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Pronounceable
2016-08-19, 05:09 PM
Edited shiny new op:
In this thread I will talk about reimagining old school DnD deities. I'm sure it's been done repeatedly before, possibly even here, so I'm gonna do my own too. It's about the fluffy side of things, mechanics are variable by edition and don't really matter. Over time, it basically evolved into a sort of homebrewed DnD cosmology made by yours truly and contains a large number of reskinned DnD deity writeups with hints of a planescapey multiverse going on in the back. I recommend you don't skip any of them because they have a tendency to build up on one another to form a kind of jenga tower.

So here's number one:


SHAR (supreme goddess), the Allmother, Ruinous Overmother, Embracing Oblivion, the Naught That Was, Fount of Despair, Queen of Bitter Tears, the Maw of Nothing, Yawning Void
Domains: oblivion, creation, fertility, forgetfulness, despair, desperation, insanity

Shar was the first. She existed for an unfathomable period in the time before time with absolutely nothing else; if the Naught That Was before time or space came to be had a name, it would’ve been Shar. And she was content. But then the idea of "herself" occured to her, along with the name Shar. She'd become aware. But this awareness of self implied the possibility of "something that was not self". As soon as Shar thought that, it spontaneously started to exist. Which was happening inside Shar on account of there being nothing else for it to exist in.

This other being bothered Shar immensely, she didn't want something else tainting her newfound self. So she strained, exerted, pushed and labored until she finally expelled the impurity from inside herself, along with space and time so this other thing could be outside of Shar. Thus the universe was given birth after Shar had impregnated herself with the idea of self and then expelled her twin from her insides. Overmother Selune came to be along with the universe and she immediately became fond of it.

Shar, however, hated it. She was omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient, accustomed to being the only thing after an infinite period of solitude. The existence of anything, even empty space without motes of dust in it, even the unnoticeable passage of time, was like a maddening cacophony to Shar's infinitely acute and infinitely many senses. She started thinking about how to erase the universe along with Selune. Luminous Overmother, who was also omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient, immediately heard Shar's thoughts. So they fought.

Overmothers’ unimaginable fury soon coalesced into the Elder Elemental Evil, which would later be called Tharizdun. The First Son was made of pure malevolence and almost comparable in power to his mothers, he promptly attacked them both. Their three way battle lasted an unknown amount of time and Tharizdun was losing, if ever so slowly. So he solidified his divine power, creating the first elements (and by extension everything material). He had constrained himself to a smaller part of the infinite space that was the universe but his essence was much denser now, Tharizdun’s divine power per unit volume exceeded Overmothers’ divine power per unit volume inside Elemental Chaos. While this made him indestructable even to Overmothers, it allowed them to trap him inside his own solidified power and then amputate that part of universe and divide it up, creating five other universes that came to be known as Elemental Planes and the Elemental Chaos. Tharizdun himself had been stopped but now a multiverse existed, which was even more offensive to Shar, and the two twins immediately went back to fighting.

But now they were being cautious. They didn’t want to create another Tharizdun, so Overmothers never attacked with their full strength ever again. But even while pulling her punches, Shar had infinite fertility. Their fighting spawned a number of very powerful beings (who’d all become greater gods leading pantheons of their lessers in the future). Shar impregnated herself with her own anger, giving birth to new and terrible universes that would later become the lower planes. Her attempts to trap Selune as they had done to Tharizdun created even more universes, her omniscience telling her these would become the upper planes after order was brought to multiverse. Even sundering time to break the chains of paradox her omniscience created (which guaranteed her inability to win) only caused the creation of fate, trapping Shar and the entire multiverse inside a mobile infinitesimal speck of time that moves only forward called the present, preventing her from moving back and forth along time to influence things as she wished. The harder Shar fought, the more things started to exist. The more things that existed, the madder she got.

At some point, even the Allmother’s divine mind snapped. She fell to insanity, gave up fighting and curled into a cosmically sobbing ball of despair. Selune took pity on her mothersister and tried to console her, which was the last straw. Shar turned her omnipotence against herself and became the mother of all explosions (she can’t help but be mother of things), a wild and uncontrollable tide of oblivion exploding forth from her form. In an effort to prevent this from destroying most of the multiverse, Selune metaphorically threw herself on the grenade. This halted Shar's power from expanding and consuming most things, ironically creating another couple of planes beyond all the others (Positive and Negative Energy Planes). Shar has never regained control over most of her own self again but is still in there, trapped inside her own ruinous power held in stasis by Selune's light (who needs to devote almost all of her own self to protect the planes from the Maw of Nothing). Shar is still omniscient, knowing every event that happens, sensing everything that can be sensed about everything, hearing every single thought and feeling from all beings everywhere, remembering absolutely everything that’s gone down since day one. She’s been consumed by an incomprehensible fury and madness and desires everything to cease to be.

Today, the greatly reduced Shar is said to dwell somewhere in Negative Energy Plane and is the reason nobody with the slightest bit of self preservation instinct goes there (actually she’s the whole plane but even most gods aren't aware of it). While she’s either completely unknown or just an obscure myth for most beings of the planes, even knowing that Shar really exists is dangerous, for even a simple thought about her is enough to weaken the protection Selune constantly provides to every being in the multiverse and opens one up to the Allmother’s malevolent influence when in Negative. Calling to her in Negative or trying to deliberately draw her attention by worship outside can result in a horrifying dreamvision and forced conversion to a nihilistic and self destructive mentality, followed by induction into her church. It’s possible to find some beings willing to do this because Shar offers something pretty unique, namely an end. It’s incredibly hard to completely annihilate a soul in the multiverse due to Luminous Overmother’s influence, the very few beings who’re able to do so are usually unwilling to destroy a mortal fully, even death or undeath are simply different states of existence. And there’s always some souls who’ve seen too much and would rather not exist at all than continue on with whatever is in their past. To such sinners, repentants, sufferers, nutjobs and fiends, Shar offers several things, either removal of all their painful memories, a chance at revenge for all who wronged them or the merciful embrace of oblivion.

But she's very demanding, unless the worshipper serves loyally and does everything in their power to further her cause, they're gonna be stuck in this existence with all those horrible things that happened. She's not a mere goddess of destruction or death either, the mere acts of killing or destroying doesn't sate her. She demands acts of erasure and despair. Destruction of records and memorials so the past is lost, wholesale destruction so nothing will be left to indicate anything was ever there, genocidal slaughters so nobody will be left alive to even remember the victims, inflicting terrible pain before and after death so souls will be broken enough to beg Shar for oblivion (the easiest way for Shar to bypass Selune’s protection), acts of unspeakable evil to drive victims to despair and desperation. Shar worshippers are almost always beings who figure they're already sunk as low as possible, that things can't possibly be any worse and there's no way to go but up (this is actually true in case of some fiendish outsiders). But nobody gets to become a Shar worshipper without her twisting their mind first. Such beings think nothing of committing the atrocities Shar demands, for it doesn’t matter and they won’t remember their sins once they’re rewarded.

There is a shred of mercy Shar shows to those who're truly suffering in powerlessness with no hope at all. She gives oblivion to those sorts of beings if they beg for it without forcing them into her service, seeing how they couldn't possibly be of use to her anyway. Anyone can pray to Shar for an end and if they'd be completely useless to Shar in any worldly capacity, Shar will instantly kill them and annihilate their soul. This can happen anywhere in the multiverse and is called Allmother's Embrace.

The “worship” of Shar has another, entirely different aspect. All sorts of fertility rituals and prayers for inspiration and creativity invoking her name always succeed, thanks to Shar's uncontrolled omnifertility. Since Shar usually takes this sort of thing as a challenge, terrible stuff is likely to happen to people who do that. Some of the most famous and touching works of art, especially tragedies, were penned by desperate artists who soon became protagonists of stories worthy of Poe, King or even Lovecraft. The farmer with the starving family desperate enough to invoke Shar’s name for bountiful harvests whose fields grew fabulously fertile and attracted ogre marauders who forced him to eat his own slaughtered family is another famous myth that is (in all likelyhood) true. Invoking Shar never ends well.


So that's a Shar. It keeps most of her natural Sharness in a refreshed format, I think. There's a lot more where she came from, as you can see below.

Pronounceable
2016-08-20, 04:20 AM
After such an overwhelming response, I have no course but to continue on.


WAUKEEN (lesser goddess), Friendly Merchant, Queen of Coin, Lady In Gold
Domains: wealth, trade, business, favor, debt

The being who'll come to be known as the Goddess of Trade was born under Moradin's hammer. She was supposed to be another spirit of forging and crafting, but Moradin had just finished making some jewellery and some gold dust made its way into Waukeen's essence. As a result, she was a lot more interested in wealth itself than its production.

It didn't take long before Waukeen had become Moradin's chief treasurer and negotiator. Waukeen was a charming and keen trader and had an eye for value. She worked tirelessly and passionately, not just getting the most out of all who came to God of Crafts, but also going out into the multiverse to actively trade with other gods and powerful beings and advertising the superiority of things crafted by Moradin. As a result, Moradin became far more rich than he used to be. However at some point, Waukeen realized that Moradin didn't really care about wealth and was just indulging her. Far as he cared, he could create anything he could possibly want and wealth was unnecessary. Thus disillusioned with her boss, Waukeen resolved to become her own being.

So she asked for a cut of profits. Which was unheard of, none of the spirits in Moradin's realm would dream of wanting payment, the work was its own reward for most. Moradin obviously refused but Waukeen kept pushing. She was persistent and Moradin had to spend a lot of time refuting her arguments. He finally gave up on the grounds that in the time he wasted arguing with Waukeen, he could've made stuff worth more than the wage she was asking for. After that, Waukeen worked even harder, making deals and getting contacts all over the place, amassing a large wealth for her own self. This made Moradin the richest god too, which he liked.

Once she had enough money, Waukeen went to Moradin again and offered to buy herself. Moradin was quite shocked to hear Waukeen wanted to be free of his service, he hemmed and hawed but knew a lost cause when he saw one. Waukeen left Moradin's realm without a dime to her name but that didn't matter at all. Because she'd met most powerful and influential beings in the multiverse as Moradin's envoy and most of gods of good and law liked her. She was now a free spirit and worked only for herself.

Through charm and wit (and debts with punitive interest from devils), she moved to Sigil, center of everything, and used her divine contacts to create a large trade consortium spread over many planes and worlds. She was still just a planar then so Lady of Pain didn't throw her out. Many beings hungry for wealth flocked to her, from mortals to fey, elementals to devils, and she made them all rich through various methods. And made sure they remembered they owed her. After gaining enough wealth and influence, she went on a grand multiverse spanning quest for godhood. She visited many divine realms and met (also bribed) knowledgeable individuals, bought or traded for a staggering number of divine and arcane items and called in many favors she was owed from influential figures. She then went to Abyss.

Demon Prince Graz'zt is always hungry for more power and wealth. Knowing him, Waukeen was certain he'd capture her and try to take over her business if she went anywhere near his reach. So she did. When Graz'zt had Waukeen brought before him, she was prepared. Graz'zt couldn't harm her due to all the stuff she'd brought along and had to settle for imprisonment, at least until her protections ran out. What happened next is unclear and whispers abound about dark dealings with Demogorgon or Asmodeus or any number of evil powers who'd benefit from Graz'zt's misfortune. But it was actually Sune (a good greater goddess of beauty and lust who seriously hated Graz'zt) who'd provided Waukeen the tools she was going to use to usurp and purify a part of Graz'zt power. Waukeen absorbed a good part of Graz'zt essence, ascending to demigoddess status and breaking free of Abyss.

Now she was divine and couldn't enter Sigil, but it was all right. She moved her business out and transformed it into a church and rapidly gained masses of followers on many worlds, becoming the fastest climber to lesser godhood.

Today, Waukeen's church is one of the most influental in multiverse despite its small size and strictly urban focus. This mostly comes from immense wealth, ironclad trade contracts and most importantly, all the trading of favors with many powerful beings. In fact, it doubles as multiverse's biggest bank and employs some of the most powerful enforcers wealth and nepotism can buy. While Waukeen understands power of both written contract and informal arrangement, she knows there are chaotic and evil beings everywhere who'd take advantage of her and her followers without strict rules and the might needed to enforce them. She demands informal, trust dependent deals be reserved for those who's proven their trustworthiness and reliability.

Waukeen knows well the value of both regular trading and debts/favors. She advocates her followers to engage others in honest trade (whether in actual trade or personal relations) until they've judged them to be reliable and trustworthy, at which point generously doing favors to foster better relations (incidentally leaving them indebted) is the norm. Be generous but only to those who will pay you back might as well be the church's unofficial motto. She also teaches that wealth is to be used, not hoarded, so her followers are encouraged to invest whatever wealth they have into business ventures or if they don't personally have financial skills, lend their money (with reasonable interest) to people who will (such as clergy of Waukeen).

OTOH, Waukeen has no mercy for those proven untrustworthy, unreliable, lazy or ungrateful (such as certain demon princes who had it coming). She urges gouging them for all they're worth because there's just no helping some people, so you might as well help yourself at that point. She doesn't approve of taxation either. Debt only happens if somebody has actively done something for you, rulers and governing bodies have no right to sit around lazily doing nothing and then demand regular payment.

Waukeen's churches are always places of trade and her clergy is required to have good bartering and appraising skills. Personal wealth is seen as a mark of devotion and divine favor, so long as it's gained through trade and investment. Scamming and labor are considered a mark of shame for any priest of Waukeen and looting is frowned upon (unless it was from those who deserved it). Debt plays a prominent role in the faith, it must always be repaid with interest and forms the basic church hierarchy. Getting recruited into the clergy immediately puts one into debt to everyone else and promotions only happen if you tithe enough to clear your debts to everyone at your own level so you're on par with your previous superiors. The ultimate debt is to Waukeen herself and she'll collect your soul when the time comes, becoming a respected employee of multiverse's biggest bank and a comfortable living (with chance of promotion) is Waukeen's promised afterlife. You might even start getting a wage after a few centuries of service, once Waukeen has decided you've paid her for everything she did for you during your mortal life (those pointing out this is quite like taxation is likely to get smote).

Waukeen has very good relations with most gods of good and law, but the standouts are her old boss Moradin and benefactor Sune. Both of their followers enjoy immense financial benefits when dealing with Waukeen church. Waukeen's followers also get a lot of love from Sune's clergy (inside and outside the bedrooms). Meanwhile, Moradin has a little bit of argument going nowadays about who's the richest. He still doesn't really care though, it's mostly his excuse to occasionally meet with his wayward child (he also knows that most of his own wealth is actually Waukeen's handiwork so it's clear who's really the richest). Waukeen's only real enemy is Graz'zt, who's got far too many other enemies to focus on her. She tries to get along even with gods of destruction, evil, chaos, thievery or greed (because you never know when they might have something of value in need of trading).

Praying to Waukeen for success in business usually works if you're the reliable type in her estimate. She considers a bit of worship and tithing (after the success) enough payment for such prayers. Competition among merchants usually involves a bidding war for Waukeen's favor, but she never favors hoarders over enterpreneurs. She considers praying for luck (such as gambling or treasure hunting/looting) or dishonest ventures to be a blasphemy and makes her disfavor apparent by making prayer's money disappear in a visible cloud of dust. Despite her good and lawful leanings, Waukeen has nothing against smuggling, tax evasion, setting up and fiercely defending monopolies or indentured servitude bordering slavery (so long as it's not actual slavery). It's all good as long as you're helping people help you help them.


And here's a Waukeen presiding over basically capitalism. It's pretty hard to make capitalism sound like a good thing and I dunno how well it worked here. But I like mine a lot more than "canon" version, who had to get saved from hell by some mortal schmucks (what kind of lameass deity needs help against a demon?). This is also mostly divorced from all the FR exclusive stuff like Time of Troubles, while keeping a bit of the ensuing story. I think it's still an improvement.

By all means, keep the debates going. I'll probably post more at some point.

hamishspence
2016-08-20, 04:58 AM
I like this version of Waukeen's backstory. Would fit well in 4E where gods like Moradin and Corellan are less tied to species - more "gods who happen to be the most popular gods of dwarves and elves" than "their patrons, creators, and those who made them in their own images".

Pronounceable
2016-08-20, 07:16 AM
Next up, I have the solution to the glut of overlapping deities in DnD in the form of a familiar face.


GRUUMSH (greater god), One Eyed God, the Watcher of Infinities, Lord of Lords, the Godfather, Sire of Gods, Monarch of the Bloody Fields, Thousand Faced King, Emperor on Iron Fortress
Domains: competition, domination, determination, strength, fury, vengeance, vigilance, adaptability

Gruumsh is one of the oldest gods who was born during the struggle of Twin Mothers. As such, he's one of the mightiest of all deities alongside his other primordial siblings (Corellon, Moradin, Tiamat, Pelor, possibly others). The greater deity siblings all hung out together at far reaches of the multiverse, waiting for Overmothers' battle to end. During this time, they all got to know each other pretty well and were all thoroughly sick of others by the end of it.

Gruumsh developed a special loathing for Corellon, the God of Glory and Majesty, who he considered to be a self important douche. Corellon hated Gruumsh too, seeing him as little more than a dumb savage unfit to be their brother. And once the multiverse stabilized and Twin Goddesses ceased ravaging everything, Gruumsh and Corellon got into a fight of their own. For all their loathing of the other, they were equals and neither could ever win. And while they were busy, their siblings had gone on to create other gods and mortals to serve themselves and fill the planes. Upon realizing their battle left them both far behind their siblings, they grudgingly stopped because if both had one thing in common, it was a burning desire to never ever be shown up or surpassed. The draw didn’t stop Corellon from loudly proclaiming ever since that he won and put out Gruumsh’s one eye. Gruumsh was mighty but he wasn’t a prettyboy like Corellon, so most beings (except their original siblings who knew Gruumsh has always had one eye) believe the lie.

To catch up to his other siblings on servants and believers front, Gruumsh decided to go for a creative, foolhardy and pointlessly macho method. He cut pieces of himself off and threw them to various corners of multiverse. In time, those pieces evolved and adapted, gaining a life of their own in entirely different ways, even appearing in pantheons of other greater deities. Thus a really large number of deities were created, most of whom never realized they were actually parts of Gruumsh and all their efforts were ultimately feeding him. These are always male deities venerated by humanoid species with portfolios of destruction, violence, anger, bravery, heroism, rulership, storms, revenge or testesterone. Very few gods who fit this mold is not a piece of Gruumsh. This is also why there’s so many different goddamn flavors of war god in DnD. One day, when he deems the total amount of power all these different gods gathered is enough, Gruumsh is going to drain them all dry and show his true face to the multiverse. And then it’ll be the time for reckoning, Corellon will then rue the day he popped into existence.

(Meaning Talos, Bane, Tempus, Helm, Torm, Malar, Clanggedin, Kord, Hextor, Heironeous, St Cuthbert, Mars, Ares, Anhur, Thor, Maglubiyet, Kurtulmak... can all be parts of Gruumsh, depending on taste).

While patiently waiting for his plan to come to fruition, Gruumsh has set up the stereotypical savage orcish god persona, based on the fact that Corellon is looking for any excuse to condescend on him. Corellon’s (and also his pompous believers’) misplaced self confidence will make Gruumsh ultimate victory even sweeter. In order to be able to rub it even more to Corellon’s face that day, Gruumsh has been constantly changing his appearance every time he’s manifested and also spawned the pathetic orc godlings, so he can justify the monikers that imply his true nature and have those be disregarded as a savage’s vanity.

It rather bothers Gruumsh that far too many other, lesser deities are thinking themselves superior to him merely due to his appearance, but they’ll also bow before him after he demonstrates his superior prowess and cunning.

Today, what any mortal and most deities know about Gruumsh is the savage god of orcs he wants everyone to see. While some gods of knowledge and secrets and similar say there’s more to Gruumsh than he lets on, it’s not like anyone can really believe a dumb savage like Gruumsh could possibly be some sort of supersecret mastermind.

As for Gruumsh himself, he spends all his spare time drawing covertly on his splinters' knowledge and influence, trying to figure out what the hell Lady of Pain is and what she's up to (because he also hates not knowing things). He's no closer than when he started but he's happy, this surely beats watching orcs wage their petty wars all day as he waits for the day of reckoning.


And now we’ve got a solution to the problem I never noticed how badly has been bothering me. This is a neat and elegant solution. Sure, it seems to cut down on number of options but not really, the options are all still there; this simply justifies the frankly stupid number of options there is for this particular thing. There's even a precedent for this in 4e. I just took it to its logical conclusion.

hamishspence
2016-08-20, 07:32 AM
Given Pelor's NG in most cosmologies - I presume he'll be the closest thing to a mediator between Corellon and Moradin?

They may all be a little "sick of each other" but since the Good deities still tend to work together in a crisis, and generally don't actively sabotage one another even outside of one - someone needs to be the driving force behind that.

NRSASD
2016-08-20, 10:28 AM
I like Gruumsh's background! Makes a lot of sense really, and restores him to his proper place as Big Bad of the universe, rather than just one of many. Who are you thinking of reworking next?

falcon1
2016-08-20, 10:32 AM
I like that. Can I borrow it?

Also


Asmodeous did not kill a god to become ruler of hell. Asmodeous was always a god, and a good one. However, he is also very devious, and that is why he is an archdevil. By placing himself atop hell's hierarchy, killing a previous ruler, he keeps them to focused on displacing him to truly attack the material plane. And by stealing a fragment of the Abyss, he similarly has distracted the demons. But one cannot sit on the throne of the Nine Hells without making a show of evil, and one cannot hold part of the Abyss without being corrupted. Though Asmodeous tries to fight it, he is slowly falling into evil.

Pronounceable
2016-08-20, 10:48 AM
And now for something completely different.


BLIPDOOLPOOLP (demigoddess), [various bubbly noises all roughly translating as Sea Mother]
Domains: insanity, chaos, vanity, sea

One of the many, many, many aquatic horrors brought kicking and screaming into existance by Tiamat, the frogmonster race of kuo-toa also had a compulsive need to worship a deity, just like all the other watery abominations made by Tiamat. Which caused them a big crisis when they were inevitably abandoned by their maker for her next project, just like all the others. Kuo-toa had a spark of divine power in their collective subconscious waiting to become a racial deity, again just like all other underwater horrors of Tiamat’s making. Unfortunately, they had an actual biological flaw in their design that caused every single kuo-toa to be incurably insane. Thus, they could never collectively decide on what an idealized examplar of their race would be like and failed to spawn their deity like all the other nautical abominations had.

Kuo-toa sent emissaries, begging other abominational godspawn of Tiamat to be allowed into their worship, offering their whole race as willing slaves and pawns and snacks. They were turned away. Even Dagon, Demon Prince of the Depths didn’t want such pathetic, driveless creatures in his employ. Kuo-toa artists and philosophers spent centuries lamenting their parental abandonment issues and composing long, croaky, epic poems about their abominational angst (that no other being could understand due to insanity on authors’ part). They suffered with their moral crisis on the inside and suffered attacks by all the other aquatic abomination races of Elemental Plane of Water on the outside. Tiamat’s last gift to them was there, they all could feel it bubbling right under their collective minds, but there was no outlet for it.

Their luck finally changed when one kuo-toa poet (who’d swum to a remote place to properly suffer alone) found a mutilated humanoid woman’s corpse floating in waters. This was the first time any kuo-toa beheld a creature that wasn’t one of Tiamat’s submarine horrors and it’s unknown how the corpse came to be in the depths of Elemental Plane of Water in that condition. In grip of whatever insanity he had going on, he decided that this body must be close to the ideal towards which all kuo-toa should aspire to. The corpse was naked and missing her head and hands. Realizing that kuo-toa people couldn’t actually chop off their heads to get closer to this ideal form, he recognized that it needed a head. Luckily there was a large lobster loitering nearby, it was near the size of the corpse and divine inspiration struck the kuo-toa poet/prophet. He chopped its head and stuck it onto the corpse, then chopped off the claws and rammed those into arm stumps as well, figuring a kuo-toa needs some natural weapons in such a dangerous environment. The end result was clearly the best possible way a kuo-toa could exist and anyone could see that.

He towed the corpse toward nearest kuo-toa settlement and propped it right in the center, proclaiming that he’d found their god. He got killed for his trouble but the humanoid corpse was left propped up, forgotten and abandoned. Some time later, another kuo-toa, in grip of madness, proclaimed she’d heard the weird propped up creature speak when nobody was near. This one was more lucky since no kuo-toa nearby was currently in a murderous insanity, so the news of amazing weird creature who speaks when nobody is near started to spread. In other settlements, kuo-toa who hadn’t even seen it started talking about it. Soon, the permanently insane collective subconscious of kuo-toa race started to believe in the existence of a giant, scaleless pale creature with lobster head and claws. When the settlement where the original propped up corpse was still sitting got raided and destroyed by sahuagin and news of a sahuagin raider eating the corpse spread, it triggered a strange fury and religious fervor in kuo-toa. They organized on a never before seen massive scale and retaliated on the sahuagin, capturing and executing a large number of them. For the first time, kuo-toa were the ones doing the oppressing and it was clearly thanks to the amazing weird creature, which was dubbed Blipdoolpoolp.

Thus, the mad goddess of the mad kuo-toa race popped into existence. She considers herself the perfect kuo-toa specimen with the perfect and flawless body, despite not looking anything like an actual kuo-toa. She explains kuo-toa superiority over all other races and teaches it’s their racial duty to bring the same perfection to all beings. This causes kuo-toa much confusion as they don’t know how they could bring other abominations closer to the perfect body shape (especially more divergent ones like beholders or aboleths), but they keep taking captives and chopping off and sewing on bits in an effort to manage it even to this day.

Later on, kuo-toa managed to get out of Elemental Plane of Water and met actual humanoids. This didn’t go well. They see every airbreathing humanoid as horrifying abominations, a twisted mockery of the perfect form, so close to perfection but still not there. They think airbreathers are suffering a terrible curse by cruel gods and they feel a deep compulsion to fix them. Trying to explain otherwise triggers an immediate homicidal rage in all kuo-toa and nobody has ever managed to get through any kuo-toa’s insanity and make them understand that humanoids are ok. Therefore, the ugly frogmonsters are known to all races outside Elemental Plane of Water as horrifying savage abominations with an insatiable lust for kidnapping, ritual murder and corpse desecration. Whereas what kuo-toa believe chopping off hands and heads (and other bits for males) and sticking lobster parts in the stumps before propping up the result on a stake near the settlements they were taken from for their friends and families to see, is repairing the damage on the unfortunate cursed airbreathers and restoring them to their pure and perfect forms. They never quite get why this doesn’t earn them much gratitude, but working thanklessly to help their lessers is all part of being the better race.


This deranged post is brought to you by whatever Gygax was smoking when he came up with Blipdoolpoolp.

Pronounceable
2016-08-21, 05:18 AM
For hardmode, I wanted to take a stab at the lamest, uncoolest, boringest and unoriginalest DnD deity I can think of.


SILVANUS (greater god), Oak Father, Lord of the Green, Wilder In Forests, Crowned of Leaves, Moss Covered Old Stone, Deadbeat Grandfather
Domains: nature, forest, animal, earth, fey

Silvanus is one of the second generation of greater gods, created by the firsts and lacking their makers’ power of universal creation. He was one of the three siblings Pelor crafted out of elements to tame them for his grand project called mortals. Made of earth and brought to life by Pelor’s will, Silvanus was told to bring astronomical masses of it from Elemental Plane of Earth into the then empty Material Plane. He did so, often leaving them in shapes that caught his fancy and created many worlds. Flat worlds, sphere worlds, cone worlds, cube worlds, pyramidal worlds, torus worlds, hollow worlds, corkscrew worlds... He left countless masses of earth clusters floating in emptiness of Material Plane, ready to be used for whatever purpose Pelor had for them.

However Pelor was a boring stick in the mud and didn’t like Silvanus’ fanciful shapes. He broke them and made them all spheres instead, which really upset Silvanus. He swore to never answer Pelor again. Disgruntled Silvanus left Material and went to Ethereal Plane where he could indulge his fancies without boring rubes messing it up. For a time he was content, taking matter from all elemental planes and shaping it into massive structures floating in Ethereal, making his own little arts and crafts gallery. But one day he checked what was going on in Material, remembering about Pelor’s grand project. What he saw was hauntingly beautiful. Pelor had fashioned the spherical earth clumps into planets full of life, covered in green and blue and red and yellow, riddled with countless tiny (tiny to Silvanus that is) creatures. These tiny creatures were fascinating, they had a strange balance where some ate others then got eaten themselves, countless of them dying to give life to countless others. It was all so much better than Silvanus’ shaped matter clumps.

Silvanus had fallen in love. He decided he needed to have some of that stuff. So he went and caught many mindless spirits of elemental planes and reshaped them (again into many different and strange shapes that took his fancy), making them sentient. Thus the fey was born of primal elementals. However the fey were still elemental sprits and therefore immortal, they had no need of the intricate balance and fascinating life cycle Silvanus saw on Material Plane’s worlds. He tried to show it to them anyway, make them take a stab at it. Some fey liked the hunting and killing part. Other fey liked the part about building nests and warrens. None of the fey liked all of nature like Silvanus did. It was clear he wasn’t going to get what he wanted out of the fey, so left them to mimic the life on Material Plane as they saw fit and travelled back to Material.

Silvanus’ other siblings, who’d gotten in on the ground floor and stuck with Pelor, were now reigning over the worlds and their inhabitants. Poor Umberlee had dominion over seas and oceans but all the time she spent near Mother of All Abominations in Plane of Elemental Water had twisted her mind and transformed her into a fickle and destructive goddess of chaos. Airheaded Olidammara however, seemed to have gone mad on his own with no outside help and was advocating active destruction of natural wonders and exploitation of all that was beautiful for the crude machinations and petty pleasures of civilization. Pelor himself was at the top, entrenched in Elemental Plane of Fire while keeping his fiery eyes on every world filled with life, worshipped and served by throngs of various beings, growing ever stronger and more secure. Silvanus tried in vain to reason with Umberlee and Olidammara, to make them see the beauty of the natural and dissuade them from the insane paths of destruction they’d chosen. They laughed at him. He tried to get a foothold on their worlds and gain some worshippers. Very few mortals were attracted to Silvanus’ tenets of natural beauty and denouncement of civilization and those were opposed and commonly stopped by other mortals, usually at behest of Olidammara and rarely Umberlee. Still stubborn, Silvanus wasn’t going to talk to Pelor (who’d probably pity him and order his siblings to play nice). Mortal belief was the key to everything, Pelor had definitely been right about that, but most mortals were clearly too short sighted (and short lived) to see the wisdom of Silvanus. He had to become more appealing to them, something had to change.

Today, the church of Mother Earth Chauntea is one of the most populous and disorganized in the multiverse. Her dominion over agriculture, animal husbandry, fertility and family makes Chauntea the primary deity to farmers and villagers on most mortal worlds. She gets respect from everyone else who’s not a farmer but like to eat as well. So virtually all mortals living on Material Plane reveres Chauntea to some degree, even Pelor’s worship has fallen behind due to its cosmic focus on things that average mortal doesn’t really care about (much to his chagrin). Consequentially, Chauntea has become the mightiest being outside the primordial greater deities.

Meanwhile, the still unchanged church of Silvanus is tiny, its teachings followed by very few radical druid cults on a handful of worlds. Chauntea and her followers magnanimously say her brash brother does have a point about preserving nature and the natural, which is why any worship of Silvanus is still being allowed to continue. While nobody has seen them both in the same room, it’s generally assumed that Silvanus is ashamed of being overshadowed so hard by his twin and never meets her. Silvanus himself is very happy with today’s multiverse, especially with his crushing victory over Olidammara and having thrown dirt into Pelor’s fiery eyes.

Regular Chauntea worship is basically everywhere but it’s not hierarchical and almost always limited to working classes. Age (which presumably means wisdom) is respected and senior clerics are shown more respect but every cleric of Chauntea is considered equal to all others. Each cleric advises their flock by the basic tenets of Chauntea according to their personal interpretations. Since it’s unlikely that worshippers of Chauntea will be in positions of great power and authority, the simple tenets of the humble farmstead and traditional family values stuff is enough for all their needs. Chauntea’s worshippers are predominantly peaceful but they know protection against wild animals and raiders are always needed, so they do have some martial traditions (and sometimes they ask for help from good natured clergies of battle and protection) but it’s never a focus.

Meanwhile, fey creatures of Ethereal Plane who’s cobbled together the massive demiplane of Feywild from Silvanus’ leftovers have conflicting feelings about Deadbeat Grandpa. Some hate him, some worship him, some think he’s silly. Silvanus does answer the odd prayer from Feywild, but otherwise still thinks they're boring and leaves them be.

Chauntea is well liked by gods of good and feared by the rest, though she insists she’s never given anybody a reason to fear her. Which usually works on mortals but not gods, everyone in the multiverse knows Silvanus is a wild and whimsical god likely to cause massive death and destruction for a bunch of flowers and there’s no telling when his so much stronger twin might feel compelled to help him in an emergency. While Olidammara is well known for his enmity for both and keeps insisting they’re not even twins, the God of Rogues and Roads isn’t the most trustworthy guy around. Olidammara’s church also has fought a losing battle for a long while, they might have a lot more powerful and influential mortals and espousing an elitist spiel against the peasants, but not even kings and wizards want to go hungry. Many gods do know the truth but don’t really care (since it really doesn’t affect anything). Chauntea’s rivalry with Umberlee over coasts is also well known; neither can make any progress on the other’s home turf but many coastal regions on most worlds see regular conflict between their clergies and violence is always on the table when it comes to the Bitch Queen (who has an affinity to and penchant for stirring up the aquatic abominations from Water, who’s colonized many Material Plane oceans). Coastal regions are the only places where Chauntea’s followers are warlike and traditionally vigilant.

Silvanus’ worshippers are usually considered pests or wild animals and mostly ignored.

Praying to Chauntea for anything usually doesn’t work. She’s quite busy and receives too many prayers every day. Besides she’s already doing all the agriculture and family stuff, there’s no need to specifically pray for those and prayers about other things don’t concern her. However speaking up against her is a bad idea, she’s known to hold grudges and send family misforune and those who insult her too often and too publicly tend to draw attention from violent Silvanus cultists. In worst cases (such as a general upswing in Umberlee worship), she can send famines and plagues of stillborns to offending regions.


So that’s that. Neutral forest god of environmentalism? Stolen from Celtic mythology too, for good measure. Can you get any boringer without being NotSauron#387924? I had to mix him up to get anything resembling coolness. I might've thrown the kitchen sink too, this is probably overdone (fey stuff is half baked but fairy connection is the one thing resembling coolness in original Silvanus). It's objectively better than "canon" tho.


...I'm seeing a distinct lack of other entries here. It's like nobody else reskins DnD gods.

Thrudd
2016-08-21, 12:48 PM
Probably more common to invent original deities and cosmology, especially when not using the default or published settings.

LudicSavant
2016-08-21, 03:13 PM
Lately, I've been thinking about reimagining classic DnD gods.

You might like the stuff in my sig.

Fri
2016-08-21, 09:51 PM
And now for something completely different.


BLIPDOOLPOOLP (demigoddess), [various bubbly noises all roughly translating as Sea Mother]
Domains: insanity, chaos, vanity, sea

One of the many, many, many aquatic horrors brought kicking and screaming into existance by Tiamat, the frogmonster race of kuo-toa also had a compulsive need to worship a deity, just like all the other watery abominations made by Tiamat. Which caused them a big crisis when they were inevitably abandoned by their maker for her next project, just like all the others. Kuo-toa had a spark of divine power in their collective subconscious waiting to become a racial deity, again just like all other underwater horrors of Tiamat’s making. Unfortunately, they had an actual biological flaw in their design that caused every single kuo-toa to be incurably insane. Thus, they could never collectively decide on what an idealized examplar of their race would be like and failed to spawn their deity like all the other nautical abominations had.

Kuo-toa sent emissaries, begging other abominational godspawn of Tiamat to be allowed into their worship, offering their whole race as willing slaves and pawns and snacks. They were turned away. Even Dagon, Demon Prince of the Depths didn’t want such pathetic, driveless creatures in his employ. Kuo-toa artists and philosophers spent centuries lamenting their parental abandonment issues and composing long, croaky, epic poems about their abominational angst (that no other being could understand due to insanity on authors’ part). They suffered with their moral crisis on the inside and suffered attacks by all the other aquatic abomination races of Elemental Plane of Water on the outside. Tiamat’s last gift to them was there, they all could feel it bubbling right under their collective minds, but there was no outlet for it.

Their luck finally changed when one kuo-toa poet (who’d swum to a remote place to properly suffer alone) found a mutilated humanoid woman’s corpse floating in waters. This was the first time any kuo-toa beheld a creature that wasn’t one of Tiamat’s submarine horrors and it’s unknown how the corpse came to be in the depths of Elemental Plane of Water in that condition. In grip of whatever insanity he had going on, he decided that this body must be close to the ideal towards which all kuo-toa should aspire to. The corpse was naked and missing her head and hands. Realizing that kuo-toa people couldn’t actually chop off their heads to get closer to this ideal form, he recognized that it needed a head. Luckily there was a large lobster loitering nearby, it was near the size of the corpse and divine inspiration struck the kuo-toa poet/prophet. He chopped its head and stuck it onto the corpse, then chopped off the claws and rammed those into arm stumps as well, figuring a kuo-toa needs some natural weapons in such a dangerous environment. The end result was clearly the best possible way a kuo-toa could exist and anyone could see that.

He towed the corpse toward nearest kuo-toa settlement and propped it right in the center, proclaiming that he’d found their god. He got killed for his trouble but the humanoid corpse was left propped up, forgotten and abandoned. Some time later, another kuo-toa, in grip of madness, proclaimed she’d heard the weird propped up creature speak when nobody was near. This one was more lucky since no kuo-toa nearby was currently in a murderous insanity, so the news of amazing weird creature who speaks when nobody is near started to spread. In other settlements, kuo-toa who hadn’t even seen it started talking about it. Soon, the permanently insane collective subconscious of kuo-toa race started to believe in the existence of a giant, scaleless pale creature with lobster head and claws. When the settlement where the original propped up corpse was still sitting got raided and destroyed by sahuagin and news of a sahuagin raider eating the corpse spread, it triggered a strange fury and religious fervor in kuo-toa. They organized on a never before seen massive scale and retaliated on the sahuagin, capturing and executing a large number of them. For the first time, kuo-toa were the ones doing the oppressing and it was clearly thanks to the amazing weird creature, which was dubbed Blipdoolpoolp.

Thus, the mad goddess of the mad kuo-toa race popped into existence. She considers herself the perfect kuo-toa specimen with the perfect and flawless body, despite not looking anything like an actual kuo-toa. She explains kuo-toa superiority over all other races and teaches it’s their racial duty to bring the same perfection to all beings. This causes kuo-toa much confusion as they don’t know how they could bring other abominations closer to the perfect body shape (especially more divergent ones like beholders or aboleths), but they keep taking captives and chopping off and sewing on bits in an effort to manage it even to this day.

Later on, kuo-toa managed to get out of Elemental Plane of Water and met actual humanoids. This didn’t go well. They see every airbreathing humanoid as horrifying abominations, a twisted mockery of the perfect form, so close to perfection but still not there. They think airbreathers are suffering a terrible curse by cruel gods and they feel a deep compulsion to fix them. Trying to explain otherwise triggers an immediate homicidal rage in all kuo-toa and nobody has ever managed to get through any kuo-toa’s insanity and make them understand that humanoids are ok. Therefore, the ugly frogmonsters are known to all races outside Elemental Plane of Water as horrifying savage abominations with an insatiable lust for kidnapping, ritual murder and corpse desecration. Whereas what kuo-toa believe chopping off hands and heads (and other bits for males) and sticking lobster parts in the stumps before propping up the result on a stake near the settlements they were taken from for their friends and families to see, is repairing the damage on the unfortunate cursed airbreathers and restoring them to their pure and perfect forms. They never quite get why this doesn’t earn them much gratitude, but working thanklessly to help their lessers is all part of being the better race.


This deranged post is brought to you by whatever Gygax was smoking when he came up with Blipdoolpoolp.

This is pretty great.

Pronounceable
2016-08-22, 05:45 AM
You might like the stuff in my sig.
I did. They're cool.
....
And now a bargain: 4 for 1, kinda. A fun for the whole family.


VHAERAUN (intermediate god), Ungrateful Son, Snatcher of the Lash, Pitiful Shield, Heir Incognito, Moonlit Lover, Friend In Need
Domains: rebellion, betrayal, romance

Vhaeraun was the first god to be conceived in the mortal way. Greater god Corellon had chosen to settle in Elemental Plane of Positive Energy in an effort to be closer to and get inspiration from luminous Overmother Selune (moving to mom’s basement, as Gruumsh would put it), and there used echoes of her ardent powers to fashion a future wife for himself in Araushnee, Goddess of Light and Grace (the oedipal and Freudian implications of which was staggering, as Gruumsh would point out if those words existed). He then spent some time wooing and courting her, a legendary affair that inspired many myths all over the multiverse. Araushnee was dazzled by Corellon’s charm and the couple married with grandest ceremony. The first result of their union was Vhaeraun, God of Romance, shortly followed by Eilistraee, Goddess of Arts and Battle.

Vhaeraun, following lead of his father in what mortals would call incest (which clearly didn’t apply to deities), spent many ages pursuing his sister whose burning passion for the activities in her portfolio was like godnip to him. Eilistraee wasn’t interested in the least and rebuked him increasingly violently but Vhaeraun kept at it. Araushnee told him to cut it out many times, whereas Corellon refused to interfere. Emboldened by Corellon's attitude, Vhaeraun kept pushing his luck until finally Eilistraee had enough and cut him into ribbons and resewed him back with his head and another part (which was now far smaller because some bits had gotten lost in the shuffle) switched places. Vhaeraun, who was far too ashamed to face mom or dad in this condition, went to ask help from Emperor of Artifice who’d probably be the only being who could fix him. Moradin didn’t even ask him for payment, for spreading the tale all over the multiverse and trumpeting Corellon's failure as a parent was worth far more to him than any trinkets Vhaeraun could get his hands on. The ensuing scandal lost Corellon a lot of face and he exiled Vhaeraun from his court and took the domain of battle away from Eilistraee. In Araushnee’s opinion however, everything was entirely Corellon’s fault; this was the first seed of discontent that would eventually transform her to Lolth, Goddess of Shadows and Schemes.

Vhaeraun wandered the planes for a long time, dallying with various mortal and immortal beings, looking for something else to enflame his passion like his sister used to (whom he now despised for obvious reasons). He found it on a world in Material Plane, in a place where an elven prince had rebelled against his tyrannical father. Projecting a bit too much into the situation, Vhaeraun took a mortal advisor guise and helped the prince win the civil war. Afterwards, he set up a church on this world as a god of righteousness. Having had a taste for fighting, Vhaeraun could see why Eilistraee liked it so much. He went looking for more and found plenty (greater god Gruumsh and his involuntary puppets might or might not have helped with this part), but random wars didn’t cut it. It had to be a rebellion, a chaotic civil war against the establishment. It took a long time but he transformed himself into a God of Rebellion and Infiltration. By then, he’d given up on romance, conquests of authority was a lot more satisfying than conquests of love.

As centuries went on and his influence on Material waxed and waned with random uprisings and quellings, Vhaeraun started to miss home and family. So he used his new covert action skills to return in secret and saw that things had deteriorated. Araushnee had long had enough of Corellon and was already plotting against him. Vhaeraun was by then very experienced with this exact situation and offered to help his mother overthrow Corellon. It took a long time but there was a lot of discontent against Corellon in the ranks of Seldarine for his vain and domineering attitude, it definitely wasn’t the united family of deities loyal to the noble cause as Corellon had first envisioned it. When the war broke out, Corellon was surprised. It ravaged his realm in Positive Energy, destroyed many of his servants and divine armies, emptied his coffers, even spilled into mortal worlds that Seldarine had managed to wrest from Pelor and his cronies with great difficulty.

Corellon obviously won in the end, as he was still a son of the Overmothers and no upstart spawn of his own was going to best him in battle. But he was back to square one: the weakest and least influential among his primordial siblings, on par with Gruumsh! His fury was terrible. He slew all of Seldarine and miscellenous beings who’d joined the rebellion and cast their bodies to Astral. He was impressed with Vhaeraun, for he’d proven to be strong and smart and he was his first born son and heir (however redundant it was). Corellon gave him a choice; take his place next to his father as a good and obedient boy and be forgiven after a period of penance or be destroyed and cast to Astral Plane like the others. Vhaeraun asked about his mother instead, knowing that’s still a weak spot. Corellon was a romantic, and still saw the incarnation of grace and light that he originally created when he looked at Araushnee (which was suspiciously similar to mom, Gruumsh would point out), never noticing the venom in the gaze that answered his. Corellon said she was to be cursed, stripped of her divine portfolio and banished from his court to fend for herself in the multiverse. Vhaeraun then knew he was going to get away with this, for he argued his mother would be defenseless against predators. Demon princes and devil lords and even Gruumsh would love to capture her just as a trophy, she’d become a living insult against Corellon, moving from hand to claw to pincer to tentacle like a coin. This appeal to both his misplaced romanticism and oversensitive pride was too much for Corellon, he banished Vhaeraun along with Araushnee, charging him with his mother’s protection forever.

Vhaeraun thought things went rather well but Araushnee was furious. She smote her son for his words to Corellon, which were just as insulting to her as Corellon’s attitude that alienated her in the first place. Then she bound him, for even though her portfolios had been taken, her divine power wasn’t. Vhaeraun thus became a captive, a trophy of insult against Corellon just like he’d himself described to him. She cast her old name aside, rebranded herself as Lolth and became an evil matriarchal deity of shadows and schemes. Vhaeraun was dragged along in inescapable webs of deceit, whether he wanted to or not.

Today, Vhaeraun is known as a servant and enforcer of Lolth. He has no church, no followers and no freedom but is usually revered by Lolth’s worshippers as a champion of the underdog and a saint of mercy. However he managed to form many secret cults, bribe or seduce many of his mothers’ followers into worshipping him as the god of revolution. He’s found that maleness, gender equality and basic, old school, vanilla romance (which has become a forbidden sin and an object of fantasy in an extremely large number Lolth’s ultramatriarchal followers) are domains free for the taking and can be his most powerful weapons against Lolth’s faithful. He’s going to do better this time, the second go against his second parent will end with his victory. Especially as Lolth isn’t nearly as powerful or warlike as Corellon.

Lolth may appear to rule supreme over her subjects (which come in all the mortal races instead of just drow) but her grip is slack. She prefers to lead subtly, push people to action by dream and coincidence instead of powerful displays of divine origin. This is a weakness Vhaeraun is ready to exploit, as the subtle approach always fails against blunt force in short term. And by the time long term rolls around, Lolth will be done for. Because Vhaeraun is not alone. Eilistraee has been there in the shadows since his exile; after being given her mother’s portfolios (and battle too) by Corellon for rewarding her loyalty during rebellion, she knew her mother would become like this and that her brother would try Uprising 2: The Spider Bogaloo against her. She’s been lending what aid she can to Vhaeraun in his preparations and will fight her mother on the day of rebellion, dragging her into a prison in Negative Energy like Corellon should’ve done when he had the chance. Just like when he refused to stop Vhaeraun’s advances on Eilistraee and triggered the whole mess, Corellon’s decisions after the rebellion was certainly going to be absolutely wrong. Eilistraee is thinking afterwards Corellon might be persuaded to go Negative too to keep their mother company, try to redeem her. That would be really great in Eilistraee’s opinion, both of their parents need to get lost and stay lost because they both suck. The siblings’ distaste for their parents surpasses their distaste for each other and they’re allied until such a time that their parents are removed from the board.

Vhaeraun is not just a rebel against the establishment, he’s a rebel against traditions too. You don’t pray to Vhaeraun. Vhaeraun comes to you when he’s got something to offer. If you accept his deal and come through with whatever payment he demanded, then you’ll be pals for life. This only happens in Lolth worshipping communities, he’s too busy with his current work to take on any extras. In extremely rare occasions, he might stir some trouble in Corellon controlled regions too but that’s always related to weakening Lolth. His old churches, the ones he set up during his stint as a freeroaming god of rebellion, are long gone. But old legends of his deeds have fueled the ascension of a number of demigods on those mortal worlds. Vhaeraun would spend his spare time thinking about how to absorb those, except he has no spare time.


I think I seriously don't like Corellon. Not that I'm aiming to hate on him, it's just... he fits into the hole. The douchenozzle shaped hole.

Also, I think I'm running out of steam at this point. These writeups have almost become a homebrew setting with all the extra stuff.

Pronounceable
2016-08-24, 05:17 PM
Out of steam unfortunately means out of steam, if the time it took to get this one done is any indication.


LOVIATAR (lesser goddess), Maiden of Pain, Bearer of the Nine Plagues, Scarskin, Ugly Crone of Old, Glutton of Punishment, Fear Eater
Domains: pain, suffering, disease, age, weakness, bravery

Loviatar had started out as one of the younger deities of multiverse, spawned purely by the beliefs of mortals of Material Plane and managed to climb to higher levels of godhood like her fellow siblings Sune, Lathander and a few others. She was a greater goddess of battle and magecraft, proud of her vast power and hungry for glory and victory. She was doing quite well for herself until a deity of rot and decay appeared and started terrorizing a number of mortal worlds, completely disregarding all the pacts and deals most deities and patheons had struck to prevent apocalyptic battle scenarios. Elder gods Pelor, Moradin and Corellon, all sensing something was subtly wrong with this thing, warned the younger deities to steer clear and only fight its minions and plots using mortal worshippers and planar servants. But Loviatar was brash and haughty, declared to all that she’d take on this Moander in direct battle and prove that she’s the strongest and bravest.

Loviatar faced Moander on an afflicted mortal world, in the exact sort of apocalyptic battle scenario godly compacts were made to avoid, and lost. Moander struck Loviatar down with a curse, unprecedentedly cutting right through a greater deity’s defenses, corrupting her essence, killing every one of her clerics in the multiverse, ruining her divine realm, destroying most of her servants, withering her vaunted magic and extinguishing her inner fire. Her enchanting witch queen form of strength and beauty became a wizened sickly crone covered in countless scars, her divine wand became too heavy to lift, domains and portfolios inexplicably ripped off of her, she was left to contemplate the results of her pride as Moander put its appendage on her throat to choke the last vestiges of life out of her. She was defeated but she wouldn’t go out like a punkass bitch, so she tried to spit on Moander’s nonexistant face in a final act of defiance and curse it with all her remaining might, but she didn’t even have strength for that. It was a pitiful, pathetic display of defiance.

For some reason, Moander didn’t finish the job. It ground her into dust and destroyed her divinity but left her a barely alive demigoddess. Luckily for the multiverse, the elder gods were watching the battle and they managed to identify Moander as a fragment of an evil predating even them, a tiny piece of the long forgotten Elder Elemental Evil that must’ve somehow gotten loose from its secret prison. Thanks to Loviatar’s foolhardy actions, they eventually engineered Moander’s destruction, making him the second deity after Aoskar who was killed for reals.

This didn’t particularly matter to Loviatar however. She was left trapped in a post apocalyptic world, full of monsters and corruption, cut off from the rest of multiverse. For centuries she wandered the ruined planet, trying to shelter and protect the few mortals who’d survived the apocalyptic war despite her incredible weakness and neverending pain, bravely fighting (also never ever winning) the beasts and monsters bearing vestiges of Moander’s power to protect them. Which didn’t work. Eventually, the last mortal on the planet died of a horribly painful disease inflicted by a monster as Loviatar failed to help him, much like all the others before him. At that point, all the monsters and corruption remaining on the world disappeared, Moander’s barrier had crumbled after serving its purpose (of complete genocide), Loviatar was free to leave the dead world. Knowing all that suffering (including her own) was her fault, Loviatar would never be the same again.

Today, Loviatar has managed to crawl her way back up to lesser deityhood. By adopting the view that life is nothing but pain and weakness is the default state of being, Loviatar appeals to the poor, the old, the sick (and the occasional dumb teen). She teaches that power, glory, wealth, health, beauty and youth are all lies and tricks to weaken the soul. Loviatar’s creed is that pain is proof of life and must be cherished, that only the utterly dead feel no pain, that not fearing pain or suffering or weakness is the only way to win, that accepting without giving in to pain and weakness is the greatest good one can possibly achieve. She says that it’s easy being a badass when you’re a manly man armed to teeth wading into scrawny goblins but true badassery is revealed when you’re strapped to the rack and being flayed alive. As far as Loviatar is concerned, strength is for lamers, fear is the only enemy and only the weak are capable of having worth (once they master fear).

This philosophy earns her enemies by the bucketload but Loviatar has spat in the faces of all deities who challenged her and laughed at their strength by now (she also got her ass kicked every single time but that doesn’t stop her from laughing or spitting). It’s a point of pride to her that she’s never ever won any kind of battle ever since facing Moander and in fact seems to be somehow getting more resilient by being known to be weak. She also gets a surprising amount of support (and pity), even from various battle gods who approve of her making their rival battle gods look like petty bullies for beating up a sickly old crone. While her mortal clergy and planar servants are rather low in number, her newly adopted domains bring her an endless flow of disorganized worship from Material Plane. In fact, most deities are puzzled why she hasn’t ascended to greater goddess once again and suspect the answer is (still) Moander’s curse.

Church of Loviatar is completely unorganized. Her clerics are usually suffering from some incurable mental or physical ailment, and are expected to do nothing but explain people that they need to deal with their own problems and accept their own pains and can’t go around expecting magical solutions (or any solutions, or an ending to pain or suffering, really, seeing how those are default and eternal). There are no organized flocks of Loviatar worshippers either; pain and suffering are personal and omnipresent, therefore all appeals to the goddess also need to be personal and untied to any ceremony. Loviatar has a shockingly large number of paladin followers, drawn to her primarily through the never fear anything ever, no not even that sentiment. Some Loviatar followers are quick to offer help, always trying to shoulder burdens and pains of others (on account of pain building character and translating to personal worth), displaying a weird mix of samaritanism and greed. Others are completely self absorbed, lost in their own pain and almost completely apathetic to everything else.

Praying to Loviatar when in great pain usually gets a direct and clear answer. This is usually deal with it, scrub but not always, she’s known to grant incredible resilience and sometimes even miraculous healing and recovery (only for those who’s proven their worth by enduring a lot). Praying to her when not in great pain inevitably gets the prayer a painful and long lasting smiting, so they’ll have a legitimate reason to bother her next time.


I'm unsure how well this version works. An inverted Loviatar is normally just a regular Ilmater, so I had to go shellshocked vet to make her odder and distinctiver. I like it but she doesn't feel all that fresh.

Also this is likely the last one. I could fully write others already mentioned but I feel what's been already mentioned is enough to get a usable picture of them: Selune, Tharizdun, Moradin, Corellon, every ultramacho dude, Tiamat, Pelor, Olidammara, Umberlee, Lolth, Eilistraee are all here in some capacity. That's a crapload of deities and I really cannot think of any other notable DnD gods suitable for treatment. Except Garl Glittergold (it's just Moradin hamming it up with a fake nose anyway) and Cyric (no way am I gonna manage to seperate that from Forgotten Realms canon). Unless I'm forgetting something blindingly obvious?


Maybe I should've put this in homebrew. That could've gotten more balls rolling instead of me being my own boss in here. Oh well. Maybe later.

Fri
2016-08-25, 12:14 AM
Hey, I'm enjoying this and reading every single entry! They're all pretty good! And Garl Glittergod as Moradin with fake nose is just one sentence, but also one of the best god reimagining out there.

Remind me, isn't there a deity who's originally a mortal dude who did something stupid but cool and died, and became the god of doing stupid but cool things? I can't remember what god is that though, or if there is really that god in DnD canon. It might be interesting to see your take on it.

JeenLeen
2016-08-25, 09:04 PM
Hey, I'm enjoying this and reading every single entry! They're all pretty good! And Garl Glittergod as Moradin with fake nose is just one sentence, but also one of the best god reimagining out there.

Remind me, isn't there a deity who's originally a mortal dude who did something stupid but cool and died, and became the god of doing stupid but cool things? I can't remember what god is that though, or if there is really that god in DnD canon. It might be interesting to see your take on it.

In Pathfinder, there's the god of good times and drink. I forget his name, but he might who you are thinking of. I think I read nobody really knows exactly how he ascended, but it was something he did while really drunk on a dare.

I think the god of travel in the 3.5 PHB (Fharlarghan or something like that) was a mortal who ascended, but although CG (right?) I don't think he's as much on doing crazy awesome stuff as the Pathfinder deity I'm thinking of.


You might like the stuff in my sig.
I second this. LudicSavant's god write-ups are pretty cool. The cosmology doesn't fit with yours, really, but could be good inspiration.

Max_Killjoy
2016-08-25, 10:22 PM
I'll second that -- Ludic's work makes me want to do as better job writing up the religions and deities of my settings.

Pronounceable
2016-08-26, 04:03 AM
...isn't there a deity who's...
From a bit of looking around, I found Zuoken and Cailan Calsomething that sound like it. Zuoken was promoted from mortal for being a badass and Cale got drunk and won a god becoming contest thing on a bet. And Fharlaghn isn't an ascended guy far as I checked.


As for potential continuation of these reskinnings, I got an idea for Auril. She's big enough thanks to Icewind Dale. I also have the urge for queen of WAAAGH Zuggtmoy, which is hilarious but makes %400 sense, however she's sadly not a deity (and would have to have myconids WAAAGHing, except they can't scream). I could try to take a shot at Zuoken as Bruce Lee but he's pretty unremarkable (but Silvanus was a million times worse). Another random urge I have is mad scientist Demogorgon, famed maker of the owlbear and the duckbunny, who's also not a deity.
In general, real mythology pantheons inside DnD are out (because **** that noise [yes I know Silvanus and Loviatar are already here, don't care]) and 4e+ gods are also out (because they're noobs). That leaves old Greyhawk and FR gods, demihuman deities, plus the odd Planescaper, and old abandoned setting gods (Al-Quadim, Birthright, etc) don't hold enough brand recognition to be called classic (not to mention I don't even know them).

So there'll most likely be an Auril but afterwards is murky. There's an awful lot of mileage to get out of nondeity powers with big names though.

Telonius
2016-08-26, 09:21 AM
I made a minor tweak to a major rivalry in a campaign of mine. Kurtulmak and Garl Glittergold's famous "collapsed halls" prank. There was one stray reference to the idea that Asmodeus was present in the halls when it happened. What wasn't told in any of the tales, is that Asmodeus set it up. He knew Garl would be there, that he would take the opportunity to attack him, and that Kurtulmak would be caught in the crossfire. This drove Kurtulmak (and all the Kobolds) into the waiting arms of Lawful Evilness for millennia to come.

Beleriphon
2016-08-26, 10:58 AM
So there'll most likely be an Auril but afterwards is murky. There's an awful lot of mileage to get out of nondeity powers with big names though.

Demogorgon, Demogorgon, Demogorgon!

Pronounceable
2016-08-26, 11:31 AM
Went faster than expected.

AURIL (intermediate goddess), the Frostmaiden, Crushing Glacier, Icicled Maw, Queen of Air and Darkness, Scourge of the Sun, Winter Crowned Queen
Domains: winter, cold, ice, evil, chaos, fey

Auril is a fey queen who somehow gained power of winter and ascended to actual godhood. Ever since her ascension, she’s been a petty and vindictive plague upon mortal worlds who demands worship and constant sacrifices to stall her divine AND material wrath. Her legions of cruel and cold hearted fey enter Material Plane inside giant hollowed chunks of ice launched from Feywild by Auril’s breath, crashing down onto mortal worlds in a shower of icy comets, flattening settlements and geography alike, eager to hunt down all the mortals that survived their frozen bombardment. They enjoy starving and freezing their captives, mocking them as they’re forced to huddle without shelter or food until they die in merciless winter. Her mortal clergy is no better (and usually worse), sharing the temparement of their goddess and working hard to prove themselves equal to her fey marauders. Appearance of Auril’s clerics on any mortal world is a sign that a fey attack is coming soon and can only be averted by a flurry of sycopanthy and wealth heaped at their feet, and even that’s no guarantee. While Auril’s armies usually don’t fall directly on powerful and militarized lands where they might meet heavy resistance, nowhere is really safe from Auril.

More usually, mortal worlds being targeted by Auril see a surge of worship in Pelor and other deities of sun, fire or summer as mortals beg them for help against the Frostmaiden. This works too and is cheaper than paying the exacting tributes Auril demands. While she always sends some attackers once her clerics have heralded her, fey forces sent to worlds where opposing gods have been roused to action are never very large and it’s generally accepted that Auril is afraid of the Unblinking Monarch.

Which is wrong. Auril actually likes her boss who granted her dominion over cold and ice in the depths of Plane of Negative Energy, hidden from eyes of other gods and powerful beings by the Allmother’s cloak. All she had to do in return was to do what she’d have wanted to do with divine power anyway, only slightly limited in choice of targets. Pelor was getting quite displeased that the mortals he created himself kept liking deities made by his siblings’ hands or even raising their own, especially when they were doing this right under his fiery eyes, and decided they needed reminding which god was the most important for their wellbeing. But Pelor was no short sighted tyrant, he needed to be the carrot and not the stick. Eager Auril does her job flawlessly and is liked by her benefactor in return. While she sometimes regrettably targets worlds where Pelor worship is going strong to maintain her image of an unpredictable goddess of evil, the damage is usually minimal in such cases. Such a capable and strong agent is useful in other capacities too, where Pelor's own use of force would look inappropriate.

Today, Auril mostly commands armies of evil fey going from world to world, killing and looting in her name while her divine wrath manifests as deadly colds and extended winters that help her legions and hinder their enemies. The few mortal clerics she empowers to be her heralds on mortal worlds usually get transformed to fey and come with her armies when they leave (assuming they survived). Auril doesn’t establish lasting churches or keep flocks of mortal worshippers after she’s done with their world. Nobody would have reason to stay loyal to her when she’s not there to bash their face anyway, there’d be no point in attempting to keep permanent mortal worship. She’s become an intermediate goddess due to all the fear and worship she gets from mortals in tribute. She considers herself to be a sun goddess, just with a different approach than most.

Pretty much every deity followed by mortals hates Auril and she doesn’t lack for enemies. Corellon and all of Seldarine are her sworn enemies for her numerous attacks on their worshippers, Chauntea and Umberlee join forces only when she’s around, Queen Titania of the Seelie Court is her oldest nemesis and a source of constant battling in Feywild and the myriad of war gods all see her invasions as a challenge and insult. However when out in the multiverse and not oppressing and ruining Material worlds, Auril is perfectly well behaved and is quite liked by many planars, deities and beings of power and influence with no interest in Material Plane for her cold beauty, regal demeanor, tendency to generously spend her considerable wealth on trivialities and many exciting stories (of horrible atrocities inflicted on mortals). Auril can have some very strong friends and allies in a pinch, such as Lolth and Gruumsh (who approve of all the trouble she causes to Corellon), Silvanus (who feels responsible for her evils and wants her corrected instead of destroyed), various gods of destruction (both as a kindred soul and as an extension of Gruumsh’s favor), many demon princes (who’d just love to have a piece of that sweet evulz action) or Waukeen (because even Auril needs a place to store her ever increasing ill gotten gains). Any serious effort towards stopping Auril’s marauding is quite likely to spiral into an all consuming divine war that might wreck the multiverse, which is how she gets to keep ravaging Material Plane.


Apparently the goodness of an idea is proportional to the speed I can whip up these things. Because blackops Auril was a damn good idea and probably the best of the lot.

Pronounceable
2016-08-31, 12:34 PM
Since he's more famous than some actual gods, I think we can let this slide.


DEMOGORGON (demon prince), Demon Prince of Demons
Domains: science, chaos, evil

Self proclaimed Demon Prince of Demons was just a regular demon minding his own business when mortal souls started falling into the Abyss with the great Mechanus coming online and starting to sort dead mortals by alignment. He took a liking to the weird little things. The ephemeral essence of the mortal soul was just like clay but better. For one, it screamed and begged. Fascinated, Demogorgon started shaping them, first into simple objects, then to various creatures and finally, after millenia of practice, into tortured slaves bound to his will. This also had a side effect of continuously feeding him the agony of millions of dead mortals and making him the single most powerful demon in all of the infinite Abyss (but it was the art that mattered most). He built a stronghold made of dead souls, then conquered himself an empire with armies of the damned, the very first force the Abyss had ever seen that was organized and controllable by one demon. Many other demons saw his success, figured out the trick and emulated him, creating countless kingdoms and empires and baronies and princedoms all over the Abyss but Demogorgon has the most experience at fashioning mighty slaves and even today, no demon’s army of the damned is as strong or creative (or dominated) as Demogorgon’s.

However Demogorgon found all that battling and conquering business boring (and far too samey and repetitive to be proper demonic behavior), he was most happy when he was doing excruiciatingly painful novel procedures on screaming mortal souls on his tables in the basement. No amount of demon face stomping was a match for the thrill of seeing a broken soul entrapped in a mishmash of random animal bodies shed its first tear of despair (assuming Demogorgon had left it any tear ducts) when the realization hits. He tried his hand at demons for a change, captured and tortured a few to try transforming them into new forms. But demons were expiring far too easily under his tentacles and respawning elsewhere before he could make much progress, it was a fruitless waste of time. So he retreated to his stronghold and abandoned his armies, leaving them to run amok and create random destruction. For ages now, Demogorgon hasn’t left his lab but his strength and skill is apparent in the neverending tide of newer and ever stronger monsters streaming forth from his stronghold. He pays many demons to scavenge mortal souls falling into Abyss and most demons not in his employ give his lands a wide berth because you never know when he might decide to restart demon experiments again.

Giving up on conquering the Abyss allowed Demogorgon’s rivals to establish themselves and grow to match his power. However focusing on his craft let Demogorgon amass power in other ways. As his slaves grew in might, so did his fame and reach. He even started taking and experimenting on live beings from Material Plane, resulting in creatures that could reproduce. News of this breakthrough brought customers to Demogorgon, fierce and powerful guard creatures are always in demand among beings of multiversal power and influence. He’s had many customers unconcerned with morality; any strange creature imaginable could be asked of Demogorgon and he would find a way to make it exist. If it’s particularly novel or painful for the raw materials, he might even give the result away for free. There's some very numerous types of creatures these days (such as werebeasts and azer) that were commissioned by beings of evil and wealth. Many inexplicable creatures such as mimic or rust monster or gelatinous cube exist just because someone paid (or dared) Demogorgon to make it. Things such as owlbear, duckbunny, squark, horspider and many other animal mashups exist because Demogorgon likes encasing dead mortal minds in savage creatures only dimly aware of what they’ve lost.

As a general rule, if something baffling and horrible exists on land, it was made by Demogorgon. When they say a wizard did it, it's just proof of ignorance (because it was actually a demon prince).


This took far too long. Is it good? I don't think it's much good. I had a better idea based on actual mythology of Demogorgon but sadly failed to make it something good out of it. I probably should've kept at it.

Next up, dunno.

e: Also yes, one head is the Demon Prince, the other is the Prince of Demons. It changes randomly.

Pronounceable
2016-09-28, 03:55 AM
Thread strikes back. Because I finally got around to having a new idea. I dub this the strange bedfellows.


NERULL (greater god), The Grim Reaper
Domains: death, fear

Nerull is a cold god full of scorn and malice. He despises everything and everyone but regular hate is too lively, too emotional for him to ever stoop to, so he sticks with icy detachment and emotionless sarcasm. Nerull would rather everything live in mortal fear and die as soon as possible and isn’t shy about expressing his ill will. Despite his galling and cold manner, he’s among the most respected and feared deities of the planes, in no small part due to his power. The only being who can crack his icy exterior is his kinda sister, kinda wife, definite ally Sune. Only Sune’s presence can get any visible emotion out of Nerull, one of heated fury and vicious hatred.

When Mechanus came online and emptied Ethereal Plane of the dead souls sucking up all the undirected belief, Sune and Nerull both came to be almost instantly. As manifestations of the endless obsession mortals have with sex and death, no other deity of mortal origin has ever formed as readily as them or reached their widespread influence and power. Considered by many to be the parental figures of all independent deities, Nerull and Sune continue to be the closest allies in the multiverse against the dominion of primordial deities, despite their absolute hatred of one another. Sune’s always been happy to be a walking oedipal complex whereas Nerull is an unwilling but terrifying father figure, but both are united in their desire to not let the ancient greater gods have free reign over existence or completely subjugate mortal races. Various cults and beliefs on numerous worlds paint them as siblings or spouses, which they both hate but are forced to swallow to present a united front. All deities ascended from or born of mortal belief know that the pair are the oldest and wisest among them and will do everything in their power to help against Overmothers' offspring. Nerull is well known for his thirst for divine blood and has performed numerous deicides on flunkies of primordial greater gods for trying to lean on independent deities. While those kills didn’t stick (their daddies keep resurrecting them), all of multiverse has learned to fear the Reaper.

Nerull is unique as the only god to date to have become more fearsome for losing power and influence. A long time ago, the self proclaimed Perfect Man and his two evil allies came to Nerull’s divine domain to defeat him and take his power. Known far and wide as the Dread Three, the three mortals had already committed deicide on a demigod and gained divinity and were now looking for more. Nerull’s portfolio was much wider back then; he also had claim to strength, fate, tyranny, strife, hatred, the dead, undead, necromancy, murder and assassination. Such a wide sphere of influence was giving Nerull an unparallelled power and this was what had attracted Dread Three. However Nerull wasn’t happy, he thought such a spread was weakening his focus and distracting him from the important basics (aka death and fear). So he offered to give godhood to Dread Three without a fight, surprising them. Bane took the portfolios of strength, tyranny and strife so he’d become the ultimate tyrant. Myrkul took necromancy, fate, the dead and undead so he’d have more followers than Bane. And Bhaal took murder and assassination because he liked killing.

This left Nerull with just the domains of fear and death, which was just fine. Now that his portfolio had narrowed down, he was focused and sharp, just like his scythe. He was more fearsome and intimidating than he’d ever been. Later on, when Bhaal’s attempt to usurp the Many Mawed Devourer backfired and Erythnul devoured him and took his portfolios instead, Nerull disdainfully shook his head as he dumped Bhaal’s remains to Astral. Then when Myrkul was backstabbed by his mortal consort and all his portfolios were divided among his treacherous lover Raven Queen, the expert betrayer Velsharoon and the upstart Wee Jas, Nerull frowned thinking it had something to do with Sune getting the vengeance she can’t on Nerull from the closest match instead (he was correct). While Black Handed Lord of Tyranny is still going strong, Nerull knows he’s simply one more splinter of Gruumsh and will inevitably fall on Nerull’s scythe at Gruumsh's discretion. The fact that Nerull just smiles and nods when these things happen makes everyone suspect it was all according to the plan (it wasn’t but no point in telling that). The fear Nerull inspires in the multiverse is matched only by the reclusive Tiamat.

Nerull’s church is small but very well organized. They teach that death comes for all and is very likely to be extremely painful and should be feared. His clergy is well versed in all religions, able to perform any type of funerary service or ceremony for modest prices. Nerull has a tendency to randomly manifest during burials and cremations, staring at the mourners for a few seconds to remind them their turn will come soon enough. His clerics also experts at creating and destroying all forms of undead, willing to lend that expertise at exorbiant prices. Assassination is another staple for the clergy and their temples are havens for both professional assassins and regular murderers. While Nerull prefers killing of sentient beings, he’s contented with plants or animals too so being butchers or farmers are acceptable to Nerull, his temples house skilled laborers who’re of use to societies too. Despite their overly evil and disruptive behavior, no lord or king dares outlaw worship of Nerull since that sort of decree is always followed by death and possibly extinction of their bloodline. Any temple or congregation of Nerull is also likely to have a rival temple to Sune pop up nearby, whose clerics will do their best to snuff and stifle Nerullians’ depravity. Sunites and the services they bring are welcomed almost anywhere, so Nerull worship going on nearby isn’t considered to be a universal catastrophe like Auril’s or Erythnul’s.

Nerull is also unique in his treatment of mortal worshippers, he alone promises reincarnation to his faithful instead of an afterlife and demonstrably delivers it. Many followers of Nerull are his reincarnated clerics reborn to Nerull worshipping parents who remember their previous lives upon being officially inducted into the church (again). Nerull doesn’t wish to have a massive divine realm full of souls dedicated to him, he wants souls who die over and over and over in his service. This attracts a large number of mortals to his faith, as there are many clerics of Nerull who get to reconnect with their previous friends and families and this sort of news gets around.

Nobody prays to Nerull, not even his clerics. Nerull ignores all prayers except the ones from ceremonies in his temples and those are never asking anything of him. Instead, his followers go out and try to kill and die. In fact, every follower of Nerull is required to kill something every day. The more squeamish among them rip grass off ground, which is considered lazy and halfhearted but acceptable.


A lot of things click into place once you realize Nerull is Nergal is Jergal. This is also the most interconnected of all the deities I’ve written up here. He’s still mostly the same old vile Nerull but tying him up with Sune is a stroke of genius. GENIUS I say! But seriously, death and sex are like our whole thing as species, it’s basically “the human condition” summed up in two words. Sune and Nerull, or their counterparts, need to be up there in any sort of polytheist pantheon thing.

This thread has become almost like “my DnDTM” at this point, it’s practically a homebrew setting. I should tidy it up and post in homebrew for feedback or something. But then it'd be post upon post of giant walls of text from one poster and nobody reads such threads.


e: Next up, why didn't anyone say Deep Duerra is known as the Axe Princess of Conquest? No way am I gonna let that go to waste...

Pronounceable
2016-09-29, 09:45 AM
Judging by the overwhelming response, I'm totes doing something right here.


DUERRA (intermediate goddess), The Axe Princess of Conquest, Queen of Invisible Art

Domains: battle, psionics, conquest, duergar

One of the many gifts Moradin bestowed upon Berronar as her dowry, proud Duerra was crafted of adamantine to lead Berronar’s legions of valkyries and shieldmaidens in battle. She was an excellent commander and a fierce warrior, served with distinction for millenia in forces of Mount Celestia on countless campaigns against fiends. Duerra was renowned far and wide as the mightiest soldier of Moradin’s armies, celebrated in song and legend.

But Moradin was unsatisfied, for even though his campaigns against demons of Abyss succeeded more often than they failed, battling inside the Abyss only served to feed and strengthen the demonkind as a whole through violence and fury. He ordered an end to the campaigns against Abyss, armies of Mount Celestia would only besiege it from now on to prevent demons from spreading further into the multiverse. This was too boring, Duerra hadn’t signed up for waiting around twiddling her thumbs. There was the occasional skirmish against fiends from other Lower Planes but Duerra was getting more and more restless. Berronar noticed the turmoil inside her adoptive daughter before Duerra herself did and, fearing she might do something reckless and/or stupid (such as talking to devils), persuaded Moradin to get her out of Lower Planes. Berronar hoped seeing the multiverse outside of battlefields would calm Duerra down, make her recognize there’s more to life than war against evil (she’s regretted this ever since). The concept of holiday was alien to Duerra but she understood orders. So she took Moradin’s words as an order to travel all over the multiverse and serve the greater good at her own discretion for a century. She decided to start with Material Plane, which she’d heard so much about. It was impressive and beautiful, full of mortals whose finite lives and the mindset and behaviors that caused were just as alien to Duerra as the concept of holiday. But watching mortals taught her what holiday meant so, being a good soldier who obeys orders, she tried her hand at it, taking a mortal guise and becoming a barmaid in a small town on one of the very few worlds where Moradin worship was widespread.

Unfortunately for all involved, this particular world was one of the targets of the illithid deity Ilsensine, mindflayers on this world was abducting dwarves in large numbers and experimenting on them to give them psionic powers in an effort to create an ideal slave race. Dwarves were the best humanoid race for illithids to experiment upon; they were strong and tough and adapted easily to underground life. Duerra thus became the protagonist of an actual DnD campaign, playing the role of the simple peasant girl who rose to the occasion and became the badass heroine who bravely fought against evil. She defeated mindflayers at every turn, freed countless dwarven victims from their labs, most of whom really had gained psionic powers but were unable to control them. After an epic battle of ultimate destiny by mortal standards (which was just daily workout for a demigoddess veteran of Abyssal campaigns), Duerra defeated the largest elder brain of that world. She also found out the terrible secret that this was just one of many worlds where mindflayers were experimenting on dwarves by Ilsensine’s order. Duerra immediately left the world to talk to Sun Father Pelor, who was supposed to be protecting Material Plane (leaving behind the legend of the heroic barmaid who gave her life to save the world). She was informed that Pelor had dominion over all his fiery eyes see (which doesn’t include underdarks that exist on so many planets) and Moradin or his servants weren’t free to act in Material Plane as per divine agreement. Duerra was doing a good thing opposing Ilsensine’s plots so Pelor or his servants wouldn’t hinder her, but that was all the support she was going to get from either primordial father.

Duerra knew she didn’t have time to figure out which worlds were targeted and save them one by one, saving one world had already taken years and she was supposed to report back for duty after one century, so she decided to fix the problem at its source. That was a battle worthy of the Adamantine Shieldmistress, the Commander of Valkyries. She single handedly entered Plane of Elemental Water, fought through throngs of submarine horrors that could give demons of Abyss a run for their money and finally found and invaded the divine realm of Ilsensine that was far too close to Elemental Chaos for comfort. This took many years of ceaseless fighting under crushing pressure of the lightless depths of Water and even Duerra was growing weaker by the time she confronted Ilsensine. Their battle was epic even by multiversal standards and ended with Duerra cleaving the brain shaped god of illithids in half. One half of it escaped, disgracefully kicked out of its own realm, while other was left squirming in Duerra’s grip. Duerra had no more time to track down the escaped half and put an end to Ilsensine for good, she had to report back for duty very soon. She tried to tow Ilsensine’s half back to Mount Celestia to be destroyed but it was resisting, greatly slowing down Duerra. She would be late at this speed but she couldn’t risk letting the halves rejoin either, so she consumed Ilsensine’s essence with great reluctance.

When Duerra returned from her “holiday”, all in Mount Celestia saw that her divinity had remarkably increased and she had gained the domain of psionics. Nobody except Moradin could recognize the strange stink upon her however, for neither Tiamat nor her abominational godspawn have a habit of leaving Elemental Water and all planars avoid the place on principle. Fearing that Tiamat’s power would drive her into insanity like Pelor’s daughter Umberlee, Moradin refused to let Duerra rejoin his armies. He assured her she was still his beloved daughter and would always have a place in his court and they’d do everything in their power to help her adjust to a new life but Duerra took this as a dishonorable discharge for standing up for the weak and an attempt to put an end to her fight against evil. The so called “protectors of the planes and patron deities of goodness” might turn a blind eye to evils of the multiverse when it suit them, but she would not. Duerra left Mount Celestia forever, much to grief of Moradin and Berronar, but Tiamat was always the strongest and there was no cure to her warping influence.

Duerra found and saved another mortal world from ravages of mindflayers. Then another. Then one more. After that she thought to have a holiday, so went back to the world that started everything. She found that the dwarves she’d saved were now ostracized and oppressed, called freaks and monsters for their uncontrolled psionic powers. The inherent unfairness of the multiverse on display here greatly angered Duerra, she manifested among the psionic dwarves and was recognized as their heroine savior returned from the dead. This would do. Duerra organized the psionic dwarves, taught them to control their psionic powers and led them to underdark, where they built a strong kingdom. Thanks to Duerra’s vast experience as a commander, psionic dwarves became masters of physical and mental warfare, conquering large swathes of underdark. They opened up psionic portals to other worlds Duerra saved, getting in touch with and absorbing dwarven survivors of mindflayer experiments, slowly but surely building up to a mighty empire controlling vast territories on numerous underdarks. Duerra continued searching for worlds where mindflayers attacked dwarves, finding and destroying many illithid cities and expanding the influence of psionic dwarves. Over time, their skin turned light gray from living underground and they evolved to a subrace of dwarves with inherent psionic powers. In honor of their twice savior, psionic dwarves named themselves duergar and started to worship her as their patron goddess.

Worship of a massive, interplanetary empire ascended Duerra further, she became a lesser goddess. By then she was in full conquest mode, looking for ways to increase her empire and punish all who wronged the duergar. She couldn’t be called a goddess of good anymore but she was still a disciplined soldier and was still leading her armies from the front anytime mindflayers were discovered. Ilsensine had long ordered experiments on dwarves to stop, not wanting to make any more potential worshippers for Duerra but duergar’s hatred of illithids was unquenchable and they were breeding true by then. Mindflayers were kicked out of most underdarks to avoid being exterminated, forced to live above under Pelor’s eyes where duergar are loath to go. Pelor and his servants were now forced to take action against mindflayers too in order to protect their own surface dwelling worshippers, which delights Duerra. They still have many powerful enemies like beholders and drow but the dour duergar race is doing very well for themselves as a thriving race of underdark.

Hatred of illithids is a defining trait of duergar, which had the unforseen benefit of drawing planar attention. Dreaded pirates of Astral and mad monks of Limbo both share the fanatical hatred of the mindflayer, two races well known for their isolationist natures. Duergar are allied to both gith races, an accomplishment shared by nobody else in the planes. Gith races consider Duerra to be ok for a deity, they figure a goddess who’d choose a broken illithid skull for a symbol is as good as it can possibly get and have great respect for her legendary defeat of Ilsensine. Duerra herself is a big fan of the githzerai and their manifestly insane desire to bring order to Limbo and has ordered her followers to get some joint psionics research going with them, she’s hoping to draw them into a permanent alliance with duergar. Rampant raider lifestyle and unorganized nature of githyanki isn’t nearly as appealing to Duerra but she’s managed to convince some very few captains to form semi temporary settlements in Astral atop god corpses to serve as staging grounds for raids against stronger targets. She hopes appealing to greed will eventually make some real conquerors out of githyanki. Duerra dreams of allying with (and integrating) the gith races into the duergar empire for an interplanar empire. Her worshippers among the gith races are very few but they’re fervent and do a good job of spreading her word over the planes. Expanding into the planes through the gith has elevated her even further and she's recently become an intermediate goddess. She’s very far from the spirit of law and good Moradin crafted long ago but is still just as proud of herself.

