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Theory:Timeline - Last Great Time War

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This page lists appearances of the Last Great Time War in the order in which it occurred. This timeline is based upon observations of the Doctor Who universe and the events that occur during each of these stories. From these observations we have attempted to build a concise timeline. It is assumed, much like its TV story counterparts that for each novel or audio series their published/numbered order is the order they occur in. This does not apply to short stories which are often ambiguous about their placement. There are also many gaps between stories.

The layout of this timeline is in part based on the observations on Doctor Who Reference Guide and Doctor Who - The Complete Adventures, as well as Lance Parkin's AHistory and other sources that allow us to make observations. None of these sources should be used solely as a source or considered a "true" timeline for stories.

Timeline[[edit source]]

Catalysts[[edit source]]

The Time Lords fire the proverbial first short of the war by instructing the Doctor to wipe out the Daleks before they are even created.
In what one source claims to be the "first skirmish" of the coming war, (AUDIO: The Dalek Conquests) the Daleks develop a time machine which is used to pursue the Doctor and his companions.
The Daleks use temporal manipulation to conquer Earth. Though this timeline is averted, one source suggests that this act brought the Daleks to the attention of the Time Lords, and perhaps motivated them to plot their "future strategy". (AUDIO: The Dalek Conquests)
Another "seed" of the Time War is planted when the Time Lords accept the Doctor's telepathic plea for assistance, sending him to the site of a Dalek army on Spiridon.
The Daleks attempt to send duplicates of the Doctor and his companions to assassinate members of the High Council. Their plan fails as one of their own duplicates destroys the ship that the duplicates of the Doctor and his companions were on.
The Doctor tricks Davros into using The Hand of Omega to turn Skaro's sun into a supernova, thus destroying Skaro.
The Daleks attack Gallifrey, and imprison Romana for twenty years.
The Emperor Dalek states that a great war with an Ancient Enemy has been foretold, a war that will be waged throughout all time and all space. The Cult of Skaro is formed, so the Dalek race will survive.
The Daleks infiltrate the Axis, and attack Gallifrey.
Vayles is sent to meet the Fourth Doctor and to instruct him to destroy the Daleks before they were created, as a method of preventing the infiltration of the Axis.
Narvin from the future (AUDIO: Desperate Measures) attempts to prevent the War.

Tensions rising[[edit source]]

The Time War has yet to be formally declared but tensions are rising between the Time Lords and Daleks. Narvin gives the Master a Chameleon Arch.
The Daleks launch a ship to Gallifrey with four Daleks aboard and a weapon designed to wipe the Time Lords from time. The fact that the Time Lords’ creation is not time locked implies this is early on in the war. The weapon malfunctions and creates temporal shadows of the four Daleks throughout time and space. The Fifth Doctor meets some of these shadows and follows them to their source and diverts the erasure of Gallifrey from time.

War is declared[[edit source]]

