Web Animation / Songs of War

The Thumbnail for the movie of the first season, featuring some of the lead characters ^note (from left to right) Abbigail, Lucan, Thalleous Sendaris, Ingressus Voltaris, Tygren Voltaris, The Necrolord, Grim, and Jalkar Bowmani. Not pictured: Niika, Achillean Nestoris, Senn, and Igneous. And that's just the first season.

"There was a time, when Enderknights ruled the land and their dragons soared the skies. The Nether clashed in battles of unimaginable force. The undead were a menacing threat to be feared and even the Ardoni clans wielded great Songs of power. That time is over."

"I believe that time is coming again."

Sulliman and Thalleous Sendaris conversing in Episode 4.

Songs of War is a fantasy animation series based off of Minecraft. It was created by Black Plasma Studios, and was in production for over three years before the release of the first episode on November 23rd 2019. The series is complete with voice acting (a first for Black Plasma Studios), an original soundtrack, a fully to-scale world built in game, and much more! The series was directed by David R.B. (also known as Arbiter) and co-directed by Samuel Kyber.

The series takes place on the fictional world of Ardonia, home to a species known as the Ardoni who have to the power to wield objects known as the Songs, which grant them unique abilities. Other species in Ardonia include Humans, Felinas, and Magnorites, all of which are seen prominently in the series.

The first season of Songs of War follows three main plotlines with its three main protagonists:

• The Ardoni storyline, focusing on a young clanless Ardoni named Senn along with his mentor Thalleous Sendaris, as they journey to stop the exiled Voltaris clan from rising to power and destroying the other Ardoni clans. Later episodes added a Magnorite named Igneous as another main character.
• The Dragon Stone storyline, focusing on a young farmer named Abbigail along with her dog Sam as she ventures out into the world to stop two mercenaries named Jalkar and Grim from stealing a mysterious Ender Dragon Egg.
• The Necromancer storyline, focusing on a former criminal named Lucan along with a lone Felina (and potential love interest) named Niika as they go on a journey to foil an attempted uprising of the Necromancers.

The series' first season ended on March 28th, 2020. There was a mid-season break between January 18th and February 29th, 2020. Despite the series being popular among the channel's own fanbase, it failed to reach a high enough level of success, and was cancelled on June 14th, 2020. The script for seasons 2 and 3 was released to the public, letting people to read the continuation and end of the story in that form.

Fortunately, a number of animators that were involved in creating Songs of War, as well as several volunteers, founded the Knights of Ardonia (named after the in-universe organisation) in an attempt to move forward with the script that's now available to the public, serving as a structured Continuation for the series. Their first episode is due to be released on Deccember the 18th 2021.

The playlist for the series can be found here.

The soundtrack can be found here.

Behind-the-scenes videos are found here.

Tropes regarding Songs of War:

