Mass Vexations: Difference between revisions

* [[Arbitrary Headcount Limit]]: Played with. The head count increases to Shepard and four squad members on a typical mission, and it even becomes a minor plot point as it allows the squad to split to accomplish a few tasks quicker. Subverted in the mission to Ilos; Shepard tells the entire squad to come along, thus ignoring the head count.

* [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking]]:

* [[As You Know]]: An interesting variation occurs whenever Art hears exposition. He's already heard it all in the game; however, the characters giving the exposition aren't aware of this fact, so to them they're just telling the story of the game as it happens. It's lampshaded repeatedly, and a few times it cuts away before said exposition can be said.

** It's generally played straight later whenever Art tells anybody about the truth about himself.

* [[Bizarrchitecture]]: In Art's recurring dream in part two; the hallway is all sorts of this, including a table. {{spoiler|And then inside... he finds his apartment, with the edges of it pulled up into a donut hole and with very strange gravity.}}

* [[Black Comedy]]: A few instances pop up.

* [[BLAM Episode]]: The April Fool's Day chapter.

* [[Blue and Orange Morality]]: Played with in reference to the game's Paragon/Renegade meters. Throughout the first fic, Shepard remains in full-Paragon mode. This changes in the sequel to where she is mainly Paragon with a slight Renegade streak.

* [[Christmas Episode]]: The seperately-published oneshot [http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6575279/1/Christmas_Vexations Christmas Vexations].

* [[Cloudcuckoolander]]: Art, who sometimes leaves a few nonsensical sayings here and there and then goes on to confuse the person he's conversing with even more.

'''Art''': That's kind of the point. }}

** Some of his trains of thought are a little crazy as well. It gets to the point where he ends up deciding to go talk to Kelly Chambers after one such train of thought.

* [[Freaky Friday Flip]]: With John of [[Spellbinding Radiance]] in the [[April Fools' Day]] chapter.

* [[Freudian Excuse]]: Art's impostor says that he was having a rough life on Earth, and felt that Art took away any chance he could've had to feed his family and give them a better life when he came into the picture. Art doesn't bite into it.

'''Art''': Yeah, I understand. I understand that you're nothing but a [[Wangst|whiny]], [[Magnificent Bastard|manipulative]] little [[Attention Whore|attention]] [[Troll|whore]] [[We Could Have Avoided All This|who can't just leave things well enough alone]]! }}

* [[From a Certain Point of View]]: Art is from Earth; it's just that he's from an Earth that was there 173 years before Mass Effect takes place. He chooses to omit the time factor when making up his backstory.

* [[Give Me a Sword]]: Jenny is throwing a fit when Art goes to get himself into Garrus' recruit mission. He walks in, simply gives her a gun, bam, problems end. It leads to a temporary alliance where they agree to save Garrus (albeit for differing reasons).

* [[Green Rocks]]: The orange paperweight; it allows Benezia and {{spoiler|Vigil}} to stop time to give some exposition at certain points.

* [[Grumpy Old Man]]: Sturge has traces of this.

* [[Heroic BSOD]]: Art goes into one in Virmire {{spoiler|after Shepard orders him to call Joker over to the AA Tower, thus sparing him instead of Ashley.}}

* [[Info Dump]]: Chapter 39 of the sequel.

* [[Insult Backfire]]:

'''Art''': Thanks. [[It's What I Do|It's one of my many specialties]]. }}

* [[Interspecies Romance]]: Between {{spoiler|Madison}} and Garrus, Thane and Shepard, and Art and Tali.

*** And then it's implied that the device functions as {{spoiler|a kind of [[Dream Weaver]], especially when combined with the second [[MacGuffin]]; it's implied and then outright stated that the one gives Art the same recurring dream for two years, and the other makes him far more lucid in that dream.}}

* [[Medium Awareness]]: When Garrus refuses to give the identity of the Journalist away, it's lampshaded in the narration as thus:

* [[Mental World]]: {{spoiler|The Fade is a combination of someone's base subconscious and a shared dreamspace.}}

* [[The Mentor]]: Sturge to Art in the past. Whether the old man will take this banner up again is yet to be seen.

* [[Pinch Me]]: Art speculates that he is in a dream upon showing up at the Citadel. He promptly slaps himself, realizing that he is, in fact, in a real world.