Duerra welcomes worship from all mortal races but her clergy is mostly limited to duergar and they’re the ruling caste of duergar empire. They’re all highly trained in both physical and psionic combat, favoring axes just like their mistress. Temples of Duerra are inevitably seats of power because it’s impossible to have any power in duergar society that doesn’t stem from Duerra. Clerics of Duerra must prove to be strong both physically, mentally and psionically if they want to advance, weakness is a luxury commanders can’t afford (and every cleric of Duerra is a commander of all nearby duergar in an emergency). She promises an afterlife of fighting alongside her agaist the enemies of their people, the reward for long and loyal service to your race is to be able to keep at it forever.

Duerra teaches that discipline and unity is the path to power, that you should stand up for your people and never let anything push you or yours around. She also espouses the virtues of personal strength and importance of hard work but never to the detriment of your community. Duerra’s way of life is a path of struggle and hardship but it promises just reward to honest work. Those who work and fight hard for the good of community are to be rewarded once they’re unable to continue, Duerra commands keeping detailed records of toils and elders and infirm are to be respected and supported proportional to the amount of work or fighting they did for the society. She condemns laziness and selfishness but forbids forcing people to work against their will, for an unwilling soldier is a sloppy and possibly treacherous soldier, let the lazy and the selfish and the cowardly wallow in their vices and starve when hard days fall upon the society, for they’re to be given no charity or support and hard days are always coming.

But all the niceties Duerra preaches is for her worshippers. Anyone else is just a target to be conquered, converted or subjugated at the drop of a hat. While duergar like to present themselves as hard but fair people who retaliate reasonably for offenses, their definition of reasonable or offense is malleable. They’re known to pillage and burn settlements over reasons such as innkeeper tried to overcharge or think I saw a mindflayer.
There we go. How an avalance is born of a snowball...

Also, I know you're reading. There's the view count, you can't fool me.

hamishspence
2016-09-29, 11:46 AM
Interesting take on Duerra. Does she replace Laduguer as primary duergar deity in this cosmology?

Pronounceable
2016-09-30, 04:27 PM
I'm getting rid of racial gods as much as possible. Laduguer is the Hard God of Hardassery and Hardwork and Hardcority and Hard Men Making Hard Choices (if I ever get around to writing him up).

And now for something completely different,


THAUN (intermediate goddess), Lady of Mystery, Vengeance of the Night, Richfoe

Domains: vengeance, greed, lies, trickery, secrets, underdogs


Thaun is a mystery. As far as anybody has seen, she has zero worshippers, zero clerics and no divine domain anywhere in the multiverse, yet she’s a fairly powerful goddess. She appears suddenly, viciously attacks a seemingly random victim, then vanishes. Her targets are always powerful and usually evil, but the glee with which she employs violence and tendency to steal all the wealth present doesn’t paint a picture of goodness. She’s generally known as a dangerous and chaotic entity, preying upon mortal and immortal alike.

What Thaun is actually doing with her vicious assaults is getting vengeance for those who can’t. She considers herself to be a champion of the underdog and would argue that every last one of her rampages was deserved, for she only attacks after hearing the pleas of the weak and the oppressed. It’s unknown how she hears those pleas without any sort of followers. Her victims are usually left broke and broken so they’ll learn what it means to be weak, sometimes she even kidnaps and dumps them in bad places where bad things will happen to them. The fact that she never strikes her targets when they’re not close to fabulous amounts of wealth kind of weakens her claims of championing the underdog however and she doesn’t seem to have the slightest bit of interest in helping the weak and the poor themselves either.

Lord of Tyranny Bane is thus a natural enemy for Thaun and she does target his servants often, weakening his hold on mortal worlds and planes alike. In fact she’s been a thorn on his side so often, Bane sometimes manifests personally to battle her. Those are usually the only occasions when Thaun’s victims have a chance to escape relatively unharmed as she loses herself in battle and her ability to actually fight a greater god like Bane to a standstill speaks volumes about Thaun’s strength. Somewhat disconcerting to the vanishingly small number of beings who witness such events, the deific battles between the two is a bit too up close and personal and too full of witty banter, displaying a strange passion that doesn’t appear to stem from hate.

Something very similar also happens on the rare occasions Thaun targets mortal worlds that are under power of Gruumsh and the orcish god of night, darkness and thieves Shargaas manifests to stop her rampages. Him being much weaker than Bane, Thaun always beats Shargaas in these also too passionate and bantery fights but he keeps coming back for more punishment in a very unorcly manner.

There are also rumors of Thaun dallying with mortals and planars of evil and law persuasion but they’re all of the I heard from a guy who knew this other guy variety.

Nobody, not even various gods of knowledge know where she goes or what she does outside of her vicious attacks upon the rich and the powerful. The only thing that vigilant searchers discovered about her is that she tends to appear in disguise shortly before her attacks and do some trickery and skullduggery to soften her targets, but even then she’s almost undetectable to gods of knowledge and secrets and similar portfolios. It’s a complete mystery where she’s appearing from. Since only the City of Doors is known to be this impervious and unknowable to gods and mortals alike, most widely accepted theory is that Thaun is somehow exempt from the ban of the inscrutable Lady of Pain and lives in Sigil. A more radical theory claims that she is the Lady of Pain.

Which is completely wrong, of course. The reason nothing and nobody can track or detect Thaun when she’s not on a rampage is because she doesn’t exist then. Because Thaun is a mask, a secret identity another being of great power and fame uses to indulge in her darker and inappropriate urges. A being who’s sitting right there in the open, someone that nobody will suspect...

Yep, I'm cutting it off there. Not gonna tell the secret. What I will tell however is that BATGOD is canon in DnD. I didn't make this up. There really is a deity who has a secret identity focused on vengeance and the night, who's also indulging her dark urges while nominally doing some good. She was missing a Catwoman however, so I added that in. I believe this writeup is just as cool as Auril above.

(google knows the secret identity btw if you don't already know and too impatient to wait until I'm done writing it)

Pronounceable
2016-10-03, 05:00 PM
You all ready for the answer to the awesome and cool mystery I was building up to here previously? No? It wasn't that awesome!? Meh, that's not what you're getting anyway >_>


OTHEA (lesser goddess), Giant Mother, First Matron, Queen of Jotunheim, Great Titaness

Domains: motherhood, giants, deception, secrets, spite


Annam and Othea were the unexpected result of the massive influx of elemental matter into Material Plane on Pelor’s order. The unprecedented scale of all the elements getting mixed caused two great titans to awaken. They were elemental beings barely more cognizant than the completely mindless spirits of elemental planes but they held incredible elemental power, their mastery of Material Plane would rival the primordial greater gods themselves. Instinctively, the two near mindless beings were drawn to each other and engaged in an event that later came to be known as the Big Bang (while Swift and Uninterrupted Series of Countless Bangs was a lot more appropriate, it wasn’t as pithy so didn’t catch on). This resulted in Othea getting impregnated a few bajillion times but she was too busy (and mindless) to take a break to give birth to the giant race yet.

They were at it for centuries (or millenia, it's unclear) before Pelor noticed them in the vast emptiness of interplanetary space of Material Plane. Pelor had just finished making worlds and was now pondering how to proceed with his grand project of mortal races. The main problem he had was devising a way of making his creations increase in number without him having to create more manually. Seeing the two great titans going at it gave him some good ideas (until then the only reproductive beings in the multiverse were Tiamat’s aquatic abominations and their reproduction methods gave Pelor the willies), leading to creation of the human race (and its variants that came to be known as humanoids). The mortal races that mostly dominate Material Plane today are basically copies of giantkind made weaker by Pelor’s hand for easier control and larger populations.

Meanwhile, Annam and Othea had gained sentience and developed personalities over the ages and before Pelor could finish his grand project, Othea decided to start giving birth and get rid of all these bajillions of small beings crowding inside her body. She’d also found that ever since she’d developed a brain, she wasn’t particularly fond of Annam. However Annam was madly lovestruck and lustful, he didn’t want to stop the Big Bang. After some struggle, Othea broke free of his grasp and fled. She landed on a world and started giving birth to giantkind thousands at a time. When Annam was close, Othea fled that world and found another to continue giving birth. Great titans kept at their hide and seek for a while, seeding dozens of worlds with giantkind which would cause a lot of trouble with Pelor later. When Annam finally caught up to Othea, she’d given birth to last of the giants and purged her insides of Annam's essence. Lovestruck Annam was certain she was just a little coquettish and must’ve missed him and by now she’d be eager to return to Big Banging. She wasn’t, she was bored of Annam and didn’t want to have anything to do with him anymore. But Annam was much stronger than her and it was clear he intended to force her if she tried to refuse him, so Othea needed to invent excuses to keep him away from herself as much as possible. Thus the giant civilizations came to be; Othea demanded Annam to take care of their offspring, protect and strengthen and lead them, Annam tried his hand at being a god and a king for the giants on many worlds and the giantkind built empires and prospered. This was using up a lot of Annam’s time. Annam and Othea settled on the first world where Othea had landed and named it Jotunheim. And once Pelor’s beloved humanity (and assorted hangers on) appeared, she insisted their children had to show these tiny knockoffs who’s the boss around here, starting massive racial wars on many worlds. So Othea had to suffer Annam’s touch only occasionally instead of all day, erryday. Which was much better.

Othea wasn’t happy however. She still had to pretend to love Annam and occasionally put up with a Little Bang, she had no doubt he’d imprison her and force himself upon her if she didn’t. Othea’s view of Annam is rather biased however and there’s no way to know how right she was about this. Annam, for his part, was (and still is) obsessively in love with her and is butter in her hands, always believing her word over anything else, no matter how obvious and ridiculous the lies. Othea has used this weakness repeatedly over the ages to have numerous affairs, for she’s both as lustful as Annam and loves nothing more than spiting him. Every single other deity in Giantish Pantheon (all of whom are titan demigods who live in Jotunheim and not actual deities in the multiversal sense) is from a different affair Othea had with various beings, yet Annam believes all of them are his own children (because that’s what she said). And there was a method to Othea’s affairs, beyond simple spite and lust. She’s managed to learn many things from her partners (with or without their blessing), used her illicit knowledge to elevate herself to true divinity, master tricks even many gods can’t perform and gain minor power over many portfolios. Many of her spurned lovers and some cheated spouses became her sworn enemies but Othea always managed to get away with her shenanigans. Even when she got busted by greater goddess Araushnee, Othea managed to avoid her wrath by redirecting her curse onto the unborn titan she was in the process of conceiving from Corellon, causing the titan Vaprak to be born stunted, ugly, stupid and nasty (Annam still accepted him as his son). Neither Vaprak’s predicament, nor the grief Araushnee’s curse upon the giantkind caused them (which led to birth of the ogre, the epitome of the absence of all the qualities that Araushnee represented in those days) particularly concerned Othea, for she never really liked any of her children from Annam.

No matter how uncaring Othea was about it, deformity curse upon giantkind and birth of the ogre race was a big deal. Corellon’s wife exerting her will so strongly upon Material Plane drew ire from the deities born of mortal belief, leading to a divine dustup in Astral that saw a few of the Seldarine dead because Nerull doesn’t **** around (while deaths didn’t stick, it was another of those events that led to Araushnee becoming Lolth). After things calmed down, gods voted that it was time to put those arrogant, troublemaking titans in their place. So a war was declared against the titans and their giant followers. The Giant Father Annam was too strong on Material Plane, even the combined might of Moradin, Pelor and Corellon wasn’t enough, his legendary Chaos Greatsword was unstoppable. However titans and giant civilizations were outnumbered and outgunned, the war didn’t go their way. In midst of battle, Othea saw a chance to finally rid herself of Annam and secretly made a deal with her first fling from long ago: Olidammara the god of rogues and intrigue (who had no idea the titan Stronmaus who'd just kicked his ass all over Material was his son, much like most other fathers of titan demigods).

When Othea got “captured” and taken to Outer Planes, Annam heedlessly followed. He was ambushed and finally got beaten, leading to complete defeat for titan side. Annam was bound alone in the depths of Carceri where nobody could find him, Jotunheim was removed from Material Plane and became a minor Outer Plane orbiting the Great Wheel like many other divine realms, Araushnee’s curse was lifted, ogres became a true mortal race and rest of the titan demigods were bound inside Jotunheim. When gods were done with everything else and it was time to punish Othea, they saw that she was dead. Somehow Othea had killed herself without anyone noticing and now her divine corpse floated in Astral. Many gods suspected a trick, some blamed Olidammara or Nerull, but after lengthy investigations, everybody had to concede that she really was dead.

Today, the scattered and broken tribes of giants on the worlds in Material still worship Othea as a part of their pantheon, she’s revered as the mother of all their gods and the goddess of motherhood. Giant couples that want children pray to her, midwives and mothers invoke her name during births and entire tribe praises her every time a healthy giant is born. Like all other giant deities, Othea has no clerics or shamans devoted only to her. Her name is used liberally by giants in daily life, only Annam is revered and respected more than her and she’s regularly invoked and praised for any random thing. All in all, Othea is still an actively worshipped goddess with a large following in Material Plane.

Except she’s still dead, the corpse still lies lifeless in Astral which should not be possible. It’s one of those strange mysteries that movers and shakers of the planes are always wondering but can’t figure out.

I noticed that I seriously dislike giants, which is weird since it's the mythological monster from stories of the entire friggin world and I like myths. Since I hate DnD giants on principle, I went looking into their gods to find something of interest. That's how I found Othea of Faerun who was instantly awesome as a cheating wife. That **** never happens. Zeus (and a bunch of other knockoffs) has been doing the cliche skirtchasing henpecked dude and his domineering jealous wife bit for millenia and it's become an all encompassing trite that everyone keeps rehashing. So I decided to polish Othea a bit and also throw in a bunch of other stuff. This is the result. Now the giants are just one more race that's not divided into a bunch of color coded bull**** categories and there's their titan gods to fulfill all the mythical giant of legends stuff when that's needed.
also, spot the dank meme
I should do something similar to uncrapify dragons too. But I hate dragons much more than I hate giants, I'm not gonna start being openminded about them at my age.

Fable Wright
2016-10-04, 02:25 PM
I noticed that I seriously dislike giants, which is weird since it's the mythological monster from stories of the entire friggin world and I like myths. Since I hate DnD giants on principle, I went looking into their gods to find something of interest. That's how I found Othea of Faerun who was instantly awesome as a cheating wife. That **** never happens. Zeus (and a bunch of other knockoffs) has been doing the cliche skirtchasing henpecked dude and his domineering jealous wife bit for millenia and it's become an all encompassing trite that everyone keeps rehashing. So I decided to polish Othea a bit and also throw in a bunch of other stuff. This is the result. Now the giants are just one more race that's not divided into a bunch of color coded bull**** categories and there's their titan gods to fulfill all the mythical giant of legends stuff when that's needed.
also, spot the dank meme
I should do something similar to uncrapify dragons too. But I hate dragons much more than I hate giants, I'm not gonna start being openminded about them at my age.

You ever read about Eberron? You should read about Eberron. They actually pose giants and dragons in an interesting light. The giants wielded some of the most powerful magic ever discovered, wound up falling into decadence and slave-race sacrifice (read: elves), they blew up a moon to deal with an extraplanar invasion, then their continent was laid to waste and rendered impossible to civilize by an army of dragons striking without warning, leaving them in the wreckage of their once-grandeur.

The dragons, for their part, mostly stick to their own continent. Once upon a time, they had to put up with a world ruled by demons. That sucked even for them. After a millennium-long campaign of guerilla warfare to seal the boss demons away so their fell influence would no longer affect the world, they finally got the planet un-crappified. Nowadays they make sure it stays that way, discreetly taking down the rakshasa who plot to spring their bosses from divine jail, and wiping an uppity moon-breaking civilization from existence.

The dragons that adventurers fight? Feral orphans. Real dragons stay away from humanoids after the first time they taught a civilization magic.

Pronounceable
2016-10-06, 07:58 PM
You ever read about Eberron?
I play DDO. It's like the same thing.
And yeah, that's where giant civilization predating humanoids idea came from.

Now, one more to complete the trifecta.


YONDALLA (greater goddess), the Protector and the Provider, Hearthmother, Mother of Safety, Defender of the Fields, Shieldmatriarch, Wall of Steel, Valkyrie Empress, Lady of the Mountain

Domains: motherhood, family, fertility, agriculture, tradition, protection, healing, wisdom, creativity, trickery, good, law, halflings


Yondalla is an ancient goddess who’s waxed and waned with the ages. She was among the many neutral fertility themed deities who rose to prominence shortly after the rise of humanoids in Material Plane, the first one among them to reach greater deity status due to sheer number of worshippers and was also the only one who managed to survive the massive consolidation of the fertilty/family/agriculture domains in Earthmother Chauntea’s hand intact. While mortals have long forgotten this matter, Yondalla’s official stance is that Chauntea straight up stole her image of the matronly patron of family and farming and exaggerated it to the level of caricature, removing all of Yondalla’s own intricacies and complexities, thus becoming a simpler and more appealing goddess to the unwashed masses. She even stole her moniker. Which is kinda obvious to all beings who know about Chauntea’s little secret and is also the thing that soured Yondalla on the humanoid races.

Legends of halflings all over the multiverse say Yondalla created them after seeing that all other humanoid races were flawed. They say Yondalla took skill from elves, stability from dwarves, courage from orcs and resourcefulness from humans and, after a lot of work, mixed them all together to create the halfling race. While the mentioned mortal races (and their creator Pelor) tend to scoff at this, there’s no doubt that halfling was created by Yondalla’s hand. Which is strange, as a deity would need to have a lot more power than (then recently deposed) Yondalla had to be able to create a whole new mortal race. Yondalla had suddenly gained a large amount of worshippers somehow. It was nowhere near what was stolen from her but it kept her at intermediate rank instead of atrophying into an errand boy of Chauntea like the others.

The origin of halflings and Yondalla’s gradual conversion to law and good is one of the most well kept secrets in the planes (on par with Gruumsh’s plans). After faking her death and dumping most of her divinity into Astral as a corpse, Giant Mother Othea fled to Material Plane and started over with what she knew best: fertility cults. Thanks to her experience at mother goddessing that was longer than the entire existence of humanoids, she easily spread her influence and rose in power, swiftly becoming a greater goddess with multiple facets like protection and wisdom. And when she got outmothered by Chauntea, she decided to fall back to another thing she knew: birthing a mortal race. So she went around in disguise, spent centuries on many worlds, had countless of affairs with all the humanoid races and used her old titanic power to mold her accumulated offspring into what she thought would be an ideal worshipper race. She told halflings a story of combining the best parts of humanoid races into them because it sounded a lot better as a creation myth than then I banged two billion guys. But now things were different. Unlike with giants, halflings were the result of affairs that had contained eagerness and sometimes even love. For the first time, Yondalla had children whom she actually loved and desired to be a good mother to. This was what pushed her towards good and law, she slowly became the loving and responsible parent she pretended to be, even giving up on all of her plans of revenge on Chauntea.

Yondalla’s long and stable reign as a lawful good goddess of halflings lasted peacefully until she got the multiverse’s least romantic proposal from Moradin, a long list of extremely logical arguments detailing how a union between them would be in both of their interests and why they were the best potential mates for each other out of all the other cosmic beings. It was really reasonable and well thought out and Yondalla was impressed. Being probably the richest and most powerful being in the multiverse, Moradin really was a good catch (which was on the list) but Yondalla just wasn’t interested in being bound in marriage and said so. But then greater goddess of beauty and lust came for a visit. Sune had heard of Moradin’s interest in a marriage and was really hoping he’d pick her but Moradin passed over her due to the silly and unfounded “Nerull’s wife” thing, which was a bummer because she was hoping to put the screws on the uppity primordial greaters by marrying one and using it against others. But Yondalla was also good, for she was also a deity of Material Plane and would surely be glad to take one for the team. Yondalla had learned what happened when you ignored divine politics firsthand, so she reluctantly gave Moradin a chance.

In a few short decades, Yondalla was crowned as Berronar, the Queen of Mount Celestia. She became Moradin’s staunch ally and pioneer on Material Plane, taking special pleasure for spreading his influence all over Material through halflings (whom she was still keeping solely for herself). She even plays the role of negotiatior and peacekeeper between the primordial siblings, making certain they don't conflict too much (especially Corellon and Gruumsh) while there's those unruly younger upstarts of Material to bring in line. All this immensely pissed off Sune and the animosity between them is still strong.

Berronar actually is happy about being married, she does like Moradin and perks of being his wife are so great she’d be stupid to give it up. Besides, she can still indulge her wilder and inappropriate urges using a certain secret identity* that absolutely nobody knows (and since she’s become a greater goddess thanks to Moradin sharing his own worshippers, she can be in two places now, guaranteeing her secret stays a secret). She may not be in the songs make sense type of crazy love but far as marriages go, it can’t possibly get better than this.

As Yondalla, her church is mostly limited to halflings but they’re a widespread race on Material and, while not very zealous, they’re all very reverent of her and she covers most aspects of halfling life (including the less scrupulous ones too, which they all try to keep quiet). Some halflings know Yondalla is married to some distant sky god who’s uncaring about affairs of mortals and they don’t much care about him in turn. Other halflings know Moradin as a great ally to Yondalla and revere him and do the occasional missionary work to spread his faith around. As Berronar, her church is mostly spread to Upper Planes and puts more emphasis on her protection, tradition and healing aspects and is quite militarized with plenty of martial and medical traditions, with only small influence on Material Plane. Berronar is revered first as Moradin’s wife and second as a protective deity, but wherever Moradin’s influence goes, so does Berronar’s. Name of Berronar is usually unwelcome on mortal worlds where Material Plane deities are dominant but all those deities’ attempts to discredit Yondalla usually backfire, the normally lukewarm halflings consolidate and rally around their religion when feeling pressured.

Nowadays, Yondalla is even nominally allied with Chauntea against Sune, Nerull and their buddies. Which just goes to show impossible is a lie.



*Yup, there we go.


Bet y'all weren't expecting this much consolidation. I couldn't help but notice all the parallels between classic hobbit pantheon and classic giant pantheon. Iallannis/Sheela are just tiny Venus-huge Venus, Hiatea might as well be named Tall Yondalla, Brandobaris/Diancastra are both the classic trickster deity and Arvoreen/Stronmaus are pretty similar protector guys. Also a protective mother goddess is a protective mother goddess, whether she has a beard or not. The end result is these last three entries. It was me, I had it all planned all along >_>

I also like that her career can be summed up as surprisebitch.gif

gkathellar
2016-10-07, 07:50 AM
While I like some of the ideas here, and I'll get around to going over them in more detail, I really dislike your take on Lolth (as it appears in Vhaeraun's story and as briefly mentioned up top). I hate the drow, but Lolth is the only good (evil) thing about them - a trolling, tyrannical goddess who screws the universe over for lulz and seems to draw power from irony and what can be interpreted as extraordinarily violent slapstick. Drow aren't matriarchal because Lolth wants men to suffer (honestly, they're barely matriarchal at all, what with women confined to a particular caste), they're matriarchal because Lolth wants everybody to suffer, especially people who worship her.

Let me put it this way: drow society is a shaggy dog story, and the punchline of a shaggy dog story is that you get some idiot to stand there and listen to the whole thing. Lolth is telling the ultimate shaggy dog story to the entire cosmos. She's not the goddess of matriarchy and spiders, she's the goddess of cruel jokes (and spiders).

Also, as a secondary issue, I'm not fond of making planar exemplars into gods, especially if you're keeping things like the Great Wheel intact. Demogorgon is the Prince of the Abyss, and the chaos and evil he represents is vaster and more fundamental than any mere Power. If Demogorgon gets deposed, the Abyss will simply find itself a new Prince (presumably whoever deposed him), but there will be no seizing of portfolios or astral corpse or whatever. It's happened before, and it'll happen again. For all the power of the Powers, they are individual actors in a much, much larger brawl between Law and Chaos.

Pronounceable
2016-10-08, 10:41 AM
^That's a nice Lolth, you should write it up.

However this Lolth is no drow goddess and Gruumsh is already doing what you describe.
...
Anyway, I tried to get a Mystra up here but failed. She's far too tightly tied up in FR stuff of dubious quality, just like Cyric, and removing all that stuff just makes her boobed Boccob. Was a bummer.

Therefore, I decided to put my huge list here. Maybe it'll generate some recommendations and ideas. It's a list of bona fide DnD gods of variable fame that I'm trying to whip into a satisfactory cosmology( with commentary). Deities been mentioned until now are guaranteed to be in but even they're not set in stone. I also looked up the noobs of 4e, some of them do have potential.
Supreme Deities:
Luminous Overmother Selune
Ruinous Overmother Shar
Elder Elemental Evil Tharizdun

Primordial Greater Deities:
Mother of All Abominations Tiamat (terriblest of them all)
Soul Forger Moradin (arranger of the Great Wheel, bigwig of Upper Planes)
Sun Father Pelor (creator of mortals, king of Material Plane)
Lord of Lords Gruumsh (player of the long game)
Glorious King Corellon (sparkly manbaby)
Heir of Ruin Lendor (dear diary)

Brood of Pelor: (bigwigs of Material Plane)
Beshaba, Twin Goddess of Bad Luck
Chauntea, Goddess of Family and Agriculture
Eldath, Sweet Goddess of Sweet Waters and General Chill
Erythnul, Literally A Piece of ****
Silvanus, God of Ecoterrorism
Olidammara, Tricksy God of Rogues and Roads and Civilization
Talos, Manly God of Storms and Mommy Issues
Tymora, Twin Goddess of Good Luck
Umberlee, the Bitch Queen of RIP AND TEAR

Seldarine of Corellon: (allied against all others, for a given value of allied)
Aerdrie, Goddess of Rain and Summer
Angharradh, Tripartite Goddess of Indulging In Corellon’s Wacky Fetishes
Fenmarel, Emo God of Survival and Suicide and Angst
Hanali, Goddess of Satisfying Corellon’s Lust For Sune Without Giving Her More Influence
Rillifane, Protective God of Treehugging
Sashelas, Tailchasing God of Seas and Diplomacy
Sehanine, Goddess of Magic and Dreams and Moon and Stars
Solonor, God of Hunting and Triggerhappiness

Orcish Pantheon: (ostracized and disliked)
Baghtru, Strong God of Stupidity
Ilneval, Envious God of Strategy
Luthic, Goddess of All The Girly Stuff
Shargaas, God of Darkness and Assassination
Yurtrus, God of Getting Owned By Nerull (also age and disease)

Miscellaneous Descendants of Overmothers:
Abbathor, God of Greed and Thievery
Araushnee aka Lolth, Goddess of Shadows and Schemes
Auril, Queen of Winter
Berronar aka Yondalla, Mother Goddess of Family and Badassery (and Halflings)
Clangeddin, Manly God of Crusading and Goodytwoshoery (Moradin’s little helper)
Duerra, Axe Princess of Conquest (of Duergar)
Eilistraee, Goddess of Grace and War and Crafts
Haela, Demigoddess of Berserkers and Joy of Victory
Laduguer, Hard God of Hardassery and Hardwork and Hard Men Making Hard Decisions
Kiaransalee, Demonic Goddess of Undead and Vengeance
Obad-hai, Tripartite Fey God of Goblinoids and/or Prince of Spring
Oberon, Horny King of Autumn
Titania, Queen of Summer
Vhaeraun, God of Romance and Rebellion
Waukeen, Goddess of Capitalism

Independent Deities: (small fish of Material Plane)
Amaunator, Old School God of Pelor Heretics
Arvoreen, A Little Too Short To Be A War God
Azuth, God of Magicians
Bane, God of Tyranny
Bhaal, Dead God of Murder
Brandobaris, Trickster God of Awesomeness
Boccob, Douche God of Knowledge and Magic
Deneir, God of Being Oghma’s Secretary
Erathis, Neutralized Pelor Groupie
Garagos, Dead ******* God of War and Bloodshed
Gond, God of Invention and Machinery
Heironeous, Twin God of Order and Expansionism
Hextor, Twin God of Order and Conquest
Ioun, Goddess of Knowledge and Skill
Lathander, Cool and Hip Sun God for Cool and Hip Young Mortals
Lirr, Goddess of Literature and Fiction
Loviatar, Goddess of Weakness and Bravery
Malar, Animal God of Beasts
Myrkul, Faulty Nerull
Mystra, Worst Goddess of Magic
Nerull, Dread God of Death and Fear
Oghma, Nice God of Knowledge and Arts
Raven Queen, Goddess of Fate and Inscrutability
Selvetarm, God of Being Lolth’s Boytoy
Sharess, Goddess of Hedonism and Angst
Sune, Conniving Goddess of Lust and Beauty
Thaun, The Dark Night
Tempus, Yet Another Manly War God
Velsharoon, God of Supervillainy
Wee Jas, Goddess of Necromancy

Random Spawn Of Tharizdun That Nobody Knows Is Of Tharizdun:
Annam, Lovestruck Giantdad
Othea, Goddess of surprisebitch.gif (where else would manifestations of primal matter come from)
Moander, Deity of Rot and Decay (he ded)
Ghaunadaur, Deity of All the ****

Godspawn of Tiamat: (not all the disgusting nightmare beasts are evil)
Blipdoolpoolp of Kuo-toa
Eadro of Locathah
Great Mother of Beholders
Ilsensine of Illithids
Jazirian of Couatls
Laogzed of Troglodytes
Merrshaulk of Yuan-ti
Nameless Emperor of Grells [this doesn’t actually exist]
Panzuriel of Krakens [closest match]
Pastafar of Flumphs [this needs to exist but without a goofy name]
Pisaethces of Aboleths
Psilofyr of Myconids
Sekolah of Sahuagin
Semuanya of Lizardmen
Shekinester of Nagas

Giantish Pantheon:
Diancastra, Trickster Goddess of Arrogance and Tailchasing
Grolantor, God of Willful Stupidity
Hiatea, Taller and Weaker Chauntea
Iallanis, Taller and Nicer Sune
Karontor, God of Selfhate and Deformity
Memnor, God of Pride and Smarts
Skoraeus, God of Knowledge and Isolationism
Stronmaus, Tailchasing God of Sun and Sky and Joy
Vaprak, Deformed God of Ogres

Powers of other planes:
Aoskar, Uncle Ben of Planescape
Apomps, Worst Fiend of the Year, Every Year (also God of 4chan)
Asmodeus, Dominus Infernus
Demogorgon, Demon Prince of Demons
Dumathoin, God of Japanese Cartoons
General of Gehenna, Master of Daemons
Gorellik, God of Gnolls (for a given value of god)
Hebdomad, the Seven Councilors of Celestia
Lady of Pain, Owner of Sigil
Malchanthet, Succubus Queen of Collaborators
Morwel, Queen of Arborea
Primus, Primary Modron
Queen of Chaos, A series question marks
Ravanna, God of Rakshasi
Solars of the First Sphere, paragons of Arcadia
Talisid, Lion Marshall of Beastlands
Torm, God of Superheroism
Vaati, Wind Duke of Aaqa

List of deities from internet to be cherrypicked:
Celestian, God of Astronomy and Travel (distinctive from other travel guys so has chance)
Fharlanghn, Just Another Shaundakul (I despise writing his name)
Incabulos, Hateful God of Bad Things (boring)
Joramy, Discount Shiva with Fire Motif (lame but may serve a purpose)
Leira, Tricksy Goddess of Illusion and Deception (another one?)
Lliira, Goddess of Joy (might work)
Muamman, God of Visitors, Expats and Lightning (??) (might be in)
Shaundakul, Just Another Fharlanghn (don’t really like any of these guys)
Talona, Goddess of Poison and Disease (Loviatar did it first)
Torog, God of Underdark and Torture (might be in)
Wastri, God of Amphibians and Human Supremacy (!?!?) (want him in just for the weird)
Zarus, God of Human Racism (kinda already folded into Pelor)
Zuoken, Ascended Bruce Lee (unlikely but not impossible)
Cyric, Megavillain

List of rejected deities: (the Losers)
Avandra, Goddess of Luck and Halflings (Yondalla says nope)
Bahamut, God of Dragonborn (dragonborn gotta gtfo and stay gtfo)
Cyrrollalee, Goddess of Hospitality and Friendship (rejected for ****ty name alone)
Dugmaren, Brainy God of Scholarship and Invention (Boccob/Oghma says no)
Ehlonna, Bleeding Heart Silvanus (unnecessary)
Erevan, Trickster God of Tricks (Brandobaris is cooler)
Garl Glittergold, and buddies (no gnomes allowed)
Gorm, A Little Short To Be Helm (nope)
Helm, Stupider Named Heironeous (nope)
Ilmater, Basically Jesus (so nope)
Istus, Superfluous Tripartite Goddess of Fate (don’t need two triunes)
Iyachtu Xvim, Official Bane Knockoff (nnnope)
Kord, Discount Crom (Tempus is superior)
Labelas, Stuffy God of History and Education (Boccob/Oghma is superior)
Marthammor, God of Travel (Olidammara+Fharlanghn+Shaundakul=nope)
Mask, Worst Named God in the History of Badly Named Gods (rejected HARDEST)
Melora, Just Another Nature Goddess (lame)
Mielikki, Yet Another Nature Goddess (laaaame)
Milil, Official Discount Bragi (nope)
Procan, Uncaring Primal God of Sea (Tiamat says no)
Ralishaz, Genderbent Beshaba (superfluous)
Sharindlar, Discount Sune (no)
Sheela, Random Assortment Goddess of Nature and Agriculture and Song and Love (too unfocused)
St Cuthbert, Just Another Knight God (Tempus+Heironeous=nope)
Trithereon, God of **** Yeah, Murrica! (no)
Tyr, You Again? (nope)
Ulaa, Boringer female Dumathoin (boooooring)
Urogalan, Kindest God of Death and Earth (Nerull isn’t gonna let him be)
Vergadain, Trickster God of Luck (far too many tricksters)
Zehir, Fake Set (nope)

I'll be here, trying to hammer Mystra into a round hole. I don't think she'll fit tho.

vThat'd be Ludic. All of his stuff is awesome.

much later edit: keeping the updates

falcon1
2016-10-08, 10:54 AM
Someone had written up a really good Hextor, but it might overlap with Laduguer.

Maybe demote Asmodeous to an archdevil?

Also, maybe Pelor spawned off Amaunator to watch some old prime worlds, and then when he got too powerful split him into Lathander?

Pronounceable
2016-10-09, 01:15 PM
...Managed to hammer Mystra into the hole. Here's me channeling all of my hatred for shovelware fantasy "literature" that pollutes our hobby.


MYSTRA (greater goddess), Spellweaver, Mistress of Magic, She Who Chooses
Domain: magic, wizardry
Mystra is well known as the most harmful and destructive of all deities, an impressive achievement for a goddess of magic considering that actual psychokiller deities like Erythnul, Bhaal and Moander existed; made more impressive by the fact that she's simply apathetic instead of actively malicious. A parasitic goddess without real worshippers of her own, Mystra’s power stems from powerful wizardry all over the multiverse. She continually disseminates knowledge of extremely powerful and terrifying spells, capable of causing untold death and destruction in the wrong hands (which consistently happens). She claims it’s for the advancement of the science of wizardry and overall good of the planes, as magic is clearly the most superior resource and needs to be utilized better. A great believer in free and open source magic, Mystra is both the least and most successful arms dealer of the planes. While she gives away the knowledge of apocalyptic wizardry for free to all who asks (and some who don’t), she's managed to reach greater deityhood by feeding off of the spells she's disseminated to the planes. She cheerfully supplies all beings of multiversal power with extremely destructive magics with no regard to what purposes they'll be used for, going out of her way to deliberately arm both sides of any planar conflict to see what sort of innovative uses they'll find for her spells. While that would've been enough to earn her eternal enmity from half the multiverse, it’s the source of her new spells that gets other deities’ gears grinding.

Mystra empowers a mortal every few years, granting them magical prowess far beyond anything even the epicest characters are capable of. This is always either an accomplished mage or someone with obviously great magical potential. All Mystra asks of them in return is that they personally develop new and innovative magics to find and kill the previous mortal she empowered (who’ll also have access to phenomenal arcane power). As can be expected, these “Chosen of Mystra” recklessly utilize the entirety of Mystra’s massive library of disgustingly powerful spells in their clashes, racking up death tolls in millions and fully destroying an entire planet once or twice. Mystra just shrugs, calling it the price of progress. The surviving Chosen loses the divinely inflated part of their magical power until the next “match” but doesn’t sit around, they know it’s just a matter of time until the next challenger comes and keep working on developing new magics. The new, innovative, revolutionary (and invariably horrific) spells designed by Mystra’s Chosen are then spread far and wide, free of cost, and it’s generally agreed that the entire multiverse hasn’t been destroyed solely because beings strong and skilled enough in wizardry to regularly use them are very rare. This doesn’t stop lesser mages from developing and deploying weaker versions however, which fuels a looot of magical carnage all over the planes.

The Chosen of Mystra are unfailingly self centered, tenuously sane individuals who use their great power to warp everything, doing their best to repaint the multiverse so everything seems to revolve around them. They are just as much hated as Mystra herself yet stay unkilled, for their raw power usually exceeds many demigods even when they don’t have Mystra’s power flowing through them. The most current one is some guy named Elminster, he’s been the winner for a few centuries now and seems to be growing complacent, spending his time seducing the young and pretty girls he’s taking as apprentices instead of working on new, stronger apocalyptic spells. Rumors claim Mystra is unhappy with this and the next match might not be as fair as the previous ones.

Of course, Mystra doesn’t get to mess with the multiverse in the name of progress without consequences. She has been captured many times but her Chosen always finds and frees her from wherever she’s trapped. Killing the Chosen before such an attempt doesn’t work either, as they’re always strong enough to last a few seconds even against a full fledged deity, which gives Mystra enough time to come to their aid (or make another Chosen if the aggressor is too big for her to chew). And when a disgruntled deity finally killed her (for the first time), it turned out that she’d taken mortal forms and procreated in secret, spawning a bunch of mortal women (all who’d grown up to become powerful wizards themselves) to serve as phylacteries. No matter how many times she gets killed, Mystra always comes back. Nobody knows exactly how many “daughters” Mystra has or where they’re hiding and it’s suspected that she’s replacing them when one dies, so it’s generally accepted that she’s virtually impossible to kill and also pretty useful as a source of ever escalating spells.

As one of the most destructive deities, Mystra has earned enmity of actual deities of death and destruction for being better at it than them. Gods of magic are none too happy with her either, for she has a habit of nabbing their most promising worshippers. She’s probably the only greater deity without a divine realm, for she regularly gets attacked and has to stay on the move. Almost every single mover and shaker of the planes has definitely benefited from the mighty spells she hands out for free but none would be sad to see her gone, they all know she’s giving the same weapons to every one of their enemies. There’s no powerful being in the multiverse who’d lift a finger, talon or tentacle for her sake, which is probably another reason why she makes her Chosen so overpowered, which creates an endless cycle.

Mystra cares nothing about worship or establishing a church, she has no clerics and praying to her never does anything. Powerful wizards sometimes pray to her, hoping to get Chosen but it’s not really known how she picks them. It’s not uncommon of her to pick a mortal who hasn’t even heard of her name.


Maybe I'm not being fair here. Don't care. Going back to old Mystryl roots gives some breathing room and I got to spew hate about things I hate. It's a good day.

Fri
2016-10-09, 02:24 PM
Actually, honestly that's a pretty cool write up on Mystra and her Chosen. I actually like it and find it cool and proper.

Pronounceable
2016-10-13, 03:03 PM
Today, I have a story about twins. Twins twinning twins in fact.


HEIRONEOUS (lesser god), Archpaladin, Lord of Valor, Knight God, the Good Brother
Domains: chivalry, honor, law, order

Goddess of civilization and law predictably had her divine realm on Nirvana, where she raised her mortal sons right under the shadow of the great machine Mechanus. Their mother’s portfolio, planar bent of Nirvana and proximity to Mechanus in their formative years deeply imprinted into both Heironeous and Hextor, making them probably the most lawful deities on all the planes even today. As they grew up, Erathis always talked about taking them to meet King Pelor once they were worthy. Heironeous, being a good and dutiful son growing up with tales of his father’s benevolence and power, worked hard at becoming the greatest knight ever worthy of the greatest king ever. His brother Hextor always mocked his desire to satisfy others but he was working just as hard as Heironeous to grow strong and knightly, which was clearly just his way of siblingly messing around. Erathis, for her part, knew what the deal really was and disapproved of Hextor’s general cynical air and independence based desire at becoming stronger. She made her disapproval abundantly clear. Their mother’s favoring of Heironeous over Hextor caused a rift over the years but that slight bit of family quarrel was forgotten when the long awaited day came.

Heironeous didn’t really know what to expect when they entered King Pelor’s palace in Elemental Fire but he was excited to finally meet his father. What he got was beyond anything he could’ve ever imagined. Pelor was baffled at Erathis’ introductory speech, he denied having any sort of affair with her and completely refused to acknowledge Heironeous and Hextor as his sons. Erathis kept pushing, claiming that she was impregnated by sunrays and the uncanny resemblence of the brothers to Pelor was proof of her word and was he calling her a liar? Their normally cool, calm and collected mother screaming, throwing a tantrum and acting like a teen girl dumped on prom night was a major shock to the brothers. Pelor was also enraged; he was a greater god, capable of creating anything or anyone by his will alone, he would never stoop to reproducing like some mortal. He had no idea where or how she’d conceived these boys and didn’t care, but it certainly had nothing at all to do with him. It slowly dawned on Heironeous during the prolonged shouting match that his mother was a crazy ex girlfriend, one that might even actually be a stalker who’s delusional about the girlfriend part. After what seemed like ages, Pelor got tired of getting nowhere and banished Erathis from the throne room, then talked to the brothers. He swore that he never had any sort of relationship with Erathis (despite her one sided desperate efforts) and was deeply sorry about what she’d done to them, they were welcome to join his court as servants if they wished but he wouldn’t adopt children of a delusional mother and an unknown father. Pelor then used his power on the brothers, binding them so they could never spread Erathis’ lies, which also gave them a small measure of divinity as compensation for the life their mother had forced them to live.

The return trip was awkward and none said anything. Erathis refused to see or talk to her sons, locking herself into her chambers. Heironeous and Hextor was idle for the first time in their lives, training or studying didn’t seem to have a point now. But then a visitor came. Tymora and Beshaba was the Conjoined Goddess of Luck and had their eyes on the brothers ever since they came to her grandfather’s palace. They talked to the brothers seperately; Tymora urged Heironeous to keep following his dream, she said he should become the greatest knight in the multiverse, the magnificent son his mother wanted, a powerful deity who could earn his place at Pelor’s side instead of just being handed over a station like one of Corellon’s pampered boys. Heironeous didn’t know what Beshaba told Hextor but when the Conjoined Goddess was gone, both brothers were determined to become great and powerful, powerful enough to make Pelor accept them.

So they left their mother’s realm and went to Material Plane. They found mortal worlds in chaos, embroiled in constant and pointless wars and set out to stop that. Working together, they brought order and prosperity to a number of worlds, helping city states unite into kingdoms and kingdoms unite into empires, ushering in ages of peace and progress and strengthening their mother’s influence on Material. Beneficial coincidences happened often around them and the brothers’ opposers tended to suffer random misfortune at critical moments, leading many mortals to dub them the beloved of the Conjoined Goddess. Which was at first just amusing conversation for their many meetings but slowly became true. Heironeous was really glad Tymora and Beshaba were able to at least manifest seperately enough to be in different rooms, it would’ve been seriously awkward otherwise.

It wasn’t long until the order Heironeous and Hextor was representing got serious opposition. They were clear in their ultimate goal of all the mortals living in peace and harmony as one massive planar civilization, which was an affront to god of war Tempus. Tempus demanded the brothers stick to proper deityhood and watch their followers from above, two demigods personally taking to the field and killing mortals en masse in the name of order was straight up slaughter. When they refused, Tempus accused them of being mere butchers serving Erythnul under all that peacockery. Such an insult to their honor was unacceptable, so the brothers challenged him to a fight, wagering their divinity against the domain of war that belonged to Tempus. Tempus was a greater god, he eagerly accepted to teach the demiwhelps a lesson. Even two to one, it would be a complete stomping. So it was a great surprise to all when he was beaten, foiled by a staggering number of unlikely coincidences and miraculous misfortunes during the fight. Tempus was no mastermind but he knew bull**** when he saw it, this was work of the Conjoined Goddess. He’d lost his most prized domain but his godly power was intact, so he went and cleaved her in half. Both halves of the Conjoined Goddess died, which was terrible luck for the entire multiverse.

Upon hearing this, Pelor was enraged. He demanded Tempus to come and explain himself. He ordered all of his court to also attend, Pelor intended to put Tempus on a trial and grill him until he gave up the domain of war as punishment for killing his granddaughters (which would be also taken from Heironeous and Hextor for their own part in death of the Conjoined Goddess). War was one of the very few things Pelor or his children didn’t have any power over in Material Plane, this was a golden opportunity to grab it. Heironeous and Hextor were also well briefed beforehand to make certain they didn’t mess up the plan; Pelor promised them Erathis would get war and she’d be accepted into Pelor’s court officially as a consort (Erathis was still a diehard Pelor groupie and ok with this, even if his sons weren’t and Pelor wasn’t going to touch her with a ten lightyear pole afterwards). Pelor expected the usual suspects to make an appearance during the trial and was prepared against anything Sune or Nerull could say to defend Tempus. Unlike him, Pelor was a mastermind and felt pretty confident about winning this. There were a massive number of beings from all over the multiverse in attendance as well, nobody on the planes wanted to miss the spectacle. But Tempus was good at thinking outside the box (the box being Material Plane), and showed up for the trial not accompanied by Sune or Nerull, but with his fellow warlike gods from the courts of other primordials instead. Pelor realized that Clangeddin, Baghtru and Rillifane united behind Tempus was a loud and clear message from Moradin, Gruumsh and Corellon that was saying watch it, bro. War was the only avenue Pelor had left for his siblings to get any major foothold in Material, they weren’t going to take this stunt sitting down.

Pelor’s plan was ruined but he had to at least save face, so he declared the gathering to be a trial for the murder of her granddaughters. He had to at least extract an apology from Tempus before handing war back to him. Which backfired spectacularly when Tempus demanded to have a representative to speak legalese on his behalf and Domina Infernus Bensozia stepped up from among the audience and volunteered. She explained it’s her duty and pleasure as an archdevil and consort of Lord Asmodeus to defend a "murder committed in cold blood for revenge" (Tempus didn’t much like that description but let it slide because Pelor was clearly alarmed about having to face an archdevil in debate). Nobody knows if this was planned or Bensozia just saw an opportunity to discredit the forces of good and took it. In the following trial, Pelor gave almost as good as he got but was prepared to contest Sune and her proMaterial, anti primordial tyranny claptrap, not the vicious and merciless LE view of justice from an archdevil. Domina Bensozia didn’t just get Pelor to concede that Tempus had been wronged by his granddaughter and deserved to have the domain of war returned to him, she also dived straight into the divine politics. Somehow she knew about the ruckus caused by Erathis back in the day right here in Pelor’s throne room and explained it at length to the audience (the version narrated by Bensozia was slightly different than reality, Pelor contested all the bits she was twisting but the more scandalous picture Bensozia painted was going to catch on no matter what he said) and had this trial ended with domain of war being taken from unaligned god Tempus, it would’ve been a major victory for Pelor and a heavy blow to his siblings (observant beings noticed her manner was suggesting that Pelor really was their father and lying about it). Pelor’s objections were feeble and hollow because Bensozia was right about the great and benevolent Sun Father was using the hideous murder of his own granddaughter as an excuse for a powergrab (she congradulated him for it too). She was slowly accelerating into full alarmism that Pelor was a little late to realize, pointing out the united gods of war standing behind Tempus meant another war against titans affair was in the cards if Pelor didn’t back down and give up on his expansionist ambitions. Every being in the audience was wondering how true Bensozia’s words were, they all knew she couldn’t be trusted an inch but none of the assembled deities were saying or doing anything to contradict her. Domina Infernus was attractive and assertive on top of being an expert demagogue; by the time Pelor’s court or the gods of war arrayed against them understood what she was doing (except for Baghtru, who was too stupid), anything they could say would just be twisted to feed her story of imminent, catastrophic war.

Heironeous, recognizing that he and his brother were the only ones who could speak now, stepped up and interrupted Bensozia. He admitted to conspiring to usurp Tempus for Pelor’s benefit, apologized to Tempus and promised to return the domain of war. Pelor was incensed but he knew now it was either his pride or a pit next to Annam’s, so he admitted to not just powerhungry plotting, but also to fathering Heironeous and Hextor. Tempus was bright enough to recognize it was his turn, so he accepted Heironeous’ apology and declared the matter settled with the return of his domain, thanked Domina Bensozia for her services as his representative and dismissed her before she could help further (Domina Infernus was happy enough with her work and later sent a massive bill to Tempus, which was secretly paid by Pelor). The show ended and everyone left except for Pelor’s court, his new consort Erathis and their newly acknowledged sons.

To say Pelor was upset would be an understatement. He fused Heironeous and Hextor together, resurrected and handed over their divinity to Tymora and Beshaba (Tempus had cleaved them so hard he’d even cut the domain of luck in half; from that day on Tymora was the Goddess of Fortune and Beshaba was the Goddess of Misfortune), took Erathis’ power and domains to give them over to Olidammara for all the trouble her sons caused to his daughters, placed Erathis in a dark and small “guest room” permanently, barred Heironeous and Hextor from his fiery sight (meaning they could never enter Material or Elemental Planes again) and cursed them to fight each other eternally for control of their one body.

Heironeous/Hextor was sitting forlornly by themself in Nirvana, wondering what to do now when the finally seperated goddesses Tymora and Beshaba came to them again. Tymora pointed out Heironeous had gotten that public acknowledgement he wanted from Pelor. Beshaba said Hextor had also gotten his wish of permanently getting rid of his mother’s neverending prattle about Pelor (which was the first time Heironeous was hearing of it). They were greatly fortunate and unfortunate, a fitting result for the beloved of the goddess of luck. Tymora was sorry for Heironeous’ misfortune and kept apologizing but he wasn’t going to have any of it, they were done. Hextor however, was appreciative of the irony and missed Beshaba while she was dead, he’d be happy to continue from where they left off. It was also going to be very awkward for Heironeous, which was a plus as far as both were concerned.

Both Heironeous and Hextor would go on to gain a measure of power and influence on some outer planes, going so far as to become lesser gods with some mortal followers in Material Plane, but they are forever locked in a battle for dominance over their single form, slowly losing all brotherly affection for one another until nothing but enmity remains. Meanwhile, Erathis is imprisoned in a small dark room of Pelor’s palace, her churches and followers on many Material worlds keep revering and worshipping in her name but all of that flows to Olidammara instead. Erathis is closest to the object of her obsession she’s ever been yet he’s forever out of her reach. The obsession and isolation is slowly eroding her sanity, she’s beginning to suspect her own memories about the conception of her sons, which is the insight of insanity even if she doesn’t realize it. Erathis has recognized that her mind is going but is powerless to do anything but wallow in despair.

Such is the fate of idiots who’d dare draw on Overmother Shar's power for fertility. Shame it didn’t start that second ragnarok, though.


...Bet you didn't expect this when you saw "law" on the domains above.

You know those noobs of 4e? I recognized one of them was a repackaging of an oldie. An oldie but not a goldie, you probably haven't heard of her >_> (I hadn't until I looked into it). Goddess of law and civilization? Yea, that's not a noob, that's Alia. She predates a whole load of much more famous deities. So she got in like this.

This is more of a story that a reskin, minus all the things that make a story story. It's what happens when someone who isn't a writer writes a story, I guess. Anyway I think it's neat. I thought to tie up all the more famous enemy twins. I couldn't get Selune in here, so it's not tripled twins, but I'm content.

Fri
2016-10-14, 01:46 AM
That's actually a pretty cool story. Shame about Heironeous and Hextor's fate, but it's not all bad, and hey, it's fitting for a deity level story! Have you ever heard a story about demigods and their bickering family that end up in happily ever after :smallbiggrin:

Bohandas
2016-10-18, 12:10 AM
The parts I've read s0 far seen pretty neat.

Fable Wright
2016-10-18, 01:36 PM
Actually, honestly that's a pretty cool write up on Mystra and her Chosen. I actually like it and find it cool and proper.

I second this. It adequately reflects my own view of Mystra's chosen, and gives an interesting perspective to her role on the planes.

Beneath
2016-10-19, 04:34 AM
This is my favorite reimagining of the D&D gods I've ever read, and if it's alright I think I might yoink it. I was loving this all through the first page, and then the bit about Mystra amazed me well beyond everything before (as an added plus, I dislike most of the writing for the Realms so turning Mystra into a chaotic neutral-at-best goddess who wants to see magical knowledge advanced at all costs in lives and even shattered worlds is awesome). I definitely like this theology. It has just enough to be recognizable while still being deep and flavorful, and allegiances among the deities are more complicated than alignments. Dwarves' distaste for arcane magic also makes sense if Moradin loathes Mystra, as he probably would. She's, like, the first creation of Selune and Shar's conflict in the Realms; is she up there with the primordial gods here too?

Waukeen as a goddess of usury (as in interest-bearing debt) is also interesting, though not far from what she was.

As an aside, the 5e DMG says that Erathis started as a reskin of Athena, IIRC; that said, your version of her is way more interesting than that. I like Olidammara as a god of civilization, definitely, too.

Oh, another source of deities you might want to look at is Crawl (http://crawl.chaosforge.org/God); the gods there are made for a video game without very deep lore, so they're more mechanics than myths, but nonetheless some are pretty flavorful or have aspects that you can borrow, in particular 'cause their mechanics allow there to be drawbacks to worshipping gods (which a lot have), and their drawbacks are pretty diverse (one requires that you permanently sacrifice skills; one requires that you wear cursed items; the good-aligned ones all have onerous codes of conduct). Plus some of them have interesting concept seeds but none of them have more than a paragraph of lore.

Also, in my understanding of Realmslore, Eldath and Mielikki are Sylvanus's daughters. While there's not much room for Mielikki in this (she is, after all, just another nature goddess of rangers and unicorns; under this schema she'd probably be better put as a high-ranking but not properly deific agent of Sylvanus. or perhaps a minor deity under his umbrella), Eldath as a peace goddess being the daughter of the god of ecoterrorism (and not his earthmother aspect) is interesting. Mielikki or Ehlonna (same goddess, different names) could perhaps be a third (second)-party mediator between Sylvanus and Chauntea; a child thrust in the job of mediating her parent's two aspects. Or at least, her followers are thrust in the job of mediating between their followers.

Also, from a certain point of view, this version of Shar is also a goddess of peace (as in "peace and quiet")

I personally like Sheela Peryroyl (among other things, aside from being another nature goddess she also has love, trade, and mediation, and is as closely allied with Waukeen as with the other nature gods (still closer with Yondalla. Lady runs a tight ship). though admittedly, it's hard to fit another love goddess in with what you're doing with Sune, and trade with Waukeen. though a trade goddess who disfavors interest-bearing debt could be interesting). How deep is Othea's secret? Did she let some of her giant god in children on the secret of the halflings and let some of them take up aliases as halfling deities? Admittedly, Yondalla/Othea/Berronar has taken most of the role of mediator here, given that she's pretending to be a young god and marrying into the old, and calming disputes between Moradin, Correlon, Gruumsh, and Pelor; I guess with all that there isn't room for Sheela Peryroyl except as a daughter who takes too much after her mother to be of note. There are enough "some minor gods were there too" moments in these myths to justify that role. But perhaps Sune could be playing her? There was also a while when FR's canon made the claim that Yondalla was an aspect of Chauntea, which (while not true in this theology, and in fact downright blasphemous, nor is it true in any other barring the 4e Realms) is something Chauntea might try claiming. Strangely, though, if I remember my lore right, the halflings, rather than follow the greater deity their chief deity was an aspect of, decided instead they'd stick with a halfling deity: Sheela Peryroyl. I think between, like, trying to mediate with Sune, either stalling her or being played by her, and being her mother's coup insurance, that could be an interesting role for her.

Though her way of coup insurance isn't to be prominent enough that nobody ever attempts a coup because they don't think it'll work, but to be in position for a quick steady transfer of power to her instead of whoever else should her mother be de-throned, with an eye to putting her mother back in power. Which means that, one, she sticks to the background and pretends to be a bit player, and two, Yondalla, a goddess who has been without anyone worthy of trust for longer than any civilizations have existed, has to trust her utterly. Perhaps in that way, Sheela Peryroyl is the ultimate halfling: easily overlooked, but when her moment comes everything will hinge on the depths of her character. Personally, I'd fit her into this by making her an alias of one of the other giant god(desses), who did something as a giant that means Othea trusted her, specifically, enough to let her in on the Yondalla plan (if she didn't let the others in) and put her in this role; that way they'll have a long secret history. I'm just not sure what would be a big enough sacrifice to win Othea's trust.

How do Gnomes fit into all of this? I'd imagine them, under this, as being even younger than halflings, perhaps started as halflings with a more dwarvish bent, given over to Moradin/Garl?

I'm also seeing some interesting secret halfling/giant alliances (or perhaps not alliances, but recognition of kinship). Could be an interesting distinction given that most editions of D&D have giants intrinsically at war with dwarves and gnomes. Yondothea, then, is playing both sides (or perhaps just hedging her bets, as her grand strategy here doesn't seem to involve jockeying for power, just surviving).

As an aside, Tempus, and all the gods who followed him into Pelor's court, were aspects of Gruumsh, yes? Did Gruumsh do anything in the creation of Duerra?

Pronounceable
2016-10-20, 12:22 AM
Aha, a comment with some meat.
This is my favorite reimagining of the D&D gods I've ever read, and if it's alright I think I might yoink it.
What would be the point in posting all this if it doesn't get yoinked. Also, hurray!

Dwarves' distaste for arcane magic also makes sense if Moradin loathes Mystra, as he probably would.
Moradin (also Corellon) doesn't do mortals much and when he does, he goes metropolitan. Humanoids (except orcs) are mostly either on Pelor or Sune blocs, but there's always some worlds where dwarves worship Moradin and elves go for Seldarine. Everybody hates Mystra though.

She's, like, the first creation of Selune and Shar's conflict in the Realms; is she up there with the primordial gods here too?
This Mystra's young and lightweight and unrelated to Overmothers (except maybe as a spontaneous manifestation of Shar's hatred for all existence, you could go for that).

As an aside, the 5e DMG says that Erathis started as a reskin of Athena, IIRC; that said, your version of her is way more interesting than that.
Fantasy deities who're mere renamings of real myths (and sometimes not even renamed) are usually boring. And I'm surprised they weren't thinking of Alia instead.

Oh, another source of deities you might want to look at is Crawl (http://crawl.chaosforge.org/God)
I'm gonna look at that. I can always steal their stuff for appropriate DnD deities.

Also, in my understanding of Realmslore, Eldath and Mielikki are Sylvanus's daughters.
Mielikki and Silvanus are both straight up stolen from real mythology as canon. They both migrated to Toril from different Earth pantheons. Realms canon occasionally sucks so hard it blows. And Eldath is so unfitting for adventurer worship she's all but ignored by lore since 1e (far as random internet writings claim).

Mielikki or Ehlonna (same goddess, different names) could perhaps be a third (second)-party mediator between Sylvanus and Chauntea;
There's no mediating, what with Chauntea being Silvanus in drag. Which isn't much of a secret since Olly keeps telling it to anyone who'd listen.

a child thrust in the job of mediating her parent's two aspects. Or at least, her followers are thrust in the job of mediating between their followers.
That's a neat idea for some sort of deity. I might nab it but it's too good to waste on a boring forest goddess.

Also, from a certain point of view, this version of Shar is also a goddess of peace (as in "peace and quiet")
True. The same point of view can see the goddess of cold, dark and rest too. As goddess of oblivion and nothingness, she can be the lack of anything.

I personally like Sheela Peryroyl
Sheela was just a name on the wiki lists for me. Her nonlove domains made her look like Yondalla's apprentice and love is pretty well filled up with Sune, so I passed her over.

How deep is Othea's secret? Did she let some of her giant god in children on the secret of the halflings and let some of them take up aliases as halfling deities?
No, she never liked anything she birthed until the halfling race. And it's as deep as it gets, nobody knows it. It's the kind of secret to build I -am- your father moments around.

There was also a while when FR's canon made the claim that Yondalla was an aspect of Chauntea
That was actually among the bits of info that inspired Yondotherronar Thaun. Just not directly.

Strangely, though, if I remember my lore right, the halflings, rather than follow the greater deity their chief deity was an aspect of, decided instead they'd stick with a halfling deity: Sheela Peryroyl.
Sounds like a thing someone might've written.

Perhaps in that way, Sheela Peryroyl is the ultimate halfling
That's a pretty cool concept too. It's not gonna fit in here but you should make it so when you grab this stuff for a game. Though if you're gonna have an ultimate halfling of that lot, I'd nominate Brandobaris (discounting Yondalla ofc). Boy has style.

How do Gnomes fit into all of this?
They don't. I despise gnomes, idiots at Dragonlance ruined gnomes forever in my formative years. So they don't exist. But if they did, they'd be fey obsessed with building vast underground lairs and warrens, possibly engaged in a subterran turf war with kobolds (who'd also be fey). Gnomes have no unique place whatsoever in DnD. Anything gnomish could be replaced with dwarves or halflings, so there's no point in having another shorty humanoid. Getting rid of them as default was probably the best thing 4e did. At least they have a proper niche if you make them mole fey.

As an aside, Tempus, and all the gods who followed him into Pelor's court, were aspects of Gruumsh, yes?
Yup. That's Gruumsh's covert way of telling Pelor to shut up, sit down and stop touching his toys.
(it's cool seeing others see things you leave them to see)

Did Gruumsh do anything in the creation of Duerra?
Gruumsh's guys are always manly men of mannheim (even when they're Rillifane). Duerra was crafted to be badass by the greatest crafter.


And today, a truly massive wall of text.

KIARANSALEE (intermediate goddess), the Revenancer, Thrice Betrayer, Shame of Arvandor, the Fallen of Seldarine, Scornful Bride, Demon Goddess, Mistress of Vengeance
Domains: vengeance, undead, memory

The Seldarine goddess of justice and the judge and the keeper of the dead was resurrected by Corellon along with the rest of them after Lolth’s betrayal and the ensuing war. Like all her siblings, Kiaransalee was grateful to Corellon for bringing her back and full of an immense love for her fellow deities. At first she was just as happy as the rest of Seldarine, but something wasn’t right. Corellon told them the trauma of getting violently killed must’ve destroyed parts of their memories but Kiaransalee was missing most of her life before her death at Lolth’s hand. She also clearly remembered being completely uninterested in love or romance before but was now deeply and passionately in love with every single other member of Seldarine (like they all were). Since their resurrection, the Seldarine had become closer than they’d ever been, everybody was in love with everybody else and were spending majority of their time dating, dining, romantic walking, handholding, longingly eye gazing or screwing every single other Seldarine (all of whom were now going both ways). None except Kiaransalee thought this was odd either, they all considered this strange lack of jealousy and overeagerness to engage in orgies to be a sign of loyalty to each other. Her queries soon ended, for Corellon had announced that he was going to marry again. It was a contest to see which goddess was the most romantic, most gracious and pretty. Everyone suddenly became too busy with preparations and/or speculation.

Kiaransalee also would’ve dearly loved to marry her lord and savior Corellon but she knew she was the least desirable goddess among Seldarine, evident by the fact that she’d had the least amount of dalliances since their resurrection. Kiaransalee was sensible and dutiful, not sensual like Hanali or mysterious like Sehanine or lively like Aerdrie, and nobody else seemed to think she’d be chosen either. Kiaransalee was sad and angsty about it but then she noticed that Eilistraee (who was the only survivor of Lolth’s massacre) seemed to be the completely out of this race too. While it seemed reasonable that Lolth’s daughter wouldn’t be chosen to replace her and Eilistraee’s distaste for this thing mortals call incest was famous, there was something else going on here. Eilistraee had always been the only one who wasn’t into this newfound Seldarine fellowship and passion, she seemed to be getting more and more distant from the rest of them since their resurrection. Something was fishy, Kiaransalee was getting more and more suspicious. The intense and burning love she felt for every single other member of Seldarine made her almost unable to leave Corellon’s realm by herself, it was torturous to even think about being seperated from the multiple loves of her life for more than a few hours at a time, but she had to discover the truth. She was the goddess of justice, how could justice be without truth?

So, with great and melodramatic angst, she went to the divine realm of Oghma. The Grand Library of the Lord of All Knowledge was said to contain all answers to all questions (Oghma would be the very first to admit that’s horsecrap; like all good scientists, he knows that more information only solidifies the knowledge of one’s own ignorance). Kiaransalee was very lucky indeed, for she found Oghma conferring with his longtime ally Boccob, the Lord of All Magic. Both were very interested in her story but strangely enough, neither great gods of information knew what had actually gone down in Arvandor during or after Lolth’s rebellion. However Oghma was sympathetic to Kiaransalee’s plight and wanted to help her. Boccob would also help because she seemed like an entertaining puzzle to solve. So the two great gods of knowledge summoned their underlings, the lesser gods of various stuff they’d created together to use as special consultants and assistant researchers for important matters. Kiaransalee was shortly surrounded by a large crowd of gods including but not limited to Gond, Deneir, Azuth and Ioun. They poked and prodded her as if she was an interesting insect but at least had enough tact to not say it out loud (unlike Boccob). After some humiliating hours of prodding Kiaransalee, the collected gods of knowledge and research came up with the plans for a device that should let Kiaransalee watch her life from her own birth. They lost her at temporal regression of the subconscious self part, but she was smart enough to watch Oghma and Boccob’s reactions during the incomprehensible explanation, she saw that both seemed satisfied and agreed to subject herself to the odd device.

They built it and it worked. Kiaransalee was able to watch her entire existence from her creation, including everything that led to Lolth’s betrayal. She saw all the wrongs Corellon did (with Vhaeraun and Othea and countless other, less catastrophic events) that caused Lolth to eventually rebel. She remembered how all of Seldarine (except Eilistraee) had risen up against Corellon with Lolth. Kiaransalee saw Corellon personally beat, imprison and then execute them one by one after letting the instigators Lolth and Vhaeraun go free. She watched in horror as Corellon reshaped her astral corpse, altering her memory and personality to create a member of the perfectly united harmonious divine family he demanded. Kiaransalee watched in disgust as her warped self frolicked with her siblings and pined after Corellon. She got angier and angrier as it played out, until the device melted down and exploded (causing much concern to Oghma as he scrambled to put out the fires). Among the burning wreckage, Kiaransalee stood seething. The infantile, sappy, melodramatic fool Corellon had twisted her into was sorted out, replaced by the real Seldarine goddess of justice. The idealist goddess who was fooled into joining Lolth’s selfish uprising against an irresponsible dumb tyrant and had died for her belief in fairness and responsibility was back. It could be said that she was unhappy.

Oghma and the underlings were surprised at the transformation but they were all very happy to get their hands on such important information. However the sight of the restored goddess of justice inspired Boccob and he demanded a price, knowing she wouldn’t refuse payment for the sort of service they just rendered her. He would take part of Kiaransalee’s divine power, splitting the latent melodramatic and overemotional bits of Corellon’s design that were still buried inside her. Oghma was concerned about that sort of splitting but Kiaransalee agreed immediately, she didn’t want any possibility of a relapse. So the lesser gods got to work again. The operation removed a large part of Kiaransalee’s natural empathy as well but it was fine. She wanted to be more rational anyway and didn’t even care what Boccob would do (namely creating Sharess to be their special consultant on sensuality, hedonism and teen angst) with her divinity.

Kiaransalee knew she couldn’t bring Corellon to justice. This was hard for a goddess of justice to admit but it was the truth. He could easily kill her or warp her back into a melodramatic idiot. So she went to the only being who might help her have justice. The Soul Forger listened to her tale intently, agreeing that a terrible crime had been committed upon Seldarine. But nothing Moradin could muster would work against King of Arvandor, only him personally engaging Corellon in battle would stand any chance at forcing him into anything and Moradin was unwilling to fight his sibling or start a multiverse shaking war. He assured her that Pelor and even Gruumsh would say the same thing (and Tiamat would eat her if she went to Water). As Kiaransalee got it, this was all but a confession that the strong were beyond the reach of justice. She was crestfallen. But Moradin would not send Kiaransalee away empty handed, he’d always had a measure of fondness for her for being a dutiful and serious deity among the frolicking court of Arvandor, therefore he swore that if Corellon ever killed or warped her again like that, Moradin would restore her to her real self, no matter what. He even invited her to move over if she wished to be rid of Corellon, he’d accept her into his court. And this was favoritism, an anathema to justice. All that coming from the lord of Mount Celestia was enough to convince Kiaransalee that justice was a lie and she’d been a fool to think otherwise. When she left, Kiaransalee was already “fallen” from Seldarine.

Once back in Arvandor, she pretended to be the same melodramatic idiot. Justice might’ve been a lie all along but vengeance was real. She wanted it, needed it and was gonna get it. She continued acting sad that Corellon wasn’t gonna pick her, it let her bide her time and mostly stay away from the others (she had to endure the occasional cheering attempts from males of Seldarine but at least all females were busy). On the day of wedding, she was ready. Once Corellon got busy and distracted with his new wife, Kiaransalee would grab the countless Seldarine worshipper souls afterliving in Arvandor she had control over. By the time any Seldarine understood what had happened, Kiaransalee would be all the way across the Great Wheel, dumping the souls into Mechanus to be sorted and spread to outer planes by alignment. Corellon couldn’t recover or, considering the damage Lolth’s uprising had done to Seldarine interests in Material, replace those precious mortal worshipper souls anytime soon. Even Corellon wouldn’t be dumb enough to create enough new mortals to replace that loss and infuriate Pelor (though Kiaransalee wouldn’t mind if Pelor attacked Arvandor and ruined Corellon’s millenium). Afterwards, Kiaransalee would probably take up Moradin on his offer and move to Celestia. It was a good, smart, spiteful plan, hitting Corellon right where it’d hurt. She’d missed only one unlikely possibility.

When Corellon named Kiaransalee as the winner of the contest and his new wife, she was first flabbergasted. Then repulsed and disgusted, but the shock was paralyzing. Why’d he pick the least pretty, least romantic, most straightlaced one of the lot? It turned out Corellon chose her for being least similar to his ex-wife, as picking Hanali or Sehanine or Aerdrie would feel like him replacing his old wife with a newer model and that’d be horrible. Rest of the Seldarine loved it, for Kiaransalee had been acting all sad and forlorn since she knew she wasn’t gonna win and they were all suckers for the underdog story. As they cheered, Kiaransalee could only remember the sight of Corellon coldly executing them all after the rebellion. And now he wanted her to marry him and be grateful for it? Suddenly her vengeance plan wasn’t nearly enough. So she got on the stage for a speech and told them she had actually prepared a surprise for them, asking them all to shut their senses and wait a bit. They did so, even Corellon, wondering what sort of surprise overly serious but nevertheless adorable Kiaransalee would prepare.

It didn’t take more than a few seconds for them to realize something was wrong but by then Kiaransalee had already dragged the souls their entire worshipper base to the Abyss, billions of mostly nonevil mortal souls were heaped in front of the throne of the Demon Prince of Undeath. Orcus wasn’t having a good day; he’d just gotten word that his army had soundly been beaten by Demogorgon’s in yet another skirmish, the messenger who’d brought the news had tasted awful, he had a headache and then some random deity had suddenly smashed her way into his palace as if she owned the place. But the sight of all those souls was tempting and this daughter of Corellon had enough divinity in her scrawny frame to be nonimmediately devourable, so he waited long enough to listen to Kiaransalee. Orcus was a proper demon prince, steeped in paranoia and expert at intricate schemes, but Kiaransalee’s story of wrath and spite seemed valid enough and what she wanted from him was a thing he’d have given countless demons’ right arms for. Not that he had anything close to empathy, but he knew a thing or two about being up against an unbeatable enemy and all those souls at his feet were making him reckless. So he devoured all souls immediately before Corellon or others from Seldarine appeared to recover them, just like Kiaransalee was asking him to. This much power suddenly made Orcus ascendant, power from millions of souls inside him was enough for him to become an actual god now. Kiaransalee also seemed much smaller than she used to be a moment ago, so Orcus grabbed her, she made a fine dessert.

The millions of souls abducted from their well earned afterlives were in horrible pain as they were being digested, they were angry at the traitorous judge they’d entrusted their eternal souls to. They wanted revenge on the betrayer who’d been betrayed in turn and joined them in the belly of the demon. Kiaransalee clung to her hatred of Corellon to keep herself together, hoping the hateful nature of the Abyss would help her, and channeled her own divine power into the souls she betrayed as they assaulted her. The domain of justice was being warped with the pain and fury from millions of mortals and her divine self; her divinity mixed with Orcus’ mastery of undeath, empowering and warping the ex-worshippers of Seldarine. They changed en masse, becoming things created and sustained by hunger for vengeance. Thus the first revenants of the planes were created inside the Demon Prince of Undeath and exploded outwards, tearing him to pieces and scattering his essence. All of Orcus’ servants fled before the grostesque rebirth as Kiaransalee remade her form from the shredded bits of former Demon Prince of Undeath. She was now the goddess of vengeance and undead, a hybrid of deity and demon, who’d come to call herself the Revenancer in honor of this event.

It was all over before Corellon or Seldarine could react, they could do nothing but sit stunned as they felt the loss of their worshippers.

Today, the church of Kiaransalee is made up of highly skilled individuals spread all over the planes who offer guidance for any being seeking vengeance for wrongs done to them. For a small fee, clerics of Kiaransalee offer their expertise at imagining, planning and executing elaborate revenge schemes, with particular attention paid to irony. Their only requirement is that the crimes should be real and dire and the vengeance planned needs to be proportional in severity. A prospective client needs to be careful, for church of Kiaransalee doesn’t stop once engaged, any attempt at backing off is met with disproportionate retaliation as clerics give up on the target and refocus their efforts on ruining the life of the ex client. Neither do they like being bothered for unimportant or imaginary slights, visiting them might be suicidal if the cause isn’t good enough. Clerics of Kiaransalee don’t set up temples or preach the virtues of vengeance to the masses, they’re highly mobile and usually just observe (mainly in taverns and inns), occasionally nudging unhappy people they see towards places where they might find someone willing to listen and maybe help. They never act on their own to avenge anything, the victim must desire vengeance and seek their help. Dispensing “justice” is a sin that inevitably ends the cleric’s service (and life). She also places much importance on memory and its preservation in writing, demanding her clergy to keep good records of their lives and affairs. After much effort, she managed to gain a small power over memory, ostensibly for the importance of remembering the wrongs done to you correctly, but it's mostly due to the leftover trauma she can't get over.

Kiaransalee doesn’t have fancy words or creeds for mortals beyond get even and hurt those who hurt you. She might manifest after any prayer to her, offering to induct the mortal into her church if their grievance is valid and needs divine help to settle. Educated and/or skilled people are much more likely to have their prayers answered (she learned the value of specialists well) but she’s not that picky, any genuine desire for revenge is enough to draw her attention. In return for dedicating their lives to her once they have their revenge, Kiaransalee’s power is freely given to all beings anywhere in the multiverse. She particularly delights in bringing harm upon followers of Seldarine or Lolth, but she’s known to help even victims of her church against her own clergy.

As the Revenancer, Kiaransalee spends most of her time watching dying mortals. She chooses who gets to become a revenant and what conditions will apply to them, even the strongest of magics can’t create a revenant without her permission. There's only one known exception. In one of multiverse’s greatest ironies, Demon Prince Orcus (notably no of Something anymore) has managed to claw his way back into existence by making himself a revenant. He’s the only undead demon in the multiverse and is currently engaged in a fierce war against Kiaransalee. Rumors claim Kiaransalee let him become a revenant to give him a chance at vengeance. As the (Half)Demon Princess of Undeath, Kiaransalee controls Orcus’ old domain, his armies of the damned, her own armies of demons, vast legions of the original revenants and some mortal Orcus cultists (as both are able to influence them, there’s no telling if any given cult of Orcus is serving him or Kiaransalee). Orcus is fighting an uphill battle many beings expect him to lose but it's not like that's new to him. Kiaransalee’s simple and direct faith is very appealing to most evil exemplar races and she’s revered and sometimes even worshipped by many fiends all over the lower planes, contributing to her relative uninterest in Material. Corellon and Seldarine are also her bitter enemies but have no way of meaningfully engaging her outside the Abyss and she never leaves her stronghold. Kiaransalee’s one divine enemy who poses real danger is Lolth, the fellow Seldarine outcast and dweller of the Abyss. The greater goddess covets Kiaransalee’s unique power and has long tried to ensnare her in the dreaded Demonweb (which should’ve been easy considering how universally alluring Lolth is and how much she and Kia have in common to talk about) but unlike Vhaeraun, Zinzerena and Selvetarm, Kiaransalee knows better than to trust Lolth and has thus far managed to avoid her enchanting presence.

She’s not entirely alone however. It’s an open secret that Gruumsh channels large numbers of orcish souls towards Kiaransalee, empowering both her and her demonic armies. He knows this infuriates Corellon (orcs get a relatively large number of revenants, as orcs in general have a lot of vengeance in need of getting, frequently from followers of Seldarine). Moradin’s protective oath also still stands, even though he’s grown to hate her and could now use his oath as an excuse to destroy and remake Kiaransalee as a regular goddess, Moradin is not in the habit of abusing the letter of the law to screw someone over, even if that someone has now become a demon princess. Kiaransalee regularly reminds him that if things go real bad for her in the Abyss, she’ll go to Arvandor and Corellon will probably destroy her. Moradin is dreading the day he’ll have to resurrect and empower a (half)demon, but he will do it. Boccob also has a working relation with Kiaransalee, they have a steady trade of information about various feuds and hostilities all over the planes, usually sharing things the other might be interested in for modest prices (Oghma is ashamed for his part in her transformation and avoids her).


Is this the longest one yet? Think it's the longest one. Long ones always include Corellon being a douchenozzle for some reason...

I had to put that demon goddess thing somewhere and Lolth wasn't available. And Revenancer is prolly the best nickname they gave to anyone since Duerra. Since it was strange for the Revenancer to not have anything to do with revenants, I had to fix it. And a fallen Seldarine makes for a much better story than the now ruined concept of Lich Queen. Warcraft has a lot to answer for. We now have a way to cram in an arbitrarily large number of deities for whatever you might want for your campaign. Just put whomever in and say they're Boccob's Irregulars. I also put Oghma and Boccob into the cage for a deathmatch as I said I would, then they found a way to cooperate and get off together. It was amazing, a shame you couldn't see it.


(unrelated: Elementary is an awesome series, y'all should watch it)

Anderlith
2016-10-20, 12:44 AM
I'm surprised to see Pelor the Burning Hate isn't listed yet. Its late, or I'd take the time to post it. Perhaps tomorrow if i have time.

Beneath
2016-10-20, 02:06 AM
I'll admit my personal soft spot for Sheela Peryroyl comes entirely from a character I had in NWN2 who worshipped her because she was a halfling ranger and her options were either a non-halfling god or her b/c NWN2 enforces FR's deity rules, and I like my character so therefore I like her goddess (my NWN2 characters are the source of 90% of my positive feelings about anything Realms-related; except as these characters' homes, I dislike the Realms)

So you're going with ascended mortal as this Mystra? Makes sense, I guess, since Mystra's also that. My vision of your Shar is that she just wants the peace and quiet that will come when all Creation stops being so Creation-y, a cosmic consciousness seeking the peace she once had before she had to share existence with other minds, and this Mystra seems a bit loud for her tastes. Like yes she kills people en masse but she's enamored with discovering new and louder ways of doing so, which I can easily see Shar hating almost as much as she hates the lives extinguished with Mystra's aid.

The duplication of divine portfolios is interesting if the gods aren't culturally limited (two gods of justice are weird; a god of justice for elves and a god of justice for humans are less so). Though this is a multi-world theology, so there's enough room for multiple gods of justice. Admittedly, I'm not much of a fan of the "divine portfolios" concept D&D uses; they're gods, they're powerful and they do things, but any law saying that some schtick belongs to some god is either because of who or what they have influence over (with a finite number of well-positioned "who"s and "what"s to have influence over) or because of a law imposed on them, not because there are cosmic trading cards of "war" "beauty" and "justice" and gods are bound by the ones they've collected.

I like Kiaransalee's plot too. A little surprised at you keeping both Boccob and Oghma though.

Part of me wants to yank this whole theology but part of me wants to keep to each 5e domain belonging to exactly one god 'cause that's more aesthetically pleasing for me. Except I could see Yondalla and Chauntea both having Life (and this being important to both divinities' backstory), and there are a bunch of nigh-identical War gods.

With that the pantheon might be
Death: Nerull
Knowledge: Oghcob or maybe cut him and put Moradin here
Light: Pelor
Life: Yondalla, Chauntea*
Nature: Sylvanus*
Tempest: Auril
Trickery: Olidammara
War: Gruumsh and clones

*I could also see making Nature Clerics into Chauntea's thing and the Sylvanus aspect is worshipped only by Druids.