• Action Girl: Niika is no slouch in fighting, being able to wield two swords and take down multiple undead and Necromancers at a time.
• Adapted Out: The Zombie Pigmen (now the Zombified Piglins) and Villagers do not appear in this series at all, despite them being fairly recognisable and common in Minecraft.
• Adaptational Badass: A rare example where this applies to an object rather than a character; The beacon, which in normal Minecraft is mostly for decoration and status buffs, is in this universe a means of travelling between the capital cities of Ardonia (and Crown Peak), via Teleportation.
  • Gold weapons, whilst still mostly ceremonious in this universe, are said to be just as effective as Iron weapons, and just as easy to repair.
• Adaptational Heroism: The Guardians are hostile to all mobs in Minecraft except for each other, here however, they act more as neutral mobs, being helpful to Senn in Episode 9 after deeming him worthy to go to Ataraxia, living up to their namesake as, well, guardians.
• Adaptational Superpower Change: In Minecraft, the Eye Beams of the Guardians simply harm the player for as long as they look at them. The Guardians in Songs of War, use their Eye Beams as a Tractor Beam, and the Elder Guardians have Mind Rape-esque Telepathy.
• Aerith and Bob: We've got characters named Thalleous and Jalkar alongside characters with names like Darlene, Abbigail, and Eddy.
  • The Ardoni in particular have names like Thalleous, Lucidius, Ingressus... and Val.
• Alas, Poor Villain: Jalkar, the series' resident Villain Protagonist. Despite being an amoral jerk who stole the Dragon Stone, it's hard not to feel sympathy for him when he's killed off by Abbigail.
• All There in the Manual: The Behind-the-Scenes videos delve more into a character's motivations and backstory.
• All Your Base Are Belong to Us: An offscreen example. Sometime in the six months between Episodes 10 and 11, the Necromancers have taken over Fort Zuka.
• Almost Lethal Weapons: The arrows that were used by the undead against Lucan in Episode 3 were enough to gravely injure, but not kill him, something that he himself says was lucky.
• Always a Bigger Fish: Played literally with the appearance of the Elder Guardian in the river in Episodes 8 and 9.
• Amazing Technicolour Population: The Zombies in this series have colour schemes of regular Minecraft Zombies, Husks and Strays. The last one is particularly odd as strays are variants of the Skeleton.
• Ambiguously Human: Grim, Jalkar's partner-in-crime (literally), is of an unknown species.
• Anachronic Order: There's no real means of showing how much time has passed when Thalleous and a partner have been travelling for, though Word of God has said it tends to be several days per Travel Montage, and there was a several month Time Skip between Episode 1 and Episode 2.
• An Arm and a Leg: Grim succeeds in slicing off half of an Enderman's arm in Episode 7, by throwing his enchanted iron scythe at it. The part of the arm that falls off then vanishes, and the Enderman retreats in pain.
• Anti-Hero: Lucan's only doing what he's doing because he has to do it to survive and get by in life, and has no real heroic motivations. He repeatedly states that he's not a hero. However, as his Character Development increases, he mellows out into more of a Lovable Rogue.
• Anyone Can Die: Firmly established with the death of Thalleous in Episode 6, and with the deaths of Jalkar and Sam in Episode 9.
• Apologetic Attacker: Igneous apologizes to Jalkar for hurting him in Episode 8, saying that he didn't know what came over him.
• Balkanize Me: For an incredibly long time, the Enderknights ruled all of Ardonia, however, after the people rebelled, their most recent king, Rendor, split up Ardonia into six different kingdoms: Conchord, Cydonia, Felden, Hydraphel, K'arthen and Northwind. The Ardoni territories developed afterwards.
• Bait-and-Switch: For Jalkar's storyline. At first it seems like he is going to have a redemption arc and do a Heel–Face Turn. The exact opposite happens when Jalkar gets worse and worse as the first season progresses and then getting killed off in Episode 9 after becoming irredeemable.
  • In Episode 12, Senn and the audience are both expecting for Senn's new song instructor to be an old man like Galleous. Much to his (and our) surprise, the instructor turns out to be a young female.
• Big Bad Ensemble: There are numerous antagonists to this series which include:
  • The Nether Realm.
  • The Voltaris clan.
  • The Unyielding Legion.
  • The Necromancers.
• Bilingual Bonus: Some of the names and settings are in languages other than English (for example, the Ardoni names come from Latin and the Felina names come from Japanese). This can lead to Non-Indicative Name every once in a while.
• Bittersweet Ending: Season 1 ends with the Deathsinger having returned and the Necromancers having begun their attack on Felden. However, Senn is being trained by Galleous and the first Enderdragon in hundreds of years has been hatched, so there's no saying that the world of Ardonia will be left defenseless.
• Bling of War: The Honour Guard and some soldiers at Fort Zuka, wield golden weapons.
• Bloodless Carnage: Not a single drop of blood is seen in any of the episodes in this series, since it's very hard to render, and it's Minecraft, which doesn't have blood to begin with.
• Book Ends:
  • Episodes 2-4 end with the Dragon Stone storyline, and the characters that are attached to it, signifying its importance in the series.
  • The first season begins and ends with the same choir tune playing, the Deathsinger's Leitmotif, signifying his ultimate importance to the series.
