Roleplay / City of Lost Characters

Welcome to the City, where a hack writer kidnaps people for plot ideas. For more information, please visit the library.^note From left to right, top to bottom: Yoshika, Cole, Plague Knight, sans, Lewis, Fried, Caro, Arcade, Eve, Jack, Rick, Ben, Rex, Mary, Morty, Lucas, Ciri, and Seiga.

"A city, floating in the nothing between realities. A place that had all the amenities to call home, but was home to no one. A place that shifted when one was not looking, making everywhere in the city both close and far from everywhere else in the city. A city for those who had just been plucked from their own realities. A city of lost characters."

— Firock the game mod, beginning of signup thread

City of Lost Characters is a Massive Multiplayer Crossover Play-by-Post Game running on the TV Tropes forum, created by Firock Finion as a Spiritual Successor of The Massive Multi-Fandom RPG. It started in 2015 and concluded in 2022.

A mysterious, godlike entity, which spends its days writing stories about all the various universes, has come up with the perfect way to gain inspiration: mass kidnapping!

Thousands of characters from all over the multiverse are snatched up and find themselves inside a large city, floating in the void. Will they be friends, or will conflict tear them apart? How will they fare in this place, which keeps changing into unrecognizable forms based on their host's quirky whims? Are they ever going to get out, and what will it take to escape?

A sequel, City of Lost Characters Season 2: New Game+, launched in 2023.

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This roleplay contains the following tropes:

