History TabletopGame / Chrononauts

* ApocalypseHow: Planetary Mass Extinction (including humanity) in the alternate 1962; Omniversal Physical Annihilation if too many paradoxes go unpatched.

There's also ''Early American Chrononauts'' that focuses purely on early US history; the two games can be combined to make what the developers call ''[=ÜberChrononauts=]''. They also released a small expansion set called ''The Gore Years'' that focuses on more recent events, and can be added on to the base game or the über version, and another one called ''Lost Identities'' which adds more ID cards.

** Two of the most notable: [[AmericanGunPolitics handguns becoming illegal in 1999]] and marijuana becoming legal in ''1986''.

* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: Averted, except with {{Jesus}}. The Crown of Thorns card simply states "Worn by You Know Who".

* GodwinsLawOfTimeTravel: Zig Zagged. If Hitler's alive and Pearl Harbor is canceled, you can patch 1945 so the Nazis win, or patch it with World Peace.

* CockroachesRuleTheEarth: One of the character cards come from a timeline where humanity has died out, leaving intelligent cockroaches to inherit the planet. In order for him to get "home", you have to trigger WorldWarIII.

This game has examples of:

* RetroactivePreparation: The "Memo From Your Future Self" card effectively works like this, instantly negating the last card another player played. The German Chocolate Cake artifact can also be used as a Memo and the image on the card shows it having a postcard attached. Though, WordOfGod says that it is not the postcard but the cake itself, and that the cake is just so good that it distracts the other player from [[TimeTravelTenseTrouble doing what they did were going to]].

* {{CoolStarship Cool Time Machine}}: Two you can get, with different bonuses. One is tiny, the size of a pocket watch. The other is very fast, which in context presumably means you spend less subjective time in hyperspace and more rushing about history altering things.

* RetroactivePreparation: The "Memo From Your Future Self" card effectively works like this, instantly negating the last card another player played. The German Chocolate Cake artifact can also be used as a Memo and the image on the card shows it having a postcard attached. Though, WordOfGod says that it is not the postcard but the cake itself, and that the cake is just so good that it distracts the other player from [[TimeTravelTenseTrouble doing what they just did]].

* [[EvilCounterpart Liberal Counterpart]]: '[[JohnLennon Senator Lennon]]' apparently becomes this for/to Ronald Reagan, if he survives.

* MakeWrongWhatOnceWentRight: See "Set Right What Once Went Wrong" below; this is what happens from the other guy's perspective when your "Went Right" is their "Went Wrong." The biggest example, though, is probably Squa Tront, who has to ensure that WorldWarIII [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt kills off humanity]] to ensure that his race of superintelligent cockroaches evolves in the far future in order to return home.

* AmericaWinsTheWar: Averted. If the US don't enter WWII, D-Day still happens and the Nazis winning the war is only one of the possible outcomes.

* ShoutOut: To several other time travel stories, including ''Film/BackToTheFuture'' ("Grey's Sports Almanac") and, of course, H. G. Wells' "The Time Machine." Most are found on the identities (like Crazy Joe's post-time line restaurant). The creator keeps a (somewhat incomplete) list [[http://wunderland.com/LooneyLabs/Chrononauts/Mysteries.html#13 here]].

* TimelineAlteringMacGuffin: Grey's Sport's Almanac, in a ShoutOut to the former TropeNamer and [[Film/BackToTheFuture possible ur-example.]]

* {{Solitaire}}: A single-player game variant involves getting a number[[note]]The default number is 8.[[/note]] of time travelers back to their home times with one pass through the deck.

* WriteWhoYouKnow: As the creator admits [[http://www.wunderland.com/LooneyLabs/Chrononauts/Mysteries.html#Characters here]], a few of the player ID cards are based on people he knew.

There's also ''Early American Chrononauts'' that focuses purely on early US history; the two games can be combined to make what the developers call ''ÜberChrononauts''. They also released a small expansion set called ''The Gore Years'' that focuses on more recent events, and can be added on to the base game or the über version, and another one called ''Lost Identities'' which adds more ID cards.

* {{Prequel}}: ''Early American Chrononauts'', which can be combined with the main game to make what the developers call "ÜberChrononauts".

* RocksFallEveryoneDies: If 13 paradoxes are active, then everyone dies and loses (unless you have Crazy Joe from the expansion pack, who wins in this scenario). In ÜberChrononauts, this kicks in if any block of four adjacent rows has 13 paradoxes.

** A bit of ''Player'' Appeal is [[http://wunderland.com/LooneyLabs/Chrononauts/Mysteries.html mentioned]] on the Looney Labs website, with certain players going out of their way to kill RonaldReagan or save JohnLennon, even if they have nothing to gain from it.

* ButterflyOfDoom: Most of the linchpins have direct effects within a few years. The one that has the longest delay is saving UsefulNotes/AbrahamLincoln from assassination. Lincoln abolishes the Jim Crow laws if he lives, which kicks off the black [[UsefulNotes/CivilRightsMovement civil rights movement]] en masse a century early, which eventually leads to Martin Luther King Jr. (if he's also saved from assassination, indirectly as a result of preventing John F. Kennedy's -- thus falling under this trope on two separate levels) becoming RichardNixon's Vice President 100 years later, and then the first black president of the US after Nixon is impeached.

* ButterflyOfDoom: Most of the linchpins have direct effects within a few years. The one that has the longest delay is saving AbrahamLincoln from assassination. Lincoln abolishes the Jim Crow laws if he lives, which kicks off the black [[UsefulNotes/CivilRightsMovement civil rights movement]] en masse a century early, which eventually leads to Martin Luther King Jr. (if he's also saved from assassination, indirectly as a result of preventing John F. Kennedy's -- thus falling under this trope on two separate levels) becoming RichardNixon's Vice President 100 years later, and then the first black president of the US after Nixon is impeached.

* GambitPileup: Except that patch might be just the one someone else needs to get home, but then someone ''else'' renders the whole thing moot by [[HitlersTimeTravelExemptionAct killing Hitler again]] because they want to play the German cake...