History for VideoGame/FateGrandOrder - TV Tropes (2024)

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* AbhorrentAdmirer: While a lot of the female Servants have a thing for the protagonist and they know it, they're flat out scared of some, annoyed by others or just unwilling to deal with them.
** During Halloween 2016, for example, {{Yandere}}s Raikou and Kiyohime literally try to sniff the protagonist out at one point (even using NP to reveals them) and the entire party flees from them in terror. They start ''swimming through lava'' to get to the protagonist.
** Swimsuit Lancer Tamamo is more aggressive than her Caster self and Tamamo Cat (as seen with her self-proclaimed nickname: Tamamo ''Shark'') and she's made her desire for the protagonist very clear. She even gives you a drink spiked with ''ketamine'' on Valentine's Day!
** Then there's Artemis and Orion, a pair so annoying that when you do their interludes you consistently get dialogue options like 'go away' and 'I'm not here' in a futile attempt to get them to leave you alone. It seems like Artemis has a bit of a thing for the protagonist as well as Orion, but all they want is for her to solve her own relationship problems and leave them out of it.
* ActionBomb: The Chibi Nobus and most of their variants approach a Servant carrying a ''Hiragumo'' tea kettle and blows themselves up in their critical attack or special attack, though another Nobus will replace them from a portal where the exploded Nobu used to be once they did. The Mecha Nobus even do it as ''normal'' attack.
* ActorAllusion:
** Creator/MamoruMiyano once voiced a [[VisualNovel/SteinsGate character]] who's heavily associated with ''Literature/DrJekyllAndMrHyde'' before.
** Ryougi has a line for Tawara Touta in My Room, whom she thinks sounds a lot like her friend, Mikiya. Both men are voiced by the same person, who is married to Shiki's voice actress.
** This is not the [[Franchise/{{Blazblue}} first time]] Creator/MiyukiSawashiro voiced a character that hates their father's guts because of the latter's actions. If anything, Mordred was the ''luckier'' one even in the context of the Nasuverse version of Myth/ArthurianLegend.
** Mash is not the only character played by Creator/RisaTaneda who fought enemies to protect her senpai. In fact, she's similar to [[LightNovel/StrikeTheBlood Yukina Himeragi]].
** Creator/ShinichiroMiki has played the part of a blue haired [[{{Anime/Pokemon}} Kojiro]] opposite a female Musashi already.
** Anastasia is not the first character played by Creator/YumiHara who [[VideoGame/SenranKagura is a beautiful young woman with ice powers]].
** Sigurd says that the version of Fafnir he remembers was a [[Manga/YuGiOh blue-eyed white dragon]].
* AdamSmithHatesYourGuts:
** Do you want that nifty 5* CE featuring a well-drawn Da Vinci and is the only consistent method of increasing money drops in the game so far? You're going to have to fork over 1,000 Mana Prisms for the ''first'' one. It only boosts money drops by 2% so if you want the 10% boost to your money you'd have to get all five of them. The price scales by 200 and the last one costs 1800. That's 7000 Mana Prisms in total that you need to get that 10% boost. Keep in mind that the items second to the Mona Lisa [=CEs=] in expensiveness, the Fou card packs combined, are only 600 Mana Prisms. {{Lampshaded}} in the Da Vinci Event where someone was so angry about this that they stole one and started making counterfeits.
** Later shop [=CEs=] are slightly less expensive in that you need only 5000 Mana Prisms to buy them all. When the Mona Lisa CE returned to the game, they changed the price to this and gave players who bought the overpriced ones a refund.
** Eventually, another currency known as Rare Prisms were added to the game. They're hard to obtain because they can only be acquired by burning the SR and SSR Servants from the gacha. An SR is one and an SSR is five. Fair enough, but everything worth buying costs at least three and for the really need stuff you need five. Fortunately, apart from the Crystallized Lore, some friend points, and the new Fou cards, the shop is only for items that the player failed to get when they were released originally, possibly because they hadn't started playing yet. That being said, the friend points and the Fou cards are horrendously overpriced, meaning it's unlikely that anyone will actually want to buy them.
* AdaptationDistillation:
** Servants can only have three Personal Skills in-game, so those who have more than three Personal Skills in their source material will either lose some of them or have them adapted into Class Skills (which is really a catch-all name for passive skills, even those that are not inherent to the class). Likewise, many Servants with multiple Noble Phantasms in lore will have at least one of their secondary Noble Phantasms adapted into Personal Skills, while their primary one is registered as their nominal Noble Phantasm used for their LimitBreak. Achilles is the most notable case for both of these, as he doesn't have any of the Personal Skills he has in lore but instead has adaptations of his many secondary Noble Phantasms as his "Personal Skills".
** While the crossover event with ''LightNovel/KaraNoKyoukai'' includes elements from all the chapters/movies, most of the material, including the event map and BGM, is based on the 5th movie, ''Paradox Spiral''.
** The ''First Order'' anime movie is one for the introductory Fuyuki chapter. The biggest difference is probably having an adult Medusa as a Lancer, while at this point in the game she's fought as a Rider, and her Lancer form available later is still a child.
* AdaptationExpansion: Some pre-FGO Servants who had been villains or the villain's minion in their debuting work are given more character and have their different sides exposed upon their inclusion in FGO. Hassan of the Cursed Arm and Meltlilith are hit the hardest by this.
* AdaptationalBadass:
** The boar that killed Diarmuid. In myth, it was incredibly large for a boar, and evil, but the Type-Moon version outright hits AnimalisticAbomination [[http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/fategrandorder/images/7/76/Dboar.png territory]], with its in-game profile describing it as "eating runes and putting even Dragonkind to shame".
** Many Servants are a lot stronger than in the series they're debuting from, such as Francis Drake, Jack the Ripper, or Okita Souji.
* AdaptationalNameChange: Due to AlternateCharacterReading, Chinese-named Servants and Noble Phantasms are referred to their Japanese names in voiced lines.
** Lu Bu Fengxian to Ryofu Housen,
** Zhuge Liang to Shoukatsu Koumei,
** Jing Ke to Keika,
** Li Shuwen to Ri Shobun,
** Xuanzang Sanzang to Genjou Sanzou, she also refers to Sun Wukong by his Japanese name Son Goku,
** [[spoiler:Yan Qing to En Sei]],
** [[spoiler:Wu Zetian to Bu Zokuten]],
** Nezha to Nata.
* AdaptedOut: Benkei, who is one of the Shadow Servants in the Fuyuki singularity, doesn't make an appearance in the anime adaptation.
* AdultFear: A fairly low-key moment from the Part Two prologue: [[spoiler:Mash and the protagonist get worried about Da Vinci when she's been stuck with Gordolf (who's been blatantly sexually harassing her) for twelve hours. Presumably he'd [[MegatonPunch feel her left hook]] if he tried anything, and there are ''plenty'' of other reasons to be worried, but nonetheless, it invokes the realistic fear of a woman being stuck with some creep while her friends can only worry. Even if she has got a giant nuclear metal fist.]]
* AffectionateParody:
** "Moonlight Festival", AKA Orion and Artemis' debut. You try to summon the Stars' Hunter Orion, but because Artemis is too clingy for him, you end up summoning the Moon Goddess herself (who manages to pass herself off as a GenderFlip version of Orion, which isn't too improbable considering the franchise's track record). Artemis, like any good Greek God, whimsically asks for dango to celebrate the Japanese moon-viewing festival. You get it by beating the hell out of other Servants.
** "GUDAGUDA Honnoji" is this even moreso, with Medea complaining about her Lily counterpart and being only used for Rule Breaker spam, Gilgamesh complaining about gacha rates, and Andersen reminding the players to take it easy with the "horrible grindy event".
** "Saber Wars" is basically one long satire on the numerous [[{{Expy}} expies]] of Altria and how plentiful they are.
** Valentine's Day event is one long harem story with the dangerous prospect of your harem consisting of legendary heroes. As said by the resident harem series protagonist himself:
--> '''EMIYA:''' They are Servants, heroic spirits of the past, you know? Compared to normal people, they are somewhat warped in the head, to a certain extent. Physical abilities, mental ability, skills, berserking... it is all at a stage where they are right at the top. If you accept chocolates from those girls.... It won’t just end like this. I will say it plainly - it will be a terrible situation. It’s unmistakably a game over!
** "Da Vinci and the 7 Counterfeit Heroic Spirits" event revolves around how expensive the Mona Lisa CE was to the point where someone created a counterfeit just so people could actually have one. But later on [[spoiler: it's revealed that it was a cover-up for Jeanne Alter's real plan, which was to summon fake Servants to accompany her. EMIYA, being a former eroge game protagonist points that she's been gathering a harem and wonders if she's actually trying to become an otome game protagonist. She of course denies it.]]
** "Starry Xuanzang Goes to India" is based on the legendary literature of China, ''Journey to the West''. Xuanzang debuts here with the game's characters humorously filling in for Xuanzang's disciples. The protagonist is Sun Wukong (because they're cosplaying him), David becomes Zhu Bajie (because he is a lech), Li Shuwen becomes Sha Wujing (a silent and reliable fighter), and Lu Bu becomes Yulong (since he is identical as his steed, the Red Hare).
* AfterTheEnd:
** When the protagonist and Mash return to Chaldea at the end of the prologue, the world has ended and all that's left is Chaldea. All of human history is vanishing as well, Chaldea is temporarily a sustained paradox.
** Chaldea Summer Part 2 begins when your party sails away for a day and end up going back to the tropical island after 2000 years have passed. The boars evolved into an intelligent race but then their civilization collapsed.
** [[spoiler:The forces of the Lostbelt have completely wiped everything off the world by the end of the prologue for ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt''.]]
* AllJustADream:
** [[spoiler: Mysterious Heroine X's storyline throughout her three interludes turns out to be this at the end.]]
** The Garden of Order event took place in [[spoiler:Ryougi's dream as she fell into a deep sleep to avoid being killed by Solomon's burning the Earth.]] [[AllThereInTheManual This is only explained in an interview and is never hinted anywhere in the event itself.]]
** The Prison Tower storyline takes place in a dream, with Mash and co. trying to wake the protagonist.
** Near the endgame, [[spoiler: Mash has several dreams sent by Solomon, with him trying to persuade her into joining him.]]
** The majority of the ''Moonlight/Lost Room'' OVA happens in the male protagonist's dream, sometime after Chaldea's 2017 Christmas party and before the Prologue of ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt''.
* AllMythsAreTrue: The Grail summons a Servant based on in-universe perceptions, concepts, and historical fact, so Servants drawn from mythology or stories are often a hodgepodge of every single story told about them. Some profiles even admit that the Servant is fictional (i.e. Assassin of Shinjuku) or are in an ambiguous state on which stories were true or made up (Brynhild is the most glaring example).
** Most legendary figures were alive at some point in in-universe history and eventually turned into a Heroic Spirit who can be summoned by the player. The same applies to most pre-twentieth century literary figures with LiteraryAgentHypothesis, such as Edmond Dantes, Frankenstein's Monster, and the Phantom of the Opera.
** Holmes muses on this and its implications regarding him as a fictional character in a trial quest. He comes to the conclusion that the ''universe'' doesn't want him examining this too closely. He does admit that that just because a myth isn't true in one world, it might be in an AlternateUniverse. This turns out to be true in the case of [[spoiler: Kojiro Sasaki]].
** Not only is Agartha one of the ''[=EoR=]'' sub-singularities, it also has El Dorado, Ys, Shangri-La, the Nightless City, and the Undersea Dragon Palace inside Agartha. Laputa shows up as part of the chapter's finale. [[spoiler:It's later revealed that Scheherazade used her Noble Phantasm to create these legendary locations in that area, modifying them for the narrative she was making and so they might not have actually existed in the Nasuverse.]]
** As of ''Epic of Remnant'' 4, the [[spoiler:''Franchise/CthulhuMythos'']] is apparently real, at least some parts. More specifically, [[spoiler:the Cthulhu Mythos itself might not be real, but Lovecraft seemed to have been inspired by dreams of very real beings from an outer universe, meaning that they are fictional works based on a ''real thing out there''. For example, the god "Sut-Typhon" what Räum tries to summon is what Yog-Sothoth is based on.]]
* AllThereInTheManual:
** The head writer, Kinoko Nasu, occasionally posts a blog entry on the main story, clarifying background details and explaining some events that were implied but not explicitly shown in the game.
*** His [[http://forums.nrvnqsr.com/showthread.php/6031-Fate-Grand-Order-Story-and-Lore-(CONTAINS-SPOILERS)/page1009?p=2440713#post2440713 blog entry]] for Camelot explains what happened to the other Knights of the Round Table that Lion King summoned, what happened before the city of Camelot was established, and how several Servants were in the circ*mstances they were in at the story's beginning.
*** There's a short story about the time Anchin visited Chaldea once, where every female Servant save for Mash is attracted to him [[LoveAtFirstSight at first glance]]. Anchin is [[IncompatibleOrientation gay and attracted to Sasaki Kojirou]].
*** The blog entry for Babylonia includes an explanation for Humanity Foundation Value and how it's ranked, what damage is done in the Londinium, Camelot, and Babylonia singularities, the relation between Clairvoyants Gilgamesh and Merlin, the revival of a dead Humbaba and how Ibaraki-douji's bandit gang kept it imprisoned, and how Enkidu summoned by the Earth as a servant would be on the same level as Arcueid Brunestud. Nasu's details on Camelot in particular explains that due to how improbable the presence of Lion King was (EX Rank), all damaged caused by her appearance is undone. This includes deaths, which are normally set in stone the moment they die in a Singularity.
*** One went up a few weeks after SE.RA.PH's release to expand on [[spoiler:the conversion of Seraphix into a sub-singularity]] and reveal a few plot details that hadn't been in the story proper.
** The ''Fate/Grand Order Material'' books reveal several things not told in Servants' in-game profiles.
*** Nearly every original Servant has a second Noble Phantasm unused in gameplay.
*** Several Servants also have skills unavailable to them.
*** Relationships between Servants that were not seen before in-game.
* AllTheWorldsAreAStage: The final Order, [[spoiler: Grand Time Temple Salomon]], has areas based off all of the previous singularities, with a Demon Pillar guarding each one.
* AlphaStrike: Near the end of the Okeanos arc, [[spoiler: David, Euryale, Atlanta, Artemis, and Drake all launch their Noble Phantasms at Heracles. This does little to inconvenience him.]]
* AlternateCharacterReading:
** [[spoiler:Tiamat's]] spawn seemingly speak in gibberish when first introduced, but the English letters of their gibberish correspond to the hiragana of a Japanese computer keyboard.
---> (text) ''! uyq@b4e4bst<u. -s@<u. -@s!''
---> (translation) ''!Nandakōiukotokane naruhodone naruhodone! (How it becomes like this, I understand, I understand)''
** The first Lostbelt has the subtitle "Princess of the Land of Beast" is obviously pointing that the Lostbelt is inhabited by the wolfmen race Yaga, but there's another way to see it. The Lostbelt's Crypter, Kadoc, has a surname that means "Country of Wolves", so the title of the Lostbelt can be read "Anastasia - [[DevotedToYou Kadoc's Princess]]".
* AlternateSelf: Generally, most Servants differ in their appearances throughout the main story because the Heroic Spirit residing inside the Throne of Heroes is seperate from the copy created through a "Saint Graph" which contains various things like memories and information and can be modified by outside forces, unlike the Throne. The reason Chaldea is able to summon anomalies like Cu Chulainn (Alter), Assassin Emiya, and the various swimsuit Servants is because they scanned their Saint Graphs into their database for summoning, allowing them to ignore the prerequisite conditions that created them in the first place for summoning. However, not necessarily everything from a previous self is retained when summoning a Servant again, resulting in some minor confusion.
** Certain Servants do recall memories of their previous summonings but refers them as their past selves. Those who had been loyal to their previous Master may remain loyal and claim them better than the Chaldean Master (like Tamamo-no-Mae), although some just let go and leave that to their past selves, and grow more attached to their current Master.
** The Lion King in Camelot is an Altria Pendragon who never died after the Battle of Camlann [[spoiler:due to Bedivere not throwing Excalibur into the lake]] and instead ultimately became a goddess thanks to the holy spear Rhongomyniad influencing her. It's noted in-story that the circ*mstances of her existence make her unique amongst all other Altrias and that the summonable Lancer Altria Pendragon, while very similar, is still ultimately a different person.
** If summoned before Babylonia, Ishtar averts this as she recognizes the protagonist and reminisces about some of the feats they did in that Singularity, much to their confusion. However, this does not apply to summoning her after doing the Singularity.
** It's noted that the Lostbelts actively mess with the Saint Graphs of Servants summoned by the World and as a result, their connection to their selves from previous meetings with the protagonists and even their own history is very fuzzy.
** [[spoiler:Not even BB can fix Meltlilith's Saint Graph from the damage it took after using Virgin Laser Palladion, making the summonable version of her and the one who appears in SE.RA.PH two distinct selves who end up connecting with the protagonist in different ways.]]
** Assassin Emiya is incredibly annoyed by this, as he comes from a timeline where he never met characters from ''Fate/stay Night'' and ''Fate/Zero'' yet Irisviel and Jaguar Warrior keep trying to connect to him because they know a different version of him.
** [[spoiler:In order to strengthen Anastasia, Kadoc used a variant of the summoning ritual as if to make her a Servant from the Lostbelt timeline and warped her Saint Graph. This does not apply to the Anastasia you can summon and she recognizes that the one summoned under Kadoc antagonized Chaldea and tries to apologize for what she technically did.]]
** [[spoiler:The Lostbelt Kings like Ivan the Terrible and Scathach Skadi are Servants from a Lostbelt timeline and are different existences from their proper timeline counterparts.]]
* AlternateTimeline: The game itself takes place in a separate timeline from ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight'', because their Fuyuki Holy Grail Wars are very different from the original timeline, like there being only one known Grail War to Chaldea. El-Melloi II's the first one to bring this up during "Fate/Accel Zero Order", because when he looked through Chaldea's records of them, they clashed heavily with what he remembers/the Association's records on them. [[spoiler: It's revealed in the Camelot chapter that Olga-Marie's father was the victor of the 2004 Fuyuki Holy Grail War.]]
** Since many of the Servants come from works that are themselves Alternate Timelines, and they can often remember those timelines; it is difficult to differentiate whose history belongs where. Waver and Dr. Roman refers to these differences as "part of the same time cluster" and are "forgivable" by the World.
** The female version of Miyamoto Musashi comes from her own timeline which was implied to be pruned at some point. In addition, the sub-singularity she appears in is its own separate timeline, which is plot-critical, as the villains are taking direct advantage of that to interfere with history.
** The Lostbelts are alternate Timelines that have replaced proper history in a certain area on Earth. The years attached to them aren't what time you're going to. It's when the timeline was changed.
* AlwaysNight: The Shinjuku sub-singularity has been mysteriously made to always be nighttime. Inhabitants of the city have gotten used to it and even forgotten what daytime is like. Though oddly the trailer for this chapter depicts Shinjuku during sunset.
* AmazingTechnicolorBattlefield: [[spoiler:Once Abigail awakens her powers, the courtroom she's in is partially transformed into an endless void with hundreds of glowing white keyholes.]]
* AmbiguousSituation: When the protagonist and Mash ask Holmes if he actually existed, he dodges the question to point out that while there's no evidence of his existence, there isn't any of most mythical heroes either, so he shouldn't be considered special in this regard. What's more, aspects are added to their legend long after they would have died even if they ''did'' exist. The truth is that there's tangible evidence and artifacts among mages, but Holmes is keeping that kind of thing a secret from Chaldea for now for complicated {{Magibabble}} reasons. While the conversation leading to this seems to imply that Holmes may be fictional as no such evidence for him exists, the quest ends with Moriarty and Holmes bickering in a way that was specifically ''not'' present in any stories about them and therefore shouldn't be part of their relationship if they were just fabricated whole cloth. [[spoiler:His monologue to himself suggests that it's related to the fact that there are parallel worlds, the Pruning Phenomenon, and that the Ages of Gods still exists beneath the world of man and held back by the Holy Spear.]]
* AnachronismStew:
** Chapter 5 is set in 1783, but being a singularity, almost all of America's history has blended together with towns based off the Wild West, a castle in Denver wired with electricity and guarded by police with robot suits, Alcatraz and Washington D.C. are established locations, the U.S. has all 48 continental states with modern borders, and medieval Celts are battling the Theosophical Society with the Indians on different sides. The first thing that alerts the heroes of the anachronism is when Nightingale yells about sanitary procedure and the danger of bloodletting at [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Rush Benjamin Rush]].
** The seventh singularity is named Babylonia which is set in Mesopotamia during Gilgamesh's rule. However, the singularity is set in 2655 B.C. during the Sumerian civilization. Babylonia has existed around 1800 B.C., hundreds of years after the Sumerian civilization. Likewise, Ishtar's relation with Gilgamesh is based on Akkadian interpretation of ''Epic of Gilgamesh'', as it was her Sumerian counterpart Inanna who tries to seduce Gilgamesh in the original story.
** [[spoiler:Wu Zetian, the empress of the ''Tang'' Dynasty, being in charge of the Nightless City of the ''Han'' Dynasty in Agartha is a subtle indicator that the fantasy lands aren't real.]]
** In Salem, the buildings being inconsistent with historical records, the records found by Mata Hari on the townspeople not matching up with Chaldea's data, and a wharf that wasn't even built during the time of the Witch Trials leads the party to the conclusion that they aren't in the actual Salem of 1692 but an elaborate illusion imposed upon the area to make it function as one.
* AncientConspiracy: [[spoiler:The real Grand Order, which is Goetia's way of ensuring that all seventy-two of his Pillars can be in the right place and time to create the Singularities. To do this, he created a compulsion within Magic Crests to prevent the owner from committing suicide, and then propagated the belief that magi must absolutely pass on their genes and sire a bloodline that can last forever. As these values and propaganda ensure that Goetia's seventy-two chosen bloodlines will last for three thousand years, all he then needs to do is activate the Demon Pillars within their Magic Crests during the right time period, effectively turning those bloodlines into his [[ManchurianAgent unwitting agents for the Human Order's destruction.]] Virtually every value that the Mage's Association holds dear was instilled by Goetia for his grand plan to remake the world.]]
* AndIMustScream: [[spoiler:The Lahmus that appear in the latter half of Babylonia are [[HumanResources processed from human beings]]. Several are shown to be non-violent or briefly turn against their [[BrainwashedAndCrazy programming that orders them to kill everything]], with the human still being conscious and trapped in their own bodies that seek only slaughter.]]
* AndYourRewardIsClothes:
** [[PlayingWithATrope Played with]]. All Servants are subjected to wardrobe changes after Ascension (i.e. increasing their LevelCap and granting them new skills) -- with most of them usually gaining Costumep*rn of all kinds. Others, however, may actually ''lose'' their initial clothes in exchange for either PowerTattoo or something else, becoming {{Stripperific}} in the process.
** Special Servant Costume Dresses are rewarded for clearing certain conditions. Of course, accessing these requires a) that you actually summoned the Servant it's for, and b) some varying ascension materials.
*** Mash's sundress ("Swimsuit of Perpetual Summer") is unlocked by clearing a challenge quest of the Summer 2016 quest rerun in 2017.
*** Medb's dominatrix get-up ("Alluring Chief Warden Look") is unlocked by beating a challenge quest in the actual Summer 2017 event.
*** Nero's PE uniform ("Olympian Bloomers") is a lottery prize in the Nerofest 2017 rerun.
*** Jeanne Alter's casual clothes in the ''[=EoR=]'' Shinjuku chapter ("Witch of the Evil Dragon ver. Shinjuku 1999") can be bought as a prize in the Da Vinci Event rerun in January 2018).
*** Arthur Pendragon gets a white suit ("White Rose") for White Day 2018, and could be obtained by exchanging the seventh Rose given during the event.
*** Finally, Astolfo's civilian wear ("Memories of Trifas") and Parvati/Sakura's school uniform ("What a Girl Wants") are available at the Da Vinci Shop for [[AdamSmithHatesYourGuts 1000 mana prisms each]].
* AnimationBump:
** The [=PVs=] animated by ufotable have much better animations than the PV made by A-1, the official partner studio. Amusingly, starting with the America trailer, A-1 Pictures increased the animation quality of their previews to one-up ufotable.
*** The new opening for ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'' is made by Studio Troyca and it also has much better animation than the first opening by A-1.
** For the animation update for Altria, people also noticed that her sprites got a drastic modification, making her a lot thinner, compared to the original sprite which several fans thought was very similar to a penguin.
** Almost all new Servants after launch have more elaborate attack animations compared to the original set of 59 Servants to attract more players and more money.
*** The original set of Sabers use the same basic animations for attacks, but Okita, Mordred, etc. have their animations designed to fit their fighting styles, and Santa Alter actually uses her Prana Burst as part of her sword attack.
*** Jeanne Alter, in her appearance as a boss exclusive Ruler, has more or less a PaletteSwap of the original Jeanne and had a simple Area of Effect Noble Phantasm. Her playable Avenger counterpart has new attack animations, and a completely different looking Noble Phantasm that only hits one enemy.
*** Several Servants from the original base game have had their battle animations updated to have more visual flair and homage their moves from other ''Fate'' media.
*** Due to several Day 1 Servants sharing generic animations, Servants like d'Eon and Heracles have had their animations updated to make them more distinct.
*** Most Servants especially the earlier ones had only one skill casting animation. Certain Servants however has a second animation which triggered when casting a particular skill (like Summer Altria and MHX after revamp), randomly triggered (like Chacha), and even later ones has 2 animations by default (like Mecha Eli-chan, Ereshkigal and Hokusai). Anastasia even has ''three'' skill animations.
* {{Anthology}}: ''Epic of Remnant'' has been described as one as each chapter is written solely by one author in their own distinct style. The thing that links them is the overarching plot of [[spoiler:the four Demon Pillars surviving.]]
* AntiFrustrationFeatures:
** Rashoumon, the first raid battle event (where the damage all players did collectively stacked up to reduce a global meter) had high difficulty spikes in its missions, and while you could still complete the first two, the third and final one was very hard to complete if you did not have specific setups. On top of that, if you died, you lost your damage progress completely. Come the "Celestial Demon Tales Onigashima" event, we had double the amount of mission choices (with smoothed out difficulties) and in the event that your team is wiped out, your damage progress is still recorded. The Rashom*on rerun in 2017 retains the Onigashima point system.
** "Chaldea Summer" has 2 parts like "Starry Xuanzang Goes to India", but the old [=CEs=] from Part 1 also boost the second batch of event items' drop rate.
*** The event also released a new ascension material that only drops from an enemy introduced by the event and used for all the swimsuit Servants and several more Servants released after the event. After the event ended, a new free quest was added to Okeanos that featured the new enemy, allowing players to still acquire the new material (albeit at a low drop rate as per usual), the Saber free quest had this enemy type added, and Agartha added another free quest to farm the material, making it accessible for players who weren't able to play the summer events.
*** Chaldea Summer's rerun simplified drop bonuses by making them class-based, rather then Servant-based like last time, making it easier for players to bring only one class to farm a node.
** The Nero Festival 2016 event features extra hard Exhibition battles, featuring extremely tough battles that even veterans would have trouble with and removes the use of Saint Quartz or Command Seals to continue if the party wipes out. Luckily, it only costs 1 AP, so players are welcome to try as many times as they like until they succeed.
** Starting with the "Prison Tower" rerun event, all challenge quests only cost 5 AP and allow players to use Quartz or Command Seals to restore their team if they get wiped out.
** Daunted by the sheer amount of text and story chapters to wade through and stymied by the AP system time-gating progress? The game's second anniversary made it so all AP for ''Observer on Timeless Temple'' is ''permanently'' half off and subsequently introduced campaigns later on to reduce it even further to only costing a quarter of the original AP required.
** Because of the GroundhogDayLoop mechanics of "Servant Summer Festival!", a little BB will pop up with a sign to inform players that this cutscene has already played out in a prior loop and can safely be skipped.
* AnyoneCanDie: The body count among allies tends to be pretty high, especially as the story continues, though technically most don't leave a body. At the end of the chapter or event, most Servants generally disappear unless they're given to the player to bring home to Chaldea as well, though that's not quite the same thing. In general, the only characters who can be counted on to make it through are Mash and the protagonist.
** [[spoiler:Olga Marie Animusphere, the {{Tsundere}} director the protagonist bonded with during Fuyuki,]] has a sudden bridge dropped on her at the climax when the Chaldea bomber shows their true colors.
** In Orleans, the friendly deaths are relatively low, basically being limited to [[spoiler:Marie Antoinette's sacrifice]] to stall Jeanne Alter and Sanson.
** In Septem, [[spoiler:Spartacus and Lu Bu]] are lost in the collateral of Altera {{Kill Sat}}ting the Roman fortress, as Boudica and Mash couldn't protect them with their defensive Noble Phantasms.
** In Okeanos, [[spoiler:Asterios]] takes a lethal hit from Hektor's lance in order to trap Heracles, giving the other heroes a chance to escape. [[spoiler: Or not, since he's shown as having survived in Tamamo Cat's interlude]].
** In London, [[spoiler:most of the Servant allies save Mordred are one-shotted by the newly revealed BigBad]], who stomps the party. [[spoiler:Jekyll and Fran]] only survive due to not being there at the time, and [[spoiler:Mordred]] is only spared [[spoiler:thanks to Hans TakingTheBullet for her]].
** In America, allies drop like flies when Cu Alter acts as the plot reaper [[spoiler:including Nero Bride, Billy the Kid, Geronimo, and later even Karna, after being stabbed in the back by him. Also, Arjuna sacrifices himself to destroy Medb's ''28'' Demon Pillars.]]
** In Camelot, [[spoiler:Hundred-Face and Serenity are killed by Tristan, Arash sacrifices himself to stop a nuke from the Lion King, Xuanzang uses all her strength to destroy the gates of Camelot, Ozymandias and Nitocris sacrifice themselves by launching Ramesseum Tentyris at Camelot and the Lion King, and Bedivere dies when he finally returns Excalibur to the Lion King. Notably, this was the actual living Bedivere. In the end, the only ones left standing are the protagonist, Mash, Fou, the Lion King, Tawara Touta, King Hassan, Cursed Arm who retires from being a Hassan, and Agravain who is basically on the verge of death by the end of the story.]]
** In Babylon, [[spoiler:most of your allies sacrifice themselves or are killed before the end of the chapter, including Kingu after switching sides and even the living Gilgamesh, though since the final boss fight takes place in the underworld, he's still available for support in that fight.]]
** Finally, in Salomon, [[spoiler:even Roman and Fou don't make it out. Roman reveals himself to be the true Solomon and erases his very existence from the Throne to stop Goetia while Fou sacrifices its intelligence to revive Mash. She doesn't appear to understand what he did for her, either, because during ''Remnant'' she comments that Fou has been acting oddly innocent and simple lately.]]
** In SE.RA.PH, [[spoiler:Gawain is killed by EMIYA Alter. He then dies after switching to Kiara's side and then kills her himself in his last breath. Meltlilith's Saint Graph is heavily damaged by her time travel back to her first meeting with the protagonist and BB is unable to preserve her memory data, meaning the death of her incarnation there is effectively permanent.]]
** In Shimosa, [[spoiler:all your enemies in the Swordmaster Duels die after being defeated by Musashi. Kato Danzo sacrifices herself in an attempt to kill Limbo Caster. Sengo Muramasa dies after using his NP to obliterate Amakusa. Your Musashi also dies after her duel with Kojirou. Finally, this dimension's Musashi passes away in peace after knowing that his promise to duel Kojirou is fulfilled by the female Musashi.]]
** In Salem, [[spoiler:Sanson gets executed by the townspeople and Lavinia is killed by Räum to awaken the Outer God inside Abigail.]]
** In the second storyline's prologue, [[spoiler:Da Vinci is fatally impaled by Kotomine. She has a backup body who shares all of her memories but it's noted that DeathOfPersonality applies to the adult version since her backup doesn't have all the experiences of the original and treats everyone else as new acquaintances.]]
* AppearanceIsInTheEyeOfTheBeholder: "Murder at the Kogetsukan" has several characters filling in for the appearances of otherwise unrelated people. Holmes theorizes that it's because the dream has so much new information overloading the protagonist that they subconsciously replaced everyone with people they know to stopgap an unending flow of info into their mind.
* TheApocalypseBringsOutTheBestInPeople: Subverted. The people of Uruk are so happy and kind even in the face of weekly [[TheWorldIsAlwaysDoomed adversity]] and the events of Babylonia as they believe in and love their king Gilgamesh and wish to fight with all they have.
* ApocalypseHow: Humanity is ''gone''. Past, present, and future. There are only temporary "singularities" left because whoever did it did it multiple times simultaneously.
* ApocalypticLog: [[spoiler:Several reports from the Seraphix staff are spread throughout SE.RA.PH which detail their slow descent into madness.]]
* AprilFoolsDay: An honoured Type-Moon tradition shows up in this game.
** In 2016, they replaced all Servant cards with [[http://imgur.com/a/tAfOE artwork done by Riyo]], the artist of "How to Play F/GO." Some of the game's artists also provided artwork for this.
** The 2017 event combines this with a ''VideoGame/PokemonGo'' parody, where the protagonist can catch all of the Servants (including Riyo's own original Servants) with quartz. [[spoiler:Except for one, who can't be caught, and just waves at you happily until the app closes.]]
** It's the same parody game app for 2018, however gameplay has been changed to something more like ''VideoGame/SpaceHarrier'' and [[spoiler:Goetia shows up as the FinalBoss.]]
* ArbitrarySkepticism: Invoked Defiance. After Bunyan is recruited in the April Fool's event; the unlikelihood of her existence (a known fake story) is waved aside by Andersen, who comments that Chaldea has a serial killer made from the fusion of aborted baby souls, crystalized nursery rhymes, living computer programs and more in its ranks. She's not close to being the strangest Servant.
* ArcNumber: The number seven has been heavily teased for the promotion of Salem, with the House of Seven Gables as a major location, the story progressing over the course of seven days, Chaldea sending a party of seven to investigate Salem, seven deaths, seven hangings, seven trials, and seven being the number counted down from in its theme song, "Heretics of Purity". [[spoiler:Räum charges Abigail with seven crimes to get her to break down and awaken the Outer God in her and the protagonist unintentionally fulfills the seventh and last role in the plan to awaken Abigail's Outer God.]]
* ArcSymbol:
** A large ring/hole in the sky appears throughout a lot of promotional material, from the OP to ensemble artwork to even the title screen. After you beat Chapter 4, that ring is revealed to be [[spoiler:Solomon's ultimate Noble Phantasm, an actual looming threat hanging over mankind's heads.]]
** The ring remains in ''Epic of Remnant'', but looks unstable and close to falling apart. This is an indication that [[spoiler:not all of the Demon Pillars have died yet in spite of Goetia's destruction.]]
** A ray of light descending upon the Earth serves as this for ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'', [[spoiler:which is what the alien invader looks like from afar.]]
* ArmorPiercingAttack:
** Certain skills, Craft Essences and Noble Phantasms can either apply the "Sure Hit" status effect that allows a Servant to ignore the Evade status, or the "Ignore Invincibility" status effect that allows a Servant to ignore both Invincibility status AND Evade status.
** Multiple Noble Phantasms have the effect of ignoring defense buffs that enemies might have. There are also a handful of Craft Essences, skills, and Noble Phantasms that can apply it as a buff.
* ArmyOfTheAges: Chaldea summons Servants from all eras of history, including the present, future, and alternate timelines.
* ArtEvolution: As part of transitioning into ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'', all bronze Servants' card art are updated to have backgrounds like higher rarity Servants, replacing the plain old summoning circle background they had in past 2 years.
* ArtifactCollectionAgency: The Folklore Department of the Clock Tower is mentioned specifically in this game as they handle forbidden artifacts that are too dangerous even for magical society which results in [[spoiler:Räum breaking into their archives to retrieve the Silver Key for its scheme.]]
* ArtifactOfDoom:
** As usual for the franchise, the HolyGrail. Here ''multiple'' Holy Grails have been scattered throughout time and are spewing out servants who then proceed to screw up history (a corrupted Jeanne rampaging through Medieval France, famous conquerors trying to topple Nero's reign early, Blackbeard raiding islands, Jason trying to find TheArkOfTheCovenant, a fog created by Babbage and Paracelsus that threatens to consume London, America threatened by a Grail-powered army of Celts, etc. [[spoiler: Solomon needs them to anchor his demons to the world so the demons can support his NP at any time in history and to stop the planet's rotation.]]