A - G

• 555: Lune gets a phone number on day 7, and this makes up the first few numbers.
• Abandoned Laboratory: Part of the setting on Day 23. As the characters quickly find out, it is inhabited by a variety of robotic foes.
• all lowercase letters: Just like in his home game, Sans' dialogue is mostly written in lowercase. He even writes in comic sans.
• Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene: Usually not all characters are together on the same place so sometimes a sad or very powerful moment can happen in one location while characters are fighting on another one. This is best exemplified in Day 2 where, while most of the characters are dealing with two bosses at once, Mary comforts Sadness about not being able to see Riley or the other emotions.
• Actually Pretty Funny: Sans tricks Caro into thinking he's gonna attack her but, after he shows it's all set up for a pun, she admits it's actually funny. She gets a bit tired after he immediately follows it up with a whoopee cushion, though.
• Alien Invasion: Countless alien species launch an all-out attack on the city on Day 19.
• All for Nothing: The Ruckus starts a hostage situation in the grocery store on Day 12, as part of their plan to revive their leader, Old Feather Beak. Sans comes up with a plan to sneak in with Cole's help and teleport Yael, the bomb he carries, and the remains of OFB out of the station, then have Caro restrain him. It works until Yael baits Sans into accidentally blasting OFB's remains with a Gaster Blaster, reviving the demon bird.
  Eun (in narration): It was a brief series of sensations, which ended with an unmistakable one; the same one I had felt many days earlier, when the bird had first appeared on that rooftop. A sensation that, among other things, informed me that all my efforts, as well as those of everyone inside this building, had gone to waste in a single moment.
• Alternative Character Interpretation: In-universe, most characters consider the Jedi order an oppressive cult after Darth Marr tells them they forced to exile anyone that refused to suppress their emotions when using the Force. Then again, a Sith lord is not the most impartial person to talk about the Jedi.
• Alternate Universe Fic: During the Thanksgiving hiatus, there was a very short-lived unofficial spin-off set in the Pokemon universe. Also see the High School AU below.
• Ambiguously Human: Miss Tairee, the librarian. Despite exhibiting powers of reality warping (using computer code to literally reprogram the fabric of reality), she claims to be human. She is also the only known character able to read the mysterious tenth-dimensional script. She can also be killed by a bullet wound to the head, as Day 7 shows.
• Amusement Park of Doom: The setting of Day 13.
• Amusing Injuries: Most injuries on day 6 turn into this. At least four characters get hit by a car—they end up slamming into a wall, leaving indentations that spell out "OUCH."
• And I Must Scream: Eve's situation while possessed by Ghostfreak. She's stuck, floating in a void of darkness, unable to move, while in terrible pain. Luckily, Tester comes along, providing a distraction.
• Animate Inanimate Object: Many things on day 6, most notably Sawyer and Brother Marcus' weapons, as well as Rick's flask.
• Animorphism: Most humanoid characters are turned into animals on Day 8 (while others are turned into robots, etc. without opposable thumbs).
• Ankle Drag: Fastanook on Day 13 is dragged into a pool by the ankle by a Stringy-Haired Ghost Girl. A number of characters initially try to save him via Take My Hand!, but to no avail.
• Anti-Human Alliance: The Non-Human Alliance is formed in Day 5 thanks to the actions of Brother Marcus and other humans being xenophobic towards non-human creatures.
• Arch-Enemy: On Day 26, everyone in the city is hunted by a murderous copy of their arch-enemy.
• Arc Villain:
  • Brother Marcus is the main source of trouble during the early portion of the game.
  • Old Feather Beak is the Big Bad of the Ruckus arc that took off starting on Day 6.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: Rex's listing of the boss challenges so far: ^note Both "Mickey Mouse" and "a volleyball match" count as this trope, in fact.
  "To put things in perspective, so far it's been a man-eating plant, a giant bee, a dragon, Mickey Mouse, a giant robot, six guys with elemental powers, and a volleyball match" That one didn't involve a battle to the death, come to think of it "Ok, so the last one wasn't that bad but you get what I mean"
• Attempted Rape: Jackson does this on Silanea in Day 2 and gets killed for it (albeit all happening offscreen), but still continues to harass her in Day 9. He's also implied to have done this successfully to other women.
• Bad Liar: Sans prefers to have Caro tell the truth to Rex about Cole's location in Day 10 precisely because he believed she would not be a very good liar. He turns out to be very correct in that assumption as it later works in his favor, as Caro's inability to lie puts her and Zelda's plan to save Sans' world in jeopardy very soon afterwards thanks to a timely phone call from Sans, resulting in a near failure thanks to the skeleton figuring everything out just by talking to her. She's also not very good at hiding her crush on Erio.
• Bag of Holding: Miss Tairee gives Ben on on Day 7, so he can hold all of the things he is carrying around. She also gives them to Curly and Lewis in Day 14.
• Banana Peel: Sans tosses a couple around in the grocery store and Nightwitch ends up slipping on them both times. Sans himself ends up slipping on one later, courtesy of Mickey.
• Battle Cry: Makoto will often call out something to Anat before summoning her Persona or ordering it to attack, and tends to slide into Large Ham territory when really pumped up by yelling things like "Fists of Justice".
• Beach Episode: The theme of Day 10, the second of five (relatively) relaxing break days that are scattered throughout the RP. The whole city is transformed into a resort.
• Beat: The player Ud The Imp specializes in these, as several of his posts include the line "A beat".
• Become a Real Boy: Mary wants to become a real girl, a wish that's granted as a result of the Day 8 challenge. Cole desires the same, and is given it for the length of Day 15. On the same day, Yoshika is given this option in exchange for finding a Parental Substitute.
• Berserk Button:
  • Miss Tairee's is harming a child in her presence, as shown by both her reaction to children dying in the Day 3 massacre, and Bill Cipher's casual attack on Garrett that led Ben to being injured in a cartoon car crash.
    • Even bigger than this, however, is people implying that she doesn't care about children. This causes Miss Tairee to go ballistic and firmly tell Sawyer to leave the library.
  • Ben has a lot of them, but the biggest ones are threatening to kill people, questioning his abilities as a hero, or treating him like just a kid.
  • It's usually not a good idea to threaten Caro when Sans is around.
  • Nothing sets Rick off more than taking his alcohol, though betraying his trust is a close second (as Ben found out when he ratted Rick out to the militia on Day 12).
  • Arcade hates slavery so much that Chise is capable of breaking him out of Despair's influence by mentioning that she's trying to help someone (Lewis) who's being enslaved.
  • Makoto is set off on Day 21 after Two is shocked to death during the Radio Station fight with Ghostfreak and temporarily loses control of her Persona in an attempt to get revenge.
• Big Brother Instinct: Arcade gets intensely protective of Eve upon learning that she was raised as a Tyke Bomb.
• Big Creepy-Crawlies: Appear throughout the city on Day 2.
• Big Damn Heroes:
  • During the boss fight with Queen Bee, Gentaro flies in out of nowhere after a quite long absence, taking down the boss in one blow.
  • This happens multiple times on Day 8. First, Brother Marcus saves Ben and Mary from Old Feather Beak; then Brother Marcus shows up again in the boss fight to hold off Old Feather Beak again, followed by Plague Knight coming in for a bombing run on the day's boss to finish them off.
  • Miss Tairee intervenes in Sans and Caro's battle against Old Feather Beak just in time to save the former from having his soul eaten by the demon, leading to OFB finally being taken down.
  • Miss Tairee again narrowly saves the day during Day 17, taking advantage of the library rules to prevent Yoshika from being killed by Lewis under Seiga's control and teleport her to safety, then blaring "Ghost" (Lewis's Character Signature Song) on a radio to snap Lewis out of it.
• Big Entrance: Plague Knight's entrance involves him flying out of a hole in the sky in a huge explosion, skidding across several balconies, then leaping several feet into the air while screaming at the top of his lungs. Then dancing.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Viola (or rather, Ellen) pretends to be an innocent little girl in order to hide how much of a sociopath she really is, having a few instances where she mostly drops the act.
• Blatant Lies: When he hears Lt. Wells getting closer to the library in Day 14 coming after him, Rex only has this to say:
  Uh, we just closed the library, guys. Better luck tomorrow
• Boom, Headshot!: Cole gets shot in the face by a Ruckus member in Day 6, with a shotgun no less.
• Boss Subtitles: Appear for every boss fight in the roleplay, e.g. here or here.
• Break His Heart to Save Him: All three of the choices Zelda and Caro are given by the Writer so they could save Sans' world (either ending their friendship with Sans, killing him once or becoming loyal members of the Ruckus) are a variation of this, the first two options being all the worse because they wouldn't be able to tell him the reason why.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: During the library battle on Day 12, one of the player characters is subject to horrific visions "too graphic to be described in this forum".
• Break Them by Talking:
  • Despair is fond of this technique, usually trying to whittle away at the insecurities of anyone he encounters. It worked on Arcade, but fails against Chise.
  • Ghostfreak develops a habit of threatening Ben and his friends and otherwise trying to make him feel helpless. Sometimes he sends Ben into a 10-Minute Retirement; sometimes he makes a fool of himself.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: This happened to Lewis on Day 16 after his heart locket was stuck with one of Seiga's special tags that controlled spirits, and he was convinced by her to attack others that interfered with her plans.
