History HorizonZeroDawn / TropesFromTheFrozenWilds

** Repairing overridden machines sounds cool in theory but is pretty much useless in practice. Overriding a machine that's part of a herd usually results in that machine attacking its herd and being destroyed, so there's nothing left to repair. Even if it does survive, you can't order it to follow you around, so all you get is a machine in mint condition that despawns the moment you leave the general area. Repairing a mount is rarely necessary because most players will unlock the "Call Mount" skill sooner or later, so even if you lose your mount you can immediately call a new one. Last but not least, repairing machines is ''expensive''. Restoring a heavy machine like a Thunderjaw from near death can cost you hundreds, if not thousands of shards for little to no gain.

* VideoGameFlamethrowersSuck: One of the new weapons introduced in the expansion, the Forgefire. It's got pathetic range and it [[IncrediblyLamePun burns]] through its ammo entirely too quickly. On top of that, the ammo takes a lot of crafting materials to build. The enemies that have vulnerability to fire are typically too large and powerful to engage at the range of the weapon, and you'll run out of ammo at very inopportune times anyway. You're ''much'' better off just using standard fire arrows or fire bombs. Once upgraded to the Improved Forgefire things become a bit better since it now has a secondary attack that shoots a long-range fireball that inflicts heavy damage on the target, but the secondary attack still has low ammo and a long charge-up before it shoots.

* FailOSuckyname: The three Banuk Hunters you meet trying to hunt machine parts each keep trying to come up with a name for their group, and each time it's worse than the last, until they hit Sunshine Snowshoes and even Aloy is laughing. They don't end up figuring out a name until you help them complete their hunt, at which point they choose one based off of what Aloy says to them -- "Nukoni's Arrows", "Scars of the North", or "Shattered Hearts".

* AuthorityEqualsAsskicking: Leadership in Banuk society is reserved for the most accomplished hunters, and Aratak is definitely the Cut's most formidable warrior. [[spoiler:Aloy herself becomes the werak's new chieftain after she defeats Aratak in a challenge for the position.]]

** Overriding HEPHAESTUS' control towers stuns every hostile machine in the area for a few seconds and... that's about it. Blowing it up from a distance is much easier to do than sneaking up to it in plain sight of the herd, with the added benefit of dealing massive damage to anything near the tower when it explodes. The XP reward is the same either way, to boot.

* InfinityPlusOneSword: The Cut is the place where you can acquire ''the'' best weapons bar none. Not only are the Banuk Striker, Champion and Powershot bows simply better than all other hunter, war and sharpshot bows, respectively; what makes them so powerful is their ability to be overdrawn for massively increased damage per shot. You'll need the improved firepower to handle the Cut's unique machines, though. The Banuk also offer a couple of top-tier armors (including some that provide health regeneration), but their effects aren't nearly as impressive as the weapons'.

* FallenHero: While it was known that [[spoiler:Ted Faro's]] company was into other things before shifting to war machines, this DLC reveals he spearheaded a number of initiatives that turned the world around after disasterous climate changes reduced the inhabitable portions of it. He was at one point hailed as "The man who saved the world".

* HonorBeforeReason[=/=]WhatYouAreInTheDark: Mailen refuses any help from Ikrie even with a broken leg, insisting on passing the test to join the White Teeth werak by following the rules to the letter. When Aloy pulls Ikrie along to protect Mailen from a pack of machines, Ikrie lets Mailen limp back to the camp alone, after which Ikrie decides to journey on her own afterward. Mailen is accepted into the White Teeth, and Aloy gets to choose how to tell the story of what happened.

* MeleeATrois: Averted with the Daemonic machines. Another aspect that sets them apart from Corrupted is that they are ''not'' hostile to regular machines, and vice versa.

* PowerUpLetdown: The Improved Stormslinger is significantly more powerful than its standard model, but unfortunately this power comes at the cost of injuring Aloy herself with every successive shot, and this self-damage increases in severity just like its offensive output does. Quickly unload most of its clip into enemies in a frantic fight and watch Aloy being killed by her own weapon. It'll make you think twice about using the thing at all after the upgrade.

* SequelDifficultySpike: Although not strictly a sequel, ''The Frozen Wilds'' was the last part of the ''HZD'' 'verse to be released and is significantly more difficult than anything in the base game. Its introduction quest already has a level recommendation on par with the very final main story quest, and it only gets worse from there.

