Wanting Is Better Than Having/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Basic Trope: A character doggedly pursues a goal, only to realize after achieving it that the pursuit was better than the result.

  • Straight: After ten years of effort, Bob finally wins the glittery "Troper of the Year" award, only to be disappointed when he discovers the trophy is a cheap plastic toy.
  • Exaggerated: After discovering the trophy is a cheap plastic toy, Bob goes on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge.
    • Or, after Bob travels 500 miles for the award ceremony, he doesn't attend. The journey was its own reward.
  • Justified: Bob has previously only seen the trophy in a faded photograph, and misidentified its make and quality.
  • Inverted: Previous "Troper of the Year" trophies have been cheap plastic toys, but the year Bob wins happens to be when it gets upgraded to a massive gold-plated prize.
  • Subverted: After discovering the trophy is actually a cheap plastic toy, Bob realizes how shallow his pursuit of material worth was, and grows as a person.
    • After discovering the trophy is a cheap plastic toy, Bob becomes ecstatic.
  • Double Subverted: Bob's "emotional growth" was actually a facade and the first step of his mental breakdown.
  • Parodied: ???
  • Deconstructed: After discovering the trophy is actually a cheap plastic toy, Bob falls into a depressed funk when he thinks about all the time and effort he wasted trying to win it.
  • Reconstructed: Alice proceeds to snap Bob out of the funk by informing him that even if the trophy's just a cheap plastic toy, he's also won the respect of many other tropers by winning it, and that that respect is worth more than any golden trophy.
  • Zig Zagged: ???
  • Averted: There is no "Troper of the Year" award or trophy.
  • Enforced: Bob is the Butt Monkey in the show, and deflating his unrealistic expectations is a normal occurrence.
  • Lampshaded: Alice comments to Bob that none of the awards she's won ever lived up to her expectations.
  • Invoked: Alice, a previous award winner, deliberately overexaggerates the prize to give Bob unrealistic expectations.
  • Defied: Alice warns Bob ahead of time that the "Troper of the Year" award is no big deal.
  • Discussed: "Bob, your expectations for that award are so ridiculously high, you're bound to be disappointed when you finally win it."
  • Conversed: "It's always fun watching Bob's expectations get deflated on this show."

Back to Wanting Is Better Than Having

Retrieved from "https://allthetropes.org/wiki/Wanting_Is_Better_Than_Having/Playing_With?oldid=52574"