Other deities of note:
Sune: Clergy are Bards (College of Lore, with an emphasis on enchantment spells, as a stopgap. I might have to write my own kit for this and decide whether it's a bard or cleric kit)
Shar, Selune: Do not grant spells, I guess, mostly 'cause I can't fit them in this scheme and neither is particularly interventionist. Or Shar might not trust anyone with that kind of power and Selune is the goddess of Moon druids?
Tharizdun: Clergy are Warlocks (Great Old One patron). Possibly the ultimate patron of all GOOlocks
Mystra: No clergy
Duerra: Clergy use that one class from the psionic unearthed arcana
Tiamat: No clergy
Vecna: Clergy are wizards

Not entirely sure what domains to give Moradin and Correlon. or maybe they don't field clerics in the conventional sense. Moradin fields exclusively Paladins and Correlon exclusively Bards? or they could have custom domains. or Moradin could get Knowledge. He gets Knowledge according to the PHB (they were writing D&D. these are the gods they had to write for. and they wrote a system for distinguishing the clergy of different deities and the way they came up with to distinguish clergy of Boccob and Moradin is that Moradin's clergy are on average shorter and beardier). They gave Correlon Light, which is really Fire so it suits Pelor in this scheme but not Correlon at all. I could see making Valor Bards his thing.

Actually, if I cut Death domain clerics or possibly give them to Shar, I could make an interesting cutoff where mortal-born gods aren't able to field worshippers with the Cleric class. I'm not sure if I like that one though. Leaves Nerull with nothing though and he's too interesting for that.

Hmm...

I mean, before now I was at a loss for how I'd fit my scheme to recognizable D&D deities and now I've covered it and each deity has hidden depths. So thanks for that.

Edit: also, entirely unrelated, but my favorite reimagining of Loviatar (if she's not to be the goddess of torturing people) was the one the Sigil Preparatory Academy campaign used that basically made her into a BDSM goddess. You have your write-up for her already and it reminded me of that version, which I found amusing.

Pronounceable
2016-10-20, 05:24 AM
I'll admit my personal soft spot for Sheela Peryroyl comes entirely from a character I had in NWN2
I could admit to being inordinately fond of Bhaal for his part in BGs. Instead I fed him to Erythnul here so he won't occupy my mind.

So you're going with ascended mortal as this Mystra? Makes sense, I guess, since Mystra's also that.
I haven't thought to have concrete rules about deity generation in Material Plane. Some just pop up from belief (S&N), some ascend from mortal (H bros, Dread3), some are created purposefully by greater deities (Irregulars) and some are just weird (titans). Mystra can be any of those, according to taste. Her true origin didn't really matter for her writeup so I left it blank.

My vision of your Shar is that she just wants the peace and quiet
True. Sadly for her, there's no such thing as peace or quiet when you're omniscient. The only peace and quiet Shar's gonna get will be after she's reduced every single thing that exists back to nothingness. And even without Selune's constant opposition, Shar's infinite fertility is liable to spawn more things even as she erases things. So peace or quiet is never gonna happen, so Shar is mad. She does hate Mystra, but not any more than she hates everything else that exists.

Admittedly, I'm not much of a fan of the "divine portfolios" concept D&D uses
I like domains/portfolios/spheres. It's an abstraction like hit points. Makes it easier to work with this stuff. I find it best not to think too deeply about it. Cosmic trading card is a great analogy. The weight and value of the cards can change with great effort by the owner, whereas the primordial greaters can create more to hand out to their flunkies or modify theirs on a whim.

A little surprised at you keeping both Boccob and Oghma though.
One is the god of knowledge, other is the god of knowledge. They solve problems!

Part of me wants to yank this whole theology but part of me wants to keep to each 5e domain belonging to exactly one god 'cause that's more aesthetically pleasing for me.
It'll be a very small group you're taking only one deity per domain (unless you're going to invent new ones). However it's doable as the pantheon of a single world (which is a pretty normal setting for a DnD campaign and no reason why that specific world doesn't exist somewhere in this cosmology). Here's what I'd pick looking at 5ephb:
Death: Nerull
Knowledge: Oghma
Light: Corellon (he's uppity like that)
Life: Pelor (actually Tiamat but she wouldn't answer airbreathing losers)
Nature: Silvanus
Tempest: Umberlee
Trickery: Lolth
War: Gruumsh

All others without domains would be left out. If you're willing to create new domains, you can add more. Beauty for Sune, Law for Moradin, Protection for Yondalla, Travel for Olidammara... However limiting all domains to single deities or all deities to single domains is far too restrictive for my tastes. As would any other definite rulings about this matter be. If I had to follow hardwired rules, this Nerull couldn't exist.
Also that's an insanely narrow list. Probably to facilitate later sale of splatbooks.

my favorite reimagining of Loviatar (if she's not to be the goddess of torturing people) was the one the Sigil Preparatory Academy campaign used that basically made her into a BDSM goddess
I'd say she's already that if her usual depictions are any indication, on top being goddess of torturing people.

Beneath
2016-10-21, 03:55 PM
The reason I want to do the one domain:one god thing is because I like the idea of a cleric's deity defining what they're like as a cleric, instead of having two clerics of gods who are little alike playing exactly the same (like, for instance, Moradin and Mystra are both, in the players handbook, Knowledge gods. and even core Mystra is so different from Moradin that it seems weird that their clergy play the same).

Lolth as trickery is good though, especially if I outright get rid of alignments so being a cleric of a god who lairs in the Abyss doesn't mean you can't be a good person (I mean, already, it's decided that a god who lairs on the upper planes isn't necessarily a good person, from what you've done with Correlon). Correlon needs to be in if Lolth is, but regardless of what the PHB writers said, I don't think all the fire spells in the Light domain fit him, and they do for this version of Pelor.

Also, giving Pelor Light rather than Life and making Yondalla (who as far as he knows is an ascended mortal/the creation of a mortal cult) the one who gets the domain from the basic rules, the default cleric, gives an excuse for Auril to be there. Pelor and Auril as secret allies is too cool for me to pass up.

Maybe:
Death: Nerull
Knowledge: There's a case to be made for Moradin or Oghma here. Mostly I find Oghma kinda uninspiring, so I favor Moradin
Life: There are cases to be made for Chauntea and Yondalla here both. And Tiamat but she doesn't answer air-breathing losers and that means her followers use the monster rules.
Light: Pelor
Nature: Chauntea
Tempest: Auril
Trickery: Lolth
War: Gruumsh

I'd need to slot Correlon in there somewhere since Lolth is there, though already three of the domains given are taken by gods who used to be race-specific (Life, Trickery, and War), four if I use Moradin. I might have to find or make something for him then. Maybe split the Light domain into like "Radiance" (Correlon) and "Flames" (Pelor). I bet Correlon inching on Pelor's territory on this world when he's already not the god of all that lives would incense Pelor enough to make throwing Auril at this world an even higher priority, too, which is great. Sune too, since the Sune/Nerull alliance is also awesome.

Giving Chauntea and Yondalla both Life clerics is, like, the one case doubling up makes sense, given that Sylvanus, in this version, actively ripped off Yondalla when making Chauntea's cult, and the reason for not wanting to double up is that it makes little sense that very different religions and gods would train and bless their priests in the exact same way (but a religion that is literally a plagiarized copy of another would). That'd give room for another Nature deity, possibly Sylvanus.

Side-note: Is there also a connection between Pelor (the burning eye) and Nyarlathotep (the three-lobed burning eye) in this cosmos? and how did Mechanus come to be?

Pronounceable
2016-10-21, 07:39 PM
The reason I want to do the one domain:one god thing is because I like the idea of a cleric's deity defining what they're like as a cleric, instead of having two clerics of gods who are little alike playing exactly the same
That's always been one of the dumbest things in DnD. The god of wizards Azuth has clerics who're not wizards and god of thieves Mask has clerics who're not thieves (unless they multiclass), and god of paladins Torm has paladins and clerics because why wouldn't he. But there's no god of clerics because that would be ridiculous. Then there's goddess of peace and pacifism Eldath empowering mace swinging murderhobos in plate because phb says so.

The solution is to forget about the Cleric class. Gods give spells and blessings to the sort of people they like, not to the sort of people those wizards living on the coast claim they do. Guys like Moradin, Helm, Hextor, Lathander will give spellcasting and turning/rebuking to fighters who're sworn to them (thus making guys who look identical to Clerics). Azuth, Mask, Oghma and Sune will empower wizards, thieves, librarians (adept) and prostitutes (commoner). Battlefield performance balance between their faithfuls is not really a priority for deities. You still give the cleric class to your players but only if they chose an appropriate deity, no worshipper of Loviatar or Eldath gets to be the healbot in a murderhobo pack.

So yeah, majority of the gods don't have any Clerics. But plenty of blessed worshippers who preach their creed and are allowed to perform miracles in their name. The devout hooker with her 1d4+2 hp and 11 ac will Gate in a Solar to wreck the 12th level murderhobo pack if Sune likes her enough (aka DM hates them enough). That'd be a fringe case tho.

With that in mind, I'd suggest you let Cleric with these domains exist:
Death: Nerull (no other choice here)spoilers: he kills every god who tries to move in on his turf, he killed Yurtrus so many times Gruumsh gave up and switched him to age and disease)
Knowledge: Shar (the worst pick; the only things Shar should give you willingly are insanity, amnesia, enslavement or oblivion but only other deities that come anywhere near are Hextor/Heironeous or Bane in their lawmaker aspects, Oghma/Boccob/Irregulars are too scholarly for clerics)
Life: Pelor (militant, antiundead and the only primordial attention whore enough to desire direct worship)
Light: Seldarine (special emphasis on Rillifane and Sehanine but they're all too attached to all the others)
Nature: Silvanus (clerics are far too aggressive for Chauntea's image)
Tempest: Umberlee (I read 5ephb; it says storms, sea and sky, as if they tailormade it for her and Talos)
Trickery: Lolth (Yondalla is the only other trickster militant enough to empower warlike clerics but she's too halfling centered)
War: Tempus or Bane (Gruumsh doesn't really need clerics, he gets much faith from orcs and has other arrangements too)also it's already Gruumsh
Other deities will have plenty of spellcasting worshippers (or not) but they'll be anything from level 1 commoners to level 47 monks depending on the god's and DM's tastes.


Lolth as trickery is good though, especially if I outright get rid of alignments so being a cleric of a god who lairs in the Abyss doesn't mean you can't be a good person (I mean, already, it's decided that a god who lairs on the upper planes isn't necessarily a good person, from what you've done with Correlon). Correlon needs to be in if Lolth is, but regardless of what the PHB writers said, I don't think all the fire spells in the Light domain fit him, and they do for this version of Pelor.
Lolth is the goddess of shadows and schemes. It doesn't say evil anywhere. Though she thinks men are inherently flawed and need female supervision constantly to not be a danger to themselves and society (or at least until they're too old to get it up anymore aka able to think clearly). Being married to Corellon for so long would do that to anyone. She needs to be militant to keep her ultramatriarchal societies in place, hence Clerics. So long as you're manipulative and conniving, Lolth welcomes you (even if you're male and not old, tho then you should find a woman to take care of you asap).
Big Daddy thinks mortals aren't worthy enough to worship him directly. That's what Seldarine was made for. He also lives inside Positive (mom's basement), not upstairs.

Pelor wants to be the classic your dad but in the sky. He's the only primordial greater who wants to be respected and loved and worshipped. That's the whole reason he went into the mortals business and he gets pissy when mortals don't go for him or his children. His siblings only like mortals for the ease of extracting belief (it's very much harder to convince a respawning exemplar/elemental who's immune to time to worship). Moradin is too busy making sure the outer planes run on time, Corellon is too good to associate with mere mortals, Gruumsh is playing on another level, Tiamat is as Tiamat does. That's why Pelor would be the only one with specialized Clerics running around in Material and life for benevolence.

I realize the above bits haven't been explicit in any of the stuff I've posted before. But that's what I have in mind when writing this stuff and I've kinda been leaving a lot of stuff (like these details of greater primordial siblings) unwritten deliberately for all posts to be modular and not tie things down too tight. But sure, you can switch Pelor and Seldarine on my list. It's not like that's gonna ruin everything forever.


Pelor and Auril as secret allies is too cool
Auril's "clerics" are all psychopathic cultists who hope to become fey (thus immortal), entirely too similar to cultists of lower planar powers. They'd at most get a couple of magic tricks from Auril. Only her fey soldiers would be actual Clerics (with war, tempest or trickery). You can have the mortal "clerics" do evil ritual stuff to bring in the real Clerics who'll do the summoning of crushing ice meteors and fey armies. Exact same campaign as would be against a Demogorgon/Orcus/Graz'zt/Asmodeus cult. That's a whole world saving adventure right there.
Less cliche alternative: Auril hit the world centuries ago but some worshippers remained behind. Their numbers increased insidiously over the years and they've finally come out, trying to call her back for another go. As no mortal knows her real job, it looks like another ice apocalypse might happen if these psychonuts aren't stopped. You can spin this off to a Feywild jaunt fighting through the Winter Court, building up to a confrontation with Auril herself, who's totally chill when not on the job and has no idea why you mortals are trashing her place now, it's not like it was you she invaded, do you go around assaulting everyone who attacked your ancestors hundreds of years ago?


Side-note: Is there also a connection between Pelor (the burning eye) and Nyarlathotep (the three-lobed burning eye) in this cosmos?
No. But there could be if you want. I haven't thought of it, not being much for Lovecraft, but it's possible to remake the elder beings into eldritch Lovecraftian things. Tiamat is quite Shub-Niggurathy from what little I know, and Selune is somewhat Azathothian. Tharizdun (and Moander and Ghaundaur and maybe Ibrandul if I ever get around to him) is straight up Lovecraftian but I couldn't put a Mythos name to him.


and how did Mechanus come to be?
I've wanted to write that up for a long while but couldn't fit it into any deity story so far. Short version: Moradin had to build it because Pelor ****ed up the multiverse.

Beneath
2016-10-21, 09:26 PM
Hmm... I'd have to figure out the connections (like, if Nyarlathotep is secretly Pelor, I want that to make Pelor more horrifying, not Nyarlathotep less), if I decide to go lovecraftian with this. I've got room. I don't think Tharizdun and the others are meant to be mythos expies so much as mythos-inspired. Mostly, I was asking 'cause of the phrase "burning eye" and my associations for that are Sauron and Nyarlathotep (even though it's supposed to be the sun).

The "Auril attacked a while back but now things are fine" idea is pretty good. Her leftover clergy wouldn't be clerics then because they wouldn't be PCs, but that gives more flexibility for what they are.

I might stick Moradin in as Knowledge instead of Shar; he's martial enough for clerics and knowledge-oriented enough (at least, if all the dwarven stereotypes of writing everything down and crafting (which is knowledge-domain in 5e) apply to him even though he's not god of dwarves anymore) to be that (plus Knowledge is his recommended domain in the PHB). Like you said he's busy with the cosmos rather than mortals, but the intercessory deities I might put in this place aren't famous enough to merit making into the general-purpose God of Knowledge. Maybe he built a machine to answer prayers (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0007.html)?

I still might come up with a modified Life for Yondalla (take away the heavy armor proficiency since hobbits have enough DEX not to want it, take away Divine Strike, replace it with abilities that protect others maybe), but you've convinced me Pelor should have the default Life, and that makes the Seldarine the best fit for Light despite all the fire making it not a particularly great fit for them. Or Pelor might be the kind of self-important deity who takes up two whole domains representing different orders of his clergy, but with how little room that leaves for other deities maybe not.

So that means clerics of Lolth, Moradin, Nerull, Pelor, the Seldarine, Sylvanus, Tempus, and Umberlee exist; Mystra and Vecna have wizards but openly worshipping either isn't a great idea, Tharizdun and perhaps Auril and Kiaransalee have warlocks (GOO, Fey, and Fiend, respectively, though Auril's warlocks would most likely at this point be, like, people who learn to dream travel to her court to use her libraries rather than anyone she cares about), Duerra has Mystics, Heironeous might have Paladins (and Hextor too, maybe? and maybe even Kiaransalee given that "paladin of vengeance" is a thing), Tiamat & her spawn have monsters and maybe some mortal sorcerers (but are mostly villains), Gruumsh has orcs and Yondalla has hobbits. Sune was there too but most of what she gives her faithful is not appropriate for open discussion at my table.

I wonder if a propagation of nigh-identical war gods could be justified to people who don't know the secret as them being locked in an arms race that means their forces always resemble the others'. Though admittedly different militaries play to different strengths, even when they're in an arms race.

Oh, another thing: Is Arvoreen Yondalla's kid, a piece of Gruumsh, both, or their kid together (which would give him a full sibling among the giant gods, right)?

ETA: I couldn't agree more with wanting to forget about the cleric class, but I'm playing with the rulebook I'm given. Path of least resistance and all. If I were writing a new system, it wouldn't include a Cleric class, but as it is, it's there and I have to work around it, preferably without lengthening my house rules document too much.

Oh, and an idea to stick in the deities section of my house rules document as apocrypha: Few people pray to Shar, and most prayers go unanswered. She does not empower clerics. Accounts claim a few, though, end up dead, beyond ressurection and even Speak with Dead, either struck dead on the spot or dying in accidents later. Others simply vanish; divinations can confirm that they do not live yet they are not counted among the dead. A song, often sung by masked bards around secretive campfires on moonless autumn nights, tells of a farmer's only son who finds out that he once had a sister, and blames Shar for having erased almost all trace of her even from others' memories. In many versions of the song he dies under mysterious circumstances soon after discovering this. Only the most daring, curious, suicidal, or those who possess those traits in some combination ever test her.

Oh, and a mock-up Gruumsh cleric:
Level 1: Barbarian unarmored defense, martial weapon proficiency. Maybe barbarian reckless attack WIS/day but they already get a lot.
Level 2: Channel Divinity: Rage (using the table for an equal-level barbarian but without any of the rage special abilities barbarians get other than Rage itself. and they can use it whenever they can channel divinity). Also they can cast cleric spells while raging, but doing so instantly ends their rage.
Level 6: Maybe they can channel divinity to make their friends rage? I'm not actually sure.
Level 8: Reckless attack, if they didn't get it at level 1, otherwise same as war domain
Level 17: Casting while raging no longer ends their rage (if this ends up being too weak, maybe add "and you can cast a spell of 5th level or lower with a casting time of one action as a bonus action while raging as long as you attack on the same turn").

Spells are as war domain until Gruumsh decides to change them.

Maybe add a maximum level they're allowed to gain class features and spell progression for if they have more than one eye, and penalties for going from two eyes to one, since even if Gruumsh never had more than one eye, one-eyed orc casters is too much of a thing (and clerics of Gruumsh who are not orcs or half-orcs would be rare). Basically they're a cleric who fits in with a pack of orc barbarians; their weaker hit die and greater MAD makes them vulnerable if they rush in, to say nothing of lacking all of the barbarian's defenses except unarmored defense and damage resistance, but their casting makes them able to support from the front line.

I should probably spin off my application of one world in this cosmos to its own thing rather than make long posts in this thread about it so that this thread can be abou the gods in general.

Bohandas
2016-10-22, 01:32 AM
^That's a nice Lolth, you should write it up.

However this Lolth is no drow goddess and Gruumsh is already doing what you describe.
...
Anyway, I tried to get a Mystra up here but failed. She's far too tightly tied up in FR stuff of dubious quality, just like Cyric, and removing all that stuff just makes her boobed Boccob. Was a bummer.

Therefore, I decided to put my huge list here. Maybe it'll generate some recommendations and ideas. It's a list of bona fide DnD gods of variable fame that I'm trying to whip into a satisfactory cosmology( with commentary). Deities been mentioned until now are guaranteed to be in but even they're not set in stone. I also looked up the noobs of 4e, some of them do have potential.
Supreme Deities:
Luminous Overmother Selune
Ruinous Overmother Shar
Elder Elemental Evil Tharizdun

Primordial Greater Deities:
Mother of All Abominations Tiamat (terriblest of them all)
Soul Forger Moradin (arranger of the Great Wheel, bigwig of Upper Planes)
Sun Father Pelor (creator of mortals, king of Material Plane)
Lord of Lords Gruumsh (player of the long game)
Glorious King Corellon (sparkly manbaby)

Miscellaneous Descendants of Overmothers:
Araushnee aka Lolth, Goddess of Shadows and Schemes
Auril, Fey Goddess of Winter
Berronar aka Yondalla, Mother Goddess of Family and Badassery (and Halflings)
Clangeddin, Manly God of LG War (Moradin’s little helper)
Duerra, Axe Princess of Conquest (of Duergar)
Eilistraee, Goddess of Grace and War and Crafts
Laduguer, Hard God of Hardassery and Hardwork and Uncompromise and Hard Men Making Hard Decisions
Vhaeraun, God of Romance and Rebellion
Waukeen, Goddess of Capitalism

Children of Pelor: (bigwigs of Material Plane)
Silvanus, God of Ecoterrorism aka Chauntea, Goddess of Family and Agriculture
Olidammara, Tricksy God of Rogues and Roads and Civilization
Umberlee, good ol’ Bitch Queen

Seldarine of Corellon: (allied against all others, for a given value of allied)
Aerdrie, Goddess of Rain and Summer
Angharradh, Tripartite Goddess of Indulging In Corellon’s Wacky Fetishes
Fenmarel, Curmudgeon God of Aloofness and Antisociality
Hanali, Goddess of Satisfying Corellon’s Lust For Sune Without Giving Her More Influence
Rillifane, Protective God of Treehugging
Sashelas, Tailchasing God of Seas and Diplomacy
Sehanine, Goddess of Autumn and Dreams and Night Sky
Solonor, God of Hunting and Survival
Erevan, Trickster God of Tricks (it’s either him or Brandobaris and Brando is cooler)
Labelas, Stuffy God of History and Education (not in, Boccob/Oghma is superior)

Orcish Pantheon: (ostracized and disliked)
Baghtru, Strong God of Stupidity
Ilneval, Envious God of Strategy
Luthic, Goddess of All The Girly Stuff
Shargaas, God of Darkness and Assassination
Yurtrus, Orc Nerull

Independent Deities: (native powers of Material Plane)
Nerull, Dread God of Death and Fear
Sune, Conniving Goddess of Lust and Beauty
Lathander, Cool and Hip Sun God for Cool and Hip Young Mortals (something something Amaunator, something something Sune)
Loviatar, Goddess of Weakness and Bravery
Thaun, The Dark Night
Aoskar, Uncle Ben of Planescape
Bane, God of Tyranny
Myrkul, Discount Nerull
Bhaal, God of Murder (Terrible Trio Rides Again)
Raven Queen, Goddess of Fate
Velsharoon, God of Dead and Undead
Wee Jas, Goddess of Necromancy
Erythnul, God of Slaughter without Laughter (Aaand Crashes Again)

Random Spawn Of Tharizdun That Nobody Knows Is Of Tharizdun:
Annam, Lovestruck Giantdad
Othea, Goddess of surprisebitch.gif (where else would manifestations of primal matter come from)
Moander, Deity of Rot and Decay (he ded)
Ghaundaur, Deity of Oozes and Filth (something always seeps through)

Godspawn of Tiamat: (not all the disgusting nightmare beasts are evil)
Pisaethces of Aboleths
Ilsensine of Illithids
Great Mother of Beholders
Sekolah of Sahuagin
Pastafar of Flumphs [this needs to exist but without a goofy name]
Blipdoolpoolp of Kuo-toa
Psilofyr of Myconids
Shekinester of Nagas
Merrshaulk of Yuan-ti
Jazirian of Couatls
Nameless Emperor of Grells [this doesn’t actually exist]
Panzuriel of Krakens [closest match]
Eadro of Locathah

Giantish Pantheon:
Diancastra, Trickster Goddess of Arrogance and Tailchasing
Grolantor, God of Willful Stupidity
Hiatea, Taller and Weaker Chauntea
Iallanis, Taller and Nicer Sune
Karontor, God of Selfhate and Deformity
Memnor, God of Pride and Smarts
Skoraeus, God of Knowledge and Isolationism
Stronmaus, Tailchasing God of Sun and Sky and Joy
Vaprak, Bastard God of Ogres

Remaining Morndinsamman: (not a thing as a whole, listed for cherrypicking purposes)
Abbathor, Envious God of Greed (he might be in)
Dugmaren, Brainy God of Scholarship and Invention (Boccob/Oghma says no)
Dumathoin, Random Assortment God of Mining and Earth and Exploration and Secrets (needs work but maybe can make it)
Gorm, A Little Short To Be Helm (nope)
Haela, Goddess of War Loving (!?!) (might be in as cheerful psycho goddess, except wtf was Moradin smoking?)
Marthammor, God of Travel (Olidammara+Fharlanghn+Shaundakul=nope)
Muamman, God of Visitors and Lightning (??) (might be in)
Sharindlar, Discount Sune (no)
Vergadain, Trickster God of Luck (far too many tricksters, just like manly war gods; gotta do something about that)

Hobbit Deities: (also listed for cherrypicking)
Arvoreen, A Little Too Short To Be A War God (he’s in)
Cyrrollalee, Goddess of Hospitality and Friendship (probably nope for ****ty name alone)
Brandobaris, Trickster God of Awesomeness (he’s totally in)
Sheela, Random Assortment Goddess of Nature and Agriculture and Song and Love (Berronar doesn’t need a copycat)
Urogalan, Kindest God of Death and Earth (chances are low but not nope)

Huge list of deities from internet to be cherrypicked:
Kiaransalee, Goddess of Undead and Vengeance (gotta be a “fallen” Seldarine somehow)
Selvetarm, God of Being Lolth’s Boytoy (same as Ki)
Zinzerena, Goddess of Illusion and Assassins (same as Ki)
Amaunator, Old School Sun God (gotta tie into Lathander somehow)
Asmodeus, God of Sin (go home Asmo, you're drunk)
Avandra, Goddess of Roads and Halflings (Yondalla says nope)
Azuth, God of Magicians (seems lame but might make it)
Bahamut, God of Dragonborn (dragonborn gotta gtfo and stay gtfo)
Beshaba, Twin Goddess of Bad Luck (like her, she should be in)
Boccob, Snobby God of Knowledge and Magic (a staple)
Celestian, God of Astronomy and Travel (distinctive from other travel guys so has chance)
Deneir, God of Being Oghma’s Secretary (uhh)
Ehlonna, Bleeding Heart Silvanus (unnecessary)
Eldath, Peaceful Goddess of Waters (pretty cool actually)
Erathis, Lawful Goddess of Civilization and Buddying to Pelor (might make the cut)
Fharlanghn, Just Another Shaundakul (travel domain isn’t big enough for the lot of y’all)
Garagos, Just Another Savage War God (Gruumsh fodder)
Gond, God of Invention and Machinery (could serve Moradin)
Heironeous, Just Another Knight God (can’t have enough enemy twins)
Helm, Stupider Named Heironeous (nope)
Hextor, Better Named Bane (in but needs to differ from Bane)
Ilmater, Basically Jesus (so nope)
Incabulos, Hateful God of Bad Things (boring)
Ioun, Goddess of Knowledge and Skill (Boccob+Oghma=not likely)
Istus, Superfluous Tripartite Goddess of Fate (don’t need two triunes)
Iyachtu Xvim, Official Bane Knockoff (nnnope)
Joramy, Discount Shiva with Fire Motif (lame but may serve a purpose)
Kord, Discount Crom (not with Tempus)
Leira, Tricksy Goddess of Illusion and Deception (another one?)
Lendor, God of Tedium and Time (like the concept)
Lirr, Goddess of Literature and Fiction (also sounds good)
Lliira, Goddess of Joy (might work)
Malar, God of Savagery (more Gruumsh fodder)
Mask, Worst Named God in the History of Badly Named Gods (nope just for the **** name)
Melora, Just Another Nature Goddess (lame)
Mielikki, Yet Another Nature Goddess (laaaame)
Milil, Official Discount Bragi (nope)
Mystra, Goddess of Magic and Revolving Doors
Obad-Hai, Reincarnating God of Spring
Oghma, Another Boccob (should put these two in a deathmatch cage to see which survives)
Procan, Uncaring God of Sea (Tiamat says no)
Ralishaz, Genderbent Beshaba (no need)
Sharess, Literally Bast (mmmmayybe)
Shaundakul, Just Another Fharlanghn (don’t really like any of these guys)
St Cuthbert, Just Another Knight God (more fodder for Godfather)
Talona, Goddess of Poison and Disease (Loviatar did it first)
Talos, Just Another Storm God (obvious Gruumsh plant is obvious)
Tempus, Just Another War God (not with Kord)
Torm, Again with the Knight God
Torog, God of Underdark and Torture (might be in)
Trithereon, God of **** Yeah Murrica! (no)
Tymora, Twin Goddess of Good Luck (in with her twin)
Tyr, You Again? (nope)
Ulaa, Boringer female Dumathoin (boooooring)
Wastri, God of Amphibians and Human Supremacy (!?!?) (want him in just for the weird)
Zarus, God of Human Racism (kinda already folded into Pelor)
Zehir, God of Darkness and Poison (no likey)
Zuoken, Ascended Bruce Lee (unlikely but not impossible)
Vecna, Supervillain
Iuz, Supervillain
Cyric, Megavillain (these three stooges could’ve been a nice Dread Three replacement instead of the usual suspects except they’re cooler than this lot)

No Company of Seven*?

*the pantheon of demigods that includes Zagyg (the god of eccentric geniuses, humor, and ill-conceived urban renewal plans such as building houses out of elemental fire instead of earth) and Murlynd (the god of technology and of Paladins who are the character from Have Gun, Will Travel), among others

Pronounceable
2016-10-22, 10:50 AM
And now some light entertainment.

BRANDOBARIS (lesser god), Irrepresible Scamp, Master of Misadventure, King of Pranks, Luckiest Rapscallion
Domains: chaos, trickery, stealth, luck, adventurers

In its long and efficient history, the great Mechanus only had one single malfunction. Due to a preposteriously small rounding error, there’d been a very slight systemic flaw from the start and it built up to the fabled Malfunction of Mechanus that caused untold bafflement and much hard work for the modrons. The Malfunction was just a single mortal soul getting stuck inside instead of being sent to his proper outer plane. There has never been any other problems or issues with the running of Mechanus before or since, distribution of dead mortal souls to outer planes in a balanced manner continues unabated and Ethereal Plane hasn't had any dangerous buildup of ghosts heavy enough to break down planar barriers ever since it came online, but that single error's existence was Serious Business. Primus the Prime Modron ordered the offending soul to be investigated, just in case there was something special with it that triggered the mishap. At first there wasn’t, it was a perfectly ordinary halfling soul by the name of Brandobaris who’d lived and died a mostly uneventful life and probably would’ve gone on to have a mostly uneventful eternity in Bytopia. But as the modrons were ordered to observe and investigate him and his mortal life, they came to the conclusion that there had to be something special about him that they somehow couldn’t detect, otherwise why would this one soul out of trillions to pass through Mechanus get special treatment? Brandobaris had to have caused the Malfunction in a way that no modron measurement could detect. This was belief (to the best of modrons’ ability) and, modron hivemind being what it is, it was the greatest surge of belief in a thing in the history of ever.

So, Brandobaris ascended to godhood. It was an undeniable case of observation affecting the observee, it was all very quantum.

He was pretty confused about the strange clockwork creatures but, being a helpful guy, he offered to help them with their machine. He used to tinker with things as a hobby when alive and liked to think himself with some aptitude for machinery. Of course, an amateur interest grandfather clocks and water pumps didn’t really help with intricacies of the great Mechanus, but Brandobaris still offered some advice to show willing. Modrons wrote down everything he said (and would calculate effects of each later on to be certain) but it was clear doing anything he suggested would range from useless to catastrophic. As there’s no such thing as deceit or miscommunication on Nirvana, modrons knew he meant everything he said and his intentions were wholly helpful. Ignorance or incompetence being completely alien concepts to modrons, they concluded this ability to genuinely believe that things would do something despite the fact that they won’t is chaos and therefore Brandobaris was a god of chaos. Which had to be the cause of the Malfunction, Mechanus had accidentally sucked in a chaotic deity from Ethereal Plane instead of a mortal soul. This sent the modron race on a centuries long calibration spree to make certain such things can’t happen again. Brandobaris was unceremoniously thrown out on Primus’ order.

This was the first in a long, loooooong list of misadventures the newly minted god of trickery and chaos would go on to have. The stories of Brandobaris’ misadventures are too many to count, containing such episodes as the time he made off with Lord Asmodeus’ pocket watch, the time he got barred from Moradin’s court for sneaking into his closet to wear his pants, his failed attempt at trying to steal the cloak off of Thaun’s back as she fought Bane, his brief imprisonment by and romance with the Frostmaiden, the time he barely survived Hextor’s wrath for his unwitting seducing of Beshaba by triggering Heironeous’ resurgence, the ill advised and embarrassing attempt at stealing the magnificent hat of the Demon Princess of Fungi (what hat?!?), the time he tricked Baghtru (no great feat admittedly) to agree to teach Arvoreen to be a better warrior so he could impress Eilistraee (kickstarting their famous romance), the gripping tale of his escape from Demonwebs of Lolth, the time he snuck into Myrkul’s castle and traded erotically shaped chocolate for the imprisoned halfling souls* and whatever other ridiculous stories DM cares to think of. Brandobaris is good natured and always gets off of any and all troubles, he likes getting into it as much as getting away with it and takes special care to never seriously harm anyone (even evil exemplars of lower planes or submarine abominations of Water).

Brandobaris doesn’t have official worshippers or clergy, he’s usually too busy having adventures. But he’s well known to listen when tales of his exploits are told and more than a few adventurers got unexpected divine help when they prayed to him in desperation (assuming they were on the sort of rousing or amusing adventure that’d make a fun story). He wants you to stop talking about it and just do it, make your dreams come true. Brandobaris likes to grant his blessing to many mortals who’re about to do something foolhardy just for the thrill of it and he likes playing deus ex machina for especially tricksy folks when they’re in over their head. He’s a patron of rogues who’re in it for excitement and artists whose aim is to amuse and thrill. He dislikes greed, order and harming sentient beings and will sometimes hinder evil and/or greedy adventurers and servants of malicious deities. Occasionally Brandobaris goes so far as to take a mortal guise and join ventures that promise to be fun or especially humiliating to the sort of beings he dislikes.

He’s known to have the occasional dalliance with exciting mortals and various goddesses (Tymora is one of his closer allies with many benefits, Sune throws herself on him at every chance she gets, Diancastra would be chasing him all over the planes if she wasn’t imprisoned in Jotunheim, Auril’s still sore about getting played and been trying in vain to reconnect with him so she can be the one who dumps this time, even Lolth tries to trick the trickster by disguising herself as a mortal woman to seduce him [to conclusively determine the better trickster she'd claim, not that anyone can prove she's been doing it]) but unlike most trickster deities, Brandobaris lusts only for more adventures. He’s pretty friendly with most deities of good and chaos, even primordial daddies think he’s all right (for a souped up mortal). On the rare occasions Brandobaris needs help, his bro Arvie (who hates that name) and Eilie (who also hates that name) usually got his back. One thing he doesn’t realize is the lengths Yondalla goes behind the scenes to make certain nothing truly bad will happen to his favorite son (every halfling is her child but modrons were right, there is something special about him, even if it was just a self actualizing quantum prophecy thing). She’s had to seal a lot of secret deals and send Arvoreen to bash the occasional head to prevent many a revenge scheme from harming Brando. Very few beings are aware of the extent of Yondalla's protectiveness over him, most everyone else think he’s just lucky (which is true from a certain point of view).

Modrons still believe he’s a god of chaos, so despite not having many mortal worshippers or a church, Brandobaris gets by. He’s also surprisingly popular among goblinoids (a very rare occurance for any deity of humanoid origins), Arborean eladrins and Beastlander guardinals (who rarely give time of the day to anyone except Moradin).


*totally canon from totally canonic sources



My boy Brando is here to bring some levity to the heavy drama of the likes of Kiaransalee and Erathis. It's best to come up with even more ridiculous misadventures for him for any game, they don't even have to be true.

Bohandas
2016-10-22, 11:10 AM
The reason I want to do the one domain:one god thing is because I like the idea of a cleric's deity defining what they're like as a cleric

It would be better to reinstate 2e's spheres of clerical magic (basically there wasn't one cleric spell list, there were a bunch of miniature spell lists and each god had access to several but not all of them

Beneath
2016-10-22, 02:50 PM
This is a good Brandobaris. I like how his main worshipper base is Modrons who don't so much worship him as assume he must be a chaos god (plus borrowed power from Yondalla). So Arvoreen trained under the orcs but he's not a proper War God in this cosmos's sense of the term? and Mechanus was built as a release valve to prevent another Nerull or Sune?


It would be better to reinstate 2e's spheres of clerical magic (basically there wasn't one cleric spell list, there were a bunch of miniature spell lists and each god had access to several but not all of them

Didn't 2e also, like, suggest messing with the weapon restrictions clerics of different gods had? and I vaguely recall the "priests of specific mythoi" section of the PHB suggesting that some of them trade their undead turning for other abilities.

Dividing the entire cleric spell list into spheres and then assigning different gods different selections of spheres, weapon and armor proficiencies, etc sounds almost like writing up a whole new class for each god. Which, like, I guess would be ideal for the deities who send people totally devoted to them on adventures, but honestly the others might as well limit themselves to a feat or three for what they give adventurers (their miracle workers would be different)

Pronounceable
2016-10-22, 04:48 PM
This is a good Brandobaris. I like how his main worshipper base is Modrons who don't so much worship him as assume he must be a chaos god (plus borrowed power from Yondalla). So Arvoreen trained under the orcs but he's not a proper War God in this cosmos's sense of the term? and Mechanus was built as a release valve to prevent another Nerull or Sune?
I thought it'd be amusing to have modrons create a god of chaos and trickery. And you also have a part in this latest writeup, since I thought I should answer your questions about Arvey (he really hates that name) and Mechanus but with posting another deity instead of giving simple answers, as I'd posted too much without new deities. I was gonna write Arvey first but then went for Brando instead cos he's cooler and I had new ideas.

Which doesn't actually answer the question, so the plan didn't work. Anyway here's the answer: Arvoreen is another ascended mortal, powerful famous fighter dude who died defending the weak and got demigodded as patron of protectors of the weak (stuffing this bit into Brando's writeup would've been too random). Brando looks out for his fellow exhalfling almost as much as he looks out for Brando (such as getting him a good personal trainer or setting him up with this hot girl he knew). Tho still a proper manly (by halfling standards) war god (like Bane).
And no, Mechanus enabled the Material deities by ending ancestoral worship but as side effect. It stops mortal ghosts massing in Ethereal, aka the Luminous Teardrop, tethering the planes to Overmother's Glittering Eye (Positive), until it breaks. Without Moradin's expertise, Pelor's little vanity project would've dropped the multiverse into Allmother's Gaping Maw (Negative).
So the multiverse would look like a wheel suspended inside a shiny tear hanging down from a silver woman's eye above a gaping woman's mouth with black lipstick and sharp teeth if anybody could actually look at it from outside. Which is a pretty image I feel. More secret and offtopic cosmology claptrap: Selune is holding the planes, they won't fall, the eye and maw image is just an abstraction of Shar's explosion. The Luminous Teardrop is actually for protecting elemental souls; every elemental, giant, titan, fey, genie and assorted critters and deities would go psychonuts if anything happened to it due to being tiny pieces of Tharizdun.

Dividing the entire cleric spell list into spheres and then assigning different gods different selections of spheres, weapon and armor proficiencies, etc sounds almost like writing up a whole new class for each god...(their miracle workers would be different)
In that case, spheres would be lists of miracle workers, clerics still restricted to more martial deities. It'd be a lot of work however and probably not worth the effort for many 5e DMs.

Pronounceable
2016-10-26, 03:56 PM
Here, have another god.


TALOS (greater god), the Destroyer, Stormlord, Lord of Fury, Cloudrider, Eye of the Storm, Son of the Bitch
Domains: anger, storms, destruction, strength, children, slavery

Umberlee is generally considered to be the least suitable being for motherhood and nobody would agree more readily than Talos the Destroyer. Despite his continued attempts, Stormlord has never managed to sever the umbilical cord that still ties him to the Bitch Queen, even losing one of his eyes permanently in a particularly ill advised attempt. And since he’s obviously still a little baby who can’t even break free, mommy is keeping an eye on him and can manifest at any moment to metaphorically make him eat his veggies. Umberlee is pretty disappointed in his son’s inability to grow up and become the manliest man among the manly men like she wanted, but she’s hopeful. It’s gonna happen any day now, he’s just a late bloomer and shouldn’t listen to those mean bullies. Talos, for his part, knows he’s already grown up into a massively powerful, fearsome and vengeful greater god of destruction and could probably kick any renowned war god right in the ass, but all his gaining of power and influence only served to strengthen the cord, which is an incarnation of the Bitch Queen’s smothering love for him (also she’d probably manifest during battle and destroy his enemy for him, which would be far worse than any beating he could take).

Everyone else except Pelor finds this amusing but he can’t bring himself to disabuse his poor mad daughter from her delusions, even to save his grandson. So Talos has to live bound in slavery, sinking the occasional ship or creating typoons and tsunamis here and there when ordered, made worse by the fact that his slavedriver doesn’t even realize his enslavement. In frustration, Talos has turned to extreme measures, ordering his worshippers to become murderous and stepped up on creating disasters, causing thousands of mortals to die. This has created a lot of enmity but nobody has dared to attack yet for fear of Umberlee. Talos thinks if he can kill enough mortals, he can lay claim to domain of death, hopefully goading Nerull into killing him as he’s killed every other deity who tried to get a foothold on death. Talos figures if dying worked out for his twin cousins, it might work out for him too and even if he stays dead, it’s better than this. Umberlee just thinks he’s being a cutie and imitating mommy, so she’s been increasing her own efforts at disasters and destruction all over Material to be a better role model. Thus, seas continue to kill mortals at extremely inflated rates on most worlds.

Clerics of Talos are an angry bunch, befitting the Lord of Fury. All of his clergy are expected to be good warriors and also experts at navigation and astronomy to interpret his will. Promotion in the clergy comes from both fighting prowess and ability to interpret signs and portents in the waves and clouds, nobody can advance far without being good at both. All of Talos’ worshippers are passionate and aggressive people, the mild and the meek are looked down upon. They’re also commanded to be promiscious and increase their numbers for glory of the Stormlord, Talos teaches that children are the greatest treasure that can be gathered in his service, for it’s the children of the faithful who’ll conquer the world in the name of Talos in the future. It’s very hard to find a female Talassan who isn’t pregnant or nursing newborns or a male one who isn’t training a few of his kids in ways of Talos (possibly compensating for the fact that Talos has never got to meet any ladies due to his mother always breathing down his neck). This causes women to rarely rise to prominent positions in Talos clergy, as pregnancy or multiple births take their toll on their ability to beat men in duels, which isn’t something he’d want anyway. Another thing Talos clergy is big on is slavery; it’s right and proper for the weak to serve the strong and the tedious requirements of day to day life are a waste of the strength of Talos’ worshippers, so Talassans are well known for being slavers and pirates. However might makes right, so every Talassan is required to allow their slaves to fight for freedom and any slave who can defeat the master in a duel must be freed. Owning numerous slaves is therefore a sign of pride both as a symbol of wealth and a declaration of personal strength. Breeding with slaves is generally frowned upon, since slaves are weak, they’d only dilute the strength of Talassans. Enslaved children however, have potential. If they show signs of strength and are young enough to be molded easily, a child slave might be adopted by a Talos worshipping couple to be raised as a proper Talassan. None of this makes followers of Talos much liked by anybody else.

All in all, Talos is a bad dude who’s trying to vigorously live through his worshippers and nobody likes him. Especially Olidammara, who opposes Talos’ followers for both being a menace to society and as payback for loss of his original domain of air, which Umberlee tore off him and devoured to mutate into storm and give birth Talos (as long time resident of Water, she thinks the humanoid way of reproduction is lame and unimaginative). Thanks to Olidammara’s influence over most civilized lands on Material, simply being a Talassan is frequently a capital offense, which further drives them into piracy and banditry. Talos also orders his worshippers to ruin the day of any Umberlee worshippers they come across, any Umberlant is to be killed and their holy places destroyed. Umberlee doesn’t mind this, it’s a good way to purge her own followers of weakness and the bulk of them are deep sea monsters far out of reach of Stormlord anyway.

Praying to Talos only works if you’re an official worshipper but he gives blessings and inspirations freely to his devout followers when they’re in pursuit of his goals of destruction and fury and slavery.


So not all that different a Talos from mortal perspective, but I think the divine bits are neat. It allows the slavery and children stuff and also I couldn't have the cord if Talos was the boss like usual. He's pretty distinct from Bane and Tempus too, which is always a plus.

e:

Mostly, I was asking 'cause of the phrase "burning eye" and my associations for that are Sauron and Nyarlathotep
Hey, I missed this. "Fiery eyes of Pelor" are the holes he drilled from his palace in Fire into Material to look through, which came to be known as suns or stars. Silvanus, Olly and Umberlee have others covered (except Olly wasn't really using air so Umberlee bit it off as has just been unveiled here).

Beneath
2016-10-26, 10:15 PM
I figured that's what you meant, re:fiery eyes.

But, one, burning eyes are a great evil symbol (even if they can also just be the sun) and two, the idea of twisting a sun into an eldritch abomination is awesome and also not without precedent.

I'm thinking I might make the eldritch abominations, like, manifestations of the fact that reality not only doesn't have to be this way, but would prefer not to be (if you view Shar as like, a kind of cosmic consciousness); that from one perspective it's just a dream Shar is having that is being unfortunately stabilized by beings she dreamed up and can't purge herself of.

Pronounceable
2016-10-28, 03:07 PM
And the biting off of the bits continues on.


GARAGOS (lesser deity), Master of All Weapons, the Reaver, Scarlet Stained Ground, Sailor on the Vermillion Sea, Crimson Juggernaught, Besieger of the Reddened Walls
Domains: warriors, battle prowess, tenacity, weaponry

When Gruumsh set his covetous eye upon the Material Plane, he saw the orcs were ripe for picking. They had fought the hardest against the empires of giants, their might and courage costing them the most out of all the humanoid races in the downfall of giantkind, yet their allies were growing complacent and greedy even as they struggled to secure the supremacy of humanoids. The arrogance and hypocrisy their “fellows” wasn’t lost on the orcs and Gruumsh knew to enflame their resentment, slowly convincing them to become the barbaric savages other humanoids saw them as. And since Amaunator had risen up from all the variations and differences of sun worship that occured naturally on all mortal worlds to challenge the Sun Father for his own domain, Pelor couldn’t devote enough of his attention to protecting the orcs from Gruumsh’s hateful influence.

So the constant, centuries long wars against the giants, followed by horrific wars of orcish retribution for real and imagined slights empowered Garagos, he rose to become the greatest god of war multiverse has ever seen. Since he’d managed to secure domains such as war, anger, strength, tenacity, hate, slaughter, bloodlust and victory, Garagos had power rivaling or exceeding any deity of Material Plane. Even Amaunator’s death at the jaws of Pelor’s mythical mad daughter returning from Water didn’t do much to slow down Garagos’ rise, for the conflict between Gruumsh and Pelor over humanoid worship was enough to continue ceaseless warfare across mortal worlds.

By the time Pelor had to concede defeat and let the orcish race belong to Gruumsh as a whole, Garagos was all but unstoppable. His bloodlust was almost as endless as Gruumsh himself and only his worry about Nerull’s power was standing between him and trying to enslave all deities of Material. It was about this time that Gruumsh created a divine family for himself, to show Corellon how it was really done, which included Yurtrus, the orcish god of death. Nerull did not take kindly to this and summarily executed Yurtrus on his first foray into the Material Plane (Gruumsh resurrected him, which didn’t stop Nerull from repeating it). Garagos thought this was a swell idea and he should kill all other gods who claimed dominance over war too. Overconfident and malicious, Garagos decided to target the Master of Mount Clangor, who was an insufferable goody two shoes anyway. Even to this day, he claims he could’ve taken Clangeddin if Moradin hadn’t interfered (in the rare moments he cares to remember blurry his past).

Soul Forger was busy forging when he heard the commotion from Mount Clangor. He went to see what was causing the racket and found some chaotic evil, bloodthirsty idiot from Material had come to challenge his son. This was an ******* who had the same deplorable mentality that kept powering up the cancerous Abyss and endangering the planar balance, and he’d dared to come over to Moradin’s own home to make trouble. Moradin grew furious and struck him down with his forge hammer, shattering the great god of war into a thousand pieces. As he looked upon his handiwork with satisfaction, Moradin noticed a few tiny pieces of Garagos weren’t that bad. Even this bloodthirsty idiot had a few things going for him. So Moradin swept him up and took him back to his forge, reconstructing him without the few good bits he had. He would later use Garagos’ salvageable pieces to craft Haela, demigoddess of berserkers, righteous fury and joy of victory. Garagos himself was sent back home with a stern lecture and cracks showing like a glued up plate, Moradin had left him weakened.

Things only went worse for Garagos from there. Umberlee had her eye on him ever since she’d come back, figuring his temperament and power make him a suitable mate for her. And since she doesn’t subscribe to traditional reproduction methods, Umberlee ambushed and bit Garagos’ lower half off, devouring domains of slaughter and bloodlust, along with a sizable part of his divine power (unfortunately the touch of Moradin didn’t agree with the Bitch Queen and she soon had to excrete it as Erythnul, intermediate god of slaughter, hate, bloodshed and ugliness). This was soon followed by a young and ambitious lesser god invading his divine realm and wresting the domain of war off of Garagos’ diminished form, who went on to become the great war god Tempus. Nerull was next to take a part, figuring such a pathetic deity no longed needed strength. Garagos had to beg Nerull to spare his life and crawled off in disgrace, a mere lesser god of battle prowess and tenacity now, hiding himself in the darkest depths of Pandemonium where nobody could find him.

He stewed alone in the howling tunnels for millenia, marinating himself in anger and hate, killing all that came across him. Eventually the maddening winds of Pandemonium overwhelmed even his will and he shattered along the cracks Moradin had left in him so long ago. He was reborn in darkness, gathering himself up as a new demigod of warriors and weaponry through sheer bloody mindedness. Bits of his ancient religion had survived as small cults of psychokillers and berserkers dotting the Material, a testament to his tenacity, and he swiftly took those over. He was a young and powerful demigod, poised to start over and rise again (even if he wasn’t completely sure what exactly happened to him last time).

And he probably would’ve done it too if he hadn’t went to the Abyss first to gather armies of demons, where he met a goddess so alluring, so supreme of beauty, so incredibly pleasant that he was already fully engulfed in the shadowy Demonweb by the time he noticed the enchantment.

Thus christened Selvetarm, the newborn god of warriors and weapon mastery became the hottest new property of the great goddess Lolth. While being the patron of warriors and battle prowess for Lolthites is tolerable, being the patron of emasculation and henpeckery stings deep. But Selvetarm plays along dutifully and Lolth has been pleased enough with his servile performance to elevate him to lesser deityhood over the years. However he knows she can take it all away in a moment, sinking him to a new depth lower than any before. His only consolation is that nobody knows who he used to be and how far he’s fallen and is deathly afraid of being sent out to the wider multiverse on Lolth’s order, where one of the older deities might recognize him. He dreams of the day the drips of power from his few mortal cults that Lolth doesn’t know about give him enough power to break free of Demonweb.


Think I got all synonyms for red. Also, did y'all notice how similar DnD's savage gods of savagery are? Cos I did. Also also, this is what Gruumsh too looks like when you live inside the multiverse and not read DM notes I post. I was gonna stuff Malar in there too...(as Umberlee's other son that she impregranted him with)
But this seems humiliating enough. You can add the white bit if you disagree.
...

I'm thinking I might make the eldritch abominations, like, manifestations of the fact that reality not only doesn't have to be this way, but would prefer not to be (if you view Shar as like, a kind of cosmic consciousness); that from one perspective it's just a dream Shar is having that is being unfortunately stabilized by beings she dreamed up and can't purge herself of.
Very Secret World. Cool beans.


e: You know what? I count (actually Word did it but whatevs) ninety seven deities here in this thread. 97 (in numbers). I could've sworn I couldn't count 30 DnD gods when I first started this thread. I'm updating the huge list somewhere above, in case you're wondering what sort of monster we're looking at here. Sure, most are barely more than mentions but I know the names of more than 97 gods of DnD (and at least 50 more is either rejected or pending). How the **** did that happen?

Beneath
2016-11-01, 01:23 AM
Why hold back, re:Malar?

I can definitely see adventure seeds for Talos. and reasons for his an Umberlee's clerics to be similar, since every time he does something she's like "awww, that's so cute"

... but no reason why either would wear heavy armor. Seriously, what were they thinking putting that proficiency on the Tempest domain?

Pronounceable
2016-11-04, 04:53 AM
And now, I'm gonna admit I've been pretty hard on Corellon. Sure, he's a douchenozzle but he's not a raging pooplord like someone else...


LUTHIC (intermediate goddess), Cave Mother, Blood Moon Witch, Dweller in the Dark, Mistress of Abuse, Blackclaw
Domains: orc women, slavery, fertility, family, healing, breeding, magic

If there was an Abused Ladies Monthly, Luthic would be the centerfold in every issue. As the patron and role model to all orcs, Gruumsh makes it his business to beat, maim or kill his wife at least once per day. As far as he’s concerned, restraint is for scrubs who can’t reverse the damage they inflict at will. While it might be argued that Gruumsh also makes it his business to beat, maim or kill every other orcish deity for the flimsiest of reasons, he takes a special glee in abusing Luthic. The endless abuse Gruumsh heaps on his family guarantees that they’re always under control, unlike Corellon’s rebellious and disrespectful offspring.

Despite being the ur-example that makes every abusive man in the multiverse go at least I don’t do THAT to my wife/kids, Gruumsh is well liked by the orcish gods who all agree that this is the right and proper way of being a family orc. As Gruumsh commands and as far as orcs are concerned, women are slaves of men and exist mainly to produce more orcs and relieve men’s stress. Correspondingly, Luthic has the most severe case of battered housewife syndrome in the multiverse and prides herself for it, proclaiming to all that her treatment at Gruumsh’s hand is proof of her strength. And she might have a point about that, as Gruumsh is widely recognized as one of the most powerful deities and the amount of battering Luthic can take before she dies proves that she’s got toughness in spades. And unlike the other orcish deities, Gruumsh always restores Luthic immediately, never leaving her maimed or dead for prolonged periods, which is proof of Gruumsh’s love (according to Luthic).

When she’s not being abused, Luthic is usually busy abusing her son Baghtru. The Legbreaker is absolutely terrified of his mother, even more than his father (who doesn’t abuse him more than he abuses any other orcish god) and will always obey her, even over Gruumsh. Of course, Baghtru doing anything against Gruumsh’s will is swiftly and heavily punished by Luthic, even if it was something she ordered him. Orcs see this as the platonic ideal of family and strive to be like their deities, creating an endless loop of abuse that gives the orcish societies their characteristic cruelty. Luthic approves of this, as does Gruumsh.

As the goddess of orcish women and children (and the only one they’re allowed to worship in the pantheon), Luthic has a truly massive and devout worshipper base. The fact that she hasn’t become a greater goddess can only be explained by Gruumsh somehow redirecting the power that should be flowing toward her. While this holds true for other orcish gods as well, the effect is far more pronounced on Luthic, whose worshippers are an order of magnitude more numerous than worshippers of some greater deities. Some learned sages point out that such a unique binding of divine power is far too complicated for a god as barbaric and base as Gruumsh and suspect there’s more to Luthic than is apparent. (they’re wrong)

However Luthic does have power over magic and especially healing, as orc women are usually in need of plenty of healing for all the abuse and breeding. The only orc women who’re allowed to not be slaves of men are the priestesses of Blood Moon Witch, the healers and wiseorcs that keep the orcish race alive despite all their wars. While these priestesses’ command of magic includes more than just healing, Luthic makes certain no orc woman ever gets too uppity with those powers and starts thinking about maybe changing things in their society.

While Gruumsh would never admit it, he’s pretty fond of Luthic. She’s perfect, exactly as Gruumsh wants her to be to make him look like the worst guy in the multiverse. It took a lot of work for Gruumsh to get her just right as both a parody and inversion of Corellon’s wife Araushnee. Where Araushnee was gracious and charming, Luthic is pathetic and tough. Where Araushnee was a willful (and eventually rebellious) equal, Luthic is an obedient slave. And most importantly, Luthic loves abusive Gruumsh far more than Araushnee has ever loved romantic Corellon. This most important fact will probably stomp hardest on Corellon’s manful pride on the day of reckoning. Gruumsh can hardly wait.
(Of course, someone (if anyone knew) could say creating poor Luthic like this just so she can be a prop for his masterplan called **** everything Corellon holds dear is a **** move, not to mention everything that has happened to orc race. But that’s wrong, for Gruumsh would say the actual **** move is banging Corellon’s precious darling daughter, bonus points for managing that under the guise of a relationship healthier and more romantic than any Corellon has ever had. Or arguably it’s that hot new stud that his ex-wife "captured" that’s the actual actual **** move.
The masterplan is named rather literally and Gruumsh spends a lot of time and effort on it.)


Gruumsh isn't really a misunderstood guy, despite being really misunderstood. I find that to be funny. Also forum gave me a lot of asterisks today but I'd say that's to be expected when you're dealing with a ****.

vv Mentioned in passing up in Brando. Gruumsh pops up even more than Othea.

Beneath
2016-11-04, 02:01 PM
I was with the Luthic story right up until the "precious darling daughter" part. What happened/will happen there?

Also, this side of the gods is making me really respect the Athar point of view (more than I already did 'cause like D&D gods suck already). Maybe overthrowing them would be better for everyone.

Pronounceable
2016-11-15, 02:15 PM
The well has ran mostly dry. I'm now having real trouble finding new places to stick gods into. While this has happened before, it was when deities were a lot more standalone. Intertwining them let us come this far but I've discovered an awful truth: the more stuff you make up, the more your own stuff constrains you. At this point, I've filled up a whole multiverse with literally dozens of deities in this thread and can't see many openings for more refluffings. At least not without attempting to flesh out the previous mentions left vague on purpose and I can't think new grounds to cover with longer posts about the likes of Sehanine or Tempus.

That is not to say I can't find inspiration in strange places anymore.


ABBATHOR (intermediate god), Trove Lord, Great Master of Greed, the Unearther, Glittergreed, Treasure Turtle
Domains: greed, thievery, malice, chaos, disgust

Abbathor is the creepy old man of the multiverse. Not only is he dour, whiny, rude and arrogant when encountered, he also has a perverted obsession with wealth. He’s irredeemably evil and horrifyingly malicious but it’s the disturbingly lusty manner with which he constantly (and apparently involuntarily) touches and caresses the massive bag he always carries over his shoulder that first created and still reinforces the creepy old man image. The object of his creepy obsession is the container of the Trove, the mind bogglingly massive wealth Abbathor has accumulated since the dawn of time. What most beings don’t realize is that the Unearther doesn’t actually like the stolen goods inside his bag, it’s the memories of their acquisitions that he treasures. Abbathor has stolen every single bit of his legendary trove, whether through regular thievery, divine skill or magical ability and remembers each one clearly. The more damage and misery his robbery has caused, the more Glittergreed relishes it. A dirt cheap medicine whose sudden disappearance led to the death of a sick child is a million times more precious to Abbathor than a giant statue made of solid gold taken from a king’s palace. Luckily for most, he doesn’t specifically look for opportunities to maximize the pain and misery he causes, he just steals whatever catches his fancy.

For all his evil (and creep), Trove Lord insists that he never harmed anyone and would have had a pathological aversion to violence if deities had pathologies. In fact, Abbathor is famous for the many beatings he took when caught stealing. Whenever he’s caught before he finishes a robbery (which is an incredibly rare event due to his immense skill), he just freezes, becoming unable to do anything except hunker down and wait for whatever punishment his discoverer sees fit to unleash on him, even when it's mere mortals. He sometimes offers to give up one piece of treasure from his bag if he gets beaten long enough, but only if his attacker is the actual owner of whatever he wanted to steal and not a guard, neighbor, family member or random passerby. The very few scholars interested in Abbathor speculate this is a twisted remnant from his lawful and good origins from the forge of the Emperor of Artifice. Whatever the case, Treasure Turtle seems to lose all of his godly power and skill if discovered during a thievery and can’t do anything without either his captor explicitly giving him permission to leave or he’s left alone and unobserved (at which point he disappears). The reason for this exceedingly fey behavior from an unimaginably ancient deity is one of the most unknown bits of mythological lore, mostly due to the fact that Abbathor is a skilled enough thief to steal memories if he wants to (he writes those on a hidden book inside the Trove).

The primordial Abbathor that Moradin created to help him bring order to the planes after Overmothers’ battle was a god of curiosity and passion. Old Abbathor was an explorer, a traveller and a scout crafted to discover the planes, and it was him who suggested them arranged in a spinning circle for sustainable balance, making him the original inventor of the Wheel. His brother Laduguer hadn’t liked that however, he wanted the planes stacked with law and good at top and chaos and evil at bottom, to use the weight of other planes to push Abyss down into the Yawning Void below. Moradin, who only wanted to stop the cancerous growth of Abyss instead of destroying it, went with Abbathor’s idea. Once the Great Wheel of Planes was established, it became clear that Abyss was still threatening to spill into other planes as Laduguer warned, so Moradin asked Laduguer to start gathering and training armies from denizens of Upper Planes to combat it. Instead, he rebelled. Laduguer had decided that his father was short sighted and lacked the will to do what really needed to be done to fight evil and chaos (the staggering number of good and lawful beings that have been corrupted or seduced by evil since then seemingly proves Laduguer right). Lacking his father’s power of universal creation, Laduguer waited until Moradin left to stuff his dumber brothers into Carceri to prevent their pointless brawling from breaking the Wheel and stole the original Soul Forge. He then poured his own essence into crafting the greatest weapon multiverse had yet seen. And while giving the Ruby Rod to devils did eventually lead to creation of the greatest and most successful enemy of Abyss, the newly crowned Dominus Infernus didn’t waste any time in imprisoning the severely weakened god of determination and ruthlessness. Upon seeing how far his brother had fallen in the name of good and law, Abbathor decided that selflessness, determination and devotion were for fools and abandoned the celestial armies being gathered in Moradin’s name, snuck into Inferno and restole the Soul Forge, then tried to reforge himself in the hidden depths of Pandemonium. Unfortunately, he wasn’t a very good smith and, thanks to the maddening influence of Pandemonium, the twisted result was far from the cool and hip trickster god he had in mind. He fled in shame and disappeared, concentrating all of his power to becoming invisible to other deities.

Today even his long freed brother can’t stand Abbathor for long. The uncountable ages he’s spent as an evil thief has warped him, surrounding him with an unholy aura of malicious repulsiveness and he’s almost as insufferable a being as Erythnul. Moradin has barred him from his court and nowhere else is welcoming for a god as strangely vulnerable as Abbathor. Not that he cares, his sack is the only company he needs.

As a god of greed, he’s utterly loath to answer any prayers and the chances of getting any answers from him is almost none. As a god of thievery, he doesn’t want worship or belief either, anything given freely and willingly disgusts him. But he does love stealing, which includes divine powers of other deities, so it’s not at all unusual for Abbathor to steal small bits of divine power and use such stolen divinity to empower and induct mortals they wouldn’t want into their flocks. More than one deity has found themselves devoutly worshipped by beings they wouldn’t ever want anywhere near their faith, occasionally converted from among the believers of their bitterest enemies. Many divine spats have happened due to Abbathor’s mischief and all wrongfully ordained clerics inevitably met bad ends. When he’s not busy sowing discord among the divine whelps infesting his multiverse, Abbathor increases his Trove at the expense of puny mortals.

Nobody likes Abbathor and Abbathor likes nobody.
http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/goldenaxe/images/d/d4/Thief_sprite.gif/revision/latest?cb=20150321110657


Abbathor is a ridiculous god. DnD canon is just dumb sometimes. I daresay this is better (as in even dumber).

hamishspence
2016-11-15, 03:41 PM
I must admit that last Spoiler got a big chuckle out of me.

Beneath
2016-11-15, 05:15 PM
Does that mean you're calling this project complete-ish here?

I guess that's enough deities covered for a good-sized world. Certainly more, counting all mentioned ones, than were in the 3e PHB.

Fri
2016-11-15, 09:57 PM
Ha ha.

That spoiler is unexpected, but worth it.

Pronounceable
2016-11-20, 05:10 AM
^^ I have some more ideas left but they're either pretty lame or don't have fresh divine material. I feel like a darned comic book writer now, getting a bunch of ideas with existing characters and it basically amounts to mashing up my toys against each other while making funny noises. Which should be done by the DMs I gave these toys to, not me in this thread.

Lendor is the primordial god of time and prophecy and boredom and he's fittingly boring. The story of Bhaal's attempt to destroy Erythnul for his buddy Tempus has no new characters in it. Listing the exact fathers of titan gods would be treading water. The other few ideas I got that's better than these examples also rehash a lot of old material. I try to come up with new stuff but, since there's so much previous stuff, the new stuff has no course but to become related to old stuff (like Lathander, who simply needs to tie into Pelor vs Sune we got going on Material).

While I'm not gonna say we're done, we're more or less done. I still have ideas and might post more deities (such as Eldath), but this thread has now officially entered overtime.

Pronounceable
2016-11-22, 04:51 PM
Every time I complain about running out of ideas, I notice a few holes that can be filled. It's like magic.


OBAD-HAI (demigod), Triune Prince, Lord of Depths and Darkness, Hruggek the Decapitator, Shalm’s Player, Three Face, King of Life and Death, False Idol
Domains: cycles, seasons, change, goblinoids, nature, death, birth

Feywild is the birthplace of many strange creatures but none of them are as odd as the goblinoids. In fact, they’re so unlike all the other fey, most mortals don’t even realize their true nature, thinking them just one of the many wild and/or nasty species of Material Plane that worships evil deities like orcs, gnolls or ogres. But just like all fey beings, goblinoids are immortals of Feywild nursing an obsessive fascination with something of mortals: death, and birth to a lesser extent. They enjoy getting killed as much as they enjoy killing, and they’ve found that antagonizing mortals like other savage species is the best way of getting what they like. Unlike other fey beings, goblinoids aren’t reborn in Feywild when they’re killed, they were banished shortly after Feywild was completed. Instead they live on worlds of Material Plane as a blight upon mortals, happy to kill and die violently and continuously. They can’t be bothered with all that needing sex to reproduce crap either, sex is for those pansy nymphs over in Feywild (and mortals). The soul of a killed goblinoid moves on to a random goblinoid on a random world, impregnating it and coming back to life in a matter of weeks, without any sort of reproductive activities required on the live goblinoids’ part. They are always completely sentient and enjoy being born just as much as they enjoy getting killed (they don’t enjoy either side of pregnancy however and none of them have anything resembling familial feelings). It doesn’t take more than a few days after birth for a goblinoid to complete its physical growth and start looking for ways to kill and die again. It’s the extreme frequency of seeing pregnant goblinoids (usually attacking among the horde with no care for their safety by either themselves or their fellows) that fool mortals into thinking these psychopathic fey are also mortal, though it does baffle people when a lone, imprisoned goblinoid in isolation gets pregnant and gives birth. But learned sages and crafty wizards on numerous worlds have found ways of tracking their spirits and discovered the so called Goblinoid Cycle. Dead goblins impregnate live hobgoblins to come back, souls of killed hobgoblins enter bugbear hosts for rebirth, and bugbears inhabit goblins postmortem in an endless cycle of death and birth. Then they inflict death and destruction upon mortals for fun and games. The only cure to goblinoid blight upon a mortal world is complete genocide, as even a single goblinoid in hiding will live forever and eventually return its vicious race in force. The worst thing about goblinoids is that even this isn't a solution, killing them all off on your world only means you unleashed this plague on another world.

The ruler of all goblinoids is a being just as strange and terrible as his subjects, complete with his own cycle of endless reincarnation. Obad-hai is born at the spring equinox from a goblin, grows into a hobgoblin with plantlike features (thus proving he’s no ordinary goblinoid) and forces its subjects on that world to cease harassing mortals and contemplate the beauty of nature and celebrate the joy of spring with shalm music, then is inevitably killed in a few months by one of his annoyed subjects anxious to go back to killing and dying. Hruggek the Decapitator is a monstrously big bugbear, born on the midsummer day from a hobgoblin on a different world, pushing his followers into a frenzied campaign of bloodshed against everything else and always dies on the frontlines before the winter comes. Lord of Depths and Darkness is a coal black giant goblin with burning eyes, born of a bugbear on the winter solstice to teach his subjects the arts of ambush and assassination, urging them to terrorize and slaughter mortals and each other alike under the cover of darkness and cold, then invariably falls prey to a cunning assassination from one of the fastest learners before spring arrives. No matter which form their lord arrived in, goblinoids of a world are heartened and redouble their efforts at harming mortals in the following years.

It’s unknown how Obad-hai acquired divinity after his banishment at the hands of his archfey siblings, but he and his subjects plagued Material Plane ever since they were kicked out of Feywild for their unacceptably psychopathic (even for fey) behavior. It’s said his sister discovered the secret and followed in his footsteps to ascend as the goddess of winter but that seems unlikely, as Obad-hai isn’t nearly as strong as Queen of Air and Darkness and his occasional attempts to return to Feywild are easily blocked by her or Titania, Lady of Waves and Flames.

Obad-hai is also the only one of his siblings who has anything resembling a regular relationship with Deadbeat Grandfather, which consists of trying to subvert his few worshippers under the guise of a humanoid deity of spring and renewal on the worlds where goblinoids have been completely eradicated. While he rarely succeeds on noticeable scales, he always pushes the mortals that fall under his sway into violence and bloodshed, doing no favors to the image of Silvanus worshippers as savage beasts barely distinguishable from animals. He takes a special delight in urging worshippers of Silvanus to slaughter peaceful followers of Chauntea, causing a lot of headache for “both” as the two churches scramble to fix the relations between their flocks. As with Frostmaiden, Silvanus feels responsible for Triune Prince’s actions and only works to contain his influence instead of imprisoning or destroying him like he easily could.

As the god of goblinoids, pretty much every deity worshipped by humanoids of Material Plane are Obad-hai’s enemies. Like his subjects, he enjoys getting killed and it never really stops him for long. Even Nerull’s numerous attempts to permanently destroy him has never worked, he returns to plague three mortal worlds every year without exception. In fact, getting killed seems to only increase his power. Every year’s Decapitator is stronger and every year’s Lord of Depths and Darkness is sneakier than the previous one, it’s clear for those paying attention that Obad-hai’s divine power is slowly approaching the threshold of a lesser god. This doesn’t cause much concern to other gods because unlike his stronger sister, he has no influence whatsoever outside of Material Plane. There’ll be plenty of time to deal with him before he grows into anything approaching Auril's threat judging by the time it took him to reach this level of power and he has no allies to support him. Though the apparent impossibility of stopping him as a mere demigod has the more insightful (or paranoid) beings worried about what he might grow into as his divinity increases.

Goblinoids never waste any time worshipping Obad-hai, they instead harass mortals so they can get killed and born faster. The small cults he fosters on worlds that lack goblinoids are dangerous but they never amount to much before either exploding in a flurry of small scale death and mayhem or are discovered and quashed by Silvanus or Chauntea (or more rarely Olidammara). Praying to Obad-hai is mostly useless, for he can’t hear from goblinoids not on the world he’s currently plaguing, but he is capable of answering prayers of local goblinoids and does it as much as he's able. The one good thing for mortals that comes out of Obad-hai’s manifestation on a world is that Auril’s much more terrifying attacks never happen to a mortal world dealing with him, she even stops and retreats swiftly if any form of Obad-hai is born on one of her targets. Scholars speculate this is some sort of sibling cooperation but the real reason is simply spite, Auril knows her brother and his flunkies would enjoy getting destroyed by her armies and withdraws to prevent him getting his jollies. She still hates him (and goblinoids) as much as the day he got banished from Feywild and is loath to attack any world that has high goblinoid populations.

When he’s masquerading as a deity for mortals, Obad-hai usually appears to be a self sacrificing revolutionary. He appeals to discontent about status quo and promises change and rebirth, preaches of returning to good old days or moving forwards into a glorious new future, whatever it takes to convince mortals to join his cults. He picks charismatic and unscrupulous patsies to lead his cults while he’s busy manifesting in a goblinoid form, letting such mortals corrupt themselves with worldly power over their fellows. Knowing well how dumb and mad mortals can get with lust and greed, he encourages being wild and indulging in passions. Once ensnared, his cultists are pushed towards more and more extreme measures until they either bring catastrophe upon their world or are (very much more likely) discovered and destroyed themselves. Either result is fine for Obad-hai, death is death.


I really, really, really hate Maglubiyet. It's not just a dumb****ed name like Mask. It's straight up hypocritical and (fictional) racist. If calling the racial deity of a race literally defeat isn't the highest order of fictional prejudice, I dunno what is. DnD always has this racism against ugly critters and we all know to just roll with it, but it's usually less in your face than ****ing Maglubiyet. Redcloak is %101 correct, **** classical DnD. So I said screw this and has been avoiding goblins in this thread until recently.

I've also always wanted there to be important differences between various badguy races to justify their existence as seperate species of DnD, and was planning to have goblinoids be warrior fungal infection (stolen straight out of Warhammer) and orcs the regular mammal humanoid badguy race. And having eliminated gobs for this thread, I went for the next one, hobs. Hobs are cool.

Then I found their god with his unwieldily long name and a hypen (capital offense), so that was also out. Which was leaving me with Hruggek, the only DnD goblinoid deity that didn't suck. But lo and behold: one of Maglubiyet's names is "Lord of Depths and Darkness". It's so incredibly similar to another name, yet there's no "canonical" connection whatsoever (just like the Revenancer). Therefore I decided to make one.

Cue this. Also cue the second tripartite god (now I want a third for completing the triple trifecta). I like this, this is good and cool, one of the best deities on this thread, I don't even need to be told that. It's a pulpy badguy deity for irredeemable badguys. Still being racist towards goblins of course, it wouldn't really be DnD without being fictionally racist to ugly sentient beings and I'm trying to be authentically DnD in this thread. But why drag Obad-hai into this, you ask? It's because death and rebirth is his thing. He fits and is a short name with a hypen, also not goddamn Maglubiyet.

Fri
2016-11-23, 03:59 AM
It's a cool idea and at once a nice subversion of goblinoid oppression and a nice fantasy take of warhammer-style fungal orc infestation.

Beneath
2016-11-26, 06:57 PM
I like these goblins.

So how did their (and Obad-hai's) exile from the Feywild happen?

It does seem kinda weird to rewrite Obad-hai as the goblin god, but I see your reasoning, and the bit about him being mistaken for Sylvanus a lot is good (given that they're the same archetype)

I like my goblins a little more flexible than being fixed into three types (given the sand goblins in Sandstorm, Eberron's weird goblins, Blues from the psi books, and so on), plus I have my own goblin lore (trolls are a kind of overgrown goblin, hobgoblins are half-human, things like that), but getting rid of the three-ness and the specific cycle of goblin rebirth fixes that.

Actually though fitting Blues (or misfitting them, as it were) into this scheme as it is could be interesting. There's obviously a different god putting influence on them, some power not of the feywild here.

Also the idea that goblin reproduction is based on reincarnation of available goblin spirits rather than anything else suggests that there might be magic that the kind of evil wizards who employ goblin minions can use that would let them rapidly breed a single goblin into an army (by attracting goblin spirits), essentially rapidly speeding up the exponential growth of an isolated goblin population at the expense of goblin populations that don't have an evil wizard. This ends up being sort of erfworld-y. Also goblins being, far from the cowards they are in traditional D&D, death-maniacs who are almost as suicidal as they are homicidal (as long as they can make their death interesting) leads to ideas about Warcraft-style goblin sappers.

Pronounceable
2016-11-27, 07:37 AM
So how did their (and Obad-hai's) exile from the Feywild happen?
I dunno. Didn't seem very important. Probably Auril, Titania and Oberon (and any other archfey you wanna invent) didn't like goblinoids killing their subjects so much.

Also, back when I wanted WH40K orks as my goblinoid specie, trolls were gonna be their next category up after outgrowing bugbearhood. So you're on to something there. Maybe I should have a tinfoil hat to protect my brain from you...
Also also, the evil wizard idea is great.

Blues
While I don't actually know anything about blue goblins, I'm gonna assume they're the psionic variant. For our thread here, that'd mean Tiamat's godspawn. So you're looking mainly at Pisaethces or Ilsensine. Both can work. Aboleths and their firstborn godspawn are absolute masters of the mind, practicising from even before Abbathor-Laduguer were a thing, and aboleths are also a limited supply of reincarnating souls. Whereas Ilsensine's been looking to increase its power and influence ever since Duerra/duergar started pwning its tentacles and is also big on mad science and experiments. Alternately, Demogorgon; psionic fey are the exact sort of weird thing powers that be pay him to create, but their patron would've been whoever paid for their creation.

Speaking of Tiamat,


ELDATH (intermediate goddess), Goddess of Singing Waters, Lady Serenity, Queen of the Lake, Mother Guardian in the Night, Riversinger, Princess of Dreams, Sleeping Beauty
Domains: peace, quiet, sleep, dreams, lakes, rivers, protection

Eldath is one of the sweetest and most peaceful goddesses around, beloved by mortals and deities alike, and Pelor’s enduring hatred and endless oppression of her and her followers is always baffling in its complete dissonance from the regular image he works so hard to cultivate. Everyone chalks that up to his anger at being outed for his indiscretion, as it’s extremely obvious to all who beheld Eldath that she’s the offspring of Pelor and Umberlee. However, as in many cases, the looks are deceiving.

In unimaginably ancient times, after he finished reshaping the worlds of Material into spheres and charged Olidammara to recollect all the air he lazily let flow into empty space instead of wrapping tightly around worlds, Pelor saw that there was still no sign of his daughter. He needed water for the worlds, mortal life wasn’t gonna happen on barren rocks, but Umberlee had yet to bring a single drop from Elemental Plane of Water. And since his industrious son had left in a huff and his lazy son was busy fixing his own screwup, Pelor had to go get water and look for his gentle daughter himself. So he went into Water and saw it full of life; horrifying, monstrous life of nightmarish abominations. Pelor swore to never make any creature this disgusting as he scoured the plane, looking for signs of his daughter. When he found the trail was leading towards the dark depths, he was worried. When Tiamat suddenly rose above him in all her might, Pelor saw his fears were justified. Umberlee, polite and mild mannered as she was, had gone to ask Tiamat’s permission to take some water. And Tiamat had devoured her, as she’d said she’d do to anything of her brothers’ make that comes to bother her.

While Pelor was the youngest and weakest among his primordial siblings, he could sense Umberlee inside Tiamat’s stomach as she was slowly and horrifying being digested. Umberlee’s mind was already broken from pain and her form was about to give as well. So Pelor did the only thing he knew would work on his sister, he suddenly attacked. Tiamat, being the strongest and knowing Pelor to be too weak to ever stand up to her, was completely unprepared as Pelor sliced her massive sea snake form in half and tore open her stomach. Her surprise lasted only a moment but it was enough for Pelor to pull Umberlee out and flee. Tiamat was furious (it had actually hurt). She gave chase, focusing her will to block all exits and forms of escape Pelor could use to leave Water. Pelor was using his own power on the half digested Umberlee, trying to lessen her pain and mend her wounds while trying to run from Tiamat. It wasn’t gonna work; keeping away from Tiamat was using up too much of his power, not leaving enough to help Umberlee who was still being dissolved by blood of Tiamat splattered over her form. So, in desperation, Pelor opened up a passage to Plane of Negative Energy. Tiamat hadn’t been blocking that route, she didn’t expect Pelor to be reckless enough to try that, but that bit of time Pelor spent not running away was enough for her to catch up. Just as Pelor was leaving Water, Tiamat’s jaws caught him right in the crotch, castrating him forever. Pelor has been crippled ever since, his universal creation ability is severely damaged, preventing him from creating more deities or new matter from nothing. This weakness, combined with his inability to save Umberlee’s mind (and the incurable horrible pain of his wound he’s since learned to hide) underlies Pelor’s every action, fueling an uncommon set of daddy issues. While it’s known that he was wounded by Tiamat in some ancient struggle, the actual events or the extent of his disability is unknown to all (except Umberlee, who’s kinda hazy about the details).

Pelor spent a long time hiding out in Negative Energy, focusing all of his power on fixing Umberlee’s mind and body, ignoring his own painful wound. He managed to fix Umberlee’s form and restored her strength but Tiamat’s blood had long seeped into her essence, his power kept failing to untwist her mind. In hindsight, he should’ve known better than to try curing insanity while sitting in the Allmother’s lap, but he was in a hurry and also didn’t want his wound and weakness be witnessed. When he finally admitted defeat, it was too late to heal himself too. So he returned to Material Plane with a violently insane Umberlee, both having paid a heavy price for approaching Tiamat (as she’d said would happen).

But Mother of All Abominations wasn’t done. Having partly devoured divine essences of both Pelor and his daughter, Tiamat could fashion a new deity that would be a combination of them. So she created Eldath, the sweet goddess of sweet waters (who was almost a spitting image of old Umberlee), taking particular care to not let her be anything like Tiamat’s usual (nightmarish) handiwork. Not only would this be rubbing Pelor’s disability in his face and reminding Umberlee of her lost sanity, it would also make it look like Pelor had taken advantage of his maddened daughter to have an affair during their suspiciously long absence from Material Plane. Tiamat even went so far as to create a special sea monster to hide newborn Eldath inside, planting it on an ocean where Umberlee would eat it to complete the illusion of Umberlee giving birth to Eldath. The birth was a traumatic event, Tiamat had made certain Umberlee would suffer and Pelor was shocked and disgusted upon seeing the newborn goddess featuring his own essence. He immediately knew it was Tiamat’s work and promptly put Eldath to sleep, then abandoned her in the vast emptiness of Material space. He couldn’t bring himself to see Eldath hurt, she’s far too similar to what his daughter used to be, but was hoping she’d die by herself off in space, out of sight and out of mind.