** The Okeanos chapter has the Ark of the Covenant from the Bible as the centerpiece of Jason's plans. And just like in the Bible, touching the Ark carelessly kills you outright, [[spoiler: even bypassing Heracles' God Hand.]]
* ArtificialIntelligence: Chaldea is using them to [[MundaneUtility simulate the internet]] since the outside world is gone. [[spoiler:Although it's later revealed that the simulation for an idol that Dr. Roman made might not have actually been one, since Merlin's the one running the Magi☆Mari blog.]]
* ArtificialStupidity: Since enemies are programmed to use their Charge attacks, including Noble Phantasms, as soon as they're ready, they can end up wasting these skills entirely:
** Arash's Stella. If your whole team has Invincible or Evasion (such as from Jeanne's Luminosité Éternelle), [[StupidSacrifice he basically kills himself without accomplishing anything]]. In fact, one story quest in "GUDAGUDA Honnoji" has him as one of the enemies in the last battle, meaning that if he's the last one standing, just put Invincible or Evasion on one Servant, let him explode, and you'll win.
** Jeanne's Luminosité Éternelle. If she has no allies with her who can benefit from her buffs, she basically wastes a turn, since even though she gets invincibility and health regen, she also gets stunned. In fact, she'll end up ''benefitting your team'', since they get an additional turn to charge up Noble Phantasms and cool down their skills. And unlike the player's Jeanne, who eventually gets an NP upgrade to remove the self-stun, no such thing happens to any enemy Jeanne.
** EMIYA Alter as the Lost Man boss has a skill, Ampoule Application, which he'll use at the start of his turn automatically, increasing his NP at the cost of 2000 HP. However, he'll use it regardless of how much health he has left, meaning it's entirely possible for him to kill himself if you can get him below 2000 health[[note]]which isn't easy to do, since he has 2 bars of health - the first having 245,000, and the second having 316,500[[/note]].
** Enemies can sometimes use skills that provide singe-turn buffs to themselves or their team even if they are last to attack, and as such wasting a turn. Additionally, they may still cast buffs on themselves while affected with the "Nullify Buff" effect, which basically renders buff abilities useless for a specified duration.
* AscendedExtra: Some Chaldea employees are given more focus in the prologue for ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'', getting names, their own artwork, and are fleshed out with a few character traits.
* AscendedGlitch:
** King Hassan's NP animation has a glitch where any enemy killed by it would not have their death animation play, only leaving behind their loot. Fans agreed this was incredibly cool and fitting for him, so the developers left it in.
** Card viewing had a bug where the card borders were left out, allowing players to view the full art. It was turned into an actual gameplay feature after positive reception from fans.
* AscendedMeme: Many of them.
** As of this game, the term "Saber-face" is officially accepted as the term for Altria's many [[{{Expy}} Expies]] as it's a hidden trait for them and then Heroine X explicitly calls them that during the Saber Wars event. It was acknowledged again during a livestream when Altria's seiyuu, Creator/AyakoKawasumi, was discussing them.
** Archer EMIYA's TeamMom and TeamChef status from memes has been acknowledged in-game, such as in Valentine's event when he gives kitchen tools to the protagonist, in Nero Fes when he is put in "Chaldea's Kitchen" team along with other "moms" like Boudica, Irisviel and Raiko, and during GUDAGUDA Strange Tales of the Imperial Holy Grail when Nobunaga referred to him as "the certain red cook".
** Kojirou's REGEND. Also his feat of clearing France from dragons has landed him with other dragonslayers for the Moon Festival event.
** The female protagonist's psychopathic tendencies, from the ''Learning with Manga''. This version of her appeared in the Law of the Jungle CE, in the same artstyle, still bullying Olga Marie and Mash. She pops up again for AprilFools, this time strangling [[FinalBoss Solomon]]. Riyo has done most of the artwork for the websites promoting official streams for the game and did another CE for the New Year's 2017 Campaign. It's gotten to the point where the female protagonist's official Nendoroid figure not only has her normal face, but her face as depicted by Riyo as well, not to mention the Bond Level-increasing stretchy arm. She made her way into game canon as the main villain of the second anniversary event.
** Riyo's chibi depictions of the Servants from the same manga became popular among fans and some imitated his artstyle to make their own. Then Riyo made his official version for all of them for AprilFools.
** One of Riyo's gag Servants became official as of "All the Statesmen" from the second anniversary. She's ascended meme personified, summoned into female form just because, and her NP animation is super short, the closest players get to a NP skip function.
** Saber Lily's crotch-targeting Noble Phantasm is utilized as a weapon in "Saber Wars".
** During "GUDAGUDA Honnouji", Medea whined about players' only using her to spam Rule Breaker (and that her younger version is more popular) and Gilgamesh of all people whines about the gacha's incredibly tiny chance of getting gold cards (apparently he got the other gold cards, [[{{Irony}} except Altria and her expies).]]
** In "Garden of Order", Dr. Roman calls Fou, "our reliable runner". "Fou running" came from how long it would take to load during events.
** The Mona Lisa CE price has been acknowledged as insanely expensive twice, with Dr. Roman wanting her to change the prices because they're too high during the Garden of Order event. She refuses. Her iron grip on the prices and being the sole supplier of them leads to someone stealing one and distributing forgeries to the masses, leading into the da Vinci and the 7 Fake Heroic Spirits event.
** Ruler Martha's quest from Part 2 of the summer event pits her against Beowulf in a battle of fisticuffs, acknowledging all the ''Manga/JojosBizarreAdventure'' jokes that originated from their NP animations.
** Siegfried's profile in Fate/Grand Order Material 1 has "sumanai"[[note]]Japanese for sorry[[/note]] written in several places, a reference to his usage of the word used to mock him.
** The oft-used fan moniker for Caster Gilgamesh, Bride Gil, was referenced in Nero Festival 2017 as he gets paired up with the Bride version of Nero, their team name being ''Shiny'' Bride.
** During Summer 2018, the protagonist can have a chance to call Ibaraki-Douji a "Banana Oni" ('Banana' written in kanji), the same way Western fans have been referring her as. As a bonus, Ibaraki also calls it a 'tasty nickname'.
** Ryoma and Oryo's EasterEgg Noble Phantasm artwork where Oryo and Ryoma directly faced the camera with Oryo doing a peace sign resulted in hundreds of snowclones. One of the tables from the Summer 2018 event's [=ServaFes=] has a banner with BB and Astolfo doing that very pose.
* AudienceParticipation: Holmes invites players during "Murder at the Kogetsukan" to guess who the culprit is which plays out as a voting poll with ten quartz as the prize for getting it right.
* AuthorAppeal: The Agartha chapter is seemingly written to appeal to the female domination fetish with multiple groups of women capturing men, enslaving them and harvesting them for their seed. In an interview, Penthesilea in particular was noted to be a dead giveaway to the audience as to who wrote the chapter given how full she is of the author's fetishes.
* AwesomePersonnelCarrier: The ''Shadow Border'', [[spoiler:an Imaginary Numbers Space Submersible originally intended by Chaldea for exploration of the Singularities via the Paper Moon, an Imaginary Numbers compass created by Atlas. Da Vinci's backup body functions as the pilot, put into stasis until the day calls for its use. The protagonists end up using it to escape Chaldea after Anastasia takes over, diving into the Imaginary Numbers dimension to escape the Oprichniki, with it becoming their new base.]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:B]]
* BackForTheFinale: [[spoiler:Almost all of the Servants from each of the previous Orders show up in the Final Order in order to help you take down the BigBad and save the future. For the fight against Andromalius, most of the Servants who debuted in events show up to help you fight it.]]
* BadassCrew:
** [[spoiler:The Argonauts in the Okeanos chapter, a group of the greatest Greek heroes led by Jason show up albeit heavily shrunk to just him, Hektor, Atalante, Medea Lily, and Heracles.]]
** The Knights of the Round Table. All of them have the potential to be summoned as Servants in this game and they're some of the deadliest opponents seen so far.
** Your party and your support team at Chaldea definitely count, with them defeating several renowned Heroic Spirits, a primordial Goddess, [[spoiler: a HiveMind of demons, and even an embodiment of humanity's lewd desires.]]
* BadassFamily: The Emiyas. All of them [[spoiler:(Kiritsugu, Irisviel, Shirou, Illya, and technically Chloe)]] are Servants in this game. They're fought together (plus Heracles and Young Gil) as the optional final battle of the ''Prisma Illya'' event.
* BaitAndSwitch:
** In Okeanos, Drake has a Holy Grail, except it's actually a part of the correct timeline. It's Blackbeard who has the Grail associated with the singularity.
** Ozymandias has the Holy Grail of the sixth singularity, and it is the one that the heroes are looking for, but he's not the one who's destroying humanity in this singularity. [[spoiler: Though he does fight the heroes in order to test them later, he surrenders his Holy Grail afterward and helps them in their final attack on Camelot.]]
** In Babylonia, Gilgamesh has a grail: it's not the one the heroes are looking for, but it's the reason the Three Goddesses Alliance is attacking. [[spoiler: At the end of the order, you get Gilgamesh's grail in addition to Solomon's as a reward for the heroes' efforts.]]
** The ''[[VideoGame/FateExtra Fate/EXTRA CCC]]'' crossover was seemingly billed as yet another funny gag event, with a goofy title card and all. However, once you actually start the event, it's revealed that this is a gaiden chapter for the ''Epic of Remnant'' storyline, and the goofy title card is switched out for the real one. [[spoiler: You even get to fight a Beast!]]
** The Fourth Night of the 2015 Christmas Event ends with a revelation that the next letter is from Gilgamesh, and the Fifth Night's title suggests that the player will have to fight Gilgamesh, who unsurprisingly, just wrote the letter to get Santa Alter to visit him[[note]]since Santa Alter is a Saber-face, and much like in ''Stay Night'', Gilgamesh believes he is [[EntitledToHaveYou entitled to Saber]][[/note]]. [[spoiler: While Gilgamesh ''does'' appear in the Fifth Night, he's TheUnfought for this event, and he doesn't even ''meet'' the player character and Santa Alter; instead, Santa Alter and the player leave before they have to deal with Gil, and instead, they get confronted by Nursery Rhyme and Jack the Ripper, who summoned Santa Alter due to not being able to properly experience Christmas]].
** In Lancer Altria's interlude, Merlin appeared in the protagonist's dreams and arranged a meeting with a mighty blonde king who wields a spear... who turned out to be Fionn.
** With "Murder at the Kogetsukan" being a detective story, it is prone to twists. One remarkable twist is regarding the Violet family where [[spoiler:Adamska's (Lancelot) wife turned out to be Harriet (Euryale) and not Eva (Raiko) who turned out to be Juliet's (Stheno) twin sister. Mash mistakenly assumed it when she make a diagram of the family.[[note]]Although certain clues point out this. Juliet mentioned having a ''fraternal'' twin but didn't say it is Harriet. Hawthorne (Moriarty) also stated that Juliet looks a lot like her mother when she was younger. Eva is not stated to be Adamska's wife, nor Juliet's mother is stated to be Eva. The behavoir of Adamska and Eva is also odd when Eva tries to hit on Morris, Chris and even the protagonist, yet Adamska is only embarassed of what she is doing.[[/note]]]]
* BalanceBuff: Servants have generally been fixed or made better in one of three ways.
** First and rarest is to simply change their hidden values or skills outright. For example, Waver was considered very low tier until he was remade into the best all purpose support character at the time while during Summer 2016 swimsuit Mordred and Altria didn't perform at the level DW wanted, so both had their NP gain per hit increased.
** Next, some interludes improve the NP damage multiplier[[note]]Usually by 1/3, so the 300% for Buster AOE would be 400% while the 1200% for quick ST would go to 1600%[[/note]], add a new skill such as Concept Improvement or improve an existing one. These are also accompanied by a short story segment. Brynhildr, for example, got both an NP interlude and a skill upgrade interlude, which turned her into arguably the best single target Lancer depending on the type of party you want to run.
** Finally, there are storyless Strengthening Quests consisting of 3-5 rounds of combat, generally ending in a fight against Servants related to the Servant being improved. These are always accompanied by skill gain, improvement or NP buff. Spartacus has had all three improvements.
* BarbieDollAnatomy:
** Enemy Picts, besides the full head helmets they wear, are nude all the way down and don't have certain anatomical features in their sprite.
** Depending on the artist, the artwork for male Servants may not feature nipples.
** SE.RA.PH's map resembles a gigantic Sakura/[[spoiler:Kiara]] with the naughty bits either not there or covered up by gameplay nodes.
* BattleInTheCenterOfTheMind: A given ability of Masters in the Fate universe is that they [[PsychicDreamsForEveryone share dreams with their Servants.]] The Main Character gets this in spades. Many of the {{Time to Unlock More True Potential}} quests involve battling the EnemyWithin of various Servants; usually stated to be AllJustADream but that power-up is still there.
* BeachEpisode: The 2016 "Chaldea Summer" event is this. You and several of your Servants have gone to a deserted tropical island and while relaxing there, have started your own tropical resort.
* BehemothBattle: [[spoiler:Avicebron summons Adam to fight off Ivan the Terrible's giant mammoth in the first Lostbelt, with the two duking it out in a special CG.]]
* BigDamnHeroes: [[spoiler: ''[[UpToEleven Every single Heroic Spirit you've encountered thus far]]'' summons themselves to the Final Order in order to help subdue the seventy-two Demon Pillars to clear a path to Solomon.]]
* BiggerOnTheInside: [[spoiler:The ''Shadow Border'', Chaldea's BaseOnWheels, uses magic to distort its interior to make it a lot larger, roughly the size of two cruisers though there isn't enough personal space for everyone as only the protagonist, Mash, da Vinci, Holmes, and Goldorf get their own rooms, everyone else has to bunk together.]]
* BittersweetEnding: As is standard for the franchise. [[spoiler: Humanity has been saved from Beast I, and Mash is resurrected and given a normal lifespan. However, Roman/Solomon has erased himself from all points of existence and the Throne of Heroes in order to weaken Goetia, while Mash's resurrection comes at the cost of Fou's power and intelligence that does neutralize the threat of Fou becoming Beast IV, also means the end of Fou as a sentient being. The world will be in disarray due to the year that the world was incinerated and most of man's extinction - the original threat to humanity - will still happen, and another one of the Beasts is acting on its own, leaving the future uncertain. Finally, the methods the protagonist and their allies used to save the world broke all kinds of laws and regulations in the Mage world, which comes back to haunt them in chapter 2.]]
* BlandNameProduct:
** Mysterious Heroine X Alter's valentine CE is a cup of Spacebucks Hot Cocoa.
** Osakabe-hime orders her otaku stuff from the website Amazones.
** Osakabe-hime plays ''[[VideoGame/MonsterHunter Creature Hunting]]'' during the summer 2018 event and becomes ''really'' addicted to the game.
* BleachedUnderpants: Some of the artists who contributed to the game have drawn adult content artwork.
* BonusBoss:
** In Fuyuki, Caster Cu advices the player not to engage shadow Heracles as even though he's been weakened, he's still ridiculously strong. Shadow Heracles then becomes a one-time boss of an optional area for players. He's likely to be a challenge for early game players as he's level 40, but his difficulty lessens as players progress through the game.
** With no warning, there is a level 50 repeatable Chimera in Germania, in the Rome chapter. The only clue being Germania is ''very'' off the beaten track.
** After beating Babylonia, Ibaraki-douji (who was TheGhost of this chapter due to running away from Uruk to form a bandit gang) is an optional boss in a one-time only free quest.
** Ryougi Shiki appears as a Bonus Boss in SE.RA.PH as MONSTER after clearing all event missions, similar to her bonus boss status back in ''VideoGame/FateExtra''. She turns into Saber Shiki after the first phase of the fight, paralleling how she had done so in Paradox Spiral after being sealed by Araya in ''LightNovel/KaraNoKyoukai''.
** Completing the church free quest in Salem unlocks one final play the party performs for the townspeople, with an Ugallu, Nezha, and [[DualBoss Asterios and Euryale]] as the bonus bosses.
** There are a number of extra and generally optional boss fights for events. Some, such as the Valentine 2017 or the rerun of Dantes' event, are BossRush endurance fights while events like the ''CCC'' collaboration let you fight a more difficult form of the event's final boss. Often, there is no reward for doing so and at best it's nothing more than a single summoning ticket or a 4* Fou.
** One transition into ''Epic of Remnant'' are events having one last challenge quest that pits the player against extremely powerful boss(es), which requires finishing the Final Singularity to access.
* BooksThatBite: The London update introduces Spell Book-type {{Mooks}}, though they don't bite and hurl magic balls instead. They drop the Forbidden Page material.
* BossWarningSiren:
** When the battle transition for the third round of a battle is labelled Fatal Battle instead of the usual Battle, it usually has some sort of boss with higher HP and attack stat. Quests that outright start with the Fatal Battle label are typically a one-round battle against a Servant.
** When it's the ClimaxBoss or FinalBoss of a Singularity, the Servant battle is labelled Grand Battle as a sign of its importance to the plot.
** [[spoiler:The Beasts have '''Advent Beast: A Human Evil Approaches''' and the latter part is RedAndBlackAndEvilAllOver text to emphasize their danger.]]
* BreakingTheFourthWall: Often in some of the sillier events like GUDAGUDA. Special note to your intentionally trying to be silly during the Fate/Accel Zero Order event by mistaking Saber for Mysterious Heroine X. All it does is make Mash tell you to cut it out and that this is meant to be a "serious event".
* BreakoutCharacter:
** From previous Fate works are Ozymandias, Hassan of Serenity, Iskandar, [[LightNovel/FateApocrypha Karna]], [[VisualNovel/FateStayNight Heracles and Cú Chulainn]][[note]]the fact that ''four'' versions of himself are in here actually put him behind ''Altria'' in most alternate versions of a single Servant[[/note]]. Some popular human characters also return as pseudo-Servants like Waver, Rin, and Taiga.
** For debuting characters, there's Marie Antoinette, Scáthach, Kiyohime, Merlin, King Hassan, Musashi and last but certainly not least, Jeanne Alter. There's also Ereshkigal, who, despite not being playable and not even ''having a combat sprite'', was so popular thanks to the Babylonia chapter that she was PromotedToPlayable during the third Christmas event, and this happened ''purely'' because of fan demand for her.
* BreakoutVillain:
** Gilgamesh. Having first featured in ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight'' as an antagonist with a rather minor role in two of the routes, Gilgamesh has since appeared as a major antagonist in ''LightNovel/FateZero'', as one of the four playable Servants in ''[[VideoGame/FateExtra Fate/EXTRA CCC]]'' and as one of the Servants in ''Literature/FateStrangeFake'', as well as other minor features. To date, he has appeared, in some manner, in ''almost every single entry in the Fate/ series''. He's also the main companion of the Babylonia chapter, as a Caster.
** Saber Alter is this as well. She was only in the Heaven's Feel route, but she's been used in other works as [[VisualNovel/FateHollowAtaraxia a gag]], [[VideoGame/FateUnlimitedCodes character analysis]] or [[Manga/FateKaleidLinerPrismaIllya just be an intimidating opponent]]. There are currently 5 versions of her (Saber, Santa [Rider], Swimsuit [Rider], Lancer, and Mysterious Heroine X [Berserker]) in this game. She's also the main villain of the Fuyuki chapter and a major ally of the Shinjuku chapter.
** Jeanne Alter was originally conceptualised as a one-off villain for the First Singularity. She was so well-received that she was reincarnated as one of the few Avengers in the game, becomes a main ally in the Shinjuku chapter, got an additional costume, and has made additional appearances in bonus stories and events (such as her Santa Lily Alter form).
* BreatherEpisode: Though no less action-packed than other chapters, America has notably little to do with the overarching plotlines compared to [[WhamEpisode London]] and [[SwordOfPlotAdvancement Camelot]] and goes back to the simple "fight Servants, get Grail, solve Singularity" formula of the first several chapters.
* BribingYourWayToVictory:
** The easiest way to obtain Saint Quartz for the gacha to obtain Servants is to spend real money. Furthermore, for some events, you basically must have gacha-exclusive [=CEs=] to farm its currencies effectively. Thankfully you can just borrow a friend's. On the other hand, the game is designed in way that it's possible to complete the storyline by using lower-tier servants from the Friend Point Summoning system up until the Camelot singularity where there is a massive DifficultySpike (and even then, certain servants such as the 3-star Euryale will carry the team well thanks to her being an anti-male Archer).
** There are also one-time x10 Summons where you are guaranteed a 5-star Servant. However, you can only use ''paid'' Saint Quartz (not the free to obtain Saint Quartz) to use these x10 Summons.
* BrickJoke:
** The fact that Mordred is the main ally in an Industrial Revolution-era London filled with GentlemanAndAScholar types investigating a murder mystery scenario instead of, say, a certain great detective is lampshaded. As it turns out, said great detective ends up in a Singularity filled with Knights of the Round, having been explicitly hired to stay out of London.
** In the SE.RA.PH chapter, when the heroes finally make it to BB, she initially thinks that it's Robin Hood whom she sent on some errands returning. A bit later, Robin returns from those errands [[spoiler: just in time for the battle against Kiara.]]
** During April Fool's, Nero has a livestream where she plays ''VideoGame/KantaiCollection''. Cue the 2017 Summer Event, where Nero looks AND plays like someone out of ''Kantai Collection''.
** After the Orleans singularity, Kiyohime shows up in your Present Box, having apparently carried out her promise to [[StalkerWithACrush follow you home]]. She appears in the Halloween event as an ally again... and makes a remark about packing herself into a present box with a pretty ribbon.
** A joke that spans a year: Stheno and Euryale have Valentine's chocolates that are either [[BlatantLies made with love]] or hastily-put together. Where did they base this from? Medusa Lancer's Valentine's chocolate, which implies that her older sisters copied her design poorly.
* BrokenAesop: The stage play that the Chaldea group performs on the second day of Salem. The story is a ''Literature/TheThreeLittlePigs''-like story about the three Jeanne "sisters" (Jeanne, Jeanne Alter and Jeanne Alter Santa Lily) who wants to build a sturdy home. They first build a fort but it is burned down by arsonists (Kiyohime, Nero and Ibaraki-douji). Then they build a wooden house but the Sun Trio (Ozymandias, Karna and Tamamo-no-Mae) scorches it. They finally settle in tents, however they are attacked by an English army led by Altria and her Knights of the Round Table. They got help from both Gilles and Amaku-- Santa Island Kamen to defend them, thus making Jeanne conclude that what's sturdy is not their house, it's the bond they have with each other. However they are still defeated and the poor Jeanne sisters are burned at the stake.
* BrokenMasquerade:
** [[spoiler:This is one of the twists for the ''F/GO'' facet of the Nasuverse. Once Goetia is beaten, human history is saved and the world outside Chaldea resumes like normal... except that it's still ''eighteen months'' after the beginning of the crisis (July 31, 2015 to December 25, 2016 in the original JP release). All timekeeping devices record this and astronomical observation of the stars confirms it, but the world at large has no idea where their 18 months went. While the Mages' Association and other groups are trying to keep something of a lid on things, people know that Something Happened.]]
** [[spoiler:Later, once Salem rolls around in late November 2017, a singularity appears where modern day Salem and Danvers, Massachusets should be - except, unlike all other singularities, this one is imposed ''on the modern day'', creating a void area around Salem-Danvers nearly ''seven kilometers in diameter''. This time even the mainstream press gets to record this one, at one point the ''US Army'' is ready to charge in, and the Mages' Association, Assembly of the 8th Sacrement, and other organizations have to work in concert to help keep something inside the singularity from escaping. Da Vinci notes that this incident is so extreme it could end Chaldea - though in the end, Chaldea suffered a different fate.]]
** [[spoiler:Exacerbated even further with ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'', as the Alien God's arrival completely upends the status quo on Earth and crushes every single nation, turning the world into a bizarre white blankness and reveals that aliens and other beings exist out there. The prologue for the first Lostbelt indicates that the few surviving settlements are still trying to figure out ''what the hell is going on'' as one {{Muggle}} sets out to record everything for posterity.]]
* ButNotTooBi: While there are plenty of female Servants who openly lust for the protagonist regardless of their gender, most of the male Servants don't do the same, even the confirmed bisexuals like Iskander or Gilgamesh. The few overt examples of male Servants being even implicitly interested in the male version of the protagonist are those like Astolfo, who looks identical to a girl right down to the clothing and Fergus, who makes it clear he is not interested in pursuing a relationship.
* ButThouMust: The player is regularly given options as to what dialogue the PlayerCharacter will say, but these are always limited to cosmetic differences that don't allow them to make any real choices. This naturally forces certain behaviors onto the player, sometimes contradictory ones. For example, in Kiyohime's interlude she's confronted with a shadow servant that calls her out on the less savory aspects of her personality. The player is given a choice of responses, but both of them object to the accusations and defend Kiyohime. However, in the Summer event player interactions with Lancer Kiyohime force them to act afraid of her due to the same tendencies they had previously denied existing.
* ButtMonkey: Siegfried has been treated as one by the fandom because of his gameplay prowess being considered pitiful, with the creators encouraging this, making "sorry" his catchphrase as he fails to live up to expectations and him as the butt of several jokes in events.
* BystanderSyndrome: The Sea of Estray are willing to let Chaldea into their entrance and use it as a base, so long as you don't disturb their workshops. However, they are unwilling to lend further aid beyond that as they're unconcerned with human civilization.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:C]]
* CallBack:
** Every time an Arthurian character appears in the post-Fuyuki chapters or an event, there's usually a dialogue choice to refer back to Saber Alter in Fuyuki, since she's the first Arthurian Servant the protagonist has canonically encountered.
** A rather depressing one happens in Babylonia. [[spoiler: At one point in the story, Gilgamesh's attendant, Siduri, talks about how raising hands usually indicates a sign of surrender. Later on, one of the Lahmus you encounter is heavily implied to be her, since it does nothing but raise its hands at you.]]
** [[spoiler: Dr. Roman hits upon the theory during the final singularity that Solomon's body is actually being possessed by an outside entity using the abilities of Solomon, comparing it to Kingu's situation with Enkidu.]]
** Way back in Orleans, Mozart claims that there is nothing more beautiful than a parting smile. Mash gives the protagonist one in Salomon [[spoiler:while she's holding back the full brunt of Ars Almadel Solomonis to protect her senpai, knowing that she's not going to survive it]]. It's indeed a beautiful smile.
* TheCavalry; In the Final Singularity, the Chaldean Team is saved from the [[spoiler: infinite Demon Pillars by nearly every Heroic Spirit the Protagonist and Mash met from past Singularities and special events]]
* TheCameo:
** Many characters that aren't Servants from the ''Fate'' franchise appear as the picture of Craft Essences.
** Almost all the characters who aren't Ryougi Shiki from ''LightNovel/KaraNoKyoukai'' show up in Garden of Order's event-exclusive Craft Essences. Two of them (Touko and Azaka) even show up in the trailer.
** The seven Fujou building ghosts and [[spoiler:Kirie Fujou]] appear as an enemy type in the Garden of Order event.
** Alice Kuonji's co*ck Robin is part of Robin's final costume.
** Miyu, Luvia, Tanaka, and Angelica make an appearance in Craft Essences for the ''Prisma Illya'' crossover.
** A petrified Matou Shinji appears in ''First Order'' whose blood is sucked by Medusa to establish what she'll do to Ritsuka, Mash, and Olga. Then she rips his head off.
** The very last chocolate sculpture available during the Valentine 2018 event is a chocolate [[Anime/CarnivalPhantasm Grail-kun]]. It even produces chocolate knives for everyone!
* CanonForeigner: The corrupted Rider Darius III in ''First Order'' anime special. The manga adaptation featured Boudica as the corrupted Berserker instead of Heracles.
* CastHerd: You're unlikely to see, say, Iskandar interact with Scheherazade or Francis Drake with Oda Nobunaga. Instead, they tend to be given their own little subgroups like the Knights of the Round[[note]]Altria, Mordred, Gawain, Lancelot, Tristan, Bedivere, Agravain, Merlin, and Arthur[[/note]] or the GUDAGUDA Servants[[note]]Okita and Nobunaga, who are later joined by Chacha and Hijikata[[/note]], though some characters can belong to multiple herds. The red mantled Archer, for example, is EMIYA around the cast from ''Fate/Stay Night'' but Nameless around Tamamo or Nero while Gawain can also show up with the ''Extra'' cast. Singularities can shake things up, however, and allow things like David showing up in Okeanos and flirting with Atalante. These are generally the exception, however, rather than the rule.
* CelestialDeadline: Even though Chaldea survived the incineration of the world, all systems ''still'' point to human history permanently ending two years later, giving the protagonists that small amount of time to save the world before that predicted event happens.
* CentralTheme: Humanity. The entire quest of the story focuses on saving human history by correcting singularities, which have a "Humanity Foundation Value" that dictates how much of a distortion they create. However, from Camelot onward, the story focuses on a different definition of "humanity" - namely, the qualities that make a human being human.
** In Camelot, [[spoiler:the Lion King is a brutal WellIntentionedExtremist due to her Divine Spirit mentality who wishes to preserve a tiny portion of "humanity", picked to her exacting standards, in a fashion that will see the rest of the world burn but will definitely at least save ''something'' of mankind, but once Bedivere returns Excalibur to her, allowing her to at last die, the goddess Rhongomyniad which now wears Altria Pendragon's flesh can at least comprehend the humanity that would lead to others opposing her and wanting to take the longer gamble of stopping Solomon outright and saving everyone, even if she still believes she acted for the best.]]
** In Babylonia, [[spoiler:the focus is on bonding with the citizens of Uruk by just living life with them, all while fighting off the gods whose "higher" perspectives make them antagonistic (but not necessarily evil, in part because the Protagonist can appeal to their own "human" qualities).]]
** This theme is at its most apparent in the final battle. [[spoiler:In Salomon, Mash rejects Grand Caster's vision of a WorldOfSilence because, while the people are smiling in their immortal state, it's all false because they don't know what it's like to live ''because'' of their mortality. Dr. Roman reveals himself to have been the true Solomon, the real King of Magic and not the Ars Goetia in his guise. Because he lived his human life only by the will of the Israeli people and God, Solomon wished on the Holy Grail to be incarnated as a normal human, so that he could live a second life by his own volition. Mash's visceral HeroicSacrifice motivates Fou to sacrifice all of his power and intelligence to bring her back from the dead, leading him to muse that her humanity was enough to "defeat" him, the Fourth Beast. Even Goetia has an AlasPoorVillain moment after his demonic power is lost and he is reduced to a human in Solomon's half-melted body, finally understanding mortality first-hand and fighting the Protagonist one last time so that his last moments won't be meaningless, even if he's already lost.]]
* CerebusSyndrome: Starts from London and keeps escalating from there. In London, [[spoiler:the BigBad reveals himself and casually wipes out almost all your allies and curbstomps you, and then states that this was just a ''warning'' for you to stop interfering with his plans.]] In America, [[spoiler:the main villain is a HumanoidAbomination who devastates America and kills millions of people in horrific ways, and the arc ends with the [[WhamEpisode bombshell]] that Mash's Demi-Servant powers are rapidly killing her.]] Camelot deals with such lovely themes as mass genocide, mindless obedience to an oppressive government, and horrific war crimes. Finally, Babylon has [[spoiler:the main villain be an outright ''EldritchAbomination'' that actually ''succeeds'' in destroying 99% percent of the world, all but ''one'' of your allies are gruesomely murdered, and the arc ends with the BigBad finally having enough and invading your home.]]
* CharacterAlignment: InUniverse, all Servants have an explicit alignment, and it's indicated that Masters do as well, though we don't see any apart from the protagonist's LawfulNeutral. Why certain Servants have one alignment or another is not always clear: Altera, Iskander, Gilgamesh, and Medusa are all Good aligned despite their butchery, for example; while Atalante and all Hassans are Evil despite their noble deeds and intentions. It wasn't till Babylonia's focus on Caster Gilgamesh that a lot of his actions as Archer make some sense as being aligned as "Good". As a side note, instead of the Neutral alignments being written as LawfulNeutral or ChaoticNeutral for example, they're listed as Lawful Balanced or Chaotic Balanced to avoid confusion.
* CharacterSelectForcing:
** Many events give bonuses for using specific Servants and Craft Essences, usually in the form of an item drop or damage bonus. Part of the difficulty of events comes from figuring out how to build a party that both maximizes these bonuses and can utilize the TacticalRockPaperScissors system along with any other gimmicks the event or enemies might have.
** Certain Servants' Interludes only allows a fixed support and can't use friend supports.
*** The Prison Tower event literally only lets you use one support Servant, Edmond Dantes, due to being cut off from Chaldea during the event's story.
*** The first chapter of SE.RA.PH locks the party only to Meltlilith for solo battles, as the protagonist lacks the support provided by Chaldea's Servants.
*** "Dead Heat Summer Race" story battles only have summer 2017 Servants available as supports.
*** Shimosa's Heroic Spirit Swordmaster Duels only have the story support version of Musashi available. In addition, certain battles are locked solely to Musashi.
*** The final parts of ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'' prologue forces you to use only the support Mash and Da Vinci.
** Applied on a party-wide sense during the Setsubun 2018 event. For the first time in the game: 1) ''you are not allowed to have any support Servant'' (either from your friend list or even in-story), 2) all Servants deployed in one round will be out of commission for the next 4 hours and 3) all this while keeping the usual cost limit. If you've been heavily reliant on your friends' support units (particularly Merlin) or been giving too much attention on your gold Servants, the cool-down will basically force you to creatively use your remaining, less-frequently used units (i.e. the less celebrated silvers, bronzes, and even the gold ones [[TierInducedScrappy who are understandably seen as too much trouble to use]]).
* ChekhovsGun:
** Seraphix has a one-off mention as one of Chaldea's financial sources in Marisbury's rant in the first arc. It later becomes a central location for one of the ''[=EoR=]'' chapters.
** During the second Lostbelt, the protagonists note that they often see two birds flying above them. [[spoiler:They are Odin's ravens, Huginn and Muninn, which were left behind by Odin before he died to help guide Chaldea.]]
* ChekhovsLecture: In the SE.RA.PH chapter, [[spoiler: after BB rewinds time to save the party from Kiara, BB explains that if you want to go all the way back to the beginning, when the Protagonist first got here, you'd have to be able to travel faster than the speed of light, and the strain would be too much for a regular Saint Graph. It turns out Meltlilith, with Passionlip's help, did exactly this so that she could replace her past self and save the Protagonist.]]
* ChristmasEpisode: The game gets one each time Christmas rolls around, and they tend to be fairly elaborate. Also, while the first one (Altria Santa Alter's) was largely a gag event (and one of the game's earliest), the second event (with Jeanne Alter Santa Lily) is, astoundingly, played ''arrow straight'' in the end. [[spoiler:It ultimately serves as a discussion of why we give presents during this season, and how it's okay for you yourself to enjoy a gift given as much as the recipient - if you all enjoy it together, then that just makes it an even better gift. Trying to be some kind of detached, wish-granting Santa machine will just result in everyone being less happy.]]
* CitadelCity: Shinjuku is cut off from the rest of Tokyo by a gigantic wall surrounding the entire ward.
* {{Cliffhanger}}:
** The America chapter ends with [[spoiler: Mash bleeding out and suddenly collapsing in the hallway. She gets treated offscreen in the next chapter.]]
** Babylonia ends with [[spoiler: Solomon launching his temple directly at Chaldea, having been fed up with their meddling in his plans.]]
** The ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'' Prologue, hoo boy. It ends with [[spoiler:our heroes essentially ''homeless'', the old Team A threatening to use the Lostbelt to rewrite world history, and you and the Chaldea crew sailing off into the Lostbelt using the ''Shadow Border'''s new drive system. You go soaring off beyond reality... and cut to the intro movie and back to the Terminal screen.]]
* CloneArmy:
** In Okeanos, it's revealed that reality itself is generating conceptual {{pirate}}s.
** Nobunaga's army is actually Nobunaga's Servant essence (her "one-star rarity") given form as an adorable chibi army of herself.
** Most of Medb's forces are clones she created using a soldier's DNA.
** The oni from Onigishima" are [[spoiler:not true Oni, they are ArtInitiatesLife drawings created by Ushi Gozen.]]
** In Agartha, Dahut's pirates are able to reproduce identical versions of themselves. [[spoiler:Columbus aims to take control of them since an obedient clone army would be very useful to a man like him.]]