    • Likewise, the first season begins and ends with the Deathsinger, though Episode 1 does it in a much more subtle way than Episode 10 does.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: Niika, after being hypnotized by the Necrolord.
• Breather Episode: Episode 8, which allows for some Worldbuilding in terms of certain societies, and building on the pasts of Lucan and Igneous.
• Casual Danger Dialogue: Abbigail exchanges some quick banter with the legionnaire from the Unyielding Legion as they're attempting to murder each other.
• Cat Folk: The Felinas are a human-like species with cat-like features, such as better eyesight, cat ears, claws, and increased agility, as seen with Niika in Episode 4. They also can't swim due to their hatred of water, and have to forced in even in the most dire of situations, as shown in Episode 7. The "cat" part is mostly reserved for the female Felinas, while the male Felinas are said to have more wolf like features, mostly in terms of their hair colour (which is greyscale).
• Cliffhanger: Episode 5, which was the last episode released before a one-month midseason break and ended with a Wham Shot, and was also shot off of an actual cliff.
  • Nearly every episode of Season 2 ended on one, to the point where it was a surprise whenever a Season 2 episode ended rather normally.
• The Chosen One: The Enderknights have a very particular variant of this trope: as revealed in Episode 12, all Enderknights are just a bunch of regular humans who are chosen to be Enderknights by pure chance. For Abbigail, she was chosen when she tried to protect the Ender dragon egg.
• Citadel City: Crown Peak, the de facto capital of all of Ardonia, is a walled city built in a circular manner. This is a reflection of when the Enderknights ruled the land, and a had their seat of power at Crown Peak.
• Colour-Coded for Your Convenience:
  • The Ardoni clans have a different colour for each of them:
    • The Kaltaris are green, the Sendaris are blue, the Mendoris are magenta, the Nestoris are yellow, and the Voltaris are red. Clanless Ardoni (such as Senn) are coloured white.
  • The Songs that can be wielded by the Ardoni are also coloured differently, as follows:
    • Aggressium is red, Mobilium is yellow, Protisium is blue, and Supporium is green.
• Colour Motif: The six kingdoms (and Crown Peak), all have their own colour palettes and banners to reflect their identity:
  • Conchord has brown, white, and dark green as its main colours. This shows in their largely-forested landscape, and use of wood and vines in their buildings.
  • Cydonia uses gray, orange and white, referring to its location in the desert of the south.
  • Felden uses black and various greens to show its location in the jungles.
  • Hydraphel has white dark gray, and various blues, motioning to its maritime industries, and using prismarine and quartz in much of its architecture.
  • K'arthen has red, gray and black to show its volcanic landscape and citizens, the Magnorites.
  • Northwind has white and icy blues to refer to its location in the far north of the world.
  • Crown Peak has grays, white and purple to signify its situation as the world capital and from being the former seat of power for the Enderknights.
• Cool Teacher: Senn's new instructor Val, who likes to break the rules (like using an Aggressium Song when she's not supposed to) and has a more relaxed teaching style than Galleous.
• Combat Pragmatist: Most of the characters in the series are very flexible in terms of fighting styles, and they will use just about any and every opportunity to win against their opponent(s).
• Combo Platter Powers: The Ardoni can achieve this by wielding more than one type of Song.
• Compilation Movie: Each season will release as one after it has ended.
• Conservation of Ninjutsu: Jalkar was deliberately holding back during his brief fight with Abbigail in Episode 4, since he was clearly the better warrior and intended to intimidate her. Instead of killing her, he resorts to just knocking her unconscious (as he did with Mr Finch seconds earlier).
• Continuity Nod: In Episode 8, we see two story arcs crossing each other for the first time. Specifically, Senn and Igneous are ambushed by Jalkar, who runs with the Dragon Egg after being punched by Igneous. In Biggerton, Abbigail comes across Senn and Igneous and allows them to refer the map she bought, and in exchange, the pair tell Abbigail where Jalkar was heading. It’s confirmed that this sort of thing will happen in the future.
  • In Episode 12, Senn and Abbigail both clearly recognize each other from their previous encounter four episodes earlier.
• Convection, Schmonvection: As with regular Minecraft, being right next to lava doesn't hamper the survival of any of the characters near it.
• Cool Sword: The standard weaponry wielded by many of the Ardoni and Enderknights are swords that look awesome.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Lucan vs. Dark!Niika in Episode 12. Given that Niika is a much better fighter than Lucan is and that Lucan doesn't want to hurt Niika, the fight goes decisively in Niika's favour. Lucan would've been killed had it not been for Kiyoshi.
• Creator Cameo: The animators will occasionally use their Minecraft avatars within the series.
  • David's avatar is used for a civilian who leans on the forth wall in Episode 8.
  • Skyfall, one of the fight scene animators, makes a background appearance in Episode 8 as a soldier in Fort Zuka, in a fighting animation that he himself created.
  • One of the Graphics Editors, "Loves", is briefly seen at the Mahoa Docks in Episode 9, loading up the fleet.
  • The Patrons, specifically the Obsidian Patrons (people who donated over $100 a month for the series), get to have their Minecraft skins featured as cameos in the series.

