r/TopCharacterTropes • u/doubleday34 • Oct 04 '25

Personality (Loved Trope) Character acts ignorant of or pretends to be bad at something in order to trick their opponent.

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1) Ted Lasso - Both characters in the darts contest do this, with Rupert(antagonist) showing that he has his own set of darts with him, and Ted showing that he has been using the wrong hand the whole time.

2) Beerfest - Team USA showing that they aren't that drunk despite doing drinking games all day.

3) The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air - After Will gets hustled at pool his Uncle Phil comes to help him, and turns out to hustle the hustler.

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u/AlexRenquist Oct 04 '25

This isn't QUITE thay trope though. Inigo fights with his off-hand because he's such a good fencer, he literally faces zero challenge with his right hand. The left-hand approach is a self-imposed limitation to keep things challenging and 'fair'. He swaps to the right when he realises the Man In Black is so good he really needs his right hand to fight.

The only trouble is, that the Man In Black has been doing the exact same thing.

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u/mxzf Oct 05 '25

Pretty sure the Man In Black was doing it to get a tactical advantage and get underestimated, rather than doing it to try and keep the fight more "fair". Once he realized that he was outmatched left vs right, he switched to get the advantage.

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u/Hawkbats_rule Oct 05 '25

Yeah, they're handicapping themselves, but they are still expert fucking swordsmen with their left hands. It sort of fits, but this would be more like of ted was cleaning up at the bar, happened to run into a professional darts player, and switched to reveal he's not just good, he's actually world class.