Line #1 Fanfic/GameOfTheAncients


1	''Game of the Ancients'' is an ongoing FanFic series by Creator/MasterGhandalf, set in the ''TabletopGame/{{Eberron}}'' setting for ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons''.
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3	Captain Len of the Wandering Blades is a mercenary down on her luck, in desperate need of funds. When a young woman named Thyra Entarro promises to pay well for a seemingly-routine job, it seems like just the lucky break she needs. But things are never that simple. Thyra has secrets of her own -- dangerous secrets. Secrets which might just explain why a Silver Flame inquisitor seems determined to hunt her down, by any means necessary. The item the mercenaries were hired to acquire turns out to be a map in the possession of a notorious Karrn warlord with ties to Khorvaire's most infamous terrorist organization, the Order of the Emerald Claw -- and he, and his necromancer ally, have their own plans for the AncientArtifact they think the map will lead them to. An artifact that, of course, lies buried in the most dangerous place on the continent. And if that wasn't bad enough, the real danger might not come from the Emerald Claw but the mysterious forces that watch and wait from the shadows, determined to reclaim a world that was once theirs. So all in all, [[SarcasmMode just another typical day]].
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5	And that's only where things ''start''...
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7	The series is plotted to take place over five stories, of which one is currently complete and another is ongoing.
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9	#''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/1293652/chapters/2683129 Game of the Ancients Part I: Khorvaire]]
10	#''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/10565145/chapters/23342292 Game of the Anceints Part II: Sarlona]]
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12	Further fics are planned to take the heroes to, in order, Xen'drik, Argonessen, and Aerenal.
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14	----
15
16	!!''Game of the Ancients'' contains examples of:
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18	* ActionGirl: Several. Len and Yhani and Valyria are the most prominent.
19	* AffablyEvil: [[spoiler: Tarazanthan]] is a rather easygoing, avuncular sort, for a millennia-old apocalyptic demon.
20	* AncientConspiracy: The Lords of Dust are a millennia-old demonic conspiracy centered around manipulating the Draconic Prophecy to gain power and release [[SealedEvilInACan the Overlords]]. They spend most of the fic lurking in the background [[spoiler: but, as is eventually revealed, are the whole reason the plot is even happening]].
21	* BecauseDestinySaysSo: Zig-zagged, this being Eberron. The Draconic Prophecy is a vastly complicated foretelling that various factions use to guide their plotting, but because it's less a single prophecy and more a vast web of if-then scenarios, it can be actively manipulated to force the outcome you want. This is what organizations like the Lords of Dust ''do'' [[spoiler: and bringing about a specific chain of events is what Durastoran is ultimately trying to do, going back as far as making sure Thyra's bloodline even ''exists'']].
22	* BigBadEnsemble: There are various antagonistic forces arrayed against the protagonists, but they mostly tie back to two ultimate string-pullers - [[OurLichesAreDifferent Erandis Vol]] and [[spoiler: Durastoran the Wyrmbreaker]]. Their goals are [[EvilVsEvil mutually incompatible]].
23	* BigBadWannabe: The Inspired general Inharanath in Part II thinks he's stumbled onto a major plot against Riedra, courtesy of our heroes, and has dedicated all his might to nipping it in the bud. That he's incidental to what's ''actually'' going on and completely ignorant of the deeper machinations at play is something he hasn't even considered - not that it makes him any less of a threat.
24	* BigGood: Taras Zanthan, professor of mythology at Morgrave University, who is Thyra's financial backer and mentor, and eventually hires the Wandering Blades to find the Key before the Lords of Dust do. [[spoiler: Except not really; he actually ''is'' a Lord of Dust himself, and is manipulating everyone for his own ends]].
25	* BlackKnight: Kharvin ir'Sarrin is a ruthless warlord and agent of the Emerald Claw who is nonetheless not without his own sense of honor, who wears heavy armor and rides a black warhorse.
26	* CatsAreMean: The Lords of Dust, one of the main antagonistic factions, are chiefly composed of rakshasas - immortal demons which resemble anthropomorphic tigers in their true forms.