• Dateless Grave: The sense of time and years in Songs of War is rather vague, and the lack of any dates on the gravestones we've seen so far further prove this.
• Death Mountain: Mount Velgrin acts as this, due to the presence of the Voltaris up on the peak.
• Decoy Protagonist: At first it seems that the Dragon Stone storyline will have an Anti-Hero protagonist in Jalkar. Then he disappears from the story for almost two episodes, during which Abbigail is introduced.
  • Thalleous is the first onscreen character we see, and he's very obviously set up the series' main protagonist. He's killed in Episode 6, thus passing the main protagonist mantle onto Senn.
• Dem Bones: As with regular Minecraft, there are skeletons in this series, specifically:
  • The Overworld has skeletons in its Undead forces.
  • The bulk of the Nether armies are made up of Wither Skeletons, regular Skeletons, and Wither Bosses.
  • The Necromancers control skeletons in their forces, and use Wither Skeleton Skulls to control them. Also, the Necrostaff is formed from a Wither Boss.
• Despair Event Horizon: Senn very nearly crosses this in Episode 7, when he's all alone nobody is willing to help him. Thankfully, he manages to pull himself together to form a plan as to what to do next.
• Distant Prologue: The prologue in the first half of Episode 1, takes place just before, and during the Great War, which began 200 years ago and ended 150 years ago.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?:
  • The actions and preparations of the remaining Voltaris, especially when it comes to the return of their master, mirrors that of several real-world demonic cults. The fact that their actions are of dark magic origin fuels this even further.
  • In Episode 11, the Necrolord has cornered Niika, who is scared and panicking, and tells her relax and look into his eyes as he gets closer to her. It's disturbingly reminiscent of sexual assault.
• Doomed Hometown: Riverstead, which is where we first meet Lucan, is the first city to be torched by the Necromancers during their invasion.
• Downer Beginning: Episode 11 begins with the Voltaris slaughtering all of the Ardoni, who had just been winning the battle moments earlier, and with the Deathsinger preparing to complete the tasks that the other Voltaris failed to do.
• Downer Ending:
  • Episode 1 ends with Hawken dead, Thalleous barely escaping with his life, and the Voltaris proving to be a threat to the world once more.
  • Episode 6 ends with the Voltaris finishing off Thalleous, and Senn being forced away from Sendaria for his own safety, trying to find survivors.
• Dressing as the Enemy: Lucan takes the knocked-out-Necromancer's robes in order to follow their tunnels back to their base. It would have been Niika, but the Necromancer was a human male, not a Felina female.
• Dragon Rider: The Enderknights famously ride Ender Dragons into battle.
• Dream Sequence: Abbigail has a surreal dream in the End, with the castle turning beneath her, Endermen looking on, and a crown on a throne in the castle. It then changes to the Endermen being stabbed by Wither Skeletons, skulls showing up all over the floor, and a portal with a Netheran Enforcer and a Wither coming through. It ends after she falls into the void and subsequently waking up.
• Dual Mode Unit: Enchanted weapons differ slightly from those in Minecraft. They have an idle status, whenever they are simply being carried by a combatant, and active status, whenever they are being used in combat.
• Dual Wielding:
  • Ingressus Voltaris wielded a large sword and an intricate staff when he won the tournament in the prologue.
  • Niika, the lone Felina, is seen wielding a pair of katanas after coming across Lucan in Episode 4. She later uses them to fight the undead to great effect in future episodes.
  • Many of the Voltaris are shown to use two weapons when fight from Episode 6 onwards.
  • Kiyoshi wields two wooden swords while sparring with his soldiers in Episode 9.
  • Val is shown to wield two twin arm blades.
• Dug Too Deep: Episode 2 reveals that the mines across Ardonia are beginning to run dry, and some resources are becoming scarce, forcing people to dig deeper into the dangers that lurk below. Episode 3 shows the undead (and some creepers) attacking the miners and their guards, killing everyone except Lucan, who points out that he got lucky.
• Easter Egg: The animators hid a Derp and Yee into every video, with the viewers tasked with finding them as part of a Scavenger Hunt.
• Egg Macguffin: The Ender Dragon Egg from Abbigail's storyline. It hatches in Episode 10.
• Elite Mooks: The Zombies shown in Episode 3 are seen using weapons and wearing armour, which until then was incredibly unusual to see.
• Evil Versus Evil: In Episode 6 we have Jalkar and Grim vs five Voltaris led by Zinaida. Jalkar and Grim win.
• The Exile: The Voltaris clan were forced into exile long before The Great War for abusing the power of the Prime Songs. After the end of The Great War, they were forced into deeper exile, with Thalleous Sendaris hunting down many of them.
• Fainting: Senn, after he harnesses the energy of a Song for the very first time. Galleous says that it's a regular occurrence for first-timers.
• Fantastic Drug: Potions are implied to be this in the series, though we haven't seen the effects that they have on anybody yet.
• Fantastic Racism:
  • The citizens of Hogtown, don't trust outsiders, treating Igneous and Senn with complete contempt. According to the creators, this is because they are constantly left behind by the kingdoms, such as Conchord, causing them to be bitter to those from outside of their community.
