Roleplay / Eldarstuck

Twelve young Eldar, each just ten cycles; or sixty five terran years old, just starting adolescense, have come together to play a game called SPELF in the grim darkness of the year...45,217?. As the galaxy's civilizations and monsters tear each other apart in ever escalating and ever increasing wars, the twelve find themselves caught in a battle of their own to claim the ultimate reward. However, as Armageddon at last descends on the long suffering galaxy, it seems that the old world is not quite as ready to accept its demise as once thought, and the twelve children are caught up in not just a battle for the ultimate reward; but a struggle between the order of Paradox Space and the chaos of the Warhammer metaverse.

Warhammer 40,000 and Homestuck don't often interact with each other fandom wise given the differences in demographic. However, SV user Mental Omega has decided to cross over two of the Internet's more high profile fandoms at last into a Quest known as Eldarstuck based off of the characters a friend of his created for Pesterchum role plays. Starting off with the young seer in training Alyrsero Ardanesh on the day of his tenth cycle, the players must guide the young Eldar through a session of SPELF that has been heavily afflicted by the influence of their home universe while also confronting their own inner problems.

After expirencing writers block and dissatifaction with what had been writen, Mental Omega rebooted Eldarstuck into Eldarstuck 2.0

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Tropes in this work include:

• Absurdly Highstakes Game: SPELF, like SBURB and SGRUB, has the price of failure being the deaths of its players very far from home, and the reward for victory being the creation and rule over an entire new universe; an incredibly valuable prize to not just the twelve players but also the factions of Warhammer 40000 as the time of ending progresses.
• Aliens Speaking English: Averted, if the theory about the gibberish spewing chat partners being trolls and "normal" humans holds true, then the reason that their words come off as gibberish is that we're seeing the story from the perspective of Eldar from the far future; where the English language has disappeared with only trace elements surviving as part of the Imperium's Gothic language. cruelSeeing however, is capable of speaking French due to what appears to be shenanigans involving universally dislocated books.
• Badass Bookworm: Despite being a child and mostly focused on indoorsy activities and spends most of his time learning the Eldar witchpath, Alyrsero has displayed considerably more competence in his first fight than John Egbert did in canon. Justified in that he's older than all four of the canon beta kids put together at the start of their respective stories and has had plenty of time to squeeze in combat training; a required part of the Eldar seer path.
• BFS: Kaeliyae's preferred weapon. As she's not using a shield and neither is she dual wielding (while also so far, being the physically strongest of the cast short of Idaliryn's wraith body), she adopted the use of zweihander swords
• Cloud Cuckoo Lander: hierarchalGuardian has a bizarre way of speaking where he divides his words into two roughly equally syllable halves, an unexplained and very British accent and in his one appearance so far, seemed to ramble on almost entirely incoherently.
• Crossover: Between Warhammer 40,000 and Homestuck with many elements from Warhammer Fantasy also being brought in due to using the "Galaxies of Darkness" fanfiction setting that crosses Warhammer 40k over with Warhammer fantasy made by Mental Omega on alternate history.com.
• Darker and Edgier: Eldarstuck is somehwat towards this end when compared to Homestuck's canon, with far more militarism and violence on display and increasing references to the depravity that the villains of Warhammer are well known for. Whereas the canon characters only had to kill at most, a handful of people who weren't Underlings and thus had no real personality beyond being game enemies; it is unlikely that the Eldar kids will be able to get through the story without killing huge numbers of people with souls and lives of their own. It is very definitely Bloodier and Gorier though.
• Deadpan Snarker: When Alyrsero isn't being angry or otherwise agitated, he seems to default to this.
• Everyone Is Bi: By word of Mental Omega, Eldar range between 1 and 5 on the Kinsey scale and 0s and 6s are nearly nonexistent.. No word on where everyone is on that scale though.
  • Word of God is that Alyrsero is at least, more towards the heterosexual end of the scale,
• Exposition Fairy: Carried over from Homestuck proper, sprites serve as these as part of their overall role in helping players navigate through a session of SBURB/SGRUB/SPELF. Alyrsero's Kaeciliasprite combines this with also being extremely touchy feely and flirtatious.
• Expy: Zarathos is said to be derived rather strongly from Gilgamesh of Fate/stay night fame, particularly in appearance in being a fair haired and pale skinned Bishōnen with blood red eyes, and in personality with his extreme arrogance.