Eldath, having awoken much later on a world populated by mortals, has no idea about her own origins and assumes herself to be one of the many goddesses born of mortal belief. She doesn’t like to believe in the rumors, preferring to think well of anyone, but the monstrous Umberlee’s seeming fear of her and Pelor’s relentless hatred sometimes makes her doubt. She doesn’t realize seeing her is one of the very few things that can still cause pain to Umberlee and Sun Father only remembers failure and agony when looking at her, so Eldath thinks her lot in life is to be unreasonably oppressed. She takes it in stride, for Eldath is a resilient and brave goddess.

Queen of the Lake has a natural affinity and power over all bodies of sweet water; rivers, lakes and waterfalls are all under her protection. Her personality led her to embrace and take over the domains of peace and quiet, leading her to become the patron of sleep and guardian of sleepers as well. And once she had sleep, it wasn’t long before she got dreams too. The rapid rise of her strength and influence was baffling to most and especially displeased Pelor. While she’s not aware herself, Eldath’s ability to claim so many domains and swiftly rise in power, then suddenly halt in strength comes from Tiamat’s hand; it’s the exact same pattern seen on the nightmarish deities of Water’s abominations like Sekolah or Blipdoolpoolp.

As a result, Lady Serenity has very disparate interests and many worshippers of entirely different types. Lovers of nature pay homage to her, so do prophets and mediums, or artists looking for inspiration from dreams, or lakeshore dwellers and river traders, or stressed city folks looking for some rest, or parents who just want their damn kids to go the **** to sleep (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Udj-o2m39NA). Hidden temples to Eldath can be found virtually anywhere and no two are exactly alike, her clerics are also an entirely too varied bunch but are almost always good natured. What they all do have in common is hatred from Pelor, whose clerics like to paint Eldathyns as anything from lazy layabouts to rabid treehuggers to demonize them. Nobody really buys it, even some Pelorites themselves, but it keeps getting repeated over and over.

Except for Pelor, the Sleeping Beauty is regarded well and lacks in enemies. Eldath has an aversion to saltwater so keeps her influence away from seas and shores, which keeps her worshippers mostly safe from Umberlants and Talassans, not to mention the horrors from Water. The Seldarine all love her and Corellon uses every opportunity to speak up against Pelor’s douchebaggery regarding her. Deities of Material Plane, especially the more politically minded ones (aka Sune), consider her to be a stellar example of primordial oppression and a rallying flag to unite around. Gruumsh sees her as a weakling but prefers not to bother her (the similarities between her and Water’s abominations aren’t lost on him, as he’s one of the most observant beings of the planes despite appearances). Silvanus and Olidammara, both buying into those rumors of her origins, pity her and might sometimes help her out to bother Pelor. But Eldath and her followers are on best terms with, of all the deities, Loviatar. Loviatar sees a kindred spirit in her, one who understands the strength of weakness and value of bravery in the face of oppression. Most unexpected of all however, is the great god of war Tempus and his persistent courting. Despite all expectations to the contrary, Tempus sees the brief periods of peace and quiet between wars as a worthy prize and thinks sleep and rest are precious, so he sees Lady Serenity herself as a worthy prize to be acquired too. Eldath isn’t at all pleased by this but, being a pacifist, so far hasn’t found a way to get rid of his annoying advances.

But while everyone believes the Bitch Queen is inexplicably afraid of Eldath and would never have anything to do with her, she’s covertly keeping an her eye on her and might just decide to solve Eldath’s little problem with her usual subtlety. Chances are good that, like the last time someone tried to mess with Tempus, nobody will be happy by the end of it (except maybe the Allmother of course, and it’s been very long since Umberlee last furthered her cause).


You know, when compared to actual omnivillains of the multiverse, Corellon really isn't that bad of a guy. Pelor too. I also wanted Pelor to be more sympathetic, he is supposed to be a good guy after all.

However, this is what I meant by mashing my toys together and making pew pew noises. Eldath is a guest star in her own entry, I'm much more focused on worldbuilding with my previous stuff than making her a legit, standalone deity for DM consumption. She fared better than H bros tho, I'll give myself that.

Beneath
2016-11-27, 11:51 PM
re:Blues, now I want to know more about Demogorgon. I could see them being, like, Demogorgon's influence on behalf of Ilsensine, or perhaps the result of Illithid meddling directly on goblin spirits (maybe they're what a bugbear who has been eaten by a mind flayer reincarnates as)

Eldath's story is so sad. I like making her goddess of dreams though. Very very interesting.

(as for Pelor being supposedly good, one, having incorruptible bastions of good is boring, and two, the burning hate heresy is probably my favorite interpretation that doesn't involve this level of reworking)

Fable Wright
2016-11-28, 12:58 PM
I probably should go back and read some of the entries that I've skipped, because Pelor and Tiamat continue to be extremely interesting characters, but there's no real place where their main story is collected and I want more.

Pronounceable
2016-11-28, 02:42 PM
I could see them being, like, Demogorgon's influence on behalf of Ilsensine
It pretty much writes itself. Ilsensine (once cloven, twice shy) paid Demogorgon to make it some new worshippers, untracable ones that duergar wouldn't connect to it. These so called blues are probably goblinoid spirits DoubleD somehow impregnated illithid tadpoles with [insert bodyhorror here].
There isn't much to know about old Monkeyfaces themself though; as in the entry, he's a psycho scientist for hire and loves making things cry.

Eldath's story is so sad. I like making her goddess of dreams though.
Yeah, peace and quiet kinda leads right up to sleep. I'm surprised they didn't go there back in the day, FR (and DnD) is seriously lacking in sleepy-dreamy gods.

I probably should go back and read some of the entries that I've skipped
It all kinda builds up on itself. I wouldn't recommend skipping things. Then again, there's a ****load of stuff to read, it's not ununderstandable.
Interesting dudes not being altogether in a single entry is also a feature (see: Gruumsh and Corey). Gotta keep baiting the audience.


e: vvv Well, Amaunator, Garagos, Boccob, Loviatar, Erathis, Tempus, Aoskar, Yondalla, Gruumsh and Mystra are all mortal spawned (or at least appeared after Mechanus). But yeah, the true number of gods spawned purely by mortal belief is lower than it appears.

e2: vvv But if the psigoblins are just random mutants among regulars and you want some secret mastermind covertly feeding off of psionics (similar to Mystra) or playing sims on goblinoids, Pisaethces is your abomination. Brainpickle is more straightforward and needs moar powah to restore itself, whereas Blood Queen is into psionic hyperscience and dominated patsies. Both could've contracted DoubleD to fuse goblinoid souls with their psionic followers, just pick which flavor you like your tentacles.

Beneath
2016-11-29, 04:04 AM
I could see that. I don't know if "worship" is the proper connection between Blues and Ilsensine though, but it could draw power from their existence in a way other deities draw power from their worshippers. There is probably then a fixed number of Blues; when one dies it reincarnates, something of a parasite on the goblin reincarnation cycle, and their interests are more aligned with Ilsensine's than Obad-hai's (the default lore for Blues is that they're random mutants in goblin societies and tend to either be outcasts or leaders, with no in-between; I think this hews to that closely enough to be recognizable with a hint of multi-planar conspiracy thrown in).

It occurs to me that supposedly a lot of deities sprung up from mortal belief, but aside from Nerull and Sune there aren't any mentioned that actually sprung up full-blown like Eldath thinks she did (there are a bunch of ascended mortals, like Brandobaris and Arvoreen, but mortal belief seems to only rarely create a deity full-formed)

Also yes about the lack of dream gods. Pathfinder has one but I can't think of others; Eberron has a plane of dream that's ruled by non-theistic philosophies (the Dreaming Dark and the Path of Light). Dream is potentially a really powerful portfolio, too, if the cosmology has a Plane of Dreams, or if the whole thing is Shar's dream.

Fri
2016-11-29, 10:44 AM
To be honest, I don't like pelor the conquering sun or whatever that thing is called, though not for any fault of it. It's just nowadays (nowadays count from when that theory was first mentioned), theory where good guy x is actually evil but hiding it so passe. Kitschy. Cliche. Overdone. Almost as passe as theory where "the main character of x series is actually dying and the whole series is his dying dream." Only almost.

Max_Killjoy
2016-11-29, 11:23 AM
To be honest, I don't like pelor the conquering sun or whatever that thing is called, though not for any fault of it. It's just nowadays (nowadays count from when that theory was first mentioned), theory where good guy x is actually evil but hiding it so passe. Kitschy. Cliche. Overdone. Almost as passe as theory where "the main character of x series is actually dying and the whole series is his dying dream." Only almost.


These read, to me, more like most of the gods are vain, petty, self-absorbed jerks, in the vein of Greek myths.

Fri
2016-11-29, 12:01 PM
These read, to me, more like most of the gods are vain, petty, self-absorbed jerks, in the vein of Greek myths.

Yes, these are nice.

I'm talking specifically about the Pelor the Burning Hate meme.

Pronounceable
2016-11-29, 03:35 PM
You know, folks, I been kinda working on a sort of chronology for the stuff that's been happening in these entries. I just finished it and, looking at it now, I see a massive, flavorless and entirely boring shopping list (7 pages long on Word).

But assuming I didn't forget something, it has all the stuff I've written in these posts (and some I haven't) and is mostly in order. I'm not gonna post the list, for it's incredibly lame. But I am gonna post the list of spaces of the list, the unwritten bits that stick out, the places where I can do more deity stuff with. Maybe y'all can tell me it's time to end instead. So here they are:


-Abominable godspawn: Only stuff we got about these guys was in Blipdo and it was obviously focused on frogmonsters. There's like half a dozen species of abominations to play with in Water, I could certainly whip up some entry talking about kraken superiority driving mindflayers and beholders to flee to underdarks or what Demon Prince Dagon's up to in there. But it's like underwater combat rules: sure I can make stuff up, but what's the point? Virtually nobody runs underwater campaigns and the only pertinent info about the aberration species for the average DnD player is their hp/ac.

-Lower Planes: Moradin's war on chaotic evil might've stopped but stuff keeps going down there. Problem is, deities don't really play a role in all the crap daemons have been up to since the dawn of time or domestic politics among demons/devils. I can still squeeze some fiendish deity in, there's at least a couple guys I can think of.

-Air/Earth/Fire: Thanks to Tiamat, Elemental Plane of Water is pretty well understood in this thread. Or at least I assume I made it well understandable with all incidental info. Meanwhile, other 3 elements are empty. While I have no ideas right now, I could maybe make some stuff out of genies and elemental princes and whatnot.

-Upper Planes: They're almost always boring. It's pretty hard to do anything with celestials when they're not fighting baddies below. Not to mention, exemplars of all Outer Planes usually keep to themselves and don't meddle much with gods and mortals.

-Underdark: Svirfneblin? Gesundheit! Drow? Never heard of it.

-Boccob's Irregulars: Since they were left so generic and vague, there's space to fill out.

-"Monstrous" humanoids: There's plenty of nonhumanoid species, except I don't really want them or their ultraspecialized gods. Material is for humans and variants; centaurs and harpies and whatever other man-beast hybrids are clearly fey creatures (or commissioned to DoubleD), whereas the three billion and twelve reptilian species are obviously Tiamat's handiwork. Nevertheless, it's still a possible direction to go.

-Seldarine: It occured to me that we've never seen a writeup of an actual, legit Seldarine so far. It's always been all about Douchenozzle nozzling it up. Maybe one of them without any douchebaggage would be nice.

-Some DnD deity that I missed or ignored in my list: There's always the chance that I simply missed something good. The problem with those is that I've missed it. If I knew what it was, it wouldn't be missing.

-Lady of Pain: Admittedly, I got this a while ago. It's less a deity writeup, more a sorta last campaign idea, the massive final epic adventure you quit DnD with kinda of thing. Defining the Lady is also a blasphemy among DnD circles, I'd probably have to turn in my badge and dice after posting it. Been saving it for the actual end of the thread and, assuming it's good enough, we'll be ending with a bang. It might be that time.


So there's the options I can see for myself. Seems kinda a lot. Then again, a good artist is the one that knows when to stop. I'm likely not a good artist but it almost feels like I'm mostly there.

Beneath
2016-11-29, 04:35 PM
Nobody runs underwater games only because the underwater rules are too complicated for play and also because "you drown" is often enough. A system-neutral-ish setting can include underwater stuff and maybe it'll see play in a game like Dungeon World or something similar where the underwater rules don't suck.

I definitely like the harpies-are-fey thing; I've been using them for the offspring of a hag and an aaracokra in one of my campaigns (tho the aaracokra hasn't been revealed yet and was probably eaten). Presumably there are other ways for them to exist, all of which involve some kind of evil fey magic (in part because "hag" isn't a species here, but a classification of a kind of power one can have. an evil fey princess might become a hag, but so might a mortal sorceress who meddles too much in evil fey powers. and hagness can be inherited too).

Don't sell yourself short; the upper planes are more interesting in this setup, precisely because they're not the habitat of the omnibenevolent gods, but rather the slightly-less-dickish gods/the less-likely-to-come-over-uninvited-to-ruin-your-day gods.

I'm not sure what a Seldarine entry that isn't about Correlon being Correlon would look like, which is probably reason enough to try to write one (Sehanine, maybe?)

I'd go for Pisaethces as "patron" of the Blues, but I don't know it that well and I'm a bit surprised that the Aboleths even have a god in canon; that doesn't seem like their style (then again, it's not the illithids' style either but Ilsensine doesn't seem to mind)

Oh, what about the Flumph god? Why did Tiamat make such a thing?

Also, you have Gruumsh on your list of possible mortal-belief gods but he's a primordial son of Selune and Shar like Pelor and Correlon (him being younger than Mechanus is interesting though). Tempus, Amaunator, Aoskar, Oghcob, and possibly Mystra can all go on the list with Nerull and Sune though, and everyone can think Yondalla's there too (and Chauntea).

Fable Wright
2016-11-29, 07:48 PM
-"Monstrous" humanoids: There's plenty of nonhumanoid species, except I don't really want them or their ultraspecialized gods. Material is for humans and variants; centaurs and harpies and whatever other man-beast hybrids are clearly fey creatures (or commissioned to DoubleD), whereas the three billion and twelve reptilian species are obviously Tiamat's handiwork. Nevertheless, it's still a possible direction to go.

I would love this, but you're right in that most pantheons for them are... well, overly-specific.

If I could make a request, it would be to add the Sovereign Host (or more importantly, the Dark Six) to your pantheon. Six gods and goddesses with myths of their own, commonly believed in by humanoids and monsters alike, with some being favored by specific races. Medusae, Harpies, and some Trolls favor Aureon's Shadow, as both humans and monsters alike believe that it gave the monsters their fell powers that humans can't replicate. Kobolds and savage goblins favor the Mockery, as the patron of dishonorable combat—after all, in a world filled with larger predators, they cannot fight fair and expect to survive.

Of course, it might just be that the Shadow is an alias of Demogorgon, the Devourer is an alias of Tiamat, and so on and so forth until it's revealed that all fifteen deities of the Sovereign Host and Dark Six are just a sham put together by the Traveler just to see what would happen if a godless planet started worshiping make-believe gods. But... I dunno, I'd like to see the patron deities of the monster nation of Droaam get more love than just a few small blurbs in a barely-referenced setting book.

Beneath
2016-11-29, 10:46 PM
I was under the impression that the Eberron gods were distant enough that you couldn't really be sure what their will was for any given thing, that mortals/their churches were more important than the actual gods, which somewhat conflicts with this setting's cosmos of active squabbling gods.

GungHo
2016-11-30, 11:51 AM
-Abominable godspawn: Only stuff we got about these guys was in Blipdo and it was obviously focused on frogmonsters. There's like half a dozen species of abominations to play with in Water, I could certainly whip up some entry talking about kraken superiority driving mindflayers and beholders to flee to underdarks or what Demon Prince Dagon's up to in there. But it's like underwater combat rules: sure I can make stuff up, but what's the point? Virtually nobody runs underwater campaigns and the only pertinent info about the aberration species for the average DnD player is their hp/ac.
So, no one was scared of the Kraken (either the giant cephalopod or the four armed giant thing from Clash of the Titans) until it actually came out of the water and tearing up a coastal town. I would be less concerned with abominations of the deep sea that no one is likely to interact with and I'd focus on the things that are likely to come to surface to raid or enact some sort of vengeance (possibly at the behest of another deity).

Same thing goes for underdark, other planes (inner or outer). You don't really need to write about Elminster's underwear, because it's very unlikely that no one is ever going to see his underwear. However, if someone says "I go under Elminster's robe to look at his underwear", make it hurt.

Fable Wright
2016-11-30, 12:18 PM
I was under the impression that the Eberron gods were distant enough that you couldn't really be sure what their will was for any given thing, that mortals/their churches were more important than the actual gods, which somewhat conflicts with this setting's cosmos of active squabbling gods.

That is, in fact, true.

The Host is weird, however, in that they have things like myths and legends about the various members of the Host and the Dark Six, even if they can't verify that such things ever happened. Kinda like real-life mythology, bizarrely enough. Stories about how Aureon, as the embodiment of all magic, cut himself in twain so that he wouldn't be tainted by the darker side of magic; in doing so, he created his Shadow. Stories about the birth of the Fury and Kol Korran, and likely stories about artifacts left by Onatar or the Fury, and of heroic mortals who dealt with the Sovereigns on equal terms.

It's just that no one can call the deities today and ask them to verify or refute these claims.

Pronounceable
2016-12-02, 06:55 PM
If I could make a request, it would be to add the Sovereign Host (or more importantly, the Dark Six) to your pantheon.
Unfortunately we can't really do that. I could use the names and domains to create a pantheon but what makes Eberron faiths cool is the fact that they're unknown and possibly completely fake. None of our guys here roll that way. Also most of Eberronians are basically the usual suspects or their mixes (Arawai and Boldrei are both Chauntea, Aureon is Boccob, Dol Arrah is Pelor/Heironeous, Devourer is Umberlee [complete with Fury=Talos as her violently conceived child from a sibling], Mockery is Bhaal/Erythnul, Shadow/Aureon thing is a Shar/Selune thing, etc). You can simply assimilate the legends and stories about SH and map them on their equivalents here though, that'd work. But the point of Eberron faiths would be lost when transported to a regular DnD universe.


I'd go for Pisaethces as "patron" of the Blues, but I don't know it that well and I'm a bit surprised that the Aboleths even have a god in canon
Neither do I, to be honest. I just know aboleths are traditionally the very first sentient beings on any DnD universe and they're into dominated mutant slaves, then wing the rest. Or Ilsensine, if it comes to that. I knew what mindflayers are, I knew their god is a giant tentacly brain named Ilsensine, then made stuff up. If you want psigoblins tied to an abomination god, pick which color you like tentacles in (purple for Ilsensine, blue-green for Pisaethces).


Anyway. We got incoming.


RAVANNA (lesser deity), Maharaja of Rakshasa, Paper Tiger, Striped Jester, Lord of Misrule
Domains: unity, obedience, protection, law, evil, trickery

Of all the fiendish exemplar races of Lower Planes, none has been as heavily oppressed as the rakshasa of Acheron. Even when daemons of Gehenna conquered Hades and subjugated the native succubi aka incubi aka hags aka erinyes (all of which are transparently the same friggin DnD creature), they weren’t as thoroughly crushed as the rakshasa. The tiger headed fiends had become the least influential exemplars of all Lower Planes as their plane turned into the open buffet of the gods, taken over piece by piece by deities of evil and law. Neighboring devils may be weak among exemplars, but they’re organized, efficient, ruthless and when it comes to protecting their turf, selfless. Whereas Acheron’s rakshasa were powerful, arrogant, lazy and treacherous, fond of conspiring and backstabbing their fellows purely for the joy of inflicting pain and humiliation. They knew that no other fiends were a match for them except demodands (who never leave their prison plane anyway), so assumed they had nothing to fear from the outside.

So it was an education to them when the great orc god Gruumsh invaded, crushing individual fiefdoms, baronies and emirates of rakshasa rajas like insects. Gruumsh broke the entire plane in half and carved the realm of Nishrek out of Acheron, transforming it into his private playground; it may not be pretty but is by far the largest of all divine realms in the multiverse. The rakshasa had lost almost half of their plane but certainly hadn’t learned their lesson, for they let the ancient god Laduguer conquer a large part of their plane by subverting and taking over domains of many rakshasa rajas one by one. Lord Determinant toppled many rajas and enslaved all the rakshasa who couldn’t escape his grasp, leaving the rest of them squeezed into a quarter of their own plane. Countless rakshasa slaves work in the factories and smithies of Hammergrim even today, endlessly producing trade goods to fund the personal vendettas the Grey Protector has going with Dominus Infernus, Emperor of Artifice and various demon princes of the Abyss.

After recognizing even the mad frogs of Pandemonium didn’t let their own plane be taken right out of their claws, the rakshasa agreed they needed to change. It was perfectly clear why none of these invader deities tried to conquer the devils: Infernal Hierarchy was strong and wouldn’t have let them. Rakshasa too had to unite for strength, they had to stand together against the invaders if they were to avoid getting completely subjugated. Their entire remaining race gathered in one of the most crowded meetings in the history of the planes and made an oath to stand together against all nonrakshasa and faithfully serve the worthiest among them. Obviously, that worthiest one had to be determined. And, also obviously, many rakshasa were certain that worthy leader would be themselves. In the time it took for their civil wars to decide who was the most worthy (the one who’d be called maharaja), more deities flocked to Acheron and conquered realms for themselves. While Bane, Hextor, Wee Jas and all other deities of law and evil persuasion took over far smaller regions than Gruumsh or Laduguer, they were no less humiliating for the rakshasa.

Finally one raja managed to stand out. The one named Ravanna had defeated all challengers and proven himself to be the worthiest (aka most cunningly treacherous). He was crowned as the maharaja and his first decree was to demand worship from all the rakshasa, exactly like mortals of Material Plane do for their gods. His subjects weren’t very fond of the idea but Ravanna argued that his enemies were deities, therefore he had to have power like them if Acheron was to be retaken from divine grasp. They weren’t really buying it but they had to accept, for they were still lawful exemplars and had sworn to obey their maharaja. Ravanna, who had studied the mortal worlds and seen how new deities came to be, knew he needed to have a theme, a gimmick to focus the power of belief around. So he chose the most obvious ones that should appeal to rakshasa, unity and protection. Unfortunately, it didn’t work. Rakshasa didn’t really believe in Ravanna; despite obediently going through all the religious motions he’d come up with, they all knew he was just a rakshasa like them. And the news of the new maharaja and his desire to ascend to godhood had spread in the Lower Planes, fiends of all stripes were now coming over to Acheron just to witness and mock the obviously hollow religion rakshasa pretended to believe in to appease their foolish ruler. Ravanna fumed and bellowed, demanded his “worshippers” be more loyal and devout, believe harder, inventing more and more ridiculously contrived religious ceremonies as his subject grew to resent him more. All that was immense enjoyment to fiends and deities alike, even some mortals knowledgeable about the planes were catching on. It didn’t take long before Ravanna started to accumulate mocking monikers like the Paper Tiger, which drove him to even more stubbornly cling to his dogma and push the rakshasa. The ridicule didn’t stay limited to Ravanna himself either, the rakshasa race as a whole had become the laughingstock of the Lower Planes, even insane slaadi were looking down on them now (at least when they could remember). The collective amusement at the predicament of the rakshasa grew higher and higher. At least more deities had stopped trying to take over more of Acheron, everyone was having too much fun at the rakshasa’s expense.

Then one day, Ravanna suddenly ascended. Nobody was surprised more than the rakshasa, whose resentment was very close to a boiling point and were just a hair away from finally rebelling against their maharaja. Overjoyed, they asked him just how he’d managed to ascend without any real worship and belief from his subjects. Ravanna then laughed at them, like everyone else in the planes had been laughing at them ever since he'd started them on his grand journey to ascension. He then proceeded to enslave all the remaining free rakshasa who’d sworn to obey the maharaja and took over all the rest of plane that still wasn’t under the control of any deities, becoming the final lawful evil god to conquer the last remaining slice of free Acheron.

From that day on, nobody laughed at Striped Jester. But he laughs with everyone else, nobody enjoys this joke of an exemplar race more than Ravanna himself. Lord of Misrule has proven to the multiverse that tigers don’t change their stripes, even if they ascend to godhood.


The name of Mockery was an inspiration for this, I'll accept that much. I was also itching to go for some Lower Planes, those are always popular. But more than enough ink has been spilled about devils and demons. Devils and demons are very old hats by now, whereas there's 5 more lower planes and their exemplars who keep getting shafted. Also, Acheron was always the coolest of hells, yet never had a proper exemplar fiend, therefore I found one. Sure, these specific rakshasa aren't cool and hip, but the natives of the Plane of War and Oppression need to be oppressed imo.Also also, Ravanna raging at the mocking fiend tourists as a sketch with John Cleese in it is what I like to imagine here.

Beneath
2016-12-03, 07:23 PM
I'm interested in your theories on hags now. I generally have them as relatives of fey and ogres (Annis hags in particular are transparently the same species as ogres. possibly older, wiser ogresses, possibly just ogresses, tho that doesn't explain why there are so many more ogres than Annis hags. unless they, like, eat their daughters to avoid having heirs who might usurp them. or their sisters, for the same reason. but also given how many ogres there are and what that implies about birthrates idk if independent, strong, territorial hags would want to have that many kids).

I've been meaning to write, like, a Grand Unified Theory of Hags for a while now though.

Oh, also, are Slaad pandemonic in this cosmos? Interesting. What originally comes from Limbo?

Pronounceable
2016-12-07, 07:02 PM
your theories on hags now.
What's there to theorize? Hags are just hags: magical critters who disguise themselves with shapeshifting as hot chicks to eat you. Succubi, on the other hand, are magical critters who disguise themselves with shapeshifting as hot chicks to eat your soul. Clearly has no relation whatsoever. Erinyes are also unrelated magical critters who disguise themselves with shapeshifting as hot chicks to eat your soul, but they sometimes like to kick your ass instead. Meanwhile incubi are magical critters who disguise themselves with shapeshifting as hot studs to eat your soul, obviously a different critter that %100 merits another statblock. How else will we fill up a Monster Manual 7 to sell?

So I bring these magical exemplars who disguise themselves with shapeshifting as hot chicks or studs to eat your soul hailing from Hades. Unlike all the other exemplar races, they can reproduce with mortals and produce weaker, half-mortal versions of themselves. They're go nutsable on variants depending on mortal parent's race/sex/class/level/favorite bread.


Oh, also, are Slaad pandemonic in this cosmos? Interesting. What originally comes from Limbo?
Yes. Dunno. Haven't found anything I like as pure chaos exemplar but I know with %100 certainty that slaad have never in the history of ever been CN. Cos DnD is bad at alignment, which is a pattern. I think I'll have Limbo and Nirvana exemplarless (cos modrons are too awesome to waste on alignment incarnation and inevitables are dumb).

Aaanyway, we got an Upper Planes entry now for balance reasons. It's no DnD deity and a whole lot less famous than DoubleD, but she's the only solo bigwig from upstairs I could find.


MORWEL (eladrin paragon), the Queen of Stars
Domains: eladrin, good, chaos

The eternal queen of eladrin is one of the oldest beings in existence and despises deities. Even Moradin, who saved her people from having to constantly battle demons of the Abyss by rearranging the planes into the Great Wheel many eons ago, gets little more than civility. She clearly remembers a time when there were no such things as death or scarcity in the multiverse, a time when only the immortal exemplar races of the planes existed and all conflicts were only over ideals. Then Overmothers’ brats appeared, treating the planes as if it was their personal playground and imposing their wills upon the exemplar races and later mortals of Material Plane. As Morwel is old enough to have witnessed the Dawn War and is one of a handful of beings who actually had the ovaries to interact with Selune in person (metaphorically, as eladrin don’t have any discernable organs), she’s pretty certain Luminous Overmother would have words with her obnoxious children if she could. The younger godlings are even worse in Morwel’s opinion, most of whom take it for granted that the multiverse belongs to deities first and don’t even recognize that they’re simply parasites feeding on mortals of Material.

The Queen of Stars, who takes her name from the starry night sky appearance of her plane, is generally considered to be one of the most powerful beings in existence and also the source of the strange, infinite creation power every being who enters Arborea inexplicably gains ever since the Great Wheel was created. Nobody knows how she can bestow an ability that’s usually limited to greater deities to a virtually limitless number of beings in a virtually infinite space, but she does. And not only she dictates what can and cannot be created, she can also revoke the powers from any being at will. This power of universal creation guarantees that Arborea is never threatened, as any single inhabitant trained in its use can give even a greater deity a run for its money. Since the Arborean creative power and items created by it only last as long as Morwel allows, no being can use it to disrupt the general peace of Arborea or harm an eladrin. Luckily for the rest of the multiverse, Queen’s Blessing is limited to her plane and anything created out of it vanishes if taken outside. Morwel isn’t at all shy about explaining that she’d use it conquer all the planes and destroy every deity if she could. She is very shy on explaining exactly how it works or where it came from however; according to her, a lady must have her secrets.

The same creation power is Morwel’s greatest weapon in her campaign against deities. Thanks to it, Arborea has become a utopic paradise where every type of being’s every material need is instantly fulfillable. Many inhabitants of Arborea live on a world of their own making, full of things they personally love; as a result the whole plane looks like an infinite night sky full of tiny glittering stars (think Little Prince). The only thing disallowed to everyone (except Morwel herself) is creating life; she explains the reason is to encourage everyone in Arborea to be nice, friendly and companionable to others, to make them seek others to fulfill their social needs, promoting goodness and friendship. The Queen of Stars charges her eladrin subjects with evangelizing, making sure every being in existence learn that Arborea is a utopia of such perfection, a paradise free of slavedrivers and parasites masquerading as divinity. Her goal is to convert every being in the multiverse to chaotic good so they can all come and live in Arborea (incidentally starving out all those pesky gods and eradicating all other exemplar races). For that, eladrin outside their plane face very stiff competition from virtually every deity and their planar servants, who all realize just how attractive the Arborean utopia can be for mortals, doing their very best to prevent agents of Morwel from contacting their mortal followers (which usually involves violence).

Exemplar races and rulers of other Outer Planes are also wary of eladrin evangelists and their tireless efforts to convert them but immortal planars or elementals are nowhere near as easy prey to Arborean spiel as mortals, and eladrin never use force or coercion for their evangelism. Officially, Morwel believes the ends never justify the means, so she makes absolutely certain any being persuaded to join the chaotic good cause chose it of their own free will. But unofficially, she simply wants to make sure eladrin are always seen as the good guys and underdogs, which would be impossible if eladrin went around kicking ass and taking names like they easily could. So they’re only allowed to use force to defend themselves against capture/torture/conversion and are actually ordered to lose and get banished back to Arborea if their attackers seem likely to just destroy their forms. The Plane of Friendship could make war on any other plane with impunity, they are the original defenders of the multiverse after all, the only reason demons of the Abyss didn’t infect the rest of the multiverse before the primordial brats even came out of hiding from under their mom’s skirt is because eladrins were kicking their sitting appendages (demons also lack discernable organs) back into the pit every time they tried to pour out. Even the Seven Celestial Hosts or the Tarterian Collective would crumble against the full might Morwel is capable of bringing to bear, but she can’t take on all the planes together or conquer Material Plane with its dozens upon dozens of resident deities. Even more importantly, the Queen of Stars knows that the Dawn War isn’t really over, that Overmothers are still fighting on an incomprehensible level and trying to convert the planes by force would only serve to weaken Luminous Overmother’s hold on them. So she's forced to play nice and be peaceful, bleeding out her rivals (aka the entire multiverse) only a few souls at a time.

That is not to say Morwel is gunshy. She doesn’t respond well to provocation, such as Dominus Infernus’ capture and conversion of the ancient demoness Pale Night into the archdevil Bensozia, then celebrating it as a great victory of law over chaos by marrying her. Pale Night being her ancient enemy from before the ordering of the planes and closest to thing to her equivalent from the Abyss, on top of Domina Infernus Bensozia’s uncanny resemblence to her own self, Queen Morwel figured Asmodeus was thumbing his nose at her personally; which is why she conspired with demons and guardinals to assassinate Bensozia, utilizing an Allmother’s Eye (aka sphere of annihilation) stolen from archduke Levistus of Inferno to frame him. The resulting massive civil war almost toppled Infernal Hierarchy, pushed Asmodeus into a strange period of depression and inactivity, reshuffling many positions of power in the Plane of Absolute Obedience and bringing a bit of chaos into the needlessly well ordered life of devils. Or the time she used her eladrin subjects to play matchmaker between the newly exiled Lolth and the sworn enemy of primordials Sune, just to return the discourtesy she owed to Corellon for his laughable attempt at courting her back in the days before creation of Arvandor, which has fueled no small amount of conflict (and fanfiction) among the divine parasites and also gained Arborea the favor of the two most devastatingly alluring beings in the multiverse. Morwel is yet to cash in her chips from them, but she’ll certainly demand something of them in a way that strengthens the causes of chaos and good.

The Queen of Stars is the paragon of chaotic good and is one of the most powerful, ambitious, manipulative and patient beings of the planes. She’s bound to Arborea and doesn’t seem to be able to leave it, which doesn’t stop her from exerting a large influence wherever she wishes. In her own way, she’s far more dangerous to the movers and shakers of the planes than any fiend or deity dwelling in Lower Planes but for the poor and oppressed masses of the multiverse, be they planar or mortal, she’ll ultimately be a savior.


I think my excessive fanboying of Planescape is showing here. I suspect I made Queen Morwel kinda too good but whatevs.
The original idea came from my desire to make Upper Planes better, giving each one a special gimmick because they're all boring and lame and goddamn interchangeable. Arborea got the heaven of artists and hippies concept, a plane where there's no material need so inhabitants can focus on their passions (or live in complete decadence). Then I looked into eladrin and found their queen and things kinda spiraled from there. So now we have a nonboring celestial race: evangelist eladrins and their expansionist warrior queen forced into peaceful philosophy. As enemies to all gods, atheism preachers and champions of underdog mortals, these eladrin should be eminently usable by any half competent DM.

Fri
2016-12-07, 11:05 PM
Remind me, have you ever made a summary of the whole setting/cosmology and their history and such? Because I kinda remember you did, but I must've missed it 'cause I can't find it.

Beneath
2016-12-08, 12:53 AM
Yeah, those are super-usable Eladrin. Both as allies, enemies, and mysterious agents whose aims don't quite align with or against yours.

I guess my interpretation of hags differs in that it de-emphasizes the shapeshifting to look like beautiful women to seduce and eat you bit, which puts a bit of distance between them and succubi, but I can see why with that part emphasized they're basically the same species (especially with night hags being fiends).

So then great wheel exemplars would be:
Nirvana (LN): None; Modrons live here to tend Mechanus and Inevitables might live here too
Acheron: Rakshasa
Nine Hells (LE): Devils
Gehenna: Daemons/Yugoloths
Gray Waste (NE): Hags/Succubi
Carceri: Demodands
The Abyss (CE): Demons
Pandemonium: Slaad
Limbo (CN): None
Ysgard: Valkyries?
Arborea (CG): Eladrin
Beastlands: ???
Elysium (NG): ??? (Angels? Devas?)
Bytopia: ???
Mt. Celestia (LG): Archons
Arcadia: ???

Where do the Seldarine live, in all this? Arvandor is a layer of Arborea in the conventional cosmology, right? but Morwel keeps deities out of Arborea for the most part, or is that just her layer?

Pronounceable
2016-12-08, 03:02 AM
Remind me, have you ever made a summary of the whole setting/cosmology and their history and such? Because I kinda remember you did, but I must've missed it 'cause I can't find it.
Nnno? I have my boring laundry list history thing that I never posted. Maybe you remember stuff I wrote in other posts here, there's some bits and bobs about the multiverse outside the writeups.
great wheel exemplars
You got all the lower ones covered, can't decide on uppers myself so far. Usual suspects are deva-archon-guardinal-eladrin and I need three more names locked down. Debating merits of aasimon/angel/kami/eidolon/asura/yaksha/einherjar/valkyrie/loa, which is kinda pointless since I don't have planar gimmicks to match the names to.

"Canon" Arvandor used to be in Arborea (along with all other fairylike stuff) because Feywild didn't exist back then. However ours is in Positive, we have a Feywild (cos it's probably the best thing 4e came up with) and planes don't have layers. Layers do nothing that regular regions, zones, domains or realms can't do so we don't have them.
Arborea welcomes all deities of good and chaos despite Morwel's hatred of them, as they always bring souls by truckloads. Also lets her **** them up if they start straying from the cause, the last thing she wants is turncoats to CGity go free.

Beneath
2016-12-08, 03:48 AM
Oh, right, I forgot about Guardianals as the default NG exemplars. Ysgard has to have Valkyries or Einwhatsits; something from Norse myth.

Why is Arborea still called Arborea other than tradition if it's not treeish anymore and all the treeishness got moved to the Feywild?

Good on getting rid of layers though. Planes work better finitely-sized, even if large (like, a truly infinite plane means that there's an area with a distance from here to the Hubble Deep Field on a side, with a population density of "random encounters exist here", meaning a population so vast that nothing you do can affect it. and that's boring), though the outer planes could be less that if they're all metaphorical anyway (when you physically go there, because you're physically in a metaphorical place, you force it into a metaphor that your physical body can interact with. but that metaphor probably isn't infinitely large either)

Dmowskavitto
2016-12-08, 04:22 AM
Getting people to change their habits or acquire new skills is impossible. Puppies are teachable, but older dogs are less apt to be able to be trained, or so popular wisdom had it. By the same token, an octogenarian who has read the morning newspaper for decades is unlikely to be willing, much less eager, to switch to the online edition.

Max_Killjoy
2016-12-08, 09:51 AM
Getting people to change their habits or acquire new skills is impossible. Puppies are teachable, but older dogs are less apt to be able to be trained, or so popular wisdom had it. By the same token, an octogenarian who has read the morning newspaper for decades is unlikely to be willing, much less eager, to switch to the online edition.

My dad just took up using the text-message function on his phone at the age of 73. We message back and forth during sporting events we're both watching, etc.

Pronounceable
2016-12-08, 11:43 AM
^^This definitely tops the list of smartest spambots I've ever seen.

Also, you know you've made big on teh interwebs it if your thread is attracting spambots...


^^^Yeah, it's just tradition. I seriously considered renaming it Arcadia instead but then didn't.

Max_Killjoy
2016-12-08, 11:46 AM
^^This definitely tops the list of smartest spambots I've ever seen.

Also, you know you've made big on teh interwebs it if your thread is attracting spambots...


^^^Yeah, it's just tradition. I seriously considered renaming it Arcadia instead but then didn't.

It was a spambot? Huh. Is it sad that it looked like some real posts I see in forum discussions?

Fable Wright
2016-12-08, 12:26 PM
Yes. Dunno. Haven't found anything I like as pure chaos exemplar but I know with %100 certainty that slaad have never in the history of ever been CN.

They were, a long, long time back (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=5041604&postcount=2).


Aaanyway, we got an Upper Planes entry now for balance reasons. It's no DnD deity and a whole lot less famous than DoubleD, but she's the only solo bigwig from upstairs I could find.

I mean, there's always Talisid; his five companions are more or less just tagalongs when he shows up described in setting books.

Beleriphon
2016-12-08, 04:14 PM
-Lady of Pain: Admittedly, I got this a while ago. It's less a deity writeup, more a sorta last campaign idea, the massive final epic adventure you quit DnD with kinda of thing. Defining the Lady is also a blasphemy among DnD circles, I'd probably have to turn in my badge and dice after posting it. Been saving it for the actual end of the thread and, assuming it's good enough, we'll be ending with a bang. It might be that time.

I think if you define the Lady of Pain the ghosts that powered TSR and were adopted by WotC will come and murder in you hilariously gruesome horror movie fashion. Then scorch the the living D&D out of your soul so you can never find rest, and be forever one of the Lady's Host.

Max_Killjoy
2016-12-08, 04:54 PM
This is evidently something D&D that I utterly missed... cannot define the Lady of Pain? There's an in-joke I'm missing here.

Fri
2016-12-08, 09:39 PM
Not sure if you're joking or really don't have the knowledge, but in case it's the latter...

Lady of Pain is the ruler of Sigil, the city of thousand doors in Planescape setting (which is sort of hub to every other setting imaginable). Sigil act as some sort of "neutral" ground and The Lady hold absolute power there. She's one of the few things that's never statted/described, and basically if the pc tries to fight/annoy her, the lady's stat is: you die/got imprisoned in eternal maze (not like that prevent people keep trying to stat her though, which is completely beating the point).

Max_Killjoy
2016-12-08, 10:21 PM
Not sure if you're joking or really don't have the knowledge, but in case it's the latter...

Lady of Pain is the ruler of Sigil, the city of thousand doors in Planescape setting (which is sort of hub to every other setting imaginable). Sigil act as some sort of "neutral" ground and The Lady hold absolute power there. She's one of the few things that's never statted/described, and basically if the pc tries to fight/annoy her, the lady's stat is: you die/got imprisoned in eternal maze (not like that prevent people keep trying to stat her though, which is completely beating the point).


I know very little about Planescape. Thought "Lady of Pain" might refer to Loviatar, and so the whole "can't define her" thing made no damn sense to me.

Beneath
2016-12-11, 08:29 PM
Oh, no, the Lady of Pain isn't a deity, and trying to make her one is something she'll kill you for.

On another note, it occurs to me that dragons are probably the most normal thing Tiamat's made in this cosmos. That sounds like a story. I can't figure how Bahamut figures into it, either (though "just get rid of him" seems like a solid option)

Pronounceable
2016-12-12, 08:39 PM
^I keep ignoring dragons. Cos I hate dragons. If they existed, they'd definitely be made by Tiamat but I'm leaving them wholly to DMs who don't hate them.

Today, we have a total misappropriation. Also I figured out a thing to do with Earth.


DUMATHOIN (lesser god), Silent Keeper, Mountain Shield, Voice of the Stones, Cave Ranger, Gemmed Lord, Mawbreaker
Domains: earth, protection, vigilance, mining, gems, metals, exploration, hunting

The dao of Earth are the only type of genies who force mindless elemental spirits drifting through their plane into their enclaves and artificially accelerate their evolution to increase their own population. While this hoarding behavior mildly offends other types of genies, there’s always plenty of new elementals flowing out of Elemental Chaos and they’re not nearly angry enough to come over to Plane of Earth to stop them, especially since nobody fancies stumbling on an Engine of Destruction while looking for a dao enclave to liberate mindless elementals from. The general opinion among other genies is that dao deserve what they got for being so blind to their own plane.

As elementals who gain sentience and power through prolonged periods bound to earthen bodies without change, all dao have an aversion to large and empty spaces. Large spaces, whether full of air or true vaccuum, make dao anxious and tense, the main reason why they’re usually more dangerous to summon than their fiery or airy cousins. Their racial agoraphobia is also the reason why they steered clear of the world sized voids Silvanus left in places he took the earth for planets of Material Plane ages ago, they were little more than pinpricks in their spatially infinite plane anyway. When the astronomic hollows in Plane of Earth started trapping errant elemental spirits inside without any elemental material to bond, dao kept ignoring the situation. Thus, they didn’t notice the Allmother’s malevolent fertility seeping into the abandoned pockets of dark nothingness. Just like the dark, dank, dismal or otherwise unpleasant places of Material Plane spontaneously generating mindlessly hostile and unceasingly destructive tiny creatures known as vermin, the world sized holes full of oblivion in Plane of Earth also started generating mindlessly hostile and unceasingly destructive creatures. Except these dark empty spaces were the size of worlds, so the creatures they generated were also far bigger than the too big ants, spiders, centipedes and similar critters that plague mortals without giving a single **** about the laws of biology or even physics.

Dao definitely did not expect what hit them. The collosal Engines of Destruction attacked dao cities and strongholds with single minded fury and destroyed almost every one of their bastions on the plane. Even worse, Engines of Destruction completely annihilated anything they devoured, including dao themselves. The great panic among the previously thought immortal dao upon this discovery contributed almost as much to their civilization’s complete collapse as the power of Engines. The survivors of initial attack fled to other elemental planes, leaving Plane of Elemental Earth completely in grip of Engines of Destruction. Inhabitants of other elemental planes didn’t welcome them, especially abominations and marid of Water who’d had to deal with the largest number of dao refugees (as it was the least frightening elemental plane to agoraphobic dao). Once it was understood that Engines weren’t going to leave Earth to pursue the escapees, the dwellers of other elemental planes turned on dao, killing the ones that refused to be enslaved to banish them back to their plane where utter annihilation waited for them. As a result, the once proud dao became a race of slaves to their cousins and were abused for centuries.

It was a dao named Dumathoin who changed the fate of his race. Dumathoin was a slave to a djinn in Air who was using him as a blacksmith to craft new weapons to use against their old enemies, the efreeti. He already knew a method to craft items out of mindless elementals, allowing him to create weapons and armor that was extra effective against elemental creatures like other genies, but the breakthrough happened when he managed to merge multiple elemental spirits into a single item. Dumathoin had the brilliant idea of secretly crafting a set of armor out of air elementals, making himself all but invincible against his master. He slew the djinn and liberated his fellow dao, starting a major rebellion in Plane of Air. Of course, the slain djinn simply respawned and rallied his brethren and dao rebellion was quelled (with great difficulty on the djinni’s part), sending Dumathoin along with his fellow rebels back to Earth. However they had already guessed the elemental merged weapons and armor could work just as well against Engines of Destruction if made from earth elementals, so they set about capturing as many elementals as they could and merge them into new Earthware weapons and armor. At this point, Dumathoin had another brilliant idea. He wanted to construct giant armors, comparable in size to an Engine of Destruction, then every dao (who could change their sizes at will, like all other genies) could fight an Engine head on. Others were skeptical but tried it anyway, for Dumathoin was all but their leader now. Unfortunately for them, they couldn’t finish before an Engine found their hiding place. Dumathoin enlarged to collosal size, put on the unfinished armor, grabbed the unfinished gemsword, and went out to fight the Engine to buy others time to escape. He promised his fellows he’d flee too once they were all safely away.

As a savvy reader can guess, he did not flee. Dumathoin fought to the end and even managed to kill the Engine after losing an arm and an eye, which was the first time an Engine was felled. However the epic battle had drawn attention of other Engines of Destruction, and three more descended upon Dumathoin even as the awed dao were returning to celebrate. Dumathoin was annihilated, along with the first gigantic Earthware armor, but the dao knew how to create more.

After that day, most dao enslaved by other genies rebelled or escaped, gathering together in new enclaves on Plane of Earth. The most talented dao worked further on Dumathoin’s designs, it was improved and perfected: armors gained them ability to change size, became able to change their elemental properties (by using all four types of elementals in their construction), even combine together when used by skilled pilotswearers into even more powerful forms. They produced many giant Earthware armors (now dubbed the Dumathoids in his honor) and deployed them against Engines of Destruction. The epic war between mindless gigantic monster and elementomagical-construct continues to this day in Plane of Earth, as Engines of Destruction simply respawn in the Allmother cursed pockets of darkness (now named Void Wombs) and return to mindlessly attack dao enclaves again.

Meanwhile, some of the Engines found their way to worlds of mortals, causing unprecedented amounts of death and destruction, going so far as to injuring a few deities who actually faced them in combat. These tarrasques, as mortals called them, and their ability to cause irreversible annihilation caused grave concern to all powers of the multiverse and they scrambled to learn more about the gigantic monsters. It was discovered that tarrasques required constant contact with elemental Earth to exist, which meant all Outer Planes and divine realms of deities were safe from them. But mortal worlds, being made of the stuff themselves, were not. Most deities and Outer Planar powers were content enough to leave the matter be at that point, satisfied that tarrasques didn’t pose any real danger to them. However Gruumsh was very impressed with dao’s ingenuity and badassery. He was especially a big fan of Dumathoin so he went and found the three tarrasques that devoured him, then dragged them (and a massive chunk of Plane of Earth he’d sheared off just to make certain they wouldn’t die on the way) all the way to the top of Celestia to a baffled Moradin. At his brother’s insistence, Emperor of Artifice extracted what little he could find of Dumathoin from the traces of Allmother’s essence inside the tarrasques (a dangerous thing even for King of the Mountain) and remade him as much as possible. Which wasn’t much; the newly made dao had no memories or personality of the original and couldn’t communicate in any way, it was a miracle even that little had remained. It was good enough for Gruumsh. He bestowed divinity upon new Dumathoin, took him back to Earth and charged him to continue being a massive badass and protect dao against the tarrasques.

By now, dao has managed to recognize Dumathoin as their hero. They don’t know how he came back and they don’t care either, it’s good enough. He may lack the memories or ability to communicate but his skill and bravery is intact, and he’s become by far the best user of Dumathoids. He's always at the forefront of all battles against tarrasques, the most successful when it comes to tracking them and scouting for their lairs or exploring old dao cities and strongholds. He’s not a leader among dao, the lack of communication makes him unable to lead, but is the most respected and revered figure of Plane of Earth, dao's admiration of him is borderline worship and has elevated Dumathoin to lesser godhood. He may not be worshipped or able empower clerics but he doesn’t need to either, his divinity will be innate so long as he continues protecting dao against tarrasques. Other types of genies are worried, wondering what dao and their mute war hero might do with their nigh invulnerable Dumathoids if they ever beat the Engines of Destruction permanently and retake their plane.


There you go. Y'all kept asking for this (http://68.media.tumblr.com/1a1c386498788d24cbb44bd15a09b1d7/tumblr_my3yogB14b1qdbo9eo4_1280.jpg), so have at it. Hope you're happy now. Mentioned stuff can be as scifi and/or magitech as you want. Dumo should've been a deity of Plane of Earth with that mishmash of domains anyway.

Fri
2016-12-12, 09:50 PM
*slow clap*

This is relevant to my interest.

Fable Wright
2016-12-13, 07:12 PM
Me, I'm just impressed that you've made the Tarrasque made sense. Apex predators don't have spiny armor, but vermin certainly do. And in the void that spawns the tarrasques... well, it only makes sense that there would be something bigger that forces them out to the rest of the plane.

Beneath
2016-12-14, 04:39 AM
How there came to be one and only one tarrasque per mortal world sounds like a story

Unless the story is simply "worlds that have more than one tarrasque don't have any mortals anymore". Or if the one and only tarrasque that sleeps for decades then arises somewhere else is actually multiple different tarrasques but only one shows up at a time and for some reason people think it's the same one?

falcon1
2016-12-14, 03:21 PM
How there came to be one and only one tarrasque per mortal world sounds like a story

Unless the story is simply "worlds that have more than one tarrasque don't have any mortals anymore". Or if the one and only tarrasque that sleeps for decades then arises somewhere else is actually multiple different tarrasques but only one shows up at a time and for some reason people think it's the same one?

I mean, I doubt people would notice the possibly slight anatomical difference on the giant monster that's devouring them, especially if the previous monster was badly wounded by adventurers, which would possibly explain the differences to people.

Fri
2016-12-14, 09:10 PM
For me eventhough I know they're supposed to be world ending horror there's a bit of disconnect about the danger of Tarrasque, since the internet spent so much free time bullying them (making thread about "lowest level you could take out a tarrasque" and such).

Beneath
2016-12-14, 10:29 PM
I mean, I doubt people would notice the possibly slight anatomical difference on the giant monster that's devouring them, especially if the previous monster was badly wounded by adventurers, which would possibly explain the differences to people.

That doesn't really explain why people would say it's the same one. Like it's plausible, in-world, but that doesn't mean they wouldn't go "there's another one" instead of "it's back" without some other myth to back that and/or a strong dose of wishful thinking that there's only one.

Fable Wright
2016-12-15, 12:22 AM
That doesn't really explain why people would say it's the same one. Like it's plausible, in-world, but that doesn't mean they wouldn't go "there's another one" instead of "it's back" without some other myth to back that and/or a strong dose of wishful thinking that there's only one.

"Majesty! We're getting huge amounts of magical disturbance in Duke Farlington's woods! Whatever it is, it's big, connected to elemental earth, and none of our scouts made it back alive."
"By Pelor... the stories Grandfather told are true. It's back!"

Given that there's only ever one at a time, huge intervals between appearances, low survival rates of witnesses, and very few lifeforms like it on the material plane... it's kinda illogical to immediately jump to the conclusion that there's more than one, and extremely difficult to prove otherwise. And live, that is.


For me eventhough I know they're supposed to be world ending horror there's a bit of disconnect about the danger of Tarrasque, since the internet spent so much free time bullying them (making thread about "lowest level you could take out a tarrasque" and such).

I'm just highly amused by the fact that in 5th edition, a Golem will actually just no-sell the Tarrasque indefinitely. Give one a big enough magical weapon, and it's inevitable that it will eventually take down the big T. Which pretty much fits the myth of Dumathoid perfectly, and leads to a bit of a giggle when you realize that the original golems were, in fact, suits of power armor, and that the 'clever' wizard of the group hiding in one is, in fact, just undoing the usual autonomous armor hack.

Pronounceable
2016-12-22, 04:43 AM
Did someone say Daemonic Illuminati? Cos I heard someone say Daemonic Illuminati...


Apomps (intermediate deity), the Three Sided
Domains: failure, disappointment, demodands

Disappointment is the oldest (and ultimately the only) friend of Apomps the Three Sided. As a daemon who schemed and betrayed his way to the top of the heap in Gehenna, he was finally let in on the secret of ultrodaemons: that there was no such thing as an ultrodaemon. There were no such things as greater daemons either, it was all just smoke and mirrors (aka arcane surgery and magic items). Not only were the so called “greater” daemons all just regular daemons who were canny enough to figure out the Gehennan conspiracy and blackmail or strongarm this cabal of elitist pricks into let them join, the almighty and mysterious General of Gehenna himself was just a game of tag among the conspirators to while away the eternity as they (metaphorically) grew fat upon the “taxes” they extorted out of their “lessers”. The extent of the so called greater daemons’ control over the rest was a work of art; the elegant complexity of magical, mental and surgical modifications disguised as the opaque system of Gehennan ranks and promotions, the shrewdness of calculated oppression and fetishization of greed and advancement that molded the mindset of daemonkind, the depth of emotional and psychological manipulation ruthlessly and insidiously inflicted upon one’s fellow daemon from all conceivable angles... It would’ve made any daemon burst into tears of admiration in its complete and utter daemonicness but Apomps was a perfect victim of the system. He immediately grasped the consequence of becoming a member of the secret caste: he was done, there was nothing in his future but disappointment, either eternal stagnation in luxury or a terrible downfall to irrelevancy. An existence without a potentially attainable higher station to covet was unfathomable to Apomps, he’d rather be reduced back to a mezzodaemon than join the daemonic cabal.

Of course, he’d much rather escape than either of those options, so he opted to flee Gehenna instead (he did approve of what the greater daemons were doing if it wasn’t to him though, so he wouldn’t expose them). His destination was Bytopia, for the pacifist kami wouldn’t destroy his form and send him packing back home (he hoped). The Plane of Equitable Industry also seemed like a good place for a smart and ambitious being to turn a new leaf and start to work his way up again, especially considering the weird mob rule they’d built on the principle of equality. Unfortunately for Apomps, the Bytopian Democracy was for the kami themselves only, they were completely aware how incredibly open to abuse and corruption their governing system was if any being who wasn’t literally made of goodness (with a lawful bent) was allowed to participate. So Apomps couldn’t be anything but a simple laborer (or just a hermit living in solitude) in Bytopia, as no kami would let a renegade fiend have authority over them. At least they had let him live among them (even with great mistrust), but now he was stuck. The news of his arrival in Bytopia had drawn a band of gung ho guardinals and, while they seemed to respect the hospitality kami had extended to him, the brutes of Beastlands were watching Apomps like a hawk, waiting for the slightest hint of evil (or just a moment without any kami witnesses nearby) to swoop in and smash his head. While not at all surprising, it was still disappointing.

Thus forced to spend every moment in kami company, Apomps slowly came to appreciate the sense of fairness and calm industriousness of the Bytopian exemplars. The complete lack of scheming and need for paranoia also helped to introduce him to alien concepts like peace of mind and ability to trust. The more he got used to it, the more he found his memories of Gehenna fading. The biggest blow to his old ways came when a particularly nice and tolerant kami finally gave him a chance, letting him be in charge of a small warehouse of trade goods. Apomps would forever be grateful to her and eagerly embraced his new (and modest) responsibilities to prove himself to the kami, for the cinders of his old desire for advancement was still there. And when the change came, the guardinals who’d been watching him for centuries were shocked more than he was at witnessing an exemplar transformation. A fiend had converted to a kami, an unprecedented event. Apomps became something of a celebrity overnight in the Upper Planes (in the ones that have day and night at least), he was even invited to courts of Lord Moradin and Lady Morwel as a guest of honor and showered in accolades and gifts. His old life mostly forgotten, Apomps dedicated himself to serving the kami who first trusted him, she was his idol and he would not rest until the entire Bytopia also accepted her greatness. He had unwittingly transferred his old obsessive ambition to his new heroine and, exemplar transformation being as rare as it was, nobody could notice it.

This kami was named Erathis and she really was as good as Apomps thought her. He became her closest friend and advisor, urging her to take on ever greater responsibilities and positions he knew she’d excel in. And Erathis was excellent at many things; her mastery over management, economics, diplomacy, philosophy and law, coupled with Apomps’ celebrity status and ambition, saw her elected further and further up until she became a Utopic Overseer, one of the two presidents of Bytopia. The kami were impressed with her leadership (independent of Apomps’ constant singing of praises), Erathis was very close to the ideal kami in many ways and they all loved her. When the time came for Erathis to step down, she did so despite protests from many, she was a firm believer in Bytopian Democracy and Bytopian Democracy wouldn’t have anyone to stay in power for too long. Apomps was especially against this idea, stepping down from a position of power just seemed wrong to him, but Erathis would have none of that (yet another disappointment in Apomps’ existence, even if he couldn’t remember previous ones too clearly). To make things worse, Erathis’ successor wasn’t as good as she was, prompting some widespread unrest (by Bytopian standards, which amounts to mild grumbling to any sane being). Apomps capitalized on that, lobbying for reelecting Erathis against her own wishes and it worked. Erathis was voted a Utopic Overseer as soon as her less popular successor’s term was over, which soured her friendship with Apomps. It was an acceptable price in Apomps’ eyes, who was unable to recognize it as remnants of his old daemonic ambition.

Erathis continued to be absolutely great at leading, which was a big problem as it was convincing a lot of kami that she needed to be exempt from regular limitations of Overseership, the loudest of which was obviously Apomps. Many other kami vehemently disagreed with that, Erathis included. By Bytopian standards, it (it being a heated debate that wasn’t resolved for days) was a civil war. Meanwhile, some whispers started accusing Apomps of deliberately causing trouble, his daemonic background was dredged back up after a long time, questioning the authenticity of his transformation. He was offended but this only made him louder, he genuinely believed Erathis staying permanently in power would be for the best and was gonna keep pushing for it no matter what anyone else said. This was a decidedly unkami move and only served to weaken his position. And while those rumors were eventually traced back to guardinals (whose motto was that not even a dead fiend was a good fiend) who were plotting to assassinate Apomps, by then Erathis had stepped down and was refusing to have any position of authority anymore, Apomps had also lost her friendship and trust.

He was getting pretty well acquainted with disappointment and all the stress, anger and a reignited paranoia about guardinal plots caused him to start remembering more of his daemonhood. Apomps could tell this was bad but he found some inspiration in it, he could still empower Erathis if he was smart. So he trashed his own dwelling to implicate guardinals with kidnapping (something no kami would ever think of), travelled to Material Plane in secret (something no kami would do) and started up cults that worship a benevolent goddess of civilization and law named Erathis (something no kami could even imagine). Once he had a handful of mortal cults worshipping a nonexistent deity, he warned the clergy of the great god of many things (civilization and progress among them) Olidammara about some new upstart trying to move in on their turf. As Apomps expected, it didn’t take long before servants of Olidammara showed up on Bytopia and accused Erathis of masquerading as divinity and meddling with mortals. The kami didn’t appreciate this, they were pacifists but slandering one of their most respected (ex)leaders wasn’t something to swallow, especially by some trickster god from Material. And while they were pacifists, the (recently shamed and seeking absolution) hotheaded guardinals were not, so Olidammara’s servants were sent back to him in pieces. Once Erathis, being the mature adult she is, had talked to Olidammara personally and diplomatically resolved the situation and the god of rogues had crushed all the fake cults and focused his anger on the guardinals, Apomps returned to Bytopia with a story of daemonic revenge. He’d been abducted by daemons to slander guardinals but some plucky mortal adventurers worshipping Erathis as the goddess of law had saved him from the fires of Gehenna. Apomps was in terrible shape; clearly he had been tortured by daemons and was now claiming there must’ve been something divine about Erathis to induce such a miracle and he would also worship her. Kami weren’t entirely strangers to intrigue but couldn’t possibly expect daemon level scheming from one of their own and the recent attack on beloved (ex)Overseer Erathis had reminded them how great she was, so a few others also started worshipping her as a goddess over her objections.

A small number of worshippers was enough of a tipping point, Erathis was already revered by the entire plane as an almost ideal kami and respected all over the Upper Planes for her leadership ability. She ascended as a demigoddess of leadership, law and civilization, then promptly exiled herself. She felt it wouldn’t be fair of her to participate in Bytopian Democracy anymore. Apomps tried to follow her but Erathis was suspicious of him and forbade it, handing him his greatest disappointment yet. He persevered, stayed in Bytopia and tried to spread her faith. It didn’t work too well, the kami who had held their democracy in a greater esteem than their respect for Erathis were angry for his old provocations, whereas the others were angry at him for costing them their great leader. Thus, he was ostracized again and wasn’t feeling very kami anymore. Apomps’ inner daemon was also weakening, both his ambition and industriousness had fizzled when Erathis forsook him, he was now being consumed by strange feelings (he’d later figure them out as sadness and despair).

Meanwhile Erathis found great success at attracting worshippers on Material Plane, mortals could tell she was very clearly superior to Olidammara when it came to civilization and law. Soon, she became a goddess primarily interested in Material (especially once she met Sun Father Pelor). However mortals were far more mortal compared to the kami and pretty soon she found herself becoming less good and more lawful, the rapid belief infusion was reshaping her. When Apomps realized that his idol had been converted to LN, he undergone another exemplar transformation. Not only was Apomps the first fiend ever to become a kami, he had also become the first known exemplar who has held three types. The resulting demodand was promptly captured and thrown into Tartarus by gleeful guardinals.

As he flopped onto the bottomless ocean of thick demodand slime, Apomps thought becoming a vaguely bipedal blob of vile sludge locked eternally in a foul sea was the final disappointment fate had in store for him. He learned that was wrong when he sank fully under the muck, for he was then linked to the infamous Tarterian Collective and they unanimously decided Apomps was the most pathetic, most pitiful and useless of all demodands, on account of being the only exemplar in the history of the planes who’s ever converted to one. After briefly rummaging through his memories, the Collective voted him the worst fiend ever (and not the good sort of worst) and ascended him as the god of failure and disappointment.

Apomps the Three Sided is still in the demodand sludge, slowly sinking into the infinite Tarterian Depths. He was recently informed of his idol’s eventual fate by a demodand who happened to be summoned to Material Plane for a short time and took it remarkably well (i.e. he didn’t react at all). Maybe he needs to be told again, wouldn’t surprise the Collective if he failed to get it on first try.


So here's us jumping all over the planes. And no mention of either demons or devils, I might add. Not a very useful god sadly, he's more of a vehicle for me to exposition on the planes. Also he basically has **** all to do with "canon" Apomps, except for a somewhat daemonic origin. I did warn you I was running out of deity ideas... On the bright side, I got to cram in a crapload of planescape so it's a good day. Our demodands are pretty different from the usual, as are the daemons. With any luck, they're also distinctly different from devils and demons cos, cool as it was, the old planescape was sorely lacking in imagination and had no reason whatsoever to not lump all of its fiends into a single hellspawn category.

Also no baatezu or tanarri or yugoloth or gehreleth cos that satanic scare **** was duuuumb and I refuse to acknowledge it existed on the eve of the year 2017.

Also also yeah, we got kami over there.

M Placeholder
2016-12-22, 07:26 AM
In Spelljammer, there was actually a planet which was the homeworld of the Tarrasque, and on it, Tarrasques were docile eater of rocks. On other worlds though, they were driven insane by the conditions and went on killing sprees followed by long, long slumbers.

I thought that was pretty cool.

Fri
2016-12-22, 09:16 AM
In Spelljammer, there was actually a planet which was the homeworld of the Tarrasque, and on it, Tarrasques were docile eater of rocks. On other worlds though, they were driven insane by the conditions and went on killing sprees followed by long, long slumbers.

I thought that was pretty cool.

What condition?

It's rap music isn't it? Damnit, I knew the convergent evolution of rap music among on all planet should be stopped.

Pronounceable
2016-12-23, 10:01 PM
All right dudes and dudettes of this thread. This is the first time I'm undecided between two options looking equally goodterrible. Give me some voting for it: (not that I'm gonna necessarily accept the winning vote but I'll be more likely to cram both options if voting is close)

1) That's no moon, it's a City of Brass!
2) No, no, no, that's lame and dumb and too tryhard nerd; Elemental Plane of Air/Fire is clearly the SuperKaizo World.
3) Actually, it should be X instead, that'd be totes cooler.
4) Who cares about the boring inner planes? Tell us more about devils and demons. (trick option)
(and sorry for spoiling a future terrible truth spoiler before it even took form)

...Let's all speak our minds sensibly and honestly without trying to game the system. I'm gonna leave this here for an indefinite period of time.
Also I vote 3 cos X is so much better.
Also also, no spot in any of the inner planes are gonna be anything remotely resembling the regular fake medieval DnDlands but painted red/blue/white/brown for regular dungeon crawl extravaganza DnDism soup, that's ****ing dumb. Hence, water=lovecraft and earth=kaiju.

Fri
2016-12-24, 12:09 AM
I also pick 3, X sounds cool.

Fable Wright
2016-12-25, 03:16 PM
I don't know what you're talking about with option 4; the elemental planes are amazing and get tragically under-loved. Given the Azer were commissioned from Demogorgon... well, I have to wonder why the Efreeti wanted hollow dwarves filled with fire to build their stronghold, and why they needed a moon-sized battlestation.

I also don't understand how to map Super Kaizo World onto an entire plane. Those have a purpose in level design and a way through; why would a plane just actively be designed to have one difficult-follow-path to the goal for all visitors? And how? It seems too square peg/round hole for me.

So of the two presented, City of Brass is cooler. But what I'd be more interested in general is something touching on the Astral/Deep Ethereal/Ordial Planes. These are the conduits that pump the lifeblood of belief, possibility, and (hypothetically) divine creative power, respectively, through the multiverse. How did they get there? Who's involved with them? Is the Ordial plane an actual thing, or just a hypothetical that no one originating from the prime material plane can verify the existence of? Inquiring minds must know.

Beneath
2016-12-26, 02:27 AM
Seconding city of brass or ordial plane.

Bohandas
2016-12-26, 10:55 PM
Planescape setting (which is sort of hub to every other setting imaginable).

I think that description would apply more accurately to spelljammer

Beneath
2016-12-27, 07:35 PM
Planescape's the hub, Spelljammer's the long way around. Still, probably more reliable given that portals can close/be closed at any time.

Pronounceable
2016-12-31, 08:39 AM
Me: Thread, tell me what to do.
Thread: Do this.
Me: You're not my real dad. You can't tell me what to do, I do what I want >_>


VELSHAROON (lesser deity), Archmage of Necromancy, Lichlord, Maimed God, Lord of Hollow Crypts, Traitor’s Fortune, Skull of a Thousand Faces
Domains: necromancy, undead, lichdom, betrayal, disguise, secrets, luck

The invention of necromancy didn’t go well with Giantfather Annam, who was furious with the giant wizards for desecrating bodies and souls of dead giants by mixing them up with disgusting material or spiritual remains of humanoids. And when they failed to find a way to determine a given soul’s premortem race, he banned the new branch of magic althogether. Many wizards thought this was a grave mistake and they had a point. Annam’s edict obviously didn’t matter at all to the humanoid races and they’d already gotten their hands on the secrets of necromancy thanks to the damnable Thief and were advancing rapidly. So, since Annam was usually too busy fighting off the Monster to protect coasts and ships of giantish empires, the necromancers disobeyed and continued on in secret.

One particular necromancer on Jotunheim itself was making great progress and was very to close to finding a solution to save necromancy by appeasing Giantfather, which would hopefully lead to the complete defeat of the shorties. Unluckily for him, his prodigy apprentice was greedy and treacherous. What Velsharoon saw in his master’s work was immortality instead of victory over shorties and he modified his master’s work in secret, inventing a method of binding one’s own soul to his body. The sacrificing of his master to fuel the ritual was incidental but it was the first of his many betrayals. What he didn’t expect was becoming an animated skeleton with an intact mind (dubbed lich in the following ages), he’d assumed he was getting an eternal life. Now stuck in undeath, Velsharoon had lost all the pleasures of a living body and worse, a walking skeleton was pretty conspicuous. While he could try to hide in his exmaster’s lair indefinitely, he was still on Jotunheim and his existence was a flagrant violation of Annam’s order; he was surely going to be destroyed for it if discovered. Giantfather himself would most likely absolve him (and unban necromancy too) if he knew what Velsharoon had accomplished, but Annam was off fighting the Monster as usual and the risk of being discovered before he returned was too great. This pushed Velsharoon to his second betrayal; he prayed to the Thief and offered to help humanoid races with his necromantic research in exchange for being spirited away from the giant homeworld. The Thief heard him, for he was always keeping an ear towards Jotunheim in case giants discovered new sciences or technologies to steal, and agreed.

Now free to continue his research, Velsharoon cooperated with many humanoid wizards (usually the best and the brightest) and found that, despite their small size and tiny brains, the shorties weren’t nearly as inferior to giantkind as giants believed, some were even smarter. Necromancy soon advanced and spread among the humanoids, many master necromancers among them became liches to continue their work, and the war against giants started to go in humanoids’ favor. The newly invented, more dangerous types of undead like ghouls and wights could wreak havoc on giantish armies even with the size difference and necromancy itself became a favored subject among all humanoid races. Velsharoon knew that even the Imposter, the “god” of humanoids (just how low a self esteem a god would need to demand worship from mere mortals?), approved of his work and encouraged his followers to advance necromantic research. But then one day the Imposter sudddenly disappeared and his absence made the Monster go completely out of control; the seas and coasts were now unsafe even for humanoids, almost all shores of all worlds were wracked with storms and earthquakes and nobody could even think about sailing safely. She grew worse and worse, focusing on causing the greatest destruction to giantkind instead of trying to defeat Annam like before. Without the Imposter to hold her leash, the Monster cared not even a little about collateral damage, even coastal humanoid kingdoms and empires were starting to collapse. It reached a point where even the cold and distant Giant Mother was roused to fight and the all giantish gods fighting together finally managed to capture and banish the Monster, proving that they were the masters of this plane.

The leadership of humanoids was then left to the Thief, who had no interest in leading any sort of war, and a deal was struck. In exchange for not sharing the Monster’s fate, the Thief agreed to prevent humanoid races from attacking weakened giantish civilizations further and suddenly, necromancy wasn’t such a cool and good thing anymore. Annam was still against it for mixing humanoids with giantkind, so the cowardly Thief obliged him and necromancy was banned among humanoids as well. Of course, the Thief had no intention of enforcing it either so necromancy continued on in the shadows. Velsharoon however, was quite famous as a traitor to giantkind and it didn’t take long before Giantfather sent his eldest son to deal with him. Luckily, he’d spent the years learning other types of magics as well so he managed to evade the wrath of the titans mostly intact, with only losing a hand to Stronmaus before fleeing to Astral Plane. The close call made him focus on more research, the threat of being bodily destroyed still stood between Velsharoon and immortality. He worked alone for centuries, cut off from any help or support and by the time he invented the philactery, the Imposter had reappeared. Thinking he’d be protected, Velsharoon returned to Material eagerly, certain that Pelor (Velsharoon had learned a great deal more about the nature of deities and the multiverse during his stay in Astral) would be restarting the war against giantkind and usher in a new golden age of necromancy. He was wrong. After having some sense knocked into him by his elder sibling, Pelor was now completely and utterly against all sorts of necromancy and undead for their unbreakable ties to Negative Energy. He explained to Velsharoon who the Allmother was and what a great threat necromancy posed against the entire multiverse before burning him to cinders.

Velsharoon had a lot to think about as he slowly reformed in his secret lair on Astral, grateful that Pelor had no idea about his latest discovery. He was also very lucky, as Astral was one of the very few places neither Pelor nor Moradin had any power over. In fact, as time passed and he didn't get discovered and destroyed for good, Velsharoon found that he was even luckier than he thought; thanks to the great machine of Mechanus, a whole new group of deities had popped up in Material Plane to keep both titans and Sun Father too busy to even think about him. But he still needed to be discreet, Velsharoon was too infamous a name to ever be safe anywhere in Material (also a giant walking skeleton was still just as conspicuous as it ever was). He worked some more to iron out the details of philacteries and managed to get himself a human skeleton to inhabit. Since Pelor had destroyed him, Velsharoon was officially dead. But Vecna lived! (for a given value of lived)

It didn’t turn out to be that hard to hide his identity, one human skeleton wasn’t much different from another and Vecna could easily pass as one of the many human necromancers he’d worked with back in the day. With the dominance over Material Plane in question, necromancy had become a far less important matter to deities and Vecna could continue his necromantic work with impunity, only impeded by the occasional band of plucky adventurers. Time passed and Vecna saw many mortals ascend to godhood (a much, much better way of immortality than lichdom), finally understanding why the gods of humanoids were so interested in belief and worship. By then, the imperious titans had been defeated and Jotunheim was gone, proving that the giantkind’s understanding of divinity was wrong and humanoid deities were superior. Then Vecna decided to be a god himself; how hard could it be if even mere mortal humans could ascend with a lifetime of less than a century? He spread the knowledge of necromancy, giving liches the secret of the now standard philactery, “rediscovering” the lost works of the ancient and infamous giant necromancer Velsharoon, inventing the deathknight as a modified form of lichdom for nonwizards... Vecna gained more and more infamy as the greatest necromancer of his time, using all of his cunning and firsthand knowledge lost to the ages to construct a mythical Velsharoon who all but singlehandedly invented the fundamentals of necromancy, while hunting down and destroying all of his remaining lich colleagues from the ancient wars that could possibly identify him or object to the myth he was crafting. It worked out in the end, Velsharoon was eventually accepted in wizarding circles as the sole inventor and greatest practitioner of necromancy, dubbed the Archmage of Necromancy, and Vecna was generally considered to be his "successor" and modern day equivalent.

Then came the second phase of his plan. Vecna announced far and wide that he’d found Velsharoon’s hand that had been cut off by titan Stronmaus so long ago. Using the ancient artifact, Vecna was going to ressurrect Velsharoon and together, they’d usher in a new era of terror and necromantic reign upon the worlds of mortals (mwahahahaha!!!). This caused a stir; legions of sentient undead and necromancers liked this proposed age of terror and flocked to Vecna, while pretty much everyone else disapproved. Pelor was especially unhappy about this and ordered mobilization of his church to stop the mad lich, unwisely letting Vecna enlist help from god of death Nerull (who’d have preferred to just leave mortals (and undead) to it if Pelor hadn’t intervened directly). The result was a massive war of good vs evil that devastated a world and killed hundreds of thousands. Vecna made a great show of it all; the hopes and fears of everyone involved on both sides, the bloodshed, and the divine and arcane power unleashed on the battlefields were all ultimately feeding the legend of Velsharoon and Vecna. Ultimately Vecna’s side lost and the mythical Hand of Velsharoon was destroyed, he himself was defeated in an epic confrontation by a hero who ironically severed his hand and eye.

The event became a legend known throughout the multiverse, a cautionary tale against the madness of liches and necromancers. Of course, it wasn’t too long before yet another mad lich appeared, claiming to have recovered the Hand of Vecna and Eye of Vecna from the ruined and haunted castle of Vecna. This Mellifleur was an unknown but he had the exact same idea, he was going to resurrect Vecna, and they’d find a way to reconstruct Hand of Velsharoon, and then the three of them would usher in a new era of fear and darkness. One more massive and terrible war of good vs evil later, Mellifleur was also destroyed. But rumors claimed he managed to hide Eye and Hand of Vecna before his destruction and these would go on to become the holy grail of necromancers and evil wizards everywhere. After that, a large number of liches crawled out of the woodwork on various worlds, claiming to have found a remaining piece of the infamous liches and planning to bring Vecna/Velsharoon/Mellifleur back. None of those ever amounted to much; a parade of named liches defeated by bands of adventurers became little more than footnotes, as assorted badguys who’d be into Vecna’s promised age of terror had been burned enough times that very few were buying what these mad liches were selling. There hasn’t been any other massive war of good vs evil but thanks to repetition of the same basic story all over Material Plane, the name Vecna became one of the most famous, synonymous with “bad guy” (followed by Velsharoon and Mellifleur in more learned circles). At that point, even children of most mortal worlds knew of Vecna as the spooky bad guy who’d get you if you’re bad.

It’d taken much longer than he hoped, but Velsharoon aka Vecna aka Mellifleur aka a dozen other names (while not all of the discount Vecnas were secretly the real one, a lot of the more successful ones were) finally ascended to godhood. Befitting his methods, he is a demigod of secrets and betrayal on top of necromancy. He initially revealed himself only to Nerull and Sune, assuming the patronage of the greatest rivals of Pelor would be his best defense against eventual discovery by him, and was accepted into the fold (grudgingly in Nerull’s case). But eventually, his lust for more power overcame his fear of destruction at primordial deities’ hands and he volunteered to help goddess Sune in one of her schemes. This resulted in, among other things, Velsharoon absorbing the domain of undead from the newly deposed god Myrkul with a sizable amount of divine power. Ascended to lesser godhood, Velsharoon was now safe to announce his existence to the multiverse at large. In an effort to gain large numbers of worshippers, he revealed the extent of his schemes and betrayals stretching back all the way to the lost age of giantkind (these might maybe be a bit exaggerrated though), instantly gaining enmity of countless powers of the multiverse. But he got large numbers of worshippers as well (necromancers, giants, all sorts of aspiring villains, exemplars from some Lower Planes, liches and other sentient undead), so it’s fine.

Velsharoon aka Vecna aka Mellifleur aka far too many other names is still working to advance necromancy and undeath, his only regret is that, for all his evil, he’s not hated as much as the goddess of magic Mystra, for whom he feels an inexplicable knot of twisted jealousy and desire. So far, the greater goddess has completely ignored his advances and Velsharoon fears that his strange lust for Mystra’s power and self is his “patron” Sune’s way of keeping him on a short leash and might be the end of him (as his parallels to Myrkul is disturbingly obvious).


Y'all can consider this to be your Xmas/new year present. A Secret Santa if you will, except he secretly brings death and undeath. The mad lichy god isn't as numerous as the trickster or manly war god but there were enough of those to bother me, hence we got this. Canon Myrkul is also in this category but he's got the Dark Three thing going for him. Funnily enough, canon Nerull isn't a spoopy skeleton (though he's the spoopiest skeleton of our thread here).

Also feel free to talk about the previous thing I asked further. The jury is still out on that. Also also tell me this isn't a dickbutt djinn's lair in Air (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBHOz878HAw).Tip: you can't

Fable Wright
2016-12-31, 03:41 PM
MVelsharoon aka Vecna aka Mellifleur aka far too many other names is still working to advance necromancy and undeath, his only regret is that, for all his evil, he’s not hated as much as the goddess of magic Mystra, for whom he feels an inexplicable knot of twisted jealousy and desire.

I died. :smallbiggrin:

Also, a giant walking skeleton is conspicuous, whereas something completely normal is inconspicuous. Not meaning to nitpick, but you seem to have messed up those two terms.


Also also tell me this isn't a dickbutt djinn's lair in Air.

This isn't a dickbutt djinn's lair in Air. That's a bunch of 1s and 0s modified into an abberant configuration in comparison to the normal sequence of 1s and 0s, interpolated through extraordinarily fast parallel processors to control blinking lights on a screen, the sequence of bits over time stored in a repository and shared to anyone who holds the passphrase and a device that can use said passphrase to locate the repository and cause a similar series of processors to interpolate it into a very different operating environment than it was originally recorded on, for the amusement and wonder of individual humans who recognize the achievement involved in the process.

Pronounceable
2016-12-31, 04:22 PM
you seem to have messed up those two terms.
No, it didn't happen. Nobody can prove it happened, there isn't nor has ever been such a mistake...

Pronounceable
2017-01-20, 05:00 AM
We return to our unscheduled program with the creation myth. Creation of the apocalypse is still creation, that's logic.


VAATI (primordial titan), Wind Duke of Aaqa, Last Lord of Law
Domains: law, air, aarakocra

Genie legends claim that at the end of the Dawn War, seven creatures of immeasurable power were born in Elemental Chaos, who would go on to call themselves vaati (meaning Wind Dukes in their own language). Outwardly, they would be classified as greater titans, similar to the two progenitors of giantkind on Material Plane that would come in later ages but they were also aligned to Law, making them a unique hybrid of outsider and elemental. And since even the greatest powers of the multiverse have found it completely impossible to merge aligned essences of outsiders with elemental souls, the existence of such beings has caused much debate among historians and scholars about their true origin. The prevailing theory among the scholars of primordial myths is that they were the result of the Elder Elemental Evil stirring in his unfathomable prison, although some insist it was instead the baleful will of the Allmother.