27	* CharacterAlignment: In-universe, as it ''is'' D and D. It's not stated in the text, but all of the main characters have them:
28	** Len is NeutralGood
29	** Yhani is LawfulGood
30	** Ghazaan is NeutralGood
31	** Havaktri is LawfulGood
32	** Rinnean is ChaoticNeutral
33	** Harsk is ChaoticGood
34	** Thyra really ''wants'' to be LawfulGood, but on most days averages closer to TrueNeutral
35	** Valyria is LawfulGood
36	** Pitar is LawfulGood
37	** Kharvin is LawfulEvil
38	** Irinali is NeutralEvil
39	** Taras is [[spoiler: LawfulEvil]]
40	** Inharanath is LawfulEvil
41	** Shaikatari is LawfulNeutral
42	* TheChessmaster: The Lords of Dust play a very mean, very long game [[spoiler: especially Durastoran and his minion Tarazanthan, whose scheming behind the scenes is responsible for most of the overarching plot]].
43	* CloudCuckooLander: Havaktri has a mild case. She's a little... ''odd'' (part of it is the generally alien perspective she has as a kalashtar; part of it is that she grew up in an isolated monastic community and her people skills are pretty much nil). Of course she's also [[BewareTheSillyOnes a very capable psion]].
44	* DarkAndTroubledPast: Len's history before she joined the Brelish army isn't something she talks about with anyone, even Yhani, but it was clearly nothing good.
45	* DemonLordsAndArchDevils: The Lords of Dust are an organization composed chiefly of extremely powerful and evil fiendish creatures. They in turn serve the even worse [[GodOfEvil Overlords]].
46	* DressingAsTheEnemy: Part II involves the Wandering Blades disguising themselves to sneak through Riedra, with Havaktri providing cover for the rest by pretending to be a high-ranking Empty Vessel.
47	* EeriePaleSkinnedBrunette: Fittingly for a necromancer, Irinali has chalky-white skin and jet-black hair. [[JustifiedTrope She likes the look and achieves it, in part, via makeup]].
48	* TheEmpire: Riedra, which is mentioned in Part I and actually visited in Part II.
49	* EveryoneHasStandards: Rinnean doesn't have a lot of morals, but he does have some [[spoiler: and he fell out with his House when they wanted him to cross a line he wasn't willing to. Apparently it involved killing children]].
50	* EvilGloating: The rakshasa fought at the climax of Part I indulges in this, explaining just how he's manipulated Thyra. [[spoiler: So as to better manipulate her ''now'', of course. And he doesn't tell everything...]]
51	* EvilSorcerer: Irinali is a necromancer who happily works for a notorious terrorist organization in order to increase her arcane power; goes with the territory.
52	* EvilVsEvil: Kharvin and Irinali fight it out with a rakshasa and his minions over a piece of the Key at the climax of Part I. More broadly, the Emerald Claw and the Lords of Dust are the fics' two biggest antagonist factions, and their goals are mutually exclusive. Part II adds the Inspired into the mix.
53	* GameplayAndStoryIntegration: Though ''Game of the Ancients'' isn't based on an actual game, all of the main characters have been roughly statted out (using ''TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}}'' rules) to fit with what they're actually capable of in the text.
54	* GeneticMemory: As a kalashtar, Havaktri gets this instead of regular dreams. Apparently they're not as helpful as one might think, mostly due to coming through garbled.
55	* TheGoodCaptain: Len was a captain in the Brelish army before being discharged, and she continues to use the title as the leader of the Wandering Blades. Though she can be a bit rough around the edges, she genuinely tries to do right by her people to the best of her abilities.
56	* TheGoodTheBadAndTheEvil: The three main factions in the fic fall here - Thyra, Len and company are the good, the Emerald Claw are the bad, and the Lords of Dust are the evil [[spoiler: albeit making use of the other two]]. As of Part II, the Inspired fall somewhere between the "bad" and the "evil" parts of the spectrum.
57	* GreaterScopeVillain: [[spoiler: Bel Shalor, the Shadow in the Flame, the imprisoned rakshasa Overlord Durastoran and Tarazanthan serve and seek to free]].
58	* GuysSmashGirlsShoot: Played straight by Kharvin and Irinali, as he's a melee fighter while she's a spellcaster. Inverted with Inharanath and Shaikatari in Part II; he's a psion and she's a soulknife[[note]]so a particular kind of melee fighter[[/note]].
59	* HalfIdenticalTwin: Rinnean and his twin sister Vaelynn look enough alike that they can disguise themselves as each other with minimal difficulty, even as adults.
60	* TheHeavy: With the actual Big Bads being mostly off-page, Kharvin and Irinali split the role of being the most visible and personal adversaries.
