Fanfic / Vault Hunters Wanted

Vault Hunters Wanted is a Borderlands fic, placed five years after the events of the second game took place. With Lilith as the main leader of the Crimson Raiders and tons of new characters, this story follows the adventures of the newest generation of Vault Hunters and their conflicts with Bellum, the newest Obviously Evil antagonist of the main series.

Has three DLCs out currently, which more or less act as sequels for the story, adding on new characters and continuing the main storyline. The first, Mister Vangorium's Wonder Gunporium, introduces the Carnival, a Pokémon style competition, with a Vault being the main prize. The second, Grave Lord Arlon's Revengathon, introduces Cassius Hardy and his Grave Lord Army, with the Crimson Raiders backing Grave Lord Arlon. The third, Eddy Tsar's Five Weeks of Hell has the Vault Hunters venture into a maximum security prison to simply survive for five weeks, giving them a Vault if they succeed.

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Vault Hunters Wanted contains examples of:

• Action Girl: Pretty any female character is this. In fact, it'd be easier to list who wasn't this trope: Mad Moxxi, Paige...that's it so far.
  • Dark Action Girl: Since close to half of the villains are female, this happens a lot. Marie Winter and Rosalign Rubity for the initial story, Dragola and Elena Tear for the first DLC, and Mortem for the second DLC.
• Aerithand Bob: All over the place
  • During the first DLC, Mister Vangorium's Wonder Gunporium, there were rather exotic and odd names like Dragola/Brittlebine, Tikari/Viitta...and then people like Jackal Cash and Elena Tear walked in. Of course, others like Suture, Masher and Nitro take that a step further...
  • During the second DLC, most of the characters had complex and foreign names (Mir, Cassius, Bastien)...all except Peter Gorman, who arguably is the Only Sane Man of Cassius's army.
• Anti-Villain: Many examples of these, as a good chunk of characters are villains anyway
  • From the initial story, Lieutenant General Ciruolo. Doesn't seem to enjoy working for the bad guys, mainly doing it since it's his job. Openly despises Maliwan due to their pretentiousness, and is Affably Evil, as he engages with casual conversation before his fight with the Vault Hunters. To top it off, he delivers a Dare to Be Badass speech to the Vault Hunters that inspires them to finish him off, all while smiling.
  • The first DLC adds a lot more. Dragola and Brittlebine are social outcasts that are Punch-Clock Villains at best, being perfectly polite and peaceful when not in a fight. Stan is an honorable knight and Affably Evil to a point, though his Undying Loyalty to Mr. Vangorium means he will never question his orders, no matter how many lines they cross. Elena Tear is a repressed Blood Knight who only fights to maintain a paycheck to support her girlfriend Paige, though she still loves fighting with a passion regardless. Nitro, a downright Designated Villain, never once crossed the Moral Event Horizon and is extremely Affably Evil, offering drinks to Wolfenstein before their fight and complimenting on his form during their battle, with his only (maybe?) negative quality being a Spirited Competitor to any tough opponents. Jackal Cash is Affably Evil and is Just Following Orders, as Mr. Vangorium more or less can control wherever he lives or dies, due to the occult ritual Jackal as a part of, and does not enjoy his job at all.
    • Hell, even Masher is like this. He does enjoy pissing other people off with his Jerkass behavior and the violence, but he really only does it to support his little brother, who has large medical bills he must pay. Doesn't justify any of the crap he does or has done, but at least makes him a bit more 3-D compared to his original impact in the story.
  • The second DLC had the likes of Bastien De La Fontaine and Peter Gorman, who are in it only for the fights and the opportunity to have a meaningful death for the other. In fact, Bastien even joins the Vault Hunters in their attack against Cassius later on, with his assistant Swarna.
• Asskicking Leads to Leadership: Lilith is the leader of the Crimson Raiders due to being the strongest. She proves this by soundly whooping Mockingbird's ass in a Curb-Stomp Battle.
• Ax-Crazy:
  • Among the player characters: Dion, Paula Picassa, Alan Fitzgerald, Suture, Wolfenstein...though these are the only blatant examples. Most of them show aspects of this, which is kinda required for the Vault Hunter job to begin with
  • The initial story had the likes of Colonel Doctor Marie Winter, and Rosalign Rubity, a Mad Doctor and a Creepy Child respectively. Of course Josef Muller has his moments too, being the leader of the above two.
  • The first DLC had two prime examples of this, Viitta and Masher. Viitta is a chainsaw-wielding Hedonist, while Masher is a Serial Rapist Jerkass with a BFG. Both of them are viewed in a negative light for the most part.
  • The second DLC has basically every new villain, but the most prominent is Mir Volstelle, who is an Enfant Terrible and Reality Warper to boot.
