History Literature / ThisUsedToBeAboutDungeons

* HowDoIShotWeb: Entads don't come with manuals, so some playing around is usually required to figure out what they do and how they work. Form will usually correlate to function and it's generally regarded as safe, but sometimes there will be flowerpots that shoot city-destroying lasers or cauldrons that will automatically homogenize anything put in them - ''anything''.

* RPGMechanicsVerse: Downplayed, with the only overt RPG elements being a party and guild system (mostly used for ease of communication) and vaguely defined "elevations".

* HowDoIShotWeb: Entads don't come with manuals, so some playing around is usually required to figure out what they do and how they work. Form will usually correlate to function and it's generally regarded as safe, but sometimes there will be flowerpots that shoot city-destroying lasers or cauldrons that will automatically homogenize anything put in them - ''anything''.

* {{Druid}}: Becoming a druid is simple: a woman just needs to give birth alone and keep the child several miles away from other humans for the first three years of their life. After that, the powers become established and the restrictions can be relaxed. As you might imagine, druids are pretty rare. Isra is a particularly noteworthy case, as her mother died in childbirth and she was raised by her father, ignorant of her differences from others.

* LoopholeAbuse: A big part of using entads is finding ways around their limits, often with the help of other entads, such as [[spoiler:taking the stone that lets you access a separate dimensional space as long as you touch it, having extra people use your connection to climb in and stay in, then transporting yourself and the stone via the dagger that only teleports a single person]].

* WhatMeasureIsANonHuman: After encountering a dungeon species with behaviour that suggests possible sapience, Mizuki is uncertain about the morality of butchering their way through them all. Alfric indicates that the consensus on the subject is that there's not much that can be done about it; even if they really are thinking creatures (which isn't at all certain on a case by case basis), they're nonetheless hostile due to the dungeon madness, their minds would be full of gaps and holes, and if left to their own devices, they'll be unmade when the party leaves the dungeon. Complicating things is that sometimes they are created as infants who aren't affected by dungeon madness and can be safely reared outside the dungeons. They're made as haphazardly as anything else from the dungeons, and tend to have large gaps in their natural cognition, with maybe 1% of them capable of functioning on their own as adults. Alfric has an aunt who makes it her business to care for such people - called Bastlefolk - and even she admits it's a messy and complicated subject.

* HarmfulHealing: As a cleric of Garos, God of Symmetry, Hannah can easily fix many minor injuries by simply mirroring an undamaged part of the body. It's even easier if the person has been "symmetricalised" in advance, ensuring that there will be a suitable source to copy. However, in a fight, she has darker options available, like mirroring a severed limb or other serious wounds. And no matter someone's outside appearance, they'll never have symmetrical intestines -- or heart ventricles.

* WhatMeasureIsANonHuman: After encountering a dungeon species with behaviour that suggests possible sapience, Mizuki is uncertain about the morality of butchering their way through them all. Alfric indicates that the consensus on the subject is that there's not much that can be done about it; even if they really are thinking creatures (which isn't at all certain), they're nonetheless hostile due to the dungeon madness, their minds would be full of gaps and holes, and if left to their own devices, they'll be unmade when the party leaves the dungeon.

** Alfric's mother drops off a care package during the night, despite living quite a long distance away. It's unclear just what entad(s) she used, but she has lots that could have enabled it.

* SchizoTech: The general tech level seems to be on par with a European country some time in the 1700s or 1800s, right on the cusp of mechanization, but then you have dungeons throwing out magic items that make it possible for things like instant two way communication, powered flight, and, [[AuthorTract apparently]], oat meal as a common breakfast food.

* TheOmniscientCouncilOfVagueness: The Editors, a secretive group of immortals who created the dungeons, codified classes, and established many of the systems that keep the world so peaceful and orderly today. The Editors continue to tweak these systems, but they require cooperation from mortal nations, and operate under certain restrictions nobody else fully understands. They're generally seen as [[BenevolentPrecursors Benevolent]], but some question the motives of these unelected overseers.

* ArtificialHuman: [[spoiler:Alfric and his five siblings]] were all "decanted" from various entads. These entads are usually in high demand by couples who can't have kids naturally, but since [[spoiler:Ria Overguard found each of them, she got the first use before donating them]].

* BenevolentPrecursors: The Editors, a secretive group of immortals who created the dungeons, codified classes, and established the criteria to determine someone's elevation. They continue to work and tweak the systems, but they require cooperation from multiple nations to enact their brand of magic and are heavily curtailed in what changes they can make.