* ClosedCircle: "Murder at the Kogetsukan" takes place on an isolated island somewhere in the Caribbean, which only the Marble Trading Company and their guests know the location of. No one can leave as they need the company to send out a request for transportation, which in of itself will take a few days to be processed. However, the protagonist accidentally intrudes upon it in their magic dreams, [[spoiler:and the information they give to Holmes allows him to deduce its location and charter a boat ahead of time.]]
* ClothesMakeTheSuperman: The Mystic Codes are functionally alternate costumes for the player with three battle skills and can only be unlocked after completing a quest or buying them from the Rare Prism shop. Essentially by wearing a different outfit, the player has access to different spells that strengthen certain playstyles.
** After the London update, there are three permanent quests in Chaldea Gate to get a Mystic Code: the Chaldea Plugsuit, Mages' Association and Atlas Academy uniforms.
** The 5 million downloads campaign has a quest to unlock Altria's casual clothes for female protagonist. The male protagonist gets Arthur's WaistcoatOfStyle instead.
** For "Fate/Accel Zero Order", the protagonist can use Altria's formal suit from Fate/Zero.
** For "Chaldea Summer" the protagonist gets a swimsuit, as fit for the season.
** The ''Fate/Extella'' promotional campaign has a quest to get Hakuno's ''Extra'' uniform.
** ''Fate/Extra CCC'''s pre-event campaign has a quest for Hakuno's ''CCC'' uniform.
** The ''Heaven's Feel'' movie commemoration campaign has the Homurahara school uniform.
* CombatStilettos: A significant number of the female Servant cast wear heels into combat, from knight-classes to assassins to casters. For starters, the various Altria faces even wear ''plated heels'' to complement the rest of their heavy armor.
* CompositeCharacter: Shinjuku introduces the concept of Phantoms - Spirits that are too weak to become a Heroic Spirit, and thus must ''fuse'' with another Phantom to become a fully-fledged Heroic Spirit (which is still weaker than a normal Servant). They are:
** Avenger of Shinjuku [[spoiler:is Hessian Lobo, which is composed of Lobo, the Hessian soldier, and only for the Shinjuku chapter, Jack Griffin.]]
** Archer of Shinjuku [[spoiler:is James Moriarty combined with Der Freischutz's Phantom. Noticeably as a result of a normal Servant fusing with a Phantom, Moriarty's power has been incredibly amplified as a result.]]
** Assassin of Shinjuku [[spoiler:is Yan Qing combined with the Phantom Doppelganger]].
** [[spoiler:Shakespeare and Andersen combine their Noble Phantasms and write a scenario to combine the power of 200 fictional detectives so the protagonist can defeat Moriarty]].
** The Sakura Five Alter Egos are comprised of several goddesses' data which is reflected in their skills and Noble Phantasms.
** The legend of Paul Bunyan was fused together with various creation myths about giants to create the playable version of Bunyan.
* TheComputerIsACheatingBastard:
** There is no shortage of instances where you will fight Servants with ludicrous amounts of HP-- way beyond what even your own max-leveled Servant will have.
** To kill an enemy with the Guts status (revive with some HP after being killed) in the same turn, one must have two different characters attack them; one to drop their HP to zero, the other to kill them after they revive from that. Because of [[SurplusDamageBonus Overkill]], chaining the same character's attack cards won't work; the enemy will just revive after that character finishes attacking them. If you only have one character on the field, you won't be able to kill an enemy with Guts active in one turn. On the other hand, the only way to get the enemy to ''stop'' after Guts activates on your side is for the character to either be the only Servant remaining, or be under the Taunt effect as well as Guts. Even then, if the enemies' other remaining action(s) include a skill that buffs them, they'll still use the skill.
** Some bosses from Camelot onward have special permanent buffs that give them advantages such as extra NP charge, powerful defense buffs, multi-layered HP, or even changing how the TacticalRockPaperScissors of their classes work.
** Enemy Servants tend to have much higher debuff and status effect resistances than their playable counterparts. [[OneHitKill Instant Death]] resistance is particularly jacked up, to the point that even instant kill specialists have essentially no chance at all of landing one. People will play for months without getting so much as a single one against a miniboss or Servant.
* TheComputerIsALyingBastard: [[MrExposition Da Vinci]] {{Info Dump}}s about Servant Attributes in London. She claims to have the Man attribute, since she's the Heroic Spirit of a real person who really existed. Nonetheless, she has the Star attribute. Additionally, her exposition about the class affinities was originally wrong before they edited it.
* ConspiracyRedemption: The former director of Chaldea had implemented several experiments that sicken the protagonist, but unfortunately there's not much they can do to fix what he did. Chaldea's restructuring over the course of the game is made to be a lot more humane thanks to the protagonist, Roman, and da Vinci. Chaldea has been noted as an oddity by Servants and the Mage's Association because of this, as they try to protect strange and ostracized Heroic Spirits instead of condemning them to their fate.
* ContinuityNod: Many, since chronologically this game takes place after all other games, novels, and anime. The Servants remember, for the most part, the events that happened and retain CharacterDevelopment gained from those.
** Altria diplomatically comments on how she has "opinions" about Holy Grail Wars, but will assist in this one however she can. Those "opinions" are likely negative due to the colossal debacles that were the [[LightNovel/FateZero 4th]] and [[VisualNovel/FateStayNight 5th Holy Grail Wars]].
** Archer EMIYA makes an offhand comment to wanting to finish Shadow Heracles in Fuyuki because he had failed to kill him in his version of the Holy Grail War in the ''Fate'' route from ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight''. He also makes various comments on events from ''Extra'' though he technically isn't the same character as Nameless.
** Lord El-Melloi II (Waver) tells you that he will help but there is only one man he will serve, Iskandar, due to their relationship in ''LightNovel/FateZero''. He also helps the young version of Iskandar in the Rome chapter for this reason.
** Jeanne and Amakusa remember their confrontation from ''Fate/Apocrypha'', and surprisingly, get along quite well on the same side.
** All Servants from the ''Extra'' series remember everything that happened in it; Nero and Tamamo even claim that their heart is already taken by a certain someone, the protagonist of that game.
** Some Servants (like Karna and Arash) like to discuss their previous Master from another ''Fate'' series since they had such a large impact on them.
** Dr. Jekyll scolds Hyde in his interlude and reminds him of their master, Tatsumi Kitano from ''Fate/Prototype Fragments''.
** [[spoiler:In Salem, Zepar expresses doubt in a flashback at Räum's plan of summoning an alien being to help it dominate humanity, since the [[VideoGame/FateExtellaTheUmbralStar last time]] aliens tried to invade Earth, they were ''crushed'' by the holy sword wielder.]]
** A pigeon report in the Valentine 2018 event notes that Fergus has been hired as a guard for his excellent dentist skills, a reference to his brief stint as one to terrorize Nursery Rhyme in the Valentine 2016 event.
** In one of the Gudaguda: Strange Tales of the Imperial Holy Grail War [[https://grandorder.wiki/File:Portrait_CE_0805.png Craft Essences]], Medusa is in the same getup she was in the [[https://grandorder.wiki/File:Portrait_CE_0062.png Poster Girl Craft Essence]].
** Gordolf occasionally talks about Toole, Gordes' ServileSnarker homunculus, from ''Apocrypha'' who he credits for making him who he is today by being his SternTeacher/caretaker.
* ContractualBossImmunity:
** Most boss-level enemies have a low instant death rate, meaning that the odds of a OneHitKill Noble Phantasm actually working on them are low. It ''is'' possible to have them work, but the vast majority of the time that particular instant death effect will fail.
** Especially evident in the Garden of Order event, which introduces Ryougi Shiki, who not only has the highest instant death rate on her Noble Phantasm, but also has a skill that makes instant death more likely to trigger. Even with max levels of the skill and 500% overcharge, it still can't reliably trigger on bosses.
* CoolAndUnusualPunishment: During the 2016 Halloween event, in order to flush out a hidden servant (Robin Hood using [[InvisibilityCloak No-Face May King]]), the Protagonist uses the threat of [[HollywoodToneDeaf Elisabeth Bathory's horrible singing]] (despite dreading it themselves, as they reveal when the plan works).
* CooldownManipulation: Tamamo-no-Mae's Noble Phantasm has the unique effect of reducing skill cooldowns by one turn and the fact that it can be easily spammed due to her Arts cards and her own NP gauge being filled by her NP makes her incredibly useful to getting skills back up and running. The only other options are the Atlas Uniform's skill and Saber Alter Maid, both of which have incredibly long cooldowns.
* CosmicKeystone: In ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt,'' [[spoiler:the titular Lostbelts are sustained by "Phantasy Trees", miles-tall constructs implied to be related to the Alien God driving the plot. These Phantasy Trees are what prevent the Crypters' seven Lostbelts from being pruned like they normally should be, and destroying one will lead the Lostbelt to fade away as it should have.]]
* CouldHaveAvoidedThisPlot: [[spoiler: In Camelot, Ozymandias points out that if the heroes mentioned that they were working with King Hassan, he would have allied with them without a fight.]]
* CriticalHitClass: No attack has a chance to crit by itself. Instead, certain units will generate the ability to crit for the team and then certain units will absorb those stars for a chance to crit. This takes a few steps and can be manipulated in some ways.
** First, you have either a unit that can generate stars on demand or per turn or you have a unit that generates them the normal way. To effectively make stars this way, you generally need attacks with high hit counts and preferably quick cards because of their natural boost to star generation. However, there are skills that increase the level of star generation, which can let the likes of Raikou generate an easy 25-30 stars with her multihit AOE Buster NP or even allow the likes of Kuro to generate 30~ stars with a QAA chain if she uses a skill to temporarily boost her star generation.
** Second, the next turn, these stars will be available for your party to use. Each class has what is known as a natural star weight which can range from about fifteen with Berserkers to over two hundred with Riders. This makes a Rider about thirteen times more likely to get a critical star than a Berserker, so Berserkers generally don't make for good crit units on their own without a lot of help. However, certain skills and Craft Essences can boost star absorption by anyway from 100% to ''6000%'', though numbers like the latter are almost exclusively reserved for Berserkers. This star absorption bonus multiplies the natural absorption rate, so while an Archer or Rider can reliably gather all the stars with a simple 300% boost or so or even go without, a Berserker needs a very high absorption rate to accomplish anything or so many stars generated that every card will reach the maximum, meaning 50~ stars generated in one turn.
** Third, once the stars have been distributed, your Servants attacks gain the ability to deal bonus damage on a crit. The base amount is double damage, but this can reach up to 120% on a unit's own skills or 100% from a friendly unit's buffs. Because this has such a high multiplier compared to attack or card buffs that rarely reach even as high as 50%, criticals have come to dominate the game. Merlin in particular is considered a gamebreaker for being able to easily provide 10-15 stars per turn by himself as well as provide a massive 100% bonus critical damage to anyone in the party. With his help, units can even crit for more damage than they'd do with their Noble Phantasms.
* {{Crossover}}: Some of these were done with the intent of giving characters from other works like BB and Ryougi Shiki a time to shine even after their character arcs and stories have been completed. The game distinguishes between two types of crossover with the ''Prisma Illya'' and ''Kara no Kyoukai'' events as "collaboration events" and the ''CCC'', ''Apocrypha'', and ''Zero'' crossovers as "special events"; the former are more light-hearted and don't really address the plots of the source material beyond light nods while the latter deal directly with the stories being crossed over with.
** Okita and Nobunaga seem to actually come from the Koha-Ace universe, having arrived in the ''Grand Order'' continuity after Nobunaga messing with the Grail broke a hole in space-time (which also caused her Servant essence to get duplicated, hence the [[{{Mook}} event enemies]] with her likeness). So this is technically the first crossover event.
** The February 2016 crossover was with ''LightNovel/KaraNoKyoukai''. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92YMDisG1OU The official reveal]].
** To help promote the [[http://news.fate-go.jp/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/gainenreisou_01_bra2a.png ''Heaven's Feel'' films]] and the [[http://news.fate-go.jp/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/gainenreisou_02_a6bmy.png ''Fate/Extra Last Encore'' anime]], the main artwork for each was made into a Craft Essence. There were also two miniquests that helped promote the two projects.
** The ''Fate/Zero'' event, "Fate/Accel Zero Order" with Waver and Iskander as main characters. The writer of this event was [[Creator/GenUrobuchi Gen Urobuchi]] himself!
** For September 2016, there was a collaboration with ''Manga/FateKaleidLinerPrismaIllya'', named [[OverlyLongName Fate/kaleid liner Prisma Illya End Sacrifice]], written by the author, Hiroshi Hiroyama.
** A crossover with ''Fate/Extra CCC'' written by Nasu happened in May 2017. BB was teased in a silhouette at the [=AnimeJapan=] announcement and was later revealed as the free Servant. It also introduces two new Classes, Moon Cancer and Alter Ego and is officially part of the game's story as a chapter of ''Epic of Remnant''.
** A crossover with ''LightNovel/FateApocrypha'' titled "Inheritance of Glory" began in Japan at the end of April 2018. It seems to actually have a place within the ''Apocrypha'' timeline, taking place after the story but before its DistantFinale.
* CuckoldHorns: Discussed by Shuten-Douji about Raikou during her battle against Sakata Kintoki. Shuten-Douji believes Raikou would grow horns of jealousy if Raikou saw the intense battle between Kintoki and herself.
* CutAndPasteEnvironments: The game often uses these for its visual novel-esque cutscenes' backgrounds and battle backgrounds. Why yes, that exact same throne room from 15th-century France also existed in the 1st-century Roman Empire and 18th-century America.
* CuteMonster: Ozymandias' sphinxes are revealed [[http://imgur.com/L0Qgt2x to be just as adorable as kittens]].
[[/folder]]

[[folder:D]]
* DarkerAndEdgier:
** The story progressively becomes darker with each singularity, as more and more innocent people become caught up in the multiple conflicts with Celts slaughtering anyone who gets in their way, to the Lion King being a heartless tyrant, killing anyone not deemed worthy of her city to [[spoiler:almost everyone in Uruk either being forcibly converted into one of Tiamat's Lahmus or killed by them.]]
** SE.RA.PH takes on a much darker tone compared to other events and even main story chapters [[spoiler:with the diaries retelling the sordid tale of Seraphix's descent into madness, the DarkSecret of the oil rig itself, and Kiara horrifically killing Servants and abusing the near dead Master candidates for the sake of her pleasure.]]
** Shimosa is darker than prior chapters in ''[=EoR=]''. [[spoiler:The Servants in this chapter literally create mountains of corpses, what with Hozoin's genocide, Tomoe burning people alive, and Chiyome feeding citizens to Orochi. The enemy Servants this time around are simply reanimated corpses with a far more realistic dying sound and the red sky that appears during the climax is because of all the massacres around you. There is also a scene where Shuten plunges her hand into your stomach and plays with your ''intestines'' (it was done to repair your communication with Chaldea, but the narration pulls no punches).]]
** In the part two prologue, the Mage's Association arrives to take back control of Chaldea. A new director is installed after he flat out bought the entirety of Chaldea along with his extremely suspicious and sad*stic assistant. The original staff, including the protagonist, are all fired and replaced by those the new director picked and all Servants were demanded to be unsummoned. Further, the Mage's Association decides to interrogate everyone remaining in Chaldea to figure out what was happening during the last year. There's even a new a Church overseer and it's none other than Kirei Kotomine. While all this is going on [[https://www.reddit.com/r/grandorder/comments/7m21k6/fgo_twitter_is_going_full_evangelion/ Japanese twitter and website are all blasting error messages]] [[PaintingTheMedium that Chaldea and its systems are on lockdown and cannot be accessed during interrogation.]] [[spoiler:Then the sad*stic assistant and Kotomine reveal themselves to be working with the new antagonists, bringing them over into Chaldea, resulting in a full-on slaughter with da Vinci brutally impaled and the protagonists forced to flee by the skin of their teeth as the one tool that could be used to stop them is forcibly frozen and deactivated.]]
** While ''Observer in Timeless Temple'' got pretty dark towards the end, ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'' takes it to all new levels. Right off the bat, [[spoiler:you're stripped of your rank and declared a heretic for breaking TheMasquerade during the events of ''Epic of Remnant'' and the first scenes see you and Mash being ''brutally'' interrogated by the Mage's Association. Then the new villains show up in force and massacre almost every remaining Chaldea official, culminating in Da Vinci being KilledOffForReal (it's explicitly stated that the young version of Da Vinci is a completely new entity with her own identity, personality and none of the original Da Vinci's memories).]] The first Lostbelt introduces the dilemma of [[spoiler:people fighting for their right to live and whether it's right for Chaldea to march in and erase them. Add onto that the horrific tyranny of Ivan's kingdom and Servants being no-nonsense for pretty much the entire story without ever letting up results in a very dark tone being established.]]
** The ''GUDAGUDA'' event series started as a simple gag event "Honnoji" filled with [[JokeCharacter Joke Characters]] and BreakingTheFourthWall to the more serious "Meiji Revival" where it's mostly humorous until [[spoiler:the protagonists find out why the event is happening in the first place]] to the much darker "Strange Tale of the Imperial Holy Grail" as there are legitimate stakes at play with the need to stop Servants from rampaging and killing civilians [[spoiler:and its ending is the saddest as Okita Alter fades away permanently]] though it becomes the same old wacky GUDAGUDA again in its second part.
* ADarkerMe: During the Garden of Order event, many Servants are snatched from Chaldea into [[LightNovel/KaraNoKyoukai Araya's Ogawa Apartment.]] More than a HatePlague; the apartment amplifies the dark history of each Servant. Fortunately killing the Servant sends them back to Chaldea, restored.
* DarkReprise: The main menu music is given a tense remix for ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'' to carry across the tension of [[spoiler:Chaldea having little resources and needing to defeat the powerful Crypters and their Servants of the Lostbelt]] to save the world.
* DaylightHorror: [[spoiler:The state of present-day Earth in ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'' is a vast, white expanse as far as the eye can see shown solely during daylight to highlight how there is ''literally nothing'' left of humanity or Earth.]]
* DeadlyDustStorm: The first obstacle the party runs into when they arrive in Camelot. It cuts off contact with Dr. Roman and impedes their progress. It's deadly even on a meta level, as the sandstorm animation on the battlefield causes a framedrop which lags the game so much, it sometimes might crash.
* DeathFromAbove:
** The Lion King uses Rhongomyniad to shoot beams in the sky as an aerial strike towards her target in chapter 6. All those craters on the Camelot map? Those are all the villages she destroyed. [[spoiler: Arash sacrifices himself to neutralize one of her blasts with his Noble Phantasm.]]
** Servants like Suzuka Gozen use their [=NPs=] to attack the enemy from above.
* DeliberateValuesDissonance:
** It's pointed out in Salem that Puritans and indigenous people were not on the best of terms at the time and that it would be a terrible idea to send Geronimo there because he would instantly be suspected to be the cause of Salem's troubles. When Nezha is enlisted to join the investigation, da Vinci notes that she'll be presented as a curiosity for the townspeople to gawk at and have to put up with that.
** Abigail Williams carries some prejudice towards Native Americans both because of the aforementioned conflict and also because her parents were killed in a raid. Though event and My Room dialogue indicate that she's slowly getting over it by interacting with Geronimo.
** [[spoiler:Columbus still firmly believes in slavery as a system to be upheld and makes an attempt during Agartha to enslave its peoples.]]
** Hokusai doesn't think too highly of most non-Japanese people and refers to them with an old-fashioned politically incorrect term.
* DenserAndWackier: The events usually involve significantly more hijinks and comedy than the main story (beating up other servants to get back stolen dango, Elisabeth Bathory hosting a Halloween party, Nobunaga and Okita showing up alongside chibi-Nobu clones, Saber Alter wanting to become Santa and kidnapping you to be her reindeer, etc).
* DetectiveDrama:
** The London chapter begins with investigating one thing: who killed Dr. Victor Frankenstein?
** Shinjuku's major conflict revolves around finding out who is responsible for running the criminal scene in the sub-singularity.
* DevelopersForesight:
** There's a hidden attribute called "Saber-face", given to Altria and her many lookalikes. Certain AI-controlled servants will go out of their way to attack anyone with this attribute. These include [[LightNovel/FateZero Lancelot, who's obsessed with Altria, Gilles de Rais, who's obsessed with Jeanne]], and Caligula, who's obsessed with Nero, who herself is a Saber-face.
** When a Noble Phantasm needs the lack of something (i.e. Mordred removing her helmet to invoke Clarent Blood Arthur or Altria dispelling Invisible Air to use Excalibur), the game will change the NP animation slightly to acknowledge this.
** Gawain's Numeral of the Saint skill can only unleash its full power in maps with sunlight, as in lore it can only be activated in-between 9 AM to 3 PM. In any battle without sunlight, it only gives a relatively minor attack buff.
** Ruler Martha's Waterfront Saint skill gives her more buffs when she's on maps with water in it.
** Jaguarman's Law of the Jungle skill gives her more buffs if she's in a jungle.
** Swimsuit Nobunaga's third skill boosts her attack even more in fiery maps.
** When casting it against humanoid enemies, Hassan of Serenity's [[KissOfDeath Noble Phantasm]] will adjust her position to match that of the target's face (i.e. tall Servants like Heracles and mounted Servants like Altria Pendragon's Lancer Alter version). However, this gets Subverted for Edmond Dantes who [[BadassBack turns away from his opponents]].
** Certain Servants introduced in ''Epic of Remnant'' have their True Name hidden until you learn them during the story. If you summon them, it'll just display their class name, and they have completely different lines depending on whether you've learned their True Name yet.
** There are several Servants the player can acquire before their appearance in the main story. Doing so will usually result in different dialogue where they either recognize the player, or don't depending on when they were summoned. For example; getting Ishtar from the Christmas 2017 event will have her recognize the player, but the player character won't recognize her, whereas if you summon her after completing Babylonia, the player character recognizes her, but Ishtar doesn't. The same occurs if you summon Qin Shi Huang Di, where he has new dialogue congratulating the player for summoning him if they have not met him in said story yet.
* DifficultySpike:
** Orleans pre-patch was dramatically more difficult than Fuyuki with [[DemonicSpiders wyverns]] with very high attack and crit rate. And it being only the second chapter was what led the enemies to being significantly nerfed.
** Okeanos is much more difficult then either post-patch Orleans or Rome, and unlike Orleans, keeps its difficulty with enemy levels being significantly higher then in either of the first two chapters and introducing several new tough enemies. Presumably this was to compensate for the long gap between Rome and Okeanos, since many players had been able to finish leveling most of their Servants. Still, it's a fairly minor step up compared to what came a few chapters later.
** Camelot is much more difficult than any other story chapter up to it. Enemies that showed up in the previous chapter as a BossInMooksClothing now show up in more plentiful amounts, the Servants themselves are as tough as ever, and the Knights of the Round Table in particular come with "gifts" that make them much tougher (ex. Gawain taking reduced damage and charging his NP faster, Mordred always having a fully charged NP at the start of each turn). Camelot is considered to be arguably the most difficult chapter in the game with the next chapter allowing you to opt out of the more difficult boss challenges.
** ''Epic of Remnant'' begins playing around with new mechanics such as multiple health bars, enemy taunt abilities and more hazard effects. It's perhaps not quite as difficult as Camelot or Babylonia once you're used to it, but the new mechanics can throw people for a loop, especially as gauge breaks often clear enemy debuffs or cause them to instantly use a powerful skill without using their turn.
** The Shimosa chapter of ''Epic of Remnant'' is currently the holder of hardest chapter which is even harder than Camelot not only because of powerful bosses, but the most difficult battles in the chapter prevents players from using Friend Supports.
** This was the purpose of the "Prison Tower" questline with several tough enemies and bosses and to make it more difficult for players, Edmond Dantes was your only support for six of the battles. To drive it home, to even participate you had to have already cleared the most recent Singularity in London.
** Rashoumon has Saber Wars' Craft Essence attack boosting system UpToEleven. It's a raid quest with only Ibaraki-douji as the only raid boss which all players attack to whittle down her massive HP bar in the ''trillions'' (at minimum two trillion) and you can do any of the three quests to fight her. The lowest one gives you 300,000 HP to shave off that trillions health bar, while the highest gives you 6 million. Up until the point it was rerun, it was considered probably the hardest event to date, to the point that players were required to have completed America (the 5th and most recent Singularity at the time) in order to participate in it. However, an evolving metagame made the event much more accessible to casual players.
** Starting with Nero Fest 2016, new events began adding in challenge quests that were completely optional but much more difficult than the free or main quests. Nero Fest in particular was considered particularly brutal with some fights like Gilgamesh or the final boss rush, which was quickly nerfed when it turned out even more difficult than expected, partially due to a few bugs like Nero granting infinite Guts to her teammates.
** The ''CCC'' crossover is by far the hardest crossover event, because it expects players to reach and defeat the FinalBoss of Part One.
** The Setsubun event is currently the most difficult "Challenge event" since it requires beating the FinalBoss of Part One as well and the event itself not only bans Friend Supports, but also demands players to have a lot of efficiently raised Servants as possible and carefully manage them.
* DisappearsIntoLight: This is what serves as the dying animation in gameplay.
** Servants still dissipate into a cloud of light when defeated.
** Shadow Servants and most enemies disappear in a foggy purple cloud when killed.
** Any enemy killed by King Hassan's NP doesn't have a dying animation; they only drop loot and disappear after the NP animation finishes.
* DistressCall: One from the Seraphix oil rig kicks off the ''CCC'' crossover as the protagonist goes to find out what happened.
* {{Doorstopper}}:
** The PDF file for Babylonia's story clocks in at one thousand pages of text.
** The Salem chapter of ''Epic of Remnant'' has been stated to have the highest word count in the game.
* {{Doujinshi}}: The 2018 summer event centers around several Servants creating their own fan comics to sell. The game also include Craft Essences that are based on said comics.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:E]]
* EasterEgg: Swimsuit Nitocris in her Medjed garb and King Hassan have a chance of popping up in the background of Ereshkigal's NP animation.
* EldritchAbomination:
** The game is full of these. Besides the Demon Pillars and [[spoiler:the Beasts]], in Salem, we have the trope namers themselves, [[spoiler:the Outer Gods as it is a Lovecraftian horror story, with one possessing Abigail Williams after Räum summons it. An Eldritch Abomination summoning a bigger Eldritch Abomination. Yikes!]]
** [[spoiler:Then there's the Alien God who served as the GreaterScopeVillain that Goetia and the Demon Pillars originally acted against before Chaldea's intervention, with Räum even attempted to summon an Outer God as desperate action to oppose the Alien God. Although how different the Alien God from the Outer Gods isn't clear yet.]]
* EldritchLocation:
** The titular Lost Room of the second OVA as it shows possibilities of alternate timelines after midnight if one falls asleep in there. The DVD booklet reveals that there were one too many incidents happening in there and Chaldea called for it to be sealed off.
** Singularity F was transformed into one after being ravaged by its Holy Grail for so long. Even after removing the root cause, the inferno still rages on and it's still a Singularity on later returns with monsters roaming about. Altria comments in her interlude that the Fuyuki Grail's curse has tainted the entire land and Lancer Vlad believes there to be something sustaining the fires that needs to be destroyed.
* EleventhHourSuperpower: [[spoiler: In the final chapter of Babylonia, Ereshkigal provides a massive buff to the party, and Merlin uses his FertileFeet to help keep the heroes above Tiamat's Chaos Tide, which is represented as being healed as much as the Chaos Tide can do damage.]]
* EliteMooks: [[MechaMooks Mechanical versions of the Camelot knights]] are introduced in "Great Battle at Himeji Castle", each variation having an additional buff that the originals lack.
* EnergyEconomy: There are two different primary kinds of currencies comprised of magic energy utilized by Chaldea in the game.
** Quantum Particles/QP for short, which are spiritrons mainly used to power up your Servants.
** Prisms, which have two different kinds: Mana and Rare. These are crystallized mana cubes which can be traded in da Vinci's workshop for Craft Essences, Embers, and Fou cards.
* EpisodeZeroTheBeginning: The Zeroth Grail: AD 2004 - Tainted City in Flames — Fuyuki. The last threshold before humanity's destruction in 2016, an alternate [[VisualNovel/FateStayNight Fifth Heaven's Feel]] where the Black Grail triumphs and corrupts six of the participating Servants.
* EvilTwin: "Alter" Servants, who usually have PaintItBlack and UndeathlyPallor features and reject the philosophies of their counterparts. This installment of the franchise actually lets them be summoned and recruited by Chaldea.
* EvilVersusOblivion: Chaldea can summon even the most villainous Heroic Spirits and get their help because the main villain of the game is basically threatening mankind's place in the space-time continuum, and Chaldea represents the last bastion of humanity against this villain. Even those who want to subjugate the world don't want to see someone else do something even worse to it, which is why they help the player.
* ExposedToTheElements:
** Servants in general are resistant to any extreme natural weather regardless of how clothed he or she is due to their nature as familiars. Subverted by Summer Servants who changed to swimsuits to adapt to the summer heat and Altera the Sun(ta) losing her Saber self's Natural Body skill, making her less tolerant to cold and caught a fever, which makes her somewhat loopy as she tries to adjust to it.
** Mash due to being a Demi-Servant is also unaffected by external temperature. [[spoiler:However, as of events in ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'', her tolerance to cold has weakened due to Galahad's refusal to cooperate in the Lostbelts.]]
** The protagonist receives a new Mystic Code for extremely cold environments upon arrival to the Ice Age-like Lostbelt of Kadoc Zemlupus. However these clothing are way too light for -''100°C'' environment, especially with the female protagonist wearing a DangerouslyShortSkirt in such weather.
* {{Expy}}:
** As usual, [[AscendedMeme Saber-faces]]. As of now, there is Altria herself, her Archer swimsuit version, Saber Alter, Saber Lily, Nero (and Nero Bride), Okita, Altria Lancer [Alter] (and vanilla Lancer), and Mordred (and her Rider swimsuit version). Also Mysterious Heroine X but she is not Altria, really. [[spoiler: Heroine X confesses that she really is Altria in her final profile portion.]] X [Alter] is another one, and Mysterious Heroine ''XX'' is a future and more mature version of Heroine X with a mecha suit. And then there's the [[NinjaPirateZombieRobot gunslinger biker maid swimsuit Alter]]. Altria's VA herself said in a livestream there would be more to come, stating that they'll never be able to stop the Saber-faces. An enemy Lancelot is even programmed to fixate on and relentlessly attack Saber-faces.
** Jeanne and her alternate selves are also considered Saber-faces in-universe (since Gilles mistakes Altria for her and Mysterious Heroine X mentions she has a slight similarity to a Saber-face).
[[/folder]]

[[folder:F]]
* {{Fanservice}}: Almost all the [[MsFanservice female Servants]] are either half-naked or end up that way. Some guys do this too, with several of them becoming shirtless or wearing tight bodysuits. This is why none of the male Servants currently don't have a swimsuit version.
** ''Fate/Grand Order VR'' gets a special mention for the segment with Mash in the minimalist version of her armor from the [[https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/fategrandorder/images/2/21/Personaltraining.png/revision/latest?cb=20160401062155 Personal Training Craft Essence]]. The segment involves three different forms of "training" including balancing and bouncing on a medicine ball with [[JigglePhysics everything you may expect]] from someone as stacked as Mash doing so, balancing on a rotating jungle gym of sorts that gives fairly generous shots of her backside, and a basic dance number broken up by her striking three sexy, if not generic, poses. She also tends to lean down during a lot of this, often right next to the viewer as if she's actively trying to invoke a {{male gaze}}.
** The male Ritsuka gets some in the shounen manga adaptation. While he prepares to cook, [[FemaleGaze specific attention]] is given to him stretching in an apron and his butt as he looks for ingredients. [[EatingTheEyeCandy All from Mash's perspective]].
* FantasyKitchenSink: The [[BeneathTheEarth underground country]] of Agartha turns out to be a hodgepodge of legendary locations from just various folklores, where Shangri-La, the Nightless City of the Han Dynasty, El Dorado, the City of Ys, and even the Undersea Dragon Palace are all miles away from each other. [[spoiler: That's because the entire thing is not real, but a construct born of Scheherazade's Noble Phantasm that brings stories to life. As she reveals this, she also weaves in one last fantasy land, and the entire country [[FloatingContinent takes off into the sky]] as the Flying Island of Laputa.]]
* FighterMageThief: One of the many, many JRPG references made in the Halloween 2016 event with Robin Hood as the thief, Ibaraki and Brave Liz as the fighters, and Nitocris pulling double duty as both their mage and medic.
* FightingAShadow: [[spoiler: It's mentioned through the story that killing the ''Literature/ArsGoetia'' demons doesn't diminish their numbers in the long run, as they'll simply be summoned back to life by the King of Magic.]]
* FirstEpisodeSpoiler: There are several things the game drops on the player which aren't mentioned in promotional material but are incredibly vital to the narrative by playing through Fuyuki like the world meeting its end before you even finish the prologue, Mash being a Demi-Servant, [[spoiler:Olga dying and Dr. Roman having to take charge of Chaldea]], and Chaldea being bombed at the very beginning resulting in a critical emergency and almost all the Masters having to put in cryogenics.
* FishOutOfTemporalWater: Like in ''Fate/stay night'', the summoning system Chaldea uses automatically fills them with general knowledge of the modern world and subverts this. They've generally adjusted on the whole though certain concepts like idol concerts and specific fields of knowledge like astrophysics which aren't covered have to be explained to them.
** Played straight with Mash as she never travelled outside of Chaldea before the game's start, resulting in her having a heck of a time trying to adjust to the multiple places they rayshift to.
** The protagonist generally seems to just go along with whatever's thrown at them and doesn't really bat an eye at all the exotic locales and people they meet.
** The game in general involves ArmyOfTheAges and TimeTravel so there will be at least one Servant involved in a chapter who is completely foreign in both time and place with no connection with another Servant involved like Tamamo no Mae showing up in Victorian London, Li Shuwen in America, and Tawara Touta in Middle East.
* FisherKingdom: [[spoiler:The Salem sub-singularity physically incarnates Sanson, Nezha, Robin Hood, and Mata Hari, and also mentally affects them, Mash, and the protagonist to force them to fit the roles given to the party in the Witch Trials and stop them from looking too closely at certain things. In addition, it also weakens the Servants in gameplay by halving their levels.]]
* {{Flashback}}: Several interludes added after part one briefly establish that they occurred before the Salomon chapter [[spoiler:due to Roman's presence in them]]. They may have been written before the final chapter but couldn't be added in until later.
* FloatingContinent: [[spoiler:Scheherazade's endgame in Agartha is to use [[Literature/GulliversTravels Laputa]] by flying it at a high enough height for people to notice and crash it into the ground, effectively breaking the masquerade by being such a large scale incident, nobody could cover it up.]]
* FogOfDoom:
** The main threat that the Londinium chapter revolves around. It's poisonous, can spawn Servants and [[spoiler: if charged by Tesla's lightning, would consume the entire earth.]]
** The fog from the Rashoumon event is intoxicating and poisonous, even for Servants.
* ForWantOfANail:
** "Fate/Accel Zero Order" diverges from ''LightNovel/FateZero'' because of Irisviel being Saber's Master instead of Kiritsugu, causing it to become a singularity detected by Chaldea and [[spoiler: the Counter Force being sent in to prevent the Einzberns from obtaining the Grail and releasing Aŋra Mainiiu]]. Chaldea's interference, using the knowledge from El-Melloi II, creates further divergences, including:
*** Altria and Diarmuid never fight each other since your party fights Altria first, forcing Irisviel to retreat from the area.
*** Kayneth helps the party after some persuasion from adult Waver and with further persuasion, eventually leave Fuyuki with Sola-Ui to go back to the Clock Tower. He forces Diarmuid to stay behind so Sola-Ui doesn't try to do anything about her attraction with him.
*** Ryuunosuke and Gilles being the first ones to die after being taken out by [[spoiler: EMIYA (Assassin)]] and your party. Gilles doesn't get a chance to summon the giant monster and so most of the fights caused by that don't happen.
*** The protagonists persuade Kariya to help defeat Gilgamesh during the King's Banquet and he subsequently loses to Lancelot, Diarmuid, and the protagonist's team.
*** Since Gilgamesh is dead, he doesn't get to corrupt Kirei. Tokiomi forces Kirei to give control over Assassin to him, removing Kirei from the conflict. Assassin dies soon after, forcing Tokiomi into defeat.