  • The bar attendant and the map merchant at Biggerton invoke this on Igneous, since Magnorites are seen as dangerous beings after K’arthen attacked Cydonia.
• Fantasy-Forbidding Father: Osivian Sendaris forbids his daughter Ria from gallivanting across the world due to her existence as one of the last remaining female Ardoni.
• Floating Continent: Ataraxia is an artificial variant of this. It's an Ardoni city outside of the traditional Ardoni Territories, and the landmasses that make it up float because of the redstone ore that's locked within them. Unlike most versions of this particular trope, There are bridges that connect it to the main landmass near it, and has outskirts on said landmass.
• Foil: Jalkar is this to Lucan. Both are thieves with a history of crime who prefer to work alone, but are forced to partner up with someone else in their respective storylines. However, Lucan did petty crime and minor theft, while Jalkar staged much bigger heists, like the dragon egg in Etherea. Lucan also has much more morals than Jalkar.
• Foreshadowing:
  • In Episode 1, Tygren vows that he will kill Thalleous and take his sword. In Episode 6, he does just that.
  • Almost everything Tygren says in Episode 1 is a reference to the true goal of the Voltaris: to allow the Deathsinger to escape from his duel with the Tidesinger to the present day.
  • In Episode 3, the Leitmotif that comes when there's focus on the Wither Skeleton Skull Lucan's carrying, is revealed to be an important part of the indoctrination of the undead by the Necromancers in Episode 6.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: Several in the Prologue:
  • If one looks very closely in the opening sequence, and later the Nether, some Ghasts can seen. This is strange as this is the only appearance of the Ghast mob in the series (so far).
  • Looking at this image, shows Thalleous Sendaris and Ingressus (in disguise) touching their swords in the centre before starting the tournament.
  • Around about the same scene in said Prologue, we can see someone who looks an awful lot like Osivian Sendaris, and is hinted to be a younger version of him.
  • In an example of both this and Chekhov's Gunman, Achillean Nestoris, a.k.a. the Tidesinger, can be seen in shots of the tournament and later Nestoria.
• From Bad to Worse: The second half of Season 1 portrays this in all of the storylines:
  • Senn and Thalleous witness the razing of Sendaria in Episode 5, followed by Thalleous' death in Episode 6.
  • Abbigail begins running low on food in Episode 9 and is forced to witness the death of her dog Sam later in the episode.
  • The authorities of Felden ignored a stream of disasters because of the Necromancers, and later pay the price for not paying attention to the problem sooner, losing an entire city in the process.
• Furry Confusion: The Felinas are a cat-like species that keep actual Minecraft cats around with them as pets.
• Gentle Giant: Older members of the Ardoni (such as Thalleous), as well as some Magnorites (mainly Igneous), are much taller than normal humans, but are in fact friendly people that get along with those who talk to them.
• Glowing Eyelights of Undeath: The Zombies get glowing white eyes whenever a Necromancer is right next to them, showing the kind of power Necromancers have over the undead. This also goes to the Skeletons and Creepers when presented with a Wither Skeleton Skull and the Necrostaff in Episode 6.
• Healing Factor: The Supporium Songs allow for the Ardoni to heal themselves when wielding them.
• Heroes Prefer Swords: Most of the protagonists that we follow use swords as their primary weapons.
• Hidden Elf Village: Ataraxia is an Ardoni city, far away from the Ardoni Territories, and was founded by the likes of Galleous Sendaris in order to give those affected by the Great War a safe haven.
• Honour Before Reason: This seems to be an important part of Ardoni culture, as they seem to act on impulse whenever the Voltaris do something incredibly shocking in the series, triggering an antagonistic reaction towards them, from rejection (prologue) to raiding (Episode 9).
• Hot-Blooded: The Magnorites, in keeping with their status as magma men, are a volatile species that recently invaded (and were then repelled from) Cydonia, and are a generally grumpy species, save for Igneous, who has kinder tendencies.
• House Fire: In the opening scene of Episode 7, the Necromancers set fire to Niika's treefort, in order to remove much of the information that she gathered on them. See "Ray of Hope" Ending below.
  • Luna accidentally burns down a barn in Episode 11.
• Insistent Terminology: Merlin is not a messenger bird, he's a highly certified communications emissary.
• Instant Messenger Pigeon: Messenger birds are used throughout Ardonia as a means of communication. This is also how Galleous Sendaris was able to collate information on what's been going on in the series.
  • Season 2 features one of these messenger birds, Merlin, as a character. He's able to deliver a message to Abbigail from Galleous, who explains her destiny as the Enderqueen and her task of recruiting other Enderknights.
• Internal Homage: The shot of Tygren noticing Zulius on Mt. Velgrin in episode 10 is almost identical to the shot of Thalleous noticing Tygren at the same place in Episode 1. Both shots are also followed by a fight/battle scene.
• Interspecies Adoption: Or rather inter-clan adoption in the form of Osivian Sendaris adopting the clanless Senn.
• Leitmotif: Every character has a subtle theme tune during their introductions and scenes (See the music playlist above).
• Lethal Harmless Powers: Songs, in their natural form as cubes that can fit in one's hands, are completely harmless unless a member of the Ardoni are wielding them.
