Fanfic / Talk About a Role Reversal

Art by b0iled_3gg

Talk About a Role Reversal is a RWBY fanfic written by nardcopter, a Role Swap AU fic where every characters have either their canon roles or specific characteristics of them taken by other characters, rather than a straight up Role Reversal AU. Team YSTR are the central protagonists, a first year team at Beacon academy comprised of Yang Xiao Long, Whitley Schnee, Adam Taurus and Ruby Rose. Together with a wide cast of supporting characters, this fanfic chronicles their adventures in Beacon and their eventual assimilation into the overarching plot of the series. Unlike typical Role Swap AUs, the specifics of the roles swapped is cleverly used to conceal certain major plot lines.

This fic is currently ongoing.

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This fanfic contains examples of the following tropes:

• Abled in the Adaptation:
  • Unlike in canon, Mercury has both his legs completely intact and not replaced by prosthetics.
  • Cinder also doesn't lose an arm during the Battle of Beacon.
• Abusive Parents: Salem's father, as with canon. She hates him so much that when Ozma told her that he came to kill him, she was overjoyed to hear about it.
• Adaptational Badass: Every character, both heroes and villains alike, are much stronger than their canon counterparts.
  • This is especially true for Whitley. Here, he enrolls into Beacon with the intention of becoming a Huntsman as well as being able to use the Schnee family's Glyph Semblance (albeit with as little proficiency as canon Weiss initially does). In canon, he is not a combatant at all and still lacks a Semblance as of Volume 8.
  • The sole exception being Pyrrha, who went through the opposite by having taken canon Jaune's role.
  • It's hard to tell if this trope applies to Emerald and Mercury, as they have different powers here.
• Adaptational Context Change:
  • Amber still ended up comatose after her fight against Cinder and co. But here it was Amber who attacked Cinder, the rightful Fall Maiden this time around, and was rendered comatose because Cinder and co acted in self-defense.
  • Going with the above, Cinder lost her left eye to the attack by Amber instead taking a full blast of Ruby's Silver Eyes.
• Adaptational Early Appearance:
  • As the first Schnee the readers see, Whitley makes his debut chronologically before the events of Volume 1 rather than at the beginning of Volume 4.
  • Neon shows up in Sun's place as the stowaway encountered by the protagonists in town, two volumes before her canon debut in Volume 3. This would apply to the rest of team FNKI as well.
  • Ilia shows up in Mountain Glenn during the events of Volume 2 rather than Menagerie in Volume 5.
• Adaptational Heroism:
  • In a reversal of the events of the "Black" Trailer, it was Adam who couldn't bear harming innocent civilians during the train heist and ditches Blake, who would go through with bombing the train here, to go on the run.
  • It turns out Salem's cabal is Good All Along in this continuity, with Salem having never become the Queen of the Grimm to begin with.
• Adaptational Jerkass: Velvet is first introduced bullying team CRDL instead of the other way around.
• Adaptational Job Change:
  • Raven is a huntress (albeit a retired one) instead of the leader of the Branwen Bandits.
    • Ruby's first scene has her asking Junior about Qrow's location, to which Junior answers he's the leader of "a bandit tribe in Mistral". Thus, this trope applies to Qrow as well.
  • It is mentioned that Winter is the heir of the Schnee Dust Company, unlike in canon where she is a specialist of the Atlesian military.
  • Willow is running the SDC, not Jacques.
• Adaptational Name Change: Not any of the characters, but everyone's weapons are given different names here, such as Crescent Rose becoming Savage Rose, and Crocea Mors becoming Crocea Gardien. The only exception as of this writing is Melodic Cudgel, Roman's cane-gun.
• Adaptational Nice Guy: Cardin and by extension the rest of team CRDL. Cardin shows genuine worry about Pyrrha getting hurt while sparring with her, and even apologized when he did end up hurting her unintentionally.
• Adaptation Personality Change: Tyrian, who in canon is an Ax-Crazy Psycho Supporter to Salem, here is the Only Sane Man of Salem's Cabal and acts more like a Cloudcuckoolander's Minder. And while he considers his fellow members his True Companions, he wryly snarks that he's Surrounded by Idiots (especially when dealing with Salem).
