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{{work}}
This [[Alternate History]] timeline published at [[
The complete timeline (including stories) is over 800 kB long.
Read [
[[Inspired By]] the [[RPG]] ''[[GURPS Alternate Earths]]'' - the scenario "Centrum", to be precise.
It has managed to get its own fanfiction work called ''[[Samowar in Atlantis]]''. And a mention by [[AlternateHistoryHub]].
Due to the versatile and lengthy nature of the storyline and its vulnerability to spoilers, tropes are denoted in thematic categories. Explanations given clickable right below.▼
{{Unmarked Spoilers}}
<ref>'''General Tropes''' denote tropes that don't belong to any other category. This folder is also sub-structured into [[Language Tropes]] that didn't get its own folder for the sake of clarity.</ref>▼
{{tropelist}}
<ref>'''Character Tropes''' are just that. Political leaders get described here just as well as the functional equivalents to your [[Ordinary High School Student]].</ref>▼
▲Due to the versatile and lengthy nature of the storyline and its vulnerability to spoilers, tropes are denoted in thematic categories. Explanations given clickable right below.
<ref>'''Religion Tropes''' were introduced to tidy up ambiguities towards other folders. [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin]]</ref>▼
<ref>'''National And Political Tropes''' denote tropes about countries and politics, domestic and international alike including warfare and nation-building.</ref>▼
<ref>'''Modern World Issues''' have been introduced as a folder because of the spoileriffic nature of many issues regarding the timeline's later 20th century when the timeline acquires a contemporary and even futuristic feel that hardly fits with the rest.</ref>▼
== Alternate History Tropes<ref>We probably needn't explain what '''[[Alternate History Tropes]]''' are if you already ended up here, no?</ref> ==
* [[Allohistorical Allusion]]: Lots of it, mostly for pure [[Rule of Funny]]. And not just with historical personalities and events, but also alternate vocabulary and culture.
** A more serious one: After the battle of Auschwitz, someone states: "Certainly this place has never seen such a massacre on any world, in any time." And on the same plane:
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== General Tropes ==
▲
* [[Artist Disillusionment]]: Some fan created a [[Fanfic]] on Alternatehistory.com. Said fanfic used an epic story covering the whole wide world as a background for drunken nonsense talk full of [[Redundancy Department of Redundancy]]. And even worse, insisted to insert some seriously [[
* [[The Beautiful Game]]: When national teams from the Socialist Block were allowed to compete in a world cup for the very first time, their Englishmen bring German Bavaria a painfully shameful defeat in the finals after penalties.
* [[Cool Train]]: Vacuum maglevs which can reach speeds of no less than 10000
* [[Cross Cultural Kerfluffle]]: "Atlantis" can refer to both Americas or the German part of the northern continent. Like "America" in our world, but even more [[Egregious]].
* [[Cyberpunk]]: The last about thirty years of the TL definitely have this vibe going on, courtesy of the Logos (hackers) and the more earlier achieved advanced state of computer technology and networks than in our history.
* [[Don't Ask]]: In an in-universe joke.
* [[Egopolis]]: Several cities named after people, like Haraldsborg (our [[New York City]]), Wildenhartburg (Chicago), Alexandersborg (Cape Town) and Fort Knox (Singapore).
* [[Hollywood]]: Well, except that it's named Paradies, and located in the place of our Rio de Janeiro.
* [[Incredibly Lame Pun]]: Do you like "for/four" jokes ? Sorry if you don't, 'cause [[User:Max Sinister|I (the author)]] do.
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* [[Self-Deprecation]]: In one of the stories, someone on the <s>internet</s> Weltsystem asks "Max" (counterpart of the author?) why he doesn't write a timeline himself instead of criticizing others'.
* [[Serendipity Writes the Plot]]: The author originally had planned to call the internet of this world "Weltnetz" but found out that [[Schmuck Bait|German neo-Nazis use this term already for the existing internet]], so he changed it to "Weltsystem".