• Lock-and-Load Montage: The start of Episode 9 shows the Felden Military at Mahoa Docks getting prepared to go to war against the Necromancers, loading up the fleets and gathering weapons for the soldiers to go to Mount Tempus.
• Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: The Protisium Songs allow the Ardoni to cast force field, bubbles, or static shields that protect them from just about anything.
• Magic Knight: The Ardoni essentially become this when they wield their songs.
• Magical Society: Etherea, one the cities in the kingdom of Conchord, is a settlement where the economy is largely dependant on enchanting, as well as technology from The End.
• Magma Man: The Magnorites, from the kingdom of K'arthen, who also double as Rock Monster, due to their physical appearances and weight. They have no need to eat or sleep, are said to have violent tempers (see Hot-Blooded above), are unable to swim, and only live for around 30 years.
• Meaningful Name: The kingdom of Cydonia is named after an area on the planet Mars. This refers to the barren landscape of both areas.
• Melancholy Moon: The moon in Episode 2, where Ria is talking about the situation between her and Senn, emphasising the attitude that Ria is speaking in during this scene.
• Monochromatic Eyes: The Zombies have the regular black eyes they have in Minecraft, but when a Necromancer is near, their eyes turn white, showing the control that the Necromancers have over them.
• Mood Whiplash: Episode 5 ends with Thalleous bringing Senn back home to Sendaria after their journey, with Senn thanking Thalleous. Then we see Senn looking distraught as Thalleous catches up to him, and it's revealed that Sendaria is up in flames.
  • Episode 11 begins rather bleakly (see Downer Beginning above). The very next scene after the title card rolls is of Senn and Galleous having a sparring session, which is light-hearted in tone.
• Mythology Gag:
  • The sounds that Lucan makes while disguised as a Necromancer are very similar to those made by Villagers in normal Minecraft.
  • The Marvelous Deer that we see in Episode 8 are directly inspired by those from the Twilight Forest mod.
• Nap-Inducing Speak: After Thalleous is finished narrating the history of The Great War on the 11th Wall of Time, we see that Hawken had fallen asleep during an unknown part of it, much to Thalleous' chagrin.
• Never Trust a Trailer:
  • A shot in the trailer showing a Voltaris clan member holding Thalleous' sword was confirmed to be a fake by David, after many fan theories on the discussion server on Discord.
  • The background in the trailer, from when Thalleous said "I believe that time is coming again." to Sulliman, is a completely different colour in the episode where we actually see it.
  • The shot of Jalkar picking up the Aggressium Song is flipped in the episode it turns up in (Episode 6), and doesn't include Zinaida's body, for obvious reasons. He's also seen talking in the episode, and not in the trailer.
• No "Arc" in "Archery": Whenever an arrow is fired from a bow, there is little, though mostly no arc to the arrow all together.
• Non-Indicative Name: In a Bilingual Bonus sense, the Kingdom of Felden’s name, translates into “the fields” in the Western Frisian language. Felden is mostly covered by jungle.
• North Is Cold, South Is Hot: The world map is designed this way, with the Kingdom of Northwind covered in ice and snow, while the south has the Kingdom of Cydonia, which is primarily a desert.
• No-Sell: Magnorites, being made of rock, are immune to some things that would hurt other species. In Episode 7, Igneous takes a glass bottle to the head like it's nothing. In Episode 8, Jalkar's knife doesn't even penetrate Igneous' skin.
• Off with His Head!: This is a common way that characters deal with zombies.
• Older Hero vs. Younger Villain: Thalleous Sendaris vs Tygren Voltaris in the climax of the first episode. While Thalleous initially has the advantage, Tygren is much younger than him and eventually overpowers him, nearly killing him in the process.
• One-Gender Race: According to Galleous, only male humans were chosen to be Enderknights, with Abbigail being the first female Enderknight.
• One-Man Army: Thalleous takes on multiple Voltaris in Episode 6. He would've succeeded had it not been for Tygren stabbing him with a spear and killing him.
• Opening Monologue: In the first episode, Thalleous reads aloud the chronicle written on the 11th Wall of Time, explaining what the world, the Ardoni and the Songs are, as well as telling the history of the Great War. This lasts 7 minutes, which is around half of the entire episode.
• Out-of-Character Moment: In Episode 9, the normally merciful Abbigail kills Jalkar coldly and mercilessly.
• Parental Substitute: It's implied that Mr Finch is this to his neighbour Abbigail, reprimanding her constantly and forbidding her from going off to hunt down Jalkar and Grim in Episode 4. Abbigail mentions to Darlene in Episode 5 that Mr. Finch raised her and took care of her after the death of her parents.
• Person of Holding: The concept of inventories carries over from Minecraft. However, characters cannot carry several cubic metres of blocks with them; Instead, they carry mostly weapons, currency and food.
• Punny Name: Biggerton, as in "bigger town".
• Purple Is Powerful: The Enderknights, coloured dark purple, are among the most powerful warriors in the world of Ardonia. This is exemplified at Crown Peak, once their seat of power in the overworld, which has subtle purple shades in its architecture.