• Fantasy Kitchen Sink: Both Homestuck and Warhammer 40,000 already count as these to begin with, so it's no surprise that joining them together only increases the Kitchen sink tendencies.
• Fantasy Pantheon: The Eldar all adhere to the Eldar pantheon from Warhammer 40,000, even if only four of them are active to any degree; Ynnead, their newly formed god of death, Cegorach the laughing god of the Harlequins, Isha the mother goddess of healing and love, and Khaela Mensha Khaine the shattered war god. Despite most of their gods still being trapped in Slaanesh, the Eldar still swear by the others.
• Floating Continent: Kaeliyae Eltravii's land; the land of Storm and Games has these floating between two layers of storm clouds.
• Gender-Equal Ensemble: The main cast has six girls and six boys as per homestuck tradition, though there are some imbalances elsewhere, such as Alyrsero breaking with Homestuck tradition by having both a genetic father and a step-mother; potentially skewing the Guardian cast with an added female; while all the Warhammer villains save for one or two are either male or genderless. God of Evil: The C'tan and the Chaos Gods remain as such.
• Greater-Scope Villain: The Chaos Gods so far seem to play this role, remaining in the background while their mortal followers and daemons serve as their actual representatives in terms of villains.
• Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: Zig-Zagged, by raw stats Kaeliyae is a much better melee fighter than Alyrsero was at her level while Alyrsero has more capacity for direct damage at a distance with his chosen warpcrafts.
• Humans Are Special: Averted, at least with regards to Warhammer 40,000's native humans; whom Mental Omega notes would make poor players of a game of SBURB due to humanity's Cargo Cult approach to technology where only the Mechanicus has a monopoly on knowledge of how the more sophisticated tech works and demands that unsanctioned inventions (which the creations of Alchemy would almost certainly count as) be treated as abominations. Nevermind their xenophobic tendencies would quickly sabotage their relations with the Consorts, Denizens, and Carapricians, and the human children with the access to the best gear would also be the most indoctrinated and the most strictly controlled.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Alyrsero is often extremely caustic in his speech but he seems to genuinely try to be a good friend.
• Kid Hero: A bit of a subversion in that the Eldar protagonists are old enough to be considered senior citizens by human standards, but Eldar mature so slowly it takes a hundred years for them to reach full adulthood.
• Lighter and Softer: Compared to mainstream Warhammer 40,000 the story has so far been this, with less of Warhammer's infamous soul crushing despair on display here, though its worth noting that the perspective has so far been seen from the eyes of children who are far removed from the darkest aspects of the setting and as Eldar, have access to far better civilian technology than most other factions.
• Magic A Is Magic A: Paradox Space retains its consistent and mechanically laid out rules. The issue in-universe however, is that Warhammer is very much not a setting with hard rules so much as guidelines and the clash between these two systems is creating friction within the session as the two struggle for dominance.
• Magic Knight: Alyrsero and Kaeliyae are perfectly capable in melee despite being psykers.
• Motor Mouth: Lelianna is prone to burying her conversation partners in text in a matter of seconds before they can respond.
• Most Writers Are Adults: Averted in a very literal sense as Mental Omega; the Quest master, is a legal minor himself and is so far younger than any of the viewpoint characters chronologically if not biologically speaking.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: As per 40k standard, many characters have very malicious sounding names. The cake has to go to Varaxar the Annihilator; a Chaos Lord who's said to be one of the best candidates to replace Abaddon the Despoiler (and named for this editor in particular). On the hero's side of thing, tyrannicalIntent's chat handle is already menacing enough, but his actual name? Zarathos Malefact, as in the name of a demon and a truncated version of the word "Malefactor", yikes!
  • Eviscera Kruellag; also known as terribleAttentions, also has this trope in spades, being the kind of the silly over the top menacing name typical of the pre-5th edition dark eldar.
• Order Versus Chaos: Said to be a central conflict in the story with the often subjective and alterable reality of Warhammer being pitted against the fate and rules driven reality of Paradox Space.
• Our Gods Are Different: To count them all:
  • The Chaos Gods: Beings comprised out of the psychic resonations of certain (largely negative) emotions and concepts such as Tzeentch being formed of Ambition and Change, Khorne from rage and war, Nurgle from despair and decay, and Slaanesh from desire and excess. Essentially entirely malevolent as they seek to self perpetuate themselves by causing yet more of their concepts and emotions in the galaxy, thus contributing heavily to its misery.
