By the nature of the series, all spoilers except those relating to the series' backstory in the "Eyes and Ears" continuity are unmarked. You Have Been Warned.
3rd Life was the 1st season of the Life SMP, setting up the standard format of the Deadly Game from which all later seasons diverge.Each member of the server begins with three lives, losing one every time they die. When someone is on their last life, their goal shifts from surviving peacefully to taking out as many other players as possible. The world itself is very limited — only 700 by 700 blocks — so resources are finite and players must share, cooperate, or steal if they are to survive. The series uses the Voice Proximity mod, so random encounters with others are commonplace.
3rd Life began on April 20th, 2021, and ended on June 8th.
Note: Unless otherwise specified, all tropes pertain to the characters, not the content creators that play them.
The 3rd Life SMP provides examples of:
- #1 Dime: Played for Drama with the Dogwarts banner which Scar steals on Day 5. It's from the first batch of banners created; when everyone else points out they have many more identical banners, Martyn says it holds sentimental value… hence Dogwarts' relentless attempts to kill Scar, since he's stuck the thing on his shield and has constantly held on to it. This culminates into literal battles where many server-members are killed, sometimes permanently, and Dogwarts never end up getting their banner back in the end.
- Accomplice by Inaction: Right after Tango is executed by a firing squad, everyone thinks that's that... until Bdubs tells Etho that he too must be punished for not reporting Tango for breaking the rules, causing him to be executed in the same way.
- All for Nothing: In an attempt to gain a monopoly over all the dark oak wood on the server, Grian and Scar spend an hour on Day 1 chopping down a dark oak forest to ensure they'd be the only one with saplings... not knowing that there is a second dark oak forest in a secluded corner of the map, right by Scott and Jimmy's base. When they hear on Day 2 that Scar scammed both Joel and Cleo out of their items by promising them dark oak saplings sometime in the future, they start distributing free dark oak saplings to everyone else out of spite.
- Anvil on Head: On Day 6, Joel attempts to invoke this on Scott by setting up a trap at his base while he is away fighting, so that two anvils will fall on his head when he tries to enter. Subverted in that the trap was not set up correctly and only succeeds in giving Scott two free anvils.
- Betting Mini-Game: Jimmy's "Chick Chance" game that he runs on Day 4 in an attempt to multiply his own diamonds. Participants place bets on whether or not a chicken will spawn from five eggs thrown in the air, which according to Jimmy is a 50/50 chance.
- Big Fancy Castle: Several of them have been built across the server, such as Etho's lava walled wool castle and Bdubs' and Cleo's Crastle with a moat.
- Big "YES!": Grian shouts this out after successfully killing 3 people with his TNT trap, even though it initially failed.
- Bookends: Scar is the first and last to die, killed by Grian in both cases.note
- Cliffhanger: Subverted. Day 5 ends with an all-out war between the Desert and Renchanting that doesn't see an end in that episode. However, Day 6 starts without this fight... and then it becomes a Double Subversion when the fight resumes mid-episode.
- Common Law Marriage: The "Flower Husbands", who simply have a small love declaration alongside Flowers of Romance (on Jimmy's part) before settling in the same corner of the map together; it's not like there's time or resources in the middle of a Deadly Game for them to have a proper ceremony anyway. They proceed to fight alongside each other in the brewing war... until things start really hitting the fan.
- Cutting the Knot: On Day 3, Bdubs and Martyn (among others) decide to play Tango's minigame, Dare to Flare. After carefully reading the rules and seeing that they prohibit all fire resistance potions, Bdubs uses a golden apple to minimise damage from the lava and Marytn uses Ender pearls to jump straight to the reward chest and back out again. Tango lets both keep the prize but bans consumables and Ender pearls from that point forward.
- Deadly Prank: The first death on the server is caused by Grian leading a creeper over to a cluster of players to scare them, then setting it off by accident, blowing Scar up. This ultimately kick-starts the plotline of the season.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: In 3rd Life, Etho loves to make fun of the size of the Crastle to annoy Bdubs, as well as Bdubs' real-life height, which is actually average despite his testiness about it. After Etho gets Cleo to do the same, she points out that this trope is in play.
- Downer Ending: Everyone dies. That much was a Foregone Conclusion. Grian's perspective really hammers it in: after an entire series of him and Scar wanting to make it big together, their friendship collapses and the two fight to the death. Grian wins, but his victory is hollow — everyone else is dead, and his only true friend for the entire series is gone at his hands. Grian ends the series by taking his own life: he didn't die with riches, friends, and power — he died sad, poor, and alone, in the ruins of his and Scar's magnum opus.
