interact a lot in the canon, who are historically connected and who otherwise wouldn't have any logical place to be put into (Bulgaria for example.) But people have went along with my messing with the sections, so I'll go with you here. What kind of sections you think would work better?

As for the new nations, I'd worry about it when they come. We can never tell what Hima-papa is about to design the next, and judging from his latest projects they're just as likely to be something like the mochis, cats and nyotalia girls as actual countries we're waiting for... If he does introduce more Africans, we can simply create a new "Africa" section and take Cameroon out of the British empire (where he really is out of place anyway) along with Seychelles.

I will be glad to help, but somehow I feel my precarious English would fell short for such task. Should we take this to the forums?

Okay, to the forums. And don't worry about your English, I'm not a native speaker either.

What's wrong with that? It's a rather famous quote by Voltaire.

I agree that some countries don't belong there, though (Hungary, Spain, the Italies, etc.).

It doesn't make much sense to break up Austria and Hungary. If she is taken out, though, she should be out in Istanbul not Constantinople.

Hungary was never part of the Holy Roman Empire, and the Ottoman occupation lasted for only ~160 years (when the country was split in three, anyway). Other than that geographically and politically the country is pretty far from Greece and Turkey (never mind Egypt), and is not part of the Balkans either.

Spain, Italy bros and Hungary being there is obviously because of the relationship between the Holy Roman Empire and the House of Habsburgs. The question still stands though, of exactly where she should be placed if not there. The Useful Notes for Hungary shows nothing but relations with those two groups, unless you count early interaction with the Mongol Empire and I'm pretty sure putting her with the Asians makes far less sense than with either of her neighbors.

Actually, come to think of it, if she (and Austria and Bulgaria and Romano) was added to the Axis, it would bypass all that.

That may be so (but let's not forget that the Useful Notes offer only a very simplistic view of Hungary's history), but it's still a bit iffy seeing Spain, Hungary and the Italies (at least Romano) in a "Holy Roman Empire" group. The connection between most of these countries is not the HRE but the Habsburgs, but even that is connection is rather loose in some cases (Portugal, S.Italy...).

Hungary's placement wouldn't be decided by something that couldn't be found in a brief overview.

How about if the Spanish Empire gets its own section? That takes Spain, Romano, Netherlands and Belgium out. If not, I'd like to hear some of your ideas.

Placing Hungary, Austria, Prussia, and Romano in the Axis wouldn't work out too well, considering that they're never shown "fighting" alongside Germany, Japan, and Italy. I always just saw this folder as a default for anyone European who wasn't a main character, Slavic, Nordic, or Switzerland.

"Central Europe," maybe (taking out Hungary, Austria, etc. and shoving them in with Swiss and Liech)? But then again, it doesn't make much sense to break up the Habsburgs.

Suggesting breaking up Spain, Romano, Netherlands and Belgium from the HRE section and merge them with Cuba's section AND renaming the page as 'Tomato Family'.

It's a kinda famous pixiv tag anyway. And lonely Cuba is forever alone.

I support taking Spain and Romano out of the HRE section. The Habsburg connection isn't strong enough, as they're completely different cultural and historical entity. In the canon too they're usually shown separated from the Ausria-Hungary-Germany-N.Italy-Prussia family. The central Europeans and the Spanish Empire should be separated. Cuba can be there in the Spanish Empire category with them, waiting for the Latin Americans.

Now where should we put Monaco?

(Though the whole category system is rather out-dated. It made sense when there were less characters. If we would start building this page from the scratch, I'd arrange them geo-politically.)

OH GOD PLESE DON'T KILL ME!!

Okay, so as nobody protested to the idea, nor did anything about it, I moved Spain, South Italy and Cuba into a new the Spanish Empire folder, wishfully hoping for Latin American characters to add there, or perhaps even Philippines.

I also took Monaco out of the HRE family, as she has zero interaction with any of them and has nothing do with them anyway. However, I had real troubles trying to figure out where she belongs. Logically she should go with France, but as the policy seems to be the Axis and the Allies folders are only for the classic Power Trio and the Five Man Band, I ended up putting her with the micronations. Technically she shouldn't really be there, as she's an acknowledged independent nation, but at least she's tiny and has intracted with them. Feel absolutely free to make other conclusions.

...I won't tell you, then.

Just For Pun. That bothered me, too. Does anyone have any suggestions?

THE LAND FROM WERE THE SUN RISES?

(I'm really, really bad at this...)

^ It will only apply to Japan and MAYBE the whole Southeast Asia since they were practically his colonies in WWII. But Japan went to Axis and IMO we should preserve ASEAN SENSASEAN for, well, ASEAN. Or maybe we can split Vietnam and Thailand now from the main Asia section and gave it that name, since as far as official pictures go they both are not in "China's big whole screwed up family".

But adding to your suggestion (because I'm totally original) : The Family Where The Sun Sets Upon?

Yes, I see what you're saying.

Perhaps if we go with something along the lines of "The Far East" or "The orient" but I won't even dear to suggest a pun, because I'm just that way.

Maybe should I go ask the crazy guys in CAPTALIA for re-name suggestions? (or, you know... the actual TV Tropes forum)

@Black Sun

Don't forget, there's already Cuba's section ("The Empire On Which The Sun Sets In A Few Hours"), so we might want to get something that's entirely distinct.

I liked "ASEAN SENSASEAN," though, and I agree that Thailand-Vietnam should probably get their own section (despite how depressingly empty that section would be) named that.

Got nothing on rename suggestions for the East Asia page, though.

Totally out of topic, Cuba's section bugs me too. A whole page for just a character that is not even remotely popular in the fandom? (no offense for Cubans out there that I know MUST be pretty patriotic)

In topic, we have one whole page for Swiss and Liech already (True Neutral), and Thailand has shown up a lot in recent strip so the page is prone to fill up sooner or latter.

Btw, seconding suggestion to ask CAPTALIANS, or TV Tropes forum in Geography section. Just not me, since I'm a total lurker for both.

Well actually is because that page is were the former Spanish Empire would be if, you know, they get characters. And is a bit unfair putting Cuba with "Those Who Do Not Seem To Fit Anywhere". The guy actually have a lot of dialogged and more appearance than say, Taiwan or Thailand and definitely more than TRNC, Australia or Vietnam so I don't see were else we could move him anyway.

For example we're still waiting for the damn official design of Luxembourg to move all the BENELUX to his own section and made "Neither Holy Nor Roman Nor An Empire" a little bit shorter.

So if I got the okey, consensus and all, I'll go to either CAPTALIA or the forums to ask about the re-name ideas, so someone just gimme the okey to go.

Hm, moved them to the YMMV tag to solve it.

Sorry, but I'm afraid you can't do that.

I haven't heard about any new human names either, especially not genderbent names... Edited the entry to weed them out.

Thanks for going ahead with that. :)

They were names that were posted by Himaruya as suggestions. But they aren't official.

That was a threat during a war long in their past. Over the course of the stories he actually notices Sealand and cares enough to warn him to not try to become a nation, and he also puts up with Poland. (Who is begining to be a bit less self-centered)

bBut I get your point

He is very kind, in fact - just very competent in a fight.

I've made some as per requested...

• Australia, has a chibi sketch and I'm really hoping Himayura will update colored version in the future... maybe. For now I put up a fanmade version, they will be deleted when the official coloring goes out.
• I add Taiwan and Thailand and re-upload Belgium and Netherlands with the Art Stella artwork. Now added Vietnam and Macau as well.

IMO let's worry about that when they get characters...