• Badass Adorable: Aurai, as many characters (even the narrators) comment on. She still is a Vault Hunter though, and a damn dangerous one at that, as Masher figured out really quickly.
• Badass Normal: Jessup, seriously. This guy is able to kick just as much ass as the other Crimson Raiders without any special powers or technology, using plain old improvisation and crazy scrap he managed to mold together himself. The only exception might be his katana, though everything else is hinted to be designed by him alone.
  • Nurse Katelyn from the first DLC. Armed only with a pistol and some scalpels, nonetheless is perfectly willing to risk her life to save Aurai and even slap Mister Vangorium, her former employer and one of the most powerful men in the entire universe, in the face. Damn.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Aurai is a sweet, bubbly girl who prefers eating sweets and being with her "big brother" Dion over actually fighting. Get her mad or activate her psychotic side though, and nothing stops her from conjuring a tornado on your dumb ass.
  • Nitro, out of all the people in the first DLC, is a remarkably kind individual, even being a Benevolent Boss to his subordinates and offering drinks to any competitors who wish to fight him. Still, he is incredibly fast and only Jackal Cash, the top man in the Carnival, was strong enough to defeat him. He doesn't prefer to kill his opponents or get himself killed, instead finding "spars" more thrilling and surrendering when he believes he has sufficiency lost. Who knows what would happen if he fought for real...
• Beware the Quiet Ones: Wolfenstein has very little dialogue in the story prior to the second DLC, yet is undeniably one of the strongest people there. He doesn't need to speak to get his point across, as his intimidating gaze and huge size usually get people the hell out of his way.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: The most blatant example among the Crimson Raiders would be Rocko. A rapping, ice-wielding Titan that fights with a fishing reel and long lengths of chain. Also happens to be remarkably powerful, able to take on a whole group of Bellum's top assassins and nearly winning with what seemed like little effort to him.
  • Not to be outdone, people like Suture are close behind him among the Raiders. Eats chocolate like crack, loves dissecting other people, and is remarkably awkward in any social convention, but one of the top men among the Carnival (though not the top) marks him as such.
• Body Horror: Let's just get this out of the way. You should not be able to morph your entire body into a liquid-like state with claws and teeth everywhere, shoot your own blood from your hands, have a festering acidic disease hosted inside your body that eats at your temples and under your eyes, or being legitimately dead with a limited blood supply. Those are the heroic examples.
• Break the Badass: Dion used to be the main tank and fighter of the group during the original story and first DLC, being able to take a crapton of damage and dish it back out just as effectively. However, upon meeting Jackal Cash, he got utterly owned, nearly dying from his injuries and being Half the Man He Used to Be. During that fight he got so pissed off about his failure to save Aurai he nearly killed himself with his effort, with tears of plasma running down his face from trying so hard.
• Cluster F-Bomb: Everyone in this series swears (with only a few examples of those who don't), though this trope applies when a character is in a swearing rage.
  • Jessup divulges into this. His introductory chapter has him swear 14 times, and he only increases this throughout the rest of his speaking roles.
  • Masher is this trope. Every other word is some kind of "shit", "fuck", or "faggot", with pretty close to every swear word under the sprinkled in as well.
  • Aurai does this when she gets violent. Even Masher calls her out on this.
  • Lilith gets one when Aurai is kidnapped and Mr. Vangorium called, going into a long rant at him and blasting the phone out of an airlock.
• Combat Pragmatist: Holy crap, Jackal Cash. He does not pause when he attacks, he hits like a ton of bricks with Beam Spam, and will do everything in his power to make sure you don't come back up. He never explains his powers in the slightest, leaving his enemies to guess and predict their limitations (there aren't many), and he knew instantly that that Dion was his main nuisances in the last fight and disposed of him properly, then changed to Aurai when he saw how pissed off she was watching Dion get brutalized. The man knows how to fight, which probably explains his rank as top man in the Carnival.
• Depraved Bisexual: Masher is the prime figurehead of this trope, due to his actions against other competitors during the Carnival. Oddly, he does not enjoy the females as much as the males, making him more Depraved Homosexual than anything, but he still chooses to be with females to "punish them".
  • Mortem is this as well, as her quotes heavily hint at. Her actual appearance supports this to the utmost degree.
• Depraved Homosexual: What Masher really is.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: Occurs many times during this story, usually Played for Laughs. Usually.
  • John and Jane, oh so very much. The corset scene in the first DLC was the top example of this, as it sounded similar to them having intercourse. Played for Squick.
  • The scene with Masher and Aurai is remarkably similar to a wedding. Played for Drama actually.
    • Hell, Masher in general. He has a Noodle People design compared to everyone else in the story, wild untamed hair, a Phallic Weapon BFG that he claims "eats pussy for breakfast" and appears to be Compensating for Something in damn close to every interaction with other characters. He is based off Nnoitra Gilga for a reason.