- Enemy Mine:
- The Crastle (Bdubs especially) was never on great terms with the Sand People, due to hostilities from the Desert's side that resulted in the loss of Bdubs' second life, and even the alliance that Cleo forged between the factions was tenuous at best. However, after the Battle for the Red Desert destroyed the Sand People's home base, and the resulting fight between the Crastle and Dogwarts resulted in the elimination of Cleo, Bdubs realized it'd be foolish to reject the Sand People's allegiance and invited them into the Crastle right before it was besieged.
- The server ended up devolving into politics because of a schism between the Desert and the Flower Forest over the monopoly on dark oak. When things really get down to the wire, however, these two factions end up forming an alliance at the end of Day 5.
- Explosive Stupidity: The TNT minecart trap on Day 4 (the one that netted Grian the highest kill count on the server) definitely counts. First off, it doesn't even detonate at first, meaning Grian misses out on so many more kills. However, as Scott proposes a fairly foolproof idea of detonating the bomb without killing anyone (shooting it from a distance with an arrow), Jimmy spies the TNT. For a myriad of reasons, ranging from greednote to generally not thinking things throughnote , Jimmy immediately goes to grab it... and nudges the TNT minecart ever so slightly, which immediately sets off the bomb. Most of the people around the bomb have left by now, but the resulting explosion still kills Jimmy, Skizz, and Ren, placing the former two on their last life and destroying all three players' items (including the TNT Jimmy wanted so badly).
- Flower Motifs: The Flower Forest faction and relationship within is represented, both in this series and beyond, with gifts of poppies as Flowers of Romance.
- Gaslighting: Martyn builds a creeper face in Jimmy's house and gets Scott to join him in pretending they don't know where it came from. Soon thereafter, Scott leaves a cake in Jimmy's secret room and feigns ignorance to make Jimmy paranoid about it.
- Gilligan Cut: On Day 3, Bdubs tells Cleo that he won't participate in Tango's minigame, Dare To Flare, calling it a "stupid little game". The next shot? Bdubs telling Impulse he wants to play.
- A God Am I: Alluded to; the Renchanting slogan that Martyn came up with is "Don't be a dog, be a god."
- Grey-and-Gray Morality: None of the people or factions on the server are what you would call morally upstanding. Dogwarts actively seeks to kill everyone on the server and wages war against those who refuse to join them; the Desert scams everyone out of everything and sets up traps for their allies and enemies alike, and its two core members are only truly loyal to each other, not even their allies. Even the Flower Forest, arguably the most peaceful faction, joins the Desert after they've been threatened by Dogwarts, and when Jimmy is killed, Scott goes on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge, vowing to destroy Dogwarts for murdering his husband.
- Helmets Are Hardly Heroic: No one on the server wears a helmet. Enforced in that one of the rules of the server specifies that no one is allowed to wear one, presumably so they're more recognizable in others' videos. Tango is executed by firing squad for violating this rule, and Etho is executed after that for not reporting Tango for the rule violation.
- Ironic Name: The Pufferish of Peace is gifted and named as a symbol of the alliance between the Red Desert and the Flower Forest, the latter being one of the most peaceful factions on the server. When the warmongering Dogwarts gets ahold of it, with Martyn stealing it from the Flower Forest just before the Battle of the Red Desert, it's repeatedly used as a weapon of war.
- Kansas City Shuffle: After Grian sets up a water elevator in Bdubs's castle on Day 5, Bdubs catches Grian with pufferfish and Grian admits that he'd tried to rig the elevator with it. Bdubs is happy that he caught Grian before the trap could be complete... and proceeds to burn to death when he goes up the elevator, realizing too late that Grian had rigged his trap — and that said trap was lava.
- Mass "Oh, Crap!": When Scar reaches his last life and becomes the first person ever to go Red, everyone else freaks out, especially those on bad terms with the Red Desert, resulting in many hasty alliances being made to try and ensure their safety.
- Mistaken for Betrayal: Ren orders Martyn to kill him using a renamed axe to turn him Red, causing a death message to appear in chat stating that Martyn killed Ren and that "Red Winter is coming". Skizz, not knowing Ren was the one who asked to be killed, assumes Martyn has turned on Ren and runs to Dogwarts to help.
- Mood Whiplash: On Day 1, a large group meets up in the center of the map to trade resources, exchange information and dance to Bdubs' jukebox... until night falls, and about a dozen phantoms suddenly swoop down on them, sending all of them running for cover.
- No Blood for Phlebotinum: Given that the world is only 700 by 700 blocks big, there's bound to be conflicts over resources. For 3rd Life in particular, see Scar and Grian's attempt to create a monopoly over dark oak trees and sand, the server conflict earlier on over villagers, and people begging for and stealing cows.
- Palatial Sandcastle: The base Grian built on top of the Monopoly Mountain was a sandcastle that is large enough for him and Scar to reside in the desert for the majority of the season before it was destroyed on Day 6, resulting in Grian and Scar moving away to a bunker.