• "Ray of Hope" Ending: At the end of Episode 7, Niika's treefort, and all the information within it, has been burned by the Necromancers, who are now aware of the repercussions of having Lucan and Niika following them. However, Niika still remembers a good deal of information from her time hunting the Necromancers, and Lucan knows where their base is.
• Really 700 Years Old:
  • The Ardoni species can live for as long as 275 years.
  • The Netherans and Enderknights, make the Ardoni look young by comparison, being able to live up to 800 years.
• Red Is Violent: The Voltaris clan are seen as this, though being on the verge of extinction probably doesn't help. This also goes for the Aggressium Songs, as they are used as means of attacking the opponent.
• The Reveal: Everything that Voltaris have planned was the Deathsinger's plan the entire time. He planned to travel to the future, get the Prime Songs, and take over the other clans. All of the Voltaris were aware of this, and Tygren was chosen to be his successor.
  • As revealed in Episode 12, the Enderknights are not some mystical race of dragon riders, rather they are normal people who are magically chosen to be Enderknights. Abbigail herself wasn't even one until she came upon the egg and chose to protect it.
• Ride the Rainbow: Downplayed. The Beacons allow people to travel between the capital cities of the world, albeit with only yellow and blue instead of the rainbow colours.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: In Episode 11, [spoiler:we see that Abbigail has been spending six months slaughtering members of the Unyielding Legion as revenge for what Jalkar did to her and Sam.]]
• Romantic False Lead: Val was apparently going to be this, according to Word of God. The idea was that she was going to be introduced as Senn's new love interest after Ria's inferred doom in Season 1, only for Ria to return later on in Season 2, thus being a Bait-and-Switch of sorts.
• Sad-Times Montage: We are treated to one in the prologue in Episode 1, with the Ardoni carrying the corpses of the fallen to graves. There's a similar scene in Episode 9, where several Ardoni carrying the victims of the Voltaris raids, with emphasis on the body of Thalleous.
• Scenery Gorn: The prologue, Episode 6 and 9 show the devastation of The Great War and the Voltaris attacks on the Ardoni Territories.
• Scenery Porn: There are plenty of examples where the scale of the map is shown to its full extent.
• Ship Tease: Quite a bit between Niika and Lucan from Episode 7 onwards.
• Sinister Scraping Sound: Part of Xaria's Dynamic Entry includes him scraping his sword on the floor of the cave in order to tell the zombies near him to stay back.
• Sins of the Father:
  • The Voltaris clan have had to deal with the reputation of their forefathers whenever they are met by other members of the Ardoni clans, which has forced them to do evil in order to survive.
  • The Magnorites throughout Ardonia have to deal with the fact that their home kingdom K’arthen, attacked Cydonia for seemingly no reason.
• Snow Means Death: Hawken is killed on top of the snow-capped Mount Velgrin.
  • Later, in Episode 11, all of the Ardoni, including Zulius and Hadion, are slaughtered by the Voltaris on Mount Velgrin.
• Strong as They Need to Be: Abbigail has been a farmer her whole life, and she had no combat experience. Despite this, she is able to defeat Grim, a feared "Reaper" who is able to take on multiple powerful trained Voltaris and armoured guards at a time (he was weakened at the time and made a mistake, however, which was likely why she won). She is also able to dodge Grim and Jalkar's attacks relatively well, land hits, and even disarm Jalkar (who also did what Grim did) in a 1 on 1 melee combat. After Jalkar attacked Abbigail and Sam pulled Jalkar off the cliff to save her and died from the fall, Abbigail suddenly had the power to kill Jalkar with her bow because of her anger at Sam's death. However, this is justified by Jalkar trying to run away with the egg, leaving himself exposed, and after being shot twice he lacked the strength to stand, let alone fight.
• Sword Almighty: Swords are presented as the ultimate weapon for the characters to use, and many of them wield swords for combat.
• Technicolour Fire: The Ender Dragons, as they do in Minecraft, have purple fire when attacking the Nether Invasion.
• Teleportation:
  • Some of the Mobilium Songs allow the Ardoni to teleport or Flash Step when wielding them.
  • The Endermen from regular Minecraft do this as well, though teleporting between dimensions requires much more energy for them to do so.
• Teleport Spam: The Enderman that fights Jalkar and Grim uses this a lot, allowing it to get the better of them until Grim catches it off guard.
• Theme Naming:
  • Many Ardoni have Greco-Roman sounding first names (which Word of God says were thought up as he was watching Gladiator), followed by their clan names.
  • The Magnorites tend to have hard "O"'s and "G"'s in their names, reflecting their existence as stone-based beings.
  • The names of the Felina are inspired by real Japanese names.
  • The towns and cities of the primarily human-inhabited kingdoms tend to have medieval-sounding names, ending with "dale", "shire", "wood", and so on.
• The Stinger: Episode 10 ends with a short post-credits scene revealing that the Tidesinger survived his duel with the Deathsinger.
• Time Skip:
  • There’s a several month time jump that occurs between Episode 1 and 2, where Thalleous has been doing a few things since we last saw him.
  • The directors have confirmed that there will be significant jumps between the seasons.
  • Six months has passed from the ending of Season 1 to the beginning of Season 2.
• Title Drop: The series' name is said by Galadar Mendoris to Zulius Kaltaris in Episode 9.

