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Belgariad (view source)

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Fix typos, add Power Limiter example, slight change to Wizards Live Longer.
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(Fix typos, add Power Limiter example, slight change to Wizards Live Longer.)
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* [[Death by Materialism]]: Most people who stray into Maragor.
* [[Death Seeker]]: Garion strongly suspects [[The Emperor|'Zakath]] of being one of these in [[The Malloreon]].
* [[Deconfirmed Bachelor]]: Silk, especially in ''the MalloreanMalloreon'' when he trades out his [[Unrequited Love]] for Queen Porenn to catching the eye of wily [[Action Girl|up-and-coming Lady-Spy]] Liselle.
{{quote|'''Garion:''' "Is ''everybody'' getting married?"
'''Silk:''' "Not ''me'', my young friend. In spite of this universal plunge towards matrimony, ''I'' still haven't lost my senses. If worse comes to worse, I still know how to run." -- ''(From the last few pages of the Belgariad)'' }}
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* [[Epic Fail]]:
** In ''[[The Belgariad]]'' Lelldorin manages to extend an epic fail over the course of several weeks. When he announces that he's going to get back to the main group, his beloved refuses to stay behind. During the departure and trip he manages to break her father's leg, run his cousin through the leg "just a little bit", punch out all of a priest's teeth, and cause enough assorted mayhem to get a bounty put on his head by the crown. And all of this was ''without trying''. This is also an example of [[Disaster Dominoes]]. He did successfully marry the girl in the process, though! (Only because traveling alone with her would cause more trouble.)
** In ''[[The Belgariad|The MalloreanMalloreon]]'', Garion [[Got Volunteered|has to]] stop a [[Chivalric Romance|war]] threatening to [[Chronic Hero Syndrome|engulf]] the entire kingdom of Arendia. He magically summons a [[Dramatic Thunder|storm]] that helps him [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|single-handedly]] stop two charging armies in their tracks, [[Crowning Moment of Funny|force]] an [[Knight in Shining Armour|old friend]] to [[Arranged Marriage|marry]] the [[Courtly Love|love]] [[Crowning Moment of Heartwarming|of his life]] and resolve the dispute. He’s very [[Tempting Fate|pleased]] with his hard day’s work. A few chapters later he [[Gone Horribly Right|finds out]] that he sparked off blizzards, hurricanes, droughts and tornados right around the world, and even triggered a new ice age. It took the combined efforts of the gods themselves and two of the most powerful sorcerers alive over six months to fix it. Needless to say, Garion is [[You Are Not Ready|banned]] from touching the weather again for two thousand years.
* [[Eunuchs Are Evil]]: The kingdom of Nyissa seems to have a lot of evil eunuchs. Considering that you have to be a eunuch to work at the royal palace, and the palace is filled with intrigue, this is a [[Justified Trope]]. Remedied in the second series when {{spoiler|[[Evil Chancellor|Sadi]]}} turns out to be <s>a pretty decent guy</s> no worse than the protagonists. And pretty [[Badass]] to boot.
* [[Even Evil Has Standards]]:
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* [[Magic A Is Magic A]]:
** Magic is rather flexible... but you may ''not'' unmake anything. Breaking things is fine, as that just changes its state, but using magic to make something "Be not!" causes it to backlash and take ''you'' out. Which means that you technically ''can'' unmake something, so long as the something is ''you''. A couple of sorcerers in the [[Backstory]] actually committed suicide this way.
** Magic comes in several types in Eddings' world: Sorcery uses "the Will and the Word"; Witchcraft utilizes nature spirits; and Magic involves summoning a demon to do your bidding for as long as you can hold him in the shape you create for him (generally, not long enough.) Necromancy exists, which is the magic of speaking with the dead spirits and commanding them. There are Wizards, whose power is never specifically defined in either set of books. It is also hinted at that there are more types of magic than that, such as that Salmissra has a type of magic which appears to be specific to the Brides of Issa. Also, it's worth mentioning that Alchemy isn't a form of magic. It is considered a science. Senji just happens to be a sorcerorsorcerer who also is an alchemist. Belgarath, Beldin, and several Grolims both know how to do sorcery and magic, and a Malloreon hedge-sorcerer is more famous for alchemy than sorcery. However, it's strongly implied in ''The Malloreon'' that all types of magic are variations of the same basic principles.