*** After Iskandar hears Kariya's story and motivations, he decides that Kariya's desire to kill Tokiomi is pointless since Sakura will still be part of the Matous and storms the mansion. He frees her in exchange for Kariya giving up his right arm and kills most of the worms. After that, he sends the two to a hospital to recover.
*** [[spoiler: Because Irisviel had the same modifications as Illya and thus became Saber's master, the Einzberns would have won. Kiritsugu, who never found companionship in any form, was then picked by the Counter Force to eliminate her to stop this. This is the one factor that surprises El-Melloi II since everything else had been going the same before Chaldea came.]]
*** [[spoiler: Irisviel, being the source of the singularity, comes with Chaldea since she's got nowhere to go now that she knows the Einzbern ritual is busted and recovering Grails is what they do.]]
** The majority of the sixth singularity happened because [[spoiler: Bedivere ''did not'' throw Excalibur back into the lake.]]
** Each Lostbelt is a major divergence from the main timeline, with some catastrophic event occurring at the date given and [[spoiler:showing the possibility of what the world would be like at 2018.]]
*** Anastasia takes place in [[spoiler:a Russia where a meteor crashed in 1570, causing a permanent Ice Age. The only reason there are still people left is because Ivan the Terrible and his magi used their last resort, fusing everyone with magical beasts to survive.]]
*** Gotterdammerung's Lostbelt diverged from around 1000 BC [[spoiler: during the Ragnarok when the Jotunn Surtr decided to devour Fenrir and became powerful enough to kill most of Norse Gods and possibly burn down the entire world instead of just Scandinavia, but the absence of Fenrir left Odin surviving who then sacrificed his life to seal Surtr into the sun, which caused the Ragnarok to be incomplete and left the giants still roaming the planet and consume humans to live, preventing the advancement of mankind in this timeline.]]
*** SIN diverges from 210 BC when [[spoiler:the First Emperor of China, Qin Shi Huangdi, succeeds in his quest for immortality after finding ancient Chinese super technology to enhance himself. He subsequently establishes an iron grip on China and conquers the entire world, creating a peaceful empire under his reign. The people are contented as they have self-growing crops and medicine that cures all ailments. However, the empire is stuck in MedievalStasis with technology limited to the capital for the emperor's use, illiteracy as the status quo, and people living very brief lives. It's also noted the ''Counter Force doesn't exist'' in this timeline because there is no danger that humanity needs to protect themselves from.]]
* {{Foreshadowing}}:
** [[https://i.imgur.com/4VCq8MR.jpg One image from the opening of the game]], showing a decrepit ruin, seems to be based off of a painting called [[https://i.imgur.com/g1bcIq2.jpg ''The Visit of the Queen of Sheba to King Solomon'']]. [[spoiler:This not only foreshadows King Solomon will have a role in the story, but the Queen of Sheba herself also appears in the game during Epic of Remnant.]]
** Mash's level cap increase foreshadows her eventual rarity upgrade in Camelot.
** In an usual Nasuverse fashion, several events, Servant profiles or My Room lines and throwaway dialogue in the main story heavily foreshadow crucial details like [[spoiler:Ereshkigal being afraid of Fou and baffled by how the protagonist is so casual around it, which could be taken as just another moment of her being silly but it's actually hinting how Fou is Primate Murder/Beast IV.]]
** Altera's appearance in this game foreshadows her true identity, a major plot point of ''Fate/Extella''.
** Babylonia lacking free quests at first foreshadows [[spoiler:that most of the areas will become unavailable when Tiamat awakens and starts destroying Mesopotamia.]]
** Solomon's Temple is ''filled'' with commentary that points towards future events. At the very beginning, four of the Demon Pillars start panicking and talk about running away. They are the same four that make up the Epic of Remnant. [[Characters/FateGrandOrderLancers Ereshkigal]] is from the future and makes references to things you haven't done yet. [[Characters/FateGrandOrderBerserkers Ibaraki]] and [[Characters/FateGrandOrderAssassins Shuten-Doji]] discuss Magical Girls as Oni, heralding the far off Oniland. [[Characters/FateGrandOrderAssassins Mysterious Heroine X]] comments on how she hasn't gotten her [[[[Characters/FateGrandOrderExtra Season 2 form]] yet, and alludes to there being [[Characters/FateGrandOrderBerserkers Mysterious Heroine Berserkers]].
* FunnyBackgroundEvent: Some Craft Essences have little background events in their artwork.
** The Cheers to 2017 CE has Kintoki and Shuten relaxing on a roof with Ibaraki behind them, spying on the couple. Meanwhile, Bathory's stuck flying on a kite.
** Altria and Shirou are on a date in the same restaurant as Taiga in the Blissful Time CE; Altria has eaten enough to stack the plates high on the table.
** The BB Shot! CE has female Hakuno chained to a bed with clear distress at her situation.
** Fran is burying Babbage in the sand in the King, Joker, Jack CE.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:G]]
* GameplayAndStoryIntegration:
** It works backward from the normal interpretation such that the gameplay limitations affect the story. The FGO Material books note in passing that your Servants like Karna and Heracles[[note]]Though not enemy versions[[/note]] do not have access to their other Noble Phantasms, mostly because it'd be hard to program and would be overpowered. However, in Heracles' Interlude, it's shown that the protagonist can't even power his Mad Enhancement properly, let alone God Hand. Then in Agartha, Astolfo can't use his other Noble Phantasms and d'Eon's isn't as strong as it should be. [[spoiler:When the latter two get outside sources of energy, they're able to fight significantly more effectively against Penthesilea's amazon warriors.]]
** Storywise, it will often acknowledge if you have summoned a Servant or not when you encounter them as {{NPC}}s or enemies; with slightly different dialogue.
** The ending of the Camelot Singularity very pointedly suggests that the protagonist should gather together Heroic Spirits "with whom you have fully bonded". This is not only a rare acknowledgement of players owning Servants other than just Mash in Chaldea, but is also a gameplay mechanic for the final Singularity -- higher bond level acts as an increasingly powerful passive power-up.
** In Section 6 Part 1 of the Babylonia Singularity, (Caster) Gilgamesh tags along with the party to get some water and not-coincidentally run into some stone colossi to fight. He very pointedly suggests that [[TacticalRockPaperScissors they're Assassin-class and that he'd have an advantage over them]], a rare acknowledgement of that gameplay mechanic existing at all in the story. And after the fight, [[spoiler:he bemoans the power of the final Spriggan-style colossi, which is suddenly a Rider-class enemy that has advantage over ''him''.]]
** The Nero Festival Exhibition Battles has Servants use ''all'' of their Noble Phantasms, no longer limited by the three skill slots and one NP slot that playable versions have:
*** Heracles has his signature God Hand which revives him twelve times.
*** Siegfried has Das Rheingold to supply him mana, which translates into giving him a full NP gauge at the start of the battle and the Armor of Fafnir, which gives hims 200% defense.
*** As Mother of Warriors, Medb engages in a ZergRush, constantly bringing out more soldiers to defend her and wear down the party.
*** Gilgamesh decides to use more than just throwing out weapons from the Gate of Babylon, using his treasures to grant himself special buffs.
*** Spartacus has Crying Warmonger active, which heals him to an absurd level each turn.
** Though it was mentioned in her Rider self, Medb is able to charm both sexes. While she can only charm stun males as a Rider, her Saber form can stun both males and females.
** Hassan of many faces will unleash all their collective personalities and try to ZergRush the player with over one-hundred assassin enemies, with Serenity and Cursed Arm joining in to fight as well.
** In lore, Mordred cannot use Clarent Blood Arthur with her helmet on because her helmet's Noble Phantasm conceals her identity, thus she needs to remove it to use its power. In the Camelot singularity, the first fight with Mordred has her unable to use Clarent because she has her helmet on, and its only after when she removes it that she will start spamming it.
* GameplayAndStorySegregation:
** As far as the story is concerned, your only Servant in each Singularity is Mash and your support is whoever guest-stars in the current chapter; servants that are brought by the player are completely ignored. In gameplay, it's very probably the exact opposite: you can control a team of five non-support Servants, and it's very likely that Mash won't be among them at least until the last story chapters due to her growth being locked behind the story. You also aren't likely to use the story support because they're typically lower level and do not have a Craft Essence equipped.[[note]]In subsequent patches, players are given an incentive by giving a higher Friend Point reward for using them (+200), instead of the usual +25 from a friend Support.[[/note]]. Camelot, the Part One ending, as well as most of ''Epic of Remnant'' do acknowledge the protagonist has Servants other than Mash in Chaldea, regardless whether the player currently has the Servant or not -- they simply don't participate in Singularities for whatever reason.
*** Played with in ''Epic of Remnant'' part three as the story support version of Musashi ''must'' be brought to every duel as she supposedly goes one-on-one with her opponent, the camera transition even showing only her on the battlefield, but you can still bring in your own Servants to fight and can even swap her out of the frontline with the Plugsuit Mystic Code.
** Some Servants have amazing in-lore parameters, but lower rarity, and because of that, very weak in-game. Asterios, for example, has A++ Strength and Endurance, and in the story can go toe to toe with Heracles for a time, but he's only a 1*, the lowest rarity available. It also works in reverse, however, such as with characters like Okita Souji, who is one of the best Sabers in the game, but outside of it is laughably weak thanks to being a relatively modern Servant and having magic tuberculosis.
** Some Servants who ''are'' at the rarity you'd expect for their power level are actually considered bottom tier, such as Altria being the worst SSR Saber, even though she's a strong contender for the strongest member of the class.
** The relationship between how skills and Noble Phantasms work in gameplay as opposed to the story varies. Mash's Noble Phantasm, for example, offers two forms of damage reduction rather than the invincibility that it should, while Okita's tuberculosis actually makes her more likely to land critical hits!
** Some Interludes claim that the Servant's NP has gained more power, but they don't actually have it upgraded in-game.
** Not all skills and Noble Phantasms available in the story can be used by the Servants, often because there's only one slot for Noble Phantasms but some Servants have more than one. Some like Mordred and Medusa get around this by having the Noble Phantasm work as a skill instead.
** Some Noble Phantasms also work differently compared to how they worked in the original material, this is apparent in Reality Marble [=NPs=] such as Unlimited Blade Works, Ionioi Hetairoi, Aestus Domus Aurea, and Ramesseum Tentyris.
** Several event storylines have the protagonist interact with several NPC Servants under the pretense that they are those Servants' Master, whether or not the player actually has them. While you might have bronze or silver Servants who are part of the storyline, most players are unlikely to have all the corresponding gold Servants that appear in the event at hand.
** After Salomon, [[spoiler:Mash supposedly lost her Heroic Spirit abilities and can't fight anymore. But you can still use her in battles just fine.]]
** Saber Gilles de Rais's profile states that he's more famous and thus more often summoned as his evil Caster version. Caster Gilles is locked to the Story Summons gacha after completing the Orleans storyline, and rare even then because there are so many other 3-star Casters; Saber Gilles can be summoned on any gacha at any time, is one of the very few 3-star Sabers, and is a meme for being such a common Servant.
** In the prologue to the game's second storyline [[spoiler: the Mage's Association has forcibly shut down the Chaldea summoning system and in doing so forcibly dispelled ''all'' of the protagonists servants]]. Obviously, [=DW=] would be ''completely suicidal'' to make this actually happen in the actual game.
** The skills listed in the Materials books sometimes don't match the ingame skills. For example, Merlin's first skill is a unique Charisma variant that also adds 20% NP gauge to the party. Officially, however, he just has a normal Charisma skill. It seems the unique effects are just for the sake of gameplay. Charisma had long been powercrept by that point.
** In the third Lostbelt, [[spoiler: Spartacus pulls a HeroicSacrifice that damages his Saint Graph so badly that he can never be summoned again by the protagonist.]] Unsurprisingly, this is not the case for the player.
* GenderFlip: A staple of the ''Fate'' franchise, taken up a notch with the game's LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters. Currently, the list includes King Arthur, Emperor Nero, Ushiwakamaru, Jing Ke, Okita Souji, Oda Nobunaga, Mordred, Gareth, Raikou (Minamoto no Yorimitsu), Merlin from the ''Prototype'' universe, Frankenstein's Monster, Paul Bunyan, and Kato Danzo. A few subversions include:
** "Orion," who claims to be this but is really the goddess Artemis parading around as him.
** Francis Drake, who is implied to be Queen Elizabeth in disguise.
** Leonardo da Vinci is a man in history and mind, he just chose to manifest with the appearance of the Mona Lisa because it's his ideal form of beauty.
** Quetzalcoatl, who is either using the appearance of one of the god's human hosts from history or transformed into a female as a result of her association with the planet Venus.
** Miyamoto Musashi, who's from an AlternateUniverse.
** Paul Bunyan, who is implied to have been male, but just summoned as female for some reason. [[LampshadeHanging Her profile and summoning dialogue are confused as to why she's a girl.]]
** Katsushika Hokusai seems genderbent at first glance, although she is actually Hokusai's daughter Oui and the octopus thing with her is the real Hokusai. Oui is summoned with her father as some of his works are actually made by her under her father's name.
* GenreShift:
** The summer 2017 event goes from a WackyRacing tournament in part 1 to [[spoiler:a jailbreak story in part 2]].
** "Murder at the Kogetsukan" is a [[MysteryFiction Mystery Novel]] with technically no Heroic Spirits (Servants are "playing" certain roles which is just the main character's mind trying to make sense of everything).
* GhostShip: A ship possessed by vengeful ghosts appears in Ushiwakamaru's interlude, preventing her and the protagonists from rayshifting out of the area.
* GlassCannon:
** The Berserker class does bonus damage to everyone else (except Shielder) and takes bonus damage from everyone else (again, except Shielder). This doesn't stop you from trashing enemies before they can attack you, though.
** The Avenger class. They have high attack and low HP, skills that emphasize attack and they have no class advantages to utilize, barring Rulers.
* TheGloriousWarOfSisterlyRivalry: Ishtar and Ereshkigal seemingly already bickered a lot, but if you have both of them the issue is exacerbated by the fact that thanks to the way they were summoned, they're in a sense the ''same person'' now.
* GodInHumanForm: Divine spirits can't normally be summoned or manifest anymore because of not fully explained reasons regarding the nature of reality changing, but there are a couple workarounds. None of them let them use their full power.
** One, they can manifest by using an inferior vessel that bars them from using their full strength or even several of their more powerful abilities. The playable Quetzalcoatl works like this and while it should be the same for Stheno and Euryale, they were actually so weak in life that they're ''stronger'' as Servants and given abilities they didn't even have, such as Euryale's bow. She has no idea where it came from and notes that it should belong to Cupid.
** Two, they can share a body with a compatible human, which merges their personality. Ereshkigal and Ishtar both make use of this with Ishtar explaining that in her current form, she's about 70% Ishtar and 30% Tohsaka Rin, who is her host. This has a stabilizing effect on her personality. Ereshkigal got the other portions of Tohsaka's personality, leading Ishtar and Ereshkigal to consider themselves to be partially the same person.
** Third, they can hijack another Servant's Saint Graph, which is like the core of a Servant. This is how Artemis manifests as an Archer with Orion's abilities. Much to her surprise in Okeanos, this bars her from using any of her true abilities or bypassing divine protections. She isn't even as strong as the real Orion because she doesn't really possess any of his skills.
* GodzillaThreshold:
** The Earth has been incinerated, forcing dozens of Servants who normally wouldn't be cooperative like Caligula and Gorgon to work together for the sake of preserving the Earth and Chaldea accepts literally any Servant into their ranks for the sake of bolstering their numbers and gaining another ally to help them fight the BigBad.
** [[spoiler:The same goes for the Beasts as they represent such a danger to humanity to the point where ''anything'' seems like a good option after enough time spent fighting them.]]
** [[spoiler:In Salem, it's crossed once Räum drives Abigail into madness, forcing the Servants there to pull out everything they've got for the sake of stopping her with it barely being enough to calm her down.]]
* GoldColoredSuperiority: All SR and SSR Servants have a gold-colored card background shown when summoned from the gacha.
* GoodMorningCrono: After the initial tutorial battle, the protagonist is woken up by Mash in a hallway. After the protagonist comes back from Fuyuki, they pass out again, and Da Vinci wakes them up and [[LampshadeHanging lampshades]] that it's [[GenreSavvy very protagonist-like of them]] to be waking up right now.
* GrandfatherParadox: [[PlayingWithATrope Played with]]. Roman says that any deaths and/or damage that happens in a paradox is undone upon fixing the anomaly. [[spoiler:Caster Gilgamesh in Babylonia reveals this is a lie. Anyone who dies in the paradox stays dead, though history "corrects" the method of how they died. Such as a human killed by a dragon in France might instead be killed by disease or an animal. At the same time, this means any person who is saved is safe.]]
* GratuitousEnglish:
** The ''Heaven's Feel'', ''Last Encore'', ''Fate/Apocrypha'', and ''First Order'' Craft Essences have their title written in English in the Japanese version.
** Several parts of the Japanese UI also have a little English subtitle which goes a long way for helping non-Japanese players play the game.
** World Faith Domination is said by Edison in English and its initials are also written in English. Other Servants also do this, whether in written text (Shakespeare) or speaking it out loud (Emiya's UBW chant).
** Kintoki (either version) is ripe with this, saying things like "bare knuckle" or "Golden Spark" because he thinks it's cool.
* GratuitousForeignLanguage: Because of various nationalities between Servants, they sometimes speak in their native language like Blavatsky laughing in Russian and Xuanzang chanting the Heart Sutra in Chinese.
* GuestStarPartyMember:
** Certain quests (particularly story quests) allow you to bring along a Servant who isn't from your friend list as your support Servant. While some times they may [[MyRulesAreNotYourRules not adhere to the game mechanics (for example, have a higher level than their cap or have more skills than they should at their level)]] They won't be as good as a friend who maxed the level of the same Servant.
** For "Da Vinci and the 7 Counterfeit Heroic Spirits", Da Vinci is playable as your support but is not available in the gacha. The same happens again when she decides to assist the protagonist and Mash for Camelot. She was finally made playable with her release in the F/GO 1st Anniversary Campaign gacha.
** Likewise in Babylonia, Merlin and [[spoiler: King Hassan]] are playable as guest Servants but weren't rollable at the time of the chapter's release. Both were later made limited-time only Servants.
* GuideDangIt
** There are a few basic mechanics that shouldn't be difficult but take most players a bit of time to notice. For instance, you can roll the Friend Points Gacha for free every day. And you can change the position of your support slot. And you need to go into the "Formation" menu to set up your friend supports, or your only available support will be Mash and everyone will think that you are a {{noob}}. And so on.
** Certain [=NPs=] depend on servant attributes that aren't visible in-game: Brynhildr's NP does extra damage to Servants she likes, which is a long and idiosyncratic list. Gilgamesh's NP does extra damage to most Servants, except a short and fairly random list of ones which it doesn't.
** [=DelightWorks=] have been devoted to keeping Aŋra Mainiiu's existence as secret as possible, with his addition to the FP gacha for the ''Fate/Zero'' crossover event only discovered by players after maintenance. When his Bond CE was added, he wasn't listed with other Servants who had their Bond CE patched in at that time. His Interlude also was not officially announced with its upgrade simply listed as a ''bugfix'' for his skill on the website and secretly added along with Enkidu's Interlude.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:H]]
* {{Hammerspace}}: Most Servants go into battle armed with their weapons normally, but sometimes you'll see them just whip something out of nowhere. For instance, [[IconicItem Zhuge Liang's crane-feather fan]] just appears out of nowhere when he does a certain attack animation. But it makes a kind of sense, since he's a Caster. Likewise, Emiya usually carries [[DualWielding twin swords]], but whips out a bow when necessary, and Sanzang Xuanzang pulls her companions' weapons out to attack.
* HandWave: Defensive Noble Phantasms like God Hand, Armor of Fafnir, or Kavacha and Kundala would be overpowered or difficult to implement, so the playable Servants just don't have them. The reasons given are pretty shoddy, such as not being able to power Heracles properly or Karna somehow lacking pieces of his armor when summoned, so it's clearly just to balance gameplay. However, enemy Heracles in Okeanos does have God Hand, but it's not entirely clear if Karna has Kavacha and Kundala in America. If he did, [[spoiler:it wasn't enough against Gae Bolg.]]
* HappilyEverAfter: Agartha ends with this text befitting its storybook theme.
* HappyEndingOverride: Part II begins with [[spoiler: Chaldea overrun by the new villains, Da Vinci killed by Kotomine (though she has a backup), the timeline once again in danger, and the heroes forced to evacuate the observatory. The only saving grace is that they're in a position to set things right once again.]]
* HeKnowsAboutTimedHits: Characters comment about the TacticalRockPaperScissors between classes despite it not being relevant in-story (or at least not reflecting during in-cutscene fights).
* HeadbuttingHeroes: Two of your three main allies in Shinjuku are Altria and Jeanne Alter, who flat out hate each other. At multiple points, they nearly try to kill each other.
* HeadlessHorseman: ''The'' Headless Horseman arrives as [[spoiler: one half of Hessian Lobo, Avenger of Shinjuku. Because the Horseman is more akin to an UrbanLegend than an actual Heroic Spirit, he has to team up with Lobo for the two of them to count as an actual Servant. In the game, he rides Lobo as his mount instead of his classic horse.]]
* HeadsIWinTailsYouLose: The first fight against [[spoiler:Solomon]] is this. Even though you defeated [[spoiler:four of his Demon Pillars, he still oneshots Kintoki, Tamamo, and Shakespeare all at once, kills Andersen a minute later,]] and makes it clear that he sees the protagonist as no threat to him, leaving them alive on a whim.
* HeyLetsPutOnAShow: In Salem, the protagonist, Mash, and the Servants have to perform a stage play every day as they are disguised as an acting troupe, each piece written by Shakespeare and Andersen.
* HighAltitudeBattle:
** [[spoiler: The final confrontation with Tesla is on a thunderstorm above Buckingham Palace]]
** The final battle against [[spoiler:Tiamat is done on magical flying platforms in front of her head.]]
** [[spoiler:The battle against the Cosmos Trees which serves as the final battle in each Lostbelt chapter is high above the clouds.]]
* HighTurnoverRate: [[spoiler:The Director of Chaldea as after Olga's death, both of her replacements died after almost a year in the seat. Gordolf seemingly was going to beat da Vinci's record by being gunned down mere days after taking control of Chaldea, but the protagonist manages to save him before that happens.]]
* HistoricalBadassUpgrade
** For every class, there are a few Servants that represent people who were pretty much entirely normal in life, but in this setting have all sorts of supernatural powers. Mozart, for example, has MagicMusic while Abigail Williams has Cthulhu mythos derived powers. Some upgrades are more extreme than others with writers and spies being particularly low tier while others like Abby have vastly superhuman abilities.
** Anastasia Nikolaeva Romanova is also one bizarre case which she is only known for being killed in Red October in Russia and the stories of her impostors. Here, she has a magus lineage which enables her to form a contract with Viy and gain ice powers.
** It's also inverted with some mythical figures. Strong as Rama, Karna and Heracles may be compared to other Servants, they're still quite a bit weaker than they were in the stories they come from.
* HistoricalBeautyUpdate:
** Almost a given with virtually all of the Servants (bar a few). Mata Hari, for example, has been given a significant upgrade in the chest department, while Anastasia looks a lot more elegant and fey than her historical counterpart's surviving pictures.
** Inverted with Caesar, who is depicted as morbidly obese in the game, despite both historical evidence ''and'' Cleopatra's in-universe claims indicating otherwise. He's a bit evasive when it comes to explaining why.
* HistoricalHeroUpgrade:
** Villainous figures like Medea, the Minotaur (Asterios), and Ishtar are given revamped backstories where they are much more sympathetic than in popular portrayals, though their bad sides are definitely acknowledged: Ishtar, for example, really will kill all her lovers and Asterios will slaughter anyone that treats him like a monster.
** Atilla the Hun, Jack the Ripper, and Elisabeth Bathory are downplayed cases. Their heinous deeds remain, but the game presents them as being either not entirely responsible for their actions or at least redeemable. Jack and Liz, for example, are severely mentally ill rather than malicious and Altera, as she prefers to be called, is basically a robot programmed to destroy civilization.
** Some characters like Karna have had their bad sides greatly downplayed in favor of making them more ideal heroes.
* HistoricalVillainUpgrade:
** This is acknowledged in-universe for many real-life victims of this trope, through the "Innocent Monster" skill. Innocent Monster is given to Servants whose public perception is warped by rumors spread long after their death, warping the Servant's nature to obey these rumors even if they never actually did anything to deserve them. For example, Antonio Salieri was Mozart's friendly rival and collaborator in life, but because historical fiction likes to blame him for Mozart's sudden death, Salieri has received the highest rank in Innocent Monster and his Servant form has become an Avenger who resents Mozart with his entire being.
** Solomon stands out, going from a good if flawed man into [[spoiler:the BigBad who is trying to exterminate humanity. This is eventually revealed to be an impostor and the true Solomon was if anything a better person than his historical counterpart.]]
** Arjuna is altered somewhat to be not quite a villain but is definitely less heroic than his rival Karna. He's arrogant, can be quite under-handed, and is jealous of Karna's natural virtue, while he struggles to suppress negative emotions.
** While his creation's crimes are presented as largely the same in the novel, Victor Frankenstein himself is somewhat more of a bastard and has seemingly lost the sympathetic traits he had in the book. [[spoiler:He even murders his second creation, Eve, and steals her body. Even though she was everything he was looking for, she wasn't strong enough to defeat the original Fran and thus he deemed her a failure.]] Not only has he learned nothing, which you can argue of him in the book as well, but he's become a murderer himself.
** Bishop Cauchon never really tortured Joan during the term of her trial due to the fact that she was still politically liable.
* HollowWorld: The fabled world Agartha is a central location as one of the ''Epic of Remnant'' sub-singularities somewhere under central Asia. The area inside is almost exactly like the surface as it's explained that bioluminescent moss which glows at regular intervals to simulate night and day provides all the light needed for everything living there.
* HopelessBossFight:
** Subverted with one bonus area in "Garden of Order". You're pitted against three ghosts with ''6,666,666'' HP, the likes of which blow even the infamous Robespierre Ghost from d'Eon's interlude out of the water - until you realize that your support is the Saber form of Shiki, who sports a OneHitKill Noble Phantasm that can and will take out all of the ghosts in one blow. The fight is ''winnable'' without Void Shiki, it just takes forever to whittle them down to 0 HP.
** In Camelot, for Gawain's first battle, after you chip off 100k from his health bar, the game automatically kicks you out.
** In Babylonia, several bosses will have HP that reaches into the millions, but you only need to wait out a few turns or deal enough damage before the battle ends automatically.
** The first fight against [[spoiler:Demon King Goetia]] ends as soon as the enemy uses their Noble Phantasm.
** Several battles in the ''Fate/Extra CCC'' event's first chapter have them with them depending on Servants either breaking their first health bar or reaching a certain amount of turns to win like the first two Suzuka Gozen fights. [[spoiler: The first battle with Kiara ends after after she uses a certain attack.]]
* HotterAndSexier:
** Many of the characters who return do so with more revealing and {{Fanservice}}y costumes this time around, and a large number of the new characters are {{Stripperiffic}}. This also includes ''[[UpToEleven Medusa]]'' who was the Queen of {{Stripperiffic}} outfits in ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight''.
** Swimsuit Servants are essentially the hotter and sexier version of their normal counterparts, having even more titillating outfits and risque artwork.
** Given the source material, the SE.RA.PH chapter is this in relation to the rest of the game. However, compared to the source material, it's significantly toned down (the Alter Egos are more modestly dressed, [[spoiler: Kiara has a far less explicit Noble Phantasm]], etc.).
* HumanPopsicle: In the third Lostbelt, it's [[spoiler:revealed that Qin Shi Huangdi has been storing all famous Chinese warriors at their prime in cryogenics, only taking them out when he requires their services.]]
* HumanResources:
** [[spoiler:In Babylonia, Tiamat starts producing more Lahmus by processing humans into her system.]]
** In Shinjuku, the Phantom of the Opera creates his minions by murdering people and then using their corpses to make automatons.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:I]]
* IChooseToStay: [[spoiler:In the post-credits scene, Da Vinci says that the player's Servants in Chaldea can terminate their contracts and return to the Throne of Heroes now that the Grand Order is complete, but that they care for the player and Mash too much to actually do so.]]
* IdiosyncraticDifficultyLevels: Daily quests and event free quests usually has 4 difficulties named "Novice", "Intermediate", "Advanced" and "Expert". However, events with more than 4 free quests names the difficulty levels beyond Expert with any theme related to the specific event like in GUDAGUDA Honnoji where levels are named afted Buddhist Hells, while some others replace the standard naming completely like in Summer 2017 Part One event where levels are named "Drive", "High Speed", "Full Throttle" and "Overheat" (racing theme) and Part Two's "Spoon", "Shovel" ,"Drill" and "Dynamite" (jail breaking theme).
* IdiosyncraticEpisodeNaming:
** An unconventional example lost in the English translation; the titles of the main story chapters (i.e: "Eternal Madness Empire", "Divine Realm of the Round Table" etc.) are all composed of six kanji characters.
** A distinction made between the Singularities and Lostbelts is that each Singularity is labelled "第[number kanji]特異点" and Lostbelts are labelled "[[GratuitousEnglish Lostbelt No. #]]".
* ImmuneToBullets: Given Servants' superhuman nature, they can outright NoSell or at least resist bullets fired by any non-Servant being, evident in E Pluribus Unum and Anastasia chapters. Subverted if the one who used the gun is a Servant itself, as during the Anastasia chapter, the Yagas barely harm a Servant with their guns yet Billy the Kid fells two Servants with his gun.
* ImprobablyFemaleCast: While there are more male Servants than female Servants overall[[note]]although male heroes' ranks tend to be lower as seen in the SSR male/female ratio.[[/note]], the cast falls into this trope due to many of the female Servants being GenderFlip variants of male heroes, rather than including heroes who were female to begin with.
* InnocentFanserviceGirl: There is a lot of female {{Fanservice}} in this game. Some of the girls simply don't realize how sexy they are.
* InSpiteOfANail: Despite the Fate/Accel Zero Order event creating an AlternateEnding for almost everybody from ''Fate/Zero'', Chaldea has to correct its nature as a singularity and remove it from the timeline, ensuring that everything will still go the same way as it originally did.
* InfoDump: Several Servants are quite knowledgeable from their exploits and past and are happy to provide this knowledge to their Master whenever they want to.
** EMIYA (Archer) has seen a lot in his tenure as a Servant (and eroge protagonist) and is willing to explain what he knows to his Master.
*** His first interlude suddenly dropping out of nowhere a kind of classification of Heroic Spirits that had never been heard before in the ''Fate'' extended universe; that Heroic Spirits are separated on how their legends are formed. He would describe the last unknown attribute, a direct opposite of "Star", but got cut off. He has two other lectures during his interlude, one about how the Archer class works and the last one on how a Servant-Master relationship works.
*** At the start of the Da Vinci event, he lectures the protagonist and Mash about Projections and fakes, setting up the theme of the event.
*** He connects the dots between the fake Servants and deduces Jeanne Alter's motivations, explaining them to everyone present. She vehemently denies everything.
** Orion and Artemis' entrance in Okeanos, while has little bearing on the overall plot of the chapter, is indirectly explaining the mechanism of Jeanne Alter's endless wyvern army and dragons in general.
** Chapter 4 has one from Da Vinci who clarifies and expands on attributes and their importance in Servant classification that EMIYA mentioned in his Interlude and Tesla ranted about during his appearance in London.
** "Garden of Order" has Roman give one about Mystic Eyes, giving a proper eye color classification for [[VideoGame/FateExtra Violet]]'s Crack Ice and talks about various attributes of Mystic Eyes.
** At the start of chapter 6, Dr. Roman expounds on Mash's past, why she was able to become a demi-Servant and [[spoiler:why she collapsed at the end of chapter 5.]]
** [[spoiler: Sherlock Holmes gives one on Solomon and Chaldea in Camelot, using his deductions and [[VideoGame/MeltyBlood the Hermes supercomputer]] to put his information together.]]
** For the Chaldea Summer event, when you build certain facilities, the Servants requesting it would give you a small bit of trivia relevant to the building. For example, if you build the cabbage farm, Anne and Mary will give you a lecture about scurvy and how sailors in their time worshiped vegetables and fruits as a symbol of good luck because of their nutritional values that prevent diseases while on board.
* InterfaceSpoiler:
** Most Servant's True Names are immediately revealed to you as soon as you roll them, revealing the identities of both [[LateArrivalSpoiler franchise veterans]] and newcomers you haven't met yet. Servants that are especially story-centric are usually story-locked, preventing you from summoning them until you complete up to a certain point in the story. But you still have a chance of rolling them during rate-up events, possibly long before you've even reached their debut chapter. The Servants introduced in ''Epic of Remnant'' [[AvertedTrope avert]] this. You need to learn their True Name in the story, even if you summon them from the gacha (it'll just refer to them by their Class name until then).
** You know the last section of a given Singularity is the last one if the usual Saint Quartz reward is replaced by an item chest (which contains a Holy Grail). The one exception is Camelot, where the Grail is awarded to you before the final set of chapters.
** Since the support Servant selection screen appears before any pre-battle cutscenes, you may occasionally see an NPC Servant that you won't officially meet until the cutscene plays out (such as Orion in the very first story quest of the Moon Goddess event).
* {{Interquel}}: The ''LightNovel/FateApocrypha'' collaboration event takes place after the final battle of that series but before the epilogue where [[spoiler:Sieg and Jeanne are reunited after Sieg spent [[IWillWaitForYou an untold number of years waiting.]]]]
* ItOnlyWorksOnce: In the mainstream ''Fate'' franchise, most Noble Phantasms of Servants are treated as such since they expend so much mana. In this game, however, it is [[AvertedTrope averted]] by virtue of the fact that the NP gauges of all servants can be filled/refilled as necessary, making Noble Phantasms spammable attacks as long as you have the skills and resources to do so. The only Servant this applies to is Arash, and this is because [[DeathOrGloryAttack his Noble Phantasm causes death after execution--even if it is high-damaging]]. Jeanne d'Arc officially has a Noble Phantasm that does this as well, La Pucelle, but she doesn't use it in this game at all, which is probably for the best.
* ItemFarming:
** Ascension/skill levelling materials have to be obtained through beating up monsters to get a RandomDrop.
** Every event requires you to grind for the event currency to buy things from the event shop.
* ItsAllUpstairsFromHere: The Setsubun event features the protagonist and Archer Inferno climb a pagoda with 100 (or possibly more) floors.
* ItsTheJourneyThatCounts: In Anne and Mary's Interlude where the party hunt down Captain Kidd's treasure, Mash thinks that his treasure will be useless but the lesson is that the journey is priceless but the pirate duo denies it and it turns out to be a real treasure.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:K]]
* KarmicDeath:
** Pierre Cauchon, the bishop who got Jeanne d' Arc burned at the stake, gets roasted alive by Ruler Alter and during the Christmas event, if he stepped out of line, he gets a roasting. To make sure that he gets the message, Jeanne Alter brought multiple versions of him to her Christmas party (to play monopoly with her) and killed them over and over for any slight against her.
** [[spoiler:Jason suffers for his ungrateful attitude towards Medea Lily much earlier than in myth, when she turns him into the Demon God Forneus out of spite.]]
** In London, [[spoiler:Makiri Zolgen/Matou Zouken is ordered by Solomon to host Demon God Barbatos. He gets better afterward, though]].
* KilledOffscreen:
** In E Pluribus Unum, the party finds out the reason for why several famous figures from the time period aren't around is because the Celts killed them while they were taking over the U.S. Fergus also mentioned he had killed three unknown Servants before attempting to kill Nero.
** [[spoiler:Ryuunosuke was killed offscreen by Assassin EMIYA in Fate/Accel Zero Order.]]
** [[spoiler: The Knights who refused to go along with Altria's plan were killed in a messy battle by those who were.]]
** [[spoiler: Some of the Servants summoned by Caster Gilgamesh are already dead by the time you arrive in Uruk. They are Amakusa and Kotaro Fuuma (both defeated by Jaguarman) and Tomoe Gozen (who died after defeating Girtabulu).]]
