ai-writing-tropes

Category: Content & Multimedia | Uploader: joshuadavidthomas | Downloads: 0 | Version: v1.0（Latest）

Detect and eliminate common AI writing tropes from prose. Use when drafting, editing, or reviewing text to avoid the predictable patterns that mark AI-generated writing.

Changelog: Source: GitHub https://github.com/joshuadavidthomas/agentkit

Directory Structure

Current level: tree/main/skills/ai-writing-tropes/

📁 references/
- 📄 composition.md 3.6 KB
- 📄 formatting.md 1.4 KB
- 📄 paragraph-structure.md 1.3 KB
- 📄 sentence-structure.md 4.2 KB
- 📄 tone.md 4.3 KB
- 📄 word-choice.md 2.0 KB
📄 LICENSE 1003 B
📄 SKILL.md 2.9 KB

SKILL.md

---
name: ai-writing-tropes
description: Detect and eliminate common AI writing tropes from prose. Use when drafting, editing, or reviewing text to avoid the predictable patterns that mark AI-generated writing.
metadata:
  trigger: Writing prose, editing drafts, reviewing content for AI tells, or when user mentions "tropes", "AI patterns", "slop", or "tropes.fyi"
  author: tropes.fyi
---

# AI Writing Tropes to Avoid

Comprehensive catalog of AI writing patterns that make text feel machine-generated. Any single pattern used once might be fine. The problem is when multiple tropes appear together or when one trope repeats throughout a piece.

## How to Use

When writing or editing prose:

1. Draft the content.
2. Check against the trope categories below.
3. If you spot a pattern, rewrite that passage.
4. Re-read the whole piece for pattern density — a few is tolerable, a cluster is not.

## Trope Categories

### Word Choice

Overused vocabulary and phrasing that AI defaults to. See [references/word-choice.md](references/word-choice.md).

Key offenders: "quietly", "delve", "tapestry", "landscape", "serves as", "leverage", "robust", "harness", "streamline".

### Sentence Structure

Formulaic sentence patterns that no human writes at scale. See [references/sentence-structure.md](references/sentence-structure.md).

Key offenders: negative parallelism ("not X — it's Y"), dramatic countdowns ("Not X. Not Y. Just Z."), self-posed rhetorical questions, anaphora abuse, tricolon abuse, gerund fragment litanies.

### Paragraph Structure

Layout and organization patterns that betray AI generation. See [references/paragraph-structure.md](references/paragraph-structure.md).

Key offenders: short punchy fragments as standalone paragraphs, listicles disguised as prose.

### Tone

Voice and framing habits that sound performative. See [references/tone.md](references/tone.md).

Key offenders: false suspense ("Here's the kicker"), patronizing analogies ("Think of it as..."), false vulnerability, stakes inflation, vague attributions, invented concept labels.

### Formatting

Visual and typographic tells. See [references/formatting.md](references/formatting.md).

Key offenders: em-dash addiction, bold-first bullets, unicode decoration.

### Composition

Document-level structural problems. See [references/composition.md](references/composition.md).

Key offenders: fractal summaries, dead metaphors beaten into the ground, historical analogy stacking, one-point dilution, signposted conclusions.

## Quick Self-Check

Before delivering prose, ask:

- Did I use the same sentence structure more than twice in a row?
- Did I use "not X — it's Y" or "Here's the thing" anywhere?
- Did I stack three or more historical examples back-to-back?
- Did I inflate the stakes beyond what the content warrants?
- Would a human actually write a first draft this way?
- Does any passage sound like it belongs on a motivational poster?

## The One Rule

Write like a human: varied, imperfect, specific.

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