  • Makoto is hit by a brainwashing spell on Day 23 and is manipulated by a Shadow into keeping it safe, causing her to threaten anyone that came near. Makoto fought both Rex and Eve until the demon was killed by Rean and Cole, releasing the spell.
• Breather Episode: Invoked by the "break days", where all of the inhabitants are immune to all harm and the themes are light-hearted. However, this doesn't stop some of the most dramatic moments happening on one of these days.
• Broke Your Arm Punching Out Cthulhu: Ben, as Cannonbolt, implements a daring plan to crash into the Leviathan on Day 11 from above like a meteor. Though Ben ends up deep underwater, nearly drowns, and ends up bedridden for the rest of the day, it damages the Leviathan to the extent that the other characters are able to bring the creature down with focused torpedo strikes on the crater Ben created.
• Brought Down to Badass: Bill Cipher is normally a Reality Warper Eldritch Abomination; his stay in the city has negated most of his reality warping powers, but he is still rather dangerous.
  • The same could be said about Old Feather Beak, the Lord of Change brought to the City as well. Despite his Daemonic magics and power being weakened, he is still a competent fighter and a prime Magnificent Bastard.
• Brought Down to Normal: The conditions of Day 13 take away everyone's powers, as well as any weapons or special items.
• The Bus Came Back: After disappearing for a good part of Day 1 and being completely absent on Day 2, Adam Jensen reappears at the beginning of Day 3 handwaving his absence as him studying the layout of the city.
  • Knuckles similarly disappeared early in Day 6, then reappeared at the beginning of Day 8. The explanation was that he'd gotten lost on the way to the library, and it took him two days to find it.
  • Bill, after vanishing in the middle of Day 6, returned at the tail end of Day 8.
• Call-Back:
  • In the aftermath of the Old Feather Beak fight in Day 9, Sans has a brief flashback to his and Caro's first meeting from Day 5 as he is unconscious from almost having his soul eaten by OFB.
  • Day 24 involves a remix of all the themes from previous days.
• Call-Forward:
  • Ben's young-adult form for Day 5 is what he looks like in Ben 10: Ultimate Alien.
  • On Day 9, when X helps Ben fix the radio tower and helps him back into the library, Ben states that he thinks X is an awesome name and that he should name an alien after him.
• Car Fu: Makoto's motorcycle is repeatedly used as a blunt weapon against enemies. While she only hurt herself when she tried in on Brother Marcus first, she did successfully hurt Yael and other less tough opponents like this.
• The Cavalry: Silanea and Brother Marcus come to the aid of the forces defending the library at the climax of Day 9's boss fight.
• Centipede's Dilemma: On Day 10, while they're having a meal in the Buffet, Garrett asks how is Lewis able to eat despite being undead... and Lewis subsequently realizes that he can't actually eat, and he's got no idea how he's been doing it up until now. (Out-of-universe, this is done in response to the GM insisting that Lewis be unable to do things that don't make sense for a ghost.)
• Cerebus Syndrome: Things start getting dark in Day 7 as the Ruckus starts acting and only get further exaggerated in Day 12 onwards many of the characters are going through a lot of issues.
• Chainsaw Good: Kelsey receives a pair of chainaxes from Miss Tairee, Morty goes a little nuts with a dropped chainsaw at the climax of Day 13.
• Change the Uncomfortable Subject: Lewis mentions offhandedly that he's dead when Jack asks him about his sisters. Jack is unnerved, having himself died in a frozen lake, and is relieved when Lewis suggests asking about the Day 10 challenge to avoid having to discuss the issue.
• Chekhov's Gun: The grenade Plague Knight gives Sans in Day 7 is later used in Day 11 by him to fight a robotic enemy he wouldn't be able to damage otherwise.
• Chronic Hero Syndrome: Ben and Rex are especially guilty of this, such as arranging a search-and-rescue party in the middle of a deadly blizzard with lethal shards of hail at the middle of the night.
  • This is Deconstructed as both characters end up getting into big trouble due to this tendency — Ben nearly drives himself to the brink of depression trying to help everyone at once, while Rex becomes reviled in the City for accepting a dangerous challenge on the other citizens' behalf.
• City with No Name: The setting is referred to simply as "The City". (Confusingly, at least two player characters — Garrett and The Tick — come from places also called "The City".) Riddler suggests the name "Enigma Town" at one point, but it doesn't catch on.
• Closed Circle: The eponymous city is literally floating in the void so not even the characters that can fly can escape.
• Cold Snap: On Day 3, the city is turned into a frozen wasteland and the balconies are replaced with giant glaciers.
• Colonized Solar System: The city becomes one in Day 12
• Compliment Backfire: On Day 6, Shiara tells Ben that she doesn't think he's a hero because he "doesn't seem dumb enough". Ben takes offense.
• Cooldown Hug:
  • Sadness manages to calm Mary down after her Freak Out with one of these.
  • This tends to happen between Sans and Caro whenever one of the two is going through a rough time.
  • Arcade hugs Eve in response to her breaking down after a series of interpersonal disasters on Day 15, which Eve returns later that day when Arcade slips back into his BSOD.
• Cosmic Retcon:
  • Similarly to one of the endings of her home game, Mary becomes Ib's sister upon returning to her world due to Miss Tairee's interference, the main difference here being that Garry also lives.
  • Lewis, Rex, Caro and Lucas try to get the Writer to do one for Sans during Day 14. Lucas eventually succeeds in making it so that not only did the genocide route from Undertale never happen, the very war that began everything never happened either.
• Criminal Amnesiac: Lewis under Seiga's control, having no memories and being roped into a plot to kill Yoshika and multiple others.
• Crucified Hero Shot: Lewis is in this position during his dream at the end of Day 16. He lampshades it when talking to Chise after she frees him from it.
• Curb-Stomp Battle:The Eve versus Ghostfreak battle on Day 16 rapidly turns into one of these, as it starts fairly even, and ends with Eve desperately trying to survive and failing.
• Curse Cut Short: Makoto tries to avoid cursing in front of younger children and Miss Tairee, and she cuts herself off when she almost says one in the Library.
• Cut Lex Luthor a Check: Lune suggested that Plague Knight should patent his work in order to make a tidy profit of his work. Unfortunately, Plague Knight had no idea about the concept of patents, so Lune had to explain it to him.
• Cycle of Hurting: Happens to a lot of unlucky civilians on Day 3. They succumb to the cold, then immediately respawn somewhere else in the city... only to very quickly die from the cold again, and again, and again... especially since they respawn without anything they've picked up in the city (such as warm clothes.)
  • Brief and played for laughs when Karkat, after being stabbed by a zombie, respawns and is immediately ganged up on by more zombies. Twice.
• Demonic Possession:
  • One of Old Feather Beak's abilities is to possess people, which is what he does to keep the Ruckus under his command. He also uses this ability on Mary and, later, Sans. It was particularly effective against an NPC named Kelsey. At first she just seems like an Ax-Crazy Blood Knight bad influence on Mary, but later, it's revealed that she's simply a postwoman who's terrified of OFB and quite traumatized by the whole experience.
  • It's also one of Ghostfreak's abilities, utilised against Rex, when he first escapes the watch, and against Eve, on Day 16.
  • As a more benevolent example, Elias briefly possesses Rex in Day 16 to stop him from further escalating the situation with Marcus in the hospital.
• Despair Event Horizon: The modus operandi of Cole's Superpowered Evil Side, aptly named Despair, is to attempt to drive people past the horizon.
  • Yael crosses it after Day 13, when he was able to walk outside his suit only to have it taken away towards the end of the day, on top of having lost his support from OFB earlier on.
• Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu?: Ben makes the mistake of making fun of Bill Cipher on Day 5, not backing down when Bill threatens him back. Luckily for Ben, it's a break day, so he's let off the hook easy.
  • Ben then enacts this trope again on Day 14 by quitting the day's competition and publicly accusing the Writer of holding the competition just to pit people against each other. Most people aren't impressed.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: On Day 6, Ben and Bill Cipher actually fight and Ben wins.
• Dirty Business:
  • Day 8: Zelda has a Heroic BSoD and spends most of the following day struggling with the fact she killed Sadness to save her from Old Feather Beak.
  • Day 13: Eve has a Heroic BSoD after giving Cole a Mercy Kill to keep him from suffering at the hands of Jason.
• Distracted by the Sexy:
  • An aged-up Ben finds himself victim to this when he sees Lune Zoldark on Day 5.
  • On Day 10, Garrett and Jack Frost are quite smitten to see Ara in a bikini, with Jack blushing intensely and struggling not to stare at her.
  • Two's choice of clothing keeps being mentioned by various characters.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: From Day 16
  • Seiga's control over Lewis reads like an abusive relationship.
  • Eve getting attacked and possessed at night by Ghostfreak while out in the dark alone feels, um, predatory, especially given the latter's use of Tentacle Rope. Not helped by the fact that Despair exploits the event to beat Arcade down emotionally. There's also this piece of dialogue from Ghostfreak, which sounds...different out of context.
  "Do you wish this? No? Do you wish to be strong for your Ben, girl? You hide behind the jokes about hunchbacks and pastel colors, and disguise the fact that you are afraid. You are afraid of me. And I will give you a reason to be afraid!"
  • Despair's techniques for keeping Arcade with him are very cult-like. He uses gaslighting and love bombing as soon as Arcade shows any signs of resistance.
