Chronopia (known in Sweden as ''Drakar och Demoner, femte utgĂĄvan'' or ''Dragons and Demons, fifth edition'') is a tabletop role-playing game and miniatures game set in a High Fantasy world. The game was published by the Swedish company Target Games, along with Mutant Chronicles.
The website is here.
Tropes specific to the RPG:
- Absurdly Spacious Sewer: Chronopia's sewers are large enough to be the home to a large number of Goblin clans, a common hunting ground for the Charib and an escape route for a pirate crew consisting of aquatic races.
- The Ageless: Elves. Most elves commit suicide sooner or later (if their taste for vice and violence doesn't catch up first).
- Back from the Brink: At one time, House Lysander was the largest of the Elven houses. Then the previous Lord Lysander had the idea to construct the Great Arena. It nearly bankrupted the house, and Lysander was very close to being destroyed. Then the old lord died and was a replaced by a young and energetic leader, who immediately forged new alliances and made a killing in the entertainment industry. In just a few hundred years, House Lysander has gone from undisputed leader to almost non-existent and back up to being the second mightiest of the Great Houses and in a position to get back on the top of the heap.
- Black-and-Gray Morality: Everyone has their own black traits, but everyone can band together and hate the Devout. Without them the other races would focus their on past grudges against each other.
- Black Sheep: Renegade elves are the ones who were cast out of their own houses. Considering the levels of debauchery City Elves get into on a daily basis, this says something.
- Bloodsport: Gladiatorial games are big business in Chronopia, with the construction of the Great Arena nearly ruining house Lysander.
- Body Horror: Necrology, the Magitek implants used by the Devout, draw heavily on this.
- House Koth also has a lot of this going,being the setting's paramount torturers and having a fondness for dark magic and spiders.
- Butt-Monkey: The goblins. Dear lord, the goblins.
- City of Adventure: Chronopia. The fluff rarely ventures outside the city, and even then only does so in the most general terms.
- The Clan: The elves divide quite naturally along clan lines.
- There are five Light Elf clans competing for territory in and around the Great Park.
- The Houses of the City Elves are all over this trope. There are seven major houses and as many minor (usually affiliated with one of the Great Houses) as the GM needs there to be.
- The Dwarves, of course, are divided into clans, each tracing its heritage back to a progenitor.
- Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: The Wongosians are small, yellow-skinned blackbloods, who are mostly known as traders and merchants. Wongosian fighters are a generally considered a joke (the last Wongosian gladiator to try his luck in the arena was eaten by Marigold the troll after two minutes). Then there's Ikki. Ikki is the largest organized crime network in existence, and is more than capable of crossing economic blades with more experienced vice dealers like houses Belisarius and Degas. Ikki hires Trolls and Orcs to do most of their grunt work, but the top enforcers are all Wongosians, all highly trained in unarmed and armed fighting arts, and more than capable of dismantling humans with a touch. There's a reason no-one messes with Ikki.
- Cybernetics Eat Your Soul: And considering the implants the Devout create aren't so much cybernetics as they are demons given flesh, you're getting off light.
- Elves vs. Dwarves: Averted. The Elves think the Dwarves are beneath contempt, which is their opinion of all non-Elves. The Dwarves think the Elves are arrogant supremacist pricks, which is pretty much the non-Elven consensus when it comes to Elves. However, there is no institutionalized animosity and the little contact there is between Elves and Dwarves is usually frosty but relatively polite.
- Fluffy the Terrible: Troll names tend towards this. Snowdrop is a legendary ravager who once wiped the floor with a squad of Black Guardsmen on his own, Marigold is a gladiator who is most famous for eating his opponents (or, if they're too big to eat in one sitting, biting their heads off), and Raindrop is a key figure in the Crusader movement, as well as one of the few recognized Troll weaponmasters.
- Genius Bruiser: Unlike most portrayala of Orcs, Trolls, and Ogres, who are generally portrayed as unintelligent savages, Ogres are at least as smart as humans, and Wild Trolls and Orcs are only slightly dumber. City trolls are dumb as rocks, but there are reasons.