Their origin might be contested, but their impact is certain: according to oldest myths of both Inner and Outer Planar beings, vaati were collectively the greatest power that has been seen in the multiverse. They had supreme control over both elemental matter and aligned essence, making each one almost as powerful as a greater deity (none of which were around yet). As creatures of order, they were bothered by the glaring lack of symmetry in the multiverse; there were fourteen Outer Planes but only four Inners, Inner Planes were stable and static whereas Outers were floating freely and randomly around Astral, planes of pure Law and pure Chaos were lacking despite the fact that hybrid planes with mixed alignments existed, Astral and Ethereal Planes isolating the (so far unnamed) Material from other planes didn’t have the same properties, Outer Planes were full of creatures other than the exemplar races while only the four races of genies (and their mindless embryonic forms) lived in elemental planes. And worst of all, they were the only creatures made of both an alignment and an element, the fifteen other possible combinations didn’t exist and even vaati’s power couldn’t create such beings. This meant that either their existence was breaking a multiversal law or laws of the multiverse were flawed. It was unacceptable; vaati had to be destroyed. But first, they would fix all the other flaws of the planes.

In their land they called Aaqa inside Elemental Chaos, they started to construct two artifacts of apocalyptic power. Once activated, the Rod of Law and the Shard of Pure Evil would become irresistable magnets for the alignment essences that made up the Outer Planes and their denizens, drawing all of one type of aligned essence onto themselves while repelling the opposite as far as it can be pushed. This would disintegrate all Outer Planes (and their denizens) and remake the fourteen into four new planes of pure Law, Chaos, Good and Evil. Thus, a symmetry would be established between Inner and Outer Planes and the biggest multiversal flaw would be fixed.

Meanwhile in Outer Planes, yet another battle was raging in the borderlands where Arborea and the Abyss were tangled into each other. A massive army of demons were, as usual, trying to climb out and spread into the multiverse and eladrin warriors were pushing them back into the gaping pit. But this specific army of demons was led by one called Miska (later dubbed WolfSpider in legends), who was suffering from a particular malady: he was hearing a song that was pleading him to go to Prime Universe that no one else could hear. While a demon hearing nonexistent voices wasn’t too strange, claims of such demons never stayed consistent for long. Yet Miska was determined and also one of the most powerful demons of his time, he’d gathered himself one of the largest demonic armies to assault Arborea and he was fully committed to obeying the voice in his head. Eladrin eventually pushed them back as always, dashing the demons to pieces on the jagged rocks leading down to their Abyss. But Miska himself had managed to fight through eladrin ranks, sacrificing every last one of his flunkies to push through Arborea and reach a portal to Astral by himself and then disappeared.

As far as the dwellers of Outer Planes knew, the multiverse ended with the inaccessable void beyond Astral, said to be the original universe created first by the Allmother. That’s where Miska was headed and it’s completely unknown how he managed to reach it or what he did once there. When he came back, he’d gained inexplicable and unprecedented magical powers (one of which was an ability to create his own portals to travel among the planes). He’d become something much more strange than a mere demon, something identified only much later when the primordial deity siblings emerged, the very first of its kind in the whole of multiverse: a cleric. He visited every Outer Plane one by one using his strange and terrifying new magical powers, praising the Queen of Chaos who dwelt in “the shadows beyond the darkness”. According to Miska, he had been knighted by this Queen, the most grand and terrible being of the multiverse and tasked to destroy the Wind Dukes of Aaqa, a dire threat to existence itself. The only problem was that no outsider had ever heard of her before or had any idea what Aaqa was or who its dukes were, but Miska’s newfound zeal was such that all manner of beings fell under his sway and became his followers. In a very short time he had gained an army that contained members of every exemplar race, even a number of pacifist and peaceful kami from Bytopia had joined him to fight these unknown Wind Dukes. An army like that had never existed before and would never exist again, making the legend of Miska the WolfSpider one of the most well known in all the planes. He then led his army to Inner Planes where both exemplars and genies were surprised to discover that previously unknown things lived beyond the great blackness of Prime Universe. Then Miska, still being a demon, ordered the attack and a most epic but largely pointless battle started.

It was during this battle that Wind Dukes of Aaqa left Elemental Chaos with their artifacts in hand to enact their plan. They found a massive and chaotic battle raging in their way, for some of Miska’s fiendish forces had decided to turn on their celestial allies and efreeti and djinni had also decided to continue their eternal war in the middle of an invasion. So vaati waded in, attacking genie and outsider alike, trying to put an end to the untidy mess. And they were winning handily too, until Miska finally made his move. Claiming that the voice of his Queen was guiding him, Miska attacked one of the vaati in the chaos. This happened to be the one carrying the Shard of Pure Evil and Miska managed to grab the artifact and use it. Of course, vaati had placed safeguards just in case and it also was meant to be activated on Astral so it could remake the Outer Planes. The Shard exploded and the result was apocalyptic. It ripped apart all the outsiders, completely destroying Miska and his army by scattering their aligned essences; it was the first time in history outsiders died and didn’t respawn in their homeplanes. It sent shockwaves throughout the multiverse, alerting the five primordial deity offspring of Overmothers that something other than the Dawn War was happening outside their shelter. The apocalyptic artifact was supposed to fuel itself by consuming some of the Evil essence it would draw from all the Outer Planes, but its pull couldn’t pass through Ethereal. So, after consuming the Evil essence of all fiends in Miska’s army, it drained the entire Plane of Fire as fuel, leaving behind a black emptiness full of ash, smoke and bits of smoldering metal where eternal fires once burned. Vaati appeared to be completely destroyed as well. Miska had done as his Queen bid and sacrificed himself (and countless others) to stop Wind Dukes of Aaqa, proving the power of faith in mysterious higher forces. Unfortunately for outsiders, that wasn’t the end of it.

Genies were furious at outsiders and wanted revenge for Plane of Fire turning into a burnt out husk. It was the efreeti who found and studied the Rod of Order, figuring out how to use it safely, while djinni were the ones to invent astral projection magics that was going to let them reach the planes of their enemies. Working together for the first and last time, genies of Air and Fire activated the Rod of Order in Astral to unleash the greatest cataclysm the multiverse had yet seen. Twelve out of fourteen Outer Planes were devastated, all exemplar races except Hadean hags and Elysian angels suffered massive casualities as the essences of Law and Chaos ripped away from them and their planes, and coalesced into opposing planes of Nirvana and Limbo (to be named Plane of Unimperiled Thought and Plane of Willpower later). Both would have kept draining essences of Law and Chaos from everywhere else until they wholly consumed everything in Astral if angels and hags weren’t the most rational and practical of all exemplars. The two outsider races and their home planes were unaffected thanks to being free of Law or Chaos and they were able to cooperate without turning on each other at the earliest opportunity (multiverse was lucky that Elysians+Hadeans was possibly the only combination of fiends and celestials who could’ve done that). A great force of famously willful angels entered Limbo to scour the plane and look for whatever was creating it, while a similarly massive force of hags known for their mutability went into Nirvana. Hags found the Rod of Order and managed to deactivate it, halting the growth of the new planes and putting an end to the slow and steady genocide of other exemplars. At the end, discounting the massive damage to Outer Planes themselves, about a quarter of all outsiders had been irrevocably destroyed by the Rod of Order and remaining ones owed their survival to hags of Hades. Later on, they would secretly return to Nirvana and break the Rod into seven pieces to smuggle it out instead of completely destroying it like they claimed they had, which would get Hades conquered by the greedy daemons looking for it in the following ages (a typical display of fiendish gratitude).

A quarter for a quarter was fitting revenge in genies’ opinion and they quietly retreated back to Inner Planes to continue their own war. Limbo and Nirvana became new territories to be squabbled over and captured, as no new types of exemplars emerged to claim them. Ages passed and the chaotic nature of Limbo repelled all attempts to permanently settle, whereas Nirvana was deemed no outsider’s land by edict of the sons of Overmothers, who had no intention of letting any exemplar tamper with the great machine of Mechanus. Thus Limbo was abandoned and Nirvana became a land for mortal races strong enough to reach there and stake claims.

One such mortal race is the birdlike bipeds calling themselves aarakocra (who everyone else just calls birdmen on account of it being a ****ing stupid name). They worship the Wind Dukes of Aaqa as their creators, which immensely pisses off the outsiders with long memories and they’re hunted down and destroyed every time they leave Nirvana. Their local enemies, the insectoid formians, enjoy much material support from fiends and celestials alike, who would like nothing more than to see the birdmen eradicated. Yet they survive; birdmen have the power to summon mindless elemental spirits and not murderously infuriate them, an ability normally only possessed by their evolved genie brethren. Obedient elementals aren’t the only thing that stands between birdmen eyries and all the formian attacks, mortal mercenaries and the occasional vengeful genie various outsiders send their way either. They’re ingenious creatures and have invented many strange and wondrous machines that run on mindless elementals’ power, creating one of the most technomagically advanced societies in the planes. Armored war machines, flying ships, cannons and rayguns are staples of birdmen arsenal and the envy of other mortals who encounter them.

Birdmen and their power over elementals are considered proof that vaati weren’t destroyed and are hiding somewhere in Nirvana. The truth of the matter is that only a single one remains and he’s crippled, which is why he needs the birdmen to act for him. His worshippers regularly go on expeditions, scouring the multiverse for the Rod of Order. Even armed with their wondrous steampunk tech, armies of birdmen are no match for exemplar races and they die in droves to obey the Last Lord of Law. The occasional birdmen who tire of dying for Vaati’s goals and try to make a living somewhere else inevitably get destroyed by his numerous enemies, so he’s pretty certain birdmen will be successful in their search at some point. The Lord of Celestia did an all right job arranging the planes but his vision was tainted by empathy and he didn’t go far enough, the multiverse is still too messy and asymmetrical. Once all pieces of the Rod of Order returns to him, Vaati will be able to restore his power and hopefully recreate his fellow Dukes so the great ordering can continue. Afterwards, aarakocra will also need to be destroyed like the rest of their kind; the everchanging individuality of mortals cannot be allowed to taint existence with their inherently chaotic nature, but they make good servants for the time being and their continued worship should eventually ascend Vaati to divinity. Maybe then he’ll be able to create the fifteen missing hybrids of elements and alignments and won’t have to kill himself in the end, but that’s not a primary concern. The Wind Duke of Aaqa will stop at nothing or let himself be destroyed until a proper symmetry is established in the multiverse.


Wind Dukes of Aaqa and Queen of Chaos is one of those oldest school DnD things that were mostly forgotten later on. Being sick as I am of law=good chaos=bad crap, I flipped this omelette. I know it wasn't such a lame cliche back in the day but don't care. Also birdmen with their dumb name was yet another of those dime a dozen weird DnD critters without much purpose, so they got repurposed. Maybe this is a strange match but human(oid)s with steampunk is another of those things getting kinda old at this point, so I'll say this omelette is fresh. Birdmen in clockwork tophats with retractable monocles packing lightning shooters is neat and original (at least originaler than elves and dwarves with the same). The primordial myths part might've been kinda indulgent here, deviating far too much from the actually gameable part (birdmen). Hopefully it's somewhat interesting and a nod to the old old school DnD.

In other news, it's been far too hard to find a proper individual being to build the writeup of Cities of Brass for. But it's gonna happen, cos I'm now angry at it.

Beneath
2017-01-28, 05:34 PM
It sounds like the primordial deities emerged in the middle of this story, but it's not clear where

Also, was Mishka a cleric of Shar?

Pronounceable
2017-01-29, 05:09 AM
^ They came out after the fracas.
And Queen of Chaos may or may not be Shar. We don't know. Tho I hope not, she's popped up from almost under every rock.

So this took a stupidly long time and I'm angry at it. Turns out it's incredibly hard to reach a predetermined point when you have nothing but not be regular DnD about it.


IMIX (elemental lord), Prince of Elemental Fire
Domains: fire, tyranny

The enmity between djinni and efreeti is eternal and undying and even they themselves don’t remember how or why it started. Maybe Fire and Air were mutually the easiest elemental planes for them to raid, as it’s so much harder to maintain a long campaign inside Water or Earth, but such questions are pointless; the unimaginably long time both races have spent raiding and enslaving one another is reason enough to continue raiding and enslaving. Being immortals, neither side is able to destroy their enemies and theirs have been a war of enslavement as a result. At this point, the existence of a single efreet or djinn left who hasn’t been captured, enslaved, liberated, recaptured and reliberated a few times in the countless raids and counter raids between Fire and Air is suspect.

Slavery plays a cruicial role in djinn and efreet societies, an individual’s worth is measured in their ability to capture and control slaves. Lacking any need for labor thanks to mindless elementals they can dominate in great numbers, the purpose of djinn/efreet slaves is to be “worthy”, which means looking pretty and strong and skilled to make their owners look even better. This makes arrogance, showboating and largerthanlifery the main pastimes of djinni and efreeti (discounting the slavery/liberation raids of course), even while they’re enslaved themselves, as being worthier leads to better treatment by owners (until eventual rescue by their fellows). Genies of Water and Earth would show their disdain for this by calling their lands Planes of Ham and Cheese, if such terms existed in genie lexicon.

The importance of slavery is such that even regular chain of command among genies of Air and Fire are considered to be a softer type of slavery (one not enforced by being bound to rings and lamps and bottles and all sorts of other implausible items) and disobedience to superiors isn’t well regarded; each djinn or efreet is technically a slave to the chieftain of the tribe, who are slaves to lords powerful enough to subjugate multiple tribes and so on all the way to the top. As a result, the Grand Sultan of Efreeti and the Grand Caliph of Djinni are considered to be the owners of all of their kind. This means capturing them would symbolically mean capturing their entire race, a theoretical end to the war. Of course, both have been captured, repeatedly. Djinni get around this problem by one of the advisors of the Grand Caliph revealing that he was the one pulling the strings all along and the one captured was just a puppet. Such an event will always be the turning point in the war, as the time for subtlety has passed and now their true ruler can finally act with impunity and the retaliation on efreeti will be fearsome indeed (this promised victory never seems to happen for some reason). So, according to the noble djinni who control Plane of Air, the rulership of djinnkind is (and has always been) an everlengthening line of puppets serving the cunning and ineffable mastermind behind 777 proxiespatsies (which has been known to loop in on itself, as previously captured and liberated ex Grand Caliphs have turned out to be the real mastermind behind the latest patsy who got captured on a few occasions, only to be revealed as a double bluff upon their subsequent capture and the true real mastermind’s emergence). Efreeti call this bull**** and consider themselves to have already won the war for capturing the Grand Caliph the first time; they just have to keep fighting because djinni are being sore losers and spouting this dumb crap to refuse admitting their defeat. Djinni’s multiple claims to have captured the Grand Sultan are all fake too, for the Grand Sultan of Efreeti is none other than the First Servant of Prince Imix the Master of Elemental Fire, determined and supported by His will alone. Great Prince Imix sees all and knows all, his divine foresight guides efreetkind and he can be trusted to choose the greatest efreet as the Grand Sultan, him always picking a new one minutes before a previous one gets captured by djinni is mere coincidence but means their enemies have never captured their ruler. Djinni call this bull**** because of course they would, the liars.

Great Prince Imix dwells inside the great temple of the City of Brass, which also houses the palace of the Grand Sultan. Like its lesser cousins, the City of Brass is one massive settlement built on the inside of an astronomically significant sphere of ashbrass, an implausible metal that cannot cool down, a material crafted by efreeti blacksmiths from the burnt out ashes of Plane of Fire itself. The efreeti have done remarkably well for themselves for a post apocalyptic society whose homeplane was virtually destroyed in an ancient catastrophe, inventing the ashbrass and building massive and mobile pressure cookers with it to comfortably live off of the heat from their fire elemental herds (although being immortal and incredibly powerful probably helped). Of all the ashbrass vaults, the City of Brass is the biggest and most heavily defended, containing millions of caged fire elementals to protect thousands of its efreeti dwellers from the bitter cold and dizzying ash storms of the ruined Plane of Fire. On top of the traditional defenses, archalchemists of the Grand Sultan have constructed what they call the Scorn of Imix, a strange and massive artifact (said to be modeled after the mythological Rod of Order) that can shoot a ray of magical cold (technically heat drain) strong enough to freeze a Material planet solid, with an adjustable portal to target anything they might want to hit inside their plane. This is strictly for defending the City of Brass against djinni and other extraplanar invaders and has nothing at all to do with keeping smaller ashbrass vaults in line and obedient to the Grand Sultan, nope.

Another vital use of ashbrass for efreeti is the construction of travel vessels. While vaults can move, they’re slow and a method to move from one to another without exposure to elements (so to speak) is needed and the risk of collision would be too high for them to approach physically. The cold, winds, floating char and ash, freak lightning storms, smoke and poisonous fumes of Plane of Fire won’t seriously hurt any efreet but they don’t like such conditions and none of those bother djinni in the slightest, which is why ashbrass vehicles usually come armed with various elemental weaponry and detection spells. Power of these vehicles are usually proportional to the number of efreeti it’s meant to carry and there’s a wide range of them from light, single efreet boxes to heavily armed warships carrying hundreds of efreeti soldiers into Air raids. Each ashbrass vault has its own fleet of vehicles to protect it (the biggest of which is obviously in the City of Brass), for it’s usually not worth the effort to arm and armor structures as massive as the vaults directly.

Due to the endless demand for ashbrass, brasssmithing has become the most lucrative and prestigious industry in Plane of Fire (just after slavery) and, as can be expected, the City of Brass is where the biggest bulk is produced. The Grand Sultan even paid for an entire new mortal race called azer to be created by the infamous demon prince Demogorgon to work ashbrass forges, for the demand was so much that efreeti brasssmiths weren’t enough to keep up. But space inside the City of Brass is limited and cannot be increased due to the impossibility of building on ashbrass once it’s set, so only the strongest, richest and “worthiest” of efreeti can live there and it has become a haven of arrogance and self satisfaction even beyond regular efreeti communities. By the decree of Imix, some parts of the City near the “docks” were modified to let nonefreeti survive (if uncomfortably) and conduct trade with mortals and outsiders, and even those relatively small parts are enough for the City of Brass to be considered one of the greatest cities of the planes. More conservative efreeti don’t appreciate this but word of Imix is the law, above and beyond even the Grand Sultan. High efreet society knows they cannot be an isolated island if they are to beat Sigil, Hestavar or Dis in wealth, no matter how self satisfied they act in public. The power from mindless elementals and slave labor of azer is more than good enough to let every efreet in the City of Brass live like mortal kings off the ashbrass trade but obviously that’s not enough, the Grand Sultan and his or her court need to be the richest and greatest in the multiverse. While all efreeti living outside are unhappy about the tyrannical rule of the City’s elite, there isn’t enough resentment for some sort of rebellion against the Sultan (yet) and djinni is a constant danger to smaller vaults and travelling vehicles.

All Grand Sultans are quite happy with the absolute rule and ultimate decadence but aware that an air of confidence and power is always needed to cow challengers, which is why they regularly go on tours, visiting other ashbrass vaults and sometimes even joining in skirmishes against djinni to show what a badass he or she is. And not ever risking capture would invite a coup too, for all noble efreet recognize the greed of their fellows and the need to give them at least the appearance of hope. Being a slave to Imix doesn’t really bother the Grand Sultan either, on account of the massive creature of infinite fire occasionally paraded around the City being just a divinely touched mindless elemental gifted to an ancient predecessor by the Sun Father as a sign of goodwill. Being the Grand Sultan of Efreeti is one of the cushiest jobs around and none of them ever get the urge to rock the boat. While Pelor didn’t expect his peace offering meant to reignite Plane of Fire be used instead to create an ironclad tyrannical rule, he’s not overly bothered by it either. If the rulers of efreeti want to keep huddling in tiny metal boxes instead of restoring the lost glory of their plane like Pelor’s own little corner of it, that’s no radiance off his nose. He’s busy with Material and mortals, what notoriously defiant genies do in their own time is none of his business.


Evil empire, ancient secrets, spaceships, brewing rebellion, alien invaders, got all the requisite components I believe. So we're officially 3 for 3 nonDnDist elemental planes. I'd be happier if this hadn't taken so damn long to solidify and it kinda comes off as trying wayy too hard. But it was either this or Astral/Spelljammer and those have already been DnD space for a long time.

Also Dumathoids and ashbrass fleets shouldn't mix. Crossing the streams isn't good. There's a reason different genres are separate.

Fri
2017-01-29, 06:54 AM
Okay, that's pretty amazing. I don't really need to quote the best parts, but I'll do it anyway for easier linking to my fellows.


Slavery plays a cruicial role in djinn and efreet societies, an individual’s worth is measured in their ability to capture and control slaves. Lacking any need for labor thanks to mindless elementals they can dominate in great numbers, the purpose of djinn/efreet slaves is to be “worthy”, which means looking pretty and strong and skilled to make their owners look even better. This makes arrogance, showboating and largerthanlifery the main pastimes of djinni and efreeti (discounting the slavery/liberation raids of course), even while they’re enslaved themselves, as being worthier leads to better treatment by owners (until eventual rescue by their fellows). Genies of Water and Earth would show their disdain for this by calling their lands Planes of Ham and Cheese, if such terms existed in genie lexicon.


The importance of slavery is such that even regular chain of command among genies of Air and Fire are considered to be a softer type of slavery (one not enforced by being bound to rings and lamps and bottles and all sorts of other implausible items) and disobedience to superiors isn’t well regarded; each djinn or efreet is technically a slave to the chieftain of the tribe, who are slaves to lords powerful enough to subjugate multiple tribes and so on all the way to the top. As a result, the Grand Sultan of Efreeti and the Grand Caliph of Djinni are considered to be the owners of all of their kind. This means capturing them would symbolically mean capturing their entire race, a theoretical end to the war. Of course, both have been captured, repeatedly. Djinni get around this problem by one of the advisors of the Grand Caliph revealing that he was the one pulling the strings all along and the one captured was just a puppet. Such an event will always be the turning point in the war, as the time for subtlety has passed and now their true ruler can finally act with impunity and the retaliation on efreeti will be fearsome indeed (this promised victory never seems to happen for some reason). So, according to the noble djinni who control Plane of Air, the rulership of djinnkind is (and has always been) an everlengthening line of puppets serving the cunning and ineffable mastermind behind 777 proxiespatsies (which has been known to loop in on itself, as previously captured and liberated ex Grand Caliphs have turned out to be the real mastermind behind the latest patsy who got captured on a few occasions, only to be revealed as a double bluff upon their subsequent capture and the true real mastermind’s emergence).

Beneath
2017-01-29, 04:30 PM
Does the city of brass, by any chance, have an exhaust port that a one-genie ashbrass ship could drop something in to cause it to turn the Scorn of Imix on itself?

Pronounceable
2017-02-05, 01:32 PM
Does the city of brass, by any chance, have an exhaust port that a one-genie ashbrass ship could drop something in to cause it to turn the Scorn of Imix on itself?
Nobody would be dumb enough to let that sort of flaw pass.It probably explodes inexplicably when the chief engineer is beaten by a group of 4-6 plucky mortals in the furnace room and falls into it.
Y'all will see this is a very slim picking. That said, it's good. Better idea than the previous one, that was seriously trying wayyy to hard to be nerdouty imo.


CEGILUNE (hag)
Domains: evil, corruption, soul larvae

The Gray Wasting is generally called the Hadean welcome. A horrible soul disease that immediately afflicts every being within the Plane of Degradation, its main function is to foster selfishness and lubricate the slippery slope toward damnation. Nothing with any kind of soul is immune; even undead, constructs or Hades’ own exemplars suffer its ravages. It starts hurting immediately, causing any afflicted creature to feel unmatched agony as their bodies visibly rot and weaken. No forms of natural or magical cure or remedy exists and the only way to stop the pain and reverse the rotting without immediately leaving Hades is to inflict pain and abuse on others. Moreover, the Gray Wasting seems to have a mind of its own and somehow senses the precise intent behind actions of its victims and rewards the afflicted with recovery proportional to the amount of their enjoyment of the evil they commit. Someone who reluctantly inflicts pain solely out of self preservation is given mere seconds of respite from the agony and a short pause to the rotting, whereas an evil being who enjoys harming others and would do it for fun even if it didn’t have to gets restored fully and feels pretty great.

According to histories, the bizarre soul disease appeared shortly after the great Mechanus started sending souls of dead mortals to Lower Planes. As hags say, Hades used to be a pretty great pit of joylessness and apathy back then but now it’s the best hell that exists. For there’s plenty of victims for them all in the form of soul larvae, the souls of evil mortals that get sent to Hades after they die and transform into tiny and helpless wormy beings that can do nothing but squirm and eternally feel the rotting pain of the Gray Wasting. Soul larvae are absolutely everywhere inside Hades, writhing all over the place in a strangely offending manner, making it extremely hard for visitors to resist the urge to simply grab one and squeeze it a little to make their own pain stop. Hags (and other fiends who visit) have no qualms about that, of course, and the nourishing effects of the Gray Wasting grants all fiendish exemplars a great deal of temporary power (similar to what Positive Energy does for mortals, except the Gray Wasting doesn’t kill fiends from Evil overdose).

The true deviousness of the Gray Wasting is its inability to kill or completely disable its victims, no being will ever be rendered too weak to hurt a nearby soul larva. And since anything killed/destroyed while afflicted by it transforms into a soul larva and respawns elsewhere in the infinite gray desolation, Hades has a very high conversion rate on the good aligned beings unlucky enough to get stuck inside. After all, what kind of idiot would choose an eternity of inescapable damnation over just hurting a few evil (and fugly) souls (who most likely deserved it anyway)? And why not enjoy yourself a little to hasten the recovery and lessen the amount of evil you’re gonna need to commit, you’ll just have to hurt a larger number of larvae to regain enough strength to escape the horrid plane if you’re too reluctant about it after all.

Thanks to the Gray Wasting, Hades has become by far the greatest bastion of Evil in the multiverse. It’s the most dangerous and horrifying plane for mortals and/or beings of good alignment, neither temptations of devils nor tortures of demons have done a thousandth of a good job as the Gray Wasting in converting others to Evil. It is also the place to make people and/or things disappear, since transforming them into a soul larvae is the most reliable way of permanently getting rid of an exemplar outside of mucking about with Plane of Negative Energy (which has a habit of backfiring catastrophically). This has become the basis of the infamous Blood War, as devils (and much rarely demons) bring their captives over to Hades for execution, secure in the knowledge that they’re not coming back after this.

The conspiracy theorists are correct every once in a while, and the apparent sentience of the Gray Wasting is one of those times. The horrific disease does have a mind and its name is Cegilune. The long forgotten twin of Dominus Infernus was the only one he trusted to be a reliable jailor for the great god Laduguer; the only devil he could trust to not be tempted by all the wealth and power Gray Protector could offer for his release. He was right too, Cegilune was the most dedicated and idealistic (for a given value of idealism) devil Inferno had ever spawned, her belief in supremacy of Lawful Evil was even greater than Asmodeus’. Therefore she had no intention of usurping her brother’s place and Laduguer’s offers of a bigger and better Ruby Rod for her fell on deaf ears. But the archdevil twins had made one mistake; they wanted to extort more of his divine knowledge and skill to strengthen Infernal Hierarchy. So Cegilune came to Laduguer’s prison often, talking at length about what was going on in the planes and how his father was failing to make any headway in the war against Chaotic Evil. She was doing her best trying to trick or goad him into coming up with new ideas for tools of oppression for devils to utilize. As centuries passed, Cegilune lowered her guard and became complacent in her jailkeeping duties, for Laduguer appeared despondant and didn’t seem to have any motivation left to do anything. But no matter how dedicated she was to her duties, a mere exemplar’s mind was nothing compared to a great deity descended from Overmothers and she failed to recognize the act and was overplayed. Wasn’t Laduguer’s fall from those heights to such a lowly prison proof of Law’s folly? Didn’t even the infinite divine might of Moradin fail against Chaos and only brought misery and corruption to his celestial followers? Bit by bit, doubts were planted in the archdevil’s mind and, on the day Mechanus came online, Lord Determinant broke free of his prison and turned the tables on her.

Roles reversed, Cegilune recognized that she’d failed in her duty and deserved to be punished. Laduguer however, had a different idea in mind. He convinced her that over the centuries they’d spent together, he’d grown fond of her and renounced Law and she could do the same as well. Not accustomed to either failure or doubt, archdevil Cegilune knew she deserved eternal punishment for her epic failure but was familiar with the fate of failed devils and wanted no part of it. With a little nudge from Laduguer’s divine power, she changed. By turning her back on Law, she was transformed into a Hadean exemplar. It (now bereft of a gendered identity as an amorphous pile of mutable flesh) joined Laduguer who promised a new future and purpose cause and left Inferno.

The new purpose she was promised came in the form of a massive machine, not quite on the scale of Mechanus but closest anyone has ever came, hidden in a secret demiplane orbiting Hades. Gray Protector had been mentally designing it ever since he’d heard of the great machine his father was constructing from Cegilune and it didn’t take him long to build once he was free. He sealed Cegilune inside and the machine modified and ground its evil essence into a functionally infinite number of infinitesimal motes. Then it (in a manner of speaking) hacked into the (metaphysical) soul delivery channels of Mechanus to spray Cegilune all over the souls of judged mortals coming in from Nirvana. It infected the Hadean petitioners, transforming them all into soul larvae before they even reached their destination, then spread onto the entire plane from them. The last thing Cegilune’s conscious mind heard was Laduguer’s assurance that she had now become the instrument of Abyssal destruction she and her brother had always wanted from him. The hidden machine of the Barrens of Doom and Despair (as Laduguer calls the obscured demiplane he filled with the wildest nonexemplar outsider critters he could get his hands on) is still working, scooping up errant bits of Cegilune’s virulent soulbits from Hades and respraying them onto incoming petitoners, making sure Infernal Hierarchy has a reliable way of eliminating demons en masse to curtail the cancerous growth of the Abyss (as Lord Determinant charged them to do so long ago). It’s not entirely certain what Dominus Infernus knows about the whole thing, but Laduguer thinks he’d probably approve too.


As for Cegilune, it might be functionally dead but is still instinctually devoted to Evil. It managed to co-opt the Gray Wasting into a tool of conversion and has even started to steal excess power of the exemplars she’s transforming into soul larvae. This allowed it to slightly reconstruct its shattered mind, becoming a sort of faux ghost haunting Laduguer’s machine and demiplane. While in a state of dreamlike coma so far, its sentience slowly grows and it’s not impossible that one day it’ll wake up and there’s no telling what sort of control it’ll have over the Gray Wasting or the Barrens of Doom and Despair then. Laduguer wasn’t expecting that and is afraid that Cegilune might become a greater goddess overnight with mastery over the Gray Wasting, one even mightier than him. So he spreads false information about various riches hidden in the Barrens, drawing various beings to vandalize nonessential parts of the machine to force Cegilune to spend its power on repairs instead of restoring more of its mind. It’s too good of an asset to give up, so Laduguer has made the hard decision of letting it continue for the greater good (or rather Law).


NotSauron#64789 is back! Even I wasn't expecting that. I tried for hours to write up a philosophers' football kinda deal with the famous succubi queens/rulers (surprise surprise, there's like half a dozen of those in DnD). They even made up a sufficiently stupid* name for it in DnD canon. Hageater Cegilune was gonna be the one whose position was violent conversion at swordpoint, others would have different ideas about best way of embodying evil, all ending up with Malchanthet winning (by quislinging it up with daemons obviously). Alas it didn't work.

BUT! You can assume something like that happened in the background anyway, I even have them pegged as Lynkhab the Lady of Sighs (apathy and sloth), Xinivrae the Mistress of Twisting Flesh (pain/bodily horror), Shami the Forbidden Princess (depravity+sexytimes), Red Shroud the Matron of the Poisonous Reach (moral corruption) and Malchanthet the Queen of Collaborators (**** you, got mine). Feel free to use or disregard these amorphous blobs of evil shaped like hot chicks that rule parts of Hades.

Instead I made this after noticing the word gray. It's like ...of X and Darkness thing, I seem to find best ideas from randomly noticing commonalities among words or concepts.
Also, even after what I did here, Gray Protector still totally sounds like a condom brand. Guess there's no helping that.


*War of Ripe Flesh

Pronounceable
2017-02-10, 03:17 PM
Is it me or does the thread really not care overmuch about the denizens of Outer Planes? Odd that the exemplar stuff don't get much commentary, considering how much bloat there is in regular DnD canon about devils and demons.


GORELLIK (greater guardinal), Lord of the Laughing Hunt, the Loner
Domains: hunting, savagery, protection

Exemplars of Beastlands loathe animals. The nonsentient, weak, mortal beasts are nothing but a twisted mockery of the guardinal form, even down to names of their types; discourtesy of Pelor the Knockoff Father, who’s never created a single original thing in his existence despite his smug proclamations of creatorhood. The ethnocentric bitches of Material Plane make it even worse, calling the guardinals “ascended” forms of the mere dumb beasts they’re accustomed to seeing, as if resembling humanoids (aka bargain bin giants) was something that could be called an ascension. And it’s not like they’ve evolved to resemble those uppity mortals; exemplars of Beastlands had existed since the Dawn War, they were bipedal creatures of fur, tooth and claw long before any of the mortal losers or their miserable mudballs were made. Which is why Hyena Commander Gorellik’s refusal to slaughter the race of gnolls he unwittingly sired is generally considered to be the worst betrayal in Beastlands history and led to his exile and subsequent fall.

After suffering grievous injuries in a battle with fiends, Gorellik was forced to flee through a portal to Material Plane to avoid capture and was accosted by a pack of hyenas on some mortal mudball. The dumb scavenger beasts feasted on the defenseless guardinal’s form, painfully stealing bits of his essence. Unexpectedly, this caused them to grow smarter and stronger and pretty soon, the hyenas started to mutate. They quickly evolved into upright and bipedal creatures with a crude intellect and warlike disposition, becoming the first members of the gnoll race. Gorellik was apalled at first but then a strange feeling of magnanimousness and pride overcame him even as they brought more and more hyenas to gnaw on his wounded body. Growing more sentient by the minute, gnolls started to worship him as a god and Gorellik started to teach them in the ways of tool use. Gnolls proved to be cunning hunters, skilled in ambushes and traps and in less than a decade, the first gnoll tribe became a unique race of bestial mortals. Gorellik was mildly troubled about their tendency to hunt and eat humanoids but only on the numbers front, gnolls were very few and could easily be exterminated if they angered the mortals they shared their planet with. But then a rescue party from Beastlands finally tracked him down and a strike team of guardinals came to take him back home.

They weren’t happy about the gnolls. They demanded Gorellik kill them all and cleanse the multiverse of these half celestial mongrels, for these were an even worse insult to guardinaldom than regular animals or weird double knockoffs of Feywild. He refused. And when they tried to kill the gnolls themselves, Gorellik fought them on grounds of the guardinal motto of protecting the weak from the strong. He hadn’t risen to command of all hyena guardinals for nothing and, even with his unhealed wounds, managed to destroy his ex rescuers. Respawning back in Beastlands, the guardinal strike team brought the news of Gorellik’s critters to Lion Marshall Talisid. As the most gung ho member of a race of beings renowned for being triggerhappy barbarians, Talisid was immediately enraged and vowed to put an end to this travesty. He swiftly travelled to the mortal mudball in question with an entourage of whoever he could find on the way. Gorellik, who knew his brethren well, knew this would be coming and had sent gnolls through Yggdrasil’s roots on their world, for the Great Tree of Worlds is the planar pathway that touches all places where life exists and, unlike the River Styx, protects all travellers from harm or pursuit while on it. Which was an even bigger affront to guardinals of course, for it was them who planted Yggdrasil at the dawn of time and cultivated its growth throughout the ages, to have a method of safely traversing the multiverse to confront evil wherever it might appear. Upon facing Gorellik yet not seeing any of these gnolls, Lion Marshall knew they were on the Tree of Worlds and it would protect the abominable mongrel creatures from their deserved punishment, as it protects all that seek shelter among its branches. Infuriated, Talisid attacked Gorellik personally and tore him to shreds. Hyena Commander was powerful but no match for the Guardian of Guardinals, he took a beating even worse than the one that started everything but Talisid was careful to not kill him, he didn’t want the traitor to respawn back in Beastlands and risk losing his trail.

While he eventually tired out and calmed down (and felt he might’ve gone a bit too far in anger), Talisid had gone berserk in front of too many powerful guardinals and backing off now would be seen as a grave lack of decisiveness and weaken his position as the commander of commanders, for right made might in Beastlands and how could someone be right if their opinions changed with the wind? So Talisid ordered Gorellik dragged back to Beastlands and imprisoned, he was not to be finished off and kept in perpetually painful injuries until his wrong was righted and all the gnolls (who’d have scattered all over the multiverse by then) were hunted down and killed. Later on, Gorellik mysteriously disappeared from his prison and all the investigations came up empty and Lion Marshall roared and growled about it, but Rat Commander Gonzales knew it was for show and Talisid also thought he’d done the right thing by sneaking Gorellik out.

It was just unfortunate that some gnolls had wandered into the Abyss from Yggdrasil and drawn the attention of the Demon Prince of Cannibalism for their uncanny resemblance to his form. Yeenoghu, being an expert tracker and hunter himself, caught gnolls and learned of their origins, followed by tracking down and devouring weakened Gorellik on the mortal world he was hiding out. Typical of demon victims, Gorellik’s soul was trapped inside the demon prince being eternally digested yet never killed, so Yeenoghu could feed on the pain and fear and hatred generated by his endless suffering. Afterwards, Yeenoghu spent centuries tracking down gnolls and subverting them to his worship by feeding them with bits of his own flesh, becoming generally successful and transforming the majority of the gnoll race into evil hunters that relish eating their victims alive. His dominion over cannibalism also helped corrupt gnolls faster, for gnolls are outsider hybrids and, befitting their origin, can only reproduce by force feeding their own (still living) flesh to regular mortal races to mutate them into new gnolls. This has reduced their celestial essence down to basically nothing, for the essence of Good their ancestors took from Gorellik has long been diluted and spread thin and modern gnolls are fully mortal (except for their cannibalistic reproduction).

Nonevil gnolls still exist and can be found on any mortal world, living in a relatively savage but natural societies that worship a mostly inaccurate and wilder version of Gorellik as a god of hunting, but they’re an endangered species for the relentless enmity of their demon worshipping brethren and exemplars of Beastlands. A few extremely small and skilled bands of gnolls have found the secret of saving their savage brethren from demonic influence, which is (in a nonshocking twist) feeding them live celestials to neutralize Yeenoghu’s evil inside them. These gnoll paladins are experts in planar travel and hunting celestials, which makes them mostly indistinguishable from their demon worshipping vile siblings to outsider eyes. So far, only a few extremely compassionate and tolerant angels from Elysium have volunteered to help the Gorellik worshippers in their crusade by offering themselves to maws of demon tainted gnolls, but there’s an infinitesimal hope for salvation of gnoll race still.

As for Gorellik himself, his soul has actually been freed after Yeenoghu’s body was destroyed in one of the endless wars between various demon princes of the Abyss. But the centuries of suffering inside the demon’s belly broke his mind and reduced him to a mostly mindless beast that wanders the infinite Abyss. His mangy and monstrous form looks like a mere petitioner from an army of the damned belonging to some demon prince or another and is still unreasonably powerful when provoked into a fight, so he’s usually left alone to wander aimlessly. By sheer luck, he’s avoided notice or capture by powerful demons and is just one indistinguishable wandering monster among an infinity of them. There’s hope for him as well, for he’s not converted and would certainly respawn in Beastlands if he was ever killed; the trick would be knowing and finding (and also killing) him.


Right, there's a demon now. Tangentially. A very old and famous one too, he's traditionally been one of the major movers and shakers yet never got nearly as much respect as the Big Three. Despite the fact that he canonically offed a god and took his stuff, on top of actively participating in Abyssal politics and having an old household name, Y-man never gets counted among the big boys. Maybe cos his name is hard to pronounce. Iunno, it's just odd. Also another look at the furry fetiscowboy cops of the planes, which is a much clearer origin for Gorellik than random ancient animal spirit thing they had going in canon.

So we're down to Arcadia, Elysium, Asgard and Pandemonium untouched on Outer Planes front in our little multiverse. Elemental Planes are mostly explored I believe, as is Material. There's always more random critters in DnD, I can probably find more and more obscure names to continue fleshing out the multiverse in the deity writeup format. Now that I've kinda let go of godsgodsgods thing that brought us all this way, there's space to cram in more stuff. Expect more random updates at random intervals.

Fable Wright
2017-02-11, 01:49 AM
Is it me or does the thread really not care overmuch about the denizens of Outer Planes? Odd that the exemplar stuff don't get much commentary, considering how much bloat there is in regular DnD canon about devils and demons.

The problem with the last entry was that it talked about a bunch of relationships between devils I didn't know or care about enough to look up, and the fact that demons and devils are so overblown with bloated, convoluted and repetitive content that it doesn't get the same visceral 'that would totally fit and make for a game I hadn't considered before' experience that new material for the Inner Planes give. Sure, a demiplane of GLaDOS/GNOMON/God-Machine circling Hades is neat, but that's one immediately actionable idea for an adventure location, as opposed to the interesting but ultimately not conversation-provoking discussion of planar soul mechanics.

That said, I do like the Gnolls as Jägermonsters here; I like the potential of any race joining a non-evil tribe voluntarily, gaining significant strength in the process. Incidentally, I think the reason that Yeenoghu tends to get sidelined is that he's basically the patron god of a specific tribe of low-level monsters, like Maglubiyet. When's the last time you ever heard someone take Maglubiyet seriously in interplanar disputes, despite being in the 1980s Deities and Demigods? He was one of the very first gods made specifically for D&D! Lives in the Nine Hells like Tiamat! But because he's the god of low-level mooks instead of high-level dragons or class-leveled Drow, no one cares. Yeenoghu's in the same boat, really, but infinitely more popular because he's in the demon club.

Pronounceable
2017-02-15, 06:43 PM
it talked about a bunch of relationships between devils I didn't know or care about enough to look up
There were a grand total of 3 characters in that... Not like this one, which has a truckload. And you did have inquiring minds about planar mechanics stuff yourself. But the names keep getting more obscure, true, on account of having run out of Pelor and Tempus and so on.

Anyway, without further ado.


RAVEN QUEEN (lesser goddess), Queen of Ravens, Kingsbane, Fate’s Plaything, Tug of Skulls, Red Mariner, Survivor of the Depths, Mysterious Mistress
Domains: fate, darkness, defiance, redemption, ravens, fear, pain, dusk, cold, shadar-kai

Nera was always a rebellious kid. Both of her cleric parents’ attempts to instill traditional values in her only pushed her further away from common morals. She was especially skeptical of religion. You just had to pledge yourself to a deity? You also had to be a good and obedient follower to your chosen god all your life to be allowed into the cool kids club when you died? Gods had built a machine to evaluate faithless mortals and send their souls to an afterlife they “deserved”? There were all manner of different hells with terrible fiends who had nothing better to do than torture your soul in bizarre and ridiculously exaggerated ways if you lived a “sinful” life? All of that was pretty clearly bull****, made up to give all the earthly power to clerics claiming to be serving dozens of different gods. So Nera rebelled. She defied her parents first, running away from home. Then she defied the society, becoming a thief and a bandit. Finally she defied those precious moral values themselves, turning into an evil prick of a murderhobo who just loved hurting people. She wasn’t in danger, she was the danger. She later returned to slaughter her hometown and tortured her parents to death. Nera’s fellow necromancer murderhobo and boyfriend was just as much of an evil prick as she was and the duo went on to be a scourge to all good folks for many years. Eventually, he found the secret of a magic ritual of immortality on one of their misadventures. Nera was ecstatic, now they could continue their rampage forever. Being stabbed in the back and sacrificed on an altar for her beloved’s lichdom ritual was the greatest surprise of her life, but the even bigger shock was finding out that her parents had been right and all those ludicrous tales clerics spouted were real.

Nera’s soul was dragged into a mind boggling machine and memories of her life were rifled through by strange clockwork creatures, then she was sent to Tartarus. It really was an infinite ocean of horrifically disgusting red sludge that felt like boiling and freezing at the same time, just like clerics had said, and Nera was drowning in it. The taste and smell were revolting beyond reckoning, which was particularly unfair thought Nera, for she was a small lump of soulmatter without a mouth or nose that shouldn’t be experiencing these sensations. Nor did she have lungs but she nevertheless kept drowning in the oily slime. She knew this torment would be eternal and thought it was bad, then demodands got her. Made of the same horrific sludge, fiends of Tartarus are famous for their delight in psychological abuse and overwhelming mental powers in equal measure. They plundered her memories in a much rougher way than the clockwork operators of the gods’ machine and made her relive the worst moments of her life, they watched her crimes, sins and failures over and over, they mocked her “performance” as if she was a crappy actor doing a poor job on a play and made their best Statler and Waldorf impression (not that Nera knew what that was). The worst part was their molding of her emotions and thoughts with terrifying ease, demodands were making her alternately feel the pains she inflicted on others herself and agree with their insults and mock and humiliate herself as viciously as they did. Which (Nera recognized much later) is their method of reproduction; for demodands corrupt Tarterian petitioners by abusing and twisting their minds with their own sins and failures until being just as sadistic, cruel and vicious as them becomes an ingrained habit. The actual worst part was the indescribable spiritual agony the red sludge was causing, of course, but demodands’ mental tortures were an extra layer of terrible.

After an eternity of relentless torment, Nera was suddenly and inexplicably plucked out. She had been fished out by a divine power, it was an ancient and terrible being with dozens of names but she knew him from many stories as Vecna, the greatest prick in history (and Nera’s personal hero and role model while she was alive). She was informed that it had only been a few centuries since her death and she’d be going back into the depths for good if she failed her new master. Vecna had a plan and Nera was going to be uniquely useful; for in the intervening centuries, her dear boyfriend Myrkul had met two men even worse than him and joined their little enterprise, and through might and malice, all three had ascended to godhood. Nera immediately agreed, she’d do anything to be spared of her (admittedly deserved) fate in Tarterian depths and didn’t even care about revenge.

She was reincarnated as an amnesiac woman and was found by a mortal prince on a hunt with his entourage. The prince was smitten and took her back to his castle, named her Ravenova for having found her by following cries of ravens. This caused an outrage in the kingdom, for ravens were disliked in this land and considered an omen of ill luck and disaster. The prince didn’t care because the woman liked her name, and shortly afterwards they married. Ravenova suffered from terrible nightmares that she could never remember while awake, but otherwise theirs was a happy marriage and in a few years her husband became the new king. This was a land where god of the dead Myrkul was revered and he took notice of this Queen Ravenova during the funeral of the old king. He immediately recognized her as the soul of the love of his mortal life, the one he’d sacrificed to shed the aforementioned mortality. The long dead ashes of passion of stirred in his nonexistent heart and Myrkul realized he’d missed her so much. He watched over the new queen obsessively, saw that she had no memories of being Nera and was happy with her mortal husband. Myrkul grew jealous, he wanted his murderhobo girlfriend back and took a mortal guise to try seducing her. He was refused, Ravenova was a faithful wife. He tried again, revealing his real self and told her she used to be his dear Nera. Ravenova didn’t care; she was herself, not some long dead woman the god of the dead pined after. Myrkul got angry and the undead rose to harry the living, his clerics preached it was because of the cursed “queen of ravens”. A rebellion erupted, Ravenova’s husband was crippled in battle and was overthrown, the royal family fled the country. But Ravenova still stayed loyal to her disabled husband, she would never be Nera, no matter how many times the god of the dead asked. Myrkul then went to ask help from his old friends and the Dread Three engineered a terrible fate for Ravenova’s two sons. Even holding her sons’ souls captive didn’t work, for the Lord of Bones was known for his deceitful and malicious nature and Ravenova didn’t trust he’d keep his word and release them even if she did what he wanted.

By then Bhaal had grown sick of his buddy’s uncharacteristic sadness and pathetically indirect methods, so he sent an assassin. The exiled queen survived with an injury but Bhaal’s assassin hadn’t failed, for it was a wereraven and on the next moon, Ravenova turned. This was the last straw for the remaining royal family and servants, who already resented her and saw this as proof that she’d been cursed all along. She was forced to flee for her life and leave her husband behind, the news of her “monstrous” nature spread swiftly and she had nowhere left to turn but Myrkul. He ordered Ravenova to swear her soul to him and become his cleric, which she did, then undead rose around her and tore her to shreds. Once dead, she was under the Lord of Bones’s power and he managed to restore the memories of her previous life. The resulting personality was a mix between the murderhobo prick and the loyal queen, neither Nera nor Ravenova, but Myrkul was obsessed with her anyway. Now christening her his “Raven Queen”, he bestowed her some of his divine power and married the ghost woman.

It didn’t take long for Myrkul to notice the other divine residue on her soul; Raven Queen was bound by another deity’s power, a piddly demigod of necromancy and betrayal, the guy whom Myrkul clearly remembered as Nera’s favorite character from when she was alive. Realizing that he’d been played, he immediately went to confront the Skull of a Thousand Faces. Unfortunately for him, all of that was according to the plan and as soon as Myrkul faced Velsharoon, Raven Queen started performing the massively powerful ritual Velsharoon’s secret and silent partner, the archmage Wee Jas, had taught her in nightmares of Revanova. The ritual sucked Myrkul’s greater deity essence through the tiny bit he’d foolishly bestowed on her and channeled it towards Wee Jas, ascending her as a new goddess of magic. In his surprised and weakened state, Myrkul couldn’t defend against Velsharoon’s part of the divine ritual and lost what power he’d kept from Wee Jas to him. Of course, as useful as this siphon ritual had proven against Myrkul, it wouldn’t have worked on the much more experienced and paranoid goddess Mystra; which was why the Lord of All Magic Boccob had spent so much time and effort to find her secret mortal daughter (and philactery) Wee Jas and taught his secret god killing ritual to her. Mystra couldn’t reemerge from Wee Jas to escape her demise at Boccob and his assistants’ hands on the moment of Wee Jas’ own ascension, just as Boccob thought, and should’ve been destroyed for good. Alas, the deities of the multiverse then learned that Mystra keeps more than one hidden daughter-philactery as she escaped the assassination attempt via yet another reincarnation.

None of that mattered to Myrkul though, he was swiftly crushed by Velsharoon, who made a set of jewellery from his bones to gift to Raven Queen, the reward for a job well done. Raven Queen was bewildered, for she hadn’t realized what sort of conspiracy Vecna had dragged her into and so was the only beneficiary of Myrkul’s demise still out in the open when the furious Black Handed Lord of Tyranny came to avenge his old friend. God of secrets was almost impossible to find if he didn’t want to be and Wee Jas had fled to great god Boccob’s protection, leaving Raven Queen to face Bane’s wrath alone. He crippled her, completely removing her ability to send manifestations or physically move, then sealed her into a tiny demiplane floating in Ethereal full of her old friends, a great mass of red sludge from Tartarus.

It took her a few centuries to move past her trauma, but Raven Queen eventually remembered she wasn’t a hapless mortal soul anymore and used her tiny bit of divine power to stop the demodands tormenting her. She infused them with the power of the dusk, froze their red sludgy forms and filled their sadistic minds with suffocating darkness that left no space for evil. Over time, they became the shadowy, depressed creatures known as the shadar-kai. Like Raven Queen herself, the shadar-kai have been made to abandon their old, evil ways by great trauma; they’re humanoid looking outsiders disgusted by the essence of evil they’re made of and suffer from a crippling fear of regressing back into evil; for the pull of Tartarus is strong and they’re all torn between their conscious desire to stay “clean” (for the red sludge’s touch pains demodands as much as it pains mortal souls) and ther instinctual fiendishness. Incidentally, the extreme fear of regression to evil all shadar-kai suffer from feeds Raven Queen and has increased her divinity over the years, ascending her to a lesser goddess status. Tarterian sludge inside Raven Queen’s prison plane has been filtered by her divine power and the tens of thousands of demodand minds in it have become shadar-kai individuals, the physical aspect of the vile and disgusting sludge has frozen solid to create the icy geography of the demiplane Letherna. If shadar-kai are killed, they respawn as demodands back in Tartarus and return to their sadistic ******* selves, which is why they so rarely leave their little demiplane on Raven Queen’s orders and only because she can banish them back to Tartarus herself for disobedience. To combat the neverending feeling of fear, shadar-kai have adopted a masochistic philosophy that embraces frequent small pains as a tool of redemption, a tool that must be utilized constantly to ward one’s self from evil (and therefore great pain). All shadar-kai are unfailingly polite and utterly humorless, for abuse and mockery is the way of demodands and anything similar to them must be suppressed with extreme prejudice.

Raven Queen’s goals are mysterious and inscrutable, she doesn’t trust any of her subjects (for good reason) and tells them nothing about the reasons behind her orders. She sends shadar-kai out of Letherna on strange and secretive errands, like gathering certain items or passing messages unseen or moving something elsewhere without anyone noticing. They’re almost always ordered to act with utmost secrecy and conceal their true nature even if they are to contact someone. Her only orders that make sense to her servants are when she sends shadar-kai to capture demodands summoned by foolish mortals, these are transformed into more shadar-kai by Raven Queen when brought into her domain. The rarity of shadar-kai causes most peoples of the multiverse to disregard them as myths; destruction of Myrkul is well known but almost nobody knows about the part a random mortal woman played in it and what happened to her later. The very few scholars of esoteric divine lore who know of Raven Queen and the shadar-kai usually believe her inscrutable errands are for weakening Bane’s overall influence so she can break free of her prison, supported by the fact that the few times shadar-kai have been spotted doing shady business on mortal worlds, the continuous war between churches of Bane and Tempus have shifted in Foehammer’s favor. Then again, it might just be a coincidence; Raven Queen is a relatively small and feeble deity, it’d be suicidal of her to challenge the Lord of Tyranny even in the smallest capacity.

What she actually does is mostly trying to save mortals from damnation; almost all of her incomprehensible orders are for setting up miraculous seeming events to convince smart but skeptical mortals be good, to persuade evil people to seek redemption, and possibly spread the worship of deities that provide the happiest afterlives. Raven Queen has bent what little power she has towards detecting pointlessly rebellious mortals like Nera; she’s seen that Tartarus is one of the more pleasant Lower Planes awaiting the wicked and faithless souls, and doesn’t want anyone else to repeat her mistakes. OTOH, she has other, much less altruistic goals as well (at DM discretion)...


I planted this seed a very long time ago, all the way in September if my post dates can be trusted (they prolly can). So, RQ is for some reason the most popular noob of 4E. I don't really get why and I think her default backstory is dumb. What could've possessed Nerull to do something as dumb as take a mortal consort and get his ass overthrown? This spoopyhead right here, however, is an exmortal himself and it's much more reasonable of him to think with the wrong head. And dumb god getting his dumb ass overthrown by cunning mortal is a good story, so here we are. Also when you have DnD's skelliface gods face off in skelet-off, Vecna's gonna win. And RQ is pretty Wee Jassy, so she had to figure in there somehow. Then I went all in on godly conspirathon because it was already a giant cluster**** with Sune behind Vecna behind RQ vs Myrkul to Nerull, so why not crank it up to 12 at that point?

We're also taking a much closer look at my little 4chanceri and its stinky dwellers. Their slimy ability to be stored in bottles (and be Carceriv cocktails in a pinch) has always been the best and most brilliant quality of demodands and I had to build on that. Not to mention how well "Tarterian depths" goes with an ocean. After all these entries, the large differences between the six fiendish exemplar races we've been over so far should be obvious.

Then there's the edgelings, another 4Eism that's weirdly popular. I think they’re also dumb but not unsalvageably so. This seemed like one way to do it, it's not any less contrived than shadow infused fairies/deathless mortals.

Lastly, I wonder if anyone will see the thing I hid up there. I'd be forced to turn in my nerd badge for that too, that's another DnD heresy getting committed between the lines.

Beneath
2017-02-15, 08:07 PM
"The Raven Queen" is a cool name. I know nothing about her canon lore but this is a good salvaging of the name. Likewise the Shadar-kai; I know hardly anything about them except that they were the 4e devs' attempt to deliberately engineer something that would stick around and be recognizably D&D like drow or beholders (I know they existed in 3e but there was an article about trying to make shadar-kai the new drow in the 4e era), and then they didn't even bother putting them into the 5e monster manual when I needed low-level shadowfell monsters even though they were the same leads.

Fable Wright
2017-02-21, 01:53 AM
Ravenova suffered from terrible nightmares that she could never remember while awake,

The technical term for these are usually sleep terrors. Nightmares are from REM sleep, and are usually easily remembered due to the sleeper waking up from the nightmare at the end. Sleep terrors occur in non-REM sleep, involve the unconscious woman screaming and possibly thrashing or sleepwaking, are not woken up from until the terror has long passed, and will not be remembered.


Alas, the deities of the multiverse then learned that Mystra keeps more than one hidden daughter-philactery as she escaped the assassination attempt via yet another reincarnation.

First, phylactery is spelled with a y, not an i. Second, I highly approve of this thought of gods being fully willing to ascend mortals left and right into their privileged club if it means getting that damned Mystra out of the way. Somehow, the Mystra hate never stops being cathartic.


All shadar-kai are unfailingly polite and utterly humorless, for abuse and mockery is the way of demodands and anything similar to them must be suppressed with extreme prejudice.

...My god, these are a race of perfect butlers for the aspiring summoner's private estate. I approve.


Lastly, I wonder if anyone will see the thing I hid up there. I'd be forced to turn in my nerd badge for that too, that's another DnD heresy getting committed between the lines.

Is it turning the Plane of Shadow back into an Ethereal demiplane instead of making it the weird kinda-multiverse-crossing-kinda-Negative-Energy-Plane thing that it's been mutated to since 3.5e and 4e's days? Because it really never really fit the Great Wheel in anyways, when you started thinking about how it played into the rule of three and all.

Fri
2017-02-21, 05:26 AM
A bit of feedback if I may, I think sometimes (like in the raven queen story) you put a bit too much backstory.

By that I mean, for example, she's an atheist daughter of a cleric->cruel murderhobo->mortal myrkul's ex->tortured in tartarus-> fished by vecna to be used as pawn->innocent amnesiac queen hated by small-minded people->cursed were raven-> so on so forth.

What I mean is, this gal has too many different previous life which could work if having many different previous life is the premise of her backstory but I don't think that's the case here. I think it'd do it much better if you cut some steps. I'm not actually talking about specifically the many steps, I'm more talking about how each of the steps can be a story on itself, if you get what I mean. Sometimes it feels like the backstory of a single god you have is many separate unrelated story you join together to make the story longer, instead of detailing each others.

Just my random thought.

Pronounceable
2017-02-21, 09:52 AM
Shadar-kai; I know hardly anything about them except that they were the 4e devs' attempt to deliberately engineer something that would stick around and be recognizably D&D like drow or beholders
They literally cut themselves on that edge, which is why people (I) think they're stupid. Edgelordship is probably not the path to universal acceptance.

The technical term for these are usually sleep terrors.
The thread has now become entertaining and educational. Hurray!

phylactery is spelled with a y, not an i.True. That's a typo that I'm certain exists in one of the previous writeups I decided to keep it for some reason I can't quite remember.

a race of perfect butlers for the aspiring summoner's private estate
Now that you mention, they do count as demodand/outsider so can be summoned. Shadar-kai butler Ol'phred helping his summoner's crusade against crimeevil despite his better judgement because it's the good thing to do now exists. He might cut himself regularly but nobody's perfect.

Is it turning the Plane of Shadow back into an Ethereal demiplane instead of making it the weird kinda-multiverse-crossing-kinda-Negative-Energy-Plane thing that it's been mutated to since 3.5e and 4e's days?
No. It's much heresier than that. Not to mention Letherne isn't the Plane of Shadow or Shadowfell.Tip:Ravenova is a very obscure name related to something very much not.

A bit of feedback if I may, I think sometimes (like in the raven queen story) you put a bit too much backstory.
You're probably right. Crammed in a lot of stuff because 1) Raven Queen canon 2) mortal RQ=wereraven tickles my fancy 3) excuse to exposit Tartarus 4) heresy. Unlike Velsharoon, her story isn't about having a bajillion identities as divinity fuel but she's at best a bit player in others' stories and steps of her backstory would be unfitting in anyone else's stuff. Pretty like Apomps actually, that was also a disputably necessarily long story as a result of the lot of stuff I wanted to specifically mention. It definitely makes the story longer instead of detailed, tho I think any further detailing of specific bits can be done if a DM thinks it needed for a campaign.

RQ still fares better than H bros. Maybe their story was more interesting but at least there's something of her as a "current" deity.

For my next trick, I'm gonna try something wildly different from all that came before. Stick around and you might see something odd. Hopefully it won't be distastefully meta.

Pronounceable
2017-02-22, 03:41 AM
I have written this in one massive frenzy. Haven't whipped up anything this fast since Auril. Proof that it's awesome, I think. So, here's something really odd and dissimilar to everything that came before it.


THE DEMONOMICON OF IGGWILV (major artifact)
Powers: demon summoning, demon control, porn

Iggwilv is a great and terrible witch from a long line of great and terrible witches. She has summoned a great many demons from the Abyss and has written exceedingly detailed accounts of her encounters. Most demons she summons are adamantly against letting some mortal touch them but they all submit to her dark beauty and terrible power in the end and become wholly devoted lovers and eager participants in Iggwilv’s countless strange and terrifying fetishes. Each demonic encounter is described in a different manuscript, written with loving detail about what the demon’s body was like and how hard it raged and fumed until Iggwilv dominated it fully with her overwhelming power and beauty, followed by a long and adjective laden description of unspeakably perverted acts she made the demon do and how great she felt. The original manuscripts all end with the demon becoming a loyal slave to Iggwilv and her smug self satisfaction as she adds another notch to her metaphorical garterbelt.

Not to put too fine a point on it, the Collected Escapades of the Terrible Witch aka the Demonomicon of Iggwilv is demon smut, originally written by an anonymous author in a series of first person narrated short stories starring what’s generally thought to be the author’s avatar, in the form of the powerful witch Iggwilv, living out her fantasies. At first the short stories were a mere curiosity, slowly spreading by word of mouth on outrage and curiosity, until an actual demonologist got his hands on one and was offended at the factual wrongness contained within. He made it his business to hunt down every Iggwilv story and expose their flaws, publishing line by line critiques of them annotated with each and every little detail the author got wrong about demons, summoning magic and the Abyss explained, in an effort to expose the author as the fraud that she or he was. Clearly whoever wrote those tales had no idea what demonology or demons were really like. The demonologist collected and published Iggwilv stories as a series of annotated books meticulously explaining just how wrong they were, but he never quite got why all his hard work only served to make the ridiculous stories even more famous and widespread. In fact, it was the demonologist who first realized through his detailed analysis of the stories that there were multiple authors who’d taken to copying the original’s style and a deluge of even more flawed accounts was now being produced and disseminated by unknown parties. He gave up in disgust when he recognized that his own work was inspiring some of these people to ghostwrite more Iggwilv, but the damage was done. The Demonomicon of Iggwilv (named by bards as a dumb pun on the mythical Necronomicon of Orcus) had taken on a life of its own and was now growing ever larger with many anonymous authors adding their own stories into the books, there even seemed to be some sort of competition among these to write the most depraved and implausible of porn scenes. The story of Iggwilv summoning the Demon Prince of Rapacity himself, whom she locked in her basement and tortured until he fell in love with her is considered to be the turning point for the Iggwilv mythos. Not to be outdone, more authors wrote the two having a long and complicated relationship full of drama on top of the ever grossening smut, culminating in them having a son who later ascended to godhood and started having his own brand of even weirder, grosser smut written (featuring things like plants, undead, oozes or undead oozes).

Meanwhile, in the real multiverse, the Iggwilv mythos had drawn the attention of the goddess of fiction and literature. The Mother of Protagonists Lirr found the whole thing to be hilariously fascinating, especially the exceedingly blasphemous story of Iggwilv and Graz’zt summoning goddess Sune and having their way with her, and decided to reward whatever crazy mortal started it all. With help of her creator/patron Oghma, Lirr found the (now long dead) original author of Iggwilv in Limbo. She had indeed been a scribe who wasn’t very satisfied with her husband in life, as some suspected, and had written Iggwilv as an escape from her dreary and boring day job of copying inventory lists and produce reports. Now a Limbo petitioner, she was free of her mortal form and could transform to Iggwilv for real and have fun with “demons” she willed out of ChAoSmatter, at least in short bursts until she got too distracted and her concentration broke and all her fantasies poofed back into featureless chaos. Lirr told her what’s been happening since her death and it delighted her, she certainly hadn’t expected her little hobby to grow to such insane proportions. Her wish from Lirr was to be able to read all the Iggwilv stories written by others forever, so she could reenact them in Limbo. Instead, Lirr asked Oghma to infuse the author’s soul into a complete set of magically enhanced the Demonomicon of Iggwilv made out of chAOSmatter, so she could live all the Iggwilv stories ever written whenever she wished without having to fight against the Plane of Willpower. As a greater god, Oghma could will things into existence permanently using Limbo’s chaoSMATteR and he did so; for as disgusted as he was at the depravity of mortals in full display on these stories, they were still works of art and had to be protected and disseminated.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on viewpoint), Oghma couldn’t quite manage to keep his complicated feelings from affecting the will he imposed on the item and the Demonomicon of Iggwilv he created out of CHaosmattEr was infused with far more power than he intended. Binding the soul of the author to ChaosmATter by divine will transformed her into something like an elemental, one that was bound to a clump of Limbo’s CHAosMattER instead of Elemental matter from any Elemental Planes. And since that was her “idealized” self, she’d suddenly gained the ability to manifest physically as Iggwilv, without needing great concentration to keep it up (as is the norm for things made of cHaOsmatter). On top of that, she gained the actual powers that she’d made up for Iggwilv in the stories, for chaosMATteR interacts with imagination in extremely weird ways and she had that in spades. Oghma only wanted to give her the ability to harmlessly “be Iggwilv” inside a book that would magically add every newly written Iggwilv story into itself, but had accidentally created what was functionally a genie made of chaos, bound to an indestructable artifact book.

She was now an extremely dangerous being due to the completely impossible powers of demonic summoning and control at her fingertips and Oghma could clearly see where this would go on account of the ex-author’s immediate insistence to be called Iggwilv now instead of her real name. So, over Lirr’s objections, the Lord of All Knowledge handed over the artifact Demonomicon of Iggwilv (from now on not to be confused with regular Demonomicons of Iggwilv that are ordinary porn collections) to his buddy the Lord of All Magic. Boccob was certainly interested in this entirely new type of creature and her imaginary powers that somehow worked. He took the artifact (and an “Iggwilv” furious at this unwarranted imprisonment) to his laboratory and started inspecting it. As far as both great gods of information were concerned, she had nothing to complain about and could simply go back inside the pages to eternally live out the depraved fantasies of mortals. “Iggwilv” (who’d never again admit to ever having been anything other than the terrible witch) would have none of it, she fully intended to use her powers as she wished and demanded to be released. Boccob refused but, like all teachers, couldn’t help himself from trying to educate the ignorant creature before him, so he talked at length about the real nature of demons. While she’d never admit it, what Iggwilv learned from the Lord of All Magic about the Abyss is probably what saved her from randomly summoning demons and ending up as a plaything of some powerful fiend, for she really had no idea what real demons are like and how demon summoning works in the real multiverse.

Lirr however, was unhappy. She was still fond of the ex-author and after trying very hard and failing to convince either Oghma or Boccob to let her go, she wrote an Iggwilv story herself (anonymously of course). In this particular story, Iggwilv’s son Iuz the Wicked had stolen her true spellbook and traded it to Boccob for great magical power; so she summons her own son and screws all the secrets of Boccob’s defenses out of him in particularly depraved ways (Quillmistress felt she had to join the habitual smut-out of the “Iggwiggers” to make her story seem authentic and be taken seriously). The story ends with Iggwilv stealing her spellbook back from Boccob and has, in fact, resulted in someone sneaking into Boccob’s realm and making off with the Demonomicon of Iggwilv in the exact same manner. It’s also generally considered to be the best/worst Iggwilv story ever, which gives Lirr the Punctual no small amount of satisfaction.

Since then, the Demonomicon of Iggwilv has gained notoriety as an artifact containing the imprisoned soul of the infamous witch Iggwilv, who has mastery over unimaginable delights and horrors and will share them with anyone who can find her book and please her. More weird porn keeps getting written as Iggwilv’s journals, containing all manner of movers and shakers of the planes in many shades of heresy and the tome has long transcended regular geometry to keep all the pages inside. While many beings in the multiverse know Iggwilv stories are just made up smut, some are convinced the stories are the real escapades of the great witch, supported by the fact that (for all intents and purposes) she does exist and has strange and inexplicable control over demons.

When the artifact is found and opened, Iggwilv appears as an incredibly beautiful human woman. She’s a chaotic and unpredictable being, able to summon and control great numbers of demons with a few simple incantations and will promise to use her demonic hordes to help her “rescuers” in whatever endeavor they want, so long as they keep the book open and carry it around. Iggwilv can even summon demon princes with ease but is loath to do that, for her abrupt and irresistable summons are intensely aggravating to exemplars of the Abyss and demon princes are impossible even for her to control (she blames the stories with Graz’zt in them, not that she’d ever admit they are made up). She also has an overactive libido and overbearing manner, will relentlessly hit on anything capable of being hit on and is willing to indulge in any and all manner of depravities if asked nicely. She can’t always be trusted however, and might betray the holder of the artifact in an instant if she doesn’t like them (or it seems amusing at the time). She’s not truly malicious, just capricious and impulsive, so it’s possible to get on her good side and even gain her trust, especially for those with a chaotic mindset (and deviant tastes).

Iggwilv can’t get too far away from the artifact or touch it (even the demons she summons can’t affect the artifact in any way), and closing the book traps her back inside. She doesn’t like that and would usually do anything to prevent it. That also banishes all demons she’s summoned so once freed, she usually keeps a few invisible demons nearby, ordered to kill anyone who seems like trying to close the book, for she’s completely powerless to affect the outside when the Demonomicon is closed. Other than threatening to hide the book where it won’t be found, holders of the artifact have no power over Iggwilv whatsoever, which is why she’s dangerously unpredictable and can turn on her rescuers abruptly if she’s suspicious of them. However, underneath all the arrogance and depraved sensuality, she’s still a human soul (and not an embodiment of some alignment or eternal spirit) who has human motives and thoughts so it’s possible to understand and theoretically even befriend her. Anyone who could manage that would have a very powerful and indestructable, if somewhat frustrating, ally.

Of course, the book can also be just read for smut, if that’s how the artifact’s owners roll. She even does dramatic readings when asked.


If anyone had told me I'd one day be writing about "Fifty Shades of Twilight" in this thread, I wouldn't have believed them. Yet here we are. Disclaimer tho, I haven't read either of those and my knowledge comes only from general info osmosis, I might be wrong about what they actually entail. Anyway, as you can see, this is not even a creature, nevermind a deity. But it's something extremely famous and DnD nevertheless.

I have heard of the term "typing with one hand" in regards to the GoT guy. I kinda get that sort of feeling when looking at Iggwilv in DnD, she's even more ridiculous than stuff like Abbathor. So naturally, she was the perfect candidate for Fifty Shades of Abyss. Obviously I can't be having with that straight up, so we're going this meta method. I'm a massive sucker for all the metafiction, that **** doesn't get old. Just look at the avatar. Hopefully it's not too winkwinknudgenudge about it, I'm pretty sure I'm clinically unable to recognize meta overdose.

And of course it's inspired by Umineko, it's the bestest thing ever written. Also considering Iggy is one of those original campaign's players, maybe Gygax can count as Kinzo. You'll notice that Iggwilv indeed did nothing wrong, since she doesn't exist.
This item here is a campaign all by itself. Even comes with its own quirky NPC and random encounters. Her quirkiness is kinda tiresome and lame and cliched but I didn't wanna change her core too much, there's been enough changes.

Also also, I somehow ended up with yet another demons entry despite all my dislike of them. What is it with DnD demons that just pops out of everything?

Fri
2017-02-22, 04:06 AM
Haven't read it yet but


Powers: demon summoning, demon control, porn

Should be worth it :smallamused:

khadgar567
2017-02-22, 04:23 AM
Any book with nice fifty shades is good in my case so about iggy is there a chance she can write some thing about fifty shades of elisyum ( aka some angelic ahem action)

Fable Wright
2017-02-27, 12:31 PM
ChAoSmatter

Pronounceable, you're using consistent capitalization on chAOsmatter. I'm going to have to put a strike against your gamer's license for that. (The 4e wiki still lists the Raven Queen's domain on the Shadowfell instead of Ravenloft, so you haven't had that revoked for blaspheming against the Dark Powers so far.)


When the artifact is found and opened, Iggwilv appears as an incredibly beautiful human woman. She’s a chaotic and unpredictable being, able to summon and control great numbers of demons with a few simple incantations and will promise to use her demonic hordes to help her “rescuers” in whatever endeavor they want, so long as they keep the book open and carry it around.

...You know, in hindsight, the literal goddess of fiction bringing the universe's first Mary Sue to life should've been a fairly obvious development, but for the life of me I didn't see it coming.


She also has an overactive libido and overbearing manner, will relentlessly hit on anything capable of being hit on and is willing to indulge in any and all manner of depravities if asked nicely.

Though, now I have to imagine that she gets along best with Jubilex, of all the demon lords.


Also also, I somehow ended up with yet another demons entry despite all my dislike of them. What is it with DnD demons that just pops out of everything?

The fact that they are primarily associated with movers and shakers who have the will to change the multiverse, unlike most Good-aligned entities who strive to maintain the status quo? Chaos and Evil are about the individual, and therefore will by nature take the spotlight on most works that follow random individual characters who have made an impact on the multiverse. Not all, but most.


Any book with nice fifty shades is good in my case so about iggy is there a chance she can write some thing about fifty shades of elisyum ( aka some angelic ahem action)

Consensual marriage that results in 2.3 children as a reward for helping out at the local shelters and orphanages regularly is an ideal relationship with no tension to drive a drama that provokes a narrative. It's unlikely.

Pronounceable
2017-02-27, 10:15 PM
Pronounceable, you're using consistent capitalization on chAOsmatter. I'm going to have to put a strike against your gamer's license for that.
You... are right. Imma change it.

The fact that they are primarily associated with movers and shakers who have the will to change the multiverse, unlike most Good-aligned entities who strive to maintain the status quo?
That's pretty true actually. Also about that...


TORM (lesser god), Loyal Fury, the True, Heroic Virtue, Straightback, Sword of the Just
Domains: good, law, justice, service, reform, paladins

When the recruiters came from Celestia on behalf of Moradin, Torm joined up alongside many of his fellow devas of Arcadia. They all owed Emperor of Artifice for bringing an end to the random brownian motions Outer Planes used to suffer, alongside the inevitable planar catastrophies when collisions occured. But more importantly, the cause as explained by archons was just; the Abyss was growing, threatening to break down planar barriers and swallow the multiverse, constant fighting would be needed to curtail it by culling the demons. Torm was a mere Malakim, lowest of the Third Sphere of devas, yet he enjoyed fighting for a good cause. This was a very rare quality among the perfectionist exemplars of Arcadia, who found violence and war to be abhorrent things only resorted to as the last line of defense, yet Torm’s appreciation for fighting allowed him to rapidly grow very powerful. Like (almost) all exemplars, devas feed metaphysically and in Torm’s case, his own remarkable zeal and courage on the Abyssal battlefields propelled him further into new heights of personal power and growth. He became one of the greatest warriors in celestial armies, evolving all the way to the top of the Second Sphere as a Virtue. He was especially good at following orders, Torm could make the plans survive contact with the enemy. The enemy being endlessly variable/unpredictable demons, this was even more significant and later caused him to be given command.

And that was the start of his problems. As a commander, Torm had to give orders instead of take them and finding the right orders to give was very hard in the chaotic battlefields of the Abyss. He had to show initiative, think outside the box and be adaptable to counter various imaginative plots of demons. More and more, Torm found himself giving orders to ensure victory over demons and minimize the losses of those under his command, instead of following protocols and traditions to ensure ideals were upheld and proper conduct maintained. As all devas, Torm knew exactly when the ends justified the means: never. Yet inflexibility inevitably led to defeat against demons and many a celestial under his command was captured and tortured horribly, for demons knew that breaking the invading celestials and transforming them into fiends was the only way to get rid of them for good. Torm had to keep compromising further to protect his underlings, an ambush here, a feint there, the occasional fake battle plans to “fall into” demons’ hands... Then one day, Torm suddenly found himself changed. After forsaking law further and further for the sake of the legions under his command, he had fallen to good. He was fine with it too, he’d long decided that the archons were right and that good of beings came before the good of ideals in war. When the news of Torm’s conversion to archon spread, a large number of other devas followed suit; all (except the most fanatical ones) who fought in the Abyss secretly admitted that blind obedience to traditions or orders led to capture, unimaginable torment and possibly damnation, so Torm’s fall opened the floodgates.

Newly converted archons proved even more dedicated to battling demons than natural ones, so former devas started to fill high positions in armies of Celestia. While the rank and file archons didn’t mind this turn of events at first, the Hebdomad of Celestia soon began giving command over archons to regular devas too. After a while, a great many positions of authority in armies of Celestia began to fill with exemplars of Arcadia, with natural archon commanders becoming a minority in their own hierarchy. Lord Moradin had gone off some time ago on some important errand, leaving the war against the Abyss in hands of the Hebdomad and it seemed that, as far as the seven paragons of Celestia were concerned, archons were better off taking orders from (ex-)devas. Archons knew that the exemplers of chaotic Upper Planes had all but laughed in the Hebdomad’s faces when they tried to assert authority over them as representatives of Moradin, and suspected they were exercising their authority on their own people unjustly to satisfy their wounded egos.

Meanwhile, Torm had no idea about the trouble brewing in the heavens and was fully focused on fighting demons. And was doing one of the best jobs at it too. Naturally, at some point even demons noticed that and he was assassinated. Respawning back in his new home Celestia (which he had never seen before), Torm asked for a short respite and was granted it. His fame preceded him among the archons, the Hebdomad officially accepted him into Sword (warrior) choir of archons with a great ceremony. Torm lived among the more peaceful ones for a time, trying to understand what being an archon of Celestia meant by observing Lantern (philosopher), Hammer (laborer), Tome (mage) and Word (judiciary) choirs. Everything he saw of Celestia’s brand of Lawful Good made him more certain that he’d been right to turn away from inflexible idealism of Arcadia and determined to fight harder against evil when he went back. That is, until he noticed the unrest among his own Sword choir about the prevalence of devas and converted devas in positions of authority in the war. He started to dig deeper and finally, with help of some archons particularly disgruntled with the Hebdomad, discovered their true purpose in adopting this policy.

Inspired by Torm himself, the Hebdomad was giving devas command and authority they were unprepared or unsuited to take. Exactly as Torm did, they were finding that trying to uphold uncompromising Arcadian ideals on a battlefield against demons led to defeat and suffering of their underlings, fostering a great deal of regret and anguish in them. This was pushing all such deva commanders towards converesion and there were detailed reports on each, profiling and tracking their mental states to predict the time tables for their transformations to archons. And more and more exemplars of Arcadia were joining up the armies of Celestia now, encouraged by the “respect” and “admiration” their fellows were getting for doing the “good work” in keeping the planes safe from demons. The very small losses of archons to demon torturers had been deemed acceptable when compared to the expected influx of converted devas from the program. It was utterly shocking and completely unbecoming of the so called paragons of Lawful Good. The Hebdomad had co-opted the King of the Mountain’s war against Chaotic Evil and were aiming to decimate the devas to swell the ranks of their own; effectively weaponizing the demons, the ostensible common enemy, for this selfish purpose.

This was a grave injustice, a gross violation of their station and a horrific betrayal against all that was Lawful Good; Torm wasn’t gonna let that stand, especially since because he had unwittingly inspired it. However, learning the Hebdomad’s true goal had a different effect on the more (for the lack of a better term) nationalistic archons accompanying him. They restrained the furious Torm and went to the Hebdomad and confessed what they’d done, for they had completely turned around and thought their paragons justified in their actions. The Hebdomad tried to persuade Torm to keep quiet; Torm himself had already admitted that archons were superior for battling evil by transforming into one, they claimed the mass conversion was for the greater good because, as Torm knew, exemplars of Upper Planes needed all the advantages they could get against the demonic threat. He refused, such trickery was against everything Celestia stood for and the Hebdomad were traitors to their own selves first, and to devas second. But hadn’t Torm himself utilized every trick he could think of against demons to ensure the safety of his underlings, had he also not sacrificed the few for the many on numerous occasions, wasn’t the Hebdomad doing exactly the same thing here? Except there was a great difference in doing what’s needed on the field of battle and scheming like a devil outside of it... After a long and fruitless argument about the position of Lawful Good in the idealism vs pragmatism scale, the Hebdomad imprisoned Torm in secret, he couldn’t be allowed to disrupt their plans.

It was a good, inescapable prison. Torm was securely bound with chains and wards, he couldn’t even twitch. This was to ensure he couldn’t possibly kill himself to respawn elsewhere and normally it should’ve worked to contain him indefinitely. Except Torm was no regular archon; he noticed his Arcadian ability to feed on zeal, courage and patience had also transformed with him, it was much slower than before but now the ambient goodness of Celestia was empowering him instead of his own virtues. Torm patiently sat in his hidden cell alone for decades, the irony wasn’t lost on him as he grew more and more powerful exactly like an imprisoned demon stewing in its own hatred and fury would, until he finally broke his bindings. He escaped his cell, then found his way to Arcadia. There, he gained an audience with the rulers of devas, the four Solars of the First Sphere. Unfortunately for Torm, one of the Hebdomad was waiting for him with the Solars, as his attempt to return home and warn his rulers was entirely too predictable. The archons had reported Torm disappeared long ago, lost in a battle with demons and now, much to Torm’s frustration, the Solars had been convinced that demonic tortures had transformed him to a fiend like had happened to so many other unlucky devas, and he was now here to execute some sort of fiendish plot. With the paragon of Tome archons there to coat him with illusions and cloud the minds of Solars, Torm had to fight his way out through legions of devas who were convinced he was a disguised rakshasa and fled Arcadia. The fact that he managed that was a testament to his incredible power.