  • The Eldar Gods: Formed out of the worship and the devotion of the Eldar, most of the Eldar Gods are trapped inside Slaanesh's stomach from when they were birthed and consumed most of Eldar civilization with four exceptions. Isha, Khaela Mensha Khaine, Cegorach, and Ynnead. Notably in standard 40k canon, Isha is still trapped with Nurgle and Ynnead is not yet 100% fully formed, however Isha has been noted to be freed and Ynnead has rescued the souls of the Eldar from Slaanesh. Perhaps the most generally benevolent deities from 40k.
  • The God Emperor of Mankind: What exactly the Emperor is, is the subject of an enormous amount of speculation both in and out of universe in Warhammer 40,000; with a great deal of contradicting information about his backstory being present. The simplest possible version is that he is an immortal human with so much psychic power that he can rival more conventional gods, and currently is essentially a skeletal corpse whose soul is kept tethered to his mortal remains left over from Horus' treachery by the Golden throne, which is fed a thousand psykers every day to keep it powered and thus keep his soul tied to his body and light the Astronomicon that guides human warp travel.
  • Gork and Mork: The Ork gods and the representation of the two most fundamental aspects of their species in the warp; cunning brutality and brutal cunning. The difference being that Mork hits you hard while you're not looking and Gork hits you harder when you are looking. Simple gods for a simple species, Gork and Mork are easy to please as long as one is a greenskin and goes about fighting and winning. They serve to egg on the Orks into ever more destructive and glorious conflicts, and are every bit as destructively violent as the species they represent.
  • The C'tan: Far older than the others, the C'tan were discovered by the Necrontyr back when the Dinosaurs were a thing after the Necrontyr were beaten in the first stage of the war in heaven against the Old Ones to try and take the Old One's secrets of immortality due to the Necrontyr being easily outmaneuvered by the much swifter Old One ships. When discovered feeding on the energy of a star in the form of enormous clouds of energy and gas by the Necrontyr, the Necronyr gave them bodies of living metal to use and interact with solid life forms. This turned out to be a bad decision as the C'tan, after tasting some of the Necrontyr's life force, found it much tastier than cosmic energy, and tricked the necrontyr into transferring themselves into living metal bodies, devouring their life force as they were converted and using them as an army to harvest the entire galaxy. Only stopped by the Necrons turning on them after they defeated the Old Ones, and were shattered into shards of their essence that were then contained by the Necrons. Unlike most gods in Warhammer, they are entirely of the material universe and when they use Reality Warping its by affecting the Materium instead of the warp.
  • God tiers: Successful players of Sburb or Spelf in this case eventually reach the "God Tiers," the highest character levels available. These fully realize a player's strength and Elemental Powers while also granting them Resurrective Immortality so long as they don't die heroically or justly. The condition for ascension is steep though: the player must first die on their Quest Bed. These ironically, have more in common with the C'tan than any of the traditional Warhammer warp deities.
  • Horrorterrors: The Gods of the Furthest Rings are stereotypical monsters of the H. P. Lovecraft variety, residing in the dark abyss between universes where time, space, and all other aspects of existence fail to act consistently. It is not really possible to place their morality in any meaningful context comparable to human morality, but compared to the likes of the C'tan or the Chaos Gods, their actions in canon are vastly more benevolent overall and they seem content to let sessions unfold without too much interference.
  • First Guardians: Potentially no longer in existence depending on whether or not Mental Omega sets this session after Act 7 of Homestuck and thus after the Green Sun's destruction, or at least as much as the term "after" has between universes; the First Guardians are the nigh omnipotent and often nigh omniscient "protectors" of planets with intelligent life, meant to ensure they can meet the purpose of playing the game, and in the case of Doc Scratch, to also ensure the appearance of Lord English. However it is quite possible that they no longer exist in the canon of the quest, and given Mental Omega's reluctance to bring in Lord English, this seems to be the likely case.
• Overlord Jr.: Zarathos Malefact in a nutshell, as his mother's son he is her de facto second in command and the one best poised to take over her Kabal in case she ever dies. However, as Dark Eldar society is based on brutal meritocratic backstabbing and plotting rather than bloodline, he's not actually guaranteed to take over, and thus has to devote significant time to helping his mother deal with those who'd want to take over her Kabal, and is too devoted to her to try overthrowing her anyway.
• Polyamory: Specifically noted to be the norm among the Eldar as they live for much too long and feel the emotions involved in romance too intensely to consider monogamy to be remotely practical. Which promises to make for an impressive Love Dodecahedron or twenty even without involving Troll quadrants and with just the twelve kids introduced so far when combined with the universal varying degrees of bisexuality felt by all Eldar.