* [[Shout-Out]]: Quite some, e.g. to ''[[Seinfeld]]'', ''[[Gone with the Wind]]'', [[Shakespeare]], and also to a number of [[
* [[Steampunk]]: Germany invents and deploys [[Tank Goodness|steam-driven tanks]] in this timeline's [[World War
* [[Sure Why Not]]: [[User:Dr Nodelescu|Some fan]] suggested that the head of the Socialist part of Germany should have the title "Oberster Politischer Kommissar", which became canon.
* [[Take That]]: Berlin is an uninteresting medium-sized city.
* [[Unreliable Narrator]]: In several of the stories from the Chaos Timeline.
* [[Write What You Know]]: The author is German. He stated that his [[Alternate History Wank|Germanwank]] essentially runs on this because it's nigh impossible to competently employ local colors, proverbs and a global language that you know nothing about.
** Another reason was having a good villain for a desired [[Bait and Switch]] factor: The original version featured Japan instead of China as the other superpower beside Germany and a traveller from our world might easily assume it to be a "Nazis victorious" timeline at first sight.
== Character Tropes ==
▲
* [[Ambiguously Gay]]: King Gioacchino of Italy and his successor, [[The Napoleon|Alessandro]] [[No Celebrities Were Harmed|Napolione]].
* [[Awesome McCoolname]]: There are some German princes (and other guys) named Kraft, which means "power / strength". Yes, this once was a real first name in Germany.
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* [[Lipstick Lesbian]]: [[Matzo Fever|Tatjana]]
* [[Loads and Loads of Characters]]
* [[The Mafia]]: ''La Famiglia'', which seizes full political power in the Italian empire after it loses [[World War
* [[Manipulative Bastard]] / [[Magnificent Bastard]]: Maffeo Servitore, of Florence. Also Alfred Kleiber, chancellor of [[Eagle Land|German Atlantis]]. And maybe Walter Meier. And the New Roman emperors.
* [[Meaningful Name]]: Sophie Stein, again. "Sophie Stein is the stone that breaks the steel of Socialist propaganda!"
* [[No Celebrities Were Harmed]]:
** A great general who was born on an island west of Italy, fought in Egypt, became emperor and brought the church under his control was already mentioned.
** Matthias Lieber, one of those who translated the Bible into German, is a [[Shout-Out]] to Martin Luther. And at the same time, a [[Shout-Out]] to the RPG ''[[
** Friedrich von Hohenzollern who might be [[Frederick the Great]] born in an Atlantean log cabin and successfully running away from his tyrannical father.
** Explorers / travellers Markus Poller and Mao Polou
** "Kingdom of God" is the counterpart to Thomas More's [[
** Condolcessa, last one of the Florentine ruling family, reminds of Lucrezia Borgia, at least in that people claim both to have committed [[Parental Incest]], though this hasn't to be true.
** "Christnacht" is a text about a rich but avaricious landowner, who isn't willing to share his wealth with others, until he is suddenly experiencing... something at the evening of christmas. And his name (Thimotheus) becomes synonymous with "miser". [[A Christmas Carol|Sounds familiar?]]
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== Religion Tropes ==
▲
* [[Christianity Is Catholic]]: Other than in our world, Catholic Christianity didn't split except for some minor fringe movements, but power gradually shifted to the governments of the Catholic nations, somehow akin to the Anglican Church or Gallican Church in our world whose rituals and doctrine were mostly kept unchanged. E.g. in Nippon, the tenno is the head of the country's Catholic Church! [[The Pope]] was gradually reduced to a mere figurehead, but this changed unexpectedly again when he had to go to <s>Australia</s> <s>Tirland</s> [[Overly Long Gag|Antipodia]] after the revolution in Britain.
* [[Interfaith Smoothie]]: The Indian Chandramoorthy develops his own religion, which combines elements from Hinduism, Islam, Catholicism and the classical Greco-Roman religion.
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== National and Political Tropes ==
▲
* [[The Alliance]]: Several times in this history. After all, it coined the term "anti-X War", as in "Anti-French War" and other wars, all of them ending with a victory of the alliance.