  Many years has it been since we last wielded the Songs of War.

• Too Awesome to Use: The Prime Songs, after being abused by the Voltaris clan hundreds of years ago, were deemed too powerful by the other clans to use. Using them is crossing the Godzilla Threshold.
• Travel Montage: We get one in Episode 1 and 3 with Thalleous and a partner (Hawken in Episode 1 and Senn in Episode 3) travelling across the vast world of Ardonia.
  • Igneous and Aren have one in Episode 11, where they go from Cydonia to K'arthen.
• Training Montage: In Episode 11, Senn is seen doing various activities in Ataraxia as part of Galleous' training.
• Tree Top Town: The Kingdom of Felden has offices in the treetops, which is meaningful, since Felden is primarily a jungle biome. The Capital City of the kingdom, Felora, is mostly based up in the trees.
• Two Lines, No Waiting: As of season 1, there are three storylines: the Ardoni one, the Dragon Stone one and the Necromancer one. As shown in Episode 8, they will occasionally cross over. Episode 9 introduced a fourth arc with the Ardoni masters gathering forces and fighting against the Voltaris, and Episode 10 sets up a fifth arc focusing on Igneous going to settle the conflict between Cydonia and K'arthen.
• Villain Protagonist: While not outright evil, Jalkar is still a person with few morals who is selfish and kills people who get in his way. This is best shown when he casually kills several guards in Episode 2. However, he does spare Mr. Finch and Abbigail when they first fight, and knocks both of them out instead of killing them.
• Volcano Lair: Mount Tempus, one of the only volcanoes in Ardonia, is one for the Necromancers.
• Wall of Text: The Walls of Time, located in the West of the Kingdom of Northwind, records significant events from Ardonia's past, with the history of the Great War being recorded on the 11th Wall of Time.
• War Is Hell: The Great War was described as this by Thalleous in Episode 5. Bearing in mind that the Ardoni were almost pushed to the brink of extinction, and that it lasted around 50 years in-universe, it's hard to argue with that.
• Water Is Blue: The Sendaris clan, who live primarily in a delta, have a lot of water around their homes so as to emphasise the colour blue.
• We Hardly Knew Ye: Both Hawken and Eddy are killed in action just a few minutes after their respective introductions.
• Weird Moon: The moon in this series is a very clear example of this, with its blue colouring and having gas clouds coming off of it when we see it.
• Wham Episode: Season 1 Episode 6 is the first example of this in the series. The clients that hired Jalkar to retrieve the Dragon Egg from Etherea was the Voltaris, the Necromancer's base and leader are seen for the first time, Thalleous, who until then was the main protagonist, is killed by Tygren, and Senn is forced to go off on his own, not knowing whether his adopted family is alive or not.
• Wham Shot:
  • Ingressus Voltaris removing his Nestoris disguise after winning the tournament in the prologue was seen as this by those in attendance, since many had forgotten about the Voltaris clan completely.
  • The shot of Sendaria being engulfed in flames as Thalleous and Senn can only watch hopelessly in Episode 5.
  • The Mt. Velgrin portal opening and showing the famous duel between Deathsinger and Tidesinger in Episode 10.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Hawken's horse suddenly disappears after Episode 1. Then again he did die at the end of that episode.
• Wretched Hive: Hogtown, a settlement outside the borders of nearby kingdoms, is described as a small-scale version of this, being a filthy town with bigoted citizens and a pig-based economy.
• You Can't Go Home Again: After the Voltaris clan allied with the Nether Realm for protection, the other clans made sure that they could NEVER return to their old home of [Old] Voltaria, and a large remnant of them made Mount Velgrin their base as a result.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Downplayed. Jalkar abandons Grim in Episode 7, feeling like Grim is no longer useful to him.