* KillerRabbit: The Chibi Nobu and its variants seem cute and harmless SuperDeformed versions of Oda Nobunaga that has adorable PokemonSpeak, but they pull out guns and shoot, [[BreathWeapon can blast lasers from their mouth]] and occasionally function as an ActionBomb. They are the standard {{Mooks}} in GUDAGUDA events so they have to be killed routinely. During the third Gudaguda event, they ''routinely'' shoot regular people in the streets despite their cute appearance and only intervention from Okita Alter and Ryōma manages to save the protagonist from the same fate.
* KryptoniteFactor: Certain Servants have either skills or Noble Phantasms that increase damage against certain enemies. For example, Boudica has a skill that increases her damage against Romans, Siegfried's Balmung does extra damage to dragons, Mordred's Clarent Blood Arthur does extra damage to "Arthur" enemies (every version of Altria), etc.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:L]]
* LaResistance:
** Geronimo was leading one against the Celts before they were almost entirely destroyed at the beginning of chapter 5. He and the remnants of it team up with the party.
** For Chapter 6, the Hassans formed one against the Knights of the Round Table and Ozymandias, slowly trying to fight back, defend the oppressed and take back their land.
** In Agartha, the men who managed to flee the three rulers of the area, formed their own and are led by the Rider of the Resistance.
** The first Lostbelt has the protagonists help the Yaga's own resistance to overthrow Ivan and his oppressive Oprichniki. [[spoiler:It starts to fall apart as the Yaga slowly learn more about Ivan and just what exactly will happen to them after Chaldea eliminates the Lostbelt.]]
* LampshadeHanging: Holmes' trial quest points out the [[ImpossibleItemDrop absurdity of physical materials dropping]] inside a simulated battle situation. The rant also continues to wonder what the hell the EXP cards and skill gems you get even are.
* LastChanceHitPoint: Guts status will at the very least make the Servant with it survive otherwise a fatal blow with one HP. However, some skills can inflict Guts that will also heal the Servant by a small amount.
* LateArrivalSpoiler:
** Because of the fact that Servants' names and Noble Phantasms are disclosed the moment you get them, the names of spoiler-sensitive Servants in their original works, like Archer [[spoiler:EMIYA]] from ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight'' and Berserker [[spoiler:Lancelot]] from ''LightNovel/FateZero'' are given away immediately.
*** It is worth taking special note of the [[spoiler:EMIYA]] spoiler being dropped so casually at the launch of ''F/GO'', as this represented a ''major'' policy shift regarding the character. ''F/SN'' Archer's identity had previously been one of the great sacred cows of the Nasuverse in terms of spoilers, and ''great'' pains were taken to ensure it was only revealed at the right time, either in the VN or in Unlimited Blade Works adaptations. It went to such an extent that ''VisualNovel/FateHollowAtaraxia'' (''F/SN''[='s=] own fandisc sequel!) and ''VideoGame/FateExtra'' took pains to avoid mentioning it, despite the fact that ''F/HA'''s story conceit should mean it is common knowledge and should influence the plot, and ''Extra'' went so far as to ''partially rewrite the character's backstory'' just to hide it... and then ''F/GO'' comes along and doesn't even bother concealing it from the start, right down to Mash coming to call Chaldea's Archer [[spoiler:Emiya-senpai]]. Of course, the GUDAGUDA pre-release comics made a joke about how by 2015, Archer's identity had practically crossed into non-spoiler territory among fans.
** Ryougi Shiki's (either one) profile have spoilers on the plot of the ''Kara no Kyoukai'' series and the nature of her powers.
** Amakusa's inclusion spoils [[spoiler: his disguise as Shirou Kotomine and his nature as a Ruler, major plot twists for ''Fate/Apocrypha''.]]
** Aŋra Mainiiu's profile and role in the Fate/Accel Zero Order event spoils [[spoiler: him residing inside the Fuyuki Holy Grail and corrupting it, plot points of the ''Heaven's Feel'' route and ''Fate/Zero''.]]
** The addition of Illya and Chloe in the ''Prisma Illya'' event spoils their true nature and the backstory of the manga up to the 2wei arc.
** [[spoiler:Mash's upgrade to an SR Servant and her true NP are blatantly shown on the support list for any player that hasn't finished Camelot yet.]]
** Merely showing what the classes are for BB, Meltlilith, and Passionlip are major spoilers for ''Fate/Extra CCC''. Kiara Sesshouin's inclusion spoils [[spoiler:not only her desire to become an Alter Ego at the end of SE.RA.PH, but also what her Noble Phantasm is, the several twists in ''CCC'', and her passive skills reveal her candidacy as one of the Beasts.]]
** Suzuka Gozen's profile has several pieces of information that haven't been revealed in another ongoing work, ''Fate/Extra CCC Foxtail''.
** As the Japanese version is far ahead of all the other versions, this trope applies to any discussion regarding this game in other regions. Events and story chapter releases can roughly be predicted by looking at their original release in Japan and Servants already released in the Japanese game spoil future twists in the American, Taiwanese, Korean, and Chinese versions.
* LateToTheTragedy: [[spoiler:Seraphix's slow conversion into SE.RA.PH over five months caused the staff to descend into madness from the isolation and monsters, doing things like executing those they blamed for their troubles or overdosing on morphine. By the time the protagonist arrives, everyone has been converted into data and is either dead or trying to survive amongst all the rampaging Servants.]]
* LayeredWorld: Humanity's existence is a layer "stitched" onto reality. ''[[AllThereInTheManual Garden of Avalon]]'' and Lancer Altria's profile explain that Altria's lance, Rhongomyniad, is the pillar holding together the Age of Man and preventing magic from overrunning the world.
** With the Incineration of the Human Order, pretty much all of that has gone kaput with [[spoiler:Avalon as the one exception in the backside of the World because it's seperate from humanity though Merlin warns that Tiamat snuffing out Babylonia would spell the end for ''that'' too.]]
** It is the crux of ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'' [[spoiler: as the Alien God's goal is to replace all of this so it can naturally exist on Earth, stitching multiple realities onto Earth called Lostbelts. Barring interference from Chaldea, its seven Crypters would engage in [[ThereCanBeOnlyOne battle royale to determine whose reality becomes the new one.]] Notably, each Lostbelt is anchored by a Phantasy Tree, an alien construct whose similarities to Rhongomyniad seem more than coincidental.]]
** This forms the central problem of "Inheritance of Glory" [[spoiler:because something has been interfering with the Greater Grail Sieg brought to the Far Side of the World and if he completely loses control over it, it could possibly affect the Human Order, subsequently leading to the laws of physics being removed and damaging the current reality of the world, bringing in gods and Phantasmal Beasts back onto present-day Earth.]]
* LethalLavaLand: Dead Heat Summer Race's second round is in a volcano. Its stage gimmick is that the party receives 300 damage each turn from volcanic rocks.
* LevelGrinding: Sort of. The game itself is pretty grindy, but in order to obtain the best Servants and Craft Essence and max everything out, the player would need to have a lot of patience and saving up a lot Saint Quartz to get the best Servants and Craft Essence available. This is also a subversion, as leveling up the Servants ''themselves'' depends on the rarity of the Servant. A 1-star Servant like Arash will only take a few weeks to max everything out, while a higher rarity servant like Zhuge Liang will take months to max him out (see LowLevelAdvantage).
* LevelUpAtIntimacy5: Some interludes require Servants at a certain bond level, new voice lines and profile sections are unlocked with bond level, levels six to nine either gives you free Quartz or fruit depending on a Servant's rarity, and reaching level ten gives you a CE with exclusive effects that only work when they're equipped to their respective Servant. It also has a special effect for the final Singularity as a passive power-up that increases in power depending on bond level.
* LimitBreak: Noble Phantasms work like this in this game. Each Servant has a gauge that fills up whenever they attack or are attacked (Arts cards fill the meter the most). Filling the gauge to 100% adds a special attack card in addition to the regular 5 that allows the Servant to use their Noble Phantasm. Higher level Noble Phantasms can be charged beyond 100% for a greater effect.
* LoadBearingBoss: [[spoiler: Solomon's Temple is identified by Roman as his [[MentalWorld Reality Marble]], so it is fully expected to collapse once Solomon is defeated, meaning that the final part of the mission is to return to the starting point in order to Reyshift out. Goetia manages to hang on to life and stall the protagonist while the temple is collapsing so that they die as well, and they only barely manage to make it, having to be rescued by Mash.]]
* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: There are already 200+ characters in-game, being a mixture of returning and debuting Servants. Nasu aims to include all Servants that appeared prior to this game in some form, even if they don't appear in the main story.
* LostInTranslation: [[spoiler:The Lahmu's gibberish]] in the NA version is ported entirely from the original JP version with no actual changes to the code requiring a hiragana keyboard, meaning the majority of players lose out on what they're initially talking about.
* TheLostLenore: [[spoiler:After erasing himself from the Throne of Heroes, Solomon has become one for the Queen of Sheba as the two can never really meet again, even as Servants. When the protagonists meet her in Salem, she agrees to help them in exchange for learning all about how Solomon lived his life as Dr. Roman, a normal human.]]
* LovecraftLite: The game has elements of this. A number of Chaldea's opponents take the form of tentacle horrors or other highly dangerous, eldritch monsters previously established in Nasuverse lore, and the nature of Servants ''themselves'' makes them rather inhuman, despite being born from human history, stories and wishes. Chaldea ultimately prevails against the things it goes up against, though not always easily. [[spoiler:The Salem chapter introduces actual Franchise/CthulhuMythos elements to the setting, and the problems caused by such entities can, like other challenges, mostly be solved by hitting them with swords a bunch, thus taking the game toward a more classic expression of the trope.]]
* LoveMakesYouCrazy:
** It's a well-known fact that Jeanne's death made Gilles jumping the slope, but here we can see just how it twists him. He calls upon the Holy Grail to resurrect her; or more specifically, a version of her that would agree with his ideals to take revenge upon France. But as the Grail cannot bring the dead back to life, and Jeanne was so pure that there was ''no part of her'' that would become such a person, he had to settle for the next best thing: creating an imperfect copy of her who would be more reflective of his wishes.
** Kiyohime is basically a personification of this trope with the belief that her Master is the replacement of her beloved Anchin.
** Phantom of the Opera and his love to Christine, he even believes that you are similar to Christine and thus won't harm you.
** Brynhild with her belief that everyone she loves is Sigurd, no matter what gender.
* LowLevelAdvantage: Silver (3-Star) and Bronze (2-to-1-Star) Servants are much weaker than their Gold (4-to-5-Star) counterparts, but they have lower level caps which allow them to Ascend and gain access to more skills faster. The fact that they're more common also increases the chance of the player coming across duplicates of them thereby making it easier for their Noble Phantasms to be upgraded than those of the higher-tier Servants. Lower rarity servants also use up less Ascension materials and skill gems to max everything out while higher rarity servants require the player to save a lot of the said materials to max them out. They also take up less party space as well due to their lower-rarity, making it easier to fit into team compositions with higher rarity servants.
* LuckStat: Most of the stats in game affect nothing, but the rather vaguely defined Luck stat actually ''does'' have a direct link to gameplay. Namely, while star weight is primarily based on class[[note]]ie. Archers have a weight of around 150 while Berserkers are at about 10[[/note]], within the class itself there's slight variation based on the luck stat. For example, EX ranked Francis Drake has a star weight of 208 while the E ranked Medusa is only at 194. Interestingly, Edmond Dantes has ''no'' Luck stat rank at all, but his star weight is equal to that of Antonio Salieri, who has B rank luck.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:M]]
* MadeOfMagic: A majority of the entities in the story. Servants, of course, qualify as this. There are also beings created by mages, as well as Phantasmal Beasts, naturally occurring pure magic beings such as Dragons, Wyverns, elementals, and Chimera. Technically they should be super rare in the modern era but the EndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt combined with TimeTravel, Chaldea's PostModernMagic, and the Holy Grail has resulted in quite a few changes to the rules.
* MagicalIncantation: Most of the Servants in the game have a few short lines they chant while using their Noble Phantasm. The longer ones can get cut off should the in-game combat speed be sped up. Unlike most examples of this trope, most of these incantations aren't necessary nor do they appear in the original works the Servants appear in, as most Noble Phantasms can be activated simply [[CallingYourAttack by announcing that Noble Phantasm's name.]] For example, Altria has a unique chant while she uses Excalibur, even though she only shouts Excalibur in the original ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight''.
-->'''Altria:''' The breath of the planet gathers, the torrent of life shines... Take this! '''''Excalibur!'''''
* MagikarpPower: Servants can get much stronger than they were normally in three basic ways apart from normal leveling.
** First, Interludes can improve the effect of stats or the power of a Noble Phantasm.
** Second, Strengthening Quests function like the above but also add new skills or alter them much more significantly.
** Third, in the One Year Anniversary, the game finally allowed the players to make use of the grails it hands out in every story chapter and some events. By using them, you can raise a Servant's level cap. To go from a cap of 60 or 65 to 70 you need one Grail, then one grail for every five levels up to 90 and then one for every two levels past that up to 100. This allows some low rarity Servants to have drastically improved effectiveness, though at an equal level their stats will still be inferior to Servants that can reach that level naturally. However, their skills can make up for it, along with requiring less money and materials to upgrade their skills and low party cost, which make them very effective indeed.
* {{Magitek}}: Like ''Fate/Extra'', magic is used along modern techniques to achieve most of the Projects of the Chaldea Security Organization.
* MakingTheChoiceForYou: [[spoiler:A big deal is made in the first Lostbelt as to whether they should erase it or not to spare the Yaga from being erased. Then the Alien God's Priestess shows up and destroys the Phantasy Tree to start the process of erasure because Chaldea has Kadoc as prisoner and therefore making the antagonist's goals of maintaining this Lostbelt pointless, rending Chaldea's agonizing over it moot.]]
* MassiveMultiplayerCrossover: This game features Servants from all corners of the Fate franchise and a few from other parts of the Nasuverse.
--> '''Nasu''': "''From the start of the planning phase, I thought, 'FGO has to be this grand story where every single character from all the Fate/ series until now would show up or else it would be pointless'.''”
* MeaningfulName: Chaldea was an ancient country absorbed by Babylonia circa 9th to 7th century BC. Its citizens were famously known as astrologers and foretellers, to the point "Chaldeans" became a synonym for astrologers during the Antiquity, as exemplified notably in Literature/TheBible. Chaldea thus works perfectly as the name of a supposed astronomical observatory, while being dedicated to scanning the past, present, and future.
* MeaningfulRename: When chapter seven transitions into [[spoiler:the second half when Tiamat is truly awake, the Singularity's name changes from Babylonia to Mesopotamia, one of the many signs the fight has gone from defending Gilgamesh's kingdom to defending one of civilization's birthplaces.]]
* MeleeATrois: During chapter eleven of Agartha, [[spoiler:the party has been fighting Megaros on top of a ship for several fights in a row when suddenly recurring boss Penthesilea shows up. The party panics for a moment, but upon seeing what appears to be Heracles she goes berserk and begins a three-way fight. The ensuing fight occurs in three rounds first against generic amazons, then against Megaros and finally Penthesilea. During the first and third round, Megaros is attacking the Amazons and you indiscriminately while during the second Penthesilea will attack Megaros just as often as she hits you, though given the health total difference between you and a boss it's more harmful than helpful. Still cool to see, though.]]
* MercyKill: According to Jeanne Alter, whenever you see an Avenger you should probably kill them immediately. Not because they're destructive and dangerous, but for their own good. As they are, there is no chance of redemption and no hope of peace, salvation or even the satisfaction of righting wrongs against them. Jeanne Alter ''is'' an Avenger...
* MindScrew: Jekyll's interlude is weird in a way that makes you question which one is the real Jekyll. Unlike other Interludes where they fight shadow Servants who embody their mistakes, there's no Shadow Servant in Jekyll's interlude. There are three different Jekylls, only one is real but it doesn't mean the other two are fake, one Jekyll is actually Hyde and planning to kill everyone. Which one is the Jekyll we need to kick his teeth in? [[labelnote: The answer]]Your playable Jekyll is actually Hyde after fooling you about already sealing Hyde. He plans to kill the Jekyll Servant created by Babbage's Reality Marble before killing the real person Jekyll out of sociopathy.[[/labelnote]]
* MissionControl: The protagonist always has someone from Chaldea guide them as they make their way through the various periods of history.
** For a majority of the first storyline, it's Dr. Roman and da Vinci. The latter goes onto the field for Camelot since she believes they would better benefit from her on the field and [[spoiler:Dr. Roman has no choice but to leave Chaldea in order to use his magic ring to counter Goetia for the final battle.]]
** [[spoiler:Since Dr. Roman died, da Vinci becomes the main navigator for the protagonist in ''Epic of Remnant''. In addition, Mash suddenly lost her Demi-Servant powers, confining her to Chaldea as her current state makes it too dangerous for her to go out in the field with Salem as the one exception as she volunteers to come along as the party's secretary.]] After completion of Shinjuku, [[spoiler:Sherlock Holmes joins them.]] The only time they aren't available is in SE.RA.PH as BB cut off all communication channels, and [[spoiler:Seraphix employee Arnold Beckman serves as a temporary one to navigate the digitized oil rig.]]
** [[spoiler:For ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'', Goldorf Musik, Sherlock Holmes, and the young da Vinci guide the protagonist from the ''Shadow Border''. Depending on whether she needs to heal or not, Mash will also serve as this.]]
* MoodWhiplash:
** Between the release of the story are frequent events with the release of new Servants. These have a habit of verging into downright CrackFic territory, which painfully contrasts with the often serious and grim nature of the main story. Most players don't care about this trope because the events are funny as hell.
** The Garden of Order event is the typical zany event with Ryougi as a landlord of the building evicting Servants for not paying their rent, but then it's revealed that some of them are going berserk because of a sinister force, and the story slowly becomes more serious, culminating in fighting off the mysterious entity lurking in the apartment, [[spoiler: a gigantic ghost made out of hate]]. Then no one acknowledges this ever again and it immediately goes back to evicting Servants from the apartment. ''Then'' on the rooftop, it resumes the serious story without acknowledging any of the silly stuff, with [[spoiler:the giant ghost making a reappearance]]. And after that battle is over, the mysterious shadow person appearing throughout the event is [[spoiler:Edmond Dantes, the Count of Monte Cristo, and his goal is to save Servants from confronting Solomon.]]
** The second story of Fate/Accel Zero Order, which was written by Nasu, is humorous like other events and a lot lighter compared to the one written by Urobuchi. Apparently defeating [[spoiler:Dark Irisviel]] at the Greater Grail Cave scattered her essence, and you must collect them to make your Servant Iri whole. The first enemy you fight is [[spoiler:Aŋra Mainiiu]] and he proceeds to grope Mash and {{Lampshades}} Iri's revealing dress. Each of the Iri clones all have their own unique personality and lines, all of them comedic.
** Chaldea Summer part 2 is very different from the tropical, relaxed tone of part 1 since your island is completely destroyed and turned into an utterly bleak wasteland, and you have to rebuild the boars' civilization.
** The ''Prisma Illya'' event starts out fun with Illya, Miyu, and Kuro getting trapped in a magical world and fighting silly monsters like cookie golems, but then it turns out you're actually in the afterlife for magical girls, full of the souls of dead magical girls.
** The third GUDAGUDA event had a rather dark and depressing turn compared to the previous events [[spoiler:due to the actions of Akechi Mitsuhide who wanted to create a new world for Nobunaga and the disappearance of Okita Alter to the PuffOfLogic]]. Then comes the second part where [[spoiler:Okita Alter comes back like nothing happened and gets involved in a parody of ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight'''s Holy Grail War with the usual GUDAGUDA comedic antics.]]
* {{Mordor}}: One section of Camelot is [[spoiler:the incinerated Earth of 2016 bleeding over into the singularity, a scorched wasteland that's still burning]], inhabited by the unfortunate inhabitants of the time period who are trying to survive and ghouls.
* MultipleEndings:
** The ending unlocked for the summer 2017 event is dependent on which team was supported the most throughout the event by the player.
** The valentine scenes for Kiara and BB can end up very gruesome if you pick the wrong dialogue choices when discussing their chocolates. Obviously, GameplayAndStorySegregation is in effect, since outside of the cut scenes, nothing else is changed.
* MultipleLifeBars: ''Epic of Remnant'' introduces the Break mechanic on certain bosses. Damage doesn't carry over after you deplete one HP bar and the enemy will cast a special skill once it lost one HP bar.
* MutualDisadvantage: Almost all classes are weak to Berserkers but everything is strong against them.
* MyNameIsQuestionMarks: Camelot introduces this mechanic for story supports, obscuring all information for them to hide plot twists or surprise appearances.
** In the ''Epic of Remnant'' singularities, a variant of this trope is applied to some of the servants introduced in said singularity, both for the versions you fight and for the playable versions (whose name will appear as "(Class name) of ___"), and they'll have different dialogue (which if you know about the historical/literary figure they're based on, can give you some clues as to who they are). After clearing certain quests as a part of the singularity, their real name, however, is revealed, and their dialogue will be updated accordingly. Strangely, while the name will only be revealed after clearing said quests, most of these servants are not story locked[[note]]of the ones that have this version of the trope applied to them, only 2 are story locked[[/note]], meaning that if you start a new game and roll them after they've been added, it's entirely possible to get them to ''bond level 10'', yet they still won't trust you with their identity.
* MyRulesAreNotYourRules: The enemy gets several advantages over the player:
** Enemies with more than one attack in a row can change their target between attacks (though they don't get Brave Chains thankfully enough).
** Since the AI can't get stars, critical attacks depend completely on RNG, and any effect that involves stars instead gives a flat crit rate increase.
** Enemies can spam skills without cooldown at the cost having to use it in place of one of their attacks that round (whereas the player can activate as many skills as they like before selecting their attacks). Have fun if the enemy has an invincibility/evade/Guts skill.
** Instead of a NP bar, enemies have a "Charge" bar that fills by one segment at the end of every turn. When the Charge bar is completely filled, the enemy's next action will be their Noble Phantasm (or a powerful special attack if not a Servant). While a player must have their NP bar fully filled at the start of the turn and then queue the attack, the enemy is under no such restriction; so, an enemy who fills their Charge bar ''during'' their turn (for example, through a skill that charges NP) can ''immediately'' use their Noble Phantasm as long as they have at least one action remaining.
** Some events have enemy Servants with new skills that they don't normally have such as the ability to instantly fill their NP bar or have Invincibility and Battle Continuation used at the same time. "Da Vinci and the 7 Counterfeit Heroic Spirits" also introduces Servants with passive skills, like a permanent attack buff.
** There is an inversion regarding turn order - the player's attacks will always go before the enemy's in a given turn. This makes Berserkers far more effective in a player's hands, able to strike first (whereas an enemy Berserker would strike second, and thus become a giant target before becoming an offensive threat).
** With Shinjuku, enemies now have a multi-layered health bar that playable Servants do not get.
* MysteriousAntarctica: Chaldea is located in a remote mountain range in Antartica, accessible only via helicopter.
* MythologyGag:
** Several Servants have special dialogue for other Servants that you have, referencing other Fate works or their own mythology.
** Servants' ascension costumes are based on other depictions of the characters, like Saber Alter's third outfit originating from an action figure of her, Karna using both his ''CCC'' and ''Apocrypha'' appearances, etc.
** Other TYPE-MOON works also show up in some way such as Alice Kuonji's co*ck Robin in Robin Hood's third and final ascension artwork.
** The supporting cast of ''Kara no Kyoukai'' and ''Prisma Illya'' appeared in event [=CEs=].
** Servants who are added after launch but hail from previous Fate media often have at least some of their moves from them incorporated into their attacks in this game:
*** Tamamo's attacks are based on her magic skills from ''EXTRA''.
*** Karna uses the EyeBeam version of Brahmastra that he used in ''CCC'' for his Extra attack.
*** Several Servants like Saber Alter, Gilgamesh, EMIYA, etc. use animations based on their moves from ''Fate/unlimited codes''.
*** Both versions of Ryougi Shiki have their [=NPs=] based on Shiki's special moves from ''Melty Blood''.
*** Several of the updated Fuyuki Servants have their animations based on ufotable's anime adaptations of ''Fate/Zero'' and the UBW anime.
** In the Da Vinci event, Jeanne Alter quotes Shirou in his battle against Gilgamesh from UBW:
--> "There is no rule that says an imitation cannot defeat the original!"
** Two of the three options for a large building on your tropical island for "Chaldea Summer" are the Einzbern Castle and Emiya residence. After building either one, Altria and Cu Chulainn both feel that they seem familiar somehow. And in Part 2, you can build the Fuyuki bridge.
** Three of the male companions on the island for the event are members of the YARIO band: Cu Chulainn, Karna, and Diarmuid with new members: Fionn, Blackbeard, and Kojirou.
** In general, Strengthening Quests feature servants that are in some way related to the Servant the Strengthening quest is for (ex. EMIYA's first Strengthening Quest features a wave of Shadow Servants from the ''Extra'' series, followed by a wave of Shadow Servants from ''Fate/stay night'', with Gilgamesh as the boss).
** The date set for the rayshift to Fuyuki is January 30, 2004, the release date of ''Fate/stay night''.
** The name of [[spoiler:Goetia' plan to eradicate the Human Order]] is Retrogression Canal Genesis Light-Year, which is the name of Aoko Aozaki's Arc Drive in ''Melty Blood''.
** The BonusBoss for the ''Fate/EXTRA CCC'' crossover is the BonusBoss from ''Fate/EXTRA'', MONSTER [[spoiler: AKA [[LightNovel/KaraNoKyoukai Ryougi Shiki]]]].
** Nero Caster mentions Slash Emperor in one of her attack voicelines, carrying on the [[Literature/AngelNotes Angel Notes]] reference from Extella.
** There is an inversion effect on this: The TacticalRockPaperScissors refer that Rider is strong against Caster while being weak against Assassins. Meanwhile, in the original ''Fate/stay night'', in the second route, Medusa was completely beaten and suffered anti-climatic death by Medea and her master (though he might pass as an Assassin class), while in the third route, she completely curb-stomped Hassan.
** Chloe's Interlude pits her against the enemies from ''Prisma Illya'''s first season: Medusa, Medea, Saber Alter, Hundred-Faced Hassan, and Heracles. Meanwhile, Illya's Interlude reveals that Young Gilgamesh remember his defeat against her in the 2wei arc and want a revenge match.
** In Jaguarman's interlude, she drags Emiya and Ishtar to go clean up Fuyuki while Kiritsugu narrowly avoids being dragged along. None of these characters are quite who they seem to be, but the joke is still obvious.
** Animation revamps of certain older Servants have references from their home series for pre-F/GO ones, or from newer titles they are featured in.
** The final fight with Amakusa Shirou Tokisada in "Inheritance of Glory" involves fighting a team of Shirou, David, Benkei, Berserker Kintoki, and St. George, the later four being Servants cut from the original ''LightNovel/FateApocrypha''.
** In ''turas realta'', Mash as a Pseudo-Servant first appears in the ruins of the shed where Shirou first met Saber in ''Fate/stay night''.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:N]]
* NarratingTheObvious: Done in a similar style to RadioDrama -- cutscenes mostly consist of characters emoting, occasionally with sound effects, sudden appearances or disappearances, attack effects, etc. If something happens that can't be conveyed in this manner, a character usually describes it -- "Ow! She just kicked me!" and that sort of thing.
* NegativeContinuity: Characters will only make reference to previous chapters of the main plot while in the main story or if the event has a required Main Story chapter besides Fuyuki for completion in order to participate. Many events will introduce characters and concepts as completely new, even if you encountered them before in another event, the main story, or through the gacha. For example, even if you did the ''Fate/Zero'' event and had Waver explain who the Einzberns are, the subject will come up again as completely new in the ''Prisma Illya'' event.
* NeverFoundTheBody: If you don't see or at least hear the gold sparks of a Servant disappearing, they probably survived. This can extend as far as [[spoiler:Megaros stomping on a mortally wounded Wu Zetian and causing her to disappear, only for it to turn out she simply activated her Presence Concealment to escape.]]
* NeverTrustATrailer: Played with. Occasionally the animated trailer for an event will have a character who doesn't show up in the plot at all. The game plays with this by having a textless fight with that character [[PostEndGameContent after you've beaten the plot.]] For example, Altria being on the roof of the Garden of Order event, or Darius being on the Bridge in the "Fate/Accel Zero Order."
* NewWorkRecycledGraphics: The stun and NP block debuff skill icons are actually two [=CGs=] from ''VisualNovel/MahouTsukaiNoYoru'', the only difference is the icons have a black silhouette in place of the characters.
* NiceJobBreakingItHero: [[spoiler:According to Galahad in ''Moonlight/Lostroom'', stopping Goetia only changed the future of Earth so that there's nothing but sand remaining.]]
* NoFourthWall: The more comedic quests starting from "GUDAGUDA Honnouji" practically ''run'' on this trope. Some Servants like BB and Nobunaga also ignore the fourth wall frequently, whether it be in My Room or during serious event stories.
* NoHeroDiscount: Even though Da Vinci is the protagonist's friend and allegedly is trying to help them save the world, she charges a serious chunk of change for some items. The Mona Lisa CE's original price was so high (and increased for each one you bought) that the price was decreased and players who'd bought it at the original price got a refund. Da Vinci even suggests she might be making a bit of a profit, mentioning that she'd like to buy herself a villa in one of her lines in the shop.
* NonIndicativeName: The subtitles of the Singularities in the ''Observer on Timeless Temple'' storyline are a CharacterTitle referring to the main ally of that chapter (e.g. Okeanos' "Voyager of Storms" for Francis Drake). The Babylonia chapter has the "Chains of Heaven" subtitle which refers to [[spoiler:Enkidu. However, Enkidu is not the main ally here and isn't actually Enkidu. The main ally in this chapter is Gilgamesh.]]
** In a bit of SpottingTheThread, one should note that the date of the sixth singularity, Camelot, [[spoiler: makes no sense- Camelot existed long before the early 1200's, so something's gotta be up.]] This is a big hint that there's something wrong with this singularity, which is confirmed when you drop in and find out [[spoiler: you're in the Middle East instead of Britain.]]
* NoTimeToExplain: In the Fate/Accel Zero Order event, El-Melloi II rushes the protagonist and Mash into several fights with little more than an "I'll explain later." It's mostly because they're working on the timetable of [[LightNovel/FateZero the Fourth Fuyuki Grail War]] and can't afford to let events happen without them while he's trying to explain the particulars, but it's also a convenient way for El-Melloi II to put off admitting his very personal connection to the events that they're meddling in.
* NothingIsTheSameAnymore: The prologue of part 2 goes to great lengths to establish the new status quo as in the first half, Chaldea is bought off by Goldorf Musik and by protocol, shuts down all reyshifts and forcibly discharge all Servants with the exception of Da Vinci and Holmes for the time being. The second half goes FromBadToWorse as [[spoiler:Chaldea is seized by the antagonists with Chaldeas itself frozen by a mysterious Servant, the party is forced to flee in a mobile base with only the protagonist, da Vinci, Holmes, Goldorf, Mash, Fou, and eight Chaldea employees left, da Vinci gets offed by Kotomine Kirei and [[DeathIsCheap acquires a new body]], Team A of Chaldea declares their intentions to erase the history of "old humanity" and bring back the Age of Gods, and a mysterious Phantasy Tree starts taking root in the world.]] The new menu for the second storyline emphasizes this even more as almost every single part of the UI is given a significant visual overhaul.
* NotQuiteDead: ''Epic of Remnant'' strongly implies [[spoiler:that Solomon did not fully succeed with his use of Ars Nova. Some of the Demon Pillars are also revealed to have survived and are hiding in four sub-singularities.]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:O]]
* {{Oculothorax}}: The Gazer-type monsters are huge levitating eyeballs with tentacles. They can fire FrickinLaserBeams.
* OddFriendship
** Frankenstein and Mordred get along oddly well given that their first meeting in ''Apocrypha'' involved attempting to brutally murder each other, including Mordred cutting off her limbs and Fran trying to suicide bomb her in response. When they meet again (sorta) in London chapter, Mordred is pretty protective of her and they seem to like each other. During the trailer for the Apo collab they even have a battleground fistbump together, much to the joy of fans. The event itself strongly implies that Mordred feels unusually close to her as both are artificial lifeforms.
** Nursery Rhyme is the personification of childhood stories and looks and behaves like a clueless little rich girl while Jack the Ripper is a serial killer that personifies child prostitution, abandonment and homeless and is somewhere between a vengeful ghost and a demon, but since both have the minds of (warped) children they're still seen together in many events.
** Gorgon and Quetzalcoatl are also close friends in Babylonia despite one wanting to KillAllHumans and the other being the [[GodIsGood most unambiguously heroic deity]] in the setting, one that loves and nurtures humans with all her heart.
* OffscreenMomentOfAwesome:
** Several Servants are off doing their own thing during the Valentine 2018 event, but it's only communicated via Semiramis' pigeons in a scrolling bar. Rider of the Resistance deserves special mention as he has a running subplot that eventually results in him ending up in space and fighting off aliens.
** When you run into Musashi in the first Lostbelt, she mentions that she met [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pele_(deity) the goddess Pele]] in Hawaii and teamed up with Yagyu Jubei in Russia.
* OnTheNext: As part of its extended ''Franchise/PrettyCure'' parody, the Halloween 2018 event has short preview skits at the end of every story quest, consisting mainly of Shuten bemusedly commenting on the situation and Ibaraki freaking out at whatever new amusem*nt park attraction she has to endeavor next.
* OneDegreeOfSeparation: The Servants of either the same time periods, the same country of origins, or the same background specialties knew each other personally. It gets pretty ridiculous with the Greeks; the Argonauts are a gathering of heroes by Jason, even heroes that weren't an Argonaut like Hektor are acquaintances with several of them. So, most Greek Servants personally know each other because of Jason's ridiculously good charisma.
* OneSteveLimit:
** Certain Servants have the same name for their Noble Phantasms.
*** Saber Altria and Arthur Prototype has their Noble Phantasms similarly named "Excalibur: Sword of Promised Victory", since both of them are based on King Arthur.
*** Brynhild and Passionlip's Noble Phantasms are both named "Brynhild Romantia" while completely different from each other. Justified because Brynhild's essence is one of Passionlip's components.
*** In Japan, EMIYA and his Alter's NP have similar kanji subtitles, though Alter's version has one character crossed out[[note]]Both have subtitles "Mugen no Kensei" but translates differently with UBW's "Infinite Sword Creation" and ULW's "Void Sword Creation".[[/note]].
** Orochi. It is the mythical serpent in Japanese folklore that appears as a recurring Hydra-variant in Shimosa as well as the one that Assassin Paraiso summons in her Noble Phantasm. [[spoiler:It is also the name of the Phantasy Tree that holds the first Lostbelt, but doesn't appear to be related to the Japanese serpent in any way.]]
** Anastasia. It may refer to Anastasia Nikolaevana Romanova the Caster Servant, or the title of the first Lostbelt chapter where she debuted in.
** The name Wu pops up twice in the game with two different people, [[spoiler:Wu Zetian]] and Wu from the "Murder at the Kogetsukan" event. It should be noted that this is only apparent in English as it's merely a phonetic similarity, "武" and "伍" are very different Japanese/Chinese characters.
* OneWingedAngel: Subverted in E Pluribus Unum. After he's defeated, Edison pulls out a "superhuman elixir" and says he'll cast away his current humanoid form and transform into "Thomas Mazda Edison". However, Karna knocks it out of his hand and tells him that sort of thing is too unhealthy.
* OnlyThePureOfHeart: Camelot's gates can only be harmed by good. [[spoiler: Xuanzang breaks them down with the Buddha's palm at the cost of her life.]]
* OrwellianRetcon: Because of the continuing updates, several things got fixed in future releases.
** Some mundane typos like ([[MemeticMutation REGEND]]).
** Lore like EMIYA explaining Heroic Spirits' attributes, he originally stated that Mozart had the Man attribute. Which is false, as datamining has proved Mozart has the Star attribute. Now the example EMIYA gives is Robin Hood.
** Profiles for Servants like Lancer Altria Alter, which originally made no mention of her being altered. It's been rewritten to acknowledge this and her constant riding of Llamrei.
** Gameplay data such as the attribute triangle which was reversed in what was strong against what and contradicted Da Vinci's explanation.
** Servant data like Kintoki's attribute, having originally been Sky and is now Man.
* OurDemonsAreDifferent: Mephistopheles was an ArtificialHuman created by Faust who nevertheless still played a role as TheCorrupter. The Demon God Pillars are [[spoiler: magical creations created by Solomon himself using the power of God.]]