Time Lords under Livia officially declare war on the Daleks, after they obliterate many other Temporal Powers. The War Council secretly operates a project in the Death Zone that could result in the resurrection of the dead Time Lords. Romana declares that the CIA and her allies will fight the War their own way and meets with Braxiatel and Ace to discuss a mission, leading into Soldier Obscura.
(CONTEXT)
Although the Doctor first makes contact with the Time War at a later point in the conflict, upon being hit by the wave front that pulls him into the War, his past is rewritten so that he was aware of the Time War from the beginning. (AUDIO: The Starship of Theseus) He refuses to involve himself in the War. (AUDIO: Soldier Obscura)
Ace and Braxiatel depart Gallifrey on their mission for Romana. Braxiatel wipes out Ace's memory and leaves her on the 20th century Earth, while telling Romana that she was killed by the Daleks. Following the loss of Braxiatel and Ace, and the Doctor's refusal to get involved, Romana asks Narvin to summon the Master to perform missions for them.
The Daleks contact Davros for aid directly after the Time War has been formally declared.
Traveling to the first year of the Time War, the War Doctor answers a summons from Davros, and attempts to save him from the Nightmare Child at the Gates of Elysium, but appears to fail.The General is only a commander at this point in the war, setting this prior to any stories where he holds a higher rank.
The Eighth Doctor's TARDIS is caught in the temporal wave caused by the Dalek's use of the Time Destructor.
The Master begins his collection of samples.
The Doctor has been "battered by the storm".
The Master's work in genetics comes to fruition.
The Master has his TARDIS and has been hiding from the Time War in a parallel universe.
The Master contemplates resurrecting Magos, setting this prior to The Castle of Kurnos 5 where he resurrects Magos.
The Eighth Doctor and the War Master swap bodies, and Narvin recruits the Doctor (in the body of the Master) to track down the Master (in the body of the Doctor) and kill him, leading directly into The Edge of Redemption. Narvin is still working for the CIA and appears to have been looking for the Master, setting this after Soldier Obscura.
The Doctor encounters the Scaramancer, an old companion of the Master to aid him in his search.
The Doctor tracks down the Master and they swap bodies back. According to the Master, the leaders of the Time Lords and Daleks are Rassilon and the Dalek Emperor respectively, though he may be speaking literally.
The Master alludes to the latest iteration of the War Council, presumably the one Leela operated as part of. Callous and Xenotopia are mentioned as being planets the Master has destroyed, setting this after Sins of the Father and Darkness and Light. Planets such as Arcking aren't mentioned implying a setting before The Good Master
The Master leads an archaeological expedition on the planet Karsh to uncover the Sublime Port. However, when he opens it, he is met with Bilis Manger, who keeps him trapped on Karsh until he tricks the Master into using the Sublime Port to destroy the planet.
Livia is still President of Gallifrey, setting this prior to Desperate Measures. The Master steals the Anti-Genesis codes, leading directly into The Master's Dalek Plan.
Under the guise of "Master Sorvad", the Master takes control of Skaro and Dalek history. Ending leads directly into Shockwave.
Ending leads directly into He Who Wins.
Ending leads directly into Beneath the Viscoid.
The Master receives an emergency recall signal from Gallifrey, and decides to respond to it, leading directly into The Devil You Know.
The Master has arrived on Gallifrey after he was summoned at the conclusion of Beneath the Viscoid. He and Leela participate in a mission to recover vital information about a potential weapon that could end the Time War. He then throws Leela into the Time Vortex and decides to head for Arcking.
Set directly after The Devil You Know from Leela's perspective.
The N-Forms receive an activation call, setting this before Desperate Measures
The War Doctor travels back in time to the First Segment of the Time War to save Gallifreyan children.

Rassilon resurrected[[edit source]]

Set two months after Celestial Intervention. Some time has passed since Leela went missing in The Devil You Know and the War Council is becoming suspicious about what happened to her and the CIA's other missing field agents. Romana claims that a time lock is ready for activation and Sky trenches are under construction. Valerian proposes the implementation of Bowships into the Time War. Braxiatel briefly returns to aid Romana, before fleeing the war for good. Livia steps down as Lady President and Rassilon returns to lead Gallifrey, which was the Livia's plan all along.
The Master has been posing as "Doctor Keller" on Arcking for six weeks, suggesting as long has passed for him since The Devil You Know. He saves Cole Jarnish, who joins him in the TARDIS.
(SEGMENT)
The Master and Cole have just escaped Arcking, setting this directly after The Good Master. Cole asks the Master to take him to a planet that he can help to save from the Time War. The Master agrees, although refuses to get involved himself. The Master and Cole base themselves on a planet where the Master starts a vineyard while Cole aids the natives. (AUDIO: The Sky Man)
Set shortly after Desperate Measures, with Romana facing an inquisition for her role in arranging secret negotiations with the Daleks. However she is acquitted of all charges by Rassilon and Livia, and is reinstated as Coordinator of the CIA. Rassilon declares that all planets that do not ally with Gallifrey are to be considered enemies and will be invaded for their resources and strategic value. Rassilon dissolves the chancellery guard and replaces it with the newly formed Interior Defence Unit, or IDU. Someone from the future of the war travels back to the present, suggesting the time lock has yet to be implemented. Romana and Narvin decide to form a resistance group against Rassilon's rule.
The Master and Cole have been based on the planet from The Sky Man for a few weeks now. The Master has started his vineyard, although there are no harvestable grapes yet, setting this before The Sincerest Form of Flattery.
The Master has been captured and is sent for trial by the High Vectors.
The trial segment.
The trial segment. The Master requests the Doctor be called as a witness, leading into The Last Line.
The Master escapes his trial.
The Master begins infiltrating the Stagnant Protocol. He drinks wine from his vineyard in The Sky Man, setting this after Boundaries where he hadn't yet cultivated any wine.
The Master uses the virus he cultivated in The Orphan from the sample he obtained in A Quiet Night In. He concludes his takeover of the Stagnant Protocol.
The Sicari collective are summoned by the resistance to assassinate Rassilon, leading directly into Assassins.
Ysalus is the first planet negatively impacted by the Time Lords in the War and Rassilon plans to use it as an example and warning to other planets. Since the events on Ysalus, there is a wider awareness of the Time Lord-Dalek conflict growing across the universe. By this point the the General, the Ollistra and Harlan have all joined the frontline. The Celestial Intervention Agency is disbanded. Specifically, Harlan is beginning work to seed Time Lord training camps across the cosmos and Ollistra has been given special dispensation to work on her own personal projects, suggesting a setting before The Conscript. Rassilon closes the academy for non-Gallifreyan students. The CIA is disbanded and its duties are absorbed by the IDU. Romana recalls the events of Havoc, Partisans and Collateral as having occurred over the past few weeks. After a failed attempt on Rassilon's life, Romana and Narvin are exiled from Gallifrey. They plan to find Leela, who was lost in the time vortex in The Devil You Know. Narvin claims that the Doctor is still running from the Time War, although Romana doubts that he'll stand on the sidelines for much longer. Mantus programs Romana and Narvin's TARDIS to send them straight into the heart of the Time War, leading directly into Hostiles.
Romana and Narvin escape the heart of the Time War by hiding from the conflict in a debris field, setting this directly after Assassins. After answering a distress call, the pair begin to make repairs to their TARDIS, in preparation for their search for Leela.