• Dramatically Missing the Point: Following Ben being framed for an attack on the Church of Literacy, Lewis tells Ben about his death at a friend's hand to explain why the latter shouldn't just expect everyone to automatically trust him. Ben not only continues to be bitter about others' suspicions of him but calls back to a previous talk with Cole and counters that no real friend would do that to someone they cared about, and Lewis predictably blowing up at him isn't enough to make him notice anything wrong with what he said.
• Dream Walker:
  • Old Feather Beak invades one of Cole's dreams to provoke him once.
  • Chise is capable of entering other people's dreams as long as they're both sleeping at the same time, although she has no control over when it happens.
• Dual Boss: Day 2 has two bosses that the characters fight at the same time, Queen Bee (giant bee) and Plantera (Man-Eating Plant).
• Earn Your Happy Ending: After what they went through in the City, Sawyer and Mary both get rewards: Sawyer has her voice back, and Mary is the human sister of Ib.
  Firock: SURPRISE EARN YOUR HAPPY ENDING SUCKERS!
• Eating Contest: Forrest Gump challenges Iyami to an eating contest on day 14. It was originally suggested by Iyami since he couldn't stop thinking about food. The rules are simple. Finish the most amount of plates before your stomach gives out.
• Epic Fail: Kouta hitting the library's door and being knocked out while trying to join the fight against Vendral.
• Emergent Human: Cole slowly learns to act like the human he now is after his powers as a Compassion spirit are removed in exchange for a better life.
• Emotion Bomb: Sadness' power is to make people experience their sad memories once they come in contact with her, which is something she can't quite control herself. Old Feather Beak had his eyes on Sadness so he could weaponize this. Fortunately for the rest of the city his first attempt was thwarted, and then he was killed and Sadness left the city before he got a second chance.
• Enemy Without: Ghostfreak escapes Ben's Omnitrix on Day 10.
• Energy Weapon: The laser rifle given to Gon by Lune. He puts it to good use against Plantera.
• Everyone Has Standards:
  • Rick, a perpetually-drunk jerkass and interdimensional felon, is disgusted to walk in on Jackson sexually assaulting Ara, and shoots him in the head after about a minute.
  • Referenced in Garrett's narration in reaction to Ghostfreak holding Eve hostage.
  He wasn't exactly a paragon of morality, but... tormenting little children? He couldn't help but feel disgusted.
• Evil Knockoff: On Day 28, everyone in the City faces evil copies of themselves out to kill them. The twist is, the copies are not subject to the nerfing of powerful abilities that the players' characters are, thus often making them stronger than the originals.
• Exact Words: Miss Tairee uses these often. Notably, she uses it to get around her boss' anti-interference rule by having Ben ask her to help against the Ruckus.
• Eye Lights Out: Sans can do this as a way of showing that he's deathly serious, it also happens when he's knocked out by Old Feather Beak's attempt to suck his soul out, which makes Caro initially think he's dead.
• Eye Scream:
  • How Vendral the dragon boss finally dies on day 3 - Rex stabs him in the eye.
  • Cole gets stabbed in the eye on Day 22, but is quickly healed after.
• Fanservice: Day 10 being set on a beach resort, many of the characters walk around in swimwear leading to many of the more attractive characters walking around half naked.
• Fantastically Indifferent: Gon, despite coming from a rather mundane universe without fantastic elements, isn't too fazed about being suddenly transported into a city full of magic and aliens. Though he does note that a teenage kid transforming into an alien is a bit odd, since "no one in his line of work can do that".
• Fatal Girlfriend Photo: Lewis on Day 13, while giving a page to Rick, reveals he's been keeping said page in the locket he carries...and in the process exposes the photo of him and his girlfriend Vivi inside it. Rick points out this mistake mere seconds before it summons Leatherface to their location.
  Rick: (shaking Lewis by the shoulders) Do you know what happens when you start showing family photos to strangers in these kinds of scenarios?!
• Fisher Kingdom: Some days have the characters changing appearance to match the theme, to varying reactions.
• Flirting Under Fire: Rex does this a few times to lighten the mood mid-fight.
• Forced to Watch: The Author forces Miss Tairee to watch the second OFB fight, in which a whopping 7 protagonists die in various violent ways while he and Yael spend most of the fight nearly unscathed, as punishment for insubordination, until she begs him to send OFB home in exchange for damaging her reputation with the protagonists further.
• Forgot I Could Fly: During Day 6, Sans teleports to the other side of the street where cars keep coming out of nowhere to run over people so he can deal with some Ruckus members, Caro tries to join him not by riding on Fried, but by catapulting herself over to the other side. This is later discussed between them:
  Sans: actually, why didn't you do that earlier instead of catapulting yourself?
  Caro: Well ... I-I guess I could say that the weirdness of this day was really starting to get to me but ... Mostly, I saw that you were in trouble and that was the fastest way I could think of how to get over here.
• For Science!: Plague Knight is quite obsessed with experimentation and with getting samples of all technology and chemicals he comes upon. To a lesser extent, Viktor, who desires to research unfamiliar technology to benefit the "Glorious Evolution" (mass cybernetic augmentation of mankind).
• Fountain of Youth: On Day 5, adults over 18 are aged proportionally backwards: elderly individuals become toddlers, middle-aged adults become young children, and young adults turn into older teenagers.
  • At Sans's suggestion, Cole agrees to become a human child on Day 15.
• Four-Philosophy Ensemble: Rick, Morty, Curly, and Lewis fall into this during Day 13, with Rick as the Cynic, Curly as the Optimist, Lewis as the Realist, and Morty as the Conflicted.
• Frameup: A mysterious party poses as Ben and attacks the Church of Literacy, attempting to incriminate the City Knights.
• Freak Out:
  • Poor Mary. After getting injured she gets worried that someone may find out she's not a human and runs off followed by Sadness, Twilight, Cole, and a woman. This gets so bad that she stabs the woman to death thinking that the whole city was designed to mock her inhumanity.
  • Sans also has a brief one when he first comes in contact with Sadness, the surge of emotions and reliving memories of what had happened not too long before he first arrived in the city causing him to break down. He manages to regain his composure fairly quickly once the effect ended though.
• Friendly Fire: During battle, the PC's often end up hitting each other with their indiscriminate fire.
• Friendship Trinket:
  • Alice gives Ben a doll that looks like him in Day 2 which he has kept with him ever since.
  • Sans gives Caro and Zelda dark blue heart bracelets, the former on Day 10 and the latter on Day 11.
  • Makoto gives Rex a dolphin plush she won from a claw machine.
• Friend to All Children:
  • Miss Tairee. She frequently expresses her concern about the children that are involved in the Boss' plans of inspiration, including Ben and Mary. When it turns out that children died in the Day 3 massacre, she is extremely distraught. Turns out she has a reason for this: Something happened to her in her home universe and she can no longer have children of her own.
  • Jack Frost is one as well, considering his role as Guardian of Fun. He immediately takes a liking to Ben when he expresses his belief in Jack Frost. When Jack finds out that children are trapped in the city, he becomes incensed.
• From Bad to Worse: The beginning of Day 7 has Sans die and Cole be kidnapped by the Ruckus, it all goes downhill from there.
  • Day 12, after the grocery store hostage situation ends in disaster. The general situation of the day gradually devolves into a stream of bickering and eventually death stopped only by outright Deus ex Machina.
  • Day 16 starts off fairly well, and then Lewis gets enslaved by Seiga, Cole gets turned into Despair, who then brainwashes Arcade into following him, and Eve gets possessed by Ghostfreak.
• Fusion Dance: Ben (in Upgrade form) merges with Rex's nanites (and later accidentally with Grimlock) in the battle on Day 7.
• Gadgeteer Genius: Rick fills this role, being able to turn common electronic items into stun guns, medical tools etc.
• Gender Bender: On Day 21 everyone turns into a different character from their home world. Some of these characters are of a different sex.
• Genre Savvy: Sans and Rick are both very aware of the conventions around them, Rick more so.
  • Due to their nature, the Fanboys are very alert to genre conventions, as well as being able to identify specific characters by way of pop cultural knowledge.
  • Genre savviness proves very handy on Day 13, where everyone is forced to rely on their feet and wits due to being disarmed, Brought Down to Normal, and deprived of the library. This gives characters with a passing knowledge of horror tropes an advantage; for example, the first characters to figure out the day challenge^note which is not written anywhere in the city, but revolves around collecting doodles of the day enemies are ones familiar with Slender.
• Gesundheit: Squigly doesn't register Yoshika introducing herself the first time, and excuses herself with "Oh, that's your name? I'm sorry, I thought you sneezed."
• Glass Cannon: Sans is obnoxious to hit thanks to his agility and teleporting ability, his magic ignores armor completely and he even has telekinetic magic to further help keep people away from him. However he's frail to the point where he can be killed if the opponent can get a clean hit on him, making so that the slightest mistake can cost him.
• Glass Smack and Slide: This happens to Plague Knight on Day 8 as he slams against the window of the library after Negi casts a strong tailwind.
• Glowing Flora: Glowing fungi light up the caverns on Day 23.
• Gosh Dang It to Heck!: Karkat, in Ben's dream after Day 10.
• Great Big Library of Everything: The library that forms the center of the city. It contains every single book ever written in any universe, ever (most are stored in extradimensional pockets, and the librarian needs to be asked to retrieve them; trying to find any particular book on your own is pretty much futile.)