  • 2.0 notes that Eldar are actually generally unhappy if they're kept in strictly monogamous relationships.
• Rhymes on a Dime: How Kaeliyae not only types, but also how she speaks to other people in person. She only ever breaks this habit when interrupted, when exclaiming something, or when only giving a one word reply.
• Tank Goodness: The preferred tactics of the Ice Dragons Space marine chapter.
• Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: Naturally this is how virtually all the Eldar speak to begin with, though Alyrsero is probably the wordiest by a good margin who likes to talk to degrees that even other Eldar can find a bit tiresome in informal contexts. The Eldar seem to run on a spectrum of wordiness and formality, with Alyrsero being the most extreme example of the verbose end and reapingHarrier being by far the least formal.
• Sliding Scale of Free Will vs. Fate: Warhammer canon tends to lean much more strongly towards the Free Will end, using the Skeins of Fate to see the future only lets you see possibilities and probabilities, and as the present changes, these possibilities and probabilities can change or even collapse and be replaced by new ones; and time travel when done is allowed to change the present without stable time loops. Homestuck however leans quite strongly towards the Fate end of the scale, with an Alpha Timeline that must be followed to avoid dooming a timeline though if Lord English is gone, timeline rules might be relaxed.
• Sophisticated as Hell: The Eldar don't often resort to swearing, so when it does happen it's quite noticeable, particularly from the more verbal and formal examples of their kind. The descriptions can veer into this when Mental Omega decides to start being a bit more flowery than normal. Alyrsero so far has shown the most of this.
• Space Elves: What the Eldar ultimately are, even noting to be capable of interbreeding with humans despite the Eldar being many tens of millions of years older.
• Spoiled Brat: Zarathos Malefact was born into incredible luxury and affluence and is an incredibly egotistical and dismissive boy who enjoys lording it over others and is utterly convinced that he is quite simply the best there is. However, he has a fragile ego and backed off of his taunts directed to Alyrsero who accused him of not amounting to anything without his mother.
• Superior Species: This is generally the opinion the Eldar as a rule have of themselves due to being much older than nearly every other species in the galaxy, much longer lived, having more and more powerful psykers, having some of the most sophisticated technology in the galaxy, and in the case of the Craftworld Eldar, viewing themselves as the Galaxy's appointed protectors while the Dark Eldar use it to justify the obscene cruelty they inflict on other species. On the other hand, the Eldar did create Slaanesh and are in a decidedly weaker position than the likes of the Imperium in terms of their ability to influence the galaxy through direct force due to their much smaller populations. The Harlequins however, are noted as being exceptional for not adhering to this.
• Technicolor Eyes: The Eldar cast's eye colors certainly run the gamut of plausible to very much not so. Somewhat reasonable colors like dark green, dark blue, and grey are present, as are completely unreasonable colors such as yellow, orange, red, blue-green, and pink.
• Tin Tyrant: Given the emphasis warhammer 40,000 places on armor and its Black-and-Grey Morality setting it's probably easier to list who isn't one, though Varaxar, the Warmaster of Chaos; is the biggest example of such. Funnily enough, the kids have two, Zarathos Malefact fits the description to a T and his mother is an even more transparent example of this.
• Token Evil Teammate: Even by the standards of Warhammer 40000 the Druchii and Drukhari are cruel and selfish in the extreme.
• Voice with an Internet Connection: Whomever are the mysterious gibberish spouting web handles. In addition, the Eldar Kids serve as this to one another until they get revealed.
  • Two further mysterious voices have appeared recently, one using golden text in a Papyrus font, one using all caps teal text in an italicized Times New Roman font unless channeling energy; which makes their text turn amethyst.
• What Is This Thing You Call "Love"?: Dark Eldar society actively tries to suppress the very concept of romantic love from its cultural memory due to a belief that it would inspire weakness and is incompatible with the Dark Eldar need to feed off of the sensations (primarily suffering) of others to keep their souls juiced up. They have no word for the concept, with the closest thing being essentially sexual and emotional dominance over someone else. They do feel it however, but they're taught to ignore it and most of those who learn about it regard the concept with amused contempt. terribleAttentions however, is quite passionate about the subject despite its anathemaic nature with regards to Dark Eldar society, and worryingly it's noted that she has to keep it a secret from the Incubus Shrine she's being raised in or else.

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