Discussion Superboss / RolePlayingGames

Is the boss required to finish whatever storyline is present?

No?

Then it's a superboss.

Like, here's the three cases that I have in mind:

• In Dark Souls I, the Artorias of the Abyss DLC (bundled afterwards in the Prepare to Die and Remastered editions) features four bosses in the areas visited. Three are mandatory for finishing that DLC's questline. I'd personally count the fourth one as a true superboss since everything else does advance the narrative, but I can also see why some people would count the others, in spite that you originally had to actively opt in (and put your own money) to experience them along the rest of the DLC's content.
• In Blasphemous, there's been three free "DLC" updates. The first one added five bosses (the Amanecidas) exclusive to NG+, and while they do form a part of a parallel storyline, I can see why they'd be considered superbosses. But the third "DLC" one really fuzzies things: there's two bosses (Isidora and Sierpes) which are needed for the "true ending" route, but which otherwise give you nothing. Are these Schrodinger's Super Boss?
• Hollow Knight. The game and it's first three "DLC" packs had plenty of completely optional bosses, several of which could be nominated for superboss category due to their difficulty (one of them falls into the previous category of "is part of an extra major questline", but probably in the same ballfield as others). There was a base ending and two advanced ones, but even those kept a good chunk of all bosses optional. But the final DLC throws in a screwball: now there's only a handful of bosses you don't need to defeat in the overworld to grab the two new endings. Actually getting this ending is an absolute masochist's chore, but it's technically an ending with its own attached storyline. Do we retroactively not count the superbosses that had been categorized before? Do we only count the one which isn't obligatory for the ending?

Is that battle optional? If so, do you have to do something, maybe a series of steps or meeting a steep condition, to unlock it? Is ihe battle intended to be more challenging than the Final Boss fight? If the answer to these questions is yes, then it can be added. If it's only yes for the first two, then it fits better under Optional Boss. If it's only yes to the first one, then it's Skippable Boss,

Well, you have to collect Arceus' plates in order to fight him (he has the dread plate, which he'll give to the player after you defeat him). So yeah, it's probably yes.

Then go ahead and add him. =)

I had made those question because I never played Arceus (or any Pokémon game) and thus didn't know the context about Volo, but I wanted to help you with this regaedless.

If they're indeed superbosses, then go ahead and add them.

OK, but what kind of cleanup? If it's whether or not an example fits the trope, there's the "Is this an example?" thread in the forums so you can bring it to the tropers lurking there for feedback. If it's what you call "Zero-Effort Example" (the real name, by the way, is Zero-Context Example), then any entry that has little or no context has to be made invisible by adding percent markups, not deleting them ourtight like you did beforehand. Also, do note that many of the entries you removed did have context and did explain why they fit the trope.

Lastly, this trope was already brought to TRS for definition issues and misuse, and many of the problem have since been fixed. Therefore, and as it currently stands, I don't think a massive cleanup is in order.

Dude, you deleted several valid examples. Was this massive "cleanup" backed up by consensus?

Yeah, that was a very large edit that you did, and you borked the markup for the page as well.

Large edits like this need to have some sort of consensus, and it doesn't appear that you got any.

Oh, uh...sorry. I guess I was probably a bit reckless with some of it, yeah, even if I think we can agree a cleanup was needed.

Deleting valid examples (and with context) like those of Etrian Odyssey, Sands of Destruction, Tales Of and Wild Arms, just to name a few, isn't doing cleanup. And it's definitely not an act of "being a bit reckless". It appears like you aren't familiar with these works and just assumed they didn't fit the trope. For cases like this, we have the "Is this an example?" thread in the forums. And for pages with multiple questionable examples, we have dedicated cleanup threads.

You misunderstood that. I didn't delete them because of them not counting, but because of them being a Zero Effort Example. I outright said people could (and probably should) re-add them with the adequate detail.

You did mention in your edit reasons about removing examples that were "just about optional bosses" (many of the removed examples, such as those of Etrian Odyssey, were actually hidden superbosses, so they weren't just optional). And like I mentioned in my opening post, ZCE entries have to be commented out (i.e. made invisible to the reader) instead of simply cut.

Also, restoring so many examples isn't trivial since the page's organization was heavily changed with your unwanted edits. And it's just inconsiderate on your part to just tell us "add them back if you want, lol" when it's a mistake you could have avoided.