Talk:Party member

Since I do not have Paper Mario I do not know all the partners. Someone please add them. And I don't really remember Luigi's partners...if you remember them add them.

Should Geno and Mallow be here? Also what about characters like Punio and Flavio who also join Mario's group? -- Sir Grodus

Punio and Flavio did not help Mario a lot, since they quickly got off the group (except for the Punies who helped Mario for almost the whole chapter). Geno and Mallow are in.

Only
This article is only for the partners in the RPG series. Howevfer if you think it should be for partners in other games talk about it here.
 * My bad. But I do think it should mention stuff outside RPGs


 * Yeah add something like "Mario also gets partners in this game" Allies is the word for partners in other games.

Bulls
I'd like to replace bulls with 16x16 images of partners.

Super Paper Mario: Squirps
Should Squirps be counted as a partner? He has an useful ability that the player can use in Chapter 4. I wonder if he count as a partner. Maybe?


 * Squirps appears to be a temporary partner, and he is not a Pixl. I don't think he belongs here, but he can be briefly mentioned. 21:51, 12 March 2013 (EDT)

Necessary?
Is it? This seems like a gussied up list that contains characters that bear very little relation to each other. Maybe this article is necessary, but I think we'll have to trim down on this one. 17:49, 28 October 2016 (EDT)
 * This page should talk about the partner characters only in the first two Paper Mario games, because when people use this terminology, that's what they are referring to. In addition, the Pixls already have their own subsection of list of them in their own Pixl article. 17:55, 28 October 2016 (EDT)

Why the other games have partners too.
I have just undone a revision by YFJ, thus re-adding the partners in SPM, SS, CS, M&L, and the main series. I did so because I believe that the various characters in this game should come under the label "partner."

Based on the opening paragraph of the current article, I would say a partner counts as any character who follows Mario for a considerable proportion of the game in order to help him. Therefore, for instance, Starlow from BIS (haven't played DT or PJ) counts because she follows Mario, Luigi, and Bowser throughout the game and is presented as a protagonist. However, Punio from TTYD does not count because he only joins Mario for part of Chapter 2.

Ergo, SMRPG, PM64, and TTYD are not the only games which have partners imo, which is why I undid the trimming, but I would be willing to discuss it here if anyone still feels that the article deserves to have only characters from those games.

I will, however, bring back some of YFJ's edits such as moving Luigi's partners to the trivia. I feel tempted to remove things such as "stack of toads" but I have not yet played Sticker Star so I won't do that without the approval of someone who has. MiracleDinner (talk) 13:56, September 1, 2019 (EDT)
 * Partners are referring to the gimmick from the early Paper Mario games: members next to Mario which have specific abilities, take damage in a unique way, can't be koed, and can be swapped out mid-battle. The introduction paragraph should be rewrote to reflect this, and we should not include the Super Mario RPG characters as they are every day party members. Any other character is just an ally. 14:30, September 1, 2019 (EDT)
 * OK I can understand that but I don't think that the list of allies page is a suitable substitute for Kersti, Starlow, Huey, Tippi, etc. since it is much too long and even includes characters such as Bestovius who only meet Mario once and very briefly. MiracleDinner (talk) 14:57, September 1, 2019 (EDT)
 * Any allies should go on that page, regardless of their influence on the game. And the list being too long is not a good excuse to not put them there. 15:00, September 1, 2019 (EDT)
 * Could we at least split that page into sections (Major e.g. Huey, Medium e.g. Flint Cragley, Minor e.g. Darkly)? Or have bold font for allies which accompany the player throughout the game?MiracleDinner (talk) 03:22, September 2, 2019 (EDT)
 * Actually, it turns out that more or less all of the characters who I restored yesterday are already on the list of allies page, but I still think there should be some list on this wiki of all of Mario's major companions, or to differentiate the list of allies page in some way based on the significance of those allies. MiracleDinner (talk) 08:43, September 2, 2019 (EDT)

Clean up this article
To settle the above discussions, I'm making this proposal. "Partner" refers to the party mechanic in the first two Paper Mario games, but this page is an awkwardly-written mess that reads like a generic list of allies with no clear indication as to what qualifies and what doesn't. It should either be trimmed to be specifically about the partner mechanic unique to the first two Paper Mario games or about RPG party members in general.

