Vitriolic Best Buds/Playing With

Basic Trope: Two best friends fighting, but still care for each other.

• Straight: Steve and Pete are best friends despite the fact that they constantly insult and berate each other.
• Exaggerated: Steve and Pete are inseparable, despite the fact that they're always trying to kill each other.
  • With Friends Like These...
• Justified: Steve and Pete are always making creative insults to one another, but only because they both know the other one won't get offended, allowing them to make insults as creative as possible.
  • Steve really does care about Pete, but is too proud to admit it, or thinks that friendship causes Badass Decay.
• Inverted: Friendly Enemy
• Subverted: Despite his usual nature, Steve is nice to Pete whenever they're together
• Double Subverted: For a month. After that, he's up to his old tricks, yet Pete loves him like a brother anyway.
• Parodied: Steve and Pete hate each others' guts. Everyone around them interprets this as a sign of how close they are.
• Deconstructed: Steve and Pete start off as friends but their continuous fighting and mutual abuse eventually drives them apart.
• Reconstructed: Steve and Pete are friends who go through rough periods of bitterness and anger, but this only reinforces their appreciation for one another, since they know they can be totally and completely honest with one another.
• Zig Zagged: Steve and Pete start out insulting each other, but end up starting to genuinely care for one another, which causes them to insult each other even more.
  • Steve begins their relationship by insulting and taunting Pete whenever he gets the chance, but eventually becomes friends with him for real. He continues to insult Pete, but Pete is not offended since he knows that Steve doesn't mean it.
• Averted: Steve and Pete are never berating each other.
• Enforced: "Let's make these characters different from your average goody-goody bunch of friends. Hey! What if they act like they hate each other?"
• Lampshaded: "How can two people who insult each other so much be so friendly?"
• Invoked: Steve is an unrepentant Deadpan Snarker. Friends are no exception.
• Exploited: Steve and Pete are captured by villains. They start arguing and fighting to distract the guards, and then beat up the guards. (They may or may not continue to bicker while beatsing up the guards.)
• Defied: Steve and Pete decide to always be nice to each other, despite their differing natures and actions towards those around them.
• Discussed: "Why does Steve and Pete insult each other like that?" "Oh, they're just being Steve and Pete."
• Conversed: "You think Steve and Pete would be nicer to each other, as inseparable as they are."

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Just go back to Vitriolic Best Buds, you little moron. ...You know I don't mean that, right?