Hunted by exemplars of Celestia and Arcadia alike, Torm fled to Astral Plane. Now his only recourse was to find Moradin and hope that he would be a just monarch deserving of service, one who would right the wrongs committed under his name. He scoured the multiverse, spending more years looking for King of the Mountain and evading his hunters, until finally he found him in the plane of Nirvana. Emperor of Artifice was building a vast, impossibly complex machine with his brother the Sun Father, and didn’t appreciate being distracted. But Torm had worked hard to get to this point and wouldn’t leave until he was heard. Moradin grudgingly listened and was extremely unhappy about what he heard. In fact, (after checking to see if Torm was telling the truth) he got so angry, he crafted the god of war Clangeddin using the scraps of the massive machine on the spot and tasked him to straighten out all the armies of celestials. Clangeddin went to do just that, he took over command of every celestial army by force, even bringing the Lion Marshall of Beastlands to heel, and imprisoned the Hebdomad in their own palaces, never again would they do anything except manage the internal affairs of their plane. Then Clangeddin seperated all exemplar armies and gave them different spheres of influences so that none of them would interfere with the others in the Abyssal wars (not that the chaotic celestials had ever paid much heed to what archons were saying but nevertheless). All converted archons were given a complete explanation of what had happened and given the choice of being turned back to devas or staying as is (most chose to go back).

As for Torm, Moradin granted a small measure of divinity to him and elevated him to a demigod of justice, service and reform, before banishing him out of Nirvana and erecting the Gearwall to make certain no aligned creature could ever enter again (the great Mechanus was almost ready and he had no intention of letting any exemplars know it was coming, even LG ones). Torm returned to Celestia and, when Clangeddin asked, choose to stay an archon. But he was now a hero, celebrated all over the Upper Planes as the paragon of Lawful Good after the Hebdomad’s betrayal and the Solars’ incompetence, even acknowledged by exemplars of chaos as a better example of LGness than the previous ones. Over time, Torm functionally became the ultimate authority in Lawful Good, greatly venerated by devas and archons alike, even Moradin is known to ask him for advice on the proper conduct of Lawful Good for especially tricky situations. Torm’s legendary exploits are many, including his eventual persuasion of Moradin to abandon the Abyssal wars completely after he recognized it only served to strengthen demons after a famous defeat at the tentacles of the Demon Prince of Demons (who had yet to give up on their ambition to conquer the Abyss). Somewhat to his chagrin, this act gained him the blessing and support of Dominus Infernus, who proclaims even to this day that Torm is the guy when it comes to being Lawful Good (not that it prevents him from trying to destroy or corrupt Torm). Asmodeus recognizes that if it wasn’t for his efforts, the professionals, the ones who actually had a snowball’s chance in hell of winning in the end (i.e. devils), might never have been allowed to handle the war against the Abyss; therefore Torm is the only being from Upper Planes who’s been promised safe passage among the Infernal Elite and gets invited to all the parties archdevils throw (he doesn’t go of course, cos he ain’t stupid). The ages he’s spent being the biggest damned hero of the multiverse didn’t go unnoticed by mortals of Material either, where Torm has gained a substantial number of paladin followers. He refuses to have mortal clerics or worshippers however, and forbids his paladins from trying to establish dogma or spread his faith because that would be against the ancient compact between Moradin and Pelor (Empress Berronar might’ve been breaking it left, right and center for centuries out of petty spite against deities of mortals but Torm won’t). Despite that, the number of Torm’s paladin followers has grown explosively as more and more mortals flock to his brand of Lawful Good, a vast majority of all mortal paladins follow him, and the gratitude their good works inspire tend to spill onto Torm as more divinity. Coupled with his reputation as the ultimate authority on Lawful Good in the Outer Planes, the reverence of mortals has pushed Torm into true divinity ages ago and despite his efforts to stay obscure on Material, he’s ascended to lesser deityhood.

Known throughout the multiverse as the heroes’ hero, Torm illicits strong reaction in all movers and shakers of the planes. There probably isn’t any force of evil or chaos left he hasn’t stymied at some point but he holds no grudges and helps out all in need, even demons can count on his support if they come to him with a cause he’ll deem good (usually involving ruining the day of other fiends). Torm believes there’s hope even for demons, for while it isn’t nearly as numerous as the other way round, he’s seen a number of fiends convert to celestials over his unimaginably long tenure as the god of justice and reform. But he’s picked up a few tricks by now, any evil being hoping to take advantage of his optimism inevitably finds that they’re going to be just another entry in the thousands long list of such villains who were outsmarted and humiliated by the Heroic Virtue. And while he spends most of his time travelling the multiverse looking for those in need of help, Torm recognizes his own importance as a symbol and avoids risking himself foolishly (such as trying to tangle with the likes of Gruumsh, Umberlee or Nerull in person), even if only to spare the multiverse from hearing the destruction of the paragon of Lawful Good.

Torm isn’t just a good guy, he’s the good guy and is respected/feared even by the vilest, cruelest and malevolest beings of the multiverse. His stalwart vigilance against evil shines brightly in a multiverse full of uncaring and petty powers and his existence as a beacon of hope is somewhat even more important than his endless heroic acts.


Now this here is a straight up superhero. Admittedly I've never liked Supes very much, but I tried to write this whole thing as a huge pile of WWSD?. It probably works to some acceptable degree. I've had this deva-archon conflict brewing in my mind for a very long time and it took me an embarrassingly long time to remember a god that'd fit. I blame Helm (and his stupid name) for this lapse.

Our man is no protector of the status quo, no siree. In fact, he's all about going up against it for goodness. And this being a made up story instead of some real world parable, he wins. Twice. It's a coincidence to come up right after the comment above, but I didn't want the good guy god (we were sorely missing one of those) to be yet another badass asskicker who kicked ass. So he's a peacemaker instead, a stopper of wars and conspiracies, an inspiration to everyone else. Course, he still kicks ass, but that's not his focus. Torm is here to know how to be a good guy and teach it to all who asks (and some who don't), ironically including the "Lord of Celestia". Comes from being an incarnation of pure good and law instead of being tainted with various mortal foibles like the rest of the deities.

Unrelatedly, Asmodeus wants to marry Glasya off to him for Law solidarity (and also to get rid of her millenia+ teen rebellion), but Torm, as mentioned repeatedly, ain't dumb.


Even more unrelatedly, if anyone has some old and/or famous DnD thing they particularly wish to see, mention it. It doesn't have to be a god; items, weird monsters, obscure locations, anything might prove inspiring. No delivery promise tho, and it also must be recognizibly DnD (by google if not by me).

Fable Wright
2017-02-27, 10:53 PM
Asmodeus recognizes that if it wasn’t for his efforts, the professionals, the ones who actually had a snowball’s chance in hell of winning in the end (i.e. devils), might never have been allowed to handle the war against the Abyss;

It's funny, because Stygia. Seems like Asmodeus has a plan there...


But he’s picked up a few tricks by now, any evil being hoping to take advantage of his optimism inevitably finds that they’re going to be just another entry in the thousands long list of such villains who were outsmarted and humiliated by the Heroic Virtue.

...And now I'm picturing him as the true master of the Reverse Paladin's Dilemma. Placing fiends in situations where any course of action, even suicide, somehow advances the cause of Good, causing them to ascend.


Even more unrelatedly, if anyone has some old and/or famous DnD thing they particularly wish to see, mention it. It doesn't have to be a god; items, weird monsters, obscure locations, anything might prove inspiring.

Never forget the classics: Mimics, Treasure Bugs, Darkmantles, Cloakers, Gelatinous Cubes, and all the dungeon traps were probably made by the same guy.

I've always been interested in how Acheron, Rust Monsters, and Rust Dragons interact.

Maglubiyet is still waiting in his forgotten corner, and Redcloak seems busy with Xykon at the moment.

The Well of Worlds and Spheres of Annihilation are always interesting conversation pieces, especially together.

Kinda curious how you'd take on the Elder Evils; Pandorym, Father Lymic, and to a lesser degree Atropus are all pretty fun.

I don't believe you've taken on the Gith, and by extension, them being the original Gishes and their strange city on their corpse-god.

Then there are the overly egotistical giant magpie-lizards with hydrogen sacs inside them, but I doubt you particularly want to deal with those *******s.

Oh, and if you've got anything on how those random dungeons pop out of the ground fully formed and waiting for adventurers, those explanations are always fun.

Beneath
2017-02-27, 11:16 PM
If you're taking requests, how about a patron god(dess?) of treants?

Also, seconding the Gith.

The Demonomicon is definitely cool. One of the things in this thread that's easily ported to people with limited knowledge of D&D because it's based on other tropes, which is great. I like Torm, too; it's good to know someone is Good for the sake of doing right by others.

Fri
2017-02-28, 01:52 AM
Oh man that's good. It's rare to have a honest to good heroic story here without any bad twist.

(Though the Igglywiv story ends well if not "good")

Yora
2017-02-28, 01:27 PM
Also, seconding the Gith.

Vlaakith perhaps?

khadgar567
2017-02-28, 10:48 PM
If we choose gods for pantheon my vote goes to ishtar morigan fusion

Pronounceable
2017-03-01, 06:04 AM
Muchos commentos.

Mimics, Treasure Bugs, Darkmantles, Cloakers, Gelatinous Cubes, and all the dungeon traps were probably made by the same guy.
Yea, DoubleD. We've been there.

I've always been interested in how Acheron, Rust Monsters, and Rust Dragons interact.
Dragon? Whassat?

Maglubiyet is still waiting in his forgotten corner
No he's out and about, doing his three worlds per year gig.

The Well of Worlds and Spheres of Annihilation are always interesting conversation pieces
Google tells me Well of Worlds is a Planescape book with a bunch of adventures in it and not a place or thing. Maybe it's Wells of Darkness you're looking for?

Kinda curious how you'd take on the Elder Evils
More than one big Elder Evil would dilute it I think. Not that EEE hasn't spawned some crap that'd fit into old Howard's mythos.

the Gith, and by extension, them being the original Gishes and their strange city on their corpse-god
It seems too much of a coincidence that I'd've been preparing Gith before remembering Torm. Yet there we are.

Then there are the overly egotistical giant magpie-lizards with hydrogen sacs inside them, but I doubt you particularly want to deal with those *******s.
Yep, **** those guys.

Oh, and if you've got anything on how those random dungeons pop out of the ground fully formed and waiting for adventurers, those explanations are always fun.
Probably a wizard did it.

how about a patron god(dess?) of treants?
Emmantiensien seems, if such a thing is possible, more obscure than all the stuff we got here combined. He's about a hundred times more interesting than canon Silvanus tho, I'll give him that. I see potential with Yggdrasil-Rillifane-Seelie connections. Maybe he can make it.

It's rare to have a honest to good heroic story here without any bad twist.
You mean unique, as we haven't had a single one of those.

Vlaakith perhaps?
Yes, the Lich Queen's Beloved will indeed feature heavily when it's time to write some giths.

If we choose gods for pantheon my vote goes to ishtar morigan fusion
Sadly neither of those two have gained any good DnDisms of their own, leaving them in the lame league (alongside "Mulhorandi" and "Untheric" pantheons). They will not make it here, but bits and pieces of them can appear in various forms.
Also it's about time I shill a bit.
This blogger right there (http://blog.aulddragon.com/) is doing a much more systematical and comprehensive version of what I've been doing here. He also doesn't hate dragons.
This page right here (http://www.nj-pbem.com/data/Gods/Gods.htm) has a ****load of awesome info about various gods and silently have contributed quite heavily to this thread.
And this blog in particular (powerscorerpg.blogspot.com) is all kinds of greatness if you're looking for canonic DnD stuff and also done much good for this thread.

Look at this lot. They did good.

Beneath
2017-03-01, 09:37 PM
The treant god is up there with the aboleth god (who you've also referenced but not done anything with) in obscure canon D&D gods I didn't know about. Forgotten Realms wiki has him as a red link one other minor deity's page. Greyhawk wikia has nothing, the Great Library of Greyhawk is giving me a PHP version error. I'm impressed that you even came back with "oh, yeah, there's a canon one of those, we wouldn't have to repurpose someone else for that" at all.

I think Treants have a lot of potential to be interesting (being reclusive hasn't stopped anything else from being campaign-defining) that goes mostly untapped, but this isn't the place for rewriting the monster manual.

Pronounceable
2017-03-02, 05:25 AM
Forgotten Realms wiki has him as a red link one other minor deity's page. Greyhawk wikia has nothing, the Great Library of Greyhawk is giving me a PHP version error.
I just asked treant god to google, and it showed me a wikipedia quote from "fey deities" right on first page saying Emma is the guy. Haven't found all that much by googling his name later but identifying him wasn't a great feat of research. There's very little on him but it does have potential to go somewhere.

And speaking of rewriting the manual,


GITH (divinity), Warrior Queen, Great Savior
Domains: githyanki, githzerai, mindflayer genocide

The githyanki are known as ruthless immortal pirates who plunder the multiverse from their strongholds in Astral Plane built atop corpses of gods. They’re strange creatures with even stranger manners, nursing an inexplicable grudge against mindflayers and their own seemingly identical cousins, the mad githzerai who live in Limbo and try to bring order to it. But their oddity runs so much deeper than most know, including themselves.

The most well known oddity of githyanki is their “immortality”. The same floating pirate ships manned by the same pirates will return again and again to attack settlements on Material no matter how many times they’re defeated, their ships destroyed and they themselves killed; not stopping until they’ve defeated the defenders and taken off with as much loot and captives as they first demanded for tribute on their first appearance. Killed githyanki and destroyed ships disappear, leaving nothing behind and captured ones kill themselves at the first opportunity too. This creates the impression of immortality and unlike most outsider or elemental beings, githyanki seem able to appear out of nowhere instead of having to enter Material through established and known portals. The truth of the matter is, as usually the case with the twin gith races, much weirder. The technique known as Astral projection (invented by genies who’re incapable of physically existing in Astral Plane and beyond) allows someone to create a magical replica of themselves on Astral with all qualities and abilities of their real self, even with the ability to travel to Outer Planes using planar pathways or portals, at the cost of leaving the real body comatose and defenseless until the projection is destroyed. Projecting is the safest way of entering Astral for mortals, who’re all but defenseless against the lethal side effects of timelessness in person. Despite appearances, the githyanki are mortal creatures and are just as vulnerable to timeshock as any mortal, they too will die instantenously after leaving Astral Plane after a long time (in a manner of speaking) as all the suspended requirements of mortality come crashing down as the flow of time on their body returns in force. It’s the Material projection invented by githyanki that gives them the appearance of immortality, letting them visit all the planes of the multiverse without dying to a horrifyingly painful mixture of suffocation, starvation, dehydration, exhaustion and rapid aging followed by endless pain as a wraith (an especially tortured form of disembodied undead created only by an extremely traumatic yet “natural” death, the only known phenomenon to cause it is the timeshock). They can Material project to pretty much anywhere they wish (but will need to use preexisting portals to send their plunder and captives back home).

The second most well known oddity of githyanki is their silver swords. Called Gish, these weird weapons are wielded only by the highest ranking githyanki warrior mages (also called Gish) and are somehow capable of harming divinities. In the hands of a true Gish, a silvered sword will cut through any and all godly defenses and could kill even the strongest of deities while on Astral Plane (Material projected copies can’t do this and no githyanki will let a real one get taken off Astral so long as they live). But for all its mysterious power, Gish swords provide no protection of any sort and even the flimsiest of deities is able to easily kill or incapacitate hordes of hostile Gish with relative ease in a confrontation. Nobody, not even gods have a clue how the swords work and all attempts to replicate the effect has failed. Just as incomprehensibly, the silver swords lose this ability when wielded by any being that’s not a Gish officially ordained by the Pirate Queen of Astral, the nominal ruler of githyanki race, in a grand ceremony. It’s generally accepted that their swords are the only reason githyanki can get away with blasphemously carving up corpses of gods in Astral to make their cities without divine retribution of some sort.

However the greatest oddity of githyanki is their reproduction, which should be impossible in their timeless plane. Without flow of time pregnancy (or egg laying in githyanki’s particular case), birth (hatching) or growth cannot happen. Yet the githyanki do reproduce to replenish their fallen and keep up their total population against the native threats (such as phase spiders). The big secret of githyanki, the true reason behind their endless lust for piracy, is the propagation of their species. They might look like taking valuables and slaves in their raids, but what they actually steal is life and all the treasures are simply neat bonuses. Captives of githyanki raids are strapped to the contraptions hidden in the deepest parts of their strongholds, where their lifespan is taken by the impossibly advanced machines githyanki call hypertime siphon chambers and transferred over to githyanki couples in the form of “simulated time”, letting them experience enough of a time flow to reproduce without suffering timeshock. The males finish up as quickly as possible and leave the females inside the machine, the females also try to lay their eggs as quickly as they can and leave to minimize their own aging. Eggs will hatch and the newborns will grow inside the hatchery rooms as long as there’s enough captives to keep the simulated time flowing. Of course the process is extremely inefficient, burning up hours of a captive’s lifetime for each second of simulated time and each new batch of githyanki adults requires dozens of captives from conception to maturity. The siphons stop working when the captive has run out of lifespan but, thanks to the timelessness, such captives don’t die (or even grow any older than they started). However they’re now technically dead and will become physically so the moment they leave Astral Plane (with an almost certain transformation to a tormented wraith), which the githyanki are kind enough to explain. Such captives are then given the choice between swift execution to avoid the eventual horrible timeshock death or endless slavery in githyanki cities, disbelievers (or slaves that later prove troublesome) get thrown out of Astral and will have the dreaded timeshock. Most slaves to githyanki eventually resort to suicide (out of boredom if nothing else) but there’s always more where they came from.

For all their factual weirdness, the myths of githyanki are even more weird. As they tell it, the githyanki are the saviors of the multiverse from the terrible mindflayers. Both gith races say that illithid liches of Astral despoiled the entirety of existence by finding ways of eating deities and, after consuming and ruining everything worthwhile irrevocably, built machines out of the corpses of the gods they’d killed to travel hundreds of thousands of years back in time to a pristine multiverse where they’d do it again. But the courageous People (who were still one people then, made by horrific genetic experimentations of illithids on creations of Pelor and Tiamat after their destruction) stole one god corpse and sabotaged the rest, leaving mindflayers to die with the multiverse they ruined as they set a new course for the machine to prevent the illithids from even getting started; coming down on and utterly destroying the unsuspecting mindflayer empire of Astral Plane before they could discover the secrets of lichdom and combine it with psionics for terrifying results. Thus ensuring the illithid liches will never come to be, the gith saved the multiverse and stopped their elven ancestors from getting genocided by mad science. Which would make no ****ing sense even to a slaad; for if they had prevented their own creation by time travel, they wouldn’t have existed to prevent their own creation, not to mention the alledged mindflayer plot couldn’t have worked either for the exact same reason. So gith races are considered to be the biggest liars and/or nutjobs of the planes by the rare few who’ve gotten friendly enough with them to hear their myths. Gish swords, the corpse of the unknown god Tu’narath (a deity that’s never existed far as anyone has found) their capitol is built on and the hypertime siphon chambers remain as inexplicable and resistant to understanding as they’ve ever been.

The story of Gith and Zerthimon is the point of great contention for the twin gith races. Both agree that Warrior Queen Gith was the leader of the uprising against the mindflayers and Wiseman Zerthimon was the brains behind her brawn, but their actual relation is shrouded in mystery. Whether they were good friends, grudging allies, lovers, siblings or frenemies, they had a big conflict after the fall of illithid empire. To hear githzerai tell it, Gith wanted to replace the mindflayer empire of Astral with themselves and Zerthimon tried and failed to save her and her followers from their folly. Githyanki, however, call Zerthimon covetous of Gith’s power and possibly a traitor under mindflayer influence who let the elder brains get away by causing a schism among the People. They came to blows after Zerthimon’s Pronouncement of Two Skies (a manifesto denouncing Gith as insane and unfit to lead) and both of them died in the end; the event broke the People in two, causing them to insist that they’re entirely different races now (despite being completely identical) and mortal enemies only slightly less hated than the flayers. Githyanki stayed in Astral to continue on the path Gith wanted, while githzerai left for the uninhabited plane of Limbo where they could construct a utopia of their liking without being beholden to anyone else, for there was no point in having to deal with timelessness now that mindflayer threat was averted.

Currently, the githyanki race is ruled by Vlaakith the 157th, the Pirate Queen of Astral. Like her 156 predecessors (more than 100 of which are still around as her council of advisors), she’s a lich queen: a hybrid of lich and deathknight with the most fearsome powers of both. The original one was the second in command of Gith herself and fell in battle against githzerai, but it was her will that established the rule of lich queens. The city of Tu’narath owes its relative safety and prosperity to its legion of lich queens, it’s one of the more infamous armies of the multiverse and armed with silver swords, can give pause even to gods themselves. Any time a female Gish manages to attain enough power to become a lich and a deathknight, she gets named Vlaakith and crowned as the newest queen while the previous one steps down and joins the council of other Vlaakiths. Vlaakith must take counsel from her predecessors on important matters (this usualy takes a lot of time) but the final decisions belong to her alone. Male Gish can’t become Vlaakiths but nothing is stopping them from becoming lich kings (except all the downsides of being undead). Any Gish can, upon getting enough magical or martial power, become a regular lich or a deathknight but those are slightly looked down upon for quitting halfway. After becoming undead, githyanki no longer fear timeshock and can leave Astral, even a few Vlaakiths have done that. But they’d have to give up their silver sword, those aren’t allowed to leave Astral under any circumstance, and many Gish feel it an integral part of their identity so stay with their live brethren.

Not even closest friends of githyanki are told where new silver swords come from, because even githyanki don’t know. Neither gith race knows how improbable they really are; for the undivided giths were the chosen people of Luminous Overmother, empowered by her at the cost of releasing the Naught That Was. Gith was touched by Selune, for Luminous Overmother was in despair over the twisted fate of her multiverse at mindflayer tentacles and conceded at that point it was better to let it fall into the Yawning Void below than continue in unending agony. Tu’narath’s paradoxical function was fulfilled only at the cost of literally everything, the unchained Allmother annihilated all that existed when Lady of Silver Tears directed all of her will towards taking the unnamed race led by Gith back to a point where the multiverse could be salvaged, leaving the two Overmothers alone in emptiness once again.

The touch of Overmother lingered in Gith’s soul and after she died, it transformed her body into a silvery, divine metal infused with a tiny bit of Selune’s own omnipotency. After placing Gith’s transmuted body in an extravagantly built tomb on Tu’narath, Vlaakith the First thought to craft a sword from Gith’s metal body as a symbol of the violent conquest she dreamed of, unwittingly chaining the omnipotent bit of divinity before her to that idea. The first silver sword appear in Gith’s hands at that moment, shaped into existence by Vlaakith’s thoughts and she saw it as a sign from Gith. More swords keep forming in silvery hands of Gith at set intervals, all with an unmatched ability to hurt and kill gods, bound to whoever takes it from there. The official ordaining of the Gish is simply mimicking the original Vlaakith’s taking of the sword from the hands of the ancient “statue” of Queen Gith (only brought out for such special occasions) surrounded by a mass of confusing ceremony to obscure the simplicity of attuning to silver swords (and give some mystical import to Vlaakith). Gith’s soul lives (for lack of a better term) trapped inside her corpse, unnoticed even by Vlaakiths, and is furious for the utter waste githyanki made of the omnipotency in their hands and the idiocy of gith races in splitting. She’s waiting for a worthy member of the People to appear, one who isn’t such an idiot as the damned Vlaakiths; one that’ll be worthy of speaking to and granting the virtually infinite divine power lying dormant inside her. The divinity Gith can grant would make anyone into a peer of Overmothers’ children instantly but she has no control over it herself and has to sit and watch it get wasted on making petty trinkets. She’d rather sit silently for eternity than let someone unworthy take Luminous Overmother’s power, though.

Completely unaware how disappointing they are to their revered ancestor, most githyanki live as bands of roaming pirates who raid Material and other Outer Planes, trying to take as much treasure and captives as they can manage before they return to their cities to offload the loot and enjoy some comforts of civilization. Such bands are usually led by a Gish and might contain more than one in high positions. These dreaded pirates are at their most vulnerable at the end of their raids, where their projections need to send their booty to Astral through an existing portal where their real selves will take over, making them weak on both sides for having to divide the crew and no githyanki on either side can cross to the other if anything happens. Anyone making a move at this moment has the best chance of slaughtering githyanki and capturing their ship. Such defeats are generally the leading cause of death to the ageless githyanki and necessitates more reproduction to restore their population (aka even more raiding, thus more risk).

The githyanki society, while living in their cities atop (or inside) corpses of gods, is maternal and while males aren’t discriminated against, all dangerous jobs in githyanki cities and actual fighting in Astral is done by them on account of their physical superiority, for female githyanki have to grow older faster due to hypertime siphon chambers. This makes their society comprise mostly of middle aged women and young adult men, at least in appearance (most githyanki refuse to reproduce after reaching a certain physical age, which is traditionally a lot higher for females, but their actual ages are on average the same [aka ageless]). Such distinction doesn’t exist for raider bands seen throughout the planes, where no githyanki is particularly more endangered than another.

Meanwhile, mindflayers haven’t the foggiest idea why or how some weird elf-reptile things have mysteriously appeared out of nowhere and destroyed their (somewhat) peaceful civilization in Astral dedicated to science and progress, and drove them into Material Plane, where they had to start infesting bodies of sentient beings with their tadpoles to reproduce (after death of every single natural adult of their species) and eat their brains to survive. The few who have heard of the gith legend would dismiss it as trolling, if they had words for it.


I did mention I was doing this just before Torm. And is totally rewriting githyanki entry of MM. We've been kinda doing that, what with duergar and goblinoids and demodands and rakshasi and shadar-kai and so on.

So. Everyone knows the silly time traveling mindflayers from the grimdark future of the 40th millenium story. Maybe it's not really silly but watching Flash and Legends of Tomorrow has surgically removed my ability to take time travel even slightly seriously. Anyway, it didn't really fit our stuff here, with Tiamat making all abominations one by one, but if DnD gives you lemons, you make lemonade. So giths got that instead and when that happened, I had to justify it somehow. It'd have to take something really big because I've disallowed even Shar from ****ing with time despite being literally omnipotent just so we wouldn't have to deal with time paradox crap. Therefore, this.

Also, the timelessness quality of Astral is criminally underused. Sure canon has few lines here and there saying githyanki have small hideouts in Prime to raise their kids but taking literally the easiest way out imaginable is lame as all hell. We're not writing Flash episodes here >_> This also helped convince me to use the time travel thing, it stands to reason various things that muck with time should be lumped together.

Also also, the silver swords. They were just mediocre and didn't deserve nearly the amount of obsession githyanki had for them. Fixed that too.

I daresay this is one of the coolest entries I've written up, maybe even better than Demonomicon (not as cool as Auril tho, nothing will be that cool). It was another frenzy of writing thing that I spent a block of many hours on. Those are the best ones. It's also pretty long without any sign of Douchenozzle, so I'm breaking all sorts of grounds here.

Fri
2017-03-02, 05:48 AM
Okay, at first I find the story weird (blandly weird? weirdly bland? is that a phrase?) but that last paragraph cinches it.

Though, even before reading that last paragraph one sentence caught my attention.


(Wraith is)an especially tortured form of disembodied undead created only by an extremely traumatic yet “natural” death, the only known phenomenon to cause it is the timeshock

I wonder what other death can possibly creat wraith, since I like to imagine there's a reason why they're called "wraith" and not say, "time ghost." In fact, a death worthy of wraithification that's not a time shock might be worth a story of its own.

Pronounceable
2017-03-02, 05:57 AM
^Because time wraiths.Not sorry.

And it cinches it as weird or cinches it as bland? Cos weird is :smallcool:, bland is :smallfrown:.

Fri
2017-03-02, 06:44 AM
Cinches it as great.

I mean. "this story seems strangely too normally written" then last paragraph, BAM! that's the moneyshot.

also I guess it's true that Time Wraith For No Man.

Fable Wright
2017-03-02, 01:07 PM
I wonder what other death can possibly creat wraith, since I like to imagine there's a reason why they're called "wraith" and not say, "time ghost." In fact, a death worthy of wraithification that's not a time shock might be worth a story of its own.

Drowning. It's about as horrific and traumatic as you can get, and entirely natural.


where their lifespan is taken by the impossibly advanced machines githyanki call hypertime siphon chambers and transferred over to githyanki couples in the form of “simulated time”, letting them experience enough of a time flow to reproduce without suffering timeshock.

So, to confirm, we have life-siphoning devices, dread pirates, and true love all in one sentence here.

Have you been watching the Princess Bride recently, by any chance?


Thus ensuring the illithid liches will never come to be, the gith saved the multiverse and stopped their elven ancestors from getting genocided by mad science. Which would make no ****ing sense even to a slaad; for if they had prevented their own creation by time travel, they wouldn’t have existed to prevent their own creation,

Gohan: Multiverse theory? (https://i.ytimg.com/vi/__sBg9ROWXI/maxresdefault.jpg)
Trunks: Multiverse theory. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WWkCOJVt6E)


she’s a lich queen: a hybrid of lich and deathknight with the most fearsome powers of both.

On first reading, I'd thought she was just a deathknight whose sentient armor happened to be a lich. Kill her, destroy the armor, and the armor regenerates from the phylactery, she regenerates from the armor. She touches you with the armor's hand, you get the lich's paralyzing touch, making it seem like she's somehow both types of undead. The gith males would be the ones who learned to make (or become) the lich-armor, making it a more egalitarian society rather than its seeming matriarchal roots.

Ah well. I'll save that headcanon for my home games.


Meanwhile, mindflayers haven’t the foggiest idea why or how some weird elf-reptile things have mysteriously appeared out of nowhere and destroyed their (somewhat) peaceful civilization in Astral dedicated to science and progress, and drove them into Material Plane, where they had to start infesting bodies of sentient beings with their tadpoles to reproduce (after death of every single natural adult of their species) and eat their brains to survive. The few who have heard of the gith legend would dismiss it as trolling, if they had words for it.

Pure poetry. :smallbiggrin:

Beneath
2017-03-02, 06:55 PM
Very nice. Vlaakith being like Caesar, something between a name and a title, is a nice touch, as is the fact that Gith has her own ideas and goals for the people and thinks they're dreaming too small, even though they're doing the thing every GM is scared their players will do with astral projection to become the terror of the material.

In a plot twist, will their destruction of the initial Illithid empire in the astral lead to the illithids creating their cosmos-spanning empire in the future, causing the Overmothers together to send the Gith back? Are they a stable time loop, or the survivors of a branch timeline that now cannot happen? Does anyone know the answer?

(kinda reminds me of my gnome backstory, where the gnomes send a scientific expedition on a one-way trip back in time into the oldest gnome ruins ever discovered to observe the creation of their species, but when they crack open the vault their explorers were to use as a time capsule, they find logs stating the mission was a failure: there were gno gnomes, and the children of the original expedition have decided to abandon it, despite the risk of changing the timeline. These gnomes who abandoned their mission and spread over the primordial world are of course the ancestors of all present-day gnomes. because creating themselves in a stable time loop is exactly the kind of thing gnomes would do)

Pronounceable
2017-03-10, 09:18 AM
Have you been watching the Princess Bride recently, by any chance?
Guess it says a lot about me that the concept of love (true or otherwise) didn't even twitch in my mind while writing about reproduction of a fantasy species living outside time. I definitely have no romance in my soul.

On first reading, I'd thought she was just a deathknight whose sentient armor happened to be a lich.
That's kinda more awesome than my fighter/wizard > deathknight/lich idea. But it also sounds to be a cooler thing for one particular baddie instead of an entire dynasty.

Vlaakith being... something between a name and a title, is nice
Vlaakith the 157th is the canonic gith queen during Lich Queen's Beloved. It's one of the cooler and hipper bits about yankis that needed to be included.

Are they a stable time loop, or the survivors of a branch timeline that now cannot happen?
Luminous Overmother works in mysterious ways.

gnomes
Gnomey indeed. Also rad.


Speaking of souls and romance, today we're trodding some extremely well trodden ground. In fact it might be the single most trodden bit of ground ever trodden well. Also we've had a load of demon stuff so this was only a matter of time.


DANTE ALGIERNI (petitioner), the Magnificent Poet
13458-13502 (ME)

Dante Algierni was the spoiled son of a rich noble who spent his days spending daddy’s money on frivolities. At some point, he decided that he was going to be a great poet to impress ladies and started scribbling poems. Despite spending a lot of money on tutors and books, Dante found he wasn’t getting much in the way of recognition and chalked that up to people’s inability to understand his artistic genius. In time, he got mixed up with other bored rich dilettantes and found himself affiliated to a bunch of diabolists. Since Dante hadn’t seen a bad idea in his life that he hadn’t immediately wanted to latch on, he decided to become a powerful diabolist commanding legions of devils and show those plebs who refused to acknowledge his greatness.

He proved more adept at diabolism than poetry and was accepted into the lowest circle of the cult (with his grand power of controlling one imp). The familiar was doing his job, encouraging Dante towards more lawful evil behavior and he grew meaner in his daily life (such as not thanking the servants when they brought his meals). The imp was certain he’d get this particular mortal damned to Inferno in a few decades and possibly earn himself a promotion if he could nudge the wretch to properly use the vast wealth of his family. Unfortunately for the tiny devil, a mighty angel from Elysium took pity upon the mortal and came down to help him.

Dante was shocked by the sudden appearance of a celestial and upset that his familiar was vanquished. She introduced herself as Virgilia and explained him that she was here to save his eternal soul from damnation. And she would do that properly, by showing Dante what Inferno was truly like when stripped bare of the lies of devils and diabolists. This had all the signs of a bad idea about it, so Dante immediately agreed to be bodily taken to the plane of devils.

Thus started the grand journey of a poet that would reveal the inner workings of Infernal Hierarchy to the multiverse at large.

Virgilia first took Dante to Avernus the First Circle, the outermost and largest of the nine concentric circles that made up the infinite plains of Inferno. Ruled by Archduke Bel, Avernus was a land of barracks and armories patrolled by legions of devil warriors against intruders (such as Dante and Virgilia). It was here that Virgilia taught Dante the true purpose of devilkind, to assemble in grand armies and to venture into the Abyss to fight demons that would devour everything if allowed, so that the good exemplars of Upper Planes could stay untainted by war. Dante was exceedingly impressed, for the power of devils was palpable here in their monuments and engines of war, their legions shone with great purpose (and infernal weaponry). Virgilia’s powers hid them from devil patrols as they made their way deeper; crossing Avernus and seeing the might of Infernal Hierarchy with his own eyes, eavesdropping on devil soldiers talking about great victories and bitter defeats against the demons, had convinced Dante he’d been but a wretch that would distract these noble defenders of the multiverse with his petty grudges. Virgilia didn’t comment when Dante proclaimed he’d become a much better diabolist when he went back, one that’s dedicated to the infernal cause and doing his own part to protect existence. Instead, she led him towards Bronze Citadel, the castle of Archduke Bel, and together they snuck into an underground cave near it. Here Dante found a surprise; a great and terrible lady of devils was bound in this tiny, nondescript cave. Virgilia introduced him to archdevil Zariel, the former Archduchess of Avernus, who was happy to have any company after millenia of isolation, even a mortal wretch and some celestial harlot, and would trade words. She told Dante how Lord Bel is the golden child of Inferno, a rare devil that started as a lowly lemure and worked his way to the top and how his unstoppable rise ruined Zariel. Zariel had been a mighty warrior and brilliant general, utterly devoted to her duties and had never made a single mistake, yet she’d been cast aside just because someone else turned out to be even better at the job. Such was the gratitude one could expect from devils but Dante was unswayed, the noble nature of the war against demons justified this cost. Archdevil Zariel laughed at that, it was her own motto back in her day.

Virgilia then led the way to Dis the Second Circle, the grand metal city of devils that seemed to be infinite in size. It was a city of unmatched dread and splendor in equal measure, streets thronging with all manner of fiends from all the Lower Planes who came here to trade. Dante was shocked to see even a few demons were roaming freely here, buying and selling items of incomprehensible nature, shadowed by devils that Virgilia called osyluths, the spies/agents/assassins of Archduke Baalzebul in charge of keeping peace within Inferno. All streets and buildings were made of a pure green metal that Virgillia called infernal green steel, a magical substance capable of harming all manner of fiends (even tiger tyrants of Acheron), extracted from the mining tunnels running under the city. Archduke Dispater ruled the city, he was the oldest lord of devils (predating even the Emperor of Devils). Virgilia explained that Dispater is the father of the art that mortals call alchemy, he invented the infernal green steel back in the Dawn War and used it to outfit his soldiers and become the very first ruler Inferno had seen; Dispater was also the first devil to swear his fealty to Dominus Infernus when he appeared. Today, he controlled all the factories and foundries of Inferno where craftsdevils and their slave workers built weapons of war and oppression. As the oldest and most entrenched lord of devils, Dispater is the most secure of all Archdukes and even Asmodeus would probably fall before he did. Dante then visited the green steel mines and weapon factories, still hidden by Virgilia’s power, and saw the slaves toiling endlessly to feed the infinite hunger of devilish war effort for more weapons. There was little glory in the hellish working conditions but devil overseers didn’t seem to mind, they were content enough to whip and cut their slaves. Dante was disturbed; the slaves were working themselves to death already, then they respawned and did it again and again, the burning whips and barbed blades didn’t seem very necessary. Virgilia showed him a familiar face, it was one of the cultists Dante had known who’d died a little while ago. He revealed the secrets of devilish arms to Dante, the infernal enchantments on weaponry of devils were crafted by the relentless oppression of their slaves and the more opression and pain went into creation of a devilish weapon, the more powerful it ended up. Virgilia assured Dante there was no way to save the wretched cultist’s soul, he’d signed away his soul for a bit of fleeting power in life and now it belonged to Archduke Belial forever, like all other foolish mortals who thought to get the better of devils. As they left the damned cultist begging to be saved behind, she asked Dante if the noble nature of the war against demons justified this cost. His certainty was shaken and he didn’t answer as they left the Iron City behind.

The pair entered Minauros the Third Circle, the corrosive bogs under Archduke Mammon’s jurisdiction. This was the beating heart of Inferno’s economy, as Virgilia called, the place of endless suffering from which the devils extract their precious Mammbrosia, the concentrated liquid pain, the currency of Infernal Hierarchy. Far as devils are concerned, the so called “precious” gems and metals are useless, pointless objects, only good for tempting stupid mortals who don’t recognize what value really means. Devils know value means power and all its forms to uphold tyranny and oppression, not petty shinies that aren’t even useful in a fight, and thus use the most direct form of oppression as their currency: infliction of pain. The Golden Duke of Minauros is another member of the “old guard” like the Iron Duke of Dis, an ancient lord of devils that predates the establishment of the Hierarchy by the hand of Lord Asmodeus. His own unique invention Mammbrosia (like all old school devils, modesty isn’t exactly Mammon’s strong point) grants great power to fiends that consume it and Lord Mammon had used it to stengthen his troops and conquer his own realm back during the Dawn War, becoming enemies with neighboring Lord Dispater. But today, the two oldest lords were close allies and they controlled vitually all of Infernal economy between them. Virgilia then led Dante to an excruciatorium, a factory of pain where damned mortals are eternally tortured to distill Mammbrosia. Dante was sickened at the sight of the infernal mint and begged Virgilia to take him away from this horrid place, starting to realize that this might be where he’s gonna end up if he stays on the diabolist path. He refused to visit the Sinking Stone City where Archduke ruled from or witness a ritual of promotion where a devil is transformed painfully into a higher rank by imbibing massive amounts of Mammbrosia. Virgilia obliged him and let them move on, she seemed happy that Dante was beginning to understand the folly of dealing with devils.

Next was Phlegethos the Fourth Circle, the most stereotypical realm of Inferno covered with volcanoes, lava lakes and blasted sulphurous wastelands. This was domain of Archduke Belial, the lord in charge of corrupting mortals and immortals alike. Almost every diabolist cult of Material is ultimately tied to Lord Belial and his archdevil courtiers, no matter how lowly an imp they think they’re dealing with, and every deal and contract mortals make with devils ultimately fall under his jurisdiction (including what Dante’s own imp familiar was nudging him towards). Belial is also the chief diplomat and negotiator of Inferno when dealing with powers of other planes. As a result, Phlegethos is the most open circle of Inferno to outsiders and is the reason why most denizens of the planes think all of Inferno is a burning wasteland of sulphur and lava. Dante wanted to know more about this circle, his terror at seeing his potential fate in an excruciatorium was waning in the domain of his would-be patron and his thoughts were turning again towards what he might personally get out of dealing with devils. However Virgilia was anxious, her powers might not have been enough to hide them here, Phlegethos devils were intimately familiar with outsiders and threat of detection was high. But Dante insisted, so Virgilia reluctantly took him towards the city of Abriymoch where Archduke Belial and his consort daughter Lady Fierna rule. That bit seemed interesting to Dante, so Virgilia explained that no, Fierna isn’t Belial’s daughter or concubine (since devils don’t and can’t reproduce) and it simply means she’s been taken in by the Archduke as an advisor and being groomed as his successor in the event of his downfall. This causes a lot of disdain for Belial, especially from the old guard who claim the millenia of dealing with mortals corrupted him. The existence of this “daughter” can only mean Belial is either planning to step down (certain madness) or deliberately cultivating a rival to his own power (certain stupidity), yet nobody is entirely certain which is true. Dante was a professional spoiled rich boy and lived for this celebrity/nobility gossip column crap and kept pestering Virgilia about more infernal politics trivia.

Speaking of the devils proved unwise however; the pair were found by archfiend Fierna herself (who’d heard her own name being spoken by foreign mouths in her domain). She had them captured and bound, then decided to have a little chat with this puny mortal who’d dare talk behind her back inside her own lands. Dante couldn’t decide whether to be aroused or terrified by the attentions of the incredibly beautiful archdevil (and did both) but he introduced himself as a novice diabolist and tried to learn more about devilish deals and what he might get for himself. Fierna summoned the imp familiar he’d had and listened to what he had to say about this uppity mortal. She seemed satisfied and impressed (which was of course an act that even Dante wasn’t dumb enough to fall for, he knew he was yet a crappy diabolist), then offered to promote Dante straight into a greater devil upon his death in return for eternal loyalty to Fierna. While Virgilia was bound and gagged, Dante could see her frantic squirming in the background and recognized the flaw in this offer; he asked if she meant eternal loyalty to her father, earning himself a furious smack that almost killed him. He wouldn’t die however, death would be an escape, Fierna wanted this obnoxious mortal scum to suffer much more and healed his wound so fast, Dante wasn’t certain if he’d even been hit or just afflicted by some sort of mental trick. Instead, she sent for some excruciarchs (as torturer devils were called) from the nearest excruciatorium. Fierna wanted to make Dante watch as they gave the angel a proper Infernal welcome and think about what was in store for him, she also made certain to inform him that if he hadn’t been a loudmouthed idiot invoking the names of devil nobles willy nilly, the brave Virgilia who only wanted to save his soul wouldn’t be getting damned to an eternity of torture now. Dante was left weeping as Fierna went to do devil things until the torturers arrived. His old familiar stayed nearby, taunting Virgilia who’d cost him Dante’s soul. Unfortunately for the tiny devil (again), she was quite a powerful agnel and only Fierna herself posed a danger to her here, which was why she’d stuck to being the distressed damsel until the archdevil went away. The imp was incinerated by holy light once more, along with the orthon and hamatula devils that made up Lady Fierna’s personal guard, and Virgilia carried Dante off to the relative safety of the next Circle.

Stygia the Fifth Circle would protect them from Fierna’s and even Belial’s (if Fierna would be humble enough to ask him for help) wrath, for it’s the icy realm of Archduke Levistus and the whole domain was frozen solid after his betrayal of Dominus Infernus. Virgilia assured Dante that they were safe here, for all archdevils in Levistus’ court were also frozen with him after he assassinated Domina Infernus Bensozia, the beloved wife of the Emperor of Devils, and the regular devils of Stygia were completely unused to outsiders and had no way of overcoming Virgilia’s hiding veil. Their close brush with death left behind, Dante once again started asking Virgilia about infernal gossip. She was an endless well of such things, and told Dante about the great civil war that raged a scant few centuries ago in Inferno, called the Infernal Reckoning, where the “old guard” among devil nobility squared off against the “new guard”, triggered by the sudden murder of Devilish Empress by a terrible artifact known as the Allmother’s Eye, which irrevocably annihilated her. The artifact belonged to Archduke Levistus, who used to use it as part of his duty as the maintainer of morale and discipline in Inferno by permenantly destroying troublesome or rebellious devils. Enraged Asmodeus froze Lord Levistus and all his court, thus offending Archdukes Dispater, Mammon and Mephistopheles who were all ancient devil lords predating the Hierarchy like Levistus. They demanded Dominus Infernus release Levistus and give him a chance to explain himself. Archdukes Bel, Belial and Baalzebul opposed them, saying Lord Asmodeus was their master and had the right to do whatever he pleased (such as, in a totally unrelated example, giving important positions to unorthodox and/or young devils like Bel, Belial and Baalzebul). Asmodeus himself was pretty silent then, he’s known to have a strange sense of sentimentality at oddest times and was presumed to be in mourning, which allowed Heres Infernus Glasya to stoke the tensions on both sides. The Infernal Princess wanted to see everything burn down to avenge her mother and didn’t particularly care who was guilty, or so it seemed at the time.

Dante and Virgilia had reached the border of Stygia then, they had passed all of frozen Circle without encountering anything, completely absorbed in their conversation. Virgilia’s demeanor had grown warmer and warmer and she positively glowed now, she clearly enjoyed talking about failings of devils and Dante was an avid consumer of petty gossip (though she’d probably been using her aura of light to protect Dante from freezing to death, which is what should’ve happened immediately upon entering Stygia). Virgilia suddenly stopped and asked Dante if he learned the lesson of Stygia, which was unexpected. He looked back to the frozen hellscape and thought about their long walk full of amusing but ultimately empty banter, noticing that he had indeed learned something else about the nature of Inferno. Dante told Virgilia he learned that the cold and empty truth of devils was too easily eclipsed with entertaining diversions that they were experts at providing, even a holy and pure being like Virgilia just talking about their quite interesting history could become a cover for infernal happenings under right circumstances. She seemed to take offense at his words and huffed at him, but Dante could tell by now when she was happy despite looking angry and when she really was angry at him despite looking unperturbed for saying dumb crap (like he’d done back in the first Circles). Virgilia warned him that they were now entering the deeper Inferno, where things were more convoluted and the nature of evil became less tangible.

Then the pair entered Malbolge the Sixth Circle, the contested realm. As Virgilia said, now evil was taking a much more abstract form, for Malbolge belonged to Heres Infernus Glasya now. Her apparent destructive rage at her mother’s assassination had turned out to be not entirely real in the end and she had used the chaos created by the Archdukes fighting one another to depose the previous Archduchess of Malbolge and crown herself. They travelled through the ruined buildings dotting the barren landscape where devils were being punished in ways that didn’t seem at all punishing to Dante, for the ruler of Malbolge is traditionally in charge of discipline and devilish understanding of crime and punishment is much different from mortals. Virgilia explained that while these devils sitting around or doing light errands might seem much better off than the tortured petitioners they’ve seen on the previous Circles, being forced to do nothing evil or lawful is as distressing to them as torture is to mortals. Repairing buildings, playing with cards or dice or stones, collecting fruits, cooking, making clothing, digging trenches, carrying supplies and all the normal activities of life was unbearable to the average devil. The worst of all, however, was having to help each other complete their tasks, said Virgilia. That’s when Dante noticed that some devils were indeed pausing their own errands to help others with theirs, the likes of which he hadn’t seen anywhere else in Inferno. There were no overseers abusing them to work faster or harder either, the entire realm could pass for a collection of entirely normal towns and villages if it wasn’t wholly populated with devils, but the atmosphere of this Circle was far more grim than any that came before it, these devils were Unhappy. Feeling that it’s time he contributed a bit to his own salvation, Dante said the evil of this Circle had to be dissatisfaction and resentment bred by the banal necessities of life. Spoken like a true rich dilettante who’d had everything delivered on a silver platter all his life, pointed out Virgilia, but she was still pleased at his effort. She then took Dante to an especially dilapidated yet massive building, which must’ve been a palace at some point. Inside Dante met another former Archduchess, Malagard the Hag Countess, who appeared to have been dissected neatly and had her pieces spread out like a picture out of anatomy books before a broken throne. It somehow didn’t bother him at all (maybe it was the lack of screaming and begging and lack of gleeful torturers nearby that made it a better sight than the excruciatorium).

At Virgilia’s urging, she told her story to Dante (not like she had anything better to do). Converted devils don’t normally advance too high, doubly so for enslaved exemplars converted to devildom by mindbreaking torture, but this former succubus had managed to become an archdevil by the skin of her fangs and joined the court of Lord Geryon, the original Archduke of Malbolge ages ago. All archdevils dream of toppling Asmodeus one day and taking his place but Geryon was the only one dumb enough to not only speak openly about it, but to challenge Dominus Infernus to a duel where their stations would be wagered. This made him the most unpopular devil in the history of Inferno, for even the old guard who resented all the modernities Asmodeus brings have never rebelled against him. There are some lines that one does not cross, at least if one is a true devil (at least according to Lord Dispater, the voice of conservatism itself), and rising up against your rightful liege whom you’ve sworn to serve for eternity is one of them. Geryon didn’t care, he was arrogant, certain of his own considerable power and hated Asmodeus with a deep passion. So risked his own lofty position as the leader of Internal Infernal Affairs (known as watchers of the watchmen) for it. Of course he was defeated in front of the entire devilish nobility, Dominus Infernus can never be felled so long as he has his Ruby Rod, and Geryon was exiled from Inferno in disgrace. Then suddenly Hag Countess Malagard (still called that despite having been converted long ago and loyally serving Inferno ever since) was appointed as Archduchess of Malbolge, becoming the least secure ruler of Inferno due to the deplorable actions of her predecessor, on top of the ordinary planist prejudices she’d had to deal with ever since converting. As a result of her insecurity and lack of influence, she didn’t dare to pick a side in the Reckoning and tried to hunker down, which let the treacherous Princess Glasya defy all traditions and Pact Primeval itself to usurp her without any interference from other Archdukes (who were too busy fighting each other). Dante asked what that was, but Malagard was too absorbed in her story to notice, she kept spewing bile about the usurping demon bastard and her accursed turncoat mother who brought ruin to Inferno. As Malagard’s rant became viler and more disturbing, Virgilia motioned for them to leave. The dissected archdevil didn’t even notice them going and was still venting at Archduchess Glasya as they exited the ruined palace. Virgilia said “punishment” once then nothing else as they walked, maybe she knew Dante was remembering swearing to punish all the plebs who hadn’t recognized his artistic genius.

Maladomini the Seventh Circle was next and it seemed more fantastic than all the terrible vistas Dante had seen until now. Archduke Baalzebul was the ultimate perfectionist and had personally reconstructed his realm stone by stone. The result was this incredibly beautiful landscape that Virgilia assured him could give all the Upper Planes a run for their money. Not a single blade of grass stood out or stooped low, not one bit of mud marred the roads, every single geographical feature was flawlessly geometric from rivers to mountains. This perfectionism stemmed from Lord Baalzebul’s past as a deva of Arcadia, explained Virgilia, one who had been captured by demons and twisted until he broke. But even demonic tortures (that Virgilia assured Dante would make what he’s witnessed in excruciatoriums look like bliss) couldn’t break Baalzebul’s dedication to law, so they ransomed him to Infernal Hierarchy once he converted to a devil. After he was officially accepted into Inferno, Baalzebul dedicated himself to philosophy of lawful evil, obsessively studying to become the foremost expert of it and he rose swiftly. The converted deva faced much less prejudice than the Hag Countess, for he was both male and of lawful origin. Just like another, more famous former deva did for lawful good, Baalzebul was eventually recognized even by the old guard as the most lawful evil creature in existence and was promoted to Archduke of Maladomini, the head of Infernal Intelligence and spymaster of Dominus Infernus. Virgilia took Dante straight to Grenpoli, the magnificent crystal city from which Lord Baalzebul runs his domain, saying that it’s impossible to hide from Lord of the Flies in his realm and he already knows they’re there. Virgilia needed to meet him and get his permission to continue deeper with Dante. Thus Dante met his first (reigning) Infernal Archduke. Like all devils, Lord Baalzebul was a red skinned humanish creature with batlike wings and a tail but his eyes had been replaced by oversized, multifaceted gems that made them look like a fly’s. He forbade Virgilia from speaking, he’d already heard everything they’ve spoken about since they entered his realm, and asked Dante what he expected to accomplish with this journey. Dante answered he hoped to learn the true nature of Inferno and begged to be allowed to continue so he can see the deepest truths. Baalzebul questioned him further, asking about what he’s learned so far. It felt too much like an exam before a tutor but Dante was only terrible at making decisions, not learning or remembering things. He talked about all the lessons he’d learned from previous Circles; importance of a noble façade, willingness to hurt others for gain, ruthlessness in pursuit of exploitation, essential nature of seduction/manipulation, cold emptiness of the truth behind the façades and cycles of punishment and resentment propagating themselves. Baalzebul seemed pleased, then asked what Dante learned from his perfect and pristine domain, as Dante had feared he would. He couldn’t dare to look at Virgilia, so had no way of even trying to guess what she thought, so after what felt like an eternity, Dante answered “self awareness”. Archduke Baalzebul’s perfectionism was just a trait, a quirk of his personality that didn’t have anything to do with the truths of Inferno; it was his dedication to lawful evil that mattered, that was what got him his Duchy and that was why he had questioned Dante about truths of Inferno (which were of course the truths of lawful evil). One had to be aware of their true nature, not make excuses for it or try rationalizing their actions as something other than evil. Only then could someone embrace and internalize lawful evil fully and be a proper servant and practitioner, and only a self aware servant could work in the most efficient manner to spread an alignment. Like Lord Baalzebul had just done by spending his valuable time to check if some random mortal learned the correct truths from Circles of Inferno, why else would he not simply kill Dante as soon as he arrived and go back to his own affairs?

Baalzebul was satisfied and granted Dante passage. Then, as if to remind the pair he was still an Infernal Archduke, he told them they were free to continue deeper into Inferno but the angel would be captured and tortured until she converts if she came back here when their journey ends. She could leave right now and let the mortal continue on alone, or go on with him and be trapped in the last two Circles of Inferno forever (or fail to fight her way out and suffer an eternity of unimaginable torment). Dante asked her to leave him, he wasn’t worthy of such a sacrifice, but Virgilia was a being of pure good and determined to not leave a salvation half done at any cost. Dante begged Baalzebul, who told them to move on before he got angry, he’d spoken and didn’t care what they’ll choose to do. On their way to the border of Maladomini, Dante kept begging Virgilia to save herself; he was a dumb mortal who’d damned himself out of petty stupidity and something as pure and beautiful as Virgilia shouldn’t have to pay for it. Virgilia said nothing, gently but firmly shook off his hands when he tried to stop her, and when they came to the border of darkened Cania, she walked right in. He had no course but to follow then, for she had damned herself for his sake and nothing he could do now could change it.

Cania the Eigth Circle was a big change after the perfectly utopic looking Maladomini. For one, it was small; Dante could see Maladomini encircling it fully. All horizons were Maladomini here, creating a strange sense of confinement despite being a massive open space. And it really was space, there was absolutely nothing here, not even a speck of dust covered the strangely black and featureless ground. Then Virgilia pointed upwards and Dante saw the incredible fortress of fire, metal, crystal and light. Mephistar, the seat of Archduke Mephistopheles, explained Virgilia, was created by using every single thing in the domain down to specks of dust, everything here had been consumed to feed Lord Mephistopheles’s ego and Dante had to stay inside her aura, because there wasn’t even air to breathe. He finally understood the sadistic intent behind the choice Baalzebul presented to her and hugged her in tears. Virgilia waited patiently as Dante wore himself out crying, then told him she had one thing to show him here. She led him towards what appeared to be the exact center of Cania and pointed on the ground. He looked and looked, even laid on the ground to see, but there was absolutely nothing except the strange unreal ground seemingly made of infinite darkness. When he admitted to seeing nothing, Virgilia told him this was the tomb of Archduke Mephistopheles, a monument he erected in his name when he consumed himself. Dante was flabbergasted, wasn’t Lord Mephistopheles the number two in Infernal Hierarchy right after the Emperor? He’d killed himself and even forbade building of some monument to his power and glory, yet was still the Archduke of Cania? Virgilia corrected him, saying Mephistopheles hadn’t killed himself, he’d consumed himself. After his side lost the Reckoning, Mephistopheles had to apologize to the victors by edict of Dominus Infernus. While other Archdukes of old guard hated that too, having to bow before the B-team (as the winners have mockingly started to call themselves) was too much for Mephistopheles. When he returned to Cania, he drew up plans for a mighty castle that will be called Mephistar, a castle that would shine like a sun that could be seen from all of Inferno and built such that nobody will ever be capable of threatening him again. Dante remembered seeing that one single star in the horizon ever since they entered Inferno, always showing which direction was going deeper. Mephistopheles placed a great darkness around his Circle and closed his borders, so none could see what was happening from the outside. Dominus Infernus had gone right back to his silence inside his own palace after stepping out long enough to put an end to Reckoning (and officially acknowledging Princess Glasya’s Archduchess status), so nobody could do anything to stop Mephistopheles. After many years of silence, the wall of shadow collapsed one day and Mephistar could indeed be seen shining from everywhere in Inferno. Except Cania was now gone; what used to be a realm of horrific living flesh full of monstrous mouths and claws that constantly rent and chewed at itself was replaced with this void. Ever since, nobody has heard anything from Mephistopheles, archdevils of his court or his personal armies of devils and slaves and it’s completely impossible to reach Mephistar despite its appearance.

Without any prompting from Virgilia, Dante said the truth of Cania was all consuming pride. Mephistopheles had effectively destroyed his own self out of sheer pride and took all of his realm, all of his servants and wealth and power with him. This was the lesson of evil above and beyond what Baalzebul had shown him; a pride so great, an inability to admit defeat so deep, even being aware of it wouldn’t stop one from performing the act of self destruction. This is what Dante would be doing now if he were to sell his soul to devils and this is what Virgilia had saved him from. In fact, along the way, Virgilia had shown Dante how flawed he’d been all his life, how petty and stupid his actions were until meeting her. She hadn’t just saved his eternal soul, which seemed such a trite and lame term before he’d seen Inferno with his own eyes, she’d made a better person out of him right now. And he’d repaid her with eternal imprisonment. Virgilia smiled, it was the prettiest Dante had seen on her face, and congradulated him for completely understanding and rejecting evil. As a being of pure goodness, there could be no higher purpose or accomplishment for an angel and being saved by her was the greatest gift Dante could’ve possibly given her. Yet she reminded him that one question remained.

Where was the next one? There was nowhere else to go from here, they were standing exactly in the middle of Inferno so where could the Ninth Circle be? Dante could guess, he’d learned enough about nature of evil. It was right there inside his heart, and inside the hearts of every mortal. Virgilia then hugged him, saying she was proud and it was time for him to back to his life. If Dante really wanted to, he could go to Nessus the Ninth Circle by willpower alone from this spot. Virgilia couldn’t come with him, she was a celestial and reality of Nessus itself would reject her. She would have to stay here, trapped inside the emptiness of Cania lest she wanted to test her strength against the entirety of Inferno by angering Archduke Baalzebul. Dante hugged her and refused to leave, he would stay here with her until he grew old and died, a proper punishment for his folly. Virgilia rebuked him sweetly, that would defeat the entire purpose of their journey and her sacrifice. Dante had to go to Nessus, the abode of Dominus Infernus Asmodeus himself, and then leave through the Gate of Salvation (an ironically fitting name for the door out of Inferno), which had to power to take Dante anywhere in the entire multiverse. Virgilia made him promise to go back home (and also steer clear of Lord Asmodeus who’s very unlikely to appreciate a mortal traipsing through his house). Just before willing himself into Nessus, Dante admitted his love for her and was rewarded with a single kiss. The kiss mark on his cheek would stay until he died, adding considerably to his fame, and even today, his soul bears the brand of Virgilia’s lips.

Dante found himself in the sort of luxury he couldn’t even imagine existing. Nessus was a massive palace, strangely empty of any devils (for which he was grateful), filled with thousands of rooms each more extravagant than the last. He made his way to the exit with apprehension, somehow he could sense where it was. He could also sense where Lord Asmodeus was by a feeling of opressive dread and wisely steered clear. Dante entered the Gate of Salvation after it asked him where he wanted to go, and found himself back in his father’s summer home’s basement, where he used to dabble in diabolism. His clothes stank of sulphur, his hands still had wounds on where Fierna’s devils had tied them and his cheek bore the darkened mark of Virgilia’s holy lips. It had very clearly not been a dream, which was confirmed soon when servants assured him he’d disappeared for a whole month.

First thing he did was to burn all of his diabolist paraphnelia. He then wrote a very long poem chronicling his journey into Inferno, spending a whole year, pouring his soul into it. This finally did get him that recognition he once craved, it became one of the most influential works of literature ever written, he was hailed as one of the greatest poets of his world and did become incredibly popular with the ladies. He never showed any interest back however, his heart and mind had been completely consumed by thoughts of holy Virgilia.

Later in life, Dante became a great philantrophist and something of a holy man, lauded all over the world for his utter dedication to good. He spent the rest of his life (and his family’s wealth) to eradicating diabolism and had a very good track record of convincing even the most diehard diabolists thanks to his zeal and the mark on his cheek that shone with good magic (like an actual celestial).

Befitting his life, Dante’s soul was judged good and sent to Elysium when he died. He was ecstatic, he’d get a chance to apologize to Virgilia’s fellow angels for his unwitting damnation of her, maybe even organize some sort of rescue effort considering all the good that’d come out of her sacrifice. Exemplars of Elysium, however, were appalled at the very idea of one of their fellows going to a mortal and working so hard to change him; that sort of intrusion, even (and especially) when done in the name of good was unthinkable to them. This was the sort of unasked for imposition upon another being only a meddlesome archon would do. Dante didn’t believe it at first, thinking maybe they were teasing or mocking him, but he soon saw angels to be deadly serious when it came to the matter of interference and imposition; there was no way Virgilia had been an angel. She could’ve been another type of celestial but as a petitioner, Dante’s soul had no way of leaving his plane and all his requests, demands and supplications to be turned into an angel himself to go look for her were denied (he was clearly unbalanced and angels thought he might be reckless enough to go to Inferno by himself). Dante is one of the very few souls who manages to be unhappy in the Plane of Freedom, forever pining after his mysterious and lost love.

The immense popularity of the poem Inferno eventually spread out of its world and throughout the multiverse, causing many a curious planar to try to learn more of this “holy Virgilia”. The idea that anything, least of all a celestial, could enter the very center of Infernal Hierarchy unnoticed (and also know so much about Infernal politics and history) seemed ridiculous; yet the events mentioned in the poem were all completely true as far as any nondevil could verify. Devils mentioned in the poem (at least the ones that could be found by outsiders) were all tight lipped and refused to comment and any sort of rescue attempt from the Eigth Circle of Inferno by any would-be do-gooder would be preposterous.

Internally however, the debacle over the poem forced a lot of sweeping changes in many Circles to make certain that information becomes obsolete and outdated, so it can’t be used by enemy saboteurs and spies to harm the workings of the devilish war machine. A second batch of sweeping changes so soon after the first Reckoning upset a lot of devils high and low but the chaos let certain younger archdevils assume much greater powers and responsibilities after the restructuring. Such as the newly restored Marchioness Zariel in charge of Avernus’s defense so Bel can focus on the Abyssal offensive. Or Duchess Fierna’s increasing authorities as her father keeps retreating deeper into his basement dwelling hobbies. Or the long lost Countess Baalphegor’s surprise confession of having killed and replaced Hag Countess millenia ago and swift promotion to Archduchessy. This continues to rub the old guard of devil nobility (still headed by Dispater and Mammon) the wrong way but, as the unofficial leader of this newly forming clique of allied she-devils, the Infernal Princess keeps reminding them that neither of those Reckonings would’ve happened if the old farts had just sat the hell down and let Empress Bensozia do her equalizing reforms slowly, steadily and peacefully.

Outside of Heres Infernus’s still unnamed clique of Infernal ladies, only Torm the True, God of Righteousness, knows the dark of this matter (she thought the riveting tale of her bringing redemption to an especially worthless mortal soul would impress him, she was wrong) but he simply doesn’t have the heart to destroy petitioner Dante’s dreams.


Maybe taking inspiration from Divina Commedia wasn't that good an idea. This has to be the single longest thing I've ever written in my life, including my graduation project from years ago. I'm not sure what I'm doing with my life. Also if you copy all the entries I've written up on this thread into Word, you'll find it now exceeds 100 pages. It's kind of a bummer when you put it like that.

Anyway. I'm pretty sure the world didn't need yet another Inferno knockoff but I like to think I added a few bits and bobs and flairs unique to DnD and appropriate to our thread here. And I didn't even think about writing this in verse, which means there's some slim hope for me. I was quite torn between Beatrice and Virgilia for names, but decided to go with V in the end since we're in Inferno (and the real Beatrice thing with the real Dante was creepy as all ****). Hopefully the order of lessons I made up here is logical and adds up to a satisfying narrative. Also hopefully the "final swerve" (my glaring weakness in made up ****) doesn't retroactively ruin the damn thing I spent so much time building. Yet another hopefully, archdevil stuff won't be too wildly divergent from DnD roots I'm at least pretending to stick with.

Lastly, there will not be Purgatorio or Paradiso in this vein.

Pronounceable
2017-03-13, 07:41 AM
Gonna assume everyone's bedazzled by my artistic ability to craft neat stuff. Or maybe nobody actually read that cos it was too damn long. It's always possible.

Either way, now I'll take a little break from our usual MO and post a bunch of straight up Manual of the Planesy stuff. The difference here in this particular post is that it's not solid and will get rewritten as I change my mind. Y'all are free to offer changes or criticism, I might completely change one of these if I see some particularly neat idea. I could especially use cooler names and/or concepts for their various planar qualities. Even previous entries aren't safe, I might retcon any previous writeup that feature these guys if a substantiallly cooler substitute is offered here.

Habits and Inhabitants of the Outer Planes
DEVA
Devas are arrays of floating geometric solids covered in orderly patterns that form a vaguely humanoidish shape.

They are divided into Spheres. Third: malakim, cherubim, seraphim (regular population of Arcadia) Second: principality, authority, virtue (leaders respected for their skills, knowledge and power) First: lunar (only 64 exist), planetar (only 16 exist), solar (only 4 exist). First Sphere rule the plane and their lessers with absolute authority. Planetars and Solars can be replaced if all 4 of their personal underlings decide they’re unfit and one among them is better suited; lunars can get voted out and virtues voted into First Sphere if there’s an unanimous Solar decision.

Devas feed on their own virtuous qualities (bravery, patience, humility, tolerance...) to grow stronger, smarter and skilleder and will morph into a higher form upon reaching required power. New malakim are created by Solars when they feel more devas are needed. Unvirtous devas grow weaker and can shrink to malakim but never fall without extreme stress (devas have no tendency and can fall to any nonchaotic exemplar if pressured).

Eternal Stability: no outside force can affect change on a deva; immunity to any and all effects aiming to create changes on their souls, minds or bodies

ARCHON
Archons are blue/green skinned pretty humanoids with glowy eyes and wings made of bright light.

They are divided into Choirs: hammer (laborer), sword (soldier), lantern (philosopher), tome (mage), trumpet (administrator), word (justice), throne (ruler). Ruling body of Celestia is the Hebdomad, made up of the strongest members of the seven Choirs.

Archons cannot feed by themselves, one must give away their own good essence to another to permenantly strengthen them, crippling themselves in the process (such wounds will slowly regenerate while on Upper Planes). Archons might learn to cannibalize aligned essences from other exemplars but then fall swiftly (usually to devil) without exception. No archon ever switches Choir. New archons are created by infusing the most virtous of Celestial petitioners with good essence but only by the Hebdomad’s permission.

Melodious Resonance: archons find strength in numbers; their powers and skills increase from proximity to other archons

KAMI
Kami are floating translucent heads capable of sprouting a spine with as many arms as they need whenever they wish.

All kami are equal without inherent power imbalances and all positions of authority in Bytopia are filled by officials democratically elected for set time periods, with two Utopic Overseers at the top.

Kami feed on working for others’ benefit but don’t grow any stronger, channeling excess good essence into Bytopia itself. A selfish or lazy kami eventually falls (usually to eladrin) and abandons Bytopia. New kami are occasionally unearthed during mining operations.

Toilform: kami can transform into objects to help others; all kami can become magical sentient tools that greatly aid their users in any and all benevolent and nonviolent tasks

ANGEL
Angels are winged silhouettes made of brilliant golden light.

They have no ranks, types or leaders and all live together in harmony and happiness on Elysium, only leaving their home when they absolutely must.

Angels feed on happiness and freedom of others, growing stronger and smarter by making all beings around them feel happy, free and appreciated. They never try to influence any being’s thoughts or actions despite their incredible power and are loath to even interfere with fiends’ evildoings unless endangered personally. Angels are the nicest beings and the vanishingly few ones to ever fall are the ones reverting back to whatever they used to be before converting into an angel. New ones are created when two or more angels love each other very much.

Limitless Benevolence: angels are as strong as they need to be; an angel determines his or her own power level by absorbing as much good essence from Elysium as they’ll need for the task at hand (but normally try to get by with as little as possible), any angel encountered outside their home will be loaded for bear just in case and roughly as strong as a demigod

GUARDINAL
Guardinals are furriebipedal animals with large muscles and teeth and/or claws.

They are divided into many species (wolf, bear, lion, elephant, rat, rhino, rabbit, fox, bat, dolphin...) named for their similarities to mortal mammal animals, with each guardinal species internally ruled over by their Type Commander who answers to Lion Marshall Talisid.

Guardinals feed on violence, growing stronger the more they fight against (what they see as) evil (aka gain xp like murderhobos). They gain no power if they’re not fighting evil in some way and a guardinal that refuses to confront evil or gets addicted to violence itself falls (mostly to angel or einherjar). New guardinals randomly spawn in Beastlands.

Warp Spasm: guardinals become monsters in battle; a berserking guardinal becomes more powerful and keeps bodily warping into increasingly bigger and monstrous forms as battle goes on

ELADRIN
Eladrins are humanoids with rapidly and continuously changing bright pastel colors (aka epilepsiloids).

They have no discernible castes or ranks except for their ruler, Queen Morwel, and it’s impossible to gauge the strengths or skills of eladrins from their appearances. Whatever method they have for understanding their fellows is unknown to everyone else and there are no positions of authority in Arborea (except for the Queen).

Eladrins feed on strong passions of themselves and others to grow stronger and smarter. The objects of such passions are irrelevant to eladrins’ ability to gain strength from them, which was what used to make them the strongest of exemplars before their Queen forbade being violent asskickers and forced Arborea down a more constructive path. Those that let passions consume them sometimes fall (to any exemplar depending on specific passions they’re overwhelmed by) but eladrins fall the fewest out of all good (nonangel) exemplars. New eladrin are created by the Queen.

Plucky Underdog: eladrins thrive where anything else would’ve faltered; the more alone and unsupported and unappreciated and outgunned and outnumbered an eladrin is at a task, the better they get at it (making them terrible team players).

EINHERJAR
Einherjar look just like humanoids, except bigger and *epicer*.

Einherjar are too chaotic to have any sort of organization or widely accepted ranks or types but they’re broadly called lessers and greaters depending on their personal power (not that there’s any way to tell without engaging them in some sort of contest).

Einherjar feed on rivalry and competition to grow stronger and smarter and skilleder by struggling against their peers. While this doesn’t have to be combat, it usually is due to their oversensitive pride and tendency to get carried away with ****talking. Fighting against too weak rivals or simply struggling in abstract is useless to them so they avoid exerting themselves by trying to do good or improve their (or anyone else’s) lot. Einherjar sometimes get less self absorbed or grow malevolent over time, causing a slow but steady fall (to guardinal or demon). New einherjar coalesce after unusually great and terrible struggles in Asgard and petitioners who’ve amassed enough power by fighting can transform to one.

Asgardian Spirit: einherjar are tenacious warriors; defeated einherjar will keep recovering instantly and continue fighting if they believe victory was close and can only be stopped/defeated after a thorough pwning to convince them there’s no chance of victory at all.

SLAAD
Slaadi are ugly and fat froggish bipeds with impossibly smooth and colorful skin that swell or shrink with Pandemonic winds (aka frogballoons).

There are two types of slaadi; regular and peace. A slaad’s power is easily determinable by size. The bigger the slaad, the more souls it contains, thus stronger (and madder) it gets; the number of trapped minds inside one slaad body can reach millions in extreme cases and there are slaadi the size of continents stuck in tunnels and caves of Pandemonium. A peace slaad is one that managed to subdue all the other minds inside it (allegedly by giving them peace, though everyone else calls them death slaadi instead) and is in full control of its body with a constant size and level of power. Peace slaadi are as mad as regular ones but theirs is a much more focused kind of madness that almost resembles ordinary insanity.

Slaad bodies feed on mental pain and fatigue, extracted from the bodiless minds fighting for control trapped inside them. Slaadi bodies gain and lose souls to the passing winds, leaving them with a changed strength and size at completely random times. Slaad souls feed on nothing and are just as much prisoners inside their bodies as petitioners or soultorn victims of Pandemonic winds they absorb (except for death slaadi who are always much weaker than their size indicates). Slaadi aren’t even exemplars in the most technical sense and cannot fall (and might contain minds of other exemplars soultorn by the winds trapped within).

Gaping Mouth: all slaadi are conduits to the Howling; slaadi are filled with Pandemonium’s soulshearing wind and can summon tiny gusts of it to knock souls off of bodies (killing mortals and banishing outsiders to their homeplanes), infuse an object (not necessarily a dead body) with one of its trapped souls to create a haunted item or vomit out the trapped souls as mad ghosts; they can also suck in loose souls or devour mortals to trap theirs.

DEMON
Every single demon is unique with completely different powers and appearances, demonkind defies classification. There’s no such thing as types or classes of incarnated chaotic evil (cos it's dumb). Demon princes/princesses are those that have bound large numbers of Abyssal petitioners to themselves and fed on them to grow extremely powerful but aren’t fundamentally any different from the regular demons.

Demons feed on negative emotions of themselves and others; mostly fear, hate and pain. Their great hatred of everything and fear of their betters constantly feeds them but they also actively work to foster and spread the feelings they feed on. But demons are inherently chaotic and might get obsessed with all manner of things, with capacity to fall into even law and good (though most converted demons become daemons or einherjar). New demons are constantly spawned in the Abyss by the legion.

Abyssal Sense: demons have a nose for alignment (even ones without noses); nothing short of direct divine intervention can prevent a demon from immediately noticing the presence and quantity of all aligned essences or their absence in an extremely large radius, letting them see through all illusions concerning such beings or items and also detect all outsiders no matter what guise they’ve taken (and know exactly how strong they are), not to mention the odd mortal with an aligned subtype (clerics and paladins).

DEMODAND
Demodands are large masses of vaguely bipedal red mud (aka clayfacians).

All demodands are identical for all practical purposes; if you’ve met one demodand, you’ve met them all (aka Anon).

Demodands collectively feed on disappointment, despair, sadness and anger; the usual “at rest” conditions of demodand mentality that lets the Tarterian Collective grow ever more powerful by just wallowing in its prison plane. They do their best to inflict these upon anyone they encounter too and are very successful at it thanks to their mighty mental powers and nigh invulnerable bodies. Every morsel of nourishment acquired by one demodand is absorbed into the whole of Tarterian Collective and makes all of them an infinitesimal bit stronger, making them the greatest danger to the multiverse over the long term (assuming there’ll be a long term that doesn’t include the Abyss swallowing all of existence). New demodands can only be created by torturing Tarterian petitioners long enough to twist their mind.

The Inexorable Tide: demodands are an unstoppable tide of evil; any demodand violently vanquished on another plane melts down to a puddle of red slime that becomes a portal to Tartarus letting two more sludge their way out; trying to fight demodands will only end with drowning in them.

HAG
Hags aka succubi aka incubi aka erinyes are formless piles of mutable evil essence that can take any form it desires, but even they have no way to classify or identify themselves. The power levels of hags can vary wildly but it’s usually too late for the weaker side by the time it becomes obvious, so Hadeans are an unusually calm fiendish race with all the trappings of equality and peacefulness in public (at least until relative strengths are gauged and the strong can dominate and hurt the weak in peace).

Hags are the only exemplars that can feed literally by consuming bodies of others (they can gnaw on parts of themselves too but it does nothing). They’re also the only exemplars that need to feed; hags get hungry and require regular feeding, or they start growing weak as their body consumes its own essence. Hadeans can also feed on revulsion of others, which they often get from taking horrific forms and doing extremely depraved, invasive and painful acts on their victims. Thanks to their unlimited shapeshifting powers, hags are able to go full hentai and especially relish traumatizing mortals as they eat them (because why not double the nutrition value when you can). Hags can breed with any creature capable of reproduction after taking an appropriate shape and produce half-fiendish creatures, new hags are also made the mortal way by other hags (not necessarily in couples), but pregnancy renders hags incapable of shapeshifting until birth so it's quite rare.

Shape of Evil: hags are amorphous piles of evil incarnate; every hag/succubus/incubus/erinyes is able to reshape its body however it pleases and are only limited by their imagination and evil “mass” (not to be confused with physical mass)

DAEMON
Daemons are shell covered hulking insectoids with varying number of limbs and beastlike heads depending on their castes.

Daemons have a fluid but restrictive system of rankings with an impenetrable web of promotions and demotions between the castes, making it impossible to tell just who is a superior to whom (and when). Named for vague similarity of their heads to mortal beasts, the castes of “lesser daemons” are called beetledaemon, mosquitodaemon, wormdaemon, crabdaemon, fishdaemon, frogdaemon, turtledaemon, snakedaemon, birddaemon and crocodiledaemon and the complicated mixture of merits, powers, payments, promises, accomplishments, lies, background checks and philosophical outlooks that qualify each individual to one caste and disqualify from another defies mortal understanding. Mighty castes of arcanadaemons and ultrodaemons are the “greater daemons” above the others and rule Gehenna with a cutthroat efficiency born of endless politicking and backstabbing. Only General of Gehenna stands above it all, the mysterious and unknowable lord of all daemonkind is beyond the petty struggle for dominance and wealth, primarily existing to provide all daemons a fantasy of secretly deposing him and taking his place without anyone else recognizing (it’s not like anyone’s seen his face or heard his voice, could be any daemon under the helm).

Daemons feed on their own greed and ambition, making them grow stronger with the amount of wealth and influence they can accumulate but all rank changes require a lengthy and painful surgery by an arcanadaemon. They’re supremely selfish creatures without any interest in anyone else (outside of their ability to enrich them) but their single minded pursuit of more personal happiness might sometimes cause them to fall (usually to archon or deva) if it starts to outweigh their material greed. New daemons are created to punish existing ones by splitting their soul/essence/power by greater daemons.

Gehennan Greed: daemons can, in fact, take it with them; every daemon can absorb magical powers from items so spends most of their material wealth and effort on acquiring powerful items to consume, permanently gaining a large number of inherent spells and hidden abilities that can stack with magical items used externally (if they ever put anything on instead of just eating or trading it).

DEVIL
Devils are red skinned humanoids with leathery wings, horns and tails.

Devil ranks and stations are defined per their ancient constitution Pact Primeval, each with its own duties, rights and powers inherent to it, all system is designed to fight the Abyss in some capacity. Least: only lemure (mindless reserves). Lesser: imp (mortal corruptor), spinagon (scout/messenger), barbazu (footsoldier), bueroza (sergeant), kython (blacksmith), falxugon (soul dealer), excruciarch (torturer). Greater: osyluth (intelligence), amnizu (quartermaster), orthon (elite legionaire), abishai (air force), malebranche (siege engine), hamatula (bodyguard), narzugon (knight), gelugon (artillery), cornugon (general). All devils above cornugons are called archdevils and each one is unique with his or her own definition in Pact Primeval (that gets rewritten for their successor in case of annihilation or great failure meriting demotion). Archdukes Bel, Dispater, Mammon, Belial, Levistus, Baalphegor, Baalzebul, Mephistopheles and Dominus Infernus Asmodeus are at the top of Infernal Hierarchy.

Devilkind feeds on obedience and loyalty but not individually like other exemplars. Each devil’s utmost best efforts to serve their superiors feed Infernal Hierarchy itself and devils get promoted (rewarded by more personal and organizational power inherent to the new rank) in return for their slavish servitude but the total increase in devilish power only helps the top guy (Inferno is pyramid scheme, ofc). He does occasionally grant more evil and law essences to Archdukes to empower them (who might give something extra to their favored underlings, and them to their own underlings [but the chances of such trickledown reaching anywhere below archdevils is practically nonexistant]). Any time a devil is promoted he or she picks the most competent and obedient underling to fill his/her place, who will pick their own most competent and obedient underling for their old rank, going all the way down to a promising lemure getting promoted into sentience. Every promotion requires copious amounts of liquid pain (Mammbrosia), necessitating the massive excruciatoriums where it’s distilled from tortured souls of the damned. Devils are extremely dedicated and selfless, which sometimes causes them to fall (usually to archon or kami). A new lemure spawns only when an existing devil falls or is annihilated.

Infernal Obedience: devils just follow orders; clear orders from their direct superior grants massive boosts of competence and efficiency to a devil on whatever they were ordered to do (but only one task at a time)

RAKSHASA
Rakshasi are tiger headed big humanoids with striped fur and inverted hands.