- Giftedly Bad: Lord Belisarius, who happens to be the wealthiest man in the city and long overdue for a traditional elvish ritual suicide, is also a hilariously bad and extremely pretentious playwright. Most people who see his performances heap praise on his work in order to curry favour.
- God-Emperor: The Emperor of Chronopia isn't there, yet, but it has been theorized that this is his end goal.
- Hollywood Voodoo: Charib magic has a strong flavor of this, but their religion does not resemble voodoo, real or Hollywood.
- I'm a Humanitarian: The Charib are mentioned to be cannibals for reasons of religion, necessity and culinary preference. Also, goblins can often find their way into the elaborate Elvish cuisine. In fact, the Charib frequently use the elvish consumption of goblin meat as a defense of their own cannibalism.
- Improbable Age: The current lord Lysander ascended to the title when he was in his sixties. Considering the fact that he is a City Elf, who are immortal and usually not considered properly weaned, let alone adults, at sixty, this is quite exceptional.
- Mad Artist: Lady Koth, who wrote the "Symphony of Pain" for full orchestra and one hundred torture victims, after hearing a socialite claim he would rather guge his eyes out than sit though another one of lord Belisarius'plays.
- Our Dwarves Are All the Same: Typical bearded warriors who wield axes. The only real differences is that dwarves in this setting are keen seafarers and fishermen (Dwarven myth has a story about one of their progenitors slaying a sea serpent, and fish are considered sacred), and that they don't necessarily find shaving their beards to be dishonorable (a long, well-groomed beard is a status symbol, but a warrior who doesn't expect to have the time or equipment needed to keep his beard groomed while on campaign will probably choose to shave before setting out and "leave his beard at home").
- Our Elves Are Different: Well, yes... except they have all the negative traits of traditional elves cranked up to eleven, with decadence, bloodlust and greed thrown into the mix.
- Our Ogres Are Hungrier: Unlike typical portrayals they are a race of muscular and intelligent warriors.
- Our Orcs Are Different: Nope. They are a typical Tolkienian rabble, famous for being cheap muscle.
- Planet of Hats: The City Elves are this, moreso than any other faction. House Belisarius consists exclusively of artsy hipsters who peddle drugs, House Lysander are obsessed with gold and bloodsports, House Cerias are a Proud Warrior Race, House Ventura are a Proud Merchant Race, House Aramas are Swashbucklers and Chivalrous Perverts, House Degas are decadent hedonists and House Koth are dark sorcerers of such power and evil even the actual demons are scared of them.
- Path of Inspiration: The church of the Devout.
- Red Light District: The Street of a Thousand Delights. Mostly type 2, but can be played either way.
- The City Narrows: The Pot is the area stereotypically seen as this, though the Docks and Demon Town can easily qualify as well.
- Time Abyss: The current lord Belisarius is over ten thousand years old. However, even he can't remember a time when the Emperor didn't rule Chronopia. Though, considering that the Emperor commands a cadre of magicians whose specialty is manipulating time, and is reputed to be the most powerful among them himself, that can mean anything, everything and nothing.
- Time Master: The Emperor's power primarily rests on the Chronomages, magicians who use magic to control time to create things unseen by mortal eyes.This includes divining the future, aging opponents hundreds of years in the blink of an eye and creating areas where time is dead, and nothing can exist.
- Underground City: The Dwarven Quarter far larger than it seems, with most of the dwarven population that doesn't have to interact with other races living underground.
Tropes specific to the Miniature Game:
- Anti-Human Alliance: The Elves, Dwarfs, and Blackbloods once allied to conquer the Firstborn Empire.
- Abnormal Ammo: The Sons of Kronos have the Ceremony of Cursing. This lets them make a metallic shot with a piece of bone from their enemies in it. The effects of this Cursed Shot varies depending on the bone used and the enemy targeted, for example a bone of a dwarf will make the shot explode into metallic fragments for an area attack and against a dwarven unit - it can knock them down.