* OurGodsAreDifferent:
** The Judeo-Christian god is having a much better showing than other deities, from 1) the main enemies being demons from the Ars Goetia; 2) Servants tangentially-connected to Christian theology and mythology being among the more useful Servants, such as Shielder[[note]]being fused with Galahad, achiever of the Holy Grail in Arthurian legend[[/note]], David[[note]]the ancestor of Jesus[[/note]], almost every Round Table Knight featured in the game (i.e. most versions of Altria, two versions of Lancelot, Tristan, Gawain and Bedivere), the Christian saints [[Characters/FateGrandOrderRiders Georgios and Martha]], as well as the Ruler-class Servants [[UsefulNotes/JoanOfArc Jeanne D'Arc]], [[spoiler:UsefulNotes/AmakusaShiro and another version of St. Martha]]; 3)[[spoiler: Hercules being killed by touching the Ark of the Covenant despite having his own divine protection]]; and, most importantly, 4)[[spoiler: the ludicrously overpowered Solomon, David's son, owing most of his power to gifts from God.]]
** Babylonia goes into more detail about how gods work. Gods with singular roles like a god of death or god of war are indifferent to humanity, while gods with multiple roles ''do'' care about humanity even if it's [[BlueAndOrangeMorality bizarre]] in how they show it. This is compared to their programming getting messed up by having multiple roles. It is also explained "logic errors" can result from a god's multiple roles intersecting with each other. Ishtar for example has all her lovers die because she is a ''war goddess'' as well as a love goddess.
** It is revealed some gods are the product of alien influence in Babylonia. One such case being the Mesoamerican gods that are the product of a meteorite from space.
* OurSoulsAreDifferent: During the Age of Gods it was possible for human souls to return to life if the body was preserved. This is a one time deal though, with the second death being permanent. Divine created beings like Enkidu, however, die and leave no soul behind after their first death.
* OurTimeMachineIsDifferent: Rayshifting has the protagonist and various Servants enter Chaldea's coffins, into which they are converted into psuedo-spiritrons and transported to a Singularity. This is the less dangerous version as your body will be fine for the most part and [[spoiler:the Paper Moon was deemed too unstable and risky for physically time travelling.]]
* OutOfCharacterMoment: Carter freaks out at the sight of a cat in Salem which is a [[spoiler:hint that he isn't actually Randolph Carter as he adores cats. When the real Carter shows up, he takes the same cat with him for his travels.]]
* OutOfFocus:
** Due to LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters, it is inevitable for some characters to not get much roles in main story. Certain non-event-bound Servants including some of the ones introduced ''during launch'' have minor to zero appearances in the main plot. Some like Emiya compensate for this by appearing in events. Even the likes of Eric Bloodaxe have a role in the main plot, but Lancer Cu Chulainn and his Prototype version haven't get theirs yet.
** Event-bound Servants as well as limited ones tend to disappear in focus once their respective events ends. Although some does get a role in the main story later on (e.g. Minamoto no Raikou in Shimosa, Nezha in Salem)
** Servants introduced merely to become playable have zero impact on the main story as well, though some do get roles later on too (like Scathach and Astolfo).
* OutsideContextProblem: [[spoiler:Räum comes to the conclusion that only beings from a completely different universe could help it with its plans for humanity's salvation and subsequently used Salem to try to bring one into our universe.]]
* OvershadowedByAwesome: Subverted. Some of the lower-rarity servants will be outclassed by higher-rarity servants in terms of their supposed role. For example, Arash and Hans Christian Anderson are outclassed by EMIYA and Medea Lily for [=AoE=] nuke damage and party healing support respectfully. The subversion is that many of the lower-rarity servants are still powerful with the right setup. The lower-rarity 1-3 star servants are much easier to obtain via Friend Point summoning while the higher tier servants are exclusive to Saint Quartz summoning, which requires a LOT of investment to obtain.
** Several updates and patches introduced newer Servants that completely outclass the servants that were introduced in this game in terms of utility and their abilities. Fortunately, many of the older servants are often given Strengthening Quests to put them in equal level with the newer servants.
* OverusedRunningGag: During the Riyo gag event, Altera shows up first pretending to be Wyatt Earp, then Buffalo Bill and finally Davey Crockett. However, when she next shows up, it's actually the goddess Colombia, the patron deity of America. After that, it's back to Altera, but this time she's acknowledging who she is [[spoiler:(it's Titan Altera!)]], and bails out your party by providing some much needed momentary firepower.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:P]]
* PanUpToTheSkyEnding
** [[spoiler:The first main story arc ends with a pan from the protagonist and Mash to the blue sky above Chaldea with a significant lack of Solomon's Noble Phantasm in the sky. The blue sky also ties back into Mash's desire to see a blue sky at Chaldea being fulfilled for her.]]
** [[spoiler:The ending of "Merry Christmas in the Netherworld" pans from Ereshkigal saying goodbye to the protagonist and Altera the (Sun)ta as they fly out of the Netherworld via Photon Ray.]]
* PatchworkMap:
** The map of Camelot has a wasteland, rocky mountains and a desert adjacent to one another with drastic transitions in-between.
** As part of its JRPG throwback, the Halloween 2016 map inexplicably has a volcano in between a castle surrounded by lush woodlands on the one side and the other a forest in the middle of winter.
** The map for the Prisma Ilya event has a grassland, a candy-themed town, a blight town, a sea-side port, and a frozen castle.
* PhysicalGod: In true ''{{Franchise/Nasuverse}}'' tradition, pureblood gods shouldn't be Servants. In true ''{{Franchise/Nasuverse}}'' tradition, they cheat a lot. Usually, these end up as a GodInHumanForm[[note]]Formally known as a ''bunrei'', which is like an avatar or splinter of the full god[[/note]] and are significantly nerfed. However!
** In the Camelot singularity, the final boss is the Lion King, also known as the goddess Rhongomyniad. She is a true divine spirit and much stronger than the playable Lancer Altria, who shares her same form, but hasn't become the goddess yet.
** In the next chapter, Babylonia, we see the potentially even stronger goddess Quetzalcoatl, who basically toys with the city of Uruk and the party because she doesn't really want to kill anyone. She's convinced to change sides through the protagonist's stupidly dramatic lucha libre attack from the sky but is prevented from killing the drama in the story by refusing to break her pact by attacking the other members of the Goddess Alliance directly [[spoiler:and she loses a good bit of her power when Merlin tricks her into doing so as punishment]]. She also freely admits [[spoiler:even at full power she wouldn't stand a chance of winning against Tiamat.]] The playable version of her doesn't have access to her full power but is still probably the strongest Rider we've seen.
* PhysicalHeaven: Since Babylonia's time period is in the Age of Gods, different mechanics are in play which is why the Babylonian underworld is ''literally'' under the world.
* PlanetOfHats:
** To a small extent: nine of the eleven individual Servants who came from Irish legends all prefer carrying pole-arms[[note]]Five of them are explicitly Lancers: the 2 versions of Cu Chulainn (one being the ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight'' Lancer and his ''Anime/FatePrototype'' iteration), Scathach, Diarmuid, and Fionn. The only outliers are the Saber Servant Fergus, Diarmuid's upcoming Saber iteration, Cu Chulainn's Caster and Berserker versions, Rider Medb, and Scathach's Assassin version (from the Swimsuit event). Berserker!Cu carries a more menacing Gae Bolg, while Caster!Cu's staff can be considered a pole-arm too. Scathach as an Assassin is spamming even more Gae Bolgs. Finally, Fergus's weapon is less a sword and more of a jousting lance. It's really only Medb's riding crop (and Saber!Diarmuid) serving as outliers.[[/note]].
** Most of historical and legendary Japanese Servants are swordsmen or at least carry a sword or any samurai weapon[[note]]Namely Sasaki Kojiro, Ushiwakamaru, Benkei (though he uses a spear, he carries swords as well), Okita Souji, Oda Nobunaga, Amakusa Shirou, Shuten-douji, Ibaraki-douji, Minamoto no Raiko, Tawara Touta, Miyamoto Musashi, Hijikata Toshizou, Chacha, Suzuka Gozen, Tomoe Gozen, Mochizuki Chiyome, Yagyuu Munenori, Sakamoto Ryouma, Okada Izou and Okita Souji (Alter). The exceptions are Kiyohime, Sakata Kintoki, Tamamo-no-Mae, Fuuma Kotaro, Hozoin Inshun, Kato Danzou, Ashiya Douman and Osakabe-hime.[[/note]].
* PlayEveryDay:
** You get seven login bonuses for seven days of consecutive logging in before the cycle resets and every fiftieth day of consecutive logging in, you get 20 Quartz for free.
** The free quests in Chaldea Gate correspond to a certain Servant class for each day of the week.
** During the Halloween 2015 event, there were initially time-limited quests available for four hours of each day of the event. This was scrapped due to the servers overloading from all the players trying to log in at the same time and was replaced by stacking one-time quests.
** Some events had daily free quests that were unlocked each day of the event, all for farming event currencies.
** The Rashom*on event has her two GiantHandsOfDoom cycling through each of the main seven Servant Classes for each segment of her health bar (which was required to be depleted by the end of each day of the event), starting with Archer and ending with Berserker. There are also daily missions to be done before the day ends, requiring players to fulfill a certain number of battles or damage done to Ibaraki.
** Anniversary campaigns typically give out a week's worth of log-in rewards and players need to log-in every day in order to get them all.
** There's a free daily 10x Friend Point summon.
* PlotlineDeath: There's a [[HandWave justification]] for this, somewhat: the Chaldea system basically keeps your summoned Servants safe from permadeath, but deaths outside this system actually count. However, Servants who aren't protected by this system for various reasons can still get killed in every damn battle and pop back up just fine unless the plot decides it's time for them to get killed or maimed. Also, Servants can sometimes get killed off when they could have protected themselves with a skill.
* PlotParallel: [[spoiler: The ''Observer on Timeless Temple'' and ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'' storylines both involves the BigBad (Solomon/Goetia and the Crypters/the Alien God) anchors the seven irregularities of time (Singularities and Lostbelts) onto the World by planting bizarre pillar-like objects (Demon Pillars and Phantasy Trees) in them. In addition, Goetia kickstarted his plot primarily to stop the Alien God from attacking. The similarities between the pillar-like objects and points in time that need to be fixed are even explicitly shown in [[https://youtu.be/or5A_ZzB6YI?t=3m55s a recap movie]] to contrast the two plots.]]
* PocketDimension:
** Some events and most Interludes take place in these.
** After Jeanne Alter's defeat, several dragons and wyverns fled the Orleans singularity and created a mini-singularity sustained by their existence. Georgios's interlude deals with removing this as it still causes damage to the timeline.
* PointAndClickMap:
** Each singularity has their own map to navigate. The most notable is America's which shows which area each faction is currently in control of during the story and where other characters not in your party are battling.
** The Halloween, all crossovers, Onigashima, Chaldea Summer and GUDAGUDA Strange Tales of the Imperial Holy Grail events have these. Unlike the story maps where everything is slowly unlocked, certain nodes were time-locked and would only open after a certain day or would only be unlocked after obtaining event items. The first Halloween map stands out since it had several hidden details on it that hinted what times new quests would be available for each day.
* PokemonSpeak:
** Fou usually only speaks his name. It's never actually shown what he's saying unless the writers transcribe it [[spoiler:or he drops it and talks normally]]. Explicit text and subtext reveal he's quite the DeadpanSnarker and also a pervert.
** Chibi Nobu and all its variants introduced in GUDAGUDA events do this as well. It's very endearing.
--> Chibi Nobu: "Nobu! Nobububu!"
* PostFinalBoss: [[spoiler: A heavily wounded King Goetia confronts the Protagonist as they're escaping [[LoadBearingBoss the collapsing temple]] in a last-ditch attempt at TakingYouWithMe. The fight, while not exactly easy, is still ''much'' easier than the preceding fight.]]
* PowerCreep:
** Some of the newer Servants such as Rider Kintoki, Chloe, Saber Lancelot, Miyamoto Musashi, and especially Merlin absolutely blow older Servants out of the water as they outshine about half-a-dozen Servants at once. First gen Servants like Altria have bad stat distributions and weak skills like Instinct, which generates fifteen stars at maximum, meanwhile Saber Lancelot can generate twenty while charging his NP at the same time; he can also generate fifteen ''per turn'' while increasing critical damage.
** Countered in some ways by the addition of Interludes and Strengthening Quests. While EMIYA (Archer) was generally considered a pretty poor [=AoE=] Archer for quite some time, but he got multiple Interludes and turned into one of the best. Quests like these have, on the other hand, played a large part in stopping the use of Servants like Oda Nobunaga, who was very good on release but in the present has skills that are too niche to make her very effective.
** As the gameplay meta has advanced, powerful Quick-based Servants like Okita or Scathach fell behind prior to Scathach-Skadi's introduction. Before her, Servants who are around as old as they are have ended up becoming much more powerful while they stayed the same. The best SSR Saber was Miyamoto Musashi followed by Nero Bride, and the best SSR Lancer was probably Swimsuit Tamamo, despite her relatively low attack stat and odd skills. Plus, due to the inherent weakness of Quick cards (80%) compared to Arts (100%) or Buster (150%), designing a Servant who allows them to catch back up may be difficult, which was probably why Scathach-Skadi was included with not only a quick buff, but also has a 100% crit damage buff exclusive to quick cards. Quick-based Servants are still good to this day, but nearly fell behind both Buster and Arts, and it would have stayed that way had it been not for Scathach-Skadi's inclusion. That said, before her inclusion, there were some Quick-based servants that managed to stay up the metagame, such as Jack, due to her having an innate power-up against female enemies, and female bosses are everywhere in this game, and Rider Kintoki because of his straightforward, easy to use skills.
** The result of this trope can be seen in the Nero Fest Exhibition Matches as they were all based around the current meta of that time and required team compositions specifically required to counter each match. Servants added later like Merlin, Musashi, Meltlilith, and Holmes easily counter them with their buffs or damage output.
* PowerEqualsRarity: Most SSR Servants are prized for their high damage output or specialized buffs though with Palingenesis and the right skillset, other Servants of lower rarities can carve out their own niche like Arash, Andersen, or Cu Chulainn.
* PowerFloats: Certain Servants are constantly levitating while some others only do so when attacking.
* PrimordialChaos: The Abyss, also known as the Ocean of Void and the Sea of Dawn, from which the primordial gods Apsu and Tiamat originated, lies beneath the Underworld. As there is no administrator to ensure people can leave, any who enter the Abyss are eternally lost with no return. Gilgamesh traveled to the primordial sea to get the herb of immortality when Enki was its administrator. During "Merry Christmas in the Netherworld", the protagonist and Altera the Sun(ta) reach this place as they try to find a cure for the disease sent from the Underworld.
* ProductPlacement:
** Miyamoto Musashi specifically mentions that she visited a [[https://www.toridoll.com/en/shop/marugame/ Marugame Udon]] restaurant and ''really'' liked it.
** Siegfried mentally informs the player during the ''Learning with Manga'' crossover that they should go on Creator/{{Netflix}} and watch ''LightNovel/FateApocrypha'' if they want to check out his exploits.
* PronounTrouble:
** Dr. Roman refers to Da Vinci with male pronouns during Septem, but female pronouns during London.
** The English localization refers to Mordred and several other female characters with male pronouns in their character profiles even though, most noticeable in Mordred's, they label their genders as "Female".
* TheProphecy: The Knights of the Round Table saw the stars foretelling the arrival of a rebel in a prophecy before the start of Chapter 6.
--> "When the foreign star shines bright, the coalition of chalk fractures, the king's authority wanes, and the tower of divine revelation falls."
* PuffOfLogic: [[spoiler:This is basically what happens to a Lostbelt and its inhabitants once the Cosmos Tree that holds it together is destroyed. It's rammed in by the fact that completion text for all Lostbelts is "Cosmos Denial". After all, the entire possibility of these timelines should not have existed.]]
* PurposelyOverpowered: As a reward for how long it takes to get a Servant to Bond Level 10 (on average they need ''1.5 million points'' but most battles only provide less than a thousand), some of their Max Bond Craft Essences are incredibly useful, though most are unimpressive.
** Heracles' gives him self-resurrection three times. This combined with his high survivability as a Berserker make him a very solid SR Servant.
** King Hassan's gives him ''permanent'' immunity to any debuff.
** Arjuna's has a 30% NP attack boost and more importantly, gives him a ''1000%'' boost to his star absorption, ensuring that at least one attack will be critical.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Q-R]]
* QuintessentialBritishGentleman: Appropriately for Londinium, the storyline is filled with GentlemanAndAScholar Servants who most of the time throwing passive aggressive rhetoric before getting down to fights with so much class. Mordred, whose solution to a murder mystery is to punch the suspects until they squeal and if they're innocent, punch someone else until they cough up, is figuratively and literally out of place.
* RaceAgainstTheClock: [[spoiler:The Seraphix oil rig is sinking into the Mariana Trench and the protagonist only has ten days in SE.RA.PH to save it.]]
* RagnarokProofing: [[spoiler:Atlas Academy is doing just fine despite the incineration of Earth killing the magi inside. Holmes theorizes that the several layers of protection in place must have allowed the institution and its various installations to survive.]]
* RandomDrop: The only way to get money, EXP, Ascension materials and Servant skill items is this. During events, this is the only way to get special Craft Essences and event currency, the chance of getting more currency is either boosted by certain Servants or event [=CEs=].
* RareCandy:
** Fou cards give Servants a stat boost with a cap of 2000 for both HP and Atk, but only 4* Fou cards can be used to level that stat boost from 1001-2000.
** The Holy Grails you've been collecting from beating each singularity and certain events can level even a 1* Servant past their usual limit up to level 100, if you have enough. The game calls this "[[https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/palingenesis Palingenesis]]." It really is rare, however as of the game's two-year lifespan in Japan, only slightly more than 20 have been available through events and story quests. Since it takes 10 to max out a one-star, which Servant a player uses a Grail on is a limited and permanent decision.
* RareRandomDrop
** For certain events, event Craft Essences also have a chance of dropping from enemies, with the indication of it dropping being a rainbow aura around the gold chest. Craft Essence experience cards are indicated by a yellow star next to the gold chest.
** The very nature of the gacha.
*** The quartz gacha has pull rates of 40% 3*/R Servants, 3% 4*/SR and 1% 5*/SSR while for Craft Essences it's 40% R, 12% SR and 4% SSR. A ten-roll guarantees at least one SR card; but in practice, this will almost always be an SR CE if the game is forced to make a gold card appear, which generally aren't considered particularly desirable. The odds of getting a rated-up Servant or Craft Essence vary. Assuming a single rate up, [=SSRs=] have a 70% chance if you roll any SSR, [=SRs=] have a 50% chance and [=SRs=] have a mere 10% chance while for [=CEs=] it's 70%, 33% and 20% respectively. More rated up [=CEs=] and Servants at one time changes the odds. For example, if two [=SSRs=] are rated up at once, each one will have a 40% chance of appearing for a total of 80% between them, reducing the odds of a spook even though it decreases the chances of getting a particular one of them.
*** The friend point gacha, while generally of little interest to most players due to how little of value is in it, actually has the rarest drop of all. Aŋra Mainiiu, the game's only 0* Servant, is a very rare FP summon-only Servant who was added during the Fate/Zero collaboration event. The official rates of pulling him are unstated but are believed to be ''far'' lower than the odds of pulling even an SSR. However, he's a JunkRare that is only as strong as a 2*/C Servant. As a nod to his rarity, he had a special line of dialogue in Christmas 2017 to acknowledge players who had actually managed to get him.
* ReadingsAreOffTheScale:
** The damage the Camelot singularity does to the timeline is unrelated to Solomon, so Chaldea has no idea what to expect; and the fact that it's becoming incredibly erratic, like the times when it literally disappeared from the map and separated from the timeline of humanity, has caused them to rank it EX in value to restoring humanity. The impossibility of the Lion King's presence is the direct cause.
** The humanity foundation value of SE.RA.PH is "CCC", which isn't quantifiable by the franchise scale.
** This is what "Saber Wars" went for - pitting you against bosses with ludicrously high HP (including the first ever enemy to break one million HP), but at the same time giving you Craft Essences to greatly multiply your Servants' attack power and overcome these foes by dealing ludicrous amounts of damage.
** The three Void Ghosts in the Incinerated Remains area from "Garden of Order" each have 6,666,666 HP, which is much higher compared to any enemy encount.
** Rashoumon has the first raid boss of the game with a ''2 trillion'' HP bar which the entire playerbase was required to attack and get rid of over the course of the event. To boost your Servants' damage, they used the system of "Saber Wars". The highest HP Ibaraki you can fight has 6 million HP, accompanied by some-hundred thousand HP GiantHandsOfDoom. This is used again for the Onigashima event.
* RecurringRiff: The melody of the title screen music, "Grand Order", is used in every Grand Battle theme and is also remixed for the title screens of ''Epic of Remnant'' and ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt''.
* ReligiousAndMythologicalThemeNaming: Shimosa's antagonists all use an afterlife as their moniker, with Lancer "Purgatorio", Archer "Inferno", Assassin "Paraiso", Berserker "Samghata Naraka"[[note]]The "Crushing Hell" of Buddhism[[/note]], Rider "Kalasutra Naraka"[[note]]The "Hell of Black Threads" of Buddhism[[/note]], Saber "Empireo", and Caster "Limbo".
* RemixedLevel: Certain stages in later parts of the game are just altered versions of earlier and "more generic" stages like the "Babylonian forest" stage in Babylonia which is just a greener version of "Redwood Forest" stage from America, the "Subway" stage in Shinjuku which is an altered version of Camelot's "Temple" stage, and the Assassin of Nightless City's forecourt stage is a Chinese-style alteration of the "Throne Room" stage. "Merry Christmas in the Netherworld" intentionally uses this as the protagonist returns to the gloomy Babylonian underworld, only to find that there are Christmas trees and someone's strung up holiday lights all over the arches and Ereshkigal's cages.
* RenaissanceMan: [[TropeCodifier Leonardo da Vinci]] is a summonable Servant and each of Hundred Faces' personalities are said to have a different area of expertise. In addition, some Heroic Spirits can materialize in more than one class. The gold medal has to go to Heracles, who is said to be summonable in all of the standard classes [[spoiler:(and Avenger)]] barring Caster, with Geronimo having four distinct classes to his name coming in second. In-game, Medusa currently has the most classes available with three, Rider, Lancer, and Avenger.[[note]]Altria, Cu Chulainn, Elisabeth, and Jeanne have that many and in the former's case ''even more'', but only when counting gag Servants and Servants where they were put into a different class due to an external force.[[/note]]
* {{Retcon}}:
** The main plot hook of the story is that CHALDEAS gives humanity a year until the extinction event, so every adaptation dates the apocalypse depending on when it was originally made: for example, the original Japanese release of the game was in 2015, so CHALDEAS predicts humanity will be gone in 2016. The anime OVA has the end-date as 2017, and in the US version, it's 2018.
** In previous Fate works, a fairly big deal was made of Servants not remembering their past summonings and if they did, it was only a vague recollection of events; Saber (Altria) in ''F/SN'' could, but her situation was ''extremely'' specific. In ''F/GO'', however, the player-summoned Servants remember their previous summonings and will discuss them at points. It isn't completely consistent and may be limited to Chaldea-summoned Servants, however; when Saber Alter and Jeanne Alter appear in Shinjuku, they explicitly do ''not'' remember your previous meetings in Fuyuki and Orleans, and Mordred in Camelot similarly does not remember your adventures in London (to Mash's abject dismay). Other Servants summoned inside some Singularities, like Atalante and Xuanzang, both cite previous encounters with the protagonist, however. Ancillary material for the franchise explains this discrepancy, saying that a Servant's memories ''do'' always go back to the original Heroic Spirit, but the Throne of Heroes automatically adjusts what the Servant remembers for the next summoning to prevent confusion from having overlapping sets of memories. In other words, what a Servant does or does not remember is ultimately circ*mstantial, and if they happen to remember past events they will only remember how it played out in one timeline.
** ''GO'' also carries forward a retcon previously put forward by ''Extra'' and ''Apocrypha'' concerning Assassins. In ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight'', the ''only'' people who could be Assassins were explicitly members of Hashashin, preferably one of the 19 "Old Men of the Mountain". Kojirou was "Assassin", yes, but he was extraordinarily unusual because he had been summoned by another Servant and wasn't a true Servant himself. As this would really limit the options ''GO'' would have for Assassin-class Servants, though, this conceit has been abandoned entirely and now anyone with proper parameters and a talent for silent, agile killing can be an Assassin; the Hashashin now make up a ''minority'' (though still an important one) of the Class.
** Moreover, previous ''Fate'' works, particularly ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight'', leaned on the idea of most proper Assassins being bad at direct confrontation with even Kojirou needing a highly specialized battlefield to match the knight classes. ''GO'''s Assassins tend to have slightly lower HP totals, and a larger proportion of them are a low-rarity, but, in practical terms, Assassins can fight as well as anyone and have a typical place in a triangle. Several Assassins are counted as among the strongest units in the entire ''game''.
** There is also a minor retcon concerning "Alter" Servants and their eyes, thanks to the proliferation of Alter Servants in ''GO''. In ''F/SN'', Altria Alter's striking golden eyes are noted in her profile as being the result ''specifically'' of her dragon blood awakening. Jeanne Alter (and her related Santa Lily version), EMIYA Alter and Dark Irisviel all have identical eyes to Altria, however, and none of them have dragon traits. While there is perhaps a dragon connection with Jeanne Alter through her "Dragon Witch" skill, there is no indication she has a physical relation to dragons, and neither EMIYA Alter or Dark Irisviel have any kind of relation to dragons, period. The previous dragon connection to Altria's eyes is also not mentioned in ''GO''. This retcon was carried further into ''Anime/FatePrototype Fragments'', [[spoiler:where a number of the re-manifested Alters of Servants like Ozymandias and Brynhild have gold eyes]].
** Relatedly, somewhere between a retcon, ArcWelding and AdaptationExpansion is the game's acknowledgment of the idea of "Alter" Servants entirely. ''F/SN'' did not use the term "Alter" at all; any Servants corrupted during the third route were referred to as "blackened", Altria included. And while ''Hollow Ataraxia'' and ''Unlimited Codes'' introduced the name of Saber Alter, no other Servant was called "Alter" prior to ''GO'' and Altria's situation was treated as essentially unique. ''GO'', however, has embraced a long-running fan idea of the Alter state being a distinct mode of existence for a Servant, separate from their usual summoned state; the Shinjuku chapter, in particular, addresses the concept of Alter Servants at some length (thanks to there being no less than three of them running around), and even attaches a set of kanji to the term "Alter" (in furigana), the kanji essentially translating to "reversed".
* RevengeBeforeReason: According to Jeanne Alter, the defining characteristic of Avengers is that they have a great emptiness inside them that they try to fill through vengeance, but can never successfully cope with. For them, getting their revenge is not even about satisfaction or pleasure but just to keep going. She finds it quite pathetic even as she knows it applies to herself just as much as to Hessian Lobo, the enemy she's trying to kill or at least slow down.
* RevisitingTheRoots: The autumn 2016 event is Nero Festival, which is basically a new and improved version of 2015's Nero Festival, the first major event the game had in its history. As such, the event refrains from having even a silly plot (besides the introduction), and just pits the player and their Servants against difficult themed teams of enemy Servants, just like the original Nero Festival, and has the original Nero Medals as event currency.
* RewatchBonus: Revelations like [[spoiler: Dr. Roman being Solomon, Mash having been fused with Galahad for several years, Fou being Primate Murder and a Beast, the circ*mstances behind how Olga's father funded Chaldea, and Goetia's nature and endgame]] put several things in a much different light on a reread of the game's story.
* RiddleOfTheSphinx: The answer to this is one of two ways to enter Ozymandias' temple complex in Camelot.
* RidiculouslyCuteCritter:
** The boars from the Chaldea Summer event are also this, both in-universe and out. The demonic boars, not so much...
** Fou, naturally, is also this, as a mobage RPG staple. [[spoiler:He ends up having a much more important role in the plot and wider Nasuverse than anyone foresaw.]]
** Ozymandias' sphinx cubs are adored by [[NotSoAboveItAll him]] and players alike.
* RooftopConfrontation: The final two battles of the Garden of Order event take place on the rooftop of the apartment complex the event is centered around.
* RuleOfFunny: Most events and some Interludes run on this.
* RuleOfThree: A major plot point is that Chaldea had successfully summoned three Heroic Spirits before the game proper.
** The first one you encounter is the third Servant summoned, Leonardo da Vinci, who's been staying at Chaldea for a while now.
** The second is [[spoiler:Galahad who was fused with Mash ten years ago and lay dormant within her. It's noted that he was the only Heroic Spirit to respond to their fusion projects with Chaldea's designer babies, the rest refused.]]
** [[spoiler:The very first one is King Solomon, summoned before Chaldea even became the gigantic facility it is now, by Maris Billy Animusphere for the Holy Grail War in Fuyuki.]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:S]]
* SadlyMythtaken:
** In Salem, "[[http://fategrandorder.wikia.com/wiki/Elder_Ghoul Elder Ghouls]]" have the appearance of [[http://lovecraft.wikia.com/wiki/Gug Gugs]]. Justified in the plot saying that Lovecraft dreamed the idea right, but not necessarily the particulars.
** Caster Cu uses Norse runes instead of Celtic. AuthorsSavingThrow has Scathatch explaining she taught him these because Odin likes warriors regardless of nationality and they were faster than Celtic ones.
* SaveScumming: If you force-quit the game during a battle turn then open the game again, it resets to before you picked your command cards. This can be useful if you forgot to use a skill or the RandomNumberGod ruins your plan. The effectiveness of this was decreased with a fix that let you return to the skill use section with a single button press, but would distribute stars at the beginning of the turn instead of redistributing them whenever you use a new skill. Now the only thing that changes crit chances is to use a star absorption skill or to generate more stars with a skill.
* ScoreMultiplier: Bonus Servants or event Craft Essences are used to boost the number of points gained in certain events like the Gudaguda events and Saber Wars.
* Sc*nthorpeProblem: The NA version introduced the messaging system in November 2018 and censors the ''entire'' message if there's any inappropriate word caught by the filter. This extends to mentioning Assassin, one of the game's seven basic classes. There's also no actual indication of censoring on the player's side, it only appears censored on friend lists.
* SelfDeprecation:
** During the GUDAGUDA Honnouji event, Andersen mentions how people shouldn't grind and grind for currency but that's how the events are set up. Gilgamesh, of all people, complains about how you need lots and lots of money or luck just to get what you want from the gacha.
** Dr. Roman and the protagonist call out how absurdly high the prices are for any of the Da Vinci Craft Essences during the Garden of Order Event. She still won't change them. This results in the Da Vinci and the 7 Counterfeit Heroic Spirits event, where someone starts selling cheap knockoffs to cater to those who don't have enough Mana Prisms to buy the real ones.
** Riyo's "How to Play" comics are full of lampshades on all the problems in the game, including the horrendous gacha rates, the ascension material farming hell, the servers being unable to handle all the players, and [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking the lack of a skip function for NP.]] Olga Marie and Mash are surprised that the author's allowed to get away with all this criticism.
*** In the official translation of Riyo's comics, when introduced with Altria, Gudako's comment about it got [[{{Woolseyism}} modified]] into "Man, something must be wrong with her parents to name her Altria" (instead of making the mistake that 'Pendragon' is her first name and thought her parents were delinquents to name her after a creature like that), indirectly poking fun on Type-Moon's verdict that Altria is spelled as such instead of the more preferred 'Artoria' (which ''VideoGame/FateExtellaTheUmbralStar'' used)
** "All the Statesmen" mocks the game repeatedly without remorse as the protagonist constantly asks for QP or rare materials with Mash having to say that, no, this event will unfortunately not give the protagonist those desired materials.
** Chloe mocks the tendency for Servants to wear increasingly {{Stripperific}} outfits when you ascend them and refuses to do so herself...[[NotSoAboveItAll until her final Ascension]].
** Okita Alter has one My Room line where she whines for her terrible luck in gambling and other games of chance, mocking the nature of the Summoning gacha though ironically coming from someone who requires extreme luck to obtain.
* SealedCastInAMultipack: In the beginning of ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'', all Servants except for da Vinci and Holmes are forcibly sent away, depriving the protagonist of any way to fight. [[spoiler:However da Vinci put all the Saint Graphs of your playable Servants in a briefcase, allowing you to bring them back with the appropriate ritual and resources.]]
* SelfImposedChallenge: Later events have the ability to rerun the most difficult fights as a way for players to challenge themselves, with no rewards for doing so after beating it the first time.
** Some of them even go one step beyond, such as Kiara in the SE.RA.PH event. Normally you buy one item to make her not use her OneWingedAngel form and then an optional amount more to remove various buffs from her humanoid form, but it's also possible to challenge her in her demon form. The most difficult version of the fight, however, is to not allow her to transform but then allow her to use the rest of her overpowered buffs, which together halve all your Arts/Quick/Buster attacks, deal a thousand damage per turn, drain 5% NP so you can never reach 100% without being at [=NP2=] or using a skill and so on.
** Another way to make fights more challenging is to not use any of the top-tier buffers (Waver, Merlin, or Mash for example), especially when fighting difficult bosses.
** Removing damage-boosting event Craft Essences is another method players do, to see whether they don't need to rely on a booster to take down bosses with several hundred thousand HP.
** ''Epic of Remnant'' chapters have themed Servants which receive double bond points for every story battles. For Shinjuku, it's Evil-aligned Servants. For Agartha, females, Astolfo, d'Eon, and Enkidu. For Shimosa Province, the Knight Classes and for Salem, Casters. For story immersion, challenge, and maximum bond point allocation, players limit themselves by using only themed Servants.
** Players can do a [[SoloCharacterRun self-imposed solo Servant fight]]. Because the game forces the player to have at least three Servants for a fight, they choose a Servant they want to do the solo fight with and pair that Servant with two other low-level CannonFodder Servants to take the first few hits for him or her (preferably Leonidas and/or Saint George since they have the Taunt skill which forces the enemy to attack them first). After the two [[CannonFodder cannon fodders]] die, only the main Servant remains to do the challenge.
** Or they can do the [[LowLevelRun low-rarity run]] where players only use 1-3 star Servants and/or 1-3 star Craft Essences. It is borderline impossible to win in stages where the opponents cheat unless players get lucky [[CriticalHit critical hits]] or the opponents skip a turn without attacking.
* SelfInflictedHell: [[spoiler: What Salem is more or less. To elaborate, Salem was created to cause as much 'pain' as possible by Räum so that Abigail, who has the ability to channel an [[{{EldritchAbomination}} Elder God]], by using her guilt on the injustices that she caused and the fact that she doesn't remember ''what'' injustice she caused. Making her incapable of forgiving herself and humanity. In doing so literally creating a Christian HellOnEarth with Räum and Abigail as joint administrator]]
* SequelEscalation: The third and final Halloween event starring Bathory goes this way, with three castles to invade instead of just Csejte Castle, two new variations of Bathory, and a more dramatic plot that isn't just about the protagonist trying to get to the castle and resolve the issue.
* SequelHook: [[spoiler:Despite the sheer sense of closure that the ending provided, with the world being saved thanks to the collective efforts of Chaldea and the sacrifice of Dr. Roman, there are still threats for Chaldea to face. Gilgamesh's speech during the climax has him imply that ''at least'' one more Beast is currently active and that once one Beast makes an attack, events accelerate to an "ultimate conclusion" of some sort, and Holmes' theory that Goetia chose 2016 to destroy humanity because a greater threat was going to do something worse in either that year or soon afterward hasn't been confirmed or denied yet. More directly, in the post-credits scene, da Vinci debriefs the protagonist and Mash saying that the Mage's Association will come knocking on their door soon, thanks to the entire ''planet'' missing a year and even the [[{{Muggles}} normies]] knowing something weird happened.]]
* SequentialBoss: The MultipleLifeBars mechanic introduced with Shinjuku has facilitated these, with a health bar depletion triggering the next phase of the fight.
** For Shinjuku, the Christine doll turns into a giant ghost.
** In SE.RA.PH's extra story, Nero turns into Nero Bride, Tamamo turns into her Lancer version, [[spoiler:and Shiki transforms into her Saber version.]]