• Adaptational Species Change: Sir Fluffykins is, according to Word of God, this story's version of Monstra the Whale Grimm. While it is unknown exactly what kind of life form he is, he most definitely is not a Grimm here.
• Adaptational Superpower Change:
  • While Mercury never received Talaria (his bionic legs) in this story, he also never lost his Semblance which allows him to meld in with his own shadow to move around undetected.
  • While it is unknown if Emerald can use her illusion Semblance here, she does have access to a pair of bionic arms that, among other functions, can double as Grappling Hooks.
• Adaptational Villainy:
  • Instead of Adam, it was Blake who became the unhinged leader of the White Fang, with Ilia serving as her lieutenant.
  • Turns out Ozpin and Glynda (as well as Amber) were Evil All Along Villains With Good Publicity in this continuity.
• Adaptational Wimp: Pyrrha is the only character in this story who is straight up nerfed rather than buffed, due to having taken canon Jaune's role as the Butt-Monkey. In fact, she's so weak that Cardin tried his best to hold back while sparring with her so as to not hurt her, and she still got hurt anyway.
• Adaptation Relationship Overhaul: Instead of half-sisters, here Ruby and Yang are cousins with Qrow as Ruby's father.
• Adapted Out: The Wyvern doesn't show up during the Battle of Beacon.
• Affectionate Nickname: Yang looks up to Adam and calls him 'Dadam' regularly.
• Age Lift: Yang and Ruby have their ages reversed, with Yang being the little sister and Ruby being the big sister.
• Agent Peacock: Whitley is a rich boy who has an interest in fashion, spending a lot of time caring for his hair and checking his nails. He is also incredibly good at combat with his weapon and semblance, enough to be let into Beacon two years early.
• Amazingly Embarrassing Parent: Summer is this for Ruby.
• Ambiguously Gay: Whitley dislikes it when Yang talks about her breasts and pushes them against his face, with the narration noting he’s more annoyed than excited by this. When mistaken as Adam’s boyfriend by Yang earlier, Whitley only brings attention to the fact he’s a minor and Adam is an adult; he doesn’t explicitly state he has no interest in boys.
• And Call Him "George": This almost happens to Whitley courtesy of Salem in Chapter 22.
• Armor-Piercing Question: When Summer and Raven brings up Salem being the Queen of the Grimm, much to Cinder and Watts' confusion, Cinder ask for clarification by asking them if they have ever seen a picture of Salem before, to which they answer "no". Then Watts asks them who gave them that description (of Salem), to which they say it's... Ozpin, who was just revealed to be Evil All Along.
• Asshole Victim: Amber, given that she stole the Fall Maiden powers from Cinder, totally had her death coming.
• Bathos: Adam, having just heartbreakingly abandoned Blake and the White Fang ethos, sits alone on the train car after separating Blake's from the rest of the train, wondering if he did the right thing... then immediately wonders what the hell he's supposed to do now.
• Bait-and-Switch: It looked like the story was going to set up the "Jaundice" arc but with Pyrrha when she admits to having faked her transcripts to get into Beacon, with Velvet overhearing it and planning to use it to blackmail Pyrrha, just like how Cardin did with Jaune in canon... But then Adam catches Velvet spying on Pyrrha, leading to the "Jaundice" arc not happening at all.
• Beware the Silly Ones/Beware the Nice Ones: Salem may be a friendly Cloudcuckoolander on the heroes' side, but she still possesses very powerful magic spells and abilities on top of being a Nigh-Invulnerable immortal.
• BFS: Penny's weapon, here called Floating Armada instead of Floating Array, can transform into a gigantic sword, which she uses to slice two Bullheads in half when she shows up to help the heroes fight Roman and the White Fang in the dock heist.
• Big Bad: Salem is still set up to be one despite this story being a Role Swap AU. Subverted as she turns out to be Good All Along and not even the Queen of the Grimm to begin with. Ozpin is the Big Bad instead.
• Big Damn Heroes: Ironwood has all the heroes beaten, and was so close to killing Cinder... then Watts shows up and knocks out Ironwood with a single EMP bullet.