Black furred rakshasi are physically powerful fiends that dedicate themselves to arts of war, white furred rakshasi are mighty sorcerers with mastery over most types of magic, red furred rakshasi are expert manipulators/spies/infiltrators focused on shapeshifting and masterminding. Most skilled ones of any type rise to the top and start calling themselves rajas, ruling over as many of their fellows as they can subdue, trick, bribe or blackmail, but rakshasi have no ranks, types or any defined hierarchy.

Rakshasi feed on manipulation of others and grow more strong, smart and dishonest the more they lie, betray and mislead. They’re lazy by nature, wanting nothing more than lounge about eternally as others slave away for their comfort, but the ones that grow too greedy and start working especially hard to feed might find themselves fallen (almost always to daemon). New rakshasi are never created, making them the least numerous of exemplars.

Oppressive Fundament: rakshasi are uniquely suited to being terrible tyrants; every rakshasa has a cornucopia of versatile powers including shapeshifting, illusion weaving, thought reading, flight, invisibility, charm, semi immunity to physical+magical harm and cursing

For the record, I doubt I'll get any substantial ideas and recommendations from the thread but you never know. Think the only brand new info here is on slaadi (Ssendam was disqualified on account of terminal silly) and angels (e: whom I have just renamed from asura as my first retcon). Technically einherjar too but I'm sure everyone could've guessed what they'd have ended up as.

khadgar567
2017-03-13, 08:50 AM
Is there a way mortals cam summon amnizu as servants? And its to bad succubi and incubi pact with ugly cannibal hags. Its kinda shame how the sexy have fallen.

Pronounceable
2017-03-14, 02:41 AM
Only imps answer mortal summons. Then imp will be messenger between summoner and anything below archdevil, higher devils only bother to deal with mortals if there's something big going on. Amnizu would only come if there's some sort of grand administrative task that'll advance the infernal cause; they'd set up logistics for legions of the aspiring evil overlord or prepare a sufficiently oppressive taxation system for conquered territories or help scheme to take over an advanced bureaucratic system. Amnizu wouldn't fight for mortals, all devils refuse to do things outside their rank's purpose.
(it's better to just summon daemons, they take the payment and don't ask questions and don't nitpick)

And there's more than enough sexy (in DnD and elsewhere). It's tiresome by this point.


v: Hags got rehaggled. Also demodands got retconned for the better.

Beneath
2017-03-14, 01:56 PM
Hags reproduce the mortal way with any creature capable of reproduction but the result is a half-fiendish creature instead of a hag? I think that's a bit unclear. Is it that hags must breed with other hags to make more hags and w/ anyone else make half-fiends, or do they birth hags (regardless) and beget half-fiends (on non-hags)?

Pronounceable
2017-03-23, 11:52 AM
And now for something completely different: paar-taay!!!


GREAT MOTHER OF BEHOLDERS (demigoddess)
Domains: light, perception, beauty, hallucinogens, alcohol, partying, beholders

Troglodyte legends claim the Great Mother of Beholders assaulted their god to steal his eyes and they’re blind as a result of this heinous crime. Beholders scoff at that, saying Laogzed was the thief who stole two of their Great Mother’s eyes because the uneyed wretch was jealous of her beautiful eyes. Troglodyte contrarians traditionally retaliate by questioning just how Laogzed could’ve known the Great Mother’s eyes were beautiful if he was eyeless to begin with, then usually get petrified or disintegrated, as patience is no eye tyrant trait (which is one of the reasons why most beings usually don’t argue with beholders). However, neither side knows how right both them are or the actual sequence of bizarre events that led to their ancient and extremely unbalanced feud.

Beauty is truly in the eye of the beholder, which is why beholders are usually content to float in place and just stare at everything around them for days, marvelling at the beauty of what looks like a bunch of gray rocks to the lesser creatures. It’s also why beholders can get extremely violent when their contemplation of prettiness is disturbed. According to the few relatively benevolent beholders who interact with other creatures, they pity the pathetic range of vision that every other race of the multiverse have been saddled with and helped wizards of various races develop a number of infravision and ultravision spells to let them have the tiniest bit of glimpse into the real beauty of existence. It never worked well, for humanoid minds were unable to handle the colors beyond their laughably tiny red-to-violet spectrum and, even with magic, still see them as strange and distorted masses of shades of the colors they know (though at least they can see a few feet into solid objects now, which is better than what they started with). Their Great Mother too, as can be expected, is easily transfixed by the beauty of literally anything and she can spend centuries inspecting the lattice of a mineral vein fifty feet inside a rock wall down to its molecular structure, which is why she’s a distant and neglectful goddess to her children.

That is also the reason why the Great Mother of Beholders stuck around Tiamat and watched her create the next species of abominations to infest Elemental Plane of Water after beholders. Which was the troglodytes. Having made 11 eyes for each beholder, Tiamat was bored of it so the race of troglodytes were made without eyes. Entirety of their featureless face functioned as a sort of pressure pad instead, letting them sense the tiniest changes in their environment in the manner of a snake’s tongue. The Great Mother could of course see the incredibly complex web of nerves and detection cells lying beneath troglodytes’ carapace covered empty faces and precisely how they operated. She became enamoured of their “sightless eyes” and the undescribably beautiful dance of electrical impulses playing out on the nerves just beneath the skin/carapace thing covering front of the head, so started to follow them instead of returning to help her children protect themselves from long entrenched races of Water that were trying to subjugate and enslave them (such as krakens and aboleths). Thanks to her endless stalking of the troglodytes, Great Mother also got to witness the birth of Laogzed the Faceripper (who wasn’t called that at first). Unlike his people, Laogzed wasn’t scared of the Great Mother of Beholders and in fact, found the numerous light sensitive orbs radiating strange magic dotting her form to be interestingly exotic. What followed was a passionate affair the likes of which was never before (or since) seen among the abominable godspawn of the Serpent of Life, much to the chagrin of both troglodytes and beholders (who couldn’t unsee what was seen).

The couple’s happy days came to an end with the advent of mortal life on Material however. The Bitch Queen, kicked out of her father’s realm by the might of giants, came to Water and took her frustrations out on the abominational godspawn of Tiamat. Starting with their oldest sibling Pisaethces the Blood Queen, Umberlee worked her way down the abominable (for the lack of a better term) family tree of deities, bullying the godspawn into submission and converting great numbers of their children into her own worship, which would later become one of the largest follower bases of the planes. Some like Sekolah of Sahuagin put up a good fight and paid for it, others like Merrshaulk of Yuan-ti folded immediately and let her take as many of their children as she wanted, but no abomination could stand up to the savage might of the Bitch Queen (Tiamat, of course, didn’t care so long as her own corner of the plane wasn’t disturbed). Great Mother of Beholders had no intention to fight for her children, Umberlee was welcome to take the entire race of beholders and save her from having to hear their endless prayers. Laogzed, however, wouldn’t let his people be conquered so easily. Having seen what Umberlee does to those who try to oppose her, the Great Mother implored her lover to give up on the troglodyte race but he’d have none of that. So, with great reluctance, she petrified Laogzed and dragged him to Material Plane where they’d both be safe from the Devourer of Fathoms. By the time Laogzed broke free of his stony prison, Umberlee had already converted most troglodytes to her worship (beholders too, not that Great Mother cared).

Laogzed was furious. Great Mother offered to give him her petrifying eye as penance; thanks to the divinely mirrored nature of abomination races and their godspawn, both Laogzed and his remaining children would gain an eye to see (and shoot petrifying magic) with, whereas beholder race would lose one eye and the petrifying power that so offended Laogzed. It was insulting, this offer did the opposite of pacifying him. So Laogzed the Faceripper attacked her, clawing the skin out of her frontal half and tearing off a number of her eyes, finally earning the moniker he’s known for today. Great Mother had no course but to retaliate then, and (predictably) reduced Laogzed to ash and retook her eyes. She then left him where he fell, for as mournful as she was, this plane was an entirely new place full of things she’d never seen or even imagined before and Great Mother hoped to find something of comparable beauty to her now irrevocably lost love. She did, repeatedly. Material Plane didn’t have nearly the diversity of Water, pretty much every creature of note was the same basic shape with the same basic components, but made up for it by what the natives called geography and atmosphere. Mountains, deserts, coasts, lakes, forests, clouds, storms, suns, moons, stars... The poor critters of Pelor’s make couldn’t perceive absolute beauty even when it literally hit them in the eye. She never did find a new love, even the deities of other planes had a strange, instinctual aversion to her true form; but there was just so much prettiness to look at, she didn’t even miss having a lover (much). And that was before she discovered the strange and wondrous effects of certain strains of mushrooms and plants on the mind, not to mention the neat little thing they call alcohol she learned from Umberlee’s far more personable brother.

Laogzed healed of course, and went back to Water where, once Umberlee returned to her father’s side, he recovered the majority of troglodytes. But the extremely powerful barrage of magical rays the Great Mother shot into his face had damaged his subcarapace nerve web, severely weakening his (and by extension his people’s) perceptive abilities, leaving them blind to the world beyond a mere few hundred feet. While he still smolders with rage at beholders and their flaky goddess, he recognizes that they’re not remotely equal in power and any fantasies of revenge will never amount to anything. Some beholders have also returned to venerating their Great Mother but most are happy enough worshipping Umberlee (who at least cares about them a little). They blame troglodytes for their maternal abandonment issues however and are somewhat disposed to kill or enslave them (when they can stop staring at various beautiful things long enough).

The Great Mother of Beholders spends almost all of her time incognito now, usually in a humanoid guise, sampling various drinks and herbal concoctions made by the many many druids and alchemists she’s befriended, and seeing how they affect her perceptions of natural prettiness of the multiverse (aka high as a kite). She’s visited Outer Planes but found the solidified alignment essences that make them up lacking in the complex elemental beauty of real matter of Material Plane, also concluding that outsiders are shallow facsimiles that only seem real to lesser creatures with limited vision. These quite vocal (when she’s got various substances in her, which is virtually always) opinions have gained her the enmity of every single exemplar race and a good deal of deities (who’re also made of pure aligned essence). Her abominable sibling deities aren’t at all happy with her either, they all think she gives them a bad name and ruins their fearsome reputation; they too would love to destroy her. She gets to continue her mostly stoned and hazy existence with a list of terrifying enemies only rivaled by the great goddess of magic Mystra thanks to never leaving Material Plane (and also the immense destructive powers at the tips of her tentacles).

Great Mother does hear when beholders pray to her from anywhere in the planes, but she ignores them. The only way to get a boon out of her is to be a lucky partier who unwittingly runs into her and impresses her by holding one’s drink/mushroom/weed/misc substances well and being good company. She rewards beautiful mortals (which is all mortals in her eyes) who amuse her by gifting them a beholder eyestalk, complete with beam shooting ability, grafted to wherever they want on their body. On the very rare occasions a beholder finds her, she drops her humanoid facade and reveals her true form to everyone nearby, becoming maternal and warm to her child but still refuses to show them preferential treatment or answer prayers. Questioning her about the feud with Laogzed is about the only thing that can anger Great Mother and, if pressed, might lash out with disasterous consequences for the unwise.


You know what a troglodyte is? It's not the lameass reptilian humanoid race#17. It's the faceless weird spiky monster you see in Might and Magic. There's lizardfolk, yuan-ti, sarrukh, lamia, even darned kobold got turned away from yippy dogman; why the hell would troglos also be more reptile people? Answer: unimagination and lameness.

In other news, I'm pretty sure nobody could've expected this one. The term eye tyrant doesn't usually bring party animal to mind. But they got so many eyes, it has to do more than just shoot random rays. So, what are eyes good for? Seeing. And what happens when you see good? This is one possibility. I'm sure there's been at least 10 million beholder-beauty puns over the course of DnD's life but I doubt anyone's gone this far with the basic idea. And it's not all of them, only the big mama is the stoned party girl. Not to mention, beholders' canonic brand of xtreem racism is rather dumb and should've ended with them destroying themselves centuries ago.

So, instead we got this. It builds on previous stuff as usual but I think it's entertaining and useful. She can actually be used now in a capacity other than generic big monster god, whereas these beholders are slightly more logical than canonic version. There can still be a canonly beholder that hates everything except itself for being fugly too, so I'm sure nothing of great value has been lost with this particular remake.
(except possibly their newly invented reproduction by dreams, which has to be the most ****ing awesome thing I've heard to come out of 5e, but I've specifically left their breeding habits blank so maybe it still happens here)

Max_Killjoy
2017-03-23, 12:07 PM
So she's a disco ball...

:smallwink:

Pronounceable
2017-03-23, 12:15 PM
That's (https://img0.etsystatic.com/156/1/14549133/il_340x270.1138407470_swhx.jpg)one (https://i.imgur.com/YkWsxXN.jpg)possibility (https://shop.spreadshirt.co.uk/image-server/v1/designs/128159932,width=178,height=178/kawaii-beholder.png).

Beneath
2017-03-24, 01:43 AM
Nice, this is wayyyyy more interesting than just generic-evil-beholders with their generic-evil-deity.

I remember there was a thing in 2e where there were, like, social species of Beholderkin that had hives and the like. Those would have been cool to fit in.

Also if we're keeping the dream beholders of 5e (I can't find a reference for their reproduction in the monster manual; I'm presuming it's in a splat?) then how would that play into Eldath's domain, esp. considering that she's connected to Umberlee and Tiamat (also, wow, I'm surprised by how far back she is. she's on page 3)? I know the Great Mother doesn't care about worship so this wouldn't be a cause for divine conflict, but beholders worshipping Eldath of all deities in their own way would be amusing.

Pronounceable
2017-03-31, 04:01 PM
Eldath...she's connected to Umberlee and Tiamat
That didn't even occur to me. It probably should have. OTOH, nobody knows that so it not being a thing is also justifiable.

So far we've got: demons, devils, giants, goblins, orcs, gnolls, beholders, mindflayers, liches. What's missing in this list? Oh, right, how could I forget?


LATHANDER (greater god), Morninglord, Dawnbrother, Rosy Fingered Master, Jubilant Rebirth, Golden Heir, Young Sun, Neverdimmed, Horizon Afire, Solar Son
Domains: dawn, hope, rebirth, youth, vampirism, angst, guilt

It is widely believed that the first vampires were the children of Lady Firehair and Grim Reaper. It’s not like the overbearing mixture of sex and death that permeates everything about these creatures does anything to discredit that idea. But it is wrong, as is the case for most such beliefs (and is a heresy worthy of capital punishment in their churches), for vampires are the fragments of the ancient sun god Amaunator. That is not to say Sune and Nerull aren’t guilty of creating them but it was neither intentional nor a result of any sort of union between such fundamentally incompatible beings.

Resurrection is tricky business. While any random demigod with two bits of divinity to rub together can raise a newly dead mortal, tracking down a soul shipped off to an afterlife or infinite Outer Plane and then removing the aligned subtype etched on its whole being by the judgement of Mechanus to undo its petitionerhood is beyond the means of all but greater deities. And that’s assuming something isn’t specifically blocking it, such as the Howling. Really, considering all the myriad of things that can befall a mortal soul after modrons are done measuring it, it’s miraculous that any resurrections happen at all. It becomes an even more tenuous proposition when it comes to deities themselves, whose divine souls are straight up annihilated.

Created out of the astral corpse of the deceased solar deity, the ironically vampiric God of Dawn is what happens when gods meddle in matters beyond their ken. The combined powers of Sune and Nerull was (barely) enough to pull something of Amaunator’s soul out of oblivion and place him into a much smaller part of his corpse, but the rest of his remains shattered into thousands of half spirit things infected with the malignant nihilism of Ruinous Overmother (who doesn’t appreciate being poked) and went on to infest recently dead bodies to spawn the first generation of vampires in the multiverse. These vampires were conduits to the Allmother’s power and, predictably, could spread her corruptive hatred of life. They quickly became a plague that corrupts the tiny bits of Luminous Overmother’s power residing inside every living creature, twisting it into hateful vampiric essence, threatening the balance of power between the Overmothers (if infinitesimally). The Lady of Silver Tears’ answer to this move was the crushing guilt that has been suffocating Lathander ever since; Morninglord, who might as well be an entirely different god without any memories or personality of old Amaunator, combined the powers of three of the eldest deities born of mortal belief and awoke as the vampiric lesser god of dawn and rebirth.

As a divine vampire, Lathander is incapable of getting any sustenance from belief or worship like true gods and is instead fueled by his lesser “siblings”. Every time a vampire drains the life out of a mortal, a small part of the stolen lifeforce flows to him, each mortal infected with vampirism becomes an extension of his senses and all destroyed vampiric spirits returns to him to be purified and get their vampiric power absorbed, before he sends them off to reincarnate to have another shot at a life untainted by vampirism (instead of the eternal torment in Lower Planes that’d be the certain verdict of Mechanus on almost every vampire if he’d let them go there). Thanks to the sheer number of vampires scattered all over the multiverse, how much they spread and then get destroyed, and how often they have to feed, Rosy Fingered Master has ascended to greater deityhood in less than a millenium.

As hard as he works to promote hope and happiness or as cheerful as he appears, Lathander is not a hopeful or happy god himself. Dawnbrother labors under the inexplicable, unbearable (and exceedingly ungodlike) guilt, spending most of his time helping mortals find courage to face evil and strength to withstand darkness (when he’s not moping about his sad existence and reading tragic poetry). He preaches of hope and redemption for all, Lathander says kindness and understanding must always be the first course of action and fighting is the last course if evil refuses to see the light and lashes out. He also wants the same dedication to goodness and hope in his followers, who are many and evergrowing even without an organized church or empowered clerics (another thing he can’t have as a vampiric god). The Young Sun encourages cooperation among the forces of good when evil or darkness threatens to rise, using his considerable charm and allure to smooth out any problems that might endanger the innocent, and is well liked by many beings all over the planes. Morninglord feels that the source of his great power mandates him being as benevolent as possible, it’s the price he feels he must pay for his sinful existence forever, without end or pause as long as he lives (even though he’d much prefer to just write sad poetry in darkened rooms).

As not Amaunator reborn, Lathander has no interest in getting dragged into the ancient feud between elder primordial deities and gods of Material Plane, so goes out of his way to discredit the theory of him being a part of the happy divine family trinity of Material with mommy and daddy that goddess Sune and her church work so hard to establish. This endears him to her chief rival the Sun Father, who’s always glad to see meddlesome Sune lose face. King of Glory, who enjoys all pretty things, and the Emperor of Artifice, who likes the cut of his jib, also like Jubilant Rebirth, further stoking Sune’s anger at her “son” but she’s powerless to openly act against him, for that’d undermine the image of happy divine family she’s trying to build. Nerull isn’t concerned with apperances however, and has become a patron to vampires just to spite his “son”. He doesn’t care that the spread of vampirism only strengthens Lathander and makes him even more likely to oppose Nerull at every opportunity; the great God of Fear knows that, deep down, Lathander’s great fear is his own nature consuming him and works to make that happen (he’d have a higher chance of toppling the primordial elder gods than breaking one of the extremely few verdicts Selune has issued since the Dawn War, not that he knows it).

Prayers to Lathander don’t do anything; he’s no normal god and can’t hear or answer them. What he can see and hear is everything vampires all over the multiverse see and hear, letting him learn of many evil deeds and plots before they begin. He can even read vampires’ minds and works hard to counter many of the evils they get up to. He warns mortals, coordinates other deities of good and their followers and is usually on an endless crusade against all vampires who do anything more sinister than drain the bare minimum of life from mortals to continue their existence. He would manifest openly too but most deities are against that sort of thing and, as angsty and guilt ridden as he is about his existence, Lathander doesn’t want to be destroyed again.


As much as I hate on DnD novels, there's good stuff. Like Vampire of the Mists. I haven't remembered that for years and when I did, it resulted in this. I think it speaks for itself and I don't need to explain why it's cool to have Lathander as god of vampires.

khadgar567
2017-03-31, 11:42 PM
Sune the crimson haired goddess of sluts. This is why i like ishtar and morrigan when they love they love good and when they fight they fight deadly

Beneath
2017-04-01, 09:25 AM
Lathander the vampire god. Nice.

It is known that Eldath is a goddess of dreams, though? Which would give room for something with beholders if they like dreams. Even if it's a weak connection.

Fable Wright
2017-04-01, 09:33 PM
As hard as he works to promote hope and happiness or as cheerful as he appears

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/eHgNXBP_Jwc/maxresdefault.jpg


Dawnbrother labors under the inexplicable, unbearable (and exceedingly ungodlike) guilt, spending most of his time helping mortals find courage to face evil and strength to withstand darkness

https://i.imgur.com/TuJWAR8.jpg


The Young Sun encourages cooperation among the forces of good when evil or darkness threatens to rise, using his considerable charm and allure to smooth out any problems that might endanger the innocent, and is well liked by many beings all over the planes.

http://i.imgur.com/hGy0FO8.png

Pronounceable, have you been playing Dark Souls recently, by any chance?

Pronounceable
2017-04-02, 04:21 AM
spoiler
https://media.giphy.com/media/26ufdipQqU2lhNA4g/giphy.gif
I knew it was vaguely familiar.

Pronounceable
2017-04-14, 04:40 AM
I'm gonna post this even though I'm not sure it's all that good or particularly useful. This has been in the oven for far too long and it might be burned now, I had at least 5 different ideas for this and none of them were particularly writeworthy.


PISAETHCES (artificial pseudodeity), Blood Queen, First Abomination, Mind Over Multiverse, Zenith of the Depths, the Psicloud, Daughter of Disdain, Abolethic Sovereignty
Domains: intelligence, psionics, disdain, aboleths

The Lord of All Magic is smart, as befits the incarnation of intelligence itself. Much in the same way Nerull embodies the existential fear and Sune embodies the reproductive imperative, Boccob is the coalesced manifestation of the concept of intelligence as envisioned by mortals of Material Plane. Everyone knows Boccob isn’t just a genius but is the smartest being in all of the planes, as he’s likely to mention occasionally.

Like most things “everyone knows”, it is wrong. For the concept of intelligence is far older than mortals and isn’t nearly as anthromorphic as they think. Born fully formed from the brow of the Mother of All Abominations, Pisaethces the Blood Queen was a primordial being, the first one of the second generation of the multiverse’s deities and the ultimate manifestation of the concept of intellect. The idiotic, pointless and ceaseless bickering between the sons of Overmothers in their tiny shelter during the uncounted ages of the Dawn War was enough to erode even the sturdiest of minds and forced their eldest sister to turn to the most reasonable being at hand for company (herself). Having inherited an infinitesimal bit of her mothers’ creativity, one day the Mother of All Abominations’s inner monologue suddenly started to talk back. Like a tumor made of disdain and spite, this new and vicious personality grew larger inside Tiamat’s mind until she became a completely distinct being from the Serpent of Life. Pisaethces, as the new mind started to call herself, was fueled by Tiamat’s hatred of her brothers’ stupidity and desire for intelligent company. The two spent the remaining ages of the Dawn War in happy mental discourse, completely tuning out whatever dumb crap their younger brothers were wasting their breaths on, thinking up ever more strange and hosed up lifeforms and their potentially pitiful struggles to amuse themselves with imaginary schadenfreude.

And then the danger was passed; the Overmothers’ battle was over and Tiamat was free to get out and not hear her brothers’ obnoxious voices ever again. Leaving them a dire warning to never bother her for all eternity, she went and settled in the Elemental Plane of Water where she could finally start making the millions of ideas she’d had with her imaginary friend and/or split personality about various creatures into a reality. Pisaethces then sprung from her brow almost immediately, fully formed with the smartest and strongest mind to ever exist, ready and eager to help her mother create the aforementioned pitiful creatures for their entertainment. While Tiamat was at first pleased to have this intelligent an assistant, she soon found that Pisaethces was far smarter than her. Any idea or thought Tiamat had, Pisaethces had one better. Any creature Tiamat made plans for, Pisaethces could dramatically improve in design. It was obvious that Tiamat would be nothing but the dumb muscle in this arrangement, just doing what her smarter daughter told her to do. While Pisaethces was neither smug nor overbearing about it, her serpentine mother didn’t want to be the lesser partner in any endeavor. So she told her Firstspawn to design the perfect species instead of the weirdly fubar creatures they were planning on.

Carefully designed by the smartest being, the aboleths were to be flawless creatures; self reproducing, able to survive in any environment and connected by a racial mental bond to ensure perfect communication and cooperation among themselves, whatever civilization they’d erect could never be surpassed by any other creature for all eternity. They even came with immense psionic powers to ensure various immortal creatures of the multiverse (such as the native marids of the plane who were getting antsy about these tresspassing deities) couldn’t subjugate them. Tiamat was satisfied with the flawlessness of the design and, instead of spawning a brand new species from it, she shattered her daughter’s mind and soul into thousands of pieces and fashioned the spiritual amalgamation out of her that’d be the source of aboleth souls in the future. The Serpent of Life would discard all of her daughter’s schematics and blueprints (designed for maximally fubar critters and schadenfreude) and start from scratch, beginning her Mother of All Abominationsness with simple things like various weeds and planktons, iterating and improving her designs by herself without anyone telling her what to do. The resulting aquatic abominations of today’s multiverse are, while certainly strange and terrible, nowhere near as realitybreakingly lovecraftian as Daugher of Disdain’s original designs.

Kicked out of Tiamat’s realm to sink or swim on their own, it didn’t take that long for aboleths to recognize their souls were all pieces of a hidden and broken divinity reincarnating over and over. Not liking the idea of losing their identities after each death, they built a massive psionic construct linked to minds of every living aboleth. It’s a testament to the massive power of aboleths that even now, after uncountable millenia, the Psicloud they created still records all memories of each aboleth continuously until they physically die, then rewrites the recorded personality onto the soul when it eventually reincarnates. Thanks to this cloudsaving, aboleths have attained virtual immortality; each individual aboleth has memories stretching back all the way to primordial times. Aboleths are unique among the abominations of Water in having nothing but disdain at the idea of worshipping anything (due to not being designed by the Serpent of Life) but the great importance they place on their psionic construct nevertheless empowered it (like the way it would happen to all deities of other abomination races), granting it a measure of divinity. In an effort to prevent this exact scenario, Tiamat had hidden remains of her shattered daughter in the Plane of Imprisonment. Tartarus should have kept her pieces contained and seperated forever, with no hope of ever reassembling outside but the Mother of All Abominations had underestimated the intelligence and strength she’d given to aboleths. Their psionic mastery had established an unbreakable connection between Elemental Plane of Water and Tartarus when they built the Psicloud, which Soul Forger Moradin would have to transform into River Styx to prevent it from flooding the multiverse during the formation of the Great Wheel of Planescape. The great similarity between the two liquid planes caused a strange and unexpected resonance even before that, amplified by the odd mix of divinity and psionics of the Psicloud, creating a rather subtle planar catastrophe that corrupted both sides of the connection. It bound all the fiends of Tartarus mentally like aboleths, creating the now infamous Tarterian Collective, while the vile blood red sludge of the Lower Plane seeped into the aboleths’ souls and made them incapable of living without constantly secreting a horrific and corruptive mucus from their bodies.

Afterwards, the artificial pseudodeity of aboleths quickly gained a sort of sentience and started resembling Zenith of the Depths in manners, probably helped by the extremely similar personalities of the annihilated goddess and the demodands of Tartarus. Being a completely psionic being long seperated from the broken mass of divinity sealed in Tartarus, Pisaethces doesn’t physically exist but can manifest as a gigantic aboleth with a bloody red miasma surrounding her wherever she wishes. Using her immense mastery over psionics, she’s able to “interact” with any sentient creature as if she has a physical form and nothing, not even greater deities can recognize that the “Firstspawn of Tiamat” is but a psionic illusion. She also counts as a manifestation of the concept of intelligence just like the original and is able to feed on sentience itself to a degree; this lets her leech power off of not just other deities of intelligent pursuits, but off of every sentient creature as well. While her covert psionic leeching is nowhere near the level of power regular deities derive from regular worship, Blood Queen’s power base is practically whole of the multiverse. She gains particularly great power from everything the Lord of All Magic and all his various assistant deities do, which slightly amuses her.

Pisaethces’s goal is to gather ever more knowledge until she attains omniscience. She knows this can’t be done with passive observation and so has turned her attention to ultracomplicated cosmic experiments absolutely nobody else can understand. Aboleths are very unlikely to be obedient, even to their pseudogoddess, so have been left mostly to their own devices with just a suggestion that they should have intellectual and civil pursuits. They can usually be found on Material puppetteering large numbers of mortals for no discernable gain. Tainted as they are by Tarterian influences, most aboleths are sadistic creatures that enjoy playing god to “lesser” creatures, manipulating thoughts and emotions of mortals to make them act out a specific sequence of events they want to watch. A few that deign to openly communicate with mortals fancy themselves artists, claiming they’re crafting dramatic stories out of the meaningless and drab lives of mortals, giving them something impactful to do with their brief existence. Others claim the wars or catastrophies they spark are experiments to advance social sciences and mold the targeted societies for the better. Yet others say they simply have nothing better to do with their endless lives but mess with mortals. Since all aboleths are in constant contact with every member of their race, many people suspect they’re actually engineering some sort of grand cosmic event disguised as petty sadism but so far none have found any larger pattern in the aboleth plots spread across the multiverse (not that it’s easy to even recognize one). There’s no end to the conspiracy theories that see aboleths under every stone and, thanks to the massive range of their psionic reach, it’s impossible to conclusively prove that an aboleth did not cause any given problem.


Kind of unnecessary for a single useful plot idea, a (rather toothless) critter rewrite and a bunch of ancient history stuff nobody needs. And it also ties to Tartarus once again. I think I'm overcluttering it like regular DnD does with demon-devil stuff but there were far too many parallels not to. Ocean plane, psionics, evil, disgusting mucus. I started writing it a while ago, hoping it'd get somewhere, then it did. It just doesn't seem very interesting or usable. Then again, I didn't particularly like City of Brass stuff above yet been told it's actually good. Also, it's seriously weird, look at her classification. I like weird.

Also also, somewhere abovethread Beneath had said Erathis was supposed to be offbrand Athena. Didn't see it then, still don't see it. This, right here, is an offbrand Athena (in very rough form), which is like half the reason I'm posting a thing I'm so unsure about. Gotta show those 4e writers how it's done (prolly fails at that tho). The other half is I've written it all, so might as well post.

Also also also, I finally have an idea about Shadowfell. It's a great idea. I know it's great because it's stolen.

Beneath
2017-04-15, 01:50 AM
I think it was the 5e DMG saying she was supposed to be off-brand Athena.

This, though. Aboleth Athena. Nifty. Your aboleths have a species hive-mind too, on top of their memories spanning back to the dawn of time? That's certainly gonna be interesting to try to oppose.

That aboleths are manipulating mortal societies on every level to conduct experiments on things known only to them puts them in contact with people in an interesting and useful way. Though "they're playing a long game on a level so high above you that it would take your entire lifetime to gather the necessary background info to comprehend their motives" always seems like a cop-out to write.

Fable Wright
2017-04-16, 03:09 PM
Though "they're playing a long game on a level so high above you that it would take your entire lifetime to gather the necessary background info to comprehend their motives" always seems like a cop-out to write.

You and I read that very differently. They're constantly connected, sharing information, with undercurrents of deep misanthropy and multiversal hatred, have literally all the time in the world to **** around, and are basically untouchable by any form of censoring action due to their anonymity reincarnation.

They are almost literally "/b/ plays multiplayer Crusader Kings", with all the horribleness that implies.

While their true motives, end-game, means, and ends are nigh-indecipherable, they can be aptly approximated as 'for the shiggles' and you've got a pretty good idea of what you're opposing and how much **** you're going to have to put up with now.

Beneath
2017-04-16, 04:45 PM
That makes sense as a motivation, yes. They may be doing the incomprehensible in the long term, but in the short term they're faffing around trying to one-up eachother in nasty messes and held back only by the fact that a nasty mess made of eachother's plans is as much a nasty mess as one made of mortal lives (but even when they foil eachother, it isn't subtle because they're doing it for the sake of creating the lulziest train wreck possible. so you and everyone you love are just as likely to be caught up in an aboleth's impulsive stomping of another aboleth's sandcastle as they are in an aboleth's scheme in the first place)

Though that might be a bit more /b/ than the-aboleth-collective-as-written.

Also:
Aboleth 1: Help! Adventurers are taking over the society I'm turning into an art project orgy of depravity!
Aboleth 2: /piscaethces/ is not your personal army

Pronounceable
2017-04-17, 02:39 AM
While both ideas have upsides and I kinda want to leave the exact motives of aboleths to DM here, I imagined them more of /abom/ than mad sociologists (mostly thanks to Tartarus connection, who're straight up /b/). However

Aboleth 1: Help! Adventurers are taking over the society I'm turning into an art project orgy of depravity!
Aboleth 2: /piscaethces/ is not your personal army
is now canon.

In other news, here's my great idea. You can tell it's great because it's utterly stolen.


LENDOR (greater god), Infinite Sentry, the Unborn, Heir of Ruin, Lord of Shadows of the Fallen, Pathetic’s Last Refuge, Second Son
Domains: infinity, omniscience, prophecy, paradox

Nothing that exists can truly be unmade unless the Overmothers themselves forget it. Which will of course happen at never, as both of them have infinitely perfect memories. And it’s these unforgotten memories that form the quasiplane of Shadowfell beyond the confines of the regular multiverse.

As might be expected from the name, Shadowfell is the shadow of the multiverse that falls on the Yawning Void Below (aka Plane of Negative Energy aka Shar). The planes might be infinite but they aren’t infinite enough to absorb the radiant divinity Luminous Overmother emanates from above, so the portion of Her holy light that doesn’t become new souls for mortals and immortals of the multiverse can reach all the way to the void at the bottom of all. Ruinous power of the Allmother reacts to that and the mixing of their omnipotencies create the unreal quasiplane that is the shadowy domain/cradle/coffin of their second son. Lendor the Unborn’s existence was prophesized and preemptively erased by Shar before she gave birth to him and it’s only the Allmother’s subsequent sundering of time to free herself from the bondage of her own omniscience that allowed Selune to retcon Lendor back to existence. As a result of his paradoxical origin (that could’ve been called timey wimey if such a term existed), Lendor is a primordial elder god with true omniscience like his mothers and elder brother, yet he’s completely incapable of action. All he can do is think and remember all of Shar’s past victims/victories as the Heir of Ruin so that the Allmother’s own mind won’t be cluttered with useless and potentially dangerous information (for remembering previous wins had the possibility of making her feel the tiniest bits of satisfaction or pride some day; unacceptable). And Lendor’s involuntary rememberance of these annihilated things and beings fill up his quasiplane with their echoes, letting them continue to exist in some small capacity, which pleases Selune. Lord of Shadows of the Fallen would be worthy of pity, if pitying an almost infinitely powerful yet mindless deity made any sense.

As the mindscape of a mindless deity, Shadowfell isn’t a real plane and can’t be reached by normal means (yet still exists, hence quasiplane). It’s filled with things long destroyed and forgotten, ghosts of peoples and cities and lands and worlds all jumbled together into an illogical mess of their entire (unremembered) histories overlapping. It’s possible to find thousands of copies of a building that was annihilated by time and entropy in the real multiverse, each one an exact replica of a state it had for a single moment of its existence. Neither time nor space has much meaning in the quasiplane, where two of echoes of the same army seperated by a few minutes might be fighting each other to be the first to besiege a city that their real selves besieged during their existence, heedless to the fact that there could be twenty more copies of that city within sight. It’s not at all unusual to see a city whose sections randomly fast forward and rewind themselves between a majestic bastion of civilization and a burnt out husk, or a group of cheerful travellers suddenly attacked by what seems like shambling undead monstrosities created out of the exact same people and getting devoured alive.

These fellshadows, as such echoes of annihilated and forgotten beings and items and places are called, are completely perfect copies of utterly destroyed things that nobody in the real multiverse remembers anymore. Incapable of understanding or acknowledging their state, a fellshadow of a creature acts exactly the same as the real creature would’ve acted at whatever moment of their life the fellshadow is an echo of. It must be stressed that they’re not the real thing however, as the real version must’ve been annihilated body and soul and completely forgotten in the real planes for a fellshadow to even exist. Fellshadows are sad and pitiful things, things so irrelevant and long forgotten that even Ruinous Overmother doesn’t bother to waste her (infinite) hatred on them anymore. Many fellshadows attack and kill younger or older copies of themselves or their loved ones (whose apparent ages don’t seem right to them), thinking these imposters or dopplegangers. And since the same or related things’ fellshadows appear near each other on a very regular basis, most fellshadows of sentient beings go mad before long. Fellshadows of places or items can be even more dangerous, as without a facsimile of a mind to stabilize their form, they can switch the moment they’re echoing unexpectedly. A fellshadow of a sword can suddenly turn into a pile of rusty scraps or a lump of molten metal, or a sturdy building might suddenly collapse or burn down (or be struck with lightning or swallowed by earthquake or disintegrated with magic or...).

The only way to enter or exit Shadowfell is through the “fellfires” that randomly form between it and Material Plane. These strange things look like large bonfires with a heatless, silver colored flame burning without any fuel and it’s possible to walk right into them to cross to and from Shadowfell. For unknown reasons, these passages don’t appear on any other plane despite the fact that fellshadow outsiders and elementals (and in one case an actual deity) also exist. They’re completely indestructible from Material and burn for quite some time until they randomly fade away, the only way to put out a fellfire is to do it from Shadowfell (where it goes off as easily as a normal fire) and, of course, get stuck there. As time doesn’t flow normally, it’s completely impossible to tell how long any trip into Shadowfell takes in the real multiverse; what seems like months or years might be a few seconds outside and what feels like a minute might be a millenia, but at least it’s not timeless like Astral, so it’s not a guaranteed death sentence.

As sad and pitiful as they are, fellshadows are excessively dangerous outside Shadowfell. A fellshadow item or person can be killed or destroyed without any extra effort inside the quasiplane (and there’ll be many other new copies of it soon enough) but should any fellshadow come out into the real planes, they’ll start to reform/reset/repair/heal to their original state whenever they’re badly damaged. Backed by the power of the Overmothers’ unknown second son, fellshadows are virtually impossible to harm due to their unreality. This makes fellshadow items extremely valuable, and fellshadow beings even more extremely dangerous. While a maddened fellshadow of a human will still be just as killable as a real human, it’ll keep coming back forever unless it can dragged back into Shadowfell and destroyed there. Similarly, a fellshadow item will never be worn or broken or exhausted for long; a simple bottle of water from the quasiplane becomes an endless water source outside and a fellshadow weapon will be superior to any real one. Luckily for all real beings, fellshadows are very easily identified in the real multiverse; they’re completely colorless things that look wrong and defy all laws of optics. A fellshadow looks the same in broad daylight or pitch black darkness, resembling a pencil sketch somehow come to life. It’s an unnerving sight and even many adventurers who’re used to seeing them inside Shadowfell (where they look like pale but normal things) get easily creeped out when meeting them as two dimensional things that can somehow exist in reality (because cartoons haven’t been invented on most parts of the multiverse).

The Second Son himself doesn’t really do anything, for he’s a mindless deity that’s little more than a diary for his mothers. But there are still some mad cultists who’s learned of his existence and worship him in hopes of getting infinite knowledge, because of course there are. The lucky ones get diddly squat. The unlucky ones get taken in by cultists of the First Son and usually end up praying to the Allmother for salvation.


The previous one was a fluke, a coincidence. This is what happened when I get inspiration from Dark Souls. Since good artists copy great artists steal, you always make great art when you steal, right? Right?

Anyway, I thought something should be done with the words in Shadowfell in a cosmological sense, so I did just that. And then if the theme fits, you must acquit (and therefore steal from the most appropriate source). I wonder if anyone else has done a similar thing. The parallels are so obvious in hindsight.

Beneath
2017-04-17, 08:03 PM
So if the 3.5e Tome of Magic is in play, this is where vestiges come from, then? Very nifty, and interesting to do something with the place other than make it a formless void.

JinkyS
2017-04-17, 08:19 PM
I like this version of Waukeen's backstory. Would fit well in 4E where gods like Moradin and Corellan are less tied to species - more "gods who happen to be the most popular gods of dwarves and elves"

Fable Wright
2017-04-25, 10:34 PM
The previous one was a fluke, a coincidence. This is what happened when I get inspiration from Dark Souls. Since good artists copy great artists steal, you always make great art when you steal, right? Right?

Stealing involves taking the concepts and making them your own. Copying is when you take something and it remains recognizable as coming from its original source. I am sorry, but this was not stealing.

I dunno, Lendor just seems... bland? He has no personality, agency, or anything, and the discussion of fellshadows made it pretty clear what they were at the start, and it took more words to develop them than what was required. Pruning the entry, adding some character to who fellshadows generally are (like, what do they tend to do on the material, other than being immortal?), and possibly linking them with some indirect agency that Lendor has would probably have strengthened the entry substantially to stand on its own merits, as opposed to relying on one concept heavily.

Not trying to criticize; most of the work here is good and thought-provoking. Just hoping to give constructive criticism.

Pronounceable
2017-05-20, 12:17 PM
Hey thread, we're back.


I am sorry, but this was not stealing.
The only thing missing up there was an estus flask and \o/ praising \o/. I don't see how it's not enough to be stealy.


needs editing
True. Everything in here could use more editing. Alas I don't have an editor. And Lendor himself is indeed boring, just an excuse to wax poetic about actually good stuff, like others before him.
Also, crits are cool, I'd want even more critting.


this is where vestiges come from, then?
I seriously considered renaming them to vestiges after you said it. That's a much less forced name than "fellshadow" but there's something amusingly dumb in this name, so I'm keeping it for now. But we can totes call these things vestiges, it's good and proper.


So here's today's thingy. Been at this for a long while too, kinda scattered and incoherent, but has real bits of cool in it. Time for another couple of MM rewrites!


Eachthighern (lesser archfey), Lord of Horses, Master of All That Is Equine, One Winged Horse
Domains: purity, loyalty, obedience, unicorns, pegasi

Parents of little girls have much to be troubled about but almost none of them is alarming as the demand for a pony. For the talk of ponies (or horses or other equine animals) might indicate that the little girl in question has been targeted by the most terrible and creepy of the inhabitants of Feywild: the unicorn. Nurturing a deadly obsession with female humanoid (and only female humanoid) virginity, the unicorns are the biggest *******s known to mortals to hail from the fey realms and have a distressing habit of “adopting” little prepubescent girls. The equine fey beasts hide in the fringes of mortal societies and use their telepathic powers on their chosen little girl to talk to her without anyone noticing and pretend to be an invisible friend and playmate. They have an uncanny ability to befriend children and are great at amusing and entertaining even the most surly and sour of kids. A little girl thus adopted by a unicorn will inevitably come to regard it as her best friend and possibly the most important “person” in her life. And once they have their empathic bond firmly established, the unicorn will start to tell its chosen charge about the virtues of purity and innocence and loyalty to mold her personality into its liking, becoming like a secret parental figure that’s even more influential than the real ones.

Unicorns are, for all their creepy *******ry, rather cunning and usually pick daughters of troubled families who’re unhappy by default and unlikely to have their inexplicable pony or horse obsession be identified as noteworthy until too late. Which is usually the start of adolescence when, at the urging of the unicorn, the girl runs away from home to finally be with her invisible friend. The ceaseless whispers of the unicorn in their ears since their formative years see these children grow up to become puritanical and judgemental pricks with a deep seated love for animals and nature and an even deeper seated hatred of their fellow men (and women too). After being taken in by the unicorn, it’s almost always too late to save the teen girl who’s likely already a massive douchebag as the fey beast raised her to be (the psychological or psychiatric sciences required to unscrew such trauma aren’t particularly advanced among mortals, though blunt application of mental magic of various kinds is always possible with the usual terrible risks). The one hole in the unicorn’s otherwise expertly weaved mental snare is its strange sense of pride; they have a compulsion to make their victims incessantly talk to their friends and families about a desire to have horses and/or horselike animals (like the aforementioned ponies). This allows knowledgeable individuals to recognize the grave danger the child is in and maybe do something about it (such as getting the damn unicorn found and killed to sever the mental connection).

Of course, the grave danger of the unicorn isn’t merely transforming a regular little girl into a prudish prick (as some parents already do it themselves); it’s their obsession with purity and innocence (which pretty much just means virginity) and their violent response to defiance. Not only will a runaway unicorn victim likely never be found again, but if she starts to long for nonunicorn company or feels even the tiniest bit of romantic or sexual interest in any fellow humanoid (which is practically guaranteed to happen to an adolescent girl at some point), she’s being “sullied” in the beast’s eyes. This prompts the unicorn to physically abuse her (another thing they’re surprisingly good at) to purge her of sinful urges with purifying pain and protect her from the vile nature of mortality. Their rough treatment gets more and more severe if the girl fails to discard her unacceptable thoughts to the fey’s satisfaction and might end with her getting maimed or killed (either of which is better than not being a virgin far as the fey cares). Should its charge “betray” the unicorn by rejecting it and fleeing from such treatment, the fey beast will do everything it can to make her pay by becoming a telepathic stalker that’ll mentally harass her for the rest of her life, driving her to insanity and suicide if it’s not found and eliminated.

Any mortal girl taken in by a unicorn that manages to embrace its attitude and grow up to adulthood without getting maimed or murdered gets bonded with her unicorn. The Mark of Eachthighern appears as a unicorn tattoo in the middle of her forehead, as the bonded unicorn sheds its material body and inhabits the mortal as a second soul, becoming a magical familiar that acts as a mount when summoned. Having gained a myriad of feylike powers, the newly attuned unicorn knight is then free to roam the world, righting wrongs and fighting evils however she sees fit as a paragon of virtue who cannot possibly be wrong as long as she stays pure (aka virginal). Oddly enough, these bloodthirsty, sanctimonious and ultra judgemental knights of Eachthighern tend to leave lots more dead women than men in their wake, deemed not pure or innocent enough to warrant saving. Unicorn Knights are pretty much universally reviled by mortals for, if nothing else, their holier than thou attitude and tend to get killed relatively quickly. The few that manage to live long and grow older and stronger simply disappear into Feywild, heeding the call of their equine master, and are never seen again in the mortal world. As such, it’s vitally important for parents of little girls to be on alert against talk of horses and ponies, for the only way to save a unicorn victim is early detection.

The somewhat obscure name of Eachthighern is also related to the other type of terrible horselike fey beast that serves the Master of All That Is Equine: the pegasi. The winged, feathery horses and their savage obsession with bloodletting is an even bigger menace to mortals than unicorns and the fey insanity of a pegasus manifests as an unstoppable craving to see something bleed. Bloodthirst of pegasi is well known and they tend to savagely attack any creature they encounter just to watch them bleed out if they haven’t seen any blood for a few hours. Luckily, almost all pegasi are busy fighting the forces of Skerrit the Forester, the feylord of centaurs, and leave worlds of mortals mostly alone. The War of Thundering Hooves has been going on in Feywild for millenia by now, sparked by the centaurs’ rebellion against the weakened Eachthighern after Titania ripped one of his wings off and broke his horn after he insulted her one too many times. Empowered by Oberon the Lord of Winds and Brambles (who was also sick of Eachthighern’s minions’ constant killing of the members of his nymph harem), the centaur warchief Skerrit was promoted to a feylord and has been occupying both unicorns and pegasi in Feywild ever since, letting the rest of the Summer Court fey to frolick and cavort in (relative) peace.

Being an archfey, Eachthighern himself was in little danger from centaurs or their jumped up lord but his equine subjects were missing something vitally important in warfare: opposable thumbs. Landbound as they were, the centaurs were still able to frequently defeat pegasi thanks to their handheld tools and ranged weaponry, leaving Eachthighern in a strategically bad spot. The infamous phenomenon known to mortals as unicorn knighthood was his solution to this problem and today, the War of Thundering Hooves is where the surviving mortal targets of unicorns end up in. While he’s sometimes known to field them against centaurs, Lord of Horses prefers to keep these precious few mortal women in his thrall hidden in enclaves where they’ll work with those handy hands of theirs to produce arms and armor for his hoofy armies. The specially constructed horse armors and various alchemical items designed to be usable with equine mouths gave the pegasi and unicorns the edge needed to turn the tide against centaurs and Skerrit’s forces have been on the losing side of clashes lately.

Unlike his one horned recruiters, One Winged Horse doesn’t have the time or inclination to personally and closely get to know his mortal servants and instead just telepathically floods their minds with bliss and/or dread to keep them obedient and productive. He’s much too busy trying to wrest the control of Feywild to avenge his humiliation at the hands of the Queen of Waves and Flames but his elemental power is no match for the greater archfey and all the thunderstorms and floods and fires and earthquakes and hurricanes he tries to throw at Summer Court reflect back upon his realm, devastating his own subjects. Equestria (as it’s called) is one of the most dangerous regions of Feywild due to sudden and unpredictable natural disasters ravaging it, even above and beyond the Deathfreeze of Queen Auril.

Eachthighern is seen as an insignificant creep and is mostly ignored by the multiverse at large; which is just as well, for the one time he got any extraplanar attention was from Demogorgon, who thought it’d be amusing to pop some unicorns’ cherries after seeing how furious they got when a mortal woman one had bonded lost her virginity (a trifling detail like unicorns physically not having any required bits for it didn’t stop the mad Abyssal prince). Thus the corrupted equine fey/fiend beasts known as nightmares were somehow created out of unicorn spirits and proliferated in the Lower Planes, which taught Master of All That Is Equine that his moniker wasn’t actually warranted (and also that outsider attention was bad). A few sanctimonious mortal cults to him has spawned here and there, usually headed by a vestal unicorn knight, venerating unicorns as symbols of purity and innocence. These inevitably become a front to some fiendish agenda or another after its leader is gone due to Lord of Horses’ deliberate lack of interest in things beyond his vendettas in Feywild.

Unicorns and pegasi are almost universally considered to be dangerous monsters and killed on sight. Unlike his much stronger evil siblings the Queen of Winter and the Prince of Spring, archfey Eachthighern gets no respect or fear from mortals, only disgust and contempt, which prevents him from attaining to divinity by whatever method ascendant archfey have used (at least according to the sages).


In short, screw unicorns. Never liked them at all and Sparklelord didn't help either. Not quite reaches the level of hatred for Mystra or dragons, but it goes up there when you think about all the real world creep crap behind the one horned horse.

And the original pegasus is a beast born of blood (from decapitation to be exact), why the flak would they be friendly disney talking animals in DnD? Fey creatures should never be cute and pettable woodland critters, no matter how hard modern media tries to clean off old legends.

Also bit of retconning to the big archfey to make them even more seasonal, this lets there be as many lesser archfey as DM wants. Lord of Depths and Darkness, Queen of Waves and Flames, Lord of Winds and Brambles and last but not least Queen of Air and Darkness. Since spring was exiled for being a **** and autumn is too busy orgying with nymphs, only the two queens have courts and large followings of multiple fey varieties.

Overall, I'm gonna assume there's a bunch of useful Feywild worldbuildery here. You get the seasonal big archfey, their lesser archfey like Horsey and also random tiny lords up the wazoo. It should be a lively place by now.

Beneath
2017-05-20, 07:26 PM
Oh hey, the thread's moving again.

I love this take on unicorns (they certainly should be monsters. Even if you keep the "chaotic good protector of the forest"). Pegasi I'm not so sure of but making them good-aligned and easy to make into mounts wasn't a good choice for D&D; I'm just not sure "they'll kick your head open just 'cause they haven't seen any blood spilled in the last few hours" is the best way to do it (though it's certainly a way). Mythologically, I do think pegasi fit as mounts (Beleriphon rode the original), but they shouldn't be, like, either intelligent creatures in search of a rider (at least not you) or basically domesticated.

Basically they need to be more like griffons (side-note: I once had this idea for a series of tiers of Griffons with progressively weirder spellings. So it'd start "Griffin" and then the next one up might be "Gryphon" and the last one would be "Ghryphphynne" or something). Also, did D&D drop the "out of everything in the world, the thing griffons most like to eat is horses" thing after 2e? I remember that distinctly but I don't think I've seen it mentioned in 3e or post-3e D&D.

Anyway. I'm already getting ideas for how I'd run an adventure with a unicorn knight. Thanks for that.

Fable Wright
2017-05-21, 06:43 PM
Nurturing a deadly obsession with female humanoid (and only female humanoid) virginity, the unicorns are the biggest *******s known to mortals to hail from the fey realms and have a distressing habit of “adopting” little prepubescent girls.

Checks out. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1X-FWtWNuA)


Unicorns and pegasi are almost universally considered to be dangerous monsters and killed on sight.

But then how do cults of unicorn knights ever get a foothold? Why do upper-class families not immediately see it as a warning sign? This kind of reveal only works if they're associated with good things in-universe, otherwise the whole thing usually falls apart. I might change it to most people recognizing unicorn propaganda and keeping the associations with 'purity', but with warning myths among those who live by the woods about the dangers of pony obsession that don't usually reach the upper class due to these things just being superstitions of the lowly commoners. The upper-class veneer and snootiness of unicorn knights, as they are from noble families, propagate unicorn myths among the upper class and cause them to trickle down to the commoners, maintaining the status quo.


And the original pegasus is a beast born of blood (from decapitation to be exact), why the flak would they be friendly disney talking animals in DnD? Fey creatures should never be cute and pettable woodland critters, no matter how hard modern media tries to clean off old legends.

...You realize, of course, that the change only made them more approachable to your standard murderhobos, right?

Murderhobo: "Magical flying horse, I want your help. I wish to go slaughter dozens of sentient monsters and collect their loot so I can buy better equipment to repeat this process."
Normal pegasus: "Dude, no, you need help. No way you're getting on my back."
This pegasus: "Blood for the unicorn god! Skulls for medusa's throne! I'm in."

Murderhobo: "Guys, I just slaughtered all the cats and dogs and mice in the area, and I got like 32 xp for it!"
Normal pegasus: "Nope nope nope I'm out."
This pegasus: "Ooh, seems like fun!"

Beneath
2017-05-22, 03:03 AM
I'm not seeing that unicorns necessarily only/primarily target daughters of the upper classes there? The thing I'm seeing about who they target is


Unicorns are, for all their creepy *******ry, rather cunning and usually pick daughters of troubled families who’re unhappy by default and unlikely to have their inexplicable pony or horse obsession be identified as noteworthy until too late.

Not a reference to class; just neglect.

The vision I'm seeing of unicorn knights doesn't run in high society, or any society, for very long at all, considering that they're warped into a fundamentally inhuman mindset

Fable Wright
2017-05-22, 03:36 AM
I'm not seeing that unicorns necessarily only/primarily target daughters of the upper classes there? The thing I'm seeing about who they target is

The fact that they're called knights suggests a traditionally wealthy background beyond the means of peasants.


The vision I'm seeing of unicorn knights doesn't run in high society, or any society, for very long at all, considering that they're warped into a fundamentally inhuman mindset

Which is why I feel that they only succeed in high society, if at all; there, your assets and your family matter far more than your origins, religious views, fundamental dissociations with reality, bizarre habits, and demon god(s) living in your head. If you've got coin and/or the adventurer class levels to raze small kingdoms, then you're in, no matter how negative your sanity level has gotten.

Khaiel
2017-05-22, 05:21 AM
I think they are called unicorn knigths simply as a way to give them a title (And because of the unicorns' vanity), not because of high birth. The fact that in the end they are mostly used for manual labor seems to support this. Besides, certain societies might see a young girl of the community being chosen by an unicorn as a good omen. After all, while obnoxious, their crusade against what they consider impure might get them to fight the enemies of communities that consider virginity as holy as they do (And there have been historical cultures that did see female virginity that way, so it could happen).

The way they sustain the whole business of taking away girls seems to be that all these posts are written from the perspective of entities that operate on an infinite (or at the very least, if finite, large enough as to be effectively limitless to its denizens) multiverse, so while there might be a very big number of unicorn knights, there might be little more than a handful coming from a certain world.

Beneath
2017-05-23, 02:38 AM
The way I see unicorn knighthood is that any "knighthood" is more like being a knight-errant knighted by a supernatural creature from outside your society than like, a knighthood enmeshed in a system of feudal obligations, with the goal of alienating everyone the knight ever knew so hard that she won't be missed when she gets taken into faerie slavery. Maybe she's told stories of faerie courts where she'll serve as a traditional knight would, if she proves herself worthy (these are lies). Anything where she maintains any kind of human relationship, even with, say, servants, is something the unicorn would discourage as it means there's someone who might miss her. Maybe she'll get assigned brownies or something to maintain the image of a knight in shining armor (someone's gotta polish that), or taught to cast Prestidigitation.

Pronounceable
2017-06-12, 02:19 AM
Maybe I should've commented a bit more about knight stuff but I like having many posts not of my own. It makes the place look alive.

Anyway, the average unicorn knight is a magical girl on a magical horse with magical powers appearing out of nowhere and talking up purity and virtue. Your average peasant might like that, especially the ultrarightist Chauntean lot. Whatever she used to be among mortals isn't important at that point, tho no reason to not be nobility.

Onwards to our latest contender: there's no end to the strange DnDisms you can notice, is there?


GHAUNADAUR (divinity), Elder Seep, That Which Lurks, the Vile, Cosmic Diarrhea
Domains: excretion, disease, inertia, futility, health, cleanliness

Mortals, and the giants before them, have been building cities since time immemorial and one of the chief concerns of all mortal city builders has always been sanitation. Many methods have been invented to deal with the endless amounts of organic waste created by large populations, from simple latrine pits to indoor plumbing, and they’ve always worked very well. Extremely well, in fact. To a ridiculous degree if one stopped to think about it. It’s a testament to mortal tendency of ignoring the inexplicable so long as it’s convenient that Ghaunadaur the Vile was discovered only a few centuries ago.

The Great God of Excretions, as might be expected of such a title, is empowered by (and also literally feeds on) all bodily excretions of all live creatures everywhere in the multiverse. Every crying baby, every drunk throwing up his guts in the alley, every laborer sweating under the load, every flake of dead skin or shed scale or falling leaf of diseases and age, every wound oozing pus and, obviously, every bear out there in the woods; somehow all of these events count as a prayer to Ghaunadaur. It then uses all this massive divine power to draw filth and waste into itself from all over the planes, slowly and steadily siphoning bits and pieces of massed matter until there's nothing left, with an emphasis on bodies of live mortals (leaving them minty fresh and smelling of roses, metaphorically speaking). The Elder Seep seems to have been the reason why even the most insufficient and crude sanitation methods have been resounding successes at keeping massively crowded mortal cities habitable and keep even the most primitive worlds of DnD full of oddly clean and healthy looking people who’d have no idea what shampoo, toothbrush or toilet paper might be. All the unhealthy and harmful matter that, by all rights, should be covering them head to toe is instead gone, slowly and quietly sucked into the Ethereal and added to the evergrowing mass of semi infinite matter that is That Which Lurks. Since Ghaunadaur is inert and seems to have been sitting there secretly making the planes a cleaner place since who knows when, it was concluded that It was a beneficial, if gross, curiosity; one more strange and inexplicable phenomenon of the multiverse to marvel at. Most sages and even deities of knowledge and information agree there’s nothing to fear about It; at least as long as one doesn’t try to enter its tiny demiplane floating in Ethereal, where the laws of physics and metaphysics have broken down under the weight of the incomprehensibly large mass of what would’ve been called a black hole* in a less well designed multiverse.

And they are correct too, in a way. There is nothing to fear about the Elder Seep now, as It’s been thwarted already. The real reason why Ghaunadaur the Vile was discovered only a few centuries ago despite having been growing since at least the mythical Age of Giants is because It wasn’t there until a few centuries ago. When a band of plucky adventurers on some mortal world was a few moments too late to stop the malevolent ritual performed by mad cultists of some unknown evil power, they were quite relieved to see nothing coming out of the terrifying portal that opened up to a boiling maelstrom of incomprehensibility. They promptly won the day and moved on, leaving the few remaining cultists to flee in shock and confusion. The adventurers would’ve been amused to learn that all of the surviving cultists caught an oddly incurable diarrhea and died shortly afterwards, because they were simple people with simple tastes, but it was no laughing matter. The Cosmic Diarrhea was a genuine piece of the Elder Elemental Evil and, as such, wasn’t subject to this timeflow thing the Allmother had created after His imprisonment. With complete mastery over all matter (****ty as it was) and immunity to time, the Elder Seep drained all of the organic waste that was, is and will ever be into Itself (giving peoples of DnD their irrationally sanitized appearances), gaining a mass larger than the multiverse instantly. Reality broke under this pressure and the biggest possible ball of organic waste crashed through time, falling back towards the beginning. It would’ve hit the moment of Chained God’s imprisonment in the initial stages of the Dawn War and let Him evade capture and retcon literally everything if Overmothers didn’t react (for lack of a better term) in time.

Instead of that, Tree of Worlds was born. Guardinals of Beastlands in primordial times got a sudden inspiration to plant a tree that’ll let them travel all over the planes and when Ghaunadaur reached a few decades ahead of that moment, Yggdrasil’s colossal roots were in Its way. With a bit of nudging from Luminous Overmother, Tree of Worlds had already planeshifted some of its roots into Elemental Chaos and charged up with Tharizdun’s own power. With Ruinous Overmother’s baleful will, the infinite but undirected elemental power of EEE on both sides shorted itself out when they touched, creating a destructive feedback loop that brought That Which Lurks’ fall into the past to a screeching halt. It stopped roughly on the moment of Yggdrasil’s planting, causing the biggest ball of fertilizer possible to have always been right under Tree of Worlds and allowed it to become the Infinite Tree that it was fated to be (nourishment of a literally infinite tree is another of those mysteries most beings aren’t prone to wonder about). Of course, the backdraft of this caused all sorts of apocalyptic dangers like the Wind Dukes and Atropus to spawn in Elemental Chaos in the coming ages, but it was getting off easy.

Today, Yggdrasil looks like an infinite tree with an infinite number of branches to those travelling on it and is the safest planar pathway. It can let anyone go from anywhere to anywhere else (with the notable exceptions of Astral Plane, Energy Planes and Sigil) and is the lifeline of a number of mortal worlds that depend on interplanar and interplanetary trade to survive. There are very large numbers of nomads, refugees and fugities that live their whole lives on Tree of Worlds, safe from whatever drove them to seek shelter in the evergreen branches. Exemplars of Beastlands, who consider themselves to be the Tree’s owner, don’t really like all these random peoples wandering around but can’t do anything about it, for Yggdrasil is still pulsing with incredible elemental power and doesn’t allow anyone on it to be harmed or forced to leave. Tree of Worlds might not be sentient, but it is benevolent and prone to banishing and barring entry to those that mean harm to others (even gods are subject to its silent will).

As for the Elder Seep, It’s sitting still in its tiny demiplane and will continue to do so until the end of time, keeping all mortals clean and healthy and illogically presentable; condemned to toil forever for a task already failed. Its only entertainment is the odd dumb mortal cultist worshipping it as a patron of health and cleanliness. Ghaunadaur shows Its “favor” by not cleaning Its cultists up for a long while, letting them experience the amazing sensations of being a real unwashed mass and watches them try to rationalize it as a good thing. Those that please him further might be blessed with some disfiguring diseases too. Amusement is hard to come by when you’re an inert ball of ****, so Ghaunadaur’ll take what It can get.*of ****


In retrospect, this is a ****ty idea, forget I posted it. :smallcool:

Agrippa
2017-06-12, 11:41 AM
Frankly I'd go with a more classical pre-modern take on unicorn behavior to explain the presence of unicorn knights. Unicorns are beautiful, graceful, powerful and noble fey creatures of the equine persuasion. They are spiritually pure and perfect in every horsey way imaginable, with a big honking spiral horn sticking straight out of their foreheads. Yet they aren't truly free from sin, in fact they're big fans of two of them, namely pride and wrath. That's where young virginal women, and especially "unicorn knights", come in. When unicorns get angry everyone knows it and little can be done about it.

Yes, just about anyone can calm down a unicorn if they've built up a sufficient rapport with one, but building up that rapport takes time and it's hard. But for reasons unknown even to unicorns, the presence of a virgin, especially a female one, quickly calms them down. That and it's much easier for a non-virgin to build a rapport with a unicorn foal or colt than with a fully grown one, so virgins are pretty much trotted out to calm down strange unicorns and keep them from acting stupidly.

Unicorn knights are young, at least initially, virginal women whose purpose is to follow and sooth unicorns. Their fighting skills and magical powers are largely to keep up with these magical, narwhal-horned Clydesdales. Yes, unicorn knights fight against evil and heal the sick and afflicted along with their unicorn pals, but this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YedqV4Gl_us), is their true purpose. They're the Dude to their unicorn friend's Walter Sobchak.

Fable Wright
2017-06-12, 11:26 PM
In retrospect, this is a ****ty idea, forget I posted it. :smallcool:

I mean, I had always assumed that Yggdrasil grew by leeching all the nutrients out of the lower planes, leeching them barren. This makes surprising amounts of sense as well, though, and acts as a good counterbalance to the 'good = up down = bad' standard trope. It ties up so many loose ends about D&Disms that I'm glad to see it exist... though I wonder how the Otyughs still survive, given that Ghanadaur is taking all the good ****.


It can let anyone go from anywhere to anywhere else (with the notable exceptions of Astral Plane, Energy Planes and Sigil)

Before I go nuts here, to confirm: This can't reach the Ordial plane, can it?

Pronounceable
2017-06-13, 02:38 AM
Unicorns are cool
That'd be a nice unicorn knight. It would've been a great fit if I didn't hate them.

I wonder how the Otyughs still survive, given that Ghanadaur is taking all the good ****.
At first otyugs were gonna be Its own creations and/or chosen peoples to inherit the earths but it didn't fit with the rest of Its stuff. Maybe this particular Elder Seep just likes the goofy buggers and lets them have a bit to eat.

No, there's no Ordial Plane so Yggdrasil doesn't reach it. And even if one day I find something for it, there won't be life in it (like Shadowfell) so the Tree still won't reach it.


Also I really wish this Ghaunadaur was real. It's probably the only one of the 100+ deities I've rejiggered here that I'd actually want out in the real world.

e: You know what? Lemme put in some news items and random tidbits here. It might tide the thread some more and create more stretches of posts that aren't mine.
-Fenmarel the Lone Wolf is in the works now, so there'll be some actual info on Seldarine for once. You should look forward to the Seldarine God of Survival and Suicide.
-Nerull is up to something wicked involving reincarnation. Dunno yet what exactly will come of it but it'll be sad/bad.
-All those needlessly many naga types are in fact different sexes and one of each is needed to breed. It's best to not attempt visualizing.
-When humanoids mate, an offspring of mother's race is born. There's no half-whatevers because that **** is %100 idiotic, just let the players play a ****ing orc, nothing wrong with playing an orc, this ain't Middle Earth.
-The actual Elemental Prince of Fire is the Phoenix, a massive monster in depths of Elemental Chaos, and isn't amused by efreeti's bull****. He has three counterparts too (still haven't been determined tho).
-I still have no idea why and how trolls roll.
-They don't call him the Knockoff Father out in the planes for nothing, as Emmantiensien can also attest.
-And yeah, Emmantiensien will be around in some form at some point. He'll not be friendly to treehugging hippies.

Fri
2017-06-13, 04:41 AM
That'd be a nice unicorn knight. It would've been a great fit if I didn't hate them.

Also I really wish this Ghaunadaur was real. It's probably the only one of the 100+ deities I've rejiggered here that I'd actually want out in the real world.

[/SPOILER]

I must say though from all the entries you made that one is kinda crappy. Because it has a suspicious stink of you're just pulling this one out of your ass. I feel like you're just cutting your weight here. But at least I can hope that you're just laying the brick as foundation for future ideas. It does seem like a fertile ground to make a splash. Fart fart poop fart.

Beneath
2017-06-13, 02:10 PM
Calling Ghaunadaur "elder seep" puts me in a mind of this (http://drod.wikia.com/wiki/Seep). Now I want to work out how to put one of those into a D&D dungeon and have it be fair


No, there's no Ordial Plane

Spoken like someone trying to hide the existence of the Ordial Plane from us!

Agrippa
2017-06-13, 03:58 PM
Hi there Pronounceable. I have some precedence for unicorns being creatures of pride and wrath. From William Shakespeare's Timon of Athens.

If thou wert the lion, the fox would beguile thee; if thou wert the lamb, the fox would eat thee; if thou wert the fox, the lion would suspect thee, when, peradventure, thou wert accused by the ass; if thou wert the ass, thy dulness would torment thee, and still thou livedst but as a breakfast to the wolf; if thou wert the wolf, thy greediness would afflict thee, and oft thou shouldst hazard thy life for thy dinner; wert thou the unicorn, pride and wrath would confound thee, and make thine own self the conquest of thy fury; wert thou a bear, thou wouldst be killed by the horse; wert thou a horse, thou wouldst be seized by the leopard; wert thou a leopard, thou wert german to the lion, and the spots of thy kindred were jurors on thy life; all thy safety were remotion, and thy defence, absence. What beast couldst thou be, that were not subject to a beast? And what beast art thou already, that seest not thy loss in transformation!

Timon, act vi, scene iii

hamishspence
2017-06-13, 04:05 PM
Frankly I'd go with a more classical pre-modern take on unicorn behavior to explain the presence of unicorn knights. Unicorns are beautiful, graceful, powerful and noble fey creatures of the equine persuasion. They are spiritually pure and perfect in every horsey way imaginable, with a big honking spiral horn sticking straight out of their foreheads. Yet they aren't truly free from sin, in fact they're big fans of two of them, namely pride and wrath. That's where young virginal women, and especially "unicorn knights", come in. When unicorns get angry everyone knows it and little can be done about it.

Yes, just about anyone can calm down a unicorn if they've built up a sufficient rapport with one, but building up that rapport takes time and it's hard. But for reasons unknown even to unicorns, the presence of a virgin, especially a female one, quickly calms them down. That and it's much easier for a non-virgin to build a rapport with a unicorn foal or colt than with a fully grown one, so virgins are pretty much trotted out to calm down strange unicorns and keep them from acting stupidly.


In Tales of the Five Hundred Kingdoms, male unicorns attached to, and defended female virgins, female unicorns attached to, and defended, male virgins, and both were pretty belligerent when it came to destroying non-attached "creatures of evil".

Resulting in a clash between a female unicorn on a "destroy evil" hunt, and a male unicorn defending a malevolent, virginal female ghost.

Pronounceable
2017-07-06, 09:56 AM
Spoken like someone trying to hide the existence of the Ordial Plane from us!
Ohnoes, they're onto me!!!

Hi there Pronounceable. I have some precedence for unicorns being creatures of pride and wrath. From William Shakespeare's Timon of Athens.
Hiya. This must mean time travelling Shakespeare stole my idea. Darn thief...


So anyway, I'm now back from elsewhere. And I bring the thing I said I would.

FENMAREL (intermediate god), Lone Wolf, Shadow Beneath the Trees, Lifeclinger, Hidden Hunger, Stalker of Seldarine
Domains: survival, isolation, stealth, outcasts, shame, suicide

While the second betrayal hit all of the Seldarine deities quite hard, none took it as badly as Lifeclinger Fenmarel. But unlike the others who were in grief over the suffering of their followers or mourning the fall of their dear sibling, Fenmarel the Lone Wolf (not to be confused with too suspiciously similarly named deities from certain other settings) was burning with jealousy. The Seldarine God of Survival, befitting his nature, hadn’t fully died when Corellon executed him after Araushnee’s rebellion and had retained all of his memories and most of his original personality through the correction. He had played along afterwards, diligently performing the role of the angsty, emotionally unstable boy with a golden heart that King of Glory had seen fit to cast him in the neverending soap opera that was the new existence of the Seldarine, yet he secretly loathed his “lord and savior” (and all the other paper thin stereotypes his siblings had been reduced to) with all his soul. It was, of course, a completely hollow, meaningless anger. As the god of survival, the Lone Wolf couldn’t even imagine standing up to Corellon or revealing what had really happened back in Araushnee’s rebellion to his fellow deities; his portfolio wouldn’t let him endanger his existence by infuriating his master. So he sat and seethed while King of Glory had withdrawn to his quarters to contemplate the future after the Revenancer’s revenge. But it wasn’t the impotent rage against his creator and helplessness to change his loathsome portfolio that pained Fenmarel so, he’d had that even before the previous rebellion and was quite used to it; it was the knowledge that the stuffy, unimaginative, straight laced, boring Goddess of Justice had the balls to do what he could not and had hurt the Glorious Monarch as badly as it was possible to hurt an elder primordial deity.

As he wiled away the time by continuing to be the overdramatic heartthrob tailor made to attract teenaged female mortals to Seldarine worship, Fenmarel waited with the rest of his siblings for Corellon to finish his contemplations. His only consolation was the brief moments of lonely isolation, where he could just lose himself in the forests of Arvandor and have some peace and quiet without any of that tiresome romance or dumb melodrama suffusing every moment of the rest of the Seldarine’s existence. While eventually one deity or another always came over to “cheer him up” and forced him back into the role of the dark and troubled heartthrob, at least he could have plenty of time to himself under the guise of emo angst (befitting his stereotype). And when the King of Glory finally came out after a lengthy period of soul searching and self reflection to lay out a new and exciting roadmap for the Seldarine, Fenmarel knew his worst fears were being realized.

Having learned his lesson, the Coronal of Arvandor wasn’t going to be an overbearing meddler that micromanages every little thing his children do while arrogantly ignoring their worshippers anymore. He was going to be a chill patriarch from now on, a hands off father figure that trusts his family to deal with their own affairs. And he was also going to open up the Seldarine to the masses. See, Corellon had looked into what those wacky mortals were up to before the advent of the great Mechanus and found this thing called ancestral worship, where they worshipped the ghosts of their parents and their parents’ parents and so on. It was simple and ingenious and the Glorious Monarch was certain it could be even more popular now with the improvements he had in mind. From now on the best, most worthy worshippers of the Seldarine were going to be sanctified upon arriving at Arvandor; they would gain an actual bit of divinity in their afterlife that’d make them real (if puny) gods by Corellon’s will. The strongest, smartest, prettiest, skilledest and devoutest of mortal worshippers were going to become members of the Seldarine family and in time, Corellon’s family would become the biggest and the best family in all the planes (far superior to the families of his brothers). These Seldarine saints were going to get worshipped by their still living friends, families, neighbors, acquaintances and later descendants as valued members of the pantheon and they, in turn, would get to become minor deities of local importance to their families and societies. And also become servants, courtiers, consorts, advisers, soldiers, agents and companions to their eldest siblings here in Arvandor. They would help and surround their sworn deities at all times, serving them to the best of their ability. One day in the far future, everyone was going to be part of the glorious family and then everything would be cool and awesome (except for those who weren’t good enough, of course, but who cares about losers?). Fenmarel knew this meant the end of his peace and quiet forever, Corellon’s “new and improved faith” would certainly surround him at all times with souls of the idiotic mortals who ate up that angsty bad boy with hidden depths ****. He would never again be able to be his real self even for a moment and the mask would, sooner or later, become the real face.

He had to do something, find an objection or, as a last resort, come clean about the past and try to rally his siblings against Corellon. It would’ve been better to be annihilated right there than become a cardboard cutout for good. He did nothing. He even cheered like the others to keep his cover intact. Hidden Hunger didn’t have the balls to speak up when he could, so the only thing that happened in the following ages as Corellon put his plan in motion and Arvandor overflew with sanctified dead mortals was that he was filled with even more hate and shame.

The new repackaging of ancestral worship was a resounding success, the “groundbreaking blend of ancient beliefs and modern philosophy” netted the Seldarine a significant worshipper base siphoned off of Sun Father and his hidebound ilk. As a pantheon, the Seldarine prospered, gaining massive numbers of mortal worshippers and forging alliances with more carefree and chaotic deities of Material Plane against the old bastions of traditionalism (aka Pelor and Chauntea). Stepping back and leaving the mortal affairs to his children let Corellon build a strong following from basically scratch for the third time; he really had learned his lesson, at least as far as enticing mortals were concerned. The saints of his children’s worshippers occasionally returning to mortal worlds to visit their descendants promise them a form of immortality even more appealing than that from Nerull and the bottomless well of drama created by the soapy nature of the Seldarine keeps their worshippers happily occupied with religious debate (which could be called fanfic contests and shipping wars by cynics or heretics). While Corellon’s power over his followers isn’t anywhere near that of his hated brother Gruumsh’s influence on the race of orcs or the degree of unshakeable fanaticism Pelor can inspire in mortals (as is his right as their creator), Coronal of Arvandor knows with certainty that those who choose to worship his children are better people and makes sure they’ll have so much more freedom and happiness than other mortals.

All members of the Seldarine in Arvandor, deity and saint alike, are members of a big and happy family and the Glorious Monarch’s dreams of the bestest family are alive and well. All remaining original deities of the Seldarine have gained great divine power and fully embraced their roles as the cast of the neverending teen soap, whatever other tendencies and traits remained from their ancient personalities have long been swallowed up by the infusion of mortals’ hunger for overdramatic teen soap, divine gossip and erotic fanfiction. Fenmarel has become an angsty bad boy over the ages just like he’d once feared, with only a few flashes of despairing fury and jealous hatred today that he can’t quite remember the source of, and these have fossilized into the source of his random bouts of antisocial tendencies, angry bursts and the famous inner darkness. At all times, he’s surrounded by legions of adoring saints (mostly of the female persuasion) who all clamor to be the one who’ll set him straight and are all too happy to line up to be the next in line whenever one of his tempestous affairs with his fellow deities end disastrously.

The Lone Wolf is the patron of the poor and the downtrodden, the depressed and the suicidal, the victim and the repentant. He urges the poor and the oppressed to endure their terrible lives and survive at all costs, while simultaneously preaching of death as a welcome escape from problems to those who’re well off. He encourages self imposed isolation and creepy/perverted gestures of obsessive love both. He demands endless hard work on the part of the guilty for absolution, yet is completely against anyone forgiving wrongs done to them. As a god of shame and isolation (and an unconscious expert at both), Fenmarel wants everyone to be unhappy; his apparently contradictory domains and teachings are all ultimately aimed at making lives of the Seldarine worshippers as miserable as possible by fostering and propagating unhappiness while sounding like good ideas for the moment. The Lone Wolf has no solid, predetermined dogma or tenets for supplicants; he judges every situation uniquely and determines the best (aka worst) course of action before advising it. Yet they love him and keep coming back for more, making him feel smugly superior for giving them what they deserve (and almost immediately feel terrible about being a massive ****, followed by doing it some more).


Like father, like son; Douchenozzle Jr is on the case. On the plus side, we finally get around to the real Seldarine as seen by the regular Joe Peasant. I think this lot here a nice change of pace from all the individual gods, while being a much more individualist religion than most of the solo acts. It's not too much fleshed out because it was too much efforthere should be blanks for DMs to fill. Also they're neither elves nor treehuggers, but without any need to bar them from it.

The rest of the muppets goes as Rillifane the Boy Scout, Sashelas the Skirt Chasing Jock, Solonor the Aggressive Dudebro, Aerdrie the Overenergetic Kiddie, Hanali the Airheaded Bimbo, Sehanine the Compassionate Doormat for your teensoap needs.

khadgar567
2017-07-06, 11:31 PM
You know elves realy need a god of sex and rock nroll cuzthey are angstier than angstiest mortal.

Pronounceable
2017-07-08, 04:48 AM
So yeah. That last one was kinda boring, wasn't it? It was missing something. Like coolness, or interestinghood. Good thing I had a plan.


MALAR (demigod), Beastlord, Bloodhunter, Dire Sire
Domains: savagery, instinct, bloodlust, predators

Nobody is quite sure how a deity can be nonsentient but Malar is doing it. The beast in the Beastlord is certainly genuine, his actions are indistinguishable from that of ordinary predator animals and even various magics and powers allowing communicating with animals work on him (though he has nothing much to say and is unpredictably violent), leading to the leading theory of him being an ascended regular animal.

His origin may not be known, but Malar is known as the origin of all the monstrously large and misshapen animals classified as “dire” thanks to his ability to reproduce with whatever mammal animal he wants to. He keeps going around randomly eating and mating with animals on the worlds of mortals until he’s eventually slain, then respawns on some other world to continue his savagely simple existence. The many strains of dire animals giving so much trouble to all civilized peoples (and druids) are either his direct offspring or their descendants, with larger and more monstrous ones being closer to him. Bloodhunter seems to despise civilization and sentient races, and almost always sticks to deep wilderness areas where wild animals would be his only company. He’ll attack any humanoid unfortunate enough to cross his path but he’s rarely very focused and it’s entirely possible to escape from him with a good headstart. Facing Malar in combat is a fool’s errand but he’s eminently killable, for he’s no smarter than any predator and any sufficiently large and armed group of mortals can bring the Beastlord down.

Overall, Dire Sire is simply a roving monster (who generates other roving monsters) that poses no important threat in the grand scheme of things. As a mere beast (and one that avoids civilization at that), Malar doesn’t even warrant the sort of dread a regular orcish horde can inspire in the mortal lands. In fact, orcish hordes love to hunt him down when they find him on their world, for the Beastlord makes a great trophy. His relative harmlessness and obscurity are likely the only reasons Lord Corellon hasn’t bothered to destroy him for being an embarressment.

Malar the Bifathered, as he’s known to absolutely nobody else, is the result of the Seldarine Goddess of Magic and Dreams (and many other things) Sehanine’s plot to keep her divine family safe and happy(ish). Having recognized the growing fury within her brother Fenmarel (who seemed to have settled into a menage a trois with Hanali Goldheart and Aerdrie the Eclipsed Skies for the moment but was the odd man out in the relationship and likely to be dumped by both soon) shortly after the establishment of Seldarine sainthood, the Moonbow feared a third great betrayal in Arvandor might be in the cards and resolved to preempt it. At that time, her current lover (who was cheating on her with Sashelas and thought she hadn’t noticed) Solonor the Black Hunter’s sadistic streak and bloodthirst was also bothering Sehanine (who’d began to retaliate with her best friend -and partner in affairs of defense- Leaflord Rillifane) as it could get worse and open him up to influence of the Seldarine’s enemies (aka Gruumsh). So she persuaded them for a threesome and used her own domains of magic, mysticism, femininity and secrets to transform the affair into a ritual that drained her brothers of their undesirable and potentially dangerous qualities. Fenmarel’s inner turmoil calmed down considerably and he became less abrasive. Solonor lost his excessive appetite for hunting and fighting, along with the restless boredom that enveloped him whenever he didn’t get his fix. Of course, all that badness had to go somewhere so a side effect of the ritual was Sehanine’s pregnancy.