61	* HeroAntagonist: Valyria and Pitar just want to do the right thing as they see it; unfortunately, this puts them at odds with both the Wandering Blades ''and'' Kharvin and Irinali. [[spoiler: Just as Tarazanthan intended]].
62	* HumanSubspecies: The kalashtar (descended from humans who merged their souls with renegade quori)are represented by Havaktri in Part I and get to play a bigger role in Part II. The second fic also features several Empty Vessels (humans selectively bred to serve as {{willing channeler}}s for the quori of the Dreaming Dark) and one actual Inspired (a vessel currently possessed by a quori).
63	* ImmortalitySeeker: Everyone who follows the Blood of Vol is this by definition, at least in theory, as their religion considers death a grave injustice to be fought against by any means. Kharvin explains the philosophy a bit to Thyra when holding her prisoner.
64	* InSeriesNickname: Len (and ''nobody'' else) calls Yhani "'Hani." Valyria's friends and family call her "Val."
65	* InterspeciesRomance: Len and Yhani. 'Hani's an Aereni elf; Len is [[spoiler: a changeling]].
66	* LadyOfWar: Yhani is an elegant, graceful elven priestess who also knows her way around a scimitar.
67	* MacGuffin: The Key, a relic from the Age of Demons that was [[DismantledMacGuffin scattered in pieces around the world]] and the protagonists ''and'' the Emerald Claw are looking for it. [[spoiler: As per the machinations of the Lords of Dust]].
68	* MagicKnight: A couple of examples:
69	** Len is a formidable swordswoman, and she's also a dabbler in arcane magic who's fully capable of enhancing her skills with the odd fireball. In game terms, she's [[TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}} a magus]].
70	** The rakshasa [[spoiler: Tarazanthan]] is also skilled as both a swordsman and a sorcerer -- it takes the combined efforts of the Wandering Blades ''and'' Valyria and Pitar to put him on the run [[spoiler: and even then, he threw the fight]].
71	* TheMagocracy: Riedra is a variation, being ruled by the Inspired (specially-bred humans possessed by powerful psionic beings) supported by the Empty Vessels or Chosen (aforementioned humans, who tend to be powerful psions in their own right even when not currently possessed).
72	* {{Mordor}}: Two variants:
73	** The Mournland is a desolate, chaotic wasteland that was once the nation of Cyre before a mysterious magical cataclysm devastated it. Unfortunately, it's also where the first part of the MacGuffin happens to be located.
74	** The Demon Wastes are a more conventional barren, volcanic home of ancient evils, glimpsed briefly in Part I's prologue and epilogue as the site of [[spoiler: the Wyrmbreaker]]'s scheming.
75	* MouthOfSauron: The vampire Orrin serves as Erandis Vol's mouthpiece to Kharvin and Irinali in Part II.
76	* MuggleBornOfMages: [[spoiler: Rinnean; he was born to a Dragonmarked House, but unlike his twin sister, he never developed the Mark himself]].
77	* MySpeciesDothProtestTooMuch: Irinali is an Aereni elf. Irinali also ''hates'' Aereni elves, considering her own people to be, by and large, a bunch of arrogant, inflexible, self-righteous hypocrites. There's a reason she lives with humans.
78	* MysticalWhiteHair: Yhani has platinum-blonde hair and is a cleric of the Undying Court who commands potent divine magic and knows a ''lot'' more than she lets on.
79	* NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast: "The Wyrmbreaker" (Dursatoran), "The Shadow in the Flame" (Bel Shalor) and "The Queen of Death" (Erandis Vol) are probably not people you want to mess with.
80	* NayTheist: Kharvin believes in the gods of the Sovereign Host, he just refuses to worship them. Followers of the Blood of Vol view all gods as being cruel demiurges (if they exist at all), and since Kharvin was a follower of the Sovereigns who converted to Vol later in life, this is particularly personal for him.
81	* TheNecrocracy: Played with; the Undying Court, reanimated elven ancestors, don't ''rule'' Aerenal per se, but do guide its overall course and have a great deal of influence over the religious and cultural lives of the Aereni people. However, as Yhani will be quick to remind you, they are animated by ''positive'' energy, rather than negative energy, and therefore are deathless and emphatically ''not'' undead.
82	* NobleDemon: Kharvin is a brutal, ruthless man, but he nonetheless holds himself to certain standards of behavior and is never cruel without reason. Irinali, on the other hand, has no such qualms.