• Black Comedy
  • What is the circumstances in which Adam first met Blake? Turns out it's no other than because of her ass. It only qualified as a Black Comedy because it was brought up immediately after an intense battle against Blake and Illia that left Ruby permanently blinded in one eye.
  • Speaking of Ruby losing an eye, Raven is worried about Summer kicking her out of the house for it.
  • The Omake of Chapter 20 has Ruby, annoyed by Summer rabidly shipping her with Adam for the sake of having hundreds of grandkids, responds to Summer's suggestions for a future child's name with "Abortion", a word that no one in real life in their right mind would use so casually, given the controversial nature of it.
  • Another Omake has Summer, after getting caught in an embarrassing situation, thinks that she is probably "dead and at peace in another universe". Considering that she's indirectly referring to her canon self...
• Boom, Headshot!: Cinder manages to score one on General Ironwood. But he straight up no sold it, with the arrow shattering on impact.
• Boomstick: Crocea Gardien, Jaune's weapon, has this as an alternate form, which he holds in a chainsaw grip.
• Butt-Monkey: Instead of Jaune, it's Pyrrha who gets cast in the role of the "lovable idiot", with her first appearance having her suffering from airsickness just like canon Jaune did.
• Catch-22 Dilemma: Discussed by Adam when team YSTR witnesses Velvet bullying team CRDL as why most humans are hesitant to take action against Faunus discrimination. Some Faunus such as Velvet actually invokes this trope in order to get away with acting like jerkasses, as confronting a rude Faunus gets a human labelled as a racist, while another Faunus confronting them would get labelled as a Category Traitor.
• Chainsaw-Grip BFG: Jaune holds the Boomstick form of Crocea Gardien this way.
• Cloudcuckoolander:
  • Amusingly, Ren is the crazy one instead of Nora in this story.
  • This version of Salem is also one, according to Tyrian who called her "an idiot".
• Composite Character: Unlike every other character who each got their roles swapped with one other character, Ironwood swapped with two other characters instead. Specifically, he swapped with Penny in being a full robot instead of a cyborg, and Hazel in being an Implacable Man on the villains' side.
• Compressed Adaptation: The entire Vytal Festival arc is skipped by merging the Breach with the Battle of Beacon.
• Covert Pervert:
  • Yang is a plucky Genki Girl who Ruby often tries to protect the innocence of. Despite this, she knows quite a lot about sex and romance, and has a very colorful vocabulary for genitalia.
  • Whitley is a serious, high-class boy who often acts as if he is above others. He is also apparently very familiar with what male leads in 'teenage smut novels' look like, and is implied to read them on his scroll late at night.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: A recreation of the Yellow Trailer with Ruby in Yang's place has Ruby start and end the fight in three seconds flat, with no one other than herself even realizing there was a fight at all. Kind of subverted since Ruby was perfectly content with leaving the club in peace after getting info on Qrow, and only retaliated when one of Junior's mooks copped a feel of her.
• Cyborg: Penny is one rather than a full robot here.
• Dark Lord on Life Support: Not the Big Bad. But Amber was rendered comatose after her attempt to steal the Fall Maiden's powers from Cinder ended with Emerald and Mercury utterly pummeling her in defense of Cinder, and had to be kept alive by the aura transfer machine in Beacon's vault.
• Death by Adaptation: Given that Gretchen Rainhart shows up in place of her brother in Salem's cabal, this trope might be applied to Hazel in this continuity.
• Defiant to the End: Ilia as Blake's lieutenant believes in this trope when fighting team YSTR.
• Defrosting Ice Queen:
  • Weiss, formerly a cold and strict sister, has mellowed out after attending Atlas Academy.
  • Whitley is cold towards the other members of YSTR when he first meets them. After much time spent together, Whitley has grown to genuinely care for them, sincerely encouraging his teammates and attempting to cheer Ruby up with jokes. He doesn't even take offence to Yang imitating his mannerisms in a mocking fashion.
• Depraved Bisexual: Downplayed with Neon. She is identified as a bisexual in the work itself, and flirts with Adam and Ruby in a manner that creeps them both out.