** Certain bosses also give themselves special unremovable buffs upon health bar depletion, forcing players to switch strategies on the fly, like Saber Empireo giving himself a 100% defense shield or Suzuka Gozen draining everyone's HP every turn.
* SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong:
** The HolyGrail has appeared in several key points in Humanity's development, and the player has to travel to them all to either destroy or retrieve the Grail in order to set history back on course and prevent its demise in the future. [[spoiler:At first the heroes assume this means that anyone who dies during a Singularity is revived once history is restored, but during Babylonia Gilgamesh replies that no, people who die stay dead, even if they didn't die in the original history. History is rewritten such that they died of some cause other than the Singularity, but the fact that they died at that specific time remains unaltered. However, the opposite is also true: anyone who lives (including those that died in the original history during that time) will survive past the point the Singularity takes place in.]]
** The Saber Wars event. Heroine X comes from the future from another planet, the Planet Servant with a dystopian future dominated by the Sabers where Lancers are extinct and Archers are deemed criminals. So she came back in time to kill all Sabers and all Servants with Saber-faces. This storyline is continued in Mysterious Heroine X Alter's trial quest.
** The ''Fate/Zero'' crossover is about Lord El-Melloi II and his determination to save the innocent lives lost to the Holy Grail.
* SevenDeadlySins:
** The theme of the Prison Tower quest bosses, with seven Servants corresponding to each sin. [[spoiler:Jeanne is the only one who doesn't actually qualify.]]
** In Babylonia, a set called the seven Evils of Humanity are brought up which are essentially disasters manifesting as Beast class Servants, brought about by humanity's beastly nature, which humanity's tasked with destroying. They don't quite match with the classical set, as the first is "Pity", the second is "Regression", the fourth is "Comparison", and another one is "Regret".
*** [[spoiler:Beast III-R invokes a somewhat more classic Evil, that being "Desire". It is somewhat broader than the [[{{Lust}} usual expression of such]], as it includes things like "desiring salvation" (though certainly, she is quite willing to exploit ''that'' kind of "Desire" as well...)]]
* ShamelessFanserviceGirl: There is a lot of female {{Fanservice}} in this game. Some of the girls know they are sexy and want others to know it to.
* ShesAManInJapan: d'Eon and Astolfo are made explicitly female in the Chinese port of the game, and can be used in girl-exclusive events as well.
* ShiftingSandLand: The first area the protagonists arrive in Camelot is this, with sandstorms, a pyramid and lots and lots of desert. It's actually the Egypt of Ozymandias' time that was twisted into the singularity when he was summoned.
* ShiningCity: The holy city of Camelot [[spoiler:built over the ashes of Jerusalem]] is this, as it stands as the last shelter in a shrinking singularity. Almost all inhabitants of the area have been attempting to get entrance into it.
* ShipTease: In a story as long as this, there's a lot of relationship teasing to go around.
** The protagonist gets the bulk of the ship tease:
*** Mash is clearly in love with the protagonist and tends to be [[ClingyJealousGirl very clingy if she sees any sign of the protagonist showing affection for other female Servants]] while as the story progresses the protagonist grows more protective and dialogue choices can show them being fond of her in return.
*** Roughly half the female Servants fall for the protagonist, though nothing much comes of this most of the time. These tend to be characters who did not have a relationship in a previous story, such as Euryale or Okita, but it does also happen to alternate versions of characters such as Swimsuit Tamamo or Nero Bride.
*** Finally, several story chapters also include a lot of romantic interactions, such as Hassan of Serenity's massive crush on the protagonist in Camelot and Ereshkigal's similar one in Babylonia (to the point Ishtar teases at a LoveTriangle forming between the protagonist, Mash, and Ereshkigal), Jeanne Alter and Saber Alter quasi-love triangle in Shinjuku, [[spoiler:not to mention Moriarty's plan literally revolves around the protagonist becoming the closest person to him]], and Meltlilith even playing the part of the heroine in the most serious event to date, SE.RA.PH.
** There's also a fair bit of teasing between various Servants:
*** Sanson, Mozart and d'Eon are all in love with Marie Antoinette, though she's kind of spacey and doesn't seem entirely aware of it.
*** Sasaki Kojirou seems to have a thing for Martha, who appears to find it kind of annoying. Still, fans eat it up so the writers started adding in more of it.
*** One of Altria's My Room lines has her reminiscing fondly about [[TookALevelInKindness EMIYA]] while [[LuminescentBlush blushing]], clearly remembering him more as [[VisualNovel/FateStayNight Shirou]] from the ''Fate'' route.
*** Caesar and Cleopatra are very much in love with each other, as is only fitting. Cleopatra is initially shocked to see how fat he is, but after recovering she doesn't care, despite her usual vanity. Similarly, Irisviel and Kiritsugu are married in other continuities and while they don't know each other here, they're still drawn to each other.
*** Kintoki is caught between Shuten-douji and Raikou, which is a really uncomfortable for him because he helped kill the former and considers the latter to be something like his mom, but she's crazy and considers that the same thing as romantic love. He appears to mostly love Shuten, but they always seem to end up bickering when they meet. Finally, Tamamo also flirts with him in London, but they both know she's only doing it to embarrass him. Kintoki knows perfectly well she actually loves someone else, namely Hakuno.
*** During Okeanos, Blackbeard loudly proclaims about how he's a lolicon and so forth and that Drake is an old hag. However, despite this, she's actually the one woman he's genuinely serious about and asks her to hold him as he dies in Okeanos, which is a request she grants. In case you're thinking it's too serious, his Interlude is also about getting explicit doujins about her.
*** Also during Okeanos, Euryale and Asterios have a BeastAndBeauty type relationship going on, or at least teased at. Asterios is fighting to protect her from Jason, but is badly injured when he attacks your party because he and Euryale assumed you were with the Argonauts. When this happens, she rushes out intending to sacrifice herself for him despite her usual self centered attitude. She's happy to see him again during Salomon.
*** Like in legend, Rama and Sita are heavily devoted to each other with a third of the America chapter revolving around their romance as Rama tries to rescue her and Rama's profile mostly focuses on the aspects of his legend with Sita.
*** There are several hints that the relationship between EMIYA Alter and [[spoiler:Kiara Sesshouin]] is much deeper than either would admit too. [[spoiler:Slaughtering her and her cult in one alternate timeline is what drove Emiya Shirou down this path, and Kiara when she becomes Beast III-R in the SE.RA.PH. chapter is able to bring him to her side not through force, but using said guilt to draw him over and corrupt him into a Beast Servant]].
*** During the first Christmas event, Santa Alter gives [[AmbiguousGender Le Chevalier d'Eon]] a maid dress, much to their consternation. If this wasn't obvious enough, Alter also asks them for their contact information.
*** Nikola Tesla is ''immediately'' smitten with Tamamo upon meeting her in London. All of his dialogue with her involves him gushing over her, to the point that Tamamo has to actually remind herself to remain loyal to Hakuno.
*** When Hijikata Toshizou was released, he came with several lines complimenting female Servants (i.e. Musashi, Carmilla). Fan artists were all over the latter. And in the Halloween 2017 event with Carmilla's animation and voice updates, she also has a voice line with Hijikata, even calling him by his real name without any honorifics. Cue fans shipping them ''even further''.
*** Musashi and Osakabehime started picking up steam in the months leading to "Battle in New York", even though they've had hints since the latter's debut in the third Halloween event. Musashi is known for her love of cute girls, while Osakabehime is known to collect Musashi merchandise, and their profiles from the material books have matching lines for each other where Musashi attempts to drag Osakabehime from her room. If the [[https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/fategrandorder/images/3/30/CE900.png/revision/latest?cb=20180919135715 Chaldea Kitchen Truck CE]] is any indication, she succeeded, and the two have been touring New York together. They're also a DualBoss during the event, and their title is "[[LadyAndKnight Princess and her Bodyguard]]", introducing a fairly popular dynamic to their interactions.
** Roman and Da Vinci had significant amount of ship tease with her attempting to take care of him, often visiting him in the middle of work to remind him to eat, and they basically become the Chaldea crew's surrogate parents. Additionally, Dr Roman gets very emotional (and slightly {{tsundere}}) when Da Vinci gets into some peril in Camelot, and Da Vinci's interlude clearly implies she has feelings for him. Part of this is based on the fact that their [[Creator/KenichiSuzumura voice]] [[Creator/MaayaSakamoto actors]] are married and the two actors are playing an official couple in [[LightNovel/KaraNoKyoukai another Type-Moon series]].
** Kadoc and Anastasia are shown to have a bond deeper then just Master-Servant, with Kadoc's fellow Crypters even worried that he'll prioritize her wish over expanding his Lostbelt and [[spoiler:Anastasia sacrifices herself at the end to save his life.]]
* ShooOutTheClowns: [[spoiler:In London, to establish just how much of a threat Solomon is and how serious the stakes have become, he kills all the Servants (Shakespeare, Tamamo and Kintoki) who were mostly providing comic relief.]]
** PlayedForLaughs in Garden of Order, where MHX is terrified of Saber Shiki due to the latter emitting an aura can ignore the rules of Servant Universe (comical characters can't be killed).
* ShootTheMedicFirst: Averted. Enemies, including enemy Servants, have honestly pretty pathetic healing, especially when used on the boss Servants they sometimes show up with. In Okeanos in particular, focusing on [[spoiler:Medea Lily]] before attacking [[spoiler:Demon Pillar Forneus]] is a good way to be grinded into dust by the latter, especially its ChargedAttack, while the former's Noble Phantasm is a minor inconvenience at best.
* {{Shopkeeper}}:
** Da Vinci serves as the default shopkeeper in the game, though she can be affected by the player's progress in the main story, like turning into a hologram when she personally joins the protagonist in Camelot and [[spoiler:being replaced by the younger Da Vinci in the ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'' storyline when the original one is killed.]]
** Event shops (with some exceptions) has the event's featured Servant (usually the reward one if there's any) as their shopkeeper.
* ShowWithinAShow: The party performs several plays; one is about Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, another features the three Jeannes, the third one stars Medea Lily and Circe, and a CompressedAdaptation of "Starry Xuanzang goes to India" for the townspeople of Salem with the UI slightly altered to reflect it being a play.
* SimpleYetAwesome:
** Most events give you a free SR Servant and allow you to buy four more copies of them and all of their unique ascension items using easily grindable items in the event shop, meaning that you can get them to level 80 and their NP level to 5 ''very'' easily. They're all considered useful in some way (with a few considered absolutely absurd), though some of the early ones have been power-creeped.
** Medea's Rule Breaker doesn't seem too special, just being a dagger that removes buffs - except its self-recharging effect, combined with her High-Speed Divine Words skill that gives her at least 80% of an NP gauge with the press of a button, makes it a very reliable and deadly SpamAttack. It helps that she has three normal Arts cards, and that Rule Breaker is an Arts card itself.
** Sakata Kintoki's Rider version gives everyone else in this list competition--having a single-target Noble Phantasm that [[JustForPun runs over]] most bosses (especially the Caster and Berserker ones). His skills are all straightforward, so he's also ''very'' easy to use. He's also a SR Servant obtainable for free.
** After Camelot, Mash is considered one of the best SR Servants. She can tank reliably with her huge HP pool, taunt, and invincibility, has decent damage potential (as Shielder class deals normal damage to any Class), and support with her NP that adds two DEF buffs and a big ATK buff to the whole party. And she has ''0 party cost''. The only downside for using her is she doesn't get any bond points.
** Paul Bunyan, full stop. She's a 1* unit with a very good skillset and '''short NP animation''', born to be the ultimate farming unit.
** Your starting outfit, Mystic Code Chaldea. Other Codes may look cool or have clever spells, but you really ''can't'' go wrong with the provided versatility of a strong heal, attack boost, and evade.
** Some lower rarity servants are like this, as despite their lower than average stat-line, some of them have incredibly powerful and useful skill setup and/or useful Noble Phantasm that makes them more useful for their utility that outweighs their lower stat line. In fact, many of these servants are often referred as "low-rarity EX tier" mainly because of their useful utility that can provide in many team composition and serve as cheaper alternatives to their respective higher rarity counterparts [[BribingYourWayToVictory for those who don't want to spend real life money]] to get higher rarity servants. Some noticeable examples include Hans Christian Andersen, Euryale, Robin Hood, Billy the Kid, David, Julius Caesar, Bedivere, Lu Bu, and Georgios, as they have very straightforward skill sets in addition to them being lower rarity.
** Some of the 4* and 5* Craft Essence the player can obtain from events for free can be really good. While the earlier events have event Craft Essences that are either decent or too situational, some of the later events have free event Craft Essence that are incredibly good (one noticeable example is the Golden Sumo Wrestling CE from the Onigashima event, which grants the servant equipped with it 15% increased attack and starting with 50% NP charge when max limited break, arguably considered one of the best free event Craft Essences the player can obtain).
* SirNotAppearingInThisTrailer: Some Servants aren't announced or promoted to make their appearance in the story all the more impactful.
** Lancer Altria Alter is the only antagonist for London that wasn't already shown in the trailer or promotional release gacha rate-up.
** In America, [[spoiler: Cu Chulainn Alter is never hinted at in the trailer or promotion, with his appearance in the chapter's cold open being the first time he appears.]] In addition, Li Shuwen who didn't have any connection to the new Servants or prior appearance in the game, yet he debuts there.
** [[spoiler:Tiamat was never shown in trailers or promotion for Babylonia to hide her role as the actual ArcVillain, with her horns as the icon representing Babylonia being the only hint towards her existence before its release.]]
** [[spoiler:Shakespeare and Andersen are never shown in the Shinjuku trailer, but they have an important role for the story's finale.]]
** [[spoiler:Kiara Sesshouin]] is the only SE.RA.PH Servant not to show up at all in promotional materials prior to release, as it would be a major spoiler.
** [[spoiler:Medb, Quetzalcoatl and Gugalanna]] do not feature at all in the "Dead Heat Summer Race" event PV.
** [[spoiler:Caster Limbo, Sengo Muramasa, Amakusa Shirou and Sasaki Kojiro]] do not appear in the Shimosa PV.
** [[spoiler:The Queen of Sheba and Lavinia Whateley]] don't appear in the Salem trailer.
** [[spoiler:Billy the Kid and Ivan the Terrible]] don't appear in the Anastasia trailer
* SituationalSword:
** Many [=NPs=] provide bonus damage against certain targets, such as Lancer Tamamo dealing bonus damage to Males, Gilgamesh to Servants and Nobunaga to enemies with Riding. A related effect is providing a power up bonus vs certain targets, which has the same effect through a different mechanic. Scathach has a power up effect against undead and divine enemies on her third skill, while one of Nobunaga's has power up against Divinity, meaning the effects multiply against enemies with both Riding and Divinity such as Raikou or Caesar. The standard super effective multiplier is 50% on [=NPs=] while power up usually ranges from 50-100% as it's normally attached to skills, meaning the effect can be improved on.
** Some skills provide extra effects to Servants with certain traits. Elisabeth and Medb, for example, provide double the effect to female and male Servants respectively on their improved Charisma buffs.
** Other skills ''only'' work on certain targets. Charm effects usually only target one gender, for example. Stheno's NP also only works on males apart from the defense down effect, causing her to be one of the least popular Servants in the game.
** Certain Craft Essences give the equipped Servant bonus damage against certain types of enemies, i.e. Origin Bullet gives the equipped Servant more damage against enemy Casters.
** Finally, some skills provide additional benefits depending on the terrain type. Ruler Martha gains an attack bonus in maps with water, Gawain gains a Buster buff on maps with sunshine, Jaguar Warrior has bonus star generation on forest maps, and Swimsuit Nobunaga has bonus attack on burning maps.
* SlapOnTheWristNuke: Due to GameplayAndStorySegregation, TacticalRockPaperScissors, and Noble Phantasm gameplay mechanics, a flashy, lore-wise devastating NP could deal a lot less damage compared to a more mundane, weaker, and less impressive NP for certain enemies, i.e. Gilgamesh's Enuma Elish is a lot less useful than Kojirou's ''Tsubame-gaeshi'' when it comes to taking on Rider dragons.
* SlidingScaleOfSillinessVersusSeriousness: The storyline can switch between silliness and seriousness (although later chapters shift more towards the later). Certain events, however, shifts more towards silliness with massive amount of either BreakingTheFourthWall or SelfDeprecation, even events that are supposed to be "serious" such as the Garden of Order and Fate/Accel Zero events (which the later is lampshaded by Mash with a BreakTheFourthWall moment).
* SNKBoss:
** The Exhibition Matches of the 2016 Nero Festival are made to be harder then hard and it shows.
*** The first is a battle against Heracles. Already a tough opponent as a Berserker with a dodge skill, an attack buff and high debuff resistance, this Heracles has his Noble Phantasm, God Hand, as a permanent unremovable buff which revives him with half HP ''eleven times''. Also, to make things harder, any Servants on the frontline at the start of the battle get hit with a permanent debuff to their Arts cards which severely cripples NP gain and damage.
*** The second has you against Scathach and Cu Chulainn. On the first turn, Scathach will use a skill to seal all Noble Phantasms for 3 turns. After taking out one, the remaining one will proceed to ''instantly kill'' your party. Both of them come with a dodge skill and they will spam them. A lot. They have high chances of launching critical attacks and more often then not, their [=NPs=] will instantly kill your Servants. Also just to make things harder, Cu's NP bar has three segments instead of the usual four, meaning he'll use his Noble Phantasm a lot more often then he usually can.
*** The fourth pits you against Siegfried with his Armor of Fafnir NP, that basically give him 200% DEF buff (which you can't dispel). Most Servants will be dealing a miniscule amount of damage, so you must bypass that buff with at least a 200% buff to your attack. Oh and for the first turn, his NP gauge is instantly full. Sumanai no more.
*** The fifth puts you against Medb with an army of her created soldiers. On the first turn, she instantly inflicts permanent charm any male Servant (that even pierces King Hassan's Charm immunity!) and the AI is adjusted to focus fire on them, so you're restricted to using female servants. She comes with Invincibility, resistance to all 3 card types, and 90% defense split across 3 buffs, and the only way to remove them is to kill the soldiers, with each soldier removing one of her defense buffs. However, when they die or enter battle, the soldier buffs Medb's attack, making her deadlier. And this is on top of Medb and the soldiers charging each other's NP bars. Oh, and the last two soldiers are Casters, which will wreck any Assassins you decided to bring if they come out.
*** The sixth battle is Gilgamesh. Already a tough opponent with Golden Rule charging his already short NP bar, he has 1.5 ''million'' HP, a high crit rate, and he drains your entire team's (including your reserve) NP bars on turn 1. For 2016, he also has two different versions of his fight which will put you through the wringer, in 2017 players only face the Hero version.
*** The "King" version gives him an absurdly high defense buff that lowers in effectiveness with each turn. However, at the same time he has an attack buff that will make him even more powerful with each turn. It's possible to remove these buffs, however, Gilgamesh has a buff that nullifies buff removal twice. And to top things off, he can throw out a five turn NP seal.
*** The "Hero" version hits the entire team (again, including the reserve) with an NP power debuff while giving himself a buff that raises his attack every turn without taking an action. And don't forget that he still has Charisma to further increase his attack! If you try to be smart and use buff removal, he decides to immediately charge his NP and hit you with Enuma Elish before recasting the buff.
*** The last battle is a BossRush against six enemies. Jack will cast a skill to make any buff fail to occur (if she's dead she puts a regen of 15k HP per turn on her allies). Medea will poison your party (on death she will cast an unremovable 50% DEF buff). Lancer Altria Alter will increase her party's NP by 2 bars per turn permanently. Amakusa will cast a 2000 max HP down debuff that is stackable (on death he will increase his team's critical chance). Ozymandias will instantly cast Imperial Privilege if he's entering and casts Protection of the Sun God (NP gauge up + buff chance increased), and on death he will add evasion pierce to his party's attacks. Lastly, there is Nero with her Imperial Privilege spam per turn, 3-times Guts, critical chance and damage up. And their debuffs on death will affect all of your party, even in reserve. If you kill Nero before any other enemy Servant, she gives every remaining enemy Servant unlimited Guts which can't be dispelled - which means all of your Command Seals and effort are completely wasted. This battle was so hard (mainly Nero's unlimited Guts), it was nerfed a day after it came out. A pre-nerf version of this battle came out on 2017 as a special surprise match after all the new matches came out to see how players would fare against it, with its difficulty being ranked ''EX''.
** The bonus boss for SE.RA.PH, [[spoiler:Demonic Bodhisattva Kiara]], is hella hard with 3 seperate HP bars, each worth one million. With several buffs she grants herself every turn and more permanent buffs, she's a hard hitter and there being no [[spoiler:Kiara Punishers]] means the party gets the full brunt of her three different attacks. Her NP removes buffs before damage is applied and she utilizes multiple different debuffs to wear down the team. This boss mainly exists just to see whether players can actually take her down, as her battle yields no bond points or drops nor are there any rewards for beating her.
** Nero Festival 2017 Autumn incorporates the Break mechanic and it's just as hard as last year's:
*** First we have Spartacus with his absurd regeneration given to him by Crying Warmonger which heals him 90k HP ''per turn'' and ''400k HP'' every three turns. His defense-piercing NP becomes stronger as his HP bars are depleted and he gains a special defense buff against Kings later on. Ideally you must deal more than 100k damage ''per turn'' to be safe! In practical terms, you need to be able to wipe out a full health bar in a single turn.
*** Second is Suzuka Gozen with different gimmicks per HP bar. First, she casts a 90% double attack-type resistance per turn. Then for her second phase, she switches between Class resistances and advantages every turn. Her final phase has her put up a massive permanent Special Defense buff that can only be weakened by Servants who have a certain alignment each turn. She also has a taunt skill throughout all three phases to let her focus fire a certain Servant.
*** Third is Arash with ''5 million HP'' and a ''three times'' Guts that revives him with two million HP. His NP bypasses invulnerability and evasion and he only has 3 NP bars (that he can charge anytime). After you manage to get all three revives out of the way, the next turn he automatically recasts another Guts buff and uses Stella again! The proper strategy to beating him is actually to ignore offense entirely and find a way to survive his multiple Stellas, each one of which will remove his own Guts. However, given that he pierces invincibility and has a ''super'' Stella that deals upwards of 180k full party damage, either a full party guts (Irisviel) or serious defense buff stacking is required.
*** Then there's Karna and Arjuna. Each brother comes with unremovable buffs (every attack Karna does grants debuffs and Arjuna is immune to debuffs and gain critical buffs when attacked) and a damage bonus against Divinity enemies. So, who to kill first? If you kill Karna first, Arjuna automatically gives himself an Instant Kill buff and drains everyone's NP gauge. If you kill Arjuna first, Karna buffs himself with massive damage resistance, a high attack buff, and extra NP gain per turn.
*** Da Vinci and her motley crew of annoying enemies is next. She comes with almost every single midboss monster type, can cast a skill to increase two NP bars and every monster has a special buff that grants a debuff on anyone who attacks them. And she will spam her invincibility pierce buff for her NP if there are only two enemies on the field. If you try to be smart and kill Da Vinci first, she buffs her companions to become absolute monsters!
*** The sixth battle is against the "Old Man of the Mountain", King Hassan and an endless army of failed Hassan candidates. He starts off with a massive damage resistance buff, which can only be removed whenever he ''kills'' one of his allied Hassans for a buff (bulky ones give him one NP bar and an attack buff, and skinny ones give him crit buffs). Once his break gauge is depleted, he starts using evasion buffs that protect him from a certain card type each turn. His chance of proccing an instant kill with any attack has been increased and his third skill lowers everyone's resistance to having an IK, with his NP almost guaranteed to unleash an IK on any unfortunate target.
*** The final battle is yet another BossRush. This time, each Servant comes with a three-turn resistance to something, a party buff that lasts as long as they're alive and a buff that they can apply when certain allies enter. And the last boss is of course Nero, who gives the entire team a Guts buff once she comes out.
* SocializationBonus: A friend's support Servant can be brought into battle, though only ones from your friend list can use their Noble Phantasm.
* SomethingCompletelyDifferent: Most limited and/or seasonal events are these as the cast takes a break from saving the world to engage in zany hijinks.
* SpannerInTheWorks: One of the biggest reasons the grand plan of [[spoiler:King Goetia]] is derailed is [[spoiler:Roman, aka Solomon]] showing up and [[spoiler:using Ars Nova to erase himself from the Throne of Heroes and thus make Goetia unable to sustain his own existence]]. This was because [[spoiler:Solomon]] was in possession of [[spoiler:the final ring]] due to it being used as a summoning catalyst by [[spoiler:his Master, Maris Billy Animusphere]]. The reason [[spoiler:Maris]] had it in the first place? [[spoiler:''God'' told Solomon to send the ring into the future where it would be needed.]] So, assuming that [[spoiler:"God" isn't the Counter Force in disguise like what apparently might have been the case with the voices Jeanne heard]], the BigBad's plan was derailed because [[spoiler:God]] foresaw what would happen ([[spoiler:but considering this is ''[[TheOmniscient God]]'' we're talking about, that's no surprise]]) and arranged for the right conditions for his defeat, [[spoiler:by allowing Maris to win the Fifth Fuyki Grail War and establish Chaldea, also allowing for Solomon to exist in the present day to act against Goetia, and also establishing the events that not only allowed the Protagonist and their allies to win in the first place, but also set things up so they have a fighting chance against the ''other'' big threats likely threatening to destroy humanity.]] So, basically, [[spoiler:[[GodIsGood God]] [[SubvertedTrope ain't]] [[TheGodsMustBeLazy lazy]], and He sure as hell knows how to set up a domino effect. Nor does He appreciate gifts he made being used by those who weren't meant to use them, ''especially'' demons.]]
** Even more simply, the bombing meant to take out all of Chaldea's summoners at the beginning would have succeeded if you hadn't fallen asleep during the orientation meeting and been kicked out of the mission to Fuyuki.
* SpellMyNameWithAnS:
** Kiara Sesshouin's name is usually spelled as such, but depending on the romanization system or source it may also be "Sessyouin", though that's not how it's pronounced.
** FSN-Saber's name アルトリア (lit. Arutoria) has been spelled either as Altria or Artoria in official Type-MOON merchandise. It has also been spelled as Arturia in some fan translations. In Fate/Grand Order however, Type-MOON dictated that the game go with Altria over the localization team's protests.
** The Near-Future Observation Lens was originally translated as SHIVA, but was later corrected to SHEBA after her appearance in Salem.
** Type-Moon in general used more "native" names on certain Servants in which the katakana that sounded closer to the Servant's native name are used instead of the katakana of their "generic" names unlike other Japanese media do. The English version reflects this through changes in the Servants' spellings to better match the spelling from their original language. Some are minor like Atalanta and Hector being Atalante[[note]] The Japanese used アタランテ (Atarante) instead of アタランタ (Ataranta) for Atalanta's name.[[/note]] and Hektor[[note]]Which used ヘクトール (Hekutoru) over ヘクター (Hekuta) which the usual katanaka for Hector[[/note]] is read as, while some are more noticeable like spelling Angra Mainyu as Aŋra Mainiiu [[note]] reflecting his Japanese name アンリマユ (Anrimayu) instead of アングラマイニュ (Anguramainiyu)[[/note]]. These name changes may apply to Achilles/Achilleus and Chiron/Cheiron once they got released in the English server in the future.
** In a more traditional version of the trope, more recent material, especially adaptations, of the Camelot chapter tend to have a problem with a certain name that features in the narrative. The story features an object that is ''very'' clearly meant to reference the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuada_Airgetl%C3%A1m Airgetlám of Nuada]]. However, both the stage and animated adaptation titles have a bad tendency of calling the object "Agateram", which is a meaningless name derived from a semi-direct romanization of the kana used for "Airgetlám" (アガートラム); this even cropped up in the promotional Craft Essence for the stage play, which gave the name in romanized letters. The English version of the chapter does retain the name Airgetlám, at least.
* StableTimeLoop:
** [[spoiler:The Singularities in the first part of the story are this. According to Gilgamesh,in the grand scheme of things what happens in a singularity will still happen but history will record if differently. The example he gave was a dragon showing up in a singularity kills a man. Once the singularity is resolved and history is restored that man does not come back to life, instead he get's killed by another more mundane cause.]]
** [[spoiler:Kiara creates one in SE.RA.PH, partially to provide the pseudo-Spiritrons to fuel her and SE.RA.PH but mostly just for her amusem*nt at watching people suffer.]]
** After hearing the protagonist's description of their moonlit walk on the beach in "Murder at the Kogetsukan", Holmes realizes that [[spoiler:there's a small gap in time between the protagonist dreaming at Chaldea and the two families arriving at the hotel, so he quickly rushes to assume the alias of the detective the Goldie family hired and arrives there as "Sheringham", leading to the protagonist seeing him as "Sheringham" in their dreams, directly setting up Holmes to become the detective when they inform him of their dreams.]]
* StatusBuff: Most units have the ability to grant themselves or allies temporary bonus effects, some stronger than others. For every buff, there is usually a debuff version.
** Offensively, the three main categories are attack, card buffs and power bonuses. Card buffs are bonus effects to the damage of Buster, Arts or Quick cards on top of boosting the secondary effects like NP gain or star generation. Power is split between three effects. First is critical damage, which can apply to all attack. Second is Noble Phantasm power up, which only applies to Noble Phantasms. Finally is just straight power up effects, which are generally fairly rare and tend to be limited to activating against certain straights such as enemies tagged as Evil or Kings. However, despite the different effective targets for power buffs, they are all actually the same effect and have additive effects, not multiplicative, which makes [=NPs=] and crits less effective during raid events like Rashom*on which provide large power bonuses to the party. There's also an added flat damage bonus from a few skills, but the effect is minor and rarely consequential.
** Defensively there are two kinds of defense skill as well as two kind of damage negation. First is defense up, which is the opposite of attack up. A related effect is damage cut, which is like attack up but much more valuable due to the lower numbers involved. Unfortunately, this isn't a common effect. The last two defensive skills are invincibility and evasion. Mechanically, these skills are identical except that invincibility effects are harder to ignore. There are also a few boss only defensive abilities that force you into using certain strategies, but these are infrequent enough to not go into much detail about them.
** Stars, health and NP can all be generated in flat amounts on a per turn basis. Merlin, for example, can provide 5+ stars every turn, 5% NP charge and 1000+ HP for five turns by using his NP. It's also possible to increase maximum health or increase healing received. All of these effects also have debuff versions that do the opposite.
** Finally, there are various miscellaneous effects like increasing the chances of instant death affecting the target when using certain attacks, NP seal, skill seal and even an effect known as buff denial, which blocks attempts by the afflicted to receive any kind of buff until the effect wears off. This effect is actually the opposite of increased skill success rate, a rare effect that increases the odds that chance based skills such as Imperial Privilege will grant their full effect.
* StealthPun:
** The "demonic fog" in Japanese is ''makiri'', [[spoiler:as in Makiri Zolgen, the villain of the chapter.]]
** The 2017 Christmas event has '''Alter'''a as the Santa stand-in, taking the role from the two Alters before her.
** Saber Gilles's White Day present is his Jeanne fanzine. He has ''issues''.
** The first new Mystic Code given in the Lostbelts has less belts opposed to the TooManyBelts of the standard Chaldea Mystic Code. The protagonist had [[JustForPun lost belts]].
** The changes in My Room always goes with beds or anything that people can sleep on. Then during the ''Inheritance of Glory'' event, the My Room is a flower garden and doesn't have any beds in it, besides some [[JustForPun flowerbeds]]. A lot funnier when Spartacus actually used one to sleep on during the event's story.
* TheStinger: [[spoiler:The ''-Moonlight/Lost Room-'' OVA's after-credits scene has someone approach Solomon's throne and take one of his ten rings.]]
* SubbingForSanta: [[ChristmasEpisode Each Christmas]], a Servant will don the Santa Hat and HilarityEnsues... and life lessons.
* SuccessionCrisis: The Septem chapter takes place during Nero's turbulent reign, when a faction of pretenders raises up to knock Nero down from the throne faster than the historical record. Said pretenders are Nero's predecessors.
* SuddenlyVoiced: The game only has certain cutscenes voiced for special occasions since if the entire game was voiced, its data would be incredibly bloated.
** BB is voiced only for one cutscene at the start of the ''Fate/Extra CCC'' event, even acknowledging that she's voiced for this cutscene and it would be a good idea to be on headphones for this if you're in public.
** The victors of each round of the "Dead Heat Summer Race" are voiced with three different variations of the same scene and the final round has an extended cutscene where a team basks in their victory.
** Starting with Nero Festival 2016, lottery draws are now voiced.
** During the climax of ''Observer on Timeless Temple,'' [[spoiler:Dr. Roman is voiced for the cutscene where he casts Ars Nova on Goetia.]]
* SuperMovePortraitAttack: Every Noble Phantasm attack animation gives a close-up shot of the face of the Servant using it.
* SupernaturalFearInducer: Demons have an ability called "Fear" that inflicts a [[CriticalHit critical damage]] debuff on a target for three turns. Caster Gilles' third skill, Prelati's Encouragement, inflicts the "Fear" status on all opponents for five turns with a chance of stunning them. Abigail's second skill also has the same effect.
* SuperTitle64Advance: ''Fate/Grand Order'' is often abbreviated to ''F/GO'' or even more blatantly, ''Fate/GO''. The April's Fools app also follows this naming scheme by adding the subtitle ''Gutentag Omen''.
* SurplusDamageBonus: Getting Overkill on an enemy guarantees more critical stars and fills a little bit more of the Servant's NP gauge.
* SwitchOutMove: The Chaldea Plugsuit is the only way of swapping Servants from the frontline to the backrow.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:T]]
* TacticalRockPaperScissors: Some Classes have bonus damage and weakness to other Classes.
** The Three Knight classes form a triangle with Sabers being strong against Lancers, Lancers being strong against Archers, and Archers being strong against Sabers.
** Riders, Assassins and Casters form another triangle. Riders are strong against Casters, Casters are strong against Assassins, and Assassins are strong against Riders.
** Berserkers exist outside both triangles. Instead, they have an advantage against most classes, but at the same time, they have a weakness to most classes. An exception is Shielder, who takes neutral damage from and deals neutral damage to Berserker. They deal half damage to and receive double damage from Foreigners.
** Shielder equally damages and resists all Classes.
** Ruler resists all classes except Berserker and Shielder but deals normal damage to everyone except Berserker, who receives the same increased damage it receives from all classes except Shielder.
** Avenger resists and deals double damage to Ruler, takes half damage from Beast and takes and deals normal damage to all other classes except Berserker.
** [[VideoGame/FateExtra BB]] has the exclusive Moon Cancer class, which completes a triangle with Ruler and Avenger by being weak to Ruler and strong against Avenger.
** Alter Egos deal double damage to the Rider triangle, deal halved damage from the Saber triangle, and are defensively neutral to most classes except Berserker. They deal double to and resist Foreigners.
** Foreigners are in a strange triangle with Berserkers and Alter Egos. They resist and deal double damage to Berserkers. They receive double and deal half damage to Alter Egos. Foreigners are weak against themselves.
** Each Beast has their own unique triangles and weaknesses.
*** The "Unknown" type which Solomon and his demons belong to is actually [[spoiler:Beast I]], and they deal double damage to the Knight class triangle, take double damage from the Cavalry class triangle, deal neutral damage to Ruler and equally resist and deal half damage to Avenger.
*** Beast II simply takes and deals neutral damage to all classes, except Avengers.
*** Beast III-R is defensively neutral to all classes ''except'' Alter Ego, which deals bonus damage to them. It is offensively neutral to all.
** Beyond the Servant classes, there is a well-hidden second set of stats that sort Servants by what grade of Servant they are, with the designations Earth, Man, Sky, Star, and Beast. They're mentioned in EMIYA's interlude and near the end of Chapter 4 by Tesla and Da Vinci, and the damage is at most modified by 10%, so it's not something you'd notice in normal gameplay unless a Servant has a skill or NP that directly relates to it (Raikou's third skill and Tesla's NP do bonus damage to Servants with the Earth or Sky traits, for example).
*** Da Vinci in chapter 4 explains how the triangle between the first three works: Earth represents legends and stories, Man are those who actually existed in history or were completely unknown, and Sky are those who were Gods or Divine. Earth beats Man because they're more powerful then regular humans, Man beats Sky because humanity can rebel against the gods, and Sky beats Earth because gods have dominion over heroes in stories.