H - M

• Half the Man He Used to Be: Makoto uses her Persona's sword to slice Darth Vader in half, and then does the same to a murderous Drow woman later on.
• Hall of Mirrors: Encountered by a number of players on Day 13, and is the scene of a fight with a duplicate of Mary.
• Hand Wave: Used sometimes by players who post more slowly than others, to explain what were their characters doing during the major events that they just missed.
• Headless Horseman: Lune gets turned into a Dullahan on Day 4, which fits for the fairy-tale theme for that day. Fortunately, she can place her head on her neck and pretend she's normal, provided that the seam in the neck isn't noticed.
• Henshin Hero:
  • Because the Valsione was too big for this RP, it became Lune Zoldark's other form.
  • Ben can turn into 10 (later 12, and once he scans people in the city 14) aliens thanks to the Omnitrix but needs to wait for it to recharge between transformations.
  • Makoto gains a new outfit and mask when using her Persona, and her powers in the City allow her to swap between forms at will.
• He's Not My Boyfriend: Caro ends up exposing her crush on Erio to Sans during Day 10 and insists that she doesn't have a crush on him. She quickly finds out there's no point in trying to hide it. Eve has the same reaction at Rex constantly teasing her about Ben's crush on her.
• Heroic BSoD:
  • Ben has one after Brother Marcus and Darth Marr are killed on Day 4. Cole helps him snap out of it but it's clear Ben isn't walking away from it unscathed.
  • Zelda has a big one on Day 8 after killing Sadness in order to prevent her from being taken by Old Feather Beak.
  • Sans has a brief one after accidentally reviving OFB but Caro quickly snaps him out of it.
  • Eve is horrified at herself after Mercy Killing Cole on Day 13.
  • Fate and Arcade both get one after contacting their homes on Day 15, albeit for different reasons.
• High School AU: A side RP game set in "The High School of Lost Characters" was briefly played to pass time during a hiatus in the main game.
• Hope Spot: Eve manages to break Ghostfreak's possession, only to promptly get beaten up and repossessed, due to being injured and mentally fatigued.
• Hostage Situation:
  • Happens in Day 12 as the Ruckus holds the people in the grocery store hostage until they can be used for the ritual for resurrecting OFB.
  • Ghostfreak holds Eve hostage to draw out Ben, and on Day 21 he holds the radio station team hostage for the same purpose.
  • Cole is briefly held hostage by a robot that escaped the jail on Day 22 until he's stabbed in the eye and thrown away to distract the group.
• Humanity Ensues: Happens to animal characters and Bill on Day 8.
• Hungry Jungle: The Day 2 theme. The whole city is turned into a jungle with carnivorous plants, the buildings are made of wood, and there are several crevices filled with giant bugs.
• Hypno Trinket: Seiga's paper talismans make any undead character they are attached to subservient to her. Yoshika has one from the outset, and she later plants one on Lewis.
• Idea Bulb: One recurring element during the cartoony Day 6.
• I'll Kill You!: Lewis's dream at the end of Day 16 ends with him screaming death threats at Seiga's disembodied voice.
• Immortal Life Is Cheap: The Ruckus have no qualms about blowing themselves up, since they know they'll just resurrect elsewhere right away.
  • On day 8, Zelda decides to kill Sadness rather than let her fall into Old Feather Beak's hands.
  • By day 12, even Ben briefly contemplates committing suicide to quickly get out of the bubble where Miss Tairee had imprisoned him, while the militia doctor fairly casually decides to euthanize one of his patients to save time.
  • On day 13, Eve kills Cole instead of letting him suffer even more at the hands of Jason. The same day has Fastanook asking his fellow Militia to let him die at the hands of the Onryo.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: During the battle on Day 4, Kieri impales Brother Marcus with giant icicles.
  • Jack Frost on Day 12 has a levitating sword forced through him during the OFB fight.
  • Makoto is stabbed through her chest with a Force-thrown lightsaber by the Day 24 boss Darth Vader, and is impaled on Solas's ice wall two days later.
• I'm Standing Right Here: On Day 6, Aigis and Rex talk about how to "disable" Ben if he goes rogue, while Ben is present, and Ben calls them out on it.
• Inadvertent Entrance Cue: On Day 1:
  Locoman: "Relax, Morty, it's perfectly normal mol...molecular transphase technOOOOlogy. Call me when something un-*urp*unusual happens."
  Ud the Imp: Something unusual does happen - [Cue over-the-top entrance of Plague Knight.]
• Inkblot Cartoon Style: The theme of day 6, complete with black-and-white everything and random objects coming to life.
• Insecure Love Interest: Rex doesn't believe that he's a good enough boyfriend for Makoto due to feeling like he's not changing the world as much as she is as a Phantom Thief in her universe, and is afraid that he isn't really a good person. Makoto was just rejected by the person she loved before being taken to the City and isn't confident that she's worth dating, thinking that Rex can find someone better.
• It Makes Sense in Context: In-universe:
  "All of sudden what seemed to be a purple unicorn came by and gave the depressed Ben a smell pep-talk that seemed to help quite a bit. That would be a pretty weird thing to tell someone without any context now that [Sans] thought about it."
• Intergenerational Friendship: Caro is a 11 years old and is very close friends with Sans, whose exact age is unknown but is said to be an adult.
  • Eve, a 12 year old, befriends the roughly 40-year-old Arcade after a stint of drama.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Makoto thinks of Rex as this after learning about many of his mistakes and harsher acts towards other characters, believing that he's still someone that wants to help others.
• Journey to the Center of the Mind: The challenge to revive Silanea's people is to enter her mind using a Psychonauts door and resolve her feelings of guilt over their deaths.
• Karma Houdini: Mary ends up murdering three people during her stay in the city and, thanks to Miss Tairee's intervention, manages to get away with all of it without any consequences and in fact ends up better than she was prior to her arrival at the city.
• Kill It with Fire:
  • Vendral disposes of Cole, Koishi, and Rex all in one move by lighting the cloud of paper they are in in fire. Ben was caught in the blaze too, but as Diamondhead he was completely unaffected by the flame.
  • Spyro burns Ghostfreak to death in Day 17.
• Knight of Cerebus: Old Feather Beak. The RP wasn't entirely lighthearted to begin with, but whenever he makes a direct appearance things tend to go downhill very quickly.
• Knight Templar: Brother Marcus, as befitting a Warhammer 40K Ultramarine. He is entirely devoted to killing xenos (i.e. anyone nonhuman) and heretics (i.e. any humans who will attempt to stop him), though when he's not currently killing anyone he's quick to save fellow humans from danger. Over time, he tentatively accepts that the City is very different from his home universe and becomes less hostile towards nonhumans, though he still makes it clear you don't want to try his patience.
• Lampshade Hanging: A lot of times, a character will be in a conversation with two people at once, talking about two entirely different things; something that doesn't happen in real life but is completely common in the roleplay. This will often be justified by writing that the character turned to look at the other person before they change the subject. Legion takes notice of this.
  "It then turned to Rex, idly noting that it was turning a lot these days."
• Large Ham: Brother Marcus and Sir Redring are the two most notable examples in the city, being very dramatic and over-the-top in how they carry themselves. As far as people from outside of the city go, there's also Papyrus.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: Seiga's control of Lewis wipes his memory.
• Layered Metropolis:
  • The City is turned into one during the seventh day. Each layer emphasizes a path the world will take in the future. The top layer has a Crystal Spires and Togas motif as the optimistic path. The bottom layer has a Cyberpunk motif as the pessimistic path.
  • The concept is even emulated in apartment form. It is called the Kowloon Walled City Apartments. The first floor is quite damp and smells of mold and mildew. The first floor even has many facilities and factories that produce a portion of the city's goods.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Rex mishears Miss Tairee's first name, Sekreh, as "Secret," aka the troper who plays Eve, and makes a snide comment about it being a ridiculous name.
• Leeroy Jenkins: Sinon, being a veteran MMORPG gamer, calls out a number of characters during Day 4 for rushing into a situation without bothering with a plan, comparing them to this archetype. She then goes on to chide herself for doing exactly that when the dragon arrives and it ends with her being slammed through a window to get her out of the way of a fire stream.
• Legacy Character: The Miss Tairee in the City isn't the first person to be given that name.
• Let's Get Dangerous!: Forrest Gump is a kind-hearted simpleton, but when he focuses on a task, he'll try to complete it no matter what.
• Let Us Never Speak of This Again: Rex has this reaction after waking up on Day 21 as Cricket, forcing him to deal with being someone he had personal issues with back at home on top of an awkward Gender Swap.
• Level Ate: Day 17 is this mixed with Shifting Sand Land, being a desert city where everything is made of candy, except actual consumables.
• Living Emotional Crutch: Caro acts as this for Sans, and when she's around him, Sans is surprisingly affectionate and friendly to her.
  • Eve quickly becomes this for Arcade after they spend Day 15 together. He acknowledges this after she talks him down from a freak out that occurred after they were separated temporarily. This becomes especially evident when Eve being attacked, and Arcade being unable to stop it, is one of the main factors in him falling to Despair.
• Losing Your Head: In a lucky twist, Lune's Day 4 Dullahan form lets her survive any form of decapitation. She proceeds to lose her head thrice: once when waking up, once fighting against Marcus, and once fighting against Vendral.
• Magic Librarian: Miss Tairee, the librarian, is the mysterious kidnapper's employee, and she helps and gives information to anyone who asks; she can also apparently rewrite reality, at least within the confines of the library.
• Massive Multiplayer Crossover: From all over fiction: games, books, TV cartoons... In-universe, too — basically, the unknown entity abducted all the characters into the city because he/she/it really likes crossover fiction.
• Meet the In-Laws: Rex and Makoto end up in this situation during their respective calls home on Day 25. Some take their relationship better than others.
• Militaries Are Useless: Mostly averted. Lieutenant Wells and his army provide some much-needed protection for the many citizens sheltered in the library on Day 9. The player characters still do a lot of heavy lifting, however.
• Mind Rape: Anyone unfortunate enough to have OFB consume their soul is assaulted with painful visions for the duration of the process. Poor Lewis.
• Mistaken for Afterlife:
  • Upon waking up and seeing that he's younger and there's a skeleton (Sans) standing before him, Kouta thinks for a moment he's died.
  • Lewis, being a ghost, mistakes the city as being the afterlife when he arrives.
• Moment Killer: Ben and Eve snuggle up for the night at the end of Day 14, about to fall asleep at each other's sides...and then Lewis asks questions into the City Knights' channel. Ben is not amused.
  • Makoto and Rex are interrupted before they kiss by Eve's phone call home, embarrassing them enough to wait until later.
• Mood Whiplash: Frequent in Day 10, in which buildup for many serious subplots is repeatedly interrupted by other characters casually having fun. It's particularly noticeable when a post with Caro and Zelda discussing a choice to save Sans's universe is immediately followed by another post with Lewis admonishing a Dead Beat for making a mess at a buffet.
  • There is also an epic one during Day 16, when a series of posts including Arcade being brainwashed by Despair, and Eve being beaten and possessed is immediately followed by potion shenanigans with Chise and Elias.
• Morality Pet: Doug the Mimikyu grows on Rex over the course of a couple of days, and he attempts to be a better role model for the pokemon.
• More Hero than Thou: Caro and Zelda get into this sort of argument regarding saving Sans's world on Day 10. Zelda ultimately decides to find a way to leave Caro out of it, though it ends up rather unnecessary.
• More than Mind Control: Despair manages to convince Arcade that he should give into his depression with a few cutting words and his depressing aura. He then convinces Arcade that he should help him break the wills of everyone else so that they could be "fixed".
• Mundane Utility:
  • Miss Tairee can conjure anything with her computer-code. Most characters have her conjure up food. On Day 21 she complains about people not bothering to use the library for anything else:
  "I have access here to nearly limitless knowledge, the wealth of the multiverse that you could explore without pause until you died of old age without ever seeing the same thing twice; a lot of people just treat it as a bed and breakfast though"
  • Specter Knight considers it a waste to slash apart bookcases... with a scythe.
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • Legion becomes depressed for a while after it accidentally hurts Ben during the fight with Battle Brother Marcus.
  • Zelda goes into a Heroic BSoD after killing Sadness on Day 8 to save her from OFB.
  • Ara is horrified when Eun chews her out for charging recklessly at OFB without any tactical consideration whatsoever, an act which got herself, Cole, and Lewis killed mere moments later.
  • Eve goes into a Heroic BSoD after mercy killing Cole on Day 13, that lasts well into the following day.
  • Makoto loses a lot of confidence in her ability to help people for a while after quitting the Militia on Day 19, topped off by accidentally killing Kelsey in the middle of a hectic battle.