83	* OldSoldier: Kharvin's a grey-bearded man in late middle-age, but don't let it fool you - he's still a force to be recoked with on the battlefield.
84	* OnlyOneName: Len doesn't have a surname. [[spoiler: This is because she's a changeling]]. Neither does Havaktri, but that's because of how kalashtar naming conventions work - her surname is "-vaktri" which is incorporated into her personal name as one word rather than two.
85	* OurLichesAreDifferent: Kharvin and Irinali ultimately get their marching orders from Erandis Vol herself, an extremely old and powerful elf lich.
86	* PathOfInspiration: The TropeNamer puts in an appearance in Part II; we get to see Inharanath (an actual Inspired) and Shaikatari (an Empty Vessel who has thoroughly drunk the Kool-Aid) up close, and Havaktri describes in detail how the con works to the rest of the company.
87	* ProudWarriorRaceGuy: Ghazaan's a hobgoblin and quite proud of his people's warrior heritage, though he's usually [[BruiserWithASoftCenter pretty laid back about it]].
88	* PsychicPowers: Havaktri is a kalashtar, who are naturally telepathic, and she's also a trained psion.
89	* PunchClockVillain: Shaikatari, who serves Inharanath because it's her duty to answer to the Inspired and Riedra rather than any sort of personal malice or ambition.
90	* TheReveal: Several in Part I alone. Thyra is [[spoiler: part rakshasa and desperately trying to find a way to remove her demonic heritage]], Valyria is [[spoiler: Thyra's older sister, and is determined to kill the "demon" she thinks killed Thyra and stole her identity]], Len is [[spoiler: a changeling and only pretends to be human]] and Taras [[spoiler: is actually the rakshasa Tarazanthan and has been playing Thyra like a fiddle all along, in various guises]]. Part II reveals that Rinnean [[spoiler: is a disgraced ex-member of House Thuranni]].
91	* ShapeshifterDefaultForm: [[spoiler: Len's human form serves as this; she only drops it and shows her true face very rarely, and then only to people, like Yhani, she trusts absolutely]].
92	* SpockSpeak: Yhani talks like this, speaking very formally and rarely using contractions. It's partially because Common isn't her native language, and partially because Aereni culture is generally much more formal than that of the Five Nations.
93	* TheStoic: Yhani rarely shows her emotions to a significant degree; this is because she comes from a culture that values a level of reserve much greater than that typically seen in the Five Nations.
94	* SwordAndSorcerer: Kharvin's a warrior, Irinali's a wizard.
95	* TimeAbyss: The Lords of Dust, including [[spoiler: Durastoran and Tarazanthan]] are all hundreds of thousands of years old. The other main BigBad, Erandis Vol, clocks in at a mere two-and-a-half thousand.
96	* UnEqualRites: Irinali, a necromancer, doesn't think much of artificers, finding their art crude and lacking in subtlety.
97	* UnevenHybrid: Thyra has [[spoiler: very distant rakshasa ancestry; not enough to even make her a tiefling, but it does manifest as sorcerer powers. Though it doesn't show in her at all, this does mean that it also applies to Valyria, who is Thyra's full sister; Rinnean takes a fair bit of relish in pointing it out]].
98	* VillainousLineage: Thyra fears that [[spoiler: her rakshsasa heritage]] will doom her to becoming a tool of evil and seeks some means to avert that destiny. [[spoiler: Ironically, Tarazanthan has specifically stoked this fear to make her easier to manipulate]].
99	* VoluntaryShapeshifting:
100	** Changelings [[spoiler: like Len]] can assume a wide variety of forms, though they're limited to the basic humanoid shape.
101	** Rakshasas are also skilled shapeshifters and can pass themselves off as mortals flawlessly at need. [[spoiler: Tarazanthan has been manipulating Thyra throughout her life, in various forms]].
102	* VillainousFriendship: Kharvin and Irinali are very different people, but they understand and respect each others' differing skillsets and make a very effective team; they also enjoy each others' company and Irinali is as loyal to Kharvin as she is capable of feeling that emotion. That said, [[MistakenForRomance while they're sometimes mistaken for lovers, their relationship is strictly platonic]].
103	* WideEyedIdealist: Havaktri is easily the most moral, and most naïve, of the Wandering Blades. Not coincidentally, she's also the youngest (she's seventeen - even Thyra is a few years older).
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Context Fanfic / GameOfTheAncients