The Doctor avoids the conflict[[edit source]]

In the history that exists at the story's end, the Doctor has travelled in the sidelines of the War trying to avoid participating. The Doctor escapes from a Time War battle on the Theseus with a group of refugees, and alludes to having lost someone in the attack.
Follows on from The Starship of Theseus.
Follows on from Echoes of War. Assassins indicates this story's setting was established early during the Rassilon presidency.
Follows on from The Conscript. Ollistra is revealed to be investigating an old CIA scheme, although she does refer to the CIA in the present tense.

Susan's War[[edit source]]

The Dalek Combat Training Manual is published. The Time Lords are attempting to locate Susan Foreman.
Susan receives a tesseract that says "Gallifrey needs you to fight the Daleks" and learns that the Eighth Doctor for a long time was creating diversions so that he could remove the cubes from her flat. Time Lords already asked the Doctor to help, but he refused. She decides to return to Gallifrey.
Set immediately after All Hands on Deck, with Susan arriving on a Time Lord flagship after responding to the hypercube. Susan meets Veklin and Rasmus for the first time.
Susan has just arrived on Gallifrey to join the Time War and discusses her role with Rasmus, setting this during Sphere of Influence.
Ending leads directly into Assets of War.
The Time Lords are experimenting on the Orrovix. Susan exiles Rennis to the planet Njagilheim, which is currently unaffected by the Time War, setting this before Nevernor.
Susan is aware that the Celestial Intervention Agency disbanded, setting this after Assassins. Susan is reunited with the Doctor for the first time since All Hands on Deck. Rassilon takes an interest in Susan and wishes to speak to her.
Set shortly after The Shoreditch Intervention.
The War Doctor is aware his younger self is still out there in the segment of the war Susan is from.

Derilobia lost[[edit source]]

Set shortly after One Life.
The Doctor uses a faulty transmat which leads to his DNA reconstituting a copy of the Valeyard who according to The War Valeyard is discovered by the Time Lords and put to work as their agent in the Time War.
Authorial intent places this between Fugitive in Time and The War Valeyard, but before the Time War is temporarily ended.Derilobia as Bliss knew it is gone, setting this after The Lords of Terror.

A cessation of arms[[edit source]]

(REFERENCE)
Working for the Time Lords, The Valeyard is sent on a mission to Grahv to recover a weapon that could be used to wipe a whole species from existence. He successfully uses it on the Daleks, erasing them from history and ending the Time War. However he is trapped in a time lock on Grahv in the process. (AUDIO: The War Valeyard) Rasmus regenerates on the battlefield just as the conflict comes to an end. (AUDIO: Dreadshade)
The War has ended due to the Valeyard wiping all of the Daleks from existence. However the Dalek Time Strategist escapes into the multiverse.
The Doctor and Bliss follow the Time Strategist to another universe, where they discover that he has been rebuilding a Dalek army using Daleks from across the multiverse. The Doctor and Bliss return to their own universe, leading directly into Dreadshade.
Rassilon is currently President of Gallifrey, setting this after Desperate Measures. Rasmus has recently regenerated into a new incarnation, some time around the events of The War Valeyard. The Doctor and Bliss return to Gallifrey, although no one can remember the Daleks anymore.
The Time Strategist and Davros return to the prime universe with their army of multiversal Daleks and the Time War is reignited once more. Davros is imprisoned on Falkus by the Dalek Emperor. The Doctor begins travelling with a alternate version of Alex Campbell.