- Pass the Popcorn: As the Red Desert briefly siege the Crastle, Martyn and Ren have just returned from recruiting Etho into Dogwarts; having no stake in the conflict at that point, the two simply stand back to watch the fireworks, with the former discussing eating popcorn during their joint commentary of the attack.
- Please Put Some Clothes On: Said to Scar many times by various people, since he chooses to not wear a shirt throughout the season.
- Point of No Return: Grian sticks with Scar even after losing his first life since it's clear there's no way he's avoiding retribution even if he ditches Scar; he's simply become too involved in the politics of the server to back out now.
- A Rare Sentence: "You don't just climb into a coffin with another man and not be bros for life."
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: After Jimmy is killed in the Battle of the Red Desert, Scott — who up until this point had been trying to stay out of conflict as much as possible — vows to get his revenge on Ren and the rest of Dogwarts, and joins the Desert in their offensive. This rampage nets him a Kill Tally of two and a count of arson before he himself gets Killed Off for Real by Dogwarts.
- Rule of Three:
- Scar goes to burn Etho's base in revenge for Pizza, and it takes him three tries to do it.
- The name of the season is 3rd Life, and each player gets three lives.
- Running Gag: Martyn likes to play a Creeper's hiss sound while in groups of people to scare them. So far, he has successfully scared everyone at least once.
- Scandalgate: Parodied near the end of Day 4, when Martyn refers to the TNT minecart triple kill incident as "Gategate".
- Shot at Dawn: Tango is executed by firing squad for violating the "No Helmets" rule.
- Shout-Out:
- One defunct faction early on is "the Village People". At least one YMCA joke was made.
- Dogwarts' overall aesthetic and dynamics have been compared to Harry Potter turning into Game of Thrones by the server-members themselves.
- When Grian is rigging a trap in Dogwarts' basement on Day 6, Scott compares him to Vinny Santorini.
- The Smurfette Principle: Cleo is the only feminine-leaning member of the server during the season.
- Sole Survivor: Grian wins the final fight between himself and Scar, making him the winner of 3rd Life. It doesn't last.
- Suddenly Significant Rule: The "No Helmets" rule, which hasn't been paid much mind, suddenly becomes very important on Day 5 when Tango breaks it and is sentenced to execution by firing squad.
- There Was a Door: Most people opt to break through Dogwarts' wall rather than use the door, much to Ren's annoyance.
- Together in Death: After being Killed Off for Real, The Stinger of Scott's perspective of the finale has Jimmy give him an Afterlife Welcome in a completed version of the Flower Forest. Canon Welding with Empires SMP Season 1 also gives them a Reincarnation Romance.
- Too Dumb to Live: Discussed twice.
- On Day 6, Grian rigs the Desert to immediately explode when someone enters the main base. Scar, his own ally, considers stepping on the pressure plate, and Grian notes that if Scar dies, he won't even feel bad because he's been warned so many times. Later in the day, Scar admits he nearly stepped on the plate and only didn't from an accidental bug. He then intentionally sets it off to try and take out his enemies, but only ends up harming (but thankfully not killing) himself and Tango.
- On Day 7, after Jimmy is Killed Off for Real, Grian notes he kind of had it coming since he not only failed to activate a trap despite ample warning, but only did activate the trap when Grian, his own ally, was caught inside.
- War Is Hell: While the server starts out with faction politics as the main source of conflict, the latter half of the season drives home the point how the escalating conflict as a war has brought nothing but horrors for everyone. By the last two sessions of the season, even the relatively pacifistic players have had to take up arms, former friends have drifted apart and turned against each other as leading figures on opposite sides, most server-members have lost allies and friends (and in at least one case, suffered from bereavement) before being taken out themselves — oftentimes without mercy, and even the "winning" faction has destroyed their home in the process and ultimately gets a Downer Ending by the nature of the Deadly Game itself.
- Wham Episode: Day 7. Where do we begin...
- Grian, Scott, Martyn, and Impulse each lose their first life, leaving Big B as the only remaining Green Name. Even then, that's only because he was Put on a Bus for the episode, and his bright green IGN only serves to put a large target on his back when he returns on Day 8.
- Grian goes back on something he's pledged for the entire series and decides to stick around with Scar in spite of his "first life" rule — he's past the Point of No Return regarding the collapsing politics of the server, and even if he ditched Scar he'd still be a big target.
- Jimmy, Cleo, and Skizz are Killed Off for Real, making them the first permanent casualties of the server.
- The Red Desert is left a smoking crater in the aftermath of a vicious battle.
- When Trees Attack: Cleo gets a scare on Day 1 when a sapling she was standing over grows into a tree, nearly suffocating her inside its trunk.