[[center: [- [[VideoGame/HorizonZeroDawn Main Page]] | [[HorizonZeroDawn/TropesAToM Tropes #-M]] | [[HorizonZeroDawn/TropesNToZ Tropes N-Z]] | '''The Frozen Wilds''']]-]

* BearsAreBadNews: Two of the three new machines introduced in the DLC are based on bears: the Frostclaw and its improvement, the Fireclaw. They're enormous and intimidating, they move '''fast''', they have melee attacks that are extremely difficult to dodge, they have ranged elemental area-of-effect attacks that '''ignore line of sight and appear on the ground you're standing on''', their weak points can be difficult to hit due to their movements and their armor, they're extremely durable (even destroying all three weak points won't kill them), they're hard to tie down with the Ropecaster, they don't have weapons you can break off and turn against them, and as their names imply, their attacks can burn or freeze you. [[UpToEleven They're like Thunderjaws, but more durable, more agile, and less cuddly.]]

* EldritchLocation: The assembly line cauldrons from the base game are creepy enough already, but the R&D Cauldron Epsilon in the Cut takes it UpToEleven. Thanks to [[spoiler:being utterly infested with HEPHAESTUS' purple [[BuffySpeak tentacle things]]]], the whole place looks more organic than anything else, which coupled with its dim lighting and being partially built inside a dormant volcano gives it a nightmarishly oppressive atmosphere.

* GrimUpNorth: The expansion is set in the northernmost part of the map in what was once Yellowstone National Park and its surroundings, but the area has since turned into a frozen wasteland where humans have to fight for their survival every second of the day. Aloy has a whole range of complaints about the cold, one of which is a quip about frost forming ''[[UpToEleven between her teeth]]''.

* CanonUniverse: [[spoiler:It is later revealed, in VideoGame/HorizonForbiddenWest, that the events of The Frozen Wilds are ''tied in'' to the first game, when Aloy converses with the rebooted GAIA about CYAN, as well as Aloy mentioning about visiting The Cut before the Battle of Meridian. Double, when the DLC's BigBad HEPHAESTUS makes a major appearance in the sequel, serving as a LivingMacguffin to stop the derangement and degradation of the biosphere for good. Additionally, Ted Faro's reputation as the 'man who saved the world' revealed in this DLC becomes important when Aloy encounters the Quen, a tribe from the far western lands beyond the sea, and finds out that their leader [[EntertaininglyWrong earnestly believes Ted's public reputation was the gospel truth]], thinking ''he'' was the one who saved the world from the Faro swarm, when [[DramaticIrony he actually caused it]]. Of course, given how closely-paced the story beats are in the main quest, it's unclear when exactly Aloy decided to take time out of her quest for answers about the Old Ones and the eclipse's sinister plans to go chasing up rumours of dangerous machines in Banuk lands, especially since the sequel makes it clear she left Meridian the same night they defeated HADES, so she had to have done it before the FinalBattle.]]

* CanonUniverse: [[spoiler:It is later revealed, in VideoGame/HorizonForbiddenWest, that the events of The Frozen Wilds are ''tied in'' to the first game, when Aloy converses with the rebooted GAIA about CYAN, as well as Aloy mentioning about visiting The Cut before the Battle of Meridian. Double, when the DLC's BigBad HEPHAESTUS makes a major appearance in the sequel, serving as a LivingMacguffin to stop the derangement and degradation of the biosphere for good. Of course, given how closely-paced the story beats are in the main quest, it's unclear when exactly Aloy decided to take time out of her quest for answers about the Old Ones and the eclipse's sinister plans to go chasing up rumours of dangerous machines in Banuk lands, especially since the sequel makes it clear she left Meridian the same night they defeated HADES, so she had to have done it before the FinalBattle.]]

* CanonUniverse: [[spoiler:It is later revealed, in VideoGame/HorizonForbiddenWest, that the events of The Frozen Wilds are ''tied in'' to the first game, when Aloy converses with the rebooted GAIA about CYAN, as well as Aloy mentioning about visiting The Cut before the Battle of Meridian. Double, when the DLC's BigBad HEPHAESTUS makes a major appearance in the sequel.]]

* AntiFrustrationFeatures: To help with the increased difficulty of the expansion area, the new medicinal plants in The Cut fill a larger portion of your medicine pouch than the regular plants in the main game area.

* DramaticallyMissingThePoint: [[spoiler:HEPHAESTUS created combat machines and upgraded aggression protocols (the Derangement) in an attempt to stop humans from hunting them. The machines are part of the terraforming process to make the planet livable for humanity. GAIA had apparently already compensated for humans hunting machines by just making more machines, but HEPHAESTUS lacks the full picture]].

* {{Irony}}: Ourea was captured by the Mad Sun-King to help with his sacrifices, which he believed would stop the Derangement. Because of this, [[spoiler:Ourea wasn't around to help CYAN when she was attacked by HEPHAESTUS, the one actually behind the Derangement. While Ourea couldn't have stopped the Derangement overall, she likely could have stopped HEPHAESTUS from getting this important foothold]].