** Also: Magic requires you to pay homage to physics, meaning the sorcerorssorcerers study nature and physics and the like quite a bit to understand how the world works ''before'' they try to mess with it. Try to lift a boulder taking into account the forces which have to go somewhere, you get pushed into the earth. Conjure a lightning storm in the wrong place, and you might mess up the global weather patterns. If you turn yourself into an animal, you'd better remember to include the heart.
* [[Magic Knight]]: Garion, who's frighteningly proficient with both weaponry and sorcery.
* [[Magical Nanny]]: Polgara plays this role as caretaker of the Rivan line for two thousand years. And her cooking... divine!
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* [[My God, What Have I Done?]]:
** Garion's horror and self-loathing over Asharak's death (no matter how badly it was deserved) is a major plot element of ''Queen of Sorcery''.
** Also a major plot point for {{spoiler|Zakath}} and his back story which affects his behaviour and decisions in much of ''the Belgariad'' and Mallorean''Malloreon''.
* [[Narrative Profanity Filter]]: Eddings uses this a great deal, most notably with Beldin. Only missed in a couple instances, but in referring to female dogs. Usually played for entertainment purposes. The descriptions of (and reactions to) people swearing can be as or more entertaining than the swearing itself.
{{quote|'''Garion:''' (in response to Ce'Nedra) "Why dear, I didn't even think you knew what half of those words meant!"}}
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** Each of the nations of the world, overlaid on their [[Fantasy Counterpart Culture]]. Drasnians are devious, Tolnedrans are greedy, Arends take [[Honor Before Reason]] to truly ridiculous levels, Nyissans are decadent hedonists, Alorns are sailors and party animals.
** Again, justified. The gods chose people who had traits that appealed to them to follow them, and have spent umpteen-thousand years cultivating those traits. Extra justified in the case of the Angaraks, who were split into nations based on physical characteristics after Torak returned from a few thousand years of doing god-stuff. Too bad those characteristics were caste-related and not tribal, like he thought.
** With the Murgos, as stated by Belgarath in ''Belgarath, the SorcerorSorcerer'', they were split based not on their physical characteristics, but on their cultural roles. Nadrak is Old Angarak for "merchant", Thull means "worker", and Murgo means "soldier". Their physical characteristics were already present because of natural trends for these roles to attract people with certain body and mind types. They simply became more and more pronounced over the hundreds of years due to their comparative isolation from one another.
* [[Plot Tailored to the Party]]: Each of the many companions has a specific skill (some more broadly applicable than others) which is necessary at some point.
* [[Power Limiter]]: Sorcery has some serious limitations. Its use results in physical exhaustion, and it makes noise that other people with the same talent can hear and use to locate you. The latter is especially cumbersome if you're trying to sneak around in enemy territory.
* [[The Power of Love]]: Torak isn't able to take over the world because Polgara {{spoiler|loves Durnik}}, and holds on to that while he's trying to bend her will to his.
* [[Power Strain Blackout]]: Since using sorcery always results in some amount of physical exhaustion, this is a very real risk, and not even the worst case scenario. Happens to {{Spoiler|Belgarath in ''Castle of Wizardry''}} and {{spoiler|Polgara in ''Enchanters' End Game''}}.
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* [[Sixth Ranger]]: Many characters join up with the group along the way, but the best example is probably {{spoiler|'Zakath}} in [[The Malloreon]]. He joins the group towards the end of the fourth book, after having been a major stumbling block to their progress during the first part of the series, and an antagonist in [[The Belgariad]]. He soon becomes something of a second [[The Lancer|Lancer]] to Garion (Durnik is his first one).
* [[Shower of Angst]]: After witnessing his first lethal fight, Garion takes a very thorough bath.
* [[Skunk Stripe]]: Polgara has one. All the sorcerorssorcerers in Garion's line (or, more accurately, Belgarath's) have a white birthmark of some sort; however Polgara's hair was raven black through and through when she was born. As noted in ''Belgarath the SorcerorSorcerer'', the snow white lock appeared when Belgarath laid his hand on her head in an ancient ritual of bennediction from his homeland.
* [[Smug Snake]]: [[Eunuchs Are Evil|Sadi]], before a boatload of [[Character Development]] in [[The Malloreon]]. By the end he's just a straight up [[Manipulative Bastard]]. Most Nyissans (and all Nyissan eunuchs) seem to have this as their [[Planet of Hats|hat]]. Harakan is another good example, and even [[The Dragon|Ctuchik]] has his moments.
* [[The Sneaky Guy]]: Silk.