* TalkingToHimself: Invoked. During the Journey to the West event, Mordred/Red Boy appeals to her mother Nightingale/Princess Iron Fan that the former is the latter son because they have the same voice. Both of them are voiced by [[Creator/MiyukiSawashiro the same person]] indeed.
* TakeMyHand: [[spoiler: Mash, recently revived by Fou, manages to do this for the protagonist when the path they're on collapses before they make it to the exit to Solomon's Temple.]]
* TakesOneToKillOne:
** Berserkers having MutualDisadvantage against most classes (except Shielder and Foreigner), has this towards other Berserkers.
** Foreigners' weakness aside from Alter Ego is also itself.
** Certain Servants have KryptoniteFactor against certain enemies due to their traits [[{{Irony}} carries those traits themselves]] like Karna, Siegfried, Jack the Ripper and MHX, making them weak against their own Noble Phantasms.
** Lorewise, certain chapters in main story involved non-Servant beings like human soldiers and Yagas who are able to fight off monsters and other summoned beings, yet completely helpless against Servants. Their only hope against them is to have some of them in their side.
* TakeThat:
** During Brynhild's Trial Quest, several Helter Skelters interrupted her dialogue, in which she commented that they must have been brought by "that damnable [[VideoGame/FireEmblem fire emblem...]]" before focusing to kill them for interrupting her dialogue.
** Da Vinci find the idea of having put [[Literature/TheDaVinciCode codes into her paintings]] to be both silly and demeaning.
* TeenageWasteland: [[spoiler:The nature of Gotterdammerung Lostbelt is some sort of this. Here, the humans only have up to 25 years to live and once one reached that age, the Valkyries will take him/her to be [[ToServeMan fed to the giants]].]]
* TemporaryOnlineContent: True to mobage tradition, certain Servants, Craft Essences, and Mystic Codes are only available for a limited time, as either missable event content or locked behind a limited-time gacha. However, the developers eventually put event content like the latter two in the Rare Prism shop. The former returning to the game remains dependent on when they decide to do another limited rate-up gacha or rerun the event.
* ThematicThemeTune: "Shikisai", the theme song for part 1, is mainly written from Mash's perspective, or more specifically [[spoiler:the mindset she has when going into the final battle, rejecting Solomon's vision of immortality even as she's dying, trying to live every moment to the fullest as a human.]]
* ThemeMusicPowerup: Some Noble Phantasms get this treatment, temporarily replacing the soundtrack while the animation plays with a small snippet of their related theme.
** Altria (her vanilla Saber version only) gets "Sword of Promised Victory" from VideoGame/FateHollowAtaraxia when she uses Excalibur.
** The original EMIYA gets his theme, "EMIYA" when he uses Unlimited Blade Works.
** Nero has a choir version of her theme from VideoGame/FateExtra, "Everything is in Your Hands" (the version that plays in ''CCC'' to be specific) when she uses Laus Saint Claudius, and her Bride counterpart uses a different arrangement. Her Swimsuit version uses a new arrangement of the same song for her Noble Phantasm.
** After the Chapter 5 update, Tamamo also has her theme music, "Extra Life with Anyone She Wants".
** Santa Alter has... "Jingle Bells". No, really.
** Ryougi Shiki (either one) gets her theme, "Seventh Heaven", from the ''LightNovel/KaraNoKyoukai'' movie series.
** Gilgamesh's updated animation gives him his {{Leitmotif}} from ''Fate/Extra CCC'', "Cosmic Air".
** Iskander has "You Are My King" and Dress of Heaven has "Silver Moon" from ''Fate/Zero''.
** Rider Kintoki has rock music play when using Golden Drive.
** [[spoiler: Mash's true Noble Phantasm, Lord Camelot, comes with a remix of the [[TitleThemeDrop title theme]].]]
** Illya and Chloe have music from the ''Prisma Illya'' anime play when using their NP. Chloe has "Shoujo Yo, Hoshi ni Nare", which is in turn a remix of "Starlog", the original opening theme music.
** After an update, Altera has her theme from ''Fate/Extella'' play when using Photon Ray.
** After much requesting from fans and her own voice actor, Bathory finally has her theme song, "Fresh Blood Demoness" from ''Extra CCC'' when using her NP.
** BB gets a remix of the "BB Channel" theme.
** Swimsuit Helena has an electronic theme, befitting the NP's cyberpunk aesthetic.
** Swimsuit Nobunaga plays rock music on her guitar for her NP.
** Osakabe-hime has soft Japanese music, enhancing the atmosphere of a Japanese princess walking on the castle roof at night.
** Kiara has "Anima Ataraxia", her [[spoiler: TrueFinalBoss]] theme from ''Fate/Extra CCC''.
** Abigail has sickly-sounding string instruments play as she unleashes unworldly horrors on the enemy.
** Scathach-Skadi's theme [[https://youtu.be/97l1f9xAtSQ is imperious in tone]], complete with a OneWomanWail.
** As part of the MagicalGirl AffectionateParody, Shuten-douji's Caster version has [[https://youtu.be/abHaZA6bQHU an upbeat Japanese tune]].
** In the story itself, "Sword of Promised Victory" plays in Shinjuku as Altria Alter [[spoiler:destroys the meteor rubble above the city with Excalibur Morgan.]]
** In Shimosa Province, [[spoiler:Sengo Muramasa has a new arrangement of "EMIYA" play as he prepares his NP against Amakusa.]]
* ThereCanBeOnlyOne: [[spoiler:SE.RA.PH once again operates by these rules in the ''CCC'' crossover, as the protagonist must eliminate the other 127 Servants to escape. Well, in theory, anyway...]]
* TheThreeFacesOfAdam: Cu Chulainn's three alternate versions are modeled after this. The Prototype version is defined by his warrior feats against the near infinite army of Connacht and explicitly referred as younger than usual, making him the Hunter. His Alter is the Lord, a what-if scenario where he's a king and changes his land to fit his ideals for better or worse. His Caster version is the Prophet, preferring to watch the story unfold and acting as a guide for his Master when needed.
* ThresholdGuardian: Nearly all enemy Servants are this; even ones that supposedly are helping Solomon. Altria Alter (both Saber and Lancer) openly comment that they are a barrier to prove whether the Main Character is worthy of moving forward.
* ThunderboltIron: One of the ascension materials, the Meteoric Horseshoe, is made from this. Its flavor text notes that though it's made up of the same materials any earthborn horseshoe would have, it's special because it wasn't forged on Earth and from a meteor.
* TimeCrash: [[spoiler:Normally sacrificing a Divine Spirit to the Ark would, at worst, just destroy the surrounding area but since it's in a singularity, this is what would happen.]]
* TimeTravel: The plot involves traveling to singularities/Lostbelts, which are a kind of corrupted version of history that have been partially severed from the normal flow of time and need to be repaired. Real-time travel to whenever you please is not actually possible without using something like Kaleidoscope.
** Chaldea's version of time travel can only go to the past and BB's hacking is the only reason they could rayshift the protagonist to the future for one special occasion in the ''CCC'' crossover.
** [[spoiler:Due to the unique nature of SE.RA.PH's digitization of the ocean, a localized version of this can occur by going upwards through the path created by SE.RA.PH as certain heights correspond to a certain point in time. Meltlilith uses Virgin Laser Palladion to launch her two hours in real time back to her first meeting with the protagonist. BB pulls a similar trick by transporting everyone before they died to two minutes before that happened.]]
** [[spoiler:The enemies in ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'' have removed humanity and imposed certain time periods on Earth but they have to keep AlternateUniverse stitched to each of their individual lines of time (their "lostbelts") via a Phantasy Tree or else the timeline is denied and collapses. The new mobile base can enter the new timeline.]]
* TimeyWimeyBall: Seemingly averted as at the end of [[VisualNovel/FateStayNight Sasaki Kojirou's]] Interlude, you get scolded for letting him mark his name on the colosseum wall, saying that it could've caused issues in the future.
* TitleDrop: Obviously, the mission to save humanity, which is known as the Grand Order. However, the mission was named for "the oldest and greatest order of mankind", a policy amongst mages to never commit suicide and to continue living so they can continue their bloodlines. [[spoiler:The Final Order, however, reveals the ''very'' sinister truth about the original Grand Order: it is an AncientConspiracy to allow Goetia to seed himself across three thousand years in the form of seventy-two agents so that he can create the Singularities.]]
* TitleThemeDrop:
** At the end of the America chapter, [[spoiler:the player fights Halphas while [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_cpYEzB59bo a remix of the main menu theme]] is playing in the background.]]
** [[spoiler: Mash's true Noble Phantasm, Lord Camelot, plays a remix of the title theme.]]
** TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon, [[spoiler: Grand Time Temple Salomon]], features a lot of remixes of the title theme, the main menu theme, and even the opening theme, "Shikisai".
* TomesOfProphecyAndFate: Well, tablet actually (paper wasn't invented yet), but Caster Gilgamesh sends the heroes to search for one of these during the Babylonia chapter, in hopes that it might have information that could help them. After retrieving it, Gilgamesh uses it and his magic to show the protagonist a cryptic vision. [[spoiler: It's later revealed to be a glimpse into "Solomon"'s motive for incinerating the Human Order.]]
* TooAwesomeToUse: Several examples:
** The Command Seals. When you have three of them activate, you can fully revive your party and fill up their NP gauge. While this is incredibly powerful, it takes 24 hours for a Command Seal to recharge, totaling about 3 days to fully recharge your Command Seals. Many would agree that this should only be used in the toughest boss fights as a comeback mechanic when your entire party is wiped.
** Saint Quartz. Obtaining them is ''incredibly'' limited and there are finite ways to obtain them such as daily logins, weekly missions, increasing the Bond level of your higher tier Servants as a reward, doing quests and Interludes, compensation for maintenances, event rewards, or [[BribingYourWayToVictory spending real life money for them]]. They are used for particular Saint Quartz summoning events where the player can potentially get a Servant or a Craft Essence that is 4 stars or more. In fact, it is not uncommon for players to save up months worth of Saint Quartz for a specific Summoning Quartz summon event where a particular servant's drop rate is either increased, or obtaining a limited Servant that cannot be obtained normally via the regular Summoning Quartz summon.
** The Holy Grail item for Palingenesis. They are considered to be the rarest item in the game for Palingenesis where you can only obtain them either through completing singularities in the main storyline, or completing certain special events. Many players will strictly use them in servants that are 4 star or above (or certain lower rarity servants that are SimpleYetAwesome).
** Crystallized Lores are the material used to increase a Servant's skill to level 10 but they are only obtainable through the Rare Prism shop or through events by either 1.) completing a challenge quest, 2.) using a high number of the rarest event currency to buy one, 3.) reaching the tenth raffle box, or 4.) grinding several million points.
* TouchedByVorlons:
** The Babylonia chapter reveals microorganisms from a meteor infected plants and animals in Mesoamerica, transforming the plants and animals into divine spirits and tying them into the prehistoric.
** [[spoiler:A major qualifications for the Foreigner class is having contact with an Outer God and resisting the madness that comes with it. Abigail Williams had been used as a vessel for the Outer God Räum attempts to summon, while Katsushika Hokusai had contact with another upon stumbling into a dimensional rift Abigail had created.]]
* TournamentArc:
** The Nero Festival events are these with several teams of Servants competing against one another to win the tournament. There were tiers of increasing difficulty that would change every 3 days of the event.
** Mysterious Heroine X's interludes are about her participating in a tournament to defeat the most famous Sabers.
** Kojirou's interlude is about him conquering Nero's colosseum.
** Shimosa is set up as a tournament of Musashi against seven swordmasters, with the FinalBoss as her final match and the ending text being "Grand Slam".
** Quetzacoatl's interlude is about her in an MMA tournament arranged by Mash to entertain her, with her going up against Ruler Martha, Assassin of Shinjuku, and Sherlock Holmes.
* TrailersAlwaysLie: Several trailers have had false details in them, fooling players into assuming what's going to happen in the story.
** The one for Garden of Order had Diarmuid in it but he doesn't show up anywhere. Likewise, Medea Lily plays no role nor do Azaka and Illya ever interact.
** The one for America had Diarmuid wielding swords, hinting he would appear as a Saber, but you only fight him as a Lancer.
** The "Fate/Accel Zero Order" trailer shows the iconic Lancelot and Gilgamesh dogfight, now with Mash and has young Waver with Kayneth, neither of which actually happens in the event story.
** Shinjuku's PV has Dantes fighting against Yan Qing, [[spoiler:which doesn't actually happen in the story. Nor does the group assembled at the end of the trailer actually come to be in the story proper as Holmes had disguised himself as Dantes, and the latter only shows up briefly for the final battle.]]
** Nero Bride ultimately plays no role in SE.RA.PH, only providing a brief appearance at the start of the chapter and even then it's the original version of Nero. She appears in the second part only as OG Nero. Moreover, the original trailer literally lies and implies that the event is another funny gag event, whereas the second trailer, released after the event revealed itself as a gruesome gaiden chapter, is accurate.
** Salem's PV depicts the male protagonist and Mash in circus attire with a circus tent in the background. However in the game, the heroes aren't circus performers and are pretending to be part of an acting troupe.
* TrailersAlwaysSpoil: The Gotterdamerung trailer reveals [[spoiler:that Surtr goes on the rampage and Sigurd has to fight him, which are major plot twists for that arc.]]
* TranslatorMicrobes: Chaldea provides translation charms for their staff to allow them to understand anyone from any time period.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:U-V]]
* UndergroundMonkey:
** Several enemies have multiple variations with different coloring like golems being made of different kinds of rock or crystal, or even snowmen and biscuits. The main difference between enemy types in gameplay are the skills they use and class.
** In the Babylonia Singularity (which actually tries to avert this trope by introducing a wave of enemies with completely new animations), the player spars with Uruk Spartan Soldiers (Uruk soldiers trained by Leonidas), but they're just renamed Roman soldiers from the Rome Singularity, complete with gladius and scutum.
** The four Irisviels that were created from the corrupted Holy Grail's essence are all recolored versions of Dark Irisviel with different skills, lines, and [=NPs=].
** Played for laughs in the gag Riyo event. Altera and Billy show up to play the role of Wyatt Earp and Doc Holiday respectively, but while Altera really gets into it, Billy admits he's not entirely sure who he's supposed to be, or why they're reusing assets in such a half-assed way. Later, Altera comes back as Buffalo Bill. Naturally, she still looks and speaks exactly the same as always. Or rather, exactly the same as a meme version of her character.
* UnderTheSea:
** One of the stages in Agartha is the Undersea Dragon Palace, where the protagonist and co. have their final encounter with Dahut.
** The entire setting of SE.RA.PH is technically one as it takes place in a sinking oil rig.
* UndyingLoyalty: As Bond EXP goes up, some Servants will vow to always serve and protect their Master.
* UnlockableContent: Beating certain points in the game's story will give the player more content.
** Each Singularity has a set of Servants associated with it that can be only summoned after beating it, and even then they can only be summoned from the main story gacha or event banners with them featured:
*** Caster Cu Chulainn and Saber Alter from Fuyuki.
*** Caster Gilles from Orleans.
*** Nero from Rome.
*** Medea (Lily) from Okeanos.
*** Nikola Tesla and Lancer Altria (Alter) from London.
*** Medb, Cu Chulainn (Alter), Li Shuwen and Thomas Edison from E Pluribus Unum.
*** Lancer Altria, Gawain, Tristan, and Bedivere from Camelot.
*** Quetzalcoatl, Gorgon and Jaguar Warrior from Babylonia.
*** EMIYA (Alter) from Shinjuku.
*** Rider of the Resistance/[[spoiler:Christopher Columbus]] from Agartha.
*** Kato Danzo and Saber Empireo/[[spoiler:Yagyu Tajima-no-kami Munenori]] from Shimosa Province.
*** Caster of Midrash/[[spoiler:The Queen of Sheba]] from Salem.
*** Antonio Salieri from Anastasia.
*** Sitonai from Gotterdammerung. Unique in that she only became available several months later during the Oniland event before being added to the story gacha.
*** Red Hare and Yu Miaoyi from SIN. Doubly so in Yu's case [[spoiler:since she's Hinako, and she ''has'' to die at the end of SIN in order to ascend to the Throne of Heroes as a Servant.]]
** Most events can only be done after beating Fuyuki, with others requiring players to go further and beat certain Singularities. To play any ''Epic of Remnant'' chapter, you must clear Salomon Temple.
** SE.RA.PH, while a big crossover event meant to draw in new players like prior crossover events, is also an ''Epic of Remnant'' chapter, and so was only accessible upon beating Salomon Temple.
** Some events include a Challenge Quest only accessible for players that beat Salomon Temple.
** The third Christmas event, "Merry Christmas in the Netherworld", can be only participated by players who beat Babylonia before and during the event period.
* TheUnmasquedWorld: [[spoiler: What Scheherazade was intending to do by crashing Laputa, effectively exposing magic and weaken it to the point where Servants could no longer be summoned, finally allowing her to rest at peace.]]
* UpgradeArtifact: The Holy Grails have been used as these for Servants throughout the game.
** The Palingenesis mechanic lets you use them on Servants to go beyond the normal level cap and level them up to 100.
** In America, Medb uses a grail to empower Cu Chulainn Alter, making him even more deadly.
** In Babylonia, [[spoiler: Gorgon uses one to make herself divine and also borrow one of Tiamat's authorities, making her more powerful than she usually would be.]]
* UrbanFantasy: Shinjuku is a return to the Nasuverse's roots with Servants duking it out in a densely populated urban environment. Also, the Servant antagonists have directly recruited {{Muggle}} gang members as their mooks, providing them with drugs that give them temporary Magic Circuits and have been given genetically engineered Chimeras as enforcement.
* UnrevealAngle:
** Throughout the first segment of ''Moonlight/Lostroom'', [[spoiler:Dr. Roman]] is kept at specific angles that don't exactly show him, but the audience is able to [[TheVoice hear him]] and see his hands.
** The same also applies to the owner of the mysterious hands that take [[spoiler:one of Solomon's rings]] in TheStinger of the aforementioned OVA.
* TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon: [[spoiler: Grand Time Temple Solomon]], the [[BigBad Big Bad's]] fortress that has been summoned to the year 2016, right before the extinction of humanity, acts as this for the first arc.
* VirtualPaperDoll: Servants can be freely switched between three different outfits and a costume store introduced with the Summer 2016 event rerun allows players to buy alternate costumes like swimsuits and casual outfits for Servants albeit certain conditions need to be fulfilled before unlocking the costumes, like beating a certain quest or having them at max level. Currently, only Mash (has two), Medb, 4* Saber Nero, Parvati, Astolfo, Jeanne Alter, and Arthur (Prototype) have these alternate costumes.
* VirtualTrainingSimulation: Chaldea provides several as part of their way to train Masters and Servants. It serves as the tutorial while you wait for entrance into the main building.
** It's also explained later that the daily quests in Chaldea Gate are these as well. The game [[LampshadeHanging warns against]] thinking about ''why'' you get [[ImpossibleItemDrop special drops]] from them in Sherlock's trial quest.
** Several interludes have the Servants using the sim with varying degrees of success, like Fergus using simulations of several women to attempt flirting or Jing Ke going through a recreation of her assassination attempt to see if it could be pulled off successfully.
** Edison has his own installed in his castle and goes through one before leading his army against the Celts.
* VitriolicBestBuds: The Knights of the Round Table bicker, squabble and attack each other constantly, but there's no hard feelings on any sides anymore even though almost all of them betrayed or screwed over their beloved king in one way or another. Even setting that aside, Mordred killed Gawain while Lancelot killed his younger siblings.
** Dr Roman and Da Vinci constantly bicker, with him calling her a pervert and her threatening to "straight-up murder" him for being so annoying. They still clearly trust and care about each other anyway. There's also a sort of one-sided version of this in Dr Roman's relationship with Mash: he's nice to her but can't help being annoying, so she never hesitates to completely roast him.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:W-Y]]
* WackyRacing: The theme for the Summer 2017 event as various Servants, some in swimsuits, pair up to win a death race. The second part still continues it as they race to break out of jail first with the explanation that Isthar's still filming them and need something to keep the audience entertained. It's all an excuse Ishtar whipped up to get Servants to complete a ritual for her to remove the Singularity.
* WakeUpCallBoss:
** You fight Saber Alter at the end of the Fuyuki prologue, and if you don't kill her fast enough, you'll learn that unlike the shadow Servants you've faced thus far, enemy Servants can and will use their Noble Phantasms once they've charged up that bar below their HP bar.
** The first Demon Pillar is fought near the end of the Septem chapter and sets the standard for future Demon Pillar fights to come, boasting a boatload of HP and weaknesses that [[TrialAndErrorGameplay the player won't know until they find out for themselves]]. Additionally, ''every'' attack it makes is [=AoE=], spelling TotalPartyKill for an underleveled and underbuffed party.
* WeAllLiveInAmerica: Even though Chaldea's employees and the Servants they summon hail from all over the globe, they all treat Japanese holidays like Golden Week and White Day as commonplace things to celebrate mainly because the developers and primary target audience of this game are Japanese and subsequently tailor the aforementioned holidays into the game.
* WebcomicTime: The game is supposed to happen in real time with each holiday marking that holiday passing by for Chaldea in the game, but production delays for events or the main story's chapters has caused the ratio of real time to what's happening in-game to be a bit skewed. One such example would be the storyline for ''Cosmos in the Lostbelt'' as the three month hiatus between its prologue and first major chapter ''did'' happen in-game, but the interval between the first chapter and second chapter is nigh-instantaneous in the story despite there being about two months in between release.
* WeatherControlMachine: Babbage and Paracelsus used the Grail to power one of these, spewing the demonic fog everywhere in London.
* WeirdSun: It's observed that the sun in the second Lostbelt is seemingly much larger which is odd because the surface would be ''scorched'' if the sun really was that close to Earth and it also never seems to move from its position. [[spoiler:It's because it was magically warped to serve as the prison for Surtr in this pruned timeline.]]
* WhamEpisode:
** London is the game's first true wham episode. [[spoiler: It introduces the concept of Grand Servants, the original seven Servants who were meant to be summoned to fight against a threat against humanity. The Servant system used in Fuyuki is the toned-down version for summoning non-Grands as mere backup to the Grand Servants; these Servants, these beings who are incomparably more powerful than human beings, are ''cheap, disposable familiars'' compared to Grand Servants and the things Grands are meant to fight. (And the phrasing of the explanation, and context of the chapter overall, is meant to make it clear that, yes, this is all meant to be back-ported to ''F/SN'' and other works.) And then we find out the Grand Caster, Solomon, is the BigBad and is working completely contrary to the purpose of his summoning. Oh, and those Grails you were collecting? Largely worthless in the grand scheme of things. Recovering them alone won't fix the problem.]]
** The very end of America reveals that [[spoiler:Mash's powers are killing her. Not slowly either, but ''rapidly''.]]
** [[WordofGod Nasu]] talked in an interview about how Chapter 6 and 7 would be the turning point of the entire game. At the start of Camelot, Dr. Roman reveals [[spoiler:Shielder's origins and place in Chaldea, how and why she became a Demi-Servant and the fact that Mash won't live past 18.]] It's also mentioned that this singularity is the ''only one'' not related to the BigBad. Also in Camelot, Sherlock Holmes reveals [[spoiler: Solomon incinerating humanity is part of a different plan, humanity was already going to die in 2016 due to something else and Olga Marie's father won the Fuyuki Holy Grail War of 2004 in ''GO'''s timeline.]]
** Babylonia finally explains a concept long foreshadowed yet unexplained by the rest of the ''Franchise/{{Nasuverse}}'', [[spoiler: the Beast-class]]. [[spoiler:The Beasts are seven embodiment of humanity's evils and are the very threat that the Heroic Spirit Summoning system, and by extension the Grand Servants, are meant to combat, and they are by far ''leagues'' more powerful than everything faced before. This chapter introduces Beast II, Tiamat, representing the sin of Regression. The final chapter reveals that the BigBad is Beast I, King Goetia, and that ''Fou'' is Beast IV, better known among Nasuverse veterans as ''Primate Murder''.]]
** Salomon, being the GrandFinale of the first arc, drops several major bombshells. [[spoiler: The Solomon that's been acting as the BigBad is actually Beast I inhabiting his dead corpse. Mash dies using Lord Camelot to defend against Goetia's Ars Almadel Salomonis. Dr. Roman reveals that he's the actual Solomon, who was summoned by Maris Billy for the Holy Grail War and used his wish to become human, shortly before he uses Ars Nova to remove himself from the Throne of Heroes and remove Goetia's immortality. And Fou gives up his power and intellect as Beast IV to resurect Mash with a normal lifespan.]]
** Shinjuku reveals that [[spoiler:Solomon's Ars Nova failed to wipe out all of Goetia's Pillars. Four of them are still around, coming up with various schemes. Hence the title, ''Epic of Remnant'', as the story of dealing with the Demon Pillars' remnants.]]
** The May 2017 crossover event with ''[[VideoGame/FateExtra Fate/Extra CCC]]'' is also this. [[spoiler: At the end of the event intro, right after BB has taunted you for thinking this would be easy, the "BB-chan's Revenge" banner ''shatters'' into the proper ''Epic of Remnant'' chapter title screen, revealing that this "event" is in fact [=EoR=] Chapter Extra: The Deep Sea Cyber-Nirvana - SE.RA.PH. The event is a full-bore, no-nonsense story chapter, with the attendant slew of new graphics, maps, missions, Servants, game mechanics (including two new playable Classes), and a story mode as big as any other chapter's, doled out over the course of a week.]]
** Salem is an enormous wham episode, despite being quiet, tense Lovecraftian horror for most of it. [[spoiler:In the opening, the singularity surrounding Salem and Danvers is manifesting in ''present day'' and is seven kilometers across - in some ways, this is an even bigger [[BrokenMasquerade masquerade breaker]] than the missing 18 months caused by the Goetia incident. Moreover, by the end of it, so much effort is required to contain the final threat of the singularity that Chaldea itself may have to be disbanded to keep things quiet. Oh, and let's not forget the wham of the confirmation that the Outer Gods that Lovecraft described absolutely do exist in the Nasuverse and they are ''not friendly''. When one attempts to manifest using a certain medium in the singularity, it easily rises to be a Beast-level threat.]]
** The prologue to the second storyline of the game is not kind to the player (you) and your team. [[spoiler:The Mage's Association forcibly turns off the Chaldea summoning system, banishes all the protagonist's previously summoned servants, sends a whole new staff and a new head to Chaldea (Da Vinci and even ''you'' were fired) and brings in a PMC force to deal with any protests, basically shutting off any means to deal with any danger humanity will face for the time being. Worse, ''Kotomine Kirei himself'' joined the fray means the church is involved in the mess too. Then they get attacked by Anastasia and her army, as both Kotomine and Konyanskaya are collaborating with them to take control of Chaldea, with the onslaught reducing the number of Chaldea's remaining employees from 40 to 8, Da Vinci gets brutally impaled by Kotomine with his bare hands, and the protagonists are forced to abandon the observatory, and the antagonists begin the process of erasing history. Even worse, seven Masters from Chaldea are revealed to be going along with this, with the aims of bringing back the Age of Gods.]] The saving grace is that [[spoiler:Holmes secretly evacuated the servants and hid their Saint Graphs for insurance, da Vinci managed to get a backup body and she brought a backup Saint Graph database along with them so they still have access to their Servants]], but for the time being things will be ''very'' bleak.
** Lostbelt 3 provides a number of shakeups. [[spoiler:Koyanskaya is revealed to be Tamamo Vitch, Sion Eltnam joins the team, the first True Ancestor who isn't Arceuid is introduced, and Spartacus is [[KilledOffForReal permanently erased from Chaldea's roster]] due to his HeroicSacrifice severely crippling his Saint Graph, proving that not even Servants are immune to FinalDeath.]]
* WhamLine:
** [[spoiler:Fou explains what he is to Mash in the void:]]
--> ''I feed on humanity's battles, growth, envy, and regret and use it for my characteristic as a beast to "become stronger than the enemy". The beast of calamity, [[spoiler: Cath Palug]]. In a different time and place, I might have been called [[spoiler:the great killer of primates - [[{{VisualNovel/Tsukihime}} Primate Murder]]]].''
** [[spoiler:Caster Limbo reveals the existence of TheManBehindTheMan who was simply using the parallel version of Shimosa as an experiment for future plans.]]
--> ''Having it appear in Chaldea was a failure; however, it left behind some good sample data. Anyway, finally, finally I succeeded in discovering the lost history. [[spoiler:This Shimosa]] is distorted compared to the original. A world that is terminated without being destroyed, a pruning event. It is not that. Then a parallel world? Ish. It's close but not the same. So this is different. This is something else. [[spoiler:This Shimosa]] is human history but not human history. It is a different world that a different earth's god observes with their different eyes. [[spoiler:An otherworld that is falsely similar to a singularity! Fuhahahahahah, no no no no. Using that temporary name was too funny and even more so using Satan!! I intended it to be a joke, but it went quite well. It was one of that Necromancer's favorite things. Even so, Doman, you were supposed to be above practical jokes right. So I was rude, my dear ally ----- sama'']]
** The ending of Götterdämmerung, confirming the existence of a certain character in the ''Grand Order'' timeline to greet the player upon [[spoiler:arrival at the Wandering Sea]]:
--> [[spoiler:''Welcome to the Primordial Mage Workshop, the Wandering Sea of Baldanders! I am Sion. [[VideoGame/MeltyBlood Sion Eltnam Sokaris]]. A spiritron hacker who managed to predict and call the end of this world, escaped to the Wandering Sea, and have since waited for your arrival. The final remaining member of the Atlas Institute.'']]
* WhatMeasureIsANonHuman: This is touched upon in London as Mash expresses discomfort at fighting homunculi as she empathizes with them since she [[spoiler:too is technically an artificial human.]]
* WhatTheHellHero: Mash really chews out [[spoiler: her "dad", Lancelot]] for [[spoiler: going along with the Lion King's plans despite knowing exactly what it entailed.]]
* WhenDimensionsCollide: A Lostbelt stitches on an AlternateHistory to Earth to rewrite reality in favor of the altered timeline.
* WholePlotReference: The Shimosa chapter is pretty much "''F/GO'' does ''Makai Tensho''", straight down to using a whole bunch of the same characters (just swapping out Jubei for Musashi). This is extra hilarious as ''Makai Tensho'' was a major inspiration for ''Fate'' in the first place. [[spoiler:It also may well be this ''in-universe'', as the whole thing was constructed by Doman and it seems like he was largely just having a lark with his experiment concerning using Lostbelts.]]
* WolverinePublicity: Likely the main reasons why Altria Pendragon (Saber) and her clones, Gilgamesh, and EMIYA are promoted heavily in marketing and feature prominently in the opening, as they're the most known characters of the ''Fate'' franchise.
* WoodenShipsAndIronMen: As the setting of the Third Order, Okeanos, is the Age of Discovery, this is inevitable. Battles of cannon fires at point blank range, sea monsters and bandits blocking the way, treacherous weather disturbing navigations, and [[BadassCrew several crews composed of Heroic Spirits]], the main draw of this Order is just how action-packed it is.
* WorldOfMammals: [[spoiler:The first Lostbelt the ''Shadow Border'' arrives in is a history inhabited solely by humanoid wolves. There are no humans besides Servants summoned there, the stationed Crypter, and Chaldea.]]
* WorldTree: [[spoiler:Each Lostbelt has its own gigantic Phantasy Tree which must be sustained until it can fully replace proper human history. It's noted by Holmes that these aren't a natural phenomenon and are probably not from this world.]]
* WretchedHive: Shinjuku, a decaying modern city overflowing with mages, mercenaries, and monsters. It literally has a magic barrier meant to keep most Servants who aren't evil-aligned from entering. It would not be out of place in the ''Franchise/ShinMegamiTensei'' franchise.
* [[SciFiWritersHaveNoSenseOfScale Writers Have No Sense of Scale]]: In the America chapter, while time does pass while moving between each stage on the map the writers still clearly underestimated just ''how much'' time it would take just due to America's sheer size. As an example, the journey from from Denver, Colorado to Deming, New Mexico is treated as lasting overnight with the player sleeping through the journey. In reality, it takes about 200 hours to walk that distance. Possibly justified with the superhuman Servants, who could conceivably have carried the player and moved quicker than he/she could on these extremely long trips.
* {{Wutai}}: While this game's setting is not a ConstructedWorld unlike most examples of this trope are in, the Shimosa chapter was notably the only Eastern Asia-themed main story chapter so far[[note]]While Fuyuki and Shinjuku are also set in Japan, it's modern day or close enough to the point where Japanese elements aren't very prominent.[[/note]] for three years, with the introduction of SIN a year later. Both very much play up the Asian aspect, with only token Western Servants and the Chaldea crew as the only foreign aspects of the story.
* YearInsideHourOutside:
** The island from the summer 2016 event is revealed to have this property in Part II, meaning that in the short timespan that the heroes left the island, the boars on the island developed intelligence, formed a civilization using the leftover infrastructure as a base, and then for the civilization to fall apart before the heroes returned.
** [[spoiler:One hundred minutes spent in SE.RA.PH is equivalent to ten minutes in the outside world. The Seraphix staff dejectedly understand this means it would take over fifty years for them to get rescued by Chaldea.]]
* YearOutsideHourInside: [[spoiler:Imaginary Number Space has this effect on the ''Shadow Border'' as the protagonists have only experienced a week inside, but by the time they leave, it's already been three months to the Crypters. Da Vinci notes it's entirely dependent on the tides and how it's acting up at the moment, so the exact ratio for Imaginary Number Space time to time on Earth is in flux.]]
* YouDontLookLikeYou: Bašmu who appear in Babylonia look like blue and yellow PaletteSwap of the regular Dragon enemies, even though in ''Apocrypha'' the ones summoned by Semiramis look like green serpentine creatures. Especially notable in that when Semiramis was added into the game, she summons a Bašmu that looks like it does in ''Apocrypha''.
[[/folder]]

* AbhorrentAdmirer: While a lot of the female Servants have a thing for the protagonist and they know it, they're flat out scared of some, annoyed by others or just unwilling to deal with them.
** During Halloween 2016, for example, {{Yandere}}s Raikou and Kiyohime literally try to sniff the protagonist out at one point (even using NP to reveals them) and the entire party flees from them in terror. They start ''swimming through lava'' to get to the protagonist.
** Swimsuit Lancer Tamamo is more aggressive than her Caster self and Tamamo Cat (as seen with her self-proclaimed nickname: Tamamo ''Shark'') and she's made her desire for the protagonist very clear. She even gives you a drink spiked with ''ketamine'' on Valentine's Day!
** Then there's Artemis and Orion, a pair so annoying that when you do their interludes you consistently get dialogue options like 'go away' and 'I'm not here' in a futile attempt to get them to leave you alone. It seems like Artemis has a bit of a thing for the protagonist as well as Orion, but all they want is for her to solve her own relationship problems and leave them out of it.
* ActionBomb: The Chibi Nobus and most of their variants approach a Servant carrying a ''Hiragumo'' tea kettle and blows themselves up in their critical attack or special attack, though another Nobus will replace them from a portal where the exploded Nobu used to be once they did. The Mecha Nobus even do it as ''normal'' attack.
* ActorAllusion:
** Creator/MamoruMiyano once voiced a [[VisualNovel/SteinsGate character]] who's heavily associated with ''Literature/DrJekyllAndMrHyde'' before.
** Ryougi has a line for Tawara Touta in My Room, whom she thinks sounds a lot like her friend, Mikiya. Both men are voiced by the same person, who is married to Shiki's voice actress.
** This is not the [[Franchise/{{Blazblue}} first time]] Creator/MiyukiSawashiro voiced a character that hates their father's guts because of the latter's actions. If anything, Mordred was the ''luckier'' one even in the context of the Nasuverse version of Myth/ArthurianLegend.
** Mash is not the only character played by Creator/RisaTaneda who fought enemies to protect her senpai. In fact, she's similar to [[LightNovel/StrikeTheBlood Yukina Himeragi]].
** Creator/ShinichiroMiki has played the part of a blue haired [[{{Anime/Pokemon}} Kojiro]] opposite a female Musashi already.
** Anastasia is not the first character played by Creator/YumiHara who [[VideoGame/SenranKagura is a beautiful young woman with ice powers]].
** Sigurd says that the version of Fafnir he remembers was a [[Manga/YuGiOh blue-eyed white dragon]].
*