* OneHitKill: Discussed between Mizuki and Kell; both wizards and sorcerers tend to either kill a monster in one shot (but with limited ammunition), or not be able to fight effectively at all. [[spoiler:Kell is able to challenge several dungeons solo, which is very dangerous, and he has moderate success, but he couldn't clear them all out and loot everything not nailed down; he had to retreat whenever there was something he ''couldn't'' one-shot.]]
--> '''Kell''': Most things will die to a single beam of concentrated power, or a blast, or whatever else I have configured.

* PeskyPigeons: Dondrian is plagued by "day owls" which serve a similar role.

* SuperSpeed: Cartiers have a form of this and act as couriers, as the setting seems to lack any form of convenient mass transit.

* SchizoTech: The general tech level seems to be on par with a European country some time in the 1800s, right on the cusp of mechanization, but then you have dungeons throwing out magic items that make it possible for things like instant two way communication, powered flight, and, [[AuthorTract apparently]], oat meal as a common breakfast food.

* BodyHorror: The dungeons procedurally generate their contents, including living things. They will usually stick close to real life animals in most respects, but sometimes a creature will just be too weird to survive more than a few minutes and will die before a dungeoneering party encounters it.

* EldritchLocation: The dungeon interiors are produced the moment a group enters. Each one has a unique layout that changes from group to group, but will tend to play on certain themes and features found in the hex. They often appear to have an open sky, but there's nothing on the surface.
--> '''Alfric''': It's a little false, half-created world.
** One example that's eldritch even by dungeon standards is [[spoiler:an exact copy of a theater hundreds of hexes away, apparently pulled directly from Verity's mind and accurate to every detail.]] Even Alfric, who has studied dungeons for most of his life, is a little creeped out. [[spoiler:They suspect a god was involved, possibly more than one.]]

** One example that's eldritch even by dungeon standards is [[spoil:an exact copy of a theater hundreds of hexes away, apparently pulled directly from Verity's mind and accurate to every detail.]] Even Alfric, who has studied dungeons for most of his life, is a little creeped out. [[spioler:They suspect a god was involved, possibly more than one.]]

* {{Druid}}: Becoming a druid is simple: a woman just needs to give birth alone and keep the child several miles away from other humans for the first three years of their life. After that, the powers become established and the restrictions can be relaxed. As you might imagine, there are few takers and druids are pretty rare. Isra is a particularly note worthy case, as her mother died in childbirth and she was raised by her father, ignorant of her differences from others.
** Known abilities include: knowing the next day's weather, controlling the weather, seeing through an animal's eyes, knowing which plants are safe to eat, an awareness of all nearby plant and animal life, and the ability to talk to and control plants, animals, and natural phenomena such as rocks and puddles of water.

** Bixzotl, God of Copies [[note]] aka God of Repetition [[/note]]
** Garos, God of Symmetry

* ChekhovsGun: [[spoiler:The book entad that writes down anything spoken near it is crucial to how the party finally get evidence against Lola.]]

* GroundhogDayLoop: Chrononauts have an innate ability to go back a day and reset time, although with a few caveats. While they are only aware of the times they personally reset, the guild communication system can be used to pass short messages between individual timelines. The exact number of times one of them can repeat a day is dependent on the individual, with 12 being noted as extraordinary, and there is a complex order of precedence that governs the order the resets apply when multiple chrononauts are involved. Generally they'll try to stay out of each other's way so they don't have to worry about it, but when they coordinate their efforts, passing messages between lower-priority and higher-priority chrononauts, they can potentially keep the same day playing out for years.
* GuttedLikeAFish: Mizuki is unsure for a while about what she can do with a local aetheric mood of "discordance", but she's eventually able to cast a spell that makes all of the target's internal organs fall out.

* TeamPet: Larial, the herb dragon and her brother and sister. They're from the first dungeon eggs the party finds.

** Bixzotl, God of Copies

** Known abilities include: knowing the next day's weather, controlling the weather, seeing through an animal's eyes, knowing which plants are safe to eat, an awareness of all nearby plant and animal life, and the ability to talk and control to plants, animals, and natural phenomena such as rocks and puddles of water.

* {{Druid}}: Becoming a druid is simple: a woman just needs to give birth alone and keep the child several miles away from other humans for the first three years of their life. After that, the powers become established and the restrictions can be relaxed. As you might imagine, there are few takers and druids are pretty rare. Isra is a particularly note worthy case, as her mother died in childbirth and she was raised by her father.

* {{Druid}}: Isra is one unintentionally, thanks to the circumstances of her birth and her father's disinterest in his new community.[[note]] To become a druid, a woman needs to give birth alone and keep the child several miles away from other humans for the first three years of their life.[[/note]] She spent most of her life unaware of the fact and mostly used her abilities to hunt more effectively.
** Known abilities include: knowing the next day's weather, knowing which plants are safe to eat, an awareness of all nearby animal life, the ability to talk to plants, animals, and natural phenomena such as puddles of water, and the ability to see through an animal's eyes.