N - R

• Never Heard That One Before: After Rex calls Adam "RoboCop" he sarcastically says that it's the first time anyone has ever called him that.
• Never Say "Die": In-universe: Ben, being a small kid, is highly reluctant to talk about the deaths of the church members killed on day 16; instead he says they were "harmed" or "taken out".
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Ben, in his attempt to search for Brother Marcus, accidentally awakens Plantera and Queen Bee on the second day, and is promptly beaten up for his trouble.
  • Rex, on Day 16, interrupts an argument and causes Eve to leave the hospital, causing her to get possessed. Arcade also leaves to look for her, causing him to be Despaired.
• The Nicknamer: Ben gives several characters nicknames.
  • Ben calls the mysterious entity trapping them in the city "The Boss".
  • He calls Plague Knight "PK" until Plague Knight asks him to stop.
  • Played with when Ben, irritated with HK-47 calling him "meatbag", starts calling HK-47 "rustbucket" to get even. HK quickly loses patience with this. Even though this is unable to kill Ben due to it being a break day, Ben stops calling him that.
  • He calls Garrett "Hood".
  • Garrett calls Jack Frost "the cold kid" a couple of times, and refers to Sans as "Bones".
• No Indoor Voice: Karkat's dialogue is written in all caps and his yelling got on quite a few characters' nerves pretty quickly alongside his cursing tendencies.
• No-Sell: Despair's attempt to break Chise fails completely since, despite her having a multitude of pains for him to pick at, she had fallen into despair and recovered from it before even ending in the city.
• Not a Date: Ben insists the outing he has with Lune on Day 5 at the seafood restaurant isn't a date, yet his interactions with her afterwards and his statements about the flowers implies that he feels it was.
• Not Distracted by the Sexy: Melanie's Day 15 costume leaves very little to the imagination. At one point she runs past Arcade, who only glances at it before turning his attention back to Eve returning with food for... reasons.
• Nothing Is Scarier: When Ghostfreak calls Ben to tell him he has Eve, we get this delightful gem:
  A few scuffling noises. A loud crack of a whip. A familiar scream. Eve's scream.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: Though a threatening villain in his home universe, Ghostfreak is very rarely taken seriously, due to the City depowering him, rendering him unable to hurt someone, or generally making it hard for him to do stuff. However, on Day 16, he is partly responsible for Lewis being mind-controlled, and brutally beats down Eve before possessing her.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Caro is very surprised when she finds out that Sans woke up earlier than her in Day 12.
  Caro: Wait, were you seriously actually up before me this time? Either it is really late already somehow or there is something else going on ... What's happening?
• Off with His Head!: Sans suffers this fate during the battle with Old Feather Beak in Day 12, much like his dear brother suffered back in his home.
• Oh, Crap!: The reaction when the cast realized that due to the way the city works, Brother Marcus didn't stay dead after their first confrontation. There's rather a lot of these moments in the RP, including Lewis' reaction when he's grabbed by Ghostfreak on Day 16.
• Oh, Crap, There Are Fanfics of Us!: On Day 17, Arcade meets a Fallout: New Vegas fangirl who obsesses over him... and insists on showing him her Arcade/Caesar slash fics, much to his disgust.
• Once Done, Never Forgotten:
  • Rex never really forgives Miss Tairee for her forgiving Mary and even giving Mary a goodbye gift, in what Rex sees as Mary being Easily Forgiven.
  • After Ghostfreak gets killed by a hunchback armed with giant scissors on Day 13, Eve keeps taunting him with the words "Hunchback. Scissors" whenever they meet.
• Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping: As mentioned above. Miss Tairee usually hides her Southern accent, but it slips out when she's particularly stressed or upset.
• Our Dragons Are Different: Ben's fairytale version of Stinkfly is turned into a dragon with six limbs and four stalk eyes like Stinkfly, and presumably can also use the same eye-goo attack. An actual dragon shows up later, with two heads, no legs, and twin stingers on its tail.
• Our Mages Are Different: Ben constantly compares any spellcaster he sees to Hex and Charmcaster, members of his Rogues Gallery.
• Our Zombies Are Different: On day 9, all sorts of zombies are brought into play. They're all traditionally mindless and bloodthirsty, though.
• Out of the Frying Pan: Led by "Sir Redring the octopode" and Heatblast, many characters are forced to leave a freezing building in the middle of a snowstorm and go through the blizzard itself in order to get to the library.
• Overnight Age-Up: On Day 5, children under 18 are aged up to be young adults 18-21 years old.
• Painting the Medium: On Day 6, Sans, Bill, and Sadness have their text turn black because of the lack of color in the city.
• Parental Substitute: Cole is more or less adopted by Sans and Caro by Day 14.
• Pie Eyes: Many characters' on day 6 in fitting with the theme. See AllHailThrall's pictures for a visual representation.
• Pie in the Face: In the grocery store mayhem in Day 6, Mickey ends up hitting Cole with one and, at the end of the conflict, Sans throws Mickey into a shelf full of pies that all fall on him.
• Pimped-Out Dress: The librarian gets one on Day 4. She...doesn't seem pleased.
• The Place: The RP is named after the city of, well, lost characters.
• Platonic Life-Partners: Sans and Caro gradually grow close to the point of inseparability.
• Powered Armor: Rick builds one that looks like bulky knight armor from various fairy tale stuff on Day 4.
• Power Incontinence: Sadness' powers activate whenever someone touches her and she has little way of controlling it other than trying to not come into physical contact with others.
• Power-Up Food: Rick invokes this as he got Morty beaten up ala Popeye during the brawl in the supermarket and then gives him a can of spinach. Morty opens the can and devours its contents, giving him supreme confidence and power.
• Precision F-Strike: Brother Marcus lets out a particularly long and loud one on Day 24, after finding himself transformed into Trazyn the Necron Overlord.
• Punch-Clock Villain: While Miss Tairee works for the presumed Big Bad, she isn't really evil herself, and feels especially sorry for the children trapped in the city. When she finds out the fate of many children on Day 3, she's so devastated that she breaks down in tears.
• Pungeon Master:
  • Sans, of course.
  • Caro slowly develops into one over the course of the RP thanks to frequent exposure to Sans' jokes.
  • Jack Frost also indulges in some puns when talking to Sans when they first meet.
• Punny Name: Miss Tairee (mystery). Lampshaded by Ben, Rick and, later, Sans. The name given to her, Sekreh Tairee is also one.
• Rage Against the Heavens:
  • Ben, upon seeing the emotionally-dead "survivors" of the Day 3 massacre, screams at the sky and vows that he will put an end to the Author's plans.
  • Ben and Koishi both start yelling at the Author on Day 5 as well.
• Rage Breaking Point: After being pushed to the limit by 13 days of various terrors, Morty flies into a berserk rage at the climax of Day 13 and takes a chainsaw to both a Skinwalker and a Brute.
• Realistic Diction Is Unrealistic:
  • Averted: Locoman does a fantastic job of mimicking both Rick and Morty's distinct, stammering speech styles.
  Loco!Rick: So we gotta just... we gotta just roll- we gotta just roll with the punches here, Morty. Can you do that, Morty? R-r-roll with the punches? It's the only way we-we're gonna survive out here.
  • Kieri has a stammer. Grimlock also suffers from one after being outside during a snowstorm.
• Really 700 Years Old: Cole ends up an even more extreme example of this than usual when he is turned into a normal toddler, despite keeping all of his memories and general personality.
• Recurring Boss: The characters end up facing Brother Marcus multiple times during the game. He's not the only one, however. OFB, Despair and Ghostfreak also recur, though OFB is defeated on Day 12 by means of Deus ex Machina.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: Caro is a heroic, passionate, optimistic and determined child who's quite mature for her age. Sans is apathetic, cynical, reserved, lacks the motivation to do much and is also associated with the color blue. Despite all that contrast, they still manage to have one of the strongest bonds in the RP.
• Red String of Fate: Discussed between Lewis and Chise during the former's dream at the end of Day 16 when they try to figure out the meaning of the dream and all the strings that had kept Lewis bound in place until Chise's intervention.
• Resurrective Immortality:
  • If anyone dies in the city, their body disappears and they're almost immediately resurrected in some other spot. Unfortunately, this also includes villains...
  • Deconstructed on Day 3, when the harsh cold causes many NPCs to become stuck in a loop of dying from exposure, regenerating somewhere outside, and getting instantly struck down from the deadly hail, repeating this process over and over until the day comes to an end.
• Relationship Reset Button: In order to connect their two universes and see each other again, Makoto makes a deal with the Director and Developer and agrees to erase all her memories of Rex as soon as she leaves the City.
• Relationship Upgrade: After Makoto and Rex's interactions on Day 19 and his concern for her when she quits the Militia, Rex convinces her to go on a date with him on the next day instead of hiding away from her failures. They quickly become a couple when he reaffirms that he's not toying with her feelings.
• Retcon:
  • When he first enters the city, Ben says he can only turn into ten aliens. After mentioning events of his series that happen when he already had access to twelve, this is retconned to Ben dismissing the existence of Ripjaws (because his powers are too specific) and Wildvine (because he's relatively new).
  • Mad Mask originally arrived on Day 4, but this was retconned to him arriving on Day 5 instead.
• RPG Mechanics 'Verse: When several player character enter Silanea's mindscape, the world inside her mind functions on D&D-like rules, with battles divided into turns and attacks decided by die rolls.
• Running Gag:
  • In Day 4, which has a fairy-tale theme, a lot of famous characters from different stories (like Jiminy Cricket, Pinocchio, Chicken Little, and Olaf) get unceremoniously killed as the day goes on. Sometimes even by the players themselves.
  • Khorne's name being misinterpreted as "corn", by at least four different people so far.
  • Rex's habit of calling Sans on the phone at the worst possible moments.
  • During Day 16, Eve can't apologise without something happening that either interrupts it, or happens before she and the person she's apologising can talk more about it.