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* [[Tap on the Head]]:
** The safe way to deal with a sorcerer, apparently.
** Averted in ''the MalloreanMalloreon'' when a group of assassins fight Brand's sons, and only one lives because he recievedreceived such a 'tap on the head'. When the heros come to question the surviving assassin, Polgara declares that while he is alive, his head and mind suffered too much damage for him to answer their questions, and likely too much for him to ever even wake up.
* [[Tell Me About My Father]]: In ''Pawn of Prophecy'', a young Garion asks his Aunt Pol about his mother. A few years later he asks Mister Wolf to tell him about his parents.
* [[Terrain Sculpting]]: In the backstory, Torak, after stealing the Orb, is faced with a war against all the other gods and their followers. To protect himself and his people, he uses the Orb to crack the entire continent in two, turning a pangaea into two distinct landmasses and causing lots of geological fallout and mayhem.
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* [[Well, Excuse Me, Princess!]]: Garion and Ce'Nedra's relationship in a nutshell.
* [[Wizard Duel]]: Belgarath vs. Ctuchik in Book 3 is an awesome scene. Also Belgarath vs. Zedar on the fifth book and prequel.
* [[Wizards Live Longer]]: Since all the sorcerers we meet inand thewhose age we get to booksknow are [[Story-Driven Invulnerability|essential to the plot]], it's never conclusively established if it's the power of sorcery itself that grants a long lifespan or whether it was given to these sorcerers by one of the Prophecies as a form of [[Plot Armor]] so they canhave enough time to accomplish the tasks set out for them. At the end of ''Pawn of Prophecy'', Belgarath explains to Garion that everyone lives as long as they need to, and that his own task just happens to be something that has taken a very long time.
:In any case, all the sorcerers encountered in the books get immortality as a package deal with their powers, and witches like Vordai have a few more centuries than the average person in them (magicians' lifespans are never specified, though it's likely few reach their natural span ''anyway'', considering how [[Evil Is Not a Toy|dangerous]] what they do is).
* [[When Trees Attack]]: An unnamed species of a deadly, flesh-eating tree makes a short appearance in ''The King of the Murgos''. It's described as having golden leaves, colorful blossoms, and rich-looking purple fruit. It extrudes a sweet smell that makes one regard the tree with affection. All this to lure prey to the range of its tendrils. According to [[Plant Person|Ce'Nedra]], the tree feeds on the agony of its victims as much as on their flesh.
* [[Who Wants to Live Forever?]]:
** Mostly averted - the [[Magic A Is Magic A|local rules of magic]] mean that learning sorcery instantly conveys immortality. Sorcerers never bitch about it, and instead find ways to stay busy for all of those years. This is [[Justified Trope|explored further]] in ''The Malloreon'' and the supplemental novels. Sorcerers do spontaneously pop up from time to time, but there's some attrition due to accidentally (or deliberately) unmaking themselves. The ones that survive this process are the ones who learn how to handle immortality. Belgarath even admits that part of the sorcerer aloofness and tendency to hole up in their towers in study and ignore the passing of a few centuries, every now and then, is a vital coping technique, lest grief drive them insane. It also makes Polgara that much more incredible, as she was forced to forgo this tactic for a thousand years...living with a family line whose every member (''every'' member, ''from birth to death'') she was intimately involved with. It would be interesting to see how Garion copes in ten to twenty years time when the [[True Companions]] start dying off...<ref>Silk, the oldest non-immortal member of the group, is pushing fifty by the end of the ''Malloreanthe Malloreon''</ref>
** Played very straight with Belgarath. Two of his sorcerer brothers – who he has lived with in the Vale for hundreds of years – take their own lives due to depression. After losing his wife of 500 years, he goes insane and has to be chained to his bed and constantly supervised to make sure he doesn't take his own life. After a year he starts [[Walking the Earth]] and becomes [[Drowning My Sorrows|a drunken beggar]] and eventually ends up [[Sex for Solace|entertaining women in Maragor]].
* [[Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?]]: Silk's dislike of enclosed spaces is tipped over into a full-blown [[Claustrophobia|phobia]] after a traumatic event in the first series. He also doesn't like snakes. This becomes a major plot point when his love interest in the second series starts to carry a highly venomous snake in her bodice. Some have speculated that she did this strictly to mess with Silk; however this is neither stated nor even strongly implied in the books. She has, however, commented on more than one occasion that Zith was cold and it was a place for her to be warm. Liselle is a pragmatist as well, and it is suggested that (possibly at the unknown prompting of the Prophecy of Light) she began doing so because it might be useful in the future. And it was. She did admit to Silk that the first time she did it it made her skin crawl and it was all she could do to keep from screaming.
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