* [[Alternate History Wank]]: Many a [[Space
* [[Balance of Power]]: It's about world history, and patterns repeat.
* [[Balkanize Me]]: North <s>America</s> Atlantis, sometimes China, France and Russia.
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* [[Cold War]]: At the latter half of the 20th century, the three major superpowers fighting for balance with each other are the German technocracy, the Socialist Block and the Chinese Empire.
* [[Culture Police]]: In the German technocracy. Censors the book "Das Paradies der Goldis" by Katherine Geller (apparently a bit like ''Valley Of The Dolls'') for the depiction of mental diseases, drug addiction and lesbian love.
* [[A Degree in Useless]]:
* [[Dirty Communists]]: Here, Socialists. They take over Britain in the mid-19th century and spread over all of Western Europe. [[And Zoidberg|And Greece]].
* [[Eagle Land]]
* [[Easy Logistics]]:
* [[The Empire]]: As this is a realistic (hi)story, it's a question of your POV. The New Roman Empire, the German technocracy and others might all qualify.
* [[Even Evil Has Standards]]: Kind of. While there are dictatorships, communists and fascists, secret polices, many wars, nukes and even worse weapons, this timeline has no equivalent of the Nazis and the Holocaust.
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* [[Imperial China]]: Still exists even in the later 20th century, ruled by the so-called adoptive emperors.
* [[Israel]]: Here called (Greater) Judea.
** Founded on Sinai in the mid-19th century and expanded considerably into Palestine and Syria in the aftermath of [[World War
** Saved Germany's ass at a very crucial moment in [[World War II]].
** {{spoiler|And the whole human race owes some Judean citizen on how [[World War III]] ended, [[Mary Sue|if nobody else]].}}
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* [[The Republic]]: France, German Atlantis, Novorossiya (New Russia, our Siberia). And Greater Switzerland, of course. Oh, and (Greater) Judea.
* [[La Résistance]]: Various. Spaniards against Republican France, Germans against Russians and Italians, various against the Socialists.
* [[Space
** [[Subverted Trope|Space Filling Chaos?]]
* [[Suspiciously Similar Substitute]]: The Rum-Seljuks are basically Ottoman Turks on steroids. And they keep the name "Seljuks" instead of Turks or Turkey to the modern day.
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== Modern World Issues ==
▲
* [[Apocalypse How]]: Here with [[Grey Goo|nanomachines]], thus potentially Class X (planetary annihilation). And many locals vaguely expected it to happen for years.
* [[Artificial Intelligence]]: AI plays an important part at the end.
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* [[The End of the World as We Know It]]: At the end, World War III between the superpowers Germany and China breaks out, and although it doesn't last long (actually a mere three hours), the world will never be again as it was before. {{spoiler|1=Because the <s>hackers</s> Logos and their allied AIs take over the world and the military and tell the war off.}}
* [[Everything Is Online]]: Exploited big time at one occasion.
* [[Fantastic Drug]]: In the [[GURPS]] adventure based on this, one dealer tries to sell the PCs the drug "black niig", which supposedly makes people feel "like Stalin
* [[For Dummies]]: aka "[[Serious Business|The Rules]] for/to ______"
* [[Former Regime Personnel]]:
:{{spoiler|Effectively stripped of their former power, many of the people in leadership positions before the [[Velvet Revolution]] had their personal fortunes largely left intact, but still feel a void as a result of their loss of power. People obviously don't deal well with becoming [[Fate Worse Than Death|obsolete over night]]. Alcoholism is said to be rampant among these guys.}}
* [[Global Currency]]: At the end of the story, the GEM (short for Geld-Einheit der Menschheit - "money unit of humanity") is introduced. The sign for it looks like a G with a circle around it, much like our @.
* [[Grand Finale]]: [[World War III]], and the world being {{spoiler|taken over by the Logos and [[A Is]]}}.
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* [[World War III]]: Appropriately at the end of the story.
* [[Write What You Know]]: The author did CS studies.
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Chaos Timeline]]
[[Category:AlternateHistory.com]]
[[Category:Literature]]
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