S - Z

• Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: Ben preaches this philosophy to Miss Tairee on Day 7.
• Screw the Rules, It's the Apocalypse!: Legion's justification for breaking open the door of a liquor store and looting it is that the other characters would otherwise freeze to death.
• Sex Signals Death: Downplayed and invoked. In order to lure Jason away from the heroes, Melanie suggests she and Calvin make out. She even allows Calvin to get to second base. Jason indeed comes for them but while Calvin is killed, Melanie manages to escape.
• Shapeshifter Weapon: Rex's main power is creating mechanical constructs from his body. These include a wheeless motorbike, a pair of giant hands, and wings with turbines.
• Shark Fin of Doom: A variation: on Day 10, Ben goes Ripjaws and tries to scare Karkat and Viola by skimming across the water so only his angler lure and fishy green fins are visible.
• Shipper on Deck: A regular occurence in the middle third of the RP. Rex, Miss Tairee, Rena, and Lewis all help send Jack and Ara on a date that Stacy tries to harass Jack out of due to shipping him with Tooth, Sora and Lewis suggest Ben and Eve go on a Ferris wheel, Rick on day 13 pushes Curly and Morty together to increase their party's chances of survival, a ship that Lewis (sense a pattern?) considers continuing after that point, Cole (just Cole) tries to get sans and Caro to let him hook up Fastanook and Veela, sans teases Caro about her crush on Erio, Lewis (you thought I was done?) considers Rex and Chise a budding Rescue Romance...
• Shout-Out: Has its own page.
• Sink or Swim Fatherhood: Arcade's challenge in exchange for being sent to somewhere other than the Wasteland is adopting the newly human Cole. This initially horrifies him, as he never knew his own father and thinks that he'll be a terrible choice.
• Sir Swears-a-Lot: Rick befit this role right from the start, rivaled only by perhaps Karkat.
• Sitcom Archnemesis: Plague Knight and Rick have an ongoing rivalry, though it's usually Plague Knight who doesn't miss an opportunity to take petty jabs at Rick.
• Slavery Is a Special Kind of Evil: Cole seems to think so. He certainly does not appreciate the very notion of a robot - a being made to serve. This despite HK assuring he has fun following orders, most of the time.
  • Arcade is so angered when Chise mentions someone being made a mindless slave that he snaps out of a BSOD just to help them.
• Sleep Cute: Ben and Eve sleep this way in a cottage between Day 14 and 15.
• Slept Through the Apocalypse: Sans sleeps through half of the library being destroyed by the Leviathan in Day 11, surviving thanks to Zelda carrying him away from danger. Caro is not the slightest bit surprised by it.
• So Much for Stealth: Ben (as Ghostfreak) attempts to sneak into the library, but is foiled by Undyne charging in the front door. Subverted in that Miss Tairee saw Ghostfreak immediately anyway.
  • Lewis infiltrating Yoshika's adoption under Seiga's command starts subtle enough, until enough people start to Pull the Thread that he opts to jump out a window with Yoshika instead of continuing to negotiate.
• Soundtrack Dissonance: A violent confrontation blows up just outside the library on Day 17, while Tairee...blasts Mystery Skulls's "Ghost" in the direction of the action. Justified; she's trying to snap Lewis out of Seiga's mind control by doing so. Not that anyone in the fight knows that.
• Starfish Language: The ten-dimensional "Universal Script" used by Miss Tairee. It's not only incomprehensible, but downright painful to look at for most people. Not even Grey Matter can read it, and when Rex directly interfaced with a computer using it, he was knocked unconscious. Miss Tairee stated on Day 7 that her boss installed "safeguards" to keep others from learning Universal Script.
• Start My Own: Ben, disgusted with the other groups in the City and feeling lonely, tries to push for change by starting a group of heroes, the City Knights.
• Stress Vomit: Day 13 inspires a fair amount of this, first Jack after being disintegrated by a Xenomorph's acid blood, then Eve after dying from a punctured lung courtesy of Foxy hooking and carrying her by the rib, and Lewis after jumping off a balcony to escape a tag team of The Slender Man and a Weeping Angel.
• Sudden Lack of Signal: Several people experience loss of connectivity upon arrival.
  "Those from universes advanced enough were mostly taking out their personal communication devices and trying to use them fruitlessly."
• Super Window Jump: Lewis jumps out one of the library's windows while carrying Yoshika.
• Suspiciously Specific Denial: Aigis' claims on day 6 that she is "not a robot."
• Symbol Swearing: Miss Tairee does this in Day 6 as she's unable to speak normally, fitting in with the Toon Town aspect of the city.
• Talking Is a Free Action: Averted on day 13, where several characters deliver fairly long speeches while trying to stop a NPC from leaving the building... only for the GM to overrule them, stating that the NPC rushed out before they managed to finish more than one sentence. The post even references the trope name outright.
• Talking the Monster to Death: Chise and Arcade force Despair to turn back into Cole by repeatedly telling him he's still capable of being Compassion.
• Tempting Fate: Discussed between Sans and Caro when the former mention how the latter wanting to avoid running into Fate as much as possible meant they would inevitably run into her, prompting Caro to namedrop the trope. Doubles as an Incredibly Lame Pun from Caro's part.
• Third-Person Person: Mad Mask talks like this, which he lampshades when Garrett points out how annoying it is.
• Throwing Down the Gauntlet: On Day 18, when the Riddler threatens to cause even more chaos in the City if Makoto tries to stop him from starting a gang, she threatens to run him down in response and fights him anyway. She stands up to and challenges Solas and his understanding of spirits and humans on Day 26 too.
• Timed Mission: The day challenges are this, as they usually need to be beaten before the day is over in order for the reward to be claimed.
• Too Kinky to Torture: Jackson of the Ruckus doesn't mind being tazed by Tali. On the contrary, he really likes it... to the point of immediately trying to talk her into "doing it as birds" (birds being what they're transformed into on that day).
• Toon Town: The City is turned into one on Day 6.
• Tournament Arc: Of sorts, Day 14 is an event where everybody competes in all types of events in order to rack up points and win a wish from the Writer.
• Tragic Keepsake: Sans kept his brother's scarf with him after he was killed during the genocide run of Undertale. Said scarf is covered in dust (what monsters turn into when they die). He initially keeps it in his dimensional box so it doesn't get damaged, then begins wearing it when Cole reveals that it still holds his brother's essence. It disappears when Lucas wishes Sans's world back to life.
• Training the Peaceful Villagers: Lune suggests starting a dojo to train the civilians in fighting against the Ruckus. The idea is quickly shot down by Lt. Wells who thinks the civilians should just keep away from the Ruckus members instead of attempting to fight them.