• Didn't See That Coming: Like in canon, Cinder ropes the White Fang into her plot to infiltrate Beacon. Unlike canon, however, she wasn't expecting them to go rogue upon retrieving a shipment of stolen Atlesian Paladins.
• Dies Differently in Adaptation:
  • In canon, Amber dies by getting shot by Cinder. Here, Amber as a villain dies when her life support is smashed by Jaune in order to save Pyrrha.
  • Ozma and Salem's children were, in canon, killed when Salem attacked Ozma out of outrage in response to the breakup. Here, as Salem is much nicer than in canon, the breakup ended with no bloodshed (albeit still tragically), and the children died of old age after living full lives.
• Disabled in the Adaptation:
  • Emerald has a pair of bionic arms rather than flesh and blood ones.
  • Roman is mute, relying on Neo to speak for him instead. Didn't stop him from becoming a mob boss, though.
  • Instead of an arm, Cinder loses a leg during the Battle of Beacon in Chapter 18, courtesy of General Ironwood. Subverted when Watts fixes her leg in Chapter 19.
  • Arthur Watts is introduced moving around on a hovering chair that he sits on. Given his similarities here with canon Pietro, this trope is implied for him.
  • Ruby loses her left eye when Blake, as the leader of the White Fang, slashes her across her face while confronting Adam during the Breach.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Unlike canon Adam who cuts off Yang's arm to torment Blake, this story's Blake cuts out Ruby's left eye just because she is annoyed by her Motor Mouth.
• Establishing Character Moment: Chapter 1 introduces most of the characters by showing us what they are like in this Role Swap AU of RWBY.
• Evil All Along: Chapter 18 reveals Ozpin and Glynda to be this.
• Eye Scream: Blake slashes Ruby across her face, destroying her left eye in the process.
• Fluffy the Terrible: An almost literal example exists in the form of Sir Fluffykins, who according to the author is this story's version of Monstra the Whale Grimm, though he is not a Grimm here. Apparently he was named as such by Salem, and Cinder's cohorts - including Tyrian - thinks it's stupid.
• Foregone Conclusion: Subverted. As all other RWBY Roleswap AUs makes Salem the headmistress of Beacon and Ozpin the King of the Grimm but this one explicitly doesn't swap their positions, many readers were caught offguard by the reveal that this Headmaster Ozpin is Evil All Along.
• Girlish Pigtails: In this AU, Yang is one of the youngest students at Beacon. She's an energetic, impulsive Genki Girl that enjoys joking around with her friends. She wears her blonde hair in pigtails, reflecting her sunny disposition.
• Greater-Scope Villain: The God of Darkness resurrecting Ozma and tasking him to kill Salem is in fact what drove Ozma to gather the four relics so he could use them to destroy the Brother Gods.
• Hide Your Otherness: Adam wears a cowboy hat to hide his horns when he heads out into the city.
• Implacable Man: Ironwood is even more implacable than canon Hazel, as attacks that would've at least slowed the latter down did absolutely nothing against the former. It took an EMP bullet from Watts to stun him long enough for the heroes to escape.
• Improbable Aiming Skills: Cinder manages to lodge an arrow in the tiny gap between bricks to send a secret message to Raven.
• It's Personal: It turns out Ozma wants to gather the relics so he can use their powers to destroy the Brother Gods because they repeatedly resurrected and erased him.
• I Want Grandkids: Exaggerated. Summer rabidly ships Ruby with Adam in the hopes of having hundreds of grandkids.
• Jerkass Gods: The God of Darkness eventually resurrected Ozma and cursed him to reincarnate over and over again until he succeeds in killing Salem, like in canon. What made them this trope is that unlike in canon, the God of Darkness basically blackmailed Ozma into carrying it out under the threat of destroying the world for good should Salem be still alive when the four relics are gathered. Luckily, Ozma isn't having any of it, and chose to live a normal life with Salem. Unluckily, it became a contributing factor in Ozma's Start of Darkness...
• The Juggernaut:
  • Jaune gets the moniker of Immovable Champion due to his massive pool of Aura as well as his Aura-amplifying Semblance.
