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Wardens is a Dragon Age fanfic written by Thaeonblade.

Suspend belief and imagine if Duncan had somehow defied the laws of time and physics to recruit all potential candidates from their origins in time for Ostagar. The Result: Chaos on the history of Ferelden and Thedas.

As the author puts it himself, this affectionate parody is an attempt of making a story with, "A mix of genuine drama with audacious humor. I may fail horribly in the attempt, but I'm sure we'll both have fun seeing what kind of mess I make. In case having all six origins present wasn't a tip, a few things may change in future occurances [sic] from how they went in the game. Again, this is a parody of Dragon Age so don't expect it to be more than 70-80% faithful to source material. As for the storyteller, I'll leave that for you to figure out."

Wardens contains the following tropes:

  • Adaptational Badass: Cailan overcomes and kills the ogre that was meant to slay him in Canon and rallies the troops at Ostagar... before the dragon came.
  • Affably Evil: Evil may be too strong of a word, but Alistair may be right to watch for Mairon.
  • Bad Boss: Mairon didn't bat an eyelash at using friendly soldiers as human bombs against the darkspawn at Ostagar.
  • Black Mage: Apart from his unapologetic cruelty, Mairon favors using purely offensive and elemental spells in battle. He also has no qualms about friendly fire or collateral damage. After attacking the Black City in the Fade and encountering its "resident", Mairon now uses a more malicious and literal Black Magic that takes the form of a demonic dragon-pony.
  • Break the Cutie: Happens to Shatele and Lily in their backgrounds, though they don't seem completely broken...
  • Broken Pedestal: Revan doesn't take news of Loghain's betrayal very well...or what he does after Ostagar.
  • Defrosting Ice Queen: Lily has gradually become less hostile to Revan as time passed after Ostagar. This is best seen from Chapter 14 and onward.
    • After the battle with blood mages in Chapter 19, Lily was visibly disturbed when blood magic was used to make her injure Revan.
    • After an encounter with a Lust Demon in the Tower and soul-searching in the Fade, Lily and Revan become a semi-official couple during the celebrations.
  • The Determinator: Mainly Revan though all Wardens display this too.
  • The Dreaded: Mairon is steadily building this reputation. Cullen agrees
    • A group of figures known only as Rune Deacons lead the Darkspawn horde under the direct command of the Archdemon and are even feared by Wardens such as Duncan
  • Dual Wielding: Revan wields two swords along with his shield and Lily wields knives in each hand.
  • Enemy Mine: The general relationship of the Wardens before Ostagar, afterwards it calms down... probably
  • Expy: While they're personalities aren't too similar...the name Revan reminds of something...
  • Fantastic Racism: Lily hates humans; Gilead hates anything non-Dalish and Mairon looks down on everything non-magical.
  • Fate Worse than Death: Mairon's "pony" appears to have inflicted this on Uldred
  • Fire-Forged Friends: It looks like this is in the works.
  • Framing Device: The entire story is being told to Seeker Cassandra and Varric by a witness from Ferelden. They're still deciding whether or not if the witness is an Unreliable Narrator or not.
  • Given Name Reveal: Mairon and Gimli's given names are actually Arthunas and Thorin. It's currently unknown why they gave themselves their used nicknames, but it must be connected to their Abusive Parents...somehow
  • Hannibal Lecture: Whether he knows it or not, Durin's logic doubles as this due to its effect on the people who hear it.
  • Happily Adopted: Shatele
  • Hidden Depths: All of the Wardens are showing shades of this. The Fade manages to draw out just how much these warriors are holding within themselves.
    • Mairon/Arthunas snapped after a childhood of torment under his Templar Mother and went on a destructive rampage during Viscount Threnhold's uprising against the Templars.
    • Revan not only lost his father, mother, and nephew, but also Iona was nearly a month pregnant with his child when she was killed. Makes one wonder if his determination is merely a cloak.
    • Lily is still strongly haunted by the events of her wedding and the general powerlessness of her people.
    • Durin's entire mindset is a side-effect of being raised by a seemingly noble father who encouraged violent competition between his siblings.
    • Gilead's role as Seeker only made his guilt over Tamlen that much more prevalent.
    • Gimli/Thorin is a Sad Clown who soldiers through life despite mental wounds from his mother's drinking habits and how his grandfather was banished for standing up to the Carta, for whom Gimli/Thorin would eventually work.
  • Insane Troll Logic: Durin often uses this to come up with conclusions on a lot of topics. For example: He concludes that since templars use lyrium to for their talents, that means that templars are essentially magic knights...a lot people get angry when he says this.
    • It's made worse when his crazy theories are proven correct.
    • Or when people actually act on them Case in point, Mairon attacking the Black City in order to escape the Fade
  • Jerkass: Mairon even makes Morrigan look reasonable by comparison.
  • Karma Houdini: Mairon is shaping up to be this in light of his lengthy friendly fire violations.
    • Or the wounded templar messengers who die horribly due to circumstances that had nothing at all to do with him
  • Kick the Dog: Mairon practically looks for puppies to punt... every chapter has at least one situation where he... does what he loves...
    • Howe literally punts a mabari puppy off the balcony during Loghain's ascension to regent.
  • Kick The Son Of A Bitch: What Revan wants to do to Howe and everyone wants to do to Loghain. Essentially how Mairon murders a remaining blood mage in Chapter 19.
  • Magic Knight: Durin accuses the Templars of being these. Revan as a Spirit Warrior technically counts.
  • Mood Whiplash: One minute, the story is unashamably funny and loves it...the next minute features a tense action scene before going back to comedy...and then drama occurs... Ostagar was a noteworthy example.
    • Some Fade dreams are played for laughs and others... aren't.
  • No Social Skills: Shatele, Durin and Mairon
  • Noodle Incident: The Orator has yet to tell of what happened when the Wardens got to the Spoiled Inn or how they got the boats. Based on the reactions of the wardens themselves...
  • Obfuscating Stupidity: Shatele seems pathetically naive, but shows frequently displays strong intellect and keen insight though covertly. She even tricks Alistair into telling her who his father is
  • Oblivious Adoption: Revan is described with heavy Rivani features, but is a trueborn Ferelden in heart and spirit.
  • Pet the Dog: When the wardens stop through Lothering, Mairon meets the Hawke Family and has a nice dinner with them...
  • Self-Made Orphan: It is heavily implied that Mairon killed his parents. Considering his Fade Dream, they may or may not have had it coming.
  • Ship Tease: Mainly between Revan and Lily despite their animosity as well as between Alistair and Shatele...
  • Shout-Out: The opening scene of the first chapter starts with two.
  • Suspiciously Specific Denial: Whenever Mairon talks about his past or a certain templar incident, he always says that he nothing to do with it. As far as the latter is concerned...
  • Take That!: Chapter 18 Half of the interaction between the wardens and Greagoir at the Circle Tower is basically them laying out a long list of hypocrisies and idiocies against the templar order.

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