The Doctor and Cass Fermazzi[[edit source]]

The Doctor and Alex meet Cass Fermazzi and invite her to travel in the TARDIS with them. They also meet Hieronyma Friend who cryptically reveals that the Doctor's travels with Alex must be "blissful", alluding to Bliss's unexplained absence.
The Doctor and Alex take Cass on her first trip in the TARDIS and they encounter Cass's childhood hero Hudson Sage. It is revealed that Hudson has been trapped in a time lock and has met the Doctor before, when he was travelling with a woman called Bliss, whom the Doctor does not remember. The TARDIS console room has its Victorian parlour interior.
The Doctor is beginning to suspect that someone is missing from the TARDIS crew and believes he should be travelling with three companions instead of two. Cass is erased from history and although the Doctor and Alex briefly forget her, they quickly remember and set out to find her.

The fall of Romana[[edit source]]

Romana comments that "those repairs were never going to last" on their TARDIS, suggesting some time has passed since Hostiles. During their search for Leela, Romana and Narvin encounter the Orrovix on war ravaged Njagilheim, setting this after Assets for War.
Romana and Narvin's search for Leela brings them to Unity, where they are finally reunited with their old friend. Romana stays behind to face the Daleks whilst they escape.
Set directly after Unity, specifically from Leela's perspective.
Set directly after Unity and concurrently with the events of Deception, depicting where Narvin and Rayo went while separated from Leela.
Set directly after Unity, with Braxiatel arriving to save Romana from the Daleks. Romana claims she’s heard the Doctor has changed for the worse, suggesting he’s become the War Doctor by this point. Braxiatel flees the Time War once and for all and asks Romana to come with him, however she elects to stay and continue her fight for Gallifrey.
Not long after Beyond. Romana suggests the Doctor wouldn’t have such a problem with weapons now, again implying he’s the War Doctor by this point. Rassilon decides to take more personal control of the War, setting this before any story where Rassilon is leading war plans personally. Romana is trapped in a bubble universe by Rassilon, while Leela is forced to join the War Room. Narvin and Livia's fates are left unknown.

Universe on the brink[[edit source]]

According to Heather Challands, the producer of Allegiance, the Gallifrey War Room range takes place before Night of the Doctor. However this is at odds with Homecoming. Set shortly after Homecoming, with Leela being released from imprisonment to join the War Room.
Leela discovers that Narvin survived the events of Homecoming and has been working with the resistance since then.
The Doctor is still avoiding the Time War, having stood on the sidelines and helped where he could in the past, and has built a robot named Ria to act as his companion. After an encounter with River Song and Bernice Summerfield, Ria is destroyed, and the Doctor decides that it is time to get involved more directly with the Time War, as oppose to avoiding it entirely. According to River's comments, the TARDIS has its Victorian parlour interior design.
The Eighth Doctor uses technology seen as modern in Assets of War.
The Eighth Doctor is trying to minimise the damage caused by the Time War.
The Eighth Doctor comes across a Time Lord-backed operation overseen by Cardinal Ollistra.
The Eighth Doctor travels incognito with Nyssa for a long time on her hospital ship, protecting her from the Time War. The Doctor claims that he is beginning to see nothing but evil on both sides of the conflict, setting this after The Lords of Terror where the Doctor first began to realise the lengths the Time Lords were willing to go to in order to defeat the Daleks.
The Eighth Doctor is travelling alone.
Leela and the General have a disagreement while on a mission on the planet Orrison.
The Daleks test their new Berserker class Dalek on a Gallifreyan outpost, leading to Veklin encountering a Berserker Dalek for the first time. Leela has been confined to the capitol following her disobedience on the Orrison mission, setting this shortly after Collaborators.
Leela is permitted to return to duty for the first time since Collaborators. Ollistra gains possession of a weapon that can erase biodata from the matrix.
Ollistra has been terrorising Gallifrey with her newfound weapon, leading to her temporary suspension from the War Room pending investigation. However she manipulates the other members of the War Room to her advantage and blackmails them for full control of the War Room.
The Eighth Doctor regenerates into the War Doctor with help of the Sisterhood of Karn.