About other games:
 * Super Mario RPG: This game has a more traditional party mechanic with 3 active members similar to the Final Fantasy series. Mario is the only character that cannot be swapped out.
 * Mario & Luigi series: These games generally have fixed parties, with the only variation being that the characters sometimes split up, like Mario and Luigi in Superstar Saga, the adults and the babies in Partners in Time, or switching between the Mario Bros. and Bowser's perspectives in Inside Story. Characters like Stuffwell and Starlow are just helper/tutorial characters that don't actually fight for the most part (though Starlow helps the Mario Bros. dodge a couple of attacks in Inside Story).
 * Super Paper Mario: Pixls' abilities function similarly to partners' field abilities (Boomer is basically the same thing as Bombette/Bobbery), but Pixls have their own article. Mario, Peach, Bowser, and Luigi also function as a party of sorts, since you can switch between them at any time.
 * Paper Mario: Sticker Star and Color Splash: These games don't have parties, just Tippi-like characters in the form of Kersti and Huey. The sections for these games on this article however, feel the need to to list anyone who follows Mario for even 2 minutes, like "Green Toad", even though the Thousand-Year Door section makes no mention of Flavio. Consistency? What's that?
 * Paper Mario: The Origami King: This game has temporary allies that assist Mario in battle. The ally characters only have one attack and are AI controlled. They are usually exclusive to specific streamer districts (e.g. Professor Toad only accompanies Mario in the yellow streamer district).
 * Super Mario series: These aren't even RPGs, yet there's a section for them. It also confusingly lists both playable characters like the Yellow and Blue Toads alongside companion characters like F.L.U.D.D. and Cappy. The Lakitu Bros. are also there, just to make it even more confusing. Even worse, it's just a bare bones list with no descriptions whatsoever. Whether or not we need a list of Mario's companions separate from list of allies, this is absolutely the wrong way to do it.

If we go with the first option (PM and TTYD partners only), other games' party mechanics can be mentioned in passing but will not have entire sections dedicated to them.

EDIT: If we go with the second option (general RPG party member article), this will need a rename, since I'm pretty sure the term "partner" is exclusive to Thousand-Year Door (the first game uses "Party Member"). Also, TTYD goes back and forth between using "partner" and "ally" in badge descriptions.

Proposer: Deadline: September 12, 2021, 23:59 GMT

Make this article about the partner mechanic in the first two Paper Mario games

 * 1) Per proposal.
 * 2) Per proposal. I don't really count M&L's as real "partners", and I see SMRPG as more "permanent party members". TOK's psuedo-partners don't really feel like the same thing to me, and we don't have articles for their attacks.
 * 3) Per proposal.

Make this article about RPG party members in general

 * 1) Per proposal.
 * 2) Per proposal. The RPG games still used partners in the sense that they accompany Mario and help him in battle and/or in the overworld like with the pixls or with Mallow and Geno. Even the "tattle" partners from the modern games had some sort of influence in battle(Starlow helped with Luiginary Works and initiating Giant Luigi, Kersti lets Mario use the battle spin and is used to strengthen Mario at the end, Huey is needed to beat Bowser and provides Mario with paint, and Olivia is needed for the Vellumental attacks). I'm a bit unsure about the Temporary partners though given how much their importance varies.
 * 3) The Pixls still work in a similar way to the partners overworld moves in the first two games, Super Mario RPG also does it a similar way for battle, and Origami King's battle allies seems to be the series' modern take on this.
 * 4) Per all. I don't see strong distinguishing between general RPG party members and the ones in Paper Mario (aside purely because of Paper Mario's gameplay style), and I think an all encompassing article about the various allies in RPG games would suffice, as even TTYD, the game to exclusively use the term "partner", is inconsistent with it. The article should absolutely be renamed to "party member" though, where TTYD mentions they're called "partners" (it technically is used in PM64 as well, but it interchanges with "friend" and "buddy" too; party member is the only sticking term, and it's stylized as a proper noun too) and it redirects to there.
 * 5) Per all.

Comments
If we're going to make this article about RPG party members, then it should just be renamed to Party Member or something alike rather than partner, which is specific to only to TTYD and beyond iirc. I do think if the decision was to retool into just Paper Mario content, then I think we should also make an article about Party Members generally speaking. I do support getting rid of the platformer content and the guide characters such as Kersti and Starlow though. 21:05, August 28, 2021 (EDT)
 * I actually don't think any game other than TTYD uses "partner", so yes, a rename would be necessary. If we have a general party member article then I don't think the early PM content needs to be split from it, since the terminology isn't even consistent between those two games. 21:19, August 28, 2021 (EDT)

Also I must ask why exactly is Mario is listed as a partner here in the first place seeing as he's the main protagonist? Somethingone (talk) 22:16, August 28, 2021 (EDT)
 * I have no clue. It just seems like not a whole lot of thought was put into what it was actually supposed to cover, and it just got more unfocused and over-inclusive over time (the Super Mario content wasn't added until December of 2018). This proposal will hopefully fix that. 21:32, August 29, 2021 (EDT)