Interesting Sage Advice re: Aberrations

[Shining Wrath]

unless otherwise noted, or you decide otherwise, aberrations are native to the prime, not far realm


Mind Flayers and the like aren't from some bizarre other plane; they are from a bizarre world right here on the Prime Material, just a portal away. If you so rule, and it's an interesting twist. It explains why they can function on "our" worlds.

Link (https://twitter.com/mikemearls/status/619579049501851648)

Somewhere, there is a planet Thoon ruled by Thoonians, humming a happy thoon.

[pwykersotz]

Or at the very least, they've naturalized. Like Native Outsiders in 3.5.

Still, I laughed at "humming a happy thoon". :smalltongue:

[Naanomi]

Few outsiders ever had real far realm origins. Aboleths are created by a far realm entity but on the (young) Prime. Illithid are from the far future of the Prime. No one really knows where the Beholder goddess game from, but she is thoroughly divine/demonic now and her creations are made, indirectly, from her. Thoon is thoon.

[Inevitability]

I believe it's been this way in other editions too. Beholders and Mind Flayers and the like aren't directly from the Far Realms, they're manifestations of its influence on the material plane. Something actually from the Far Realms themselves would probably be strong enough to pose a serious challenge to 20th-level adventurers.

[Nifft]

Few outsiders ever had real far realm origins. Aboleths are created by a far realm entity but on the (young) Prime. Illithid are from the far future of the Prime.

I'm with you on the illithids, but I thought the 3.5e origin for aboleths was that they were from the previous Prime.

Maybe they're why the gods and titans destroyed the previous prime.

[Naanomi]

Very early in the history of this cosmos, exact time undetermined but before the Gods manifested; maybe predating the existence of the Prime worlds in crystal spheres but not the 'prime' itself; the Blood Queen entered our reality from the Far Realm, and where she touched the world (maybe the Prime, maybe Proto-elemental matter from the primordial inner planes) the Aboleth manifested

The only think lore wise known to predate this cosmos all together are the Le'Shay (epic fey from 3.5 epic handbook)

[Mcdt2]

I'm with you on the illithids, but I thought the 3.5e origin for aboleths was that they were from the previous Prime.

Maybe they're why the gods and titans destroyed the previous prime.

The Aboleths predate the current Prime, but IIRC they weren't in the previous one, instead existing in the primordial chaos between them. 3.5 has the LeShay, strange elf-like fey who claimed to have been from the previous multiverse, which was wiped out by some unspecified disaster in such a way that attempting to prevent it via time travel would simply cause a worse catastrophe to occur. They really expanded upon that, however.


As for the question of whether other aberrations are of Far Realms origins: gods, I sure hope not. There is in no way anything truly from the Far Realms can be a meaningful encounter for PCs of any level. It's not that they are too strong for players to beat, the question simply doesn't compute. An incredibly powerful outsider such as a demon might have a CR of 20, as might some eldritch horror akin to Cthulhu. A Far Realms entity might have a CR of "Fish". Creatures from the Great Wheel and the Far Realm can't interact in any way that doesn't end with both parties being utterly destroyed mentally and likely physically. There is no part of the Far Realms which can make sense to a creature from the Wheel. It's not that the natives are 5th-dimensional beings with alien motives - they're things without any concept of physical space or thought whatsoever. Nothing on the Wheel exists in the Far Realms and vice versa. Seriously, the Far Realms is the kind of place that would give Cthulhu or Nyarlathotep nightmares.

[Naanomi]

Though the far realm itself is incomprehensible and very little 'from' there is meaningful to people from our reality (uvuudaum being the major exception that are both dwellers in the far realm and can interact with the great wheel relatively well); its influence makes a good narrative tool and a very brief trip there (with every protective ward imaginable and only in the places 'near' a breach to our world and thus infected with our energies) can make a good end game for a high level party