- Amazon Brigade: The Blade Sisters are a group of all female warriors of the Tribe of Dawn faction of the Sons of Kronus, while the Black Sisters are from that same tribe and serve the Firstborn. The Red Lotus Eaters of House Helios are elven fire mages who are predominantly female, while their Keepers of Flame are all women.
- Attack Animal: The Sons of Kronos will let their Warhounds and Warhawks run wild on the battlefield.
- Astral Projection: The Dream Warriors of House Crystal Lotus are ancient elves who are past the point of moving, but can send out near-intangible mental projections. Capable of physically attacking an enemy, if a Dream Warrior is "killed" it only takes a few days before the real Dream Warrior can do another sending.
- Automatic Crossbow: The Heavy Automatic Crossbow is the only type of this weapon in the setting. An example of dwarven engineering prowess, it's only used by the Horned Ones clan and they just mount them on their War Torkhas to provide support fire.
- Barbarian Hero: The Untamed or Sons of Kronos are the Celtic-inspired barbarians who's actions were essential to save humanity from the inhuman races and the Devout.
- Beast of Battle: Almost all of the non-human races uses these. The Elves have the reptilian Dragonbane, Swamp Goblins have their mosquito-like Drones and Arachnid cavalry, and so forth etc. Only the Stygians lack these - having no cavalry or mounts (though arguably their whole army might count), while humans are stuck with horses and in one case - a stag.
- BFS: With so many monsters and gigantic humanoids, no wonder everyone carries oversized weapons. Interestingly most of these are one-handed weapons. For weapons that require two hands, one particularly intimidating piece is the Repulsar Knight's Maiming Polearm which is a twin-bladed berdiche with gigantic blades that take almost half the shaft.
- Bizarre Sexual Dimorphism: The Stygians monstrous Sisters of Tiamat do have males. However males are rare and only ever have 2 heads so they're not so useful in battle as the females, who have at least 5. The males instead, are kept in the temple pools for breeding purposes.
- Black-and-Gray Morality: Everyone has their own black traits, but The Devout are a common enemy to all. The Firstborn have a serious grudge against those who enslaved them which includes the Elves, Dwarves, and Blackbloods who seek to regain their lost power by any means.
- Bodyguard Babes: The Black Sisters are Sons of Kronos women who were charged by Kronos himself to serve the One King. Most serve as shock troopers and guards for judges, but 3 companies always guard the One King and are known as the Black Guard.
- Cannon Fodder: The Stygians used captured prisoners as meat shields ahead of their army.
- Close-Range Combatant: The Stygians are entire race of these, barring some thrown spears and two units that can spit acid.
- Deal with the Devil: The 4 Prophets of the One King were not satisfied with the scant reward for their services, so they made a deal with the Dark Lord and became the first of his Devout. Individuals from other races also have their own dealings with the Dark One.
- Deity of Human Origin: The One King pretty much became one when he reincarnated and created the discipline of time magic that manipulates the time streams. He then searched for the Tablets of Fate to cement that claim. His archenemy the Dark Lord also turned out to be one. All the mortal races have differing accounts about his origin, though the common theme is that he's the First Sinner and with newly learnt black magic, he fought back against the creator god that tried to punish him. When he lost, he was banished to Hell and eventually became the ruler there.
- Elves Versus Dwarves: Zigged-zagged. The Elves were in alliance with the Dwarves and Blackbloods to subjugate the Firstborn and some Dwarven clans still retain friendship with the Crystal Lotus House. Then there are Dwarves that really dislike Elves, because the Obsidian Serpent house destroyed the Dragon clan and took their hold.
- Elfeminate: Averted. The Elves of Chronopia are tall and muscular, with the armoured elite wearing armour only a shade less bulky than the human overly-armoured Repulsar Knights. Then there's Jade House's Ascended who are elves changed by the Yellow Lotus into being like miniature Hulks
- Expy: The Sons of Kronos are virtually the Simon Bisley rendering of the Celtic tribes in Sláine.