  • Ironwood, being a robot here, is even tougher than canon Hazel. To wit, Jaune, the aforementioned Immovable Champion, couldn't hold him back for long or do much against him; a direct hit from a Semblance-empowered Nora blew him across the room, but he instantly recovered from that as if nothing happened (and that's without Aura); and not even Cinder with her Fall Maiden powers could do much, even after scoring a headshot against him. It took Watt's EMP bullet to finally knock him down, and even then just temporarily.
• Male Gaze: In-Universe. Adam was attracted to Blake in the first place because of her rear. Yang was just joking about it at first and could not believe it when Adam indirectly confessed to it being completely true.
• Mama Bear: Summer is very protective of Ruby.
• Marshmallow Hell: Whitley is almost suffocated by Salem's breasts when she gives him a tight hug.
• Mouth of Sauron: A non-supernatural example in Neopolitan, who speaks for the mute Roman.
• Mood Whiplash:
  • In Chapter 18 the hilarious revelation of Adam's confession to being attracted to Blake because of her rear comes right after the intense fight against Blake and Ilia which also had the horrifying scene of Blake cutting out Ruby's left eye.
  • Chapter 18 also defied this trope at the same time by not having an Omake right after what is a Wham Episode.
• Mythology Gag: One Omake has Summer thinking that she's "dead and at peace in another universe", which, as of Volume 8 of the canon show, is somewhat true.
• The Napoleon: Weiss is shorter than her younger brother Whitley, and is sensitive about her height. She also terrifies YSTR and PAVL with how angry she can get.
• The Nicknamer: Yang enjoys giving nicknames to her friends. She nicknames Adam 'Dadam', and calls Whitley 'Ice Prince'.
• Not So Above It All:
  • Adam Taurus, the no-nonsense edgelord who acted as the Only Sane Man in this story, was attracted to Blake because of her rear when they first met each other in Menagerie. Yang was just joking about it when she first suggested it, and could not believe it was actually true.
    • In general, Adam is very happy to participate in team YSTR and PAVL's antics, despite the fact he's several years older than everyone else.
  • Weiss is incredibly surprised to discover her high-class, uptight brother Whitley willingly participated in the food fight between YSTR and PAVL.
• Not What It Looks Like: When Summer emerges from a broom closet in Signal Academy after a confidential phone call with Raven, she gets caught by some students who thought she was having an affair with another staff member of the school.
• O.C. Stand-in: While Gretchen Rainhart is technically a canon character, the author called her an OC due to the complete lack of information on her canon self.
• Off the Rails: Cinder cooks up the same plan she used in canon to infiltrate Beacon. But it gets derailed when the White Fang, under Blake's leadership, goes rogue and starts acting on their own whims.
• Revolvers Are Just Better: Whitley uses a revolver called Pistolblume.
• Ridiculously Human Robot: Not Penny, who's a cyborg here. Ironwood is the robot this time around.
• Role Swap AU
• Sanity Slippage
  • Because it was Adam who had a moral conscience and refused to go through with the train heist, it was Blake who ended up suffering this instead.
  • Reincarnation certainly hasn't done a good thing to Ozma's sanity this time around, seeing how he's gone full evil by the time he became Ozpin.
• Savvy Guy, Energetic Girl: Ren and Nora's personalities are reversed here, with Nora being the quiet one and Ren being the Motor Mouthed Cloudcuckoolander.
• Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: Whitley is the sensitive guy to Adam's manly man. Whitley prefers caring for his physical appearances and attending formal parties. Adam is a former mercenary who is all too happy to bring a sword to a date.
• Shipper on Deck: Summer totally ships Ruby x Adam.
• Spared by the Adaptation:
  • Summer Rose is still alive in this continuity.
  • Ozpin survives the Battle of Beacon. Though given he's the Big Bad of this story, having him die so early would be counterproductive to the plot.
  • Pyrrha, Penny, and Roman also survived the Battle of Beacon.
  • Gretchen Rainhart is still alive here, though that means Hazel died in her place instead.
• Start of Darkness: Subverted by Ozma who was initially content with living a normal life with Salem, in defiance of the God of Darkness tasking him to kill her. But then Double Subverted when he reveals his intent to use the four relics to destroy the Brother Gods for repeatedly resurrecting and erasing him long ago, and won't have it any other way despite Salem's warning that it might result in them destroying the world for good. At which point, he breaks up with her so he could carry out his vendetta against the Gods by himself.