• Translator Microbes: While in the City, all characters hear any foreign languages as their own, so people from different worlds and countries can understand each other.
• Trap Is the Only Option: As part of the challenge on Day 13, the characters have to collect doodles of various horror enemies. In true Slender fashion, this is invariably accompanied by the horror enemy depicted in the doodle. Upon finding a doodle of the Slender Man himself, Lewis immediately asks if this trope is at play.
  Lewis: What would you put the odds at that I have to take this oddly-placed doodle, which I know for a fact through gaming will summon a demon once I do, in order to advance the plot?
  Rick: Oh, I dunno, I'm gonna *urp* I'd say probably, uh... eighty percent? Ninety?
• Trapped in Another World: The characters' plight; they're trapped in a dimension created by the enigmatic entity.
• Travelling at the Speed of Plot: Invoked. The layout of the city is constantly shifting, ensuring that characters will arrive from one place to another right at the moment convenient to the plot.
• True Companions: Sans and Caro are about as close as they can be without making their relationship romantic, as they consistently express the admiration for one another in various ways and don't hesitate to help each other in any way possible. Caro especially values their friendship so much that she refuses to accept any of the Writer's conditions to save Sans' world on the basis that she would rather stay friends and try to keep him happy in the city than to cause him any more pain
• Turns Red: Just like in Terraria on Expert mode, Queen Bee and Plantera become much more powerful after getting attacked by the characters of the city. Queen Bee becomes fast enough to outfly Rex, and Plantera sprouts extra vines that are more durable than before.
• Uncomfortable Elevator Moment: Twice.
  • Silanea, Curly, and Lewis squeeze into the hospital elevator, the latter retreating into his Soul Jar to do so and having to deal with the unease of temporary sensory deprivation while the former two simply have a casual chat.
  • Garrett and Makoto end up in the same elevator together only a short while after the latter is caught trying to be The Mole to the Riddler's attempt to start a gang (which Garrett sided with).
• Underwater Base: The entire city more or less becomes this in Day 11.
• Unexpected Gameplay Change: Silanea's mindscape is an RPG Mechanics 'Verse, in contrast to the rest of the RP.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: In general, the NPCs aren't that fazed by the player characters, no matter who they are. One of the NPCs on day 3 is more interested in finding some good meat than in Asgore, the goat monster.
• Unwanted Assistance:
  • Once people learn about what happened in Sans' universe, they tend to want to help him despite his protests. This ends badly for Caro and Zelda in Day 10. By the time Rex joins the cause in Day 14, Sans has given up on protesting.
  • Ben insists on trying to free Miss Tairee from having to do what the Writer wants despite she repeatedly saying she doesn't need it.
• Unwanted Revival: Lewis on Day 13 is...not sure how to feel about being restored to full life, enjoying having the sensation of being alive back but wanting his magic. This is not helped by the Everything Trying to Kill You aspect of the day making magic even more desirable to have.
• Unwilling Suspension: Ben finds Cole hanging in a tree on Day 16.
• Verbal Tic: Rick's constant burping; Cole also has a very unique pattern of speech due to not having been a human for a long amount of time. He's constantly using alliterative synonyms for the same words.
• Villain Team-Up:
  • Following Yoshika being freed from her control by an interested Writer, Seiga allies with Ghostfreak and a group of NPC thrill killers in an Evil Plan to return Yoshika to her side.
  • On Day 26, a number of nemeses team up to help take down each other's heroes.
• Virtual Soundtrack: Key moments (such as boss battles or the beginning of a new day) are underscored by the GM with YouTube links to appropriate songs.
• Wake-Up Call Boss: Vendral from Day 4. It's the first boss to kill players, and it kills several of them with clever tactics.
  • As far as NPC and PC villain's go, OFB is this, being harder to fight and more intelligent than any boss the PC's had faced before.
• Webcomic Time:
  • Or Forum RPG time. Each day is scheduled to take at least two weeks, if not more, and the whole thing^note which will last one month, or thirty days, of ingame time was going to last, as stated by Firock, between one year and four. In the end, the roleplay lasted about six years (although this included a nearly year-long hiatus).
  • Lampshaded by Bill Cipher after a planned hiatus: "Does anyone else have the feeling they've been suspended in time for about a week?"
  • Similarly lampshaded by Rick: "I-i-it's been two weeks, right? Feels more like a *urp* year and a half."
  • And another lampshading by Lewis: "Like, this exchange had barely started and I already felt like I'd been here three days."
  • After the aforementioned year-long hiatus: "Ben felt like he had been sleeping for almost a year."
• What the Hell, Hero?:
  • Phillip has this reaction after Makoto tells him that she quit the Militia during the Day 19 challenge. Kelsey has a less intense version when Makoto apologizes for killing her on Day 21.
  • Makoto calls out Rex on some of his past actions towards Cole, Eve, and Ben a few times when she learns about them.
  • Lewis gets this from a few characters for attacking Tristan on Day 23 in an attempt to get revenge for what he did to Silanea, letting a brainwashed Makoto escape in the process and nearly kill others.
• Who Names Their Kid "Dude"?: Miss Tairee's first name is Sekreh. Sekreh Tairee. Subverted as it's later revealed that it's the name the Writer gives to all of his secretaries.
• Who Writes This Crap?!: Rick complaining about unrealistic science-fiction tropes, such as dense Asteroid Thickets.
• The World as Myth: Known as the "multiversal bleeding effect". It's how many characters, particularly the Fanboys, recognize the player characters.
• The X of Y: The title.
• You Can Talk?: Whenever Anat decides to speak with anyone other than Makoto, this tends to be their reaction, since most of the time she's either a motorcycle or a robot that can only make engine noises. Both Rex and Ben are initially confused by her having a voice.
• You Have Researched Breathing: Cole has to be taught how to drink and eat as he normally didn't require it in his home universe.
• You Just Told Me: During the Day 24 challenge to find the Changelings disguised as competitors, Makoto and Caboose's doppelgangers abuse this to gain way more information than they should have to better fit in, like who's dating who and prior events their real counterparts were there for. Makoto's clone even gets an Accidental Public Confession out of an already guilty Lewis by pressing him when he acted strangely around her.
• Your Makeup Is Running: Lewis asks Curly about this trope while having a BSOD on Day 15.
• Your Soul Is Mine!: One of Old Feather Beak's abilities is draining the soul of other beings, which he attempts to do on Sans during the climax of Day 9 but is stopped by a flying book. Lewis on Day 12 isn't so lucky.
• Zombie Apocalypse: Day 9's theme.

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