- Eye Scream: The Hammerheads of the Stygians are made thus. All Stygians are fascinated by the moon, when particularly obsessed young Stygians keep staring up, a Reaper comes up behind them and cuts out their eyes!! The blind Stygian is then bound and taken to have a metal ram-plate and tail blade surgically attached while various ceremonial piercings are added to the body. Between the agony and having the moon forever denied to them, the Hammerhead goes insane and becomes a berserk living battering ram.
- Flaming Weapon: The Burning Blades are warriors from the Sons of Kronus who serve as elite warriors for the Firstborn. Each of them carry Fireswords, magical weapons that can ignite an enemy. House Helios has the Warrior of the Sun who also carries a Firesword.
- God-Emperor: The One King. He's pretty much achieved his godhood status after coming back to life.
- Good Job Breaking It Hero: The One King went and recovered the Tablets of Destiny, giving the Firstborn a fighting edge against the Devout. Unfortunately it caused the Stygian invasion, because he had to go to their territory and slaughter some of their high priests to do so.
- For that matter, it was the One King's poor treatment of the Four Prophets that led to the Devout being formed in the first place.
- Green Rocks: The lotus flowers of the elves extends their lives and gives them magical abilities.
- Have You Seen My God?: The Old Gods of the Eternal Realm have left, this leaves only the Blood Totems, the Earth Goddess and the One King as the remaining gods in the world to fend off the threats of the Dark One and the Serpent Goddess.
- Heavily Armored Mook: Many factions have them, with the chunkiest armour on a mook going to the Iron Guard of the Firstborn. They're only a shade less armoured than the Repulsar Knight, who's the most heavily armoured unit in the game.
- Hive Mind: The Stygian Priestesses who have direct link to their Goddess, and coordinate the rest of the Stygians in battle.
- Kill It with Fire: The Dwarven Fire Thrower teams are a 2-man unit that operate a flamethrower. Given that the majority of enemies are melee troops, this weapon averts Video Game Flamethrowers Suck and can really ruin someone's day.
- Legions of Hell: The Devout have opened portals to Hell and are summoning a growing number of demons to accompany their undead and human minions.
- Living Weapon: The Stygian make extensive use of these, including the worm-like Tenebrous Crawler (the unit with the highest strength in the game). The Dwarves also use their Blood Totem gods in this fashion and the Devouted have their various demons to send in a fray.
- Multi-Armed and Dangerous: The Trolls of the Blackbood Empire along with the Guardians and Embalmed of the Stygians both have 4 arms and a lot of muscle for dealing with enemies. Additionally the Stygians have the Sisters of Tiamat, which are Hydra-like giant serpents who are Multi-headed and Dangerous.
- Our Dragons Are Different: The lesser ones are pretty much extinct, with Elves stealing their eggs and mutating them to make the Dragonbane mounts. Then there's every unit of the Stygians, they're descended from the draconic Serpent Goddess, Tiamat and so each Stygian gets the Draconic trait.
- Our Dwarves Are All the Same: Averted. Each clan is significantly different from each other in the weapons and units they bring to a fight. Not to mention that each tribe (except for the Dragon clan) have a corrupted god in their household.
- Our Elves Are Different: Tall and slender beings who live long by consuming magical lotus. They are also pretty arrogant, and have a history of slavery.
- The Ogre: They're the rulers of the orcs, trolls, goblins and fellow ogres that make up the Blackbloods. They achieve this by not only being bigger and stronger than their orc servitors, they're also more intelligent and have created an Arabian-themed empire.
- Our Orcs Are Different: Here they are a Mongol themed warrior culture, they form the backbone of the Blackbloods armies. As well they're quite intelligent and well-versed in the study of astronomy, medicine and alchemy (Orc alchemists serve as the magic users of the Blackbloods).