• Strange Minds Think Alike: In the first half of the Chapter 20 Omake, Summer, who is totally shipping Ruby with Adam, suggests naming one of their future children Rosario. The second half of the same Omake has Jaune, who is with Adam in another location, suggest the exact same thing to Adam.
• Surrounded by Idiots:
  • Roman lampshades this trope in his thoughts when the White Fang grunts he bought along for the dock heist had to be told to do even the most obvious things.
  • Tyrian, who is perfectly sane in this story, thinks of the rest of Salem's cabal - including Salem herself (who's a Cloudcuckoolander here) as idiots.
• Team Mom: Ruby takes up this role in team YSTR. She looks after Yang and Whitley, the younger members of the team. She also fusses over Adam, the oldest member of team YSTR much like a wife would.
• Unwanted Harem: Adam has Neon, Velvet, and Ruby all vying for his affections, often in incredibly destructive ways.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Salem, as with canon, tried to plea to the Brother Gods to resurrect Ozma after he died of an illness. The resulting quarrel between the Brother Gods involved resurrecting and erasing Ozma over and over again, like in canon. Unlike canon, however, neither Salem nor the Brother Gods realizes that Ozma started harboring intense hatred of the Brother Gods because of that moment, which became one of the factors in his Start of Darkness...
• Villain with Good Publicity: Ozpin, headmaster of Beacon Academy, is the Big Bad of this story.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Whitley has this relationship with his partner Yang and his teammate Adam. They bicker and fight, and his compliments toward them sound more like insults. However, they're all still teammates and will stand together against any enemies they fight.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Ozma's goal of gathering the four relics is, unlike Salem in canon, not to have the Brother Gods destroy the world, but to destroy the Brother Gods so they wouldn't be able to harm Salem ever again. At least until Salem disagreed with him on the notion that it is doomed to fail and will result in the world getting destroyed for good. At which point Ozma stops being a Well-Intentioned Extremist and made it a personal vendetta against the Gods for repeatedly resurrecting and erasing him. Becomes completely averted when, due to implied Sanity Slippage, he became fully evil as Ozpin in the present day.
• Wham Episode
  • Oh, boy. Chapter 18 completely changes the course of the plot.
    • Ozpin and Glynda being Evil All Along, while Amber stole Cinder's Fall Maiden powers rather than the other way around.
    • Blake slashing out Ruby's eye.
    • Ironwood is a full robot, and he believed Ozpin's lie about Raven going through a Face–Heel Turn.
    • Teams YSTR and PAVL as well as Raven becoming wanted fugitives. Chapter 19 adds Summer to the mix as well.
  • The flashback sequence in Chapter 22 initially started out as a retelling of Salem's canon backstory... Until we see a diverging point that turns it into Ozma's backstory and reveals what drove him down the path of evil.
• Wham Line:
  • Cinder revealing to Raven that she was the rightful Fall Maiden, but had her powers stolen by a minion of Ozpin.
  • This speech from Chapter 18 eliminates any doubt you have about Ozpin's true nature up until this point.
    Glynda: "Oh, Raven, I think it's you who misunderstands!"
    "Ozpin may have been lying to you, hiding this and that. But from me? No, he'd never do anything of the sort!"
    "You simply can't see him how I see him! You may have been deceived but not me! Because to me..."
    "HE IS MY GOD!"
  • In the flashback sequence in Chapter 22, Ozma revealing his plans to use the four relics to destroy the Brother Gods.
• Wham Shot: In Chapter 18, when Raven reveals to Glynda that Ozpin is not who he seems, Glynda's response is to... start laughing evilly.
• Who Wants to Live Forever?: Salem doesn't, given that her beloved children and their children lived normal human lifespans, and she is forced to watch them die while her immortality kept her alive.
• With Catlike Tread: The white Fang grunts have absolutely no sense of stealth when raiding the docks for Dust, which annoys Roman for how stupid it is, as it is basically drawing the attention of every policeman and Hunters in town.