A Warrior emerges[[edit source]]

Set directly after The Night of the Doctor.
The young looking War Doctor makes a decision. In one outcome, he ends up a Dalek spy.
The War Doctor is young and is working with the Sisterhood of Karn.
The War Doctor is working with Time Lord agent Veklin. Prelude to Consequences.
Immediately after Consequences.
The Doctor discovers the War Master's corpse, who was killed by the The Barber-Surgeon while on a mission for the Time Lords.
Leela is working with the War Council, so after The Last Days of Freme for Gallifrey. The Barber-Surgeon erases himself from history, thus restoring everyone he killed, including Leela and The Master.
The War Doctor is hit by a temporal weapon that causes him to cycle through his previous incarnations. In the form of his fourth incarnation he faces the Hyreth on 21st century Earth with the aid of Kate Stewart, Petronella Osgood, Sarah Jane Smith and the Monk. The Doctor is advised to seek out his daughter in order to use her biodata to stablise his degeneration, leading directly into The Artist at the End of Time.
The Doctor, now primarily taking the form of his fifth incarnation encounters Jenny and the Curator at the end of time, although he loses his memory of these events.
Davros is imprisoned on Falkus, setting this after Restoration of the Daleks. The Doctor and Veklin help him escape. Space Station Zenobia is destroyed, setting this after The Passenger. Davros mentions the Daleks' attempt to prevent the genesis of the Time Lords, setting this after Effect and Cause.
The War Doctor is fighting in the War.

The Master flees[[edit source]]

(SEGMENT)
Several months after they first arrived, The Master and Cole flee the planet after Cole's plan to cure the villagers of a plague goes wrong, resulting in the creation of a new cybernetic species. Cole asks the Master to get involved and do something about the Time War, leading directly into The Heavenly Paradigm. (AUDIO: The Sky Man)
Follows directly on from the end of The Sky Man. The Master reveals to Cole that he plans to end the Time War for good. He kills Cole in order to power up the weapon that could end the Time War. When his plan fails, he escapes the war using the Chameleon Arch.

The Malignant threat[[edit source]]

The Doctor fights various battles with the Squire.
The Doctor isn't aware of who wrote the term "Exterminhate" on a wall, placing it before The Organ Grinder, where he meets the Volatix Cabal.
Along with the War Master, the Doctor lands on the Overcast homeworld during the Time War, where his actions on the planet unleash the Malignant.

The weary soldier[[edit source]]

Takes place 400 years after The Night of the Doctor.
Ollistra orders the release of the Great Vampires against the Daleks. Arriving on Zenobia II, the War Doctor protests to Councillor Voltrix in Ollistra's absence.

The Final Day[[edit source]]

The Daleks breach the Sky trench and begin their assault on Arcadia, setting this before The Day of the Doctor.
Priyan tells Engin that Rassilon is initiating the Ultimate Sanction, placing it just before The End of Time.
Set on the last day of the Time War. Dalek saucers are already on Gallifrey, placing it after The Last Day.
Announcing that Gallifrey has fallen, Leela escapes Gallifrey, ending up in the TARDIS of a confused Fourth Doctor. The War Doctor is currently on Gallifrey fighting the Daleks, and sends Leela a Wayfinder so that she might survive the War, setting this before The Day of the Doctor.
The General states that the High Council's plan has failed, therefore placing it later in the last day of the Time War than The End of Time. After an adventure in 16th Century England involving a Zygon invasion, the War, Tenth and Eleventh Doctors return to their barn on Gallifrey. The three Doctors fly to Gallifrey and inform the War Council of their plan to save Gallifrey. They recruit nine of their past selves, as well as a future incarnation and save the planet. Later the War Doctor rengerates.

The Eighth Doctor's War[[edit source]]

The Eighth Doctor is working for the Time Lords during the storm in Heaven.
The Doctor is described as having a frock coat and "shoulder length hair". He knows that he is going to "change" again, but claims that he must do something first, something which involves the Daleks.
The Eighth Doctor escapes the cell and recovers the Key of Rassilon.
The Eighth Doctor uses the Moment to end the Last Great Time War and regenerates into a new incarnation…

Aftermath[[edit source]]

Some recall a recently regenerated Ninth Doctor.
On Earth in 2005, the Ninth Doctor observes that the Nestene Consciousness is still fighting "the war".
After seeing what he believes to be the last Dalek being destroyed, the Doctor deems that the Time War is over.
The Dalek Emperor survives the Time War and ends up in the Sol system circa the year 199,900.
The Bad Wolf calls an end to the Time War by destroying the Emperor and his fleet.
The Siege of Trenzalore is viewed by some as the true final battle of the Time War. (PROSE: The Secret Lives of Monsters)

Currently Unplaced[[edit source]]

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