* [[Playing with Syringes]]: Lots of examples, as per the original game. Art even lampshades it in front of the crew:

* [[Plot Induced Stupidity]]: Whoever built the warehouse that Art snipes {{spoiler|Tarak}} at in part 2 forgot to install a window pane in one of the windows. It's mercilessly lampshaded when Art finds this out:

* [[Poor Communication Kills]]: Art constantly neglects to tell Tali about her loyalty mission. Predictably, he very nearly loses Tali's friendship during the course of events on the Rayya. They manage to make up before the mission ends. The whole debacle has such an effect on Art that he tells Tali (and the rest of the Brotherhood) about {{spoiler|Legion, and the truth of the geth}} almost immediately after.

* [[Prince and Pauper]]: Art and his impostor. Played with as Art wasn't aware that someone was taking his place when the switch began.

* [[Sensitive Guy and Manly Man]]: Wrex and Art, in one case where the two warm up to each other as the fic goes on.

** They even get a small assosciation reversal after the Family Armor chapter:

'''Wrex''': [[Exact Words|This isn't Tuchanka.]] I should be allowed to indulge. }}

* [[Sequel Hook]]: At the end of part 1, Art saves the Citadel. However, he drops plenty of thoughts on what's coming up in Mass Effect 2. {{spoiler|As well, Orange's true nature is revealed and the mystical elements are introduced, meaning there is a lot of room for development to occur in the next installment.}}

* [[Ship Tease]]: Quite a bit for some of the less important characters. Of particular note is Al and Jack, as well as Sturge and Chakwas.

* [[Shipper on Deck]]: Art for Kaidan and Shepard. It's played with, however, given that Art mentions several times that he personally prefers pairing fem!Shepard with Thane in the games. He comes to regret it when {{spoiler|Kaidan dumps her on Horizon}}.

* [[Take That]]: Given the [[Author Filibuster]] nature of some of Art's ramblings, there are a few of these scattered throughout. The two most prominent are a long internal monologue decrying a troll that attacked most of the [[Kung Fu Panda]] fandom and [[Bias Steamroller|Armond White]] being compared to a Reaper during Art's second [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]].

** Mass Vexations 2 has take thats to Tommy Wiseau and Eric Douglace. And then there are several to ''[[Twilight (novel)|Twilight]]'' that are spoken to other characters that fly right over their heads:

'''Jacob''': *beat* You're right, that does sound idiotic. }}

* [[The Talk]]: Given to Art by Mordin, in a much more awkward way than in the game.

** {{spoiler|[[Dead Space (series)|Isaac Clarke]] has joined the fun. Conveniently enough, during a miniature [[Zombie Apocalypse]].}}

* [[Training Montage]]: Not really given the medium, but Art does more or less lampshade a possible scenario for a montage.

* [[Trapped in Another World]]: Art, obviously.

* [[Trying Not to Cry]]: The entire reason Art locks himself in his room {{spoiler|after Virmire}} is because he doesn't want anyone to see him cry. Also, because he doesn't have to tell anyone his origins that way.

* [[You Are Not Alone]]: Tali comforts Art after {{spoiler|Virmire}} by hearing his actual backstory and giving him a long hug.

* [[You Are the Translated Foreign Word]]: Art mentions in the prologue of part 2 that when he met Shala'Raan, she referred to him as Tali's ''hesh'alan''. It slowly transforms into a [[Running Gag]] where Art gets frustrated that no quarian in the vicinity will tell him what it means.

** He eventually does find out what it means: {{spoiler|Rael tells Art that it means 'captain of the soul'.}}

** Art eventually starts calling Tali a translated foreign word of his own, using [[Gratuitous Spanish|"querida"]] as his chosen word for her.

** Part of his wondering if he'll ever see his friends again is mitigated in the sequel when {{spoiler|Sturge shows up as a character}}.

* [[Your Mom]]: Used against Zaal'Koris when they go to the Fleet. The extremely poor taste of Art's insult is lampshaded by Kasumi soon after:

'''Art''': [[Cloudcuckoolander|Yes, really.]] }}

* [[Your Princess Is in Another Castle]]: {{spoiler|Art with the Virmire mission. He's said goodbye to the entire crew, he's bracing himself for dying by nuclear explosion... and then Shepard goes for him. It was obvious, though; the orange paperweight was still mysterious, and there were still a few loose ends about Art's speculation on Mass Effect 2.}}