  • Elena's fight with Lupus. She comments on how her sword is far larger than normal, and Lupus replies by saying his guitar is dripping wet. The commentators call this out.
  • Anything related to Mortem and over half the words out of her mouth. Her "fight" with Wolfenstein stands out, as it has various rape imagery attached to it.
• Genius Bruiser:
  • Baldemar and Taika both made their own technology for their Action Skills (an exact clone of the user and a flying wyvern that breathes laser beams respectively).
  • Oddly, Masher technically is one. He built a giant flying steampunk castle for his district out of scrap metal, which seemingly took little effort for him. Guy may be an asshole, but he is pretty smart.
• Jerkass: A heroic example exists for Jessup, who turned into a complete ass who swears every other word. He's abrasive, disrespectful, and still considered a good guy by the other Crimson Raiders
  • One of the top villainous examples would be Masher from the first DLC. Misogynistic, racist, and a serial rapist, he makes his own comrades dislike him for his behavior. While he does have Pet the Dog moments with his servant Carnifex and his little brother, he is still an undeniable asshole who loves pissing other people off.
• Mad Artist: Lupus and Paula are the top examples, though both of them find creative outlets in other types of art.
• Mad Scientist: Doctor Suture, a player character Vault Hunter, is one of the most obvious examples. He's like Doctor Franken Stein on chocolate, with the powers ripped straight from Deadman Wonderland to boot. Of course, this is mitigated somewhat by his guilt of experimenting on Aurai and his attempts at romance with his nurse Katelyn. Doesn't stop him from being entertaining with his deadpan, scientific sense of humor or general sociopathic tendencies towards other people.
  • Marie Winter is a villainous example from the initial story. Mad obsessed with Krieg, makes gadgets for the other Bellum employees, and loves dissecting prisoners of war for her amusement.
  • Daedalus from the second DLC counts. He defines research as incinerating people with his laser beams, and he apparently did experiments on himself as evidenced by the huge eye that's used for reconnaissances and the stitches across his real body.
• Manly Tears: Lampshaded by the commentators, more specifically why it's tolerable for men to cry and not be seen as weak. The following badasses have cried during this story, discounting Tender Tears and Single Tears of course:
  • Saprus during his backstory as his wife is dying.
  • Suture, when Aurai forgave him for all the horrible things he had done to her.
  • Lilith, when Mockingbird was taunting her about Brick dying and her subsequent Curb-Stomp Battle against him to shut him up.
  Scotty "Roundhouse" Dale: I thought the parable is men don't cry.
  Richard McGuinness: Boys don't cry. Men cry.
• Obviously Evil: Tends to avoid this, but a few villains definitely don't have anything close to a Freudian Excuse to why they're such dicks
  • Josef Muller is the first one shown like this, and he himself admits to this. He has literally no reason to be attacking the Crimson Raiders or doing pretty much anything he does, as he merely does it for his sick entertainment. Despite this, he is apparently rather intelligent in his own way, as he does lead a large weapons-manufacturer that seems to be successful, and he finds some of the best soldiers to fight for him seemingly from nowhere.
• One-Man Army: Jackal Cash, full stop. He took on 8 Vault Hunters as the same time, only being defeated by an 11th-Hour Superpower from Dion and being attacked simultaneously by the others as it was happening. Even then, when he respawned, he repeated the same thing again but took on Lilith (who is the strongest Siren) and didn't even die that time, only backing off when Mr. Vangorium ate the dirt. This guy is The Dreaded and Memetic Badass in-universe, and he deserves the reputation.
• Quirky Miniboss Squad / Standard Evil Organization Squad: Most villains are introduced like this, though they're all treated very seriously by the heroes. The Bellum Assassins of the initial story are this, along with the Carnival of the first DLC.
  • Cassius's Grave Knight army seem to avoid this, as each one is introduced only after the last one dies or bites the dust.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Tends to happen a lot. Usually only lasts a paragraph, but tends to leave characters at a loss for words or in tears.
  • Aurai's speech to Suture goes on for numerous paragraphs, and is a very well-deserved speech about his emotionless attitude to Katelyn, his experimentation on Aurai and how he is a total monster for everything he's done. He doesn't disagree. Thankfully, Aurai is an All-Loving Hero and forgives him, which drives him to tears
  • Aurai (again) does this to one of Mir's clones, using a Hannibal Lecture that perfectly diagnoses his psychological problems and leaves him so devastated he couldn't even fight back, allowing her to blow off his head.
• Sliding Scale of Gameplay and Story Integration: Played straight in regards to outfits and respawns, as they reference both during the story. Zig-zagged with perks and leveling up; while it is mentioned that the characters gain new abilities due to their perks, it is never directly linked to any experience system of any kind. Averted with loot stats, as they are never mentioned at all (probably to keep the story from being too mathematical).