- Our Trolls Are Different: Certainly these guys are different than trolls in other games. In this setting, they have 4 arms and are a Gentle Giant race (until they get caught up in a fight, then they get caught up in their own bloodlust).
- Physical God: The Dwarven Blood Totems are what remained of the Dwarven gods. When a wave of corruption hit the dwarves, their gods soaked it and mutated into savage beasts. The Dwarves were forced to imprison their gods, but continue to honor them for their sacrifice and will turn them loose on enemies.
- Praetorian Guard: The Ogre Emperors have their Deathseekers. These are a cadre of elite Ogre (and occasionally Troll) fanatical swordsmasters who are the personal guard of the emperor.
- Reincarnation: The One King was slain by the elf Duke Chropus during the uprising of the Triad. Centuries later, the One King is reborn amongst the Sons of Kronos.
- Rapid Aging: One of the Chronomancers spells called Wither causes its target to age rapidly till they die. This can only be used once per game.
- Renegade Splinter Faction: The Vulture Clan were the ones to turn to the Devout during the clan wars and it was they who unleashed the black magic that transformed the gods. Meanwhile the Sons of Kronos have the Nuada a.k.a the Shadow Tribe who have turned to the Devout and for the Elves, the Obsidian Serpent is moving in that direction.
- Reptiles Are Abhorrent: The Stygians who raid the other races and sacrifice them to their Goddess.
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: The great barbarian warrior Kronos goes through one when he sees his dear friend, the One King die. He then manages to stay alive against constant arrow fire and attacking elves, to fight his way to Duke Chropus and chop him to bits. With Chropus dead, Kronos finally dies. For this deed, the Untamed rename themselves the Sons of Kronus.
- Sand Worm: The Stygian's Desert Crawler and its much larger cousin, the Tenebrous Crawler. The first sighting of the latter had 3 of these smash their way through a Blackblood fortress.
- Screw Destiny: What the One King is attempting to do when he took the Tablets of Destiny. If he unlocks their secrets, he'll gain of mastery of the cosmos and be able to defeat the Dark Lord completely. Otherwise, the Devout will control the realm.
- Shoulders of Doom: If you wear metal armour, you're going to have these with the most intimidating having long spikes.
- Slave Mooks: The Firstborn enslaved by the Triad are used to do most of their fighting for them against the other races.
- Slave Liberation: In the past the Firstborn were enslaved by the Elves, Dwarfs, and Blackbloods when they slew the One King. But when he was born again began freeing all enslaved humans from the other races and rebuild his empire. The Blackbloods themselves had a revolt, their empire was originally run by the Orcs but an Ogre uprising ended the days of the Orc emperors.
- Snake People: Some of the Stygians.
- Stripperific: Female humans and elves on the battlefield will only be wearing a few strips of cloth. Don't expect these to turn a sword or arrow very well.
- Suffer the Slings: Used exclusively by the Sons of Kronos, slingers are very dangerous despite their lack of firepower. They are very sneaky and have the ability to use cursed shot.
- Time Master: Chronomancers have the ability to control the flow of time and reality, they can make warriors move faster, or slow the movement of their enemies. And once per battle they can destroy an opponent by withering them into oblivion (this bypasses the agelessness of certain non-human creatures).
- The Ageless: The Stygians stop aging when they reach maturity, this makes the "immortality" temptations by the Devout meaningless to these guys.
- Took a Level in Badass: For the goblins, this happened when a faction of nature-worshipping goblins broke off from the Blackblood Empire to go live in the swamps. These Swamp Goblins made an alliance with the Jade House of elves and have successfully repelled many incursions into their swamps through a good helping of poison blow-darts, spears and giant arachnid cavalry.
- Wolverine Claws: Weapons of this kind are used by a few of the races. They are the Parrying Claw, Ripper Claw, Mantis Claw and Dragon-Toothed Bracer.
- Zerg Rush: What the Stygians threat boils down to. It's for this reason, they're also known as the Swarm.