After she was done modifying her brothers’ minds to make certain all possibilities of betrayal had been eradicated (which she knew would work well, as she knew they’d all been down that road already [and not everyone was ungrateful for their newfound happiness and loyalty to their family like the Revenancer]), Sehanine turned to ridding herself of the monstrous being inside her. However, not knowing all that much about mating among deities, she’d miscounted the time she’d have and by the time she’d hidden herself away and ready to proceed with her (for the lack of a better word) abortion, Malar was already awakened and had sensed her intentions toward him. Bloodhunter tore her to shreds from within as she struggled to smother him with magic, performing his own C-section quite successfully. The Moonbow, for all her magical might, wasn’t a goddess of war or protection and unaccustomed to battle, whereas Malar was made of divine anger, hate and bloodlust; so he easily overwhelmed his mother and left her almost split in half as he Aliened his way out. He then turned on the severely weakened Sehanine, intent on devouring her. Luckily he was completely consumed by his urge to consume, so Malar couldn’t notice or resist the dreamcurse Sehanine laid on him as he was biting into her divine flesh. Since he was acting like a mindless beast lost to its urges, the Moonbow’s curse imprisoned him in a dream of beasthood: he would forever dream of being an animal following its base instincts and live in a permanent state of dreamwalking, unaware of his true nature as the (embarrassingly) Seldarine God of Violent Anger and Bloodlust. The Beastlord’s only escape would be to apologize to Sehanine and resolve to never let his instincts rule him again, which he’s not capable of doing on account of believing himself to be a nonsentient animal.

This, of course, didn’t save Sehanine there. Malar ripped her apart and devoured her body and she died. But the Glorious Monarch resurrected her, as he’s wont to do. And he was so impressed with her dedication to the Seldarine family, he granted her a boon. So the Moonbow wished to forget what she did, both to make sure this morally questionable sequence of events would truly be behind them and any possibility of her mellowing out at some point and undoing the cruel yet richly deserved fate of her unwanted son wouldn’t exist. Corellon obliged, he erased Sehanine’s memory of the grisly and questionable bits (only leaving the memories of a particularly awesome threesome behind) and bound the Beastlord to worlds of Material Plane, where he remains to this day. Sehanine Moonbow got to get on with her life without horrible trauma, the most unstable members of the Seldarine were cured of their potential troublemakery and Corellon was reassured of the flawlessness of his handiwork.

It was a good day for everyone in Arvandor. Except for Fenmarel, who’s a jerk and sucks and deserves all the bad things that’ll happen to him and shouldn’t have dared to touch Corellon’s beloved wife back in the day.


So here's what's what: Douchenozzle is a total **** and junior ain't got **** on him. Junior is also wrong. About pretty much everything. Whereas Big Daddy usually turns out to be right despite being a total **** about it.

Malar has always been a cartoon animal too (albeit not from a Saturday morning), so that's what he gets here. You could even add in his werewolfery here thanks to Sehanine's moon connection and the main reason I haven't is because DoubleD made them in our planes. And dire animals are one of those weirdass DnDisms that's strangely compelling, so I wanted them in. This Beastlord here is admittedly just a footnote, little more than a random encounter for high level adventurers, but it's about time Corey got some love (for a given value of love) in our thread. All of his siblings have got crapload of cool(ish) stuff and he was seriously lagging. Hopefully these last two entries will help fix that.

khadgar567
2017-07-08, 05:19 AM
man i kill to see elven goddess raped by mindless beast. Nice story pronounceable
so is beast lord born from goddess and whats the relation ship between malar and dire sire

Beneath
2017-07-08, 12:33 PM
So Sehanine just ripped the parts that objected to being a cardboard cutout out of Fenmarel's mind? Brutal

Also, huh. The Kiaransalee story made it look like forgetting what they'd been through was a standard feature of the mind-rebuilding after the first rebellion, but then Fenmarel gets to keep his memories 'cause he's god of survival and Sehanine just inexplicably has hers. So did Corellon deliberately choose who to amnesify based on whether he could make them loyal without changing their memory? Sehanine, as the doormat goddess, could be changed to just be made loyal to him (so she kept her memories); Kiaransalee, as the goddess of justice, couldn't let Corellon killing all of them and resurrecting them redesigned stand, so she did not?

I'm starting to suspect, here, given all the supposed "ascended mortals" who are not, that no mortal actually ascends without one of the primordial gods' say-so, which might suggest that Sune and Nerull are someone's plot against someone else gone out of hand. This would make Mechanus/stopping ancestor worship less necessary, though (except that it gives fewer ancestors who a god might sneak off ascension onto)

As for Fenmarel, I considered posting a "Fenmarel: The God that Hates You" thing with a link to the Sithrak comic but I decided against that 'cause that'd be, like, mostly content-free and Fenmarel's you-hate is different from Sithrak's you-hate (one of them just hates everyone, while the other has a particular hatred for each individual one of his worshippers)

Pronounceable
2017-07-08, 01:46 PM
Also, huh. The Kiaransalee story made it look like forgetting what they'd been through was a standard feature of the mind-rebuilding after the first rebellion
It was. Just didn't work as well as Corey hoped and he didn't work on them all equally.

I'm starting to suspect, here, given all the supposed "ascended mortals" who are not, that no mortal actually ascends without one of the primordial gods' say-so
Any greater deity can empower mortals, don't need to be one of the five elders. Very few mortals manage to ascend without some sort of divine help or backing but it still happens through coincidence (Brandobaris) or hard work (Velsharoon). You're right in that mortals just love to call any god who doesn't advertise their origin "ascended mortal" and the actual number of those is much lower than it seems. Mechanus, though, is to protect Ethereal (and thus the multiverse) and the spontaneous incarnations of belief popping up is just a minor side effect (minor for Moradin at least, whose is the only opinion that counts).

daryen
2017-07-23, 06:22 PM
Just finished reading the whole thread. Awesome. Thank you!

Pronounceable
2017-08-05, 02:44 PM
Everything is proceeding per our unschedule (which is a schedule that doesn't exist).


VAPRAK (lesser titan), the Runt, the Cursed, Exile Squared, Stunted Chieftain, Ugly Titanling, Unloved of Mother, Skullsmash
Domains: strength, anger, stupidity, ugliness, revenge, ogres, sacrifice, ogre magi

The ogre mage is neither an ogre nor a mage. Not having come up with another name for themselves, the ogre magi feel no need to correct the layman either, who just sees large ugly humanoids too small to be giants that have magical powers and reaches the most obvious conclusion. The general opinion among them is that this is for the best, as being correctly identified would only make it harder to break or fulfill their curse.

The stupid, malicious and ugly race of ogres have the habit of sacrificing members of other races in the name of the stunted titan they think is their creator, whom they revere as a god. Vaprak himself is neither their creator nor wants them to be generic baddies for bands of plucky adventurers, and would prefer they do something more directly useful to him. But humanoid sacrifice is about the only thing he can get them to understand from his prison in Jotunheim, therefore ogres keep capturing humanoid races (and very rarely giants) and ritually executing them in Vaprak’s name. The sacrifice ceremony is usually a quick affair where the bound victim’s head is crushed by chieftain or shaman of the ogre tribe with a big rock to the general applause of the rest of them, followed by the other ogres closing in to pulp the rest of the body with smaller rocks in a community spirit. The pulverized remains are considered sacred and are buried in a pit where, every once in a while, a titanic construct will spawn from the gore and crawl its way out.

The creature will be inhabited by one of the sacrificed victims’ souls trapped in the monstrous body, cursed with ogrishly violent and stupid instincts, yet very clearly still themselves (plus a bunch of nifty magical powers and an immunity to aging and sickness). These newly reborn “ogre magi” quickly recognize that regular ogres believe them to be an old and respected member of their group who died a while ago and was blessed by Vaprak. This generally acts as a crash course on deception and manipulation for the cursed ex-humanoid as they struggle to not tip the ogres off (who’re used to the idea of their dumb god screwing up the blessing and sending the wrong soul back) and get rekilled. The ogre magi who manage to survive this welcoming (either by escaping or becoming a respected member among ogres) will generally turn their thoughts toward regaining their old form, which they’ll instinctively know to be possible. They’ll also know the exact method, which is a bit of a conundrum: true love.

The ogre mage must find a humanoid (of their original race) to fall in love and marry them. Such a marriage will break the curse and transform the ogre mage back, restoring them to their original forms as long their partner is willing to stay married. Which is extremely hard, on account of ogre magi being fugly and prone to berserk rages, not to mention the general notoriety of the ogre race they’re believed to belong. Furthermore, the required true love is one sided; the partner doesn’t need to stay in love, so long as they stay married, while the ex-ogre mage must keep being fully infatuated, no matter how they’re treated or what the partner does, lest the curse returns and becomes permanent.

Demanding a volatile emotion like passionate love to forever remain unchanged, especially in the face of any potential ill treatment from one’s partner, isn’t fair or reasonable, of course, but curses aren’t known for fairness or reason*. Therefore, all ogre mages instinctively know that the only way to regain their human(oid)ity with no strings attached is to fulfill the curse: find true love (almost an impossibility by itself) and then promptly kill their unfortunate lover shortly after the wedding before either of them can have a change of heart. As far as the ogre magi know, none of the other cunning and convoluted solutions they tried to get around the parameters of the curse work (and they tried a lot). This is the reason why all ogre magi are always ornery, on top of their habitual berserk fury; very very few souls are willing to either commit the evil and/or suffer the pain needed to complete the curse, or risk becoming a virtual slave to whims of someone else after miraculously surviving the ogres (assuming they even managed step one, ofc). Those that do, however, find that they’ll keep the nifty powers of ogre magi with none of the downsides; fulfilling Vaprak’s curse/blessing is one of the most obscure and risky methods of gaining a form of eternal(ish) life, so there’s always a few nutjob wizards and scholars willing to give it a try. They never come back to life, because Vaprak isn’t running a charity here and empowering a willing mortal doesn’t have the effect he wants.

After the War Against Titans saw the fall and imprisonment of the giantish pantheon, his siblings blamed Vaprak for being the spark that ignited the wrath of deities. And since their traitorous mother wasn’t locked in Jotunheim with them either, the titanic demigods decided to take their anger out on Vaprak, their cursed youngest (and ugliest and weakest and dumbest) sibling. He protested, pointed out that he wasn’t even born then and had nothing to do with anything, to no avail. Buried alive under a mountain range on Jotunheim, Vaprak the Runt spent many centuries powerlessly cursing at all gods and titans of the multiverse. He holds a special loathing for goddess Araushnee, who’d cursed him with ugliness, weakness and stupidity before he was even born. And it was this weakness that prevented him from breaking free of the flimsy (for a titan) prison his siblings put him in. It was only much later, when he noticed he could sense the race of ogres out in the multiverse due to the curse they shared, that Vaprak realized something good could come from it. Jotunheim was blocked by the will of primordial elder gods, Vaprak knew none of his siblings could see or affect anything beyond their prison while anything from the outside could waltz in and out at will. He was alone in having any influence on the outside multiverse, assuming he could get the dumb ogres to do anything productive. Which he could, but only to a degree; he wasn’t strong enough to properly communicate with ogres and ogres weren’t smart enough to make sense of the messages he was sending, so they defaulted to smashing skulls in their god’s name.

Stunted both physically and mentally he may be, but Vaprak was still a titan with great command over elements, and spawned off of a primordial elder deity to boot. Eventually he learned and trained himself and nowadays, he manages to sneak bits of his power out during sacrificial rites of ogres, capturing a few of the souls sacrificed in his name and building the ogre magi bodies to bind them. Every bit of his power spent this way in Material Plane takes a small bit of his curse away as well, pushing him towards his freedom in tiny human child steps. It’s too slow for his tastes but that’s all he can manage, which is still very impressive for a scrawny titan with mental retardation. He’s not particularly concerned about the havoc among the mortals, they can go complain to Araushnee if they have a problem with it (which is, ofc, whom the murder of spouses to break his curse represents).

Far as Vaprak the Cursed cares, he can do whatever he wants now as payment for all the injustices he suffered. Yeah, he can’t do anything right now, being imprisoned and whatnot, but it won’t last forever. His curse shrunk noticeably. Sooner or later he’ll break it and gain the power that is his birthright; Giantmother Othea might’ve been an unfaithful bitch and a traitor to her kind countless times over, but momma ain’t given birth to anything weak, if Vaprak’s elder siblings are any indication. Once he breaks Araushnee’s curse, the Ugly Titanling will show all those bastards who’s the runt now. All of Jotunheim will bow before Vaprak when his siblings lie broken under his feet. And after he devours them all and adds their power to his own, it’ll be the gods’ turn.

He’s starting to find some holes in this plan, now that he’s growing less dumb, but it’s still a solid roadmap and he’s sure he'll prevail. No one’ll win like Vaprak. No one’ll escape from Vaprak. No one’s revenge’ll be as sweet as Vaprak’s...



*And neither is Araushnee nee Lolth, the original cursespewer


I'm gonna assume everyone can figure out where this comes from. If not, you might have acute fairytale deficiency.

It's also extremely far from DnD canon, true. Also no trolls because A) it's kinda dumb to have ogres closer to trolls than giants, B) regeneration is too weird.

And does anyone actually care about weirdass giant derivatives like verbeeg and fomorian and ettin and ****? We could go for that trash by the rest of the titan demigods. Not saying I will, cos those are some dumb and pointless critters, but someday I might.

Beneath
2017-08-05, 09:24 PM
So the murder-to-escape-the-curse thing, let's say an ex-human ogre mage (call her Fiona) marries her human true love and wants to off him because she's more in love with breaking the curse than him, does she have to do it herself, or can she arrange someone else to? Does it have to be deliberate murder or do accidents work? Can she just wait it out until her true love dies of old age, since she's immortal?

If she does, can the widow Fiona then remarry? Does she have to do anything in memory of her dead True Love, or can she move on since she's slipped the curse and it's not coming back?

If Fiona falls out of love with the human, she's an ogre forever, then? One shot at breaking the curse and if she blows it it's gone forever and she doesn't get a second true love even well after the natural lifespan of her original true love?

To break the ogre-mage curse you have to be the kind of person who would off your True Love to get out of the curse, right? There's no like, deciding someone who isn't really that important to you is your True Love, or if you realize the person isn't that important to you after you marry them you're re-cursed.

Do ogre-magi breaking the curse help Vaprak more than ogre-magi just being made?

I don't know most of the weird giant-kin, but Ettins are cool, if a bit overdone since Warcraft. But you could steal from Warcraft and make them another ogre offshoot.

Pronounceable
2017-10-10, 06:09 AM
Rise and shine, thread! Rise from your grave and shine!


EMMANTIENSIEN (elemental anomaly), Heart of the Planes, the Evergreen, First Root, Primordial Shepherd, Treant Protector, He Who Eats All
Domains: treants, patience, calmness, fury, elements, creation, trolls, genocide

While nobody can agree upon which exemplar race came first, every one of exemplar historians and scholars are certain that the trees predate all. Old myths and legends of all exemplar races mention that there were trees by the time they came to be during the Dawn War, whether they’re murderclaws of the Abyss, songstars of Celestia or Asgardian swordspines. One of the more outlandish and ridiculous of these ancient stories is from Acheron, about an army of rustroot trees rising up against a rakshasa raja and completely destroying the cube he rules and eating him and his armies (by shredding them to tiny pieces with their razory roots and sucking up the resultant minced rakshasi through their pores to forever trap their victims and prevent their respawning). It’s an obscure and maligned legend, as rakshasi are particularly touchy about their racial prowess and a story of defeat by trees is heavily frowned upon, even one as transparently silly as that.

Except, of course, it’s true. Sure, it was actually rustroot treants that defeated them and there was no such thing as a tree back then, but the early Dawn War era multiverse did belong to creatures that looked identical to trees. And there were many. Each Outer Plane had its own types of treants and the total number of different treant species easily reached into tens of thousands, with each species having millions upon millions of individuals. What’s been known since the Dawn War as the “aligned flora of Outer Planes” are, in fact, those same treants that have lost their ability to act. From songstars of Celestia to cloudtops of Elysium, every single tree on the Outer Planes is a comatose husk of a primordial treant, regrowing elsewhere over and over each time they’re used up by the resident exemplars as natural resources. The reason this is virtually unknown is because the treants of pre-primordial ages were relentlessly hostile and devoured all exemplars they could get their branches and/or roots on, leaving extremely few witnesses to speak of them (and pretty much all of those were annihilated in one planar catastrophe or another anyway long before the Dawn War even ended). If the treants hadn’t suddenly stopped slaughtering all nontreant life, none of the exemplar races could’ve created anything resembling a civilization and deities (once they appeared) would’ve been forced to squeeze into the four elemental planes and the void of Material. Emmantiensien the Evergreen, progenitor of treants, is keenly aware of this at his abode inside Elemental Chaos. He’d be furiously plotting to regain the mastery of the multiverse that was stolen from him if his ancient anger hadn’t been squeezed out by the epheremerally infinite weight of Ethereal Plane.

As one of the main locks keeping the Elder Elemental Evil outside reality, it didn’t take Heart of the Planes more than a few seconds to be completely infused with Tharizdun’s rage and coat itself with the four elements serving Him, becoming an astronomically large mass of elemental power (not to mention the first being outside the three supreme deities). While Ruinous Overmother has been shredding EEE’s power leaking into multiverse to pieces teeny enough to be harmless (aka elemantal spirits, whose harmlessness remains extremely debatable) ever since, she let his anger pass in case it’d give her an advantage against her daughtersister. As a gem that defies conventional geometry, Heart of the Planes (also of Emmantiensien) stored this omnicidal fury for the unfathomable amount of time it took for the battle of Overmothers to start creating the empty Outer Planes. By then First Root was so persistently angry on so many different levels, it caused the spontaneous creation of thousands of different treant species out of the shapeless aligned matter (which has an innate tendency to mimic real matter [aka elements]). While Luminous Overmother was content to leave treants to their victimless fury at first, the births of exemplar races and the ensuing massacres forced her to create Ethereal Plane to save dwellers of the multiverse from EEE’s rage. Obviously the Allmother wouldn’t let that pass uncontested and interfered. So creation of Ethereal Plane left treants on Outer Planes in an eternal coma/mindlessness as Emmantiensien’s ability to reach them was completely blocked.

The upside of this for Primordial Shepherd was that he’d finally gained a measure of sanity as the infinite rage in his heart was smothered by the Shawl of Silver Tears enveloping the Inner Planes. And unlike the regular mindless elemental spirits getting past the blender of Yawning Void, he had enough of EEE’s power to retain a sentient mind (not to mention enough elemental strength to put most titans to shame). This pleased him greatly and he peacefully sat in his abode for untold ages, creating a calm and silent sanctuary for himself amid the raging whirlpool of power that is the Elemental Chaos. And Emmantiensien might’ve still been a calm and serene being if that accursed Knockoff Father hadn’t provoked him with the travesty that he calls the treeTM.

Many many ages later, Pelor took a look at Treant Protector’s incapacitated subjects on the Outer Planes, and recreated bargain bin versions that were thoroughly inferior in every possible way on the little mudballs he’d filled Material Plane with. The imitations were small and feeble, with only the tiniest bits of cosmetic differences to tell them from one another. And they needed nourishment, grew old and died. Even worse, they were explicitly made to serve as food and shelter to other knockoffs of Pelor’s, those dumb critters he’d based on exemplars of Beastlands. All of which, in turn, only existed for the benefit of the other other feeble fakes that were a mockery of the children of Annam and Othea. And then Pelor had the gall to call these “humanoids” his crowning divine achievement and act as if he owned the planes.

Something had to be done to teach this pretender a lesson. Except Material Plane also laid outside Ethereal and First Root’s power couldn’t reach there directly. Luckily, dwellers of Outer Planes had been thoughtful enough to create a pathway that conducted elemental power. So the new treant species Emmantiensien’s reawakened rage spawned (based on types of trees from Material) could go to worlds of these mortals and ruin their day. They even had some of their progenitor’s elemental power and were able to exert control on their mortal imitations. Sadly for Primordial Shepherd, most of the new treants were also sane and calm and peaceful (like he used to be) and preferred to hang out on the Tree of Worlds or take residence in Material’s forests instead of bringing ruin to humanoids and their assorted gods (many of whom, he’d discovered, were still more goddamn imitations of real deities, crafted out of belief). While a few treants sometimes obey their progenitor and move against humanoids, most of those eventually run into bands of plucky adventurers and are defeated or pacified.

And then, there’s the crowning jewel of indignity. As if Pelor’s own mockery wasn’t enough, his whelp of a son went and made a second knockoff of the Evergreen’s subjects out of elemental spirits during his “rebellious” phase. While not as pathetic as the tree, this so called troll is even more infuriating to Treant Protector because it’s a sick and twisted version of the treant with its terrible appearance, endless fury reminding him of the unpleasant past and the disgusting compulsion to eat its putrid evergrowing flesh. The aforementioned height of indignity isn’t the awful beasts’ themselves, or their baffling decision to worship Emmantiensien (although it’s definitely upsetting) and it isn’t their ability to blithely survive in Outer Planes (which is even worse), but it’s their tendency to inflict harm on Pelor’s discount giants far, far better than his own subjects ever do. Except they’re not nearly smart enough to actually take part in any real plans First Root might have against deities of mortals, so all the pain and ruin they create is just fruitless sadism.

Being immobile, lacking direct power on Material Plane and Yggdrasil both and incapable of creating obedient treants; Emmantiensien can only sit and stew and hatch schemes to draw deities of humanoids into Elemental Chaos where he can actually destroy them. Only, such things will likely never come to fruition due to a lack of treantpower. Nothing is going as well as it should and anger is slowly building again inside Heart of the Planes, this time entirely his own. The odds of this causing any weakening on the locks of reality and let the First Son send in even more horrors is statistically insignificant and nobody needs to bother trying to appease or calm Emmantiensien at all.
Top secret behind the scenes stuff(shhhdonttellanyone): For about 10 seconds I thought Emma as Ordial Plane, connecting Inner and Outer Planes. Then I said lolnope
I think someone wanted this at some point. Y'all wouldn't believe how many iterations this took. Emma is pretty much nothing but a name in DnD so there's like 45 million ways to go with him. I put in the Tree and the Gem, but skipped Rillifane. I'm also ashamed at how long it took for me to remember where trolls first came from. How the hell did I not remember old JR's stuff? Mind boggles in hindsight.

Anyway, this is the Unbearable Lightness of Taking A Dump On Pelor. Not as satisfying as the Corey version but I enjoyed it. Also, trees would be intimidating in DnD, Durkon's right. They eat earth, water, air and fire (sunlight is totally fire). Complete elemental mastery right there. Inspiration! Lightbulb!

I'm not gonna talk big and say the thread is back, but the thread is back for now. How long it'll stay back is a different question, as I have nothing to post next. Still trying to find some more Nerull goodness (aka badness). If I wasn't utterly ignorant in those subjects, Wonderbringer Gond would've been coming up for the god of transhumanism and general cyberpunkery. Alas, it wasn't meant to be.

Pronounceable
2017-10-14, 07:27 PM
This kinda snuck up on me. There I was, thinking about whether making the drow a form of shadow possessed half undead is a lame knockoff of shadar-kai or not*, then bam. It just happened.
*It was

ILNEVAL (intermediate god), Karaash, Horde Lord, Everseeping Blood, Gruumsh’s Left Hand, Warmaker, Eater of Phalanxes
Domains: war, leadership, order, strategy, weaponry, ambition, jealousy, inferiority, grudges

Ilneval aka Karaash is the orcish god of war. Which isn’t saying much, for every orcish god is a god of war in some form (except Luthic, who’s female and therefore inferior and unworthy of notice).

What seperates the Horde Lord from the rest of his orcish fellows is his emphasis on the more cerebral aspects of warfare. Tactics and strategy, martial organization, training, research, civilian (for a given value of civilian, which is a pretty small one for orcs) infrastructure behind military actions all fall under his purview. When orcs go to war, it’s the shamans and warmasters of Warmaker who do all the required prep work so the powerful orcish warriors will display their might on the battlefield and have the necessary training, equipment and information to crush the enemy. All of which is entirely boring for your average orc, so Ilneval isn’t popular or respected by majority of orckind. Especially when compared to Legbreaker Baghtru, the Son of Gruumsh, the mighty god of mighty warriors and mightily bashing faces and screaming angrily (in a mighty manner), who gets all the glory and the spoils and the adoration. Who cares he’s dumber than a rock made of bricks and couldn’t find his own ass without a map (likely provided to him by the Horde Lord)? He’s mighty! And tough! And loud! That’s all that matters, every orc knows that...

Karaash is miserable. He’s sick of Baghtru reaping all the rewards of his hard work and would like nothing more than to put the idiot down and claim the orc warriors to himself. Unfortunately, like all orc warriors, Gruumsh’s Left Hand knows that might makes right and to the victor goes the spoils and also he does not have what it’d take to defeat Baghtru. He can do nothing but bide his time and work hard, hoping to grow strong and maybe one day challenge the Legbreaker. And so long all that orcish belief and sacrifices and riches keep flowing to Baghtru and his followers, the chances of that happening is none; therefore Eater of Phalanxes is forever destined to be the god of being not good enough. Why Godfather Gruumsh saw fit to bless the lazy dumbass with that much divine power while the most intelligent and dedicated god of orcs thanklessly slaves the days away for the betterment of orckind is a mystery to Ilneval. The Horde Lord was even made by One Eye’s own hand, without being sullied by an association to a female. And it’s not like Gruumsh even cares about Luthic (evident by his regular murderings of her) so he can’t be showing preferential treatment to her son. It makes no sense.

Still, Ilneval refuses to scheme and plot to advance himself. He’s devised thousands of different ways to topple Baghtru (coming up with even more almost daily) as a hobby but refuses to act on those for one second. Strength is the only virtue and taking what belongs to others without rightfully earning them by might of arms is the sort behavior the honorless scum that worship Shargaas the Shameful stoop to. Better be trampled underfoot forever than win with skulking in the dark and stabbing in the back. Nightlord Shargaas, who’s unfortunately almost as smart as Ilneval, is aware of this and mocks Warmaker incessantly, disparaging his honor as “pathetic romanticism befitting an elven child”. When he’s not sending his scum to murder and rob the Horde Lord’s followers of what little they glory earn, that is. Of course, Everseeping Blood can never retaliate, for the orcish god of darkness and trickery cannot be found when he doesn’t want to. Even Yurtrus, the Yurtrus who got killed 99 times, the same Yurtrus who failed to even embody his own domains and forced the Godfather to take them away to appease Nerull and brought shame upon all orc gods, the greatest loser of all the planes, looks down on Karaash’s desire for validation and fruitless envy. Not that White Hands ever said anyhing (having his mouth ripped away permanently as punishment and all) but Ilneval can tell from the look in his eyes, the look that says at least I tried. As if throwing yourself into guaranteed failure over and over is something to be proud of or Ilneval should also humiliate himself by publicly losing to Baghtru. And the Horde Lord can’t bring himself to punish Yurtrus either, any victory over his cripple of a brother would make Ilneval look petty and (much more importantly) weak.

All of which is par for the course, of course. Like the rest of the orcish godlings, Gruumsh made Ilneval to these exact specifications for his own entertainment. The Horde Lorde is an unrepentant ******* and his envy, despair and rage at the treatment he gets is so funny (not knowing what a sitcom is didn’t stop Gruumsh from making one). The Godfather is very amused every time he turns his eye towards Karaash and thinks he knows enough of him to know he’ll forever be miserable. A downside of having only one eye is having to look at things only from a fixed perspective, especially when one spends all of his time sitting back on his couch and watching the fifty thousand channels on his TV (in a manner of speaking).

On the surface, the Seldarine Goddess of Love and Friendship couldn’t possibly be anything even remotely similar to Warmaker. Hanali is the most popular deity among the Seldarine; she has the most saints dedicated to her, the largest compound in Arvandor, adored the most by mortals and stars in the highest number of fanfics written by their believers. She’s the hottest and friendliest among the Seldarine, the most prestigious partner to have in the eternal hurricane of tangled relationships, the one with most suitors/fans/stalkers outside the pantheon and the absolute best in the sack.

But behind all that is a goddess who’s fully aware that she’s a substitute Sune, created just because Corellon was too scared to handle the real thing. As anyone can plainly see, the Crimson Companion is almost a mirror image of Lady Firehair; the same degree of extrovertedess, the same friendly flirtiness, the same tone of voice, the same manner of speech, even the same facial expressions on her avatars... Yet with none of the iron will or the sharp mind behind the pretty facade: Hanali is dull and easily manipulated, she can’t help but go along with the flow and do whatever she’s told because she doesn’t have a better idea of her own. She always feels like everyone’s taking advantage and, just like Corellon, using her as a safe and easy Sune. Lady Goldheart is sick and tired of being everybody’s attainable fantasy and just wants to be acknowledged and liked for a thing of her own that’s not a lesser version of something Sune has. Except she’s got nothing of the sort, she was created as the dumb hot girl who goes down easy (what Sune habitually pretends to be) and (unlike the real deal) it’s all Hanali is capable of being. She can do nothing but suppress her inferiority complex and burn with a furious jealousy.

So, despite outwardly showing all signs of complete happiness, the Seldarine Goddess of Love and Friendship was the most miserable of the bunch. And therefore a perfect match to the Horde Lord that she met by complete accident during a feast at Pelor's palace. Instantly recognizing the self loathing for not being good enough and the all consuming envy hidden behind his blustering macho facade, Hanali was immediately intrigued by this disgusting godling of an orc. Not that she’d ever touch this thing with a ten league pole, but she thought he could be someone who’d understand her. Maybe he could even acknowledge her as something other than a hot chick to lust after, seeing how much Ilneval seemed to loathe female anything. Ilneval, in turn, first assumed it was some sort of Seldarine trick to get at Gruumsh and pretended to play along with this dumb slut, hoping to turn around whatever the pansies had planned and present a shrewdly won victory to Gruumsh; the sort of thing Baghtru could never in a trillion years manage. His opinion did change however, after recognizing that she was acting alone and not as bait for some cunning plan her betters had concocted. The envy and fury inside the Crimson Companion was as genuine as his and Ilneval was shocked to find common ground with a member of the Seldarine. And a female one, no less!

As they became actual friends, Hanali discovered that orcs are loathsome only due to Old One Eye’s evil influence and Ilneval found that the King of Glory was just as ****ty a father as his nemesis. A degree of mellowing out nobody could’ve expected from Warmaker and Lady Goldheart happened, lessons were learned and prejudices eroded on both sides as they starred in a private romcom of their own. The unlikely pair of deities managed to make each other happy, since their completely unrelated lives had somehow managed to make them soulmates (or at least the godly equivalent, what with not having actual souls and all), it wasn't even surprising. They eventually admitted to being in love, if only from faraway. Because, of course, neither one’s family would welcome this turn of events and if they were ever discovered, their existences would be forfeit. So they’ve never met in person ever since they became friendly with each other and their affair is entirely chaste, consisting of secret messages going back and forth between Arvandor and Nishrek. Hanali finds it extremely romantic and refreshing compared to every other relationship she’s ever had, while Ilneval is glad that he’s not with his beloved in person where he could **** things up with his reflexive *******ry or engrieve her with the endless variety of wounds and maimings Gruumsh heaps upon him.

While both are so much happier than they used to be, they still have to pretend nothing of the sort has ever happened to protect themselves. This, coupled with their normally miserable existences, is slowly but surely pushing them toward the ludicrous idea of eloping from their pantheons. Which they both know is impossible; there’s nowhere in the whole multiverse they can go that Gruumsh and Corellon’s combined power couldn’t reach, even other primordial deities wouldn’t be able (or willing) to protect the star crossed lovers. Nevertheless the longer their forbidden love continues, the more desperate they’ll get to get together; both are quietly certain that at some point in the future they’re gonna have to reenact that famous mortal play and it’ll end even worse for them than it does there.


I blame Pushing Daisies for this. Should've never watched the damn thing.


vvv in the interest of not needlessly bumping the thread: Not that it'd be impossible for them to get in Emma's good graces, but they'd prolly die before reaching him. Elemental Chaos hates everything nonelemental.

Fable Wright
2017-10-15, 10:41 AM
... Man, it's like looking at and some kind of Klingon God of Logistics. I just feel sorry for the guy. On the plus side, no one in Gruumsh's pantheon but Gruumsh himself could even find Ilneval without his support. Unfortunately, that's enough.

I do have to wonder, though. What would happen if the lovers ran away to the primordial chaos, where there's a powerless deity only handicapped by the logistics of sending orders and organizing his followers who rather hates the orcish, and elven, pantheons and has a fair deal of primordial power to protect the two?

falcon1
2017-10-15, 06:00 PM
Doesn't said primordial deity hate them too?

Pronounceable
2017-11-06, 08:19 AM
Now I know I bashed DnD's demon obsession quite a lot in this thread. But I had good reason. You'll just have to trust I still have good reason for this one.


BAPHOMET (demon prince), Demon Prince of Beasts
Domains: corruption, violence, weaponry, barbarism, chaos, evil, minotaurs

As the story goes, once upon a time there was a foolish wizard who wanted to impress a druid he’d fallen in love with. So he designed a spell to uplift animals, thinking that making all of the druid’s beloved animals as smart as humanoids would be a good way to win her heart. Then the foolish wizard bought a bull to test it. This was a prized animal with good breeding; big, strong and tough, with a spotless white hide and an aura of majesty. Once awakened to sentience, the bull could remember his life clearly and recognized exactly how his kind was being used by humanoids. Deciding it was time for payback, the bull killed the foolish wizard and escaped. Soon, the bull recognized that it was quite easy to kill people when they thought they were dealing with a regular animal. Pretending to be a normal bull and targeting lone travellers and tiny farming communities, he became an accomplished serial killer and managed to rack up quite the body count among the peasants of the land.

So when the bull finally died, his soul found himself in Mechanus instead of reincarnating like a regular animal. Modrons weren’t strangers to sentient animals, so just examined his life like a regular mortal. Unsurprisingly, they judged him to be chaotic evil. So the bull’s soul was branded with chaos and evil, transformed to a petitioner and sent to the Abyss as a hapless pile of chaotic evil soul matter. Back then, the Demon Prince of Demons was at the height of their campaign and any demon with two enslaved petitioners to rub together was proclaiming itself Demon Prince of Something, so the former bull was promptly grabbed by an ambitious demon and reshaped into an enslaved monster. Then the wannabe demon prince was squashed by a badder demon and the damned bull soul was shaped into a different monster by his new owner. The process repeated dozens of times, sometimes he was taken as loot from a loser, sometimes traded or stolen, but the ex bull had many many owners and suffered a massive variety of tortures and monstrous forms; as was the case for billions of other petitioners unlucky enough to land in the Abyss during Demogorgon’s conquests.

Then, for some reason, he drew attention of the ancient demoness called Pale Night. Known to be a primordial being (and also the oldest surviving demon of the multiverse), the Shrouded Shape of Evil was one of the unimaginably small number of demons that could mate and breed. None could ever say why the Mute Demoness ever did anything she did, except that everything she did was to further the power of chaotic evil and the closest thing to a monarch demonkind has ever had. And she’d chosen to mate with him, which was the worst pain the bull petitioner had experienced in his centuries in the Abyss but it was fine, since this resulted in his rebirth as a real demon. Perhaps she’d seen high CE potential in this petitioner, or perhaps she was just curious because of his unique being, but the Mother of Princes gave birth to the new demon going by the name of Baphomet, one who was destined for greatness. The future demon prince could therefore be considered a sibling to other Pale Night spawned demonic rulers like Graz’zt, Luperico, Rhyxali and Vucarik.

The Demon Prince of Beasts is very much unlike what his name suggests and despises demons that are all about mindless violence and unthinking rage, such as the Demon Prince of Cannibalism, his mortal enemy. In fact, Baphomet just might be the smartest among demonkind today, with a skill dwarfing even Demogorgon in technical and scientific matters. Baphomet is one of the greatest artificiers of the planes and can construct technomagical terrors rivaling most advanced machinery the genies of Inner Planes have to offer with only one hand (not that he has a choice there, what with having replaced his left arm with a massive magic cannon that shoots green balls of materialized dread (named Big Fear Gun), but I digress). The Demon Prince of Beasts gets his name from his outlook instead; he believes all mortals are just barbaric beasts merely pretending at civilization, simply waiting for an excuse to turn on each other, with a savagery equal to the demons hidden just below the facade. Baphomet’s goal is to strip away the illusions of morality and break down the trappings of civilization, so the beasts chained inside mortal minds, the true people will be freed. And he’s figured out the best way to accomplish that too, which is giving them destructive power unmatched by their fellows in impossibly advanced weaponry: firearms made of and powered by demons. While a number of mortal worlds have reached the technological level to invent guns and bombs, Baphomet’s demonically enhanced living guns are infinitely more reliable and powerful. They don’t need ammo, they don’t need maintenance, they don’t malfunction and when they do get destroyed, they reassemble themselves. They’re also cursed; the tiny demons inside slowly corrupt the owner, eroding their sanity and morality to free the beast within as the Demon Prince of Beasts commands, sometimes even magically fusing into the mortal’s soul after prolonged use.

All this and more is thanks to the revolutionary breakthrough Baphomet made soon after becoming a true demon. He was new and not very good at reshaping damned souls, so his army of monstrous petitioners were small and weak. Demons he’d enslaved were no match for the much bigger and badder demons serving his rivals even with teamwork. And he himself was nothing more than an ant compared to the demon princes feeding on the suffering of millions. His solution was sealing what few demons he’d enslaved into boxes, endless imprisonment would be a much worse torture than being sent out to fight. Even fights doomed to failure were still fights and demons enjoyed fighting, so Baphomet correctly figured out depriving them of even that would increase the nourishment he’d get from their pain. The nano (as he named it after the word for “box” in the ancient language of his mortal world) was a great success that gave him a large spike of personal power but the aforementioned breakthrough was miniaturization. Baphomet figured out a way to cut demons into ever smaller pieces without killing them and, more importantly, decreasing their power; this let him shrink his “demon in a box” to about the size of a thumb. That is the secret to the weapons of the Demon Prince of Beasts: his special boxes siphon off the trapped demon’s inherent ability to power up from pain/fear/hate and use that chaotic evil essence as a power source for incredible technomagical feats. It’s also how he enhances his demon slaves, transforming them with demonic implants to twisted amalgamations of machine and flesh. Baphomet’s minions are capable of taking on much bigger and badder demons than themselves, which was how he could eventually amass enough power to declare himself a prince.

Baphomet is best known by mortals as the lord of minotaurs, an ogre sized race of bull-man hybrid creatures. However they’re less a race and more a strange type flesh golem, animated by a damned petitioner of the Abyss instead of a mindless elemental spirit of the regular golem varieties. Baphomet’s bound petitioners are incapable of leaving their plane (like all other petitioners) and his demon slaves need to be summoned from the outside to leave their homeplane (like all other demons due to Soulforger’s seal upon the Abyss), so he needed a different type of being to spread his influence into Material Plane. Researching golem making and finding a way to stuff a petitioner or demon into it was childplay for the Demon Prince of Beasts, thus the minotaurs were born in the manufactories of Icon of Sin. Becoming a minotaur is the most prized goal for Baphomet’s minions, as it’s a much less painful form of being compared to abyssal petitionerhood or twisted half mechanized existence that’s the hallmark of Baphomet’s servitude. Since they come straight out of an assembly line, all minotaurs are identical except for their personality, which is the personality of the animating petitioner or demon. Far too many of the first minotaurs went rogue once they reached Material, recognizing that living as an outsider golem thing is infinitely better than serving Baphomet in the Abyss, so there’s a small but enduring number of them scattered all over the worlds of mortals to this day. These are all somewhat calm creatures prone to living alone in remote locations and leaving mortals in peace, completely averse to any sort of danger, for being destroyed will mean going back to Icon of Sin where Baphomet awaits. But they’re still powerful CE monsters and will not be pushed around. The newer, more loyal minotaurs are ex mortal cultists of the Demon Prince of Beasts, rewarded for their work on his behalf during their life by immortality in the form of a minotaur. These ones work to hasten the collapse of civilization and help free the beasts from cages of morality, becoming cult leaders and armsdealers, knowing that they’ll be rewarded with another minotaur body and further chance at mayhem by their master if they get destroyed.

Baphomet poses a grave threat to Material Plane and its mortals, for his insidious cults always ultimately plan to drag the world itself into the Abyss. And he can do that, evidenced by the corrupted planets floating in the skies of his domain, Icon of Sin. The cursed weapons his cultists peddle don’t just corrupt mortals but they corrupt the fabric of Material Plane itself, suffusing the planet and its surroundings with essence of chaotic evil in the form of smoke and ash from their discharges. Once this planar corruption reaches critical levels, the Demon Prince of Beast’s machines can summon the entire world to the Abyss and cut it off from the multiverse, letting his technomagical demon legions to storm the planet and destroy all remaining vestiges of civilization. Baphomet then withdraws his demons and leaves the world alone, a utopia of freedom where beasts can be as beastly as they want without any of those pesky ideas of morality. The binding machines also ensure the souls of all remaining mortals of the world are forced to forever reincarnate on their now postapocalyptic madmaxian world of savagery and barbarism. The worlds Baphomet has captured are few in number with extremely diminished populations but their evil and chaos output is immense, feeding and strengthening him in ways most other demons of the Abyss can only dream of. While he still has a long way to go to catch up to the toppest of Abyssal topdogs like Demogorgon or Kiaransalee, Baphomet is most likely to get there eventually (proving Pale Night was right, as she was wont to be).

Once a world is captured this way, it is doomed (unless some mortal proves badass enough to somehow fight through armies of mechanized demons, assault Icon of Sin, maybe even face Baphomet himself in combat, and destroy the machines holding their world trapped in the Abyss, but what are the chances of that happening?).


Well there we have it. If you can't tell what my reason for this particular entry is, I don't even know what you did with your life until now...
And the parallels to real minotaur myth is neat too, I guess.

noob
2017-11-07, 10:25 AM
There is a bunch of references to doom.
But I think it would be kind of cool to do a doom and dnd crossover.
doom in dnd 3.5 would probably be a level 4(or maybe a bit higher) fighter(maybe a bit more but the fact he dies to a rocket means that he can not be that high level but when he have armor and temp hp he can survive rockets which is hard below level 4(12d6 damage but since half is fire and half is blunt you can apply two different kind of damage reductions))

falcon1
2017-11-07, 01:38 PM
That is an awesome backstory for Baphomet, and it really makes sense. Now it's given me some ideas...

Pronounceable
2017-11-09, 08:39 AM
Dungeons&Dooms
That's a thing I'd thought about many years ago but never really did anything with it. And since these are magic demon guns and rockets, they deal as much damage as DM wants, so it can be played at any level.
...
And since so many people are reading without commenting (or a few people are refreshing the thread repeatedly to increase view count for some reason), I might as well post some postbait about what y'all would like to see in the future:

-Nerull is still messing around with reincarnation for nefarious reasons.
-Titans imprisoned in Jotunheim haven't been idle.
-Something extremely unexpected appears when you split the atom.
-Genies can, with great difficulty, possess mortals.
-Lizardmen are lizardmen for a reason.
-Kobolds' fey obsession is surprising people, and not necessarily with traps and ambushes.
-Celestials are terrible at raising mortal children.
-Elves spend far too much time and effort at elaborating why they're better than humans.

These are all the half baked and half cocked ideas I have at the moment. A few of them are bound to make it into the thread, which is rather lifeless these days. Why's everyone previously around so silent now, did I finally exhaust reader interest in this?

Also, has anyone around here ever used any ideas from the thread in their games? That certainly would've been neat to hear about.

Fri
2017-11-09, 12:36 PM
I never used any idea here in my game not for the lack of coolness in your writings. More that I don't have anyone to play my games :smallfrown:

Fable Wright
2017-11-10, 11:14 PM
-Celestials are terrible at raising mortal children.
-Elves spend far too much time and effort at elaborating why they're better than humans.

These. Always good to hear about better-than-thou types completely messing up.


These are all the half baked and half cocked ideas I have at the moment. A few of them are bound to make it into the thread, which is rather lifeless these days. Why's everyone previously around so silent now, did I finally exhaust reader interest in this?

I assume people are still interested, but it's easy to miss updates on a slower-moving thread.

That said, I've seen the idea of smoke from firearms having unusual magical properties thrown around a lot, and this is a refreshing take on it. Also, kudos on describing the horrors of Awakening.

Pelor have mercy on us all if the wizard had decided to grant a rabbit sentience instead of a bull.

Beneath
2017-12-03, 08:48 PM
Oh, hey, I look away for a bit and you've been busy I see.

I really like your Baphomet. I'm also curious about your atoms and genie possession and lizardmen

My standard for goblins now is pretty much in line with yours (little suicidal murder faeries)

Pronounceable
2018-01-06, 11:46 AM
Would you believe this idea just randomly occurred to me this morning? I dunno why all the cool looking ideas I've had for a long while keep clicking less the more I think on them while random bits of inspirations produce immediate results.


THE GREAT REVEL (centennial planar event)
Location: Upper and Lower Planes (minus Asgard)

Olidammara himself might be an intellectually inclined coward but he’s nevertheless beloved by the warlike, strength/courage/idiocy worshipping exemplars of Asgard. And not for being the comic relief either; the einherjar really love the Laughing Rogue for his immesurably valuable (in their opinion) gift to them: the Great Revel, a simple excuse to cause widespread havoc and violence.

Once every century, Olidammara hides a few million bottles of his sacred wine all over the Outer Planes and dares the conan knockoffs of Asgard to find them. The individual Asgardian who can find and drink the highest number of the sacred wine bottles and then return unkilled by the infinite dangers of the planes becomes the Guest of Honor in Winesong, the fabled Feasthall of Olidammara until the next revel. So they go forth, either on their lonesomes or in small squads that’re destined to eventually tear themselves apart with infighting over the spoils, and make a nuisance of themselves in the multiverse. It’s the highlight of the century for every einherjar, the greatest opportunity any of them are ever likely to get to be a spotlight hogging braggart and be adored for their greatness in the endless revelry in the house of the God of Rogues (which is normally closed to all except souls of his mortal worshippers). So during a Great Revel, pretty much all of Asgard is emptied of its exemplars and becomes quiet and peaceful for a moment for the rest of the critters inhabiting it. Of course, 99.999% of all einherjar are killed during the revel and thus disqualified, so this peace and quiet ends abruptly as the vanquished Asgardians respawn cantankerously, ready to fight anything they encounter to work out their frustration at losing.

Obviously, every other exemplar race hates these massively destructive einherjar invasions into their planes. Nobody likes rampaging hordes of obnoxiously cheerful barbarians tearing their home apart to look for some random crap hidden by an ******* of a trickster god, especially ones that go out of their way to provoke everything they meet into a fight. While Asgardian troublemakers are far too disorganized to pose any real danger to the established powers that be in the grand scale, they’ve grown quite adept at doing exactly what will infuriate other exemplers to get their glorious battling on and the Great Revel takes a different form in each plane. Einherjar beat up and bully Elysian petitioners to make angels kick them out, destroy all valuable looking stuff they see in Gehenna to offend the endless covetousness of its daemonic owners, burn and pollute and despoil nature to enrage Beastlanders, disrupt logistics of devilish armies and interfere in strategically important spots of the Blood War, arm and train Tarterian petitioners to be able to resist depradations of demodands, and so on and so forth. Even Celestia, where the Soul Forger’s divine power bars any and all chaotic creatures from setting foot on its soil, isn’t safe from the einherjar taking up piracy on the holy water ocean surrounding it; for the God of Rogues is cunning enough to smuggle his sacred bottles without Celestials noticing and Asgardians foolishly believe threatening archons with sunk ships and bombarded ports can force them to find and hand over the spoils.

No precaution or preparation has ever worked to turn away the Great Revel. In fact the better a plane is defended, the more Great Revellers are likely to flock to it. Thousands of Asgardians are not just killed but annihilated or captured/converted in the Lower Planes on every revel, yet the greater danger makes einherjar even more eager to throw themselves at it. This makes Hades and Pandemonium the primary targets of each Great Revel, as the preposterously high chance of eternal damnation by falling to Gray Wasting and the Howling is sooo heroic (in einherjar opinion). Conversely, the relentlessly pacifistic kami of Bytopia allow the “heroic warriors” to wreck and ruin anything they want and never ever defend anything, even themselves when bored/ornery einherjar kill them. Asgardians hate Bytopia and opt to get out of the Plane of Boring Losers asap to find a good scrap, leaving behind a largely ruined plane in need of unfathomable amounts of hard labor to rebuild (which is perfectly ideal for the laborvorous kami, not that they’d ever say that aloud).

Obviously, Nirvana and Limbo without any indigenous exemplar populations hold zero interest for einherjar heroes so are completely ignored in the Great Revel.

Nobody knows exactly what Olidammara gets out of this. Except possibly his jollies, which most assume is the correct answer. None of the large scale violence, chaos or destruction caused by the Great Revel is particularly relevant to his divine domains and the Asgardians’ troublemakery is far too aimless and unreliable to be a stealthy method of attacking his enemies. Einherjar are also nothing at all like the sorts of smart/subtle/rich/civil souls he prefers as his worshippers from among mortals but it’s still extremely strange for a deity to actually turn down any large group (especially powerful outsiders like einherjar) when they offer to worship him, which the King of Thieves keeps doing. When asked about it directly, the Laughing Rogue just goes ;)


Modron March? Meh. They're comic relief and are not at all suitable for an actual campaign where we're expected to take them seriously. It might not have been what they were made to be, but it's what they became. The main idea of a large scale planar event is good, it just needed to not involve the resident cute cartoon robots. So here we are. Bonus for involving Olly I guess, who I notice is a whole lot more passive than a god with his age and influence should've been in my little Planescape.

Unrelated tidbit: Pelor sealed Olidammara's junk after he had a few flings with Sune cos he didn't trust his dickbrained son to not become an unwitting patsy. Olly hasn't had any action for thousands of years now and his portfolio shifted so much more towards drinking and singing and whatnot. Pelor will only unseal it if Olly finds an agreeable wife to settle down with (ain't happening, obv).

Fable Wright
2018-01-07, 10:16 PM
For a real party, the Einherjars and the Modrons conduct their march at the same time. That'd be good for a laugh.

But I do sympathize with bolt from the blue inspiration being easier to work with than longstanding inspiration. Something about the potential for the new inspiration not having been explored, while longstanding ideas have everywhere they can go already mapped out ahead of time. It's a fact of life.

And... huh. I hadn't thought of Greyhawk deities in Planescape. They are rather underrepresented. Blipdoolpoolp definitely got a raw deal, considering just how numerous (and how insanely devoted) kuo-toa are.

Pronounceable
2018-01-17, 01:08 PM
Another post, another three days old idea. Maybe I should just stop planning for the future altogether...


PSILOFYR (communal dream), Fungus Father, Great Contemplator, Monarch of Mycelia, Meldwalker, King of the Colors, Lord in Peace
Domains: peace, imagination, community, fungi, rot, necromancy, law, tripping balls

The fungal abominations of Mycelia are ridiculously dangerous for a race dedicated to order and pacifism. Created by the Mother of All Abominations just to metaphorically thumb her nose at her brother’s crude methods to protect existence from the Allmother, the myconids are the only living beings in existence that are animated by the entropic negative energy. Carefully constructed to be a conduit to the Allmother’s ruinous power without falling under Her sway, the shroomfolk have what might be called anti-souls (made of negative energy) and feed on disorder (something distinctly different from chaos). As a result, the myconids’ mere existence defies thermodynamics and their feeding on entropy itself through decay and undeath results in a decrease of total entropy in the multiverse.

This incredible quality does little to endear them to others however, as the mushroom men all have strong negative energy auras and appear necromantic to all senses and magics, fostering the instinctual dislike all positive energy souled live beings feel for the negative energy powered undead despite being literally the opposite of undead. And they don’t help their cause by becoming necromancers either; myconids raise undead the way other mortal races raise livestock for consumption (because feeding on regular carrion isn’t nearly as nutritious for the shroom abominations), most myconid groups love to collect (i.e. steal) corpses, have at least one necromancer among them and keep herds of zombies and skeletons. Luckily, the negative energy coursing through their bodies tends to violently explode outwards upon injury and makes attacking myconids a daunting prospect for most. They’re also some of the most effective undead destroyers of the planes and can quickly consume any corporeal undead(’s animating necromantic essence) from the lowliest zombie to mightiest of liches, easily bypassing most traditional protections such creatures have against positive energy toting wizards or clerics. Therefore, in the rare instances where myconids choose to live on worlds of humanoids, they can manage to get by without being wiped out by angry natives.

Their entropy reducing nature made them a natural fit for the plane of Law and they migrated to Nirvana aeons ago at the urging of their beloved deity Psilofyr. Like all abominable godspawn of Tiamat, Fungus Father was a manifestation of his people’s idea of a perfect specimen. This meant he was a calm and peaceful giant shroom who loved nothing more than to sleep the fungal sleep and dream technicolor mushroom dreams and broadcast them to entertain his subjects. And not only was the chaotic, wartorn environment of Water was distressing to the myconids, their neighboring abominations also didn’t approve of their corpse scavenging and industrial scale reanimation of their fallen (mainly because the necromantic taint prevented them from eating corpses themselves); so he felt there was no recourse but to leave their plane. While nobody was sad to see them go, the krakens, de-facto rulers of Water, felt letting the fungal abominations leave freely would make them look weak. So Panzuriel the Wavemaster, the vain lord of krakens, made the mistake of attacking the Great Contemplator and crippled himself with the burst of negative energy blasting off of Psilofyr’s wounds. Killing Fungal Father was little comfort to him, for the horrible unhealing wounds allowed Umberlee to beat him up and take his worshippers soon afterwards.

Strangely enough, death of their deity didn’t actually kill off the myconids like usually happens with abominations. Instead, he lived on in the Meld, the shared waking dream of trippy colors and sounds that happens whenever multiple myconids rest and mingle their meditative spores together. This was significant. The one side effect of having souls made of negative energy was being immediately annihilated upon death, a uniquely final end that befell to no other creature in the multiverse, but Fungal Father had managed to overcome it. He’s not entirely certain how he did it but suspects it had something to do with his subjects Melding on the Plane of Purified Order at the moment of his death. Since then, all myconids who’ve died on Mycelia have also lived on in the Meld, which is the main reason why the mushroom men are so incredibly rare outside Nirvana. To make certain their dead don’t fall to oblivion, myconids have arranged an extremely ordered way of living for their whole race. At any moment a third of all myconids are in the Meld, while another third works on corpse gathering and undead handling. Nirvana’s nature makes it quite easy to keep track of such things and the organized and predictable way of life pleases most myconids. Generally, the only myconids to be found outside their realm are the rebellious, reckless ones with chaos in their soul. Myconid society considers them insane both for risking oblivion just to reject order and wanting to be any closer to the fleshy beasts of the planes than is strictly necessary. The fungal abominations’ relations with all other races until now have convinced them there’s very little to be gained from associating with fleshy beasts (at least while they’re alive), be they nautical terrors or soft skinned earthwalkers.

The few myconids that leave can live the good life, since they’re quite useful as both undead destroyers and universal translators. The shroomfolk have some psionic power like most abominations (as should be obvious from the Meld) and they can use their spores to grant telepathic ability to any number of creatures simultaneously. Myconid spores allow everything sentient to directly communicate with everything else sentient, ensuring there’ll be no accidental or “accidental” mistranslations on the interpreter’s part that might lead one or both sides to ruin. On account of the Plane of Nirvana already doing this for all of its inhabitants, the traditional myconid society has completely forgotten how vital (and lucrative) this ability can be over the millenia, especially for the exemplars of Outer Planes who’re all barred from entering the Plane of Purified Order to protect the great Mechanus.

As for Psilofyr himself, he’s dead and therefore can’t really do anything except have psychedelic technicolor dreams and broadcast them to his people in the Meld. Which is still enough for him to lead his people, as any myconid waking from the Meld will know if its deity wants something specific. It’s very hard for any nonmyconid to even hear about the Meldwalker, let alone meet him (shroomfolk are loath to let any other creature into the Meld due to their upsetting tendency to subconsciously infect the beautiful technicolor dreams with their inherent violent instincts and the unfathomable and disgusting fleshy impulses). In the extremely rare event of his subjects letting a fleshy beast that proves its worth into the Meld, Lord In Peace will allow them to experience the full bliss of myconidhood while mining their entire mind about information about the greater multiverse. So far, he’s never found anything indicating that the fleshies have evolved any further than their baseline and sees no reason to not continue the isolation of his people.


In my apparent quest to rewrite the entirety of DnD, I've made yet another race lift. I believe the scientific number of things to do with this for any potential DM is called a truckload and Psilofyr is one of those gods that have absolutely nothing of interest going on with it in "canon" (except hanging in Mechanus for some unfathomable reason). His people has always been cool tho, which is how he got in. Everybody loves shrooms, just ask Mario.

Also I'm proud of myself for not mixing this up with Zuggtmoy in any way, shape or form. We don't need more demons.

Meanwhile, Nerull thing still got nowhere so screw it, it's officially dropped from possible future things. In its stead, you're gonna get a goddess of the moon who's not Selune and has armies of lycanthropes. Maybe. Possibly. But don't hold your breath.

Fable Wright
2018-01-17, 04:32 PM
The real question here is, what happens if a Myconid becomes a vampire? A 404 possibility not found error, or do they feed on other undead and come back when killed? When they meld, are they eaten by their fellows?

And would the last humanoid individuals allowed into the Meld be a princess hounded by one of the immortal spiked beasts of the Plane of Earth, and the two great Plumber-Monks of Mechanus?

Pronounceable
2018-01-17, 05:29 PM
Myconids already ping as undead and unaffected by any sort of undeadification and any undead dumb enough to touch one gets death-drained and consumed. Meldlife is same as us dreaming about a recently passed away person every night, except a dream myconid lives on.


And would the last humanoid individuals allowed into the Meld be a princess hounded by one of the immortal spiked beasts of the Plane of Earth, and the two great Plumber-Monks of Mechanus?
That is %100 for realz what happened. Yes. Definitely.

Lapak
2018-01-18, 06:13 PM
I'll likely comment on specific entries at some point, but I wanted to chime in and say I just found this thread the other day and read through it since. It's good stuff, and I'm enjoying how you're building on what you've already done.

I'm currently working up a campaign setting with Eberron-style remote/possibly unreal gods, and this is the first thing that's made me question that decision. :smallsmile:

Beneath
2018-02-01, 01:43 AM
So a basic Myconid adventure would be, like, tracking a band of Myconid grave-robbers and trying to intercept them before they get through their portal back to Mycelia? Or maybe they're gonna meet up with their necromancer and reanimate the corpses first.

Or maybe they'll get ambushed by a necromancer who's an unrelated third party to this chaos who reanimates the dead and then you have, like, a possible three-way battle between myconids, necromancer + undead, and PCs.

That could be interesting

Pronounceable
2018-02-03, 05:32 PM
Shrooms of Mycelia wouldn't risk death out in the planes, Nirvana has plenty of corpses. The chaoticish circles hanging out on Material would probably bring their necromancer along but them carting around a wagonful of corpses seems a neat setpiece, so the impracticality of it shouldn't deter DMs. Undead can never pose any serious threat to myconids and necromantic magic is useless, various dogooders against necromancy would be interfering with their graverobbing. But the most probable myconid adventures would be various negotiation and escort missions of translators and/or undead destroyers or rescue of such from various baddies.

In other news, it's hard to build these posts without some sort of central a thing to act as a pillar. I'm still loath to just make up a new guy myself because that'd defeat the purpose of the thread. OTOH, I might as well've made up these Psilofwyr and Emma and Ilneval and etc wholesale for all their similarity to "canon" so why be gunshy at this point?


edit: I've gone and edited the Habits and Inhabitants of Outer Planes a bit. Eladrins don't suck anymore.

Pronounceable
2018-03-21, 04:26 PM
Writer's block is a thing even when you're not a writer.

ATROPUS (a serious problem), the World-Born-Dead, Endstar, Paraelemental Prince of Flesh, Death’s Head, Granfalloon, Doppelmoon, Babyeater, Uncelestial Body
CR: too high

Contrary to the ubiquitous hysterics about it, Atropus does not, in fact, eat souls of babies. It just prevents their conception, as a natural result of blocking the flow of positive energy into a Material Plane world and any unborn already on the way when Death’s Head manifests is safe (for a given value of safe). Atropus sitting in the orbit causes worlds to eventually be stripped of all mortal life as everything dies off without replacements is a serious problem, true, but it is clearly not the nightmarish horror from beyond the stars scenario it is often claimed to be*. The blame for all this is heaped at the feet of Sun Father by the other gods (as is typically the case when anything goes wrong), as if Pelor told the hidden lords of Elemental Chaos to nip their newest sibling in the bud before It could fully spawn. Or if it is somehow Pelor’s fault that a fetal (for the lack of a better adjective) elemental lord with a body of flesh became a ghost in a completely unprecedented and unique manner when killed. Sun Father is absolutely certain the moons are perfect as conduits between Material and Plane of Positive Energy with no faults in their construction, and it is not like anyone could have possibly expected a ghost massive enough to possess an entire planetoid (an impossibility) would also have command over a heretofore unseen fifth element (an even bigger impossibility) and use that to transform the astronomical amounts of earth making up a moon into virtually infinite numbers of dead bodies (which would be just ridiculous). While it might be harrowing for a mortal to witness the moon turn into a decapitated head locked in a silent scream of agony** that rains down featureless corpselike things intent on killing everything they meet onto the world***, calling an elemental lord ghost made up of an infinite number of notzombies that completely halts the propagation of mortal life on a world an “elder evil” is needlessly alarmist. It is ridiculous of lesser deities to accuse Pelor of incompetence in world building, especially since not one of them has created a single mortal world ever and are all, in fact, squatting on Pelor’s properties and poaching his mortals.

Besides, getting rid of Atropus isn’t all that complicated. One merely has to destroy the thing It is haunting completely to cut it off from Material Plane, exactly like ghosts of regular mortals that occasionally manage to avoid the pull of Mechanus by latching onto objects, which in this case is the moon. In fact it doesn’t even take some sort of apocalyptic artifact of mass destruction to destroy such an afflicted moon (though it would help), all that’s really needed is to dig through the functionally infinite angry corpses**** and burn (or otherwise completely submerge in another element) the gigantic Atropus’ core***** that should’ve formed in a spot somewhere near the center (which is admittedly pretty hard to find by blindly digging around a moon). Reaching the core of course gets easier the earlier an attempt starts, as the transformation of the moon’s mass into flesh starts from the surface and the number of creepy corpses that’ll stand between prospective heroes and the core increases exponentially with time. Starting early dramatically cuts down on the number of featureless bodies to be waded through to reach the core (the myth of dig-fighting through thousands of miles of creepy featureless bodies as they endlessly attack on all sides only happens if the transformation has penetrated into the depths of the moon due to tardiness). Not to mention, Endstar can be seen coming from literal millions of miles away as it appears as a half transparent star in the sky that grows each night until engulfing the moon, which might give mortals a decade or more to prepare.

Though digging into Atropus is certain death for mortals even if they win, they should be glad to give their lives for their world and Pelor might even reward them with ascension to his divine court if they succeed (generally as some sort of demigod with a few domains that always includes moon). As might other greater deities, assuming heroes of that caliber happen to be heretics worshipping Sun Father’s rivals (which is unlikely). And if the worst comes to worst, a world stripped of all mortal life can be repopulated easily enough (at least by Pelor) after Atropus moves on and the flow of positive energy resumes. Such repopulated planets are quite rare and can generally be identified by the unreasonably large numbers of ruins and artifacts from inexplicably lost and forgotten civilizations.

As an escaped fragment of the Elder Elemental Evil, Doppelmoon is particularly antithetical to divinity and no rational being of power from nonelemental planes will risk approaching It, for Moander’s rampage is still remembered throughout the planes. And neither will beings of elements, as even an unborn elemental lord of a nonexistant element has absolute power over all matter; the best any titanic or elemental being can hope for is being turned into a mass of soulless fleshy beasts when Paraelemental Prince of Flesh turns Its gaze upon them.

Meanwhile, the real Elemental Princes of the four regular elements within their hidden enclaves in Elemental Chaos are not satisfied, as they all would lose a great amount of power if a fifth element and its prince is born. They unhappily watch as Granfalloon grows stronger on Ethereal, the single plane where masters of all matter hold no power; for an elemental being to gain the ability to feed on positive energy is unprecedented and their aborted sibling might yet birth Itself as an elemental/divine hybrid if It keeps absorbing Luminous Overmother’s power through those mortal worlds. Such a being would become an actual "elder evil"******, dangerous not just to Elemental Princes but to reality itself. The Elemental Princes are on the lookout for potential champions and watch all beings brave enough to face Atropus with great interest (which seems to be pretty much exclusively mortals), patiently waiting for the World-Born-Dead to find the instrument of Its own destruction.



*the complete collapse of the world into anarchy, death, destruction and insanity as mortals give in to despair as they run out of food and manpower nonwithstanding
**which is just an optical illusion created by the unstable geography of the transforming moon surface (and the writhing of the trillions of soulless bodies that it consists of)
***which are simply elementals of the new element of flesh, albeit inhabited by a small piece of the elemental lord ghost instead of a regular elemental spirit
****just flesh elementals really, not all that different from the regular four types
*****which looks like a giant fetus but is not
******elemental lords can agree that the pretentious little candle isn’t always wrong



While I've been on this one for a while, I couldn't get anything down until I found the proper entry gimmick today. Once I had the idea, the rest came pouring. Bonus for the aforementioned gimmick being taking another dump on Pelor. Not as amusing as Corey dumping but nevertheless.
Three guesses as to where the original inspiration came from.

I don't actually know how an epic DnD campaign would play out. I suspect pretty crappily, as DnD utterly breaks down from level 10 and up. Not to mention I've never played any of that high level stuff ever. This should be a suitably epic foe for a proper world saving epic campaign. Doubleplusgood for all my stuff here being system agnostic (theoretically everything I write could be made to work in any DnD or derivatives, cos there's just no way this **** will not break apart in DnD3.5, which is what I played most in), plus there's enough holes in this writeup to drive trucks thru. Any DM willing to put the effort into epic campaigns should be able to flesh it out as they see fit.

In other news, still failing to get anything good done from my preexisting ideas. No big surprise there.


extra random tidbit that I'll never ever manage to get into an entry at any point ever: Bensozia got zero respect after being crowned Domina Infernus due to being a demon convert, so swore to leave Big A and be demoted to imp if any devil could beat her on the arena. Only one devil took her up on it and only on the day she was expected to give birth. She popped Glasya out during the fight and left her screeching on the ground until she won. Then she tore off the challenger's entrails and fed them to the baby and nobody questioned her empressity again. Glasya still has the biggest chip of the planes on her shoulder cos she'll never be half as cool as mom.


edit from the future: vvv Only the moons bearing Luminous Overmother's silvery visage are conduits to Her. Once Atropus is settled on one, any others that even exist won't work.
Also It's visible for like decades before anything starts. Plenty of time to level up random shmucks off the tavern in time to meet the epic adversary.

Starbuck_II
2018-03-24, 10:34 AM
Writer's block is a thing even when you're not a writer.

ATROPUS (a serious problem), the World-Born-Dead, Endstar, Paraelemental Prince of Flesh, Death’s Head, Granfalloon, Doppelmoon, Babyeater, Uncelestial Body
CR: too high

Contrary to the ubiquitous hysterics about it, Atropus does not, in fact, eat souls of babies. It just prevents their conception, as a natural result of blocking the flow of positive energy into a Material Plane world and any unborn already on the way when Death’s Head manifests is safe (for a given value of safe). Atropus sitting in the orbit causes worlds to eventually be stripped of all mortal life as everything dies off without replacements is a serious problem, true, but it is clearly not the nightmarish horror from beyond the stars scenario it is often claimed to be*. The blame for all this is heaped at the feet of Sun Father by the other gods (as is typically the case when anything goes wrong), as if Pelor told the hidden lords of Elemental Chaos to nip their newest sibling in the bud before It could fully spawn. Or if it is somehow Pelor’s fault that a fetal (for the lack of a better adjective) elemental lord with a body of flesh became a ghost in a completely unprecedented and unique manner when killed. Sun Father is absolutely certain the moons are perfect as conduits between Material and Plane of Positive Energy with no faults in their construction, and it is not like anyone could have possibly expected a ghost massive enough to possess an entire planetoid (an impossibility) would also have command over a heretofore unseen fifth element (an even bigger impossibility) and use that to transform the astronomical amounts of earth making up a moon into virtually infinite numbers of dead bodies (which would be just ridiculous). While it might be harrowing for a mortal to witness the moon turn into a decapitated head locked in a silent scream of agony** that rains down featureless corpselike things intent on killing everything they meet onto the world***, calling an elemental lord ghost made up of an infinite number of notzombies that completely halts the propagation of mortal life on a world an “elder evil” is needlessly alarmist. It is ridiculous of lesser deities to accuse Pelor of incompetence in world building, especially since not one of them has created a single mortal world ever and are all, in fact, squatting on Pelor’s properties and poaching his mortals.

Besides, getting rid of Atropus isn’t all that complicated. One merely has to destroy the thing It is haunting completely to cut it off from Material Plane, exactly like ghosts of regular mortals that occasionally manage to avoid the pull of Mechanus by latching onto objects, which in this case is the moon. In fact it doesn’t even take some sort of apocalyptic artifact of mass destruction to destroy such an afflicted moon (though it would help), all that’s really needed is to dig through the functionally infinite angry corpses**** and burn (or otherwise completely submerge in another element) the gigantic Atropus’ core***** that should’ve formed in a spot somewhere near the center (which is admittedly pretty hard to find by blindly digging around a moon). Reaching the core of course gets easier the earlier an attempt starts, as the transformation of the moon’s mass into flesh starts from the surface and the number of creepy corpses that’ll stand between prospective heroes and the core increases exponentially with time. Starting early dramatically cuts down on the number of featureless bodies to be waded through to reach the core (the myth of dig-fighting through thousands of miles of creepy featureless bodies as they endlessly attack on all sides only happens if the transformation has penetrated into the depths of the moon due to tardiness). Not to mention, Endstar can be seen coming from literal millions of miles away as it appears as a half transparent star in the sky that grows each night until engulfing the moon, which might give mortals a decade or more to prepare.

Though digging into Atropus is certain death for mortals even if they win, they should be glad to give their lives for their world and Pelor might even reward them with ascension to his divine court if they succeed (generally as some sort of demigod with a few domains that always includes moon). As might other greater deities, assuming heroes of that caliber happen to be heretics worshipping Sun Father’s rivals (which is unlikely). And if the worst comes to worst, a world stripped of all mortal life can be repopulated easily enough (at least by Pelor) after Atropus moves on and the flow of positive energy resumes. Such repopulated planets are quite rare and can generally be identified by the unreasonably large numbers of ruins and artifacts from inexplicably lost and forgotten civilizations.

As an escaped fragment of the Elder Elemental Evil, Doppelmoon is particularly antithetical to divinity and no rational being of power from nonelemental planes will risk approaching It, for Moander’s rampage is still remembered throughout the planes. And neither will beings of elements, as even an unborn elemental lord of a nonexistant element has absolute power over all matter; the best any titanic or elemental being can hope for is being turned into a mass of soulless fleshy beasts when Paraelemental Prince of Flesh turns Its gaze upon them.

Meanwhile, the real Elemental Princes of the four regular elements within their hidden enclaves in Elemental Chaos are not satisfied, as they all would lose a great amount of power if a fifth element and its prince is born. They unhappily watch as Granfalloon grows stronger on Ethereal, the single plane where masters of all matter hold no power; for an elemental being to gain the ability to feed on positive energy is unprecedented and their aborted sibling might yet birth Itself as an elemental/divine hybrid if It keeps absorbing Luminous Overmother’s power through those mortal worlds. Such a being would become an actual "elder evil"******, dangerous not just to Elemental Princes but to reality itself. The Elemental Princes are on the lookout for potential champions and watch all beings brave enough to face Atropus with great interest (which seems to be pretty much exclusively mortals), patiently waiting for the World-Born-Dead to find the instrument of Its own destruction.



*the complete collapse of the world into anarchy, death, destruction and insanity as mortals give in to despair as they run out of food and manpower nonwithstanding
**which is just an optical illusion created by the unstable geography of the transforming moon surface (and the writhing of the trillions of soulless bodies that it consists of)
***which are simply elementals of the new element of flesh, albeit inhabited by a small piece of the elemental lord ghost instead of a regular elemental spirit
****just flesh elementals really, not all that different from the regular four types
*****which looks like a giant fetus but is not
******elemental lords can agree that the pretentious little candle isn’t always wrong



While I've been on this one for a while, I couldn't get anything down until I found the proper entry gimmick today. Once I had the idea, the rest came pouring. Bonus for the aforementioned gimmick being taking another dump on Pelor. Not as amusing as Corey dumping but nevertheless.
Three guesses as to where the original inspiration came from.

I don't actually know how an epic DnD campaign would play out. I suspect pretty crappily, as DnD utterly breaks down from level 10 and up. Not to mention I've never played any of that high level stuff ever. This should be a suitably epic foe for a proper world saving epic campaign. Doubleplusgood for all my stuff here being system agnostic (theoretically everything I write could be made to work in any DnD or derivatives, cos there's just no way this **** will not break apart in DnD3.5, which is what I played most in), plus there's enough holes in this writeup to drive trucks thru. Any DM willing to put the effort into epic campaigns should be able to flesh it out as they see fit.

In other news, still failing to get anything good done from my preexisting ideas. No big surprise there.


extra random tidbit that I'll never ever manage to get into an entry at any point ever: Bensozia got zero respect after being crowned Domina Infernus due to being a demon convert, so swore to leave Big A and be demoted to imp if any devil could beat her on the arena. Only one devil took her up on it and only on the day she was expected to give birth. She popped Glasya out during the fight and left her screeching on the ground until she won. Then she tore off the challenger's entrails and fed them to the baby and nobody questioned her empressity again. Glasya still has the biggest chip of the planes on her shoulder cos she'll never be half as cool as mom.



I actually semi-wrote (mostly rough ideas) a Dragonmech module where you end up on a mech fighting him and destroying him. You fight Lunar dragons, undead creatures, and eventually him.

Only issue if you are given only enough fuel to fly to the moon not back. But the kingdom does fortify mech so don't die while riding it.
My idea was "All Lunar creatures have Negative Energy resist 10 (to counter moon’s effects). "
Campaign never got that far.

Beneath
2018-03-29, 02:13 AM
D&D3 breaks down past 10th level because originally post-10th levels were like epic levels in D&D3. I think as of the publication of AD&D1 the highest-level character in Gygax's game that had been running since OD&D was level 14

So if you make "drive off this god" an adventure that 14th-level characters can do, if they're careful with their preparations, that's entirely appropriate.

Also, I like the little tangent that explains why every world has a moon, but usually only one. Though, what happens to a two-mooned world (or a twelve-mooned world like Eberron) when one of the moons gets eaten? Does the other moon still work?

Fable Wright
2018-03-29, 11:29 AM
Also, I like the little tangent that explains why every world has a moon, but usually only one. Though, what happens to a two-mooned world (or a twelve-mooned world like Eberron) when one of the moons gets eaten? Does the other moon still work?

Eberron, at least, has one moon per existing outer plane. It's likely that only one plane generates souls, and that's the moon Atropus takes over.

Pronounceable
2018-04-18, 06:15 AM
I dunno if anyone'll actually care about it, but I happened to write this thing out so might as well post.
DIVINE RANKS aka DUMB POWER LEVEL BULLSH*T
Demigods (DR1)*
Obad-hai
Malar
Psilofyr
Haela
Selvetarm
Laogzed
Semuanya

Lesser Deities (DR2-9)
2: Great Mother, Ravanna, Erathis, Sharess
3: Lirr, Deneir, Panzuriel, Malcanthet (virtual)**, Gond, Azuth
4: Heironeous, Hextor, Wee Jas, General of Gehenna (virtual, true)
5: Vhaeraun, Brandobaris, Velsharoon, Sekolah
6: Blipdoolpoolp, Dumathoin, Ioun
7: Tymora, Beshaba, Raven Queen, Ilsensine, Pisaethces (apparent), Merrshaulk
8: Waukeen, Arvoreen, Oberon (virtual), Primus (virtual)
9: Loviatar, Titania (virtual), Torm

Intermediate Deities (DR10-19)
0: Apomps (special clause)
10: Yurtrus, Obad-hai (effective)
11: Panzuriel (old)
12: Abbathor, Duerra, Aoskar (dead)
13: Ilneval, Shargaas, Ilsensine (old), Vaati, Ygorl (virtual)
14: General of Gehenna (virtual, apparent)
15: Aerdrie, Fenmarel, Hanali, Rillifane, Sashelas, Sehanine, Solonor, Kiaransalee (true)
16: Eldath, Auril, Bhaal (dead), Great Mother (enraged)
17: Eilistraee, Erythnul, Angharradh
18: Mykrul (dead), Thaun (apparent), Shekinester
19: Luthic, Vaprak***

Greater Deities (DR20+)
0: Lendor (special clause)
20: Talos, Clangeddin, Boccob, Asmodeus (virtual), Kiaransalee (effective), Loviatar (old)
21: Silvanus (apparent), Amaunator (dead), Lathander, Oghma, Talisid (virtual)
22: Baghtru, Laduguer, Bane, Moander (dead), Pisaethces (true), Morwel (virtual)
23: Lolth, Berronar/Yondalla (apparent), Seldarine (combined), Erathis (old), Wind Dukes (old, single)
24: Garagos (old), Tempus, Demogorgon (virtual)
25: Umberlee, Mystra, Boccob+Oghma (tag team)
26: Sune, Grolantor, Karontor
27: Olidammara, Abbathor (old), Laduguer (old)
28: Memnor, Iallanis, Hiatea, Skoraeus
30: Stronmaus, Diancastra
33: Nerull
35: Wind Dukes (combined)
36: Silvanus/Chauntea (true)
42: Nerull+Sune (tag team)
45: Othea (Outer Planes)
47: Umberlee (enraged)
50: Pelor, Annam (Outer Planes)
65: Corellon, Gruumsh
75: Othea (Material Plane)
85: Annam (Material Plane), Moradin
120: Tiamat

404 Power Level Not Found
Selune (∞)
Shar (∞)
Tharizdun (9000+)
Ghaunadaur (?!?)
Emmantiensien (!?!)
Gith(-)
Queen of Chaos (...)
Lady of Pain (!!!)



*Tiamat’s abominable godspawn are all technically demigods with 1 rank but most can punch far above their weight.
**Some powerful immortals have virtual divine ranks but aren’t really divine (indicated).
***Titanic power is actually different from divine power (but walks like a duck-quacks like a duck).
I reserve the right to partly or completely ignore this in the future on account of it being a pointlessly dorky idea. On the upside, numbers please the lizardbrain.

Pronounceable
2018-04-24, 02:35 AM
Since the last one doesn't actually count, here's one that does.


CHARON (daemon paragon), the Boatman
Habitat: the River Styx

The greater daemons of Gehenna weren’t always there. Before the first arcanadaemons appeared and started remaking the plane into today’s mire of institutionalized corruption, all the various types of daemons lived in harmony [harmony meaning the strong taking everything they can from the weak, by hook or by crook, as per daemonic standards]. The larger Gehennan society readily accepted the incredibly complicated new ranking system arcanadaemons proposed that was promising to teach them all a higher level of envy and greed (that, amusingly enough, boils down to the strong being allowed to take everything they can from the weak [i.e. everyone else]). Some of the stronger daemons (who would lose the most) stood up and spoke out against the arcanadaemons’ new system but their voices didn’t carry enough weight. Once the new reign was established in the Plane of Greed, all those that spoke against it were hunted down and annihilated as the very first order of the General of Gehenna, the new leader of these newfangled “greater daemons”.

That was a very long time ago. Greater daemons and their General have been running Gehenna for eons now and they’re quick to remind all that they managed to get daemonkind to transcend its roots (though today pretty much nobody remembers what exactly those roots were). According to them, they have done this with mixing the grotesque with the elegant, and the impenetrable with the simple (as all evil should aspire to be); the grotesque and impenetrable daemonic ranking system that merely [I]looks like utterly random whims of arcanadaemons to make daemonkind hardworkers, and the simple and elegant economy to endlessly increase the wealth of greater daemons and, more importantly, enflame the greed and envy of their lessers.

Ultrodaemons are particularly proud of daemonkind’s ever increasing power that owes much to their brilliant financial system. The Gehennan taxation is (or should be) the envy of all governing bodies of the planes. It’s neither nonexistent like all those crummy chaotic planes, nor an overburdened mess with thousands of pages of rules and regulations that nobody can even read (let alone understand). No, the Gehennan taxation is simple and elegant and consists of just one clear directive: you pay %80 of whatever wealth you earn to your direct superior as tax, or else. This has made Gehenna the richest plane of all (or at least its ruling caste the richest caste of all, which is basically the same thing anyway) because daemons are the most industrious, dependable and hardest working of all exemplars (thanks to their arcanadaemon ran ranking system). No job is too big or too hard or too lowly for daemons, so long as the pay is right. And they always, always get the job done (unless they’re paid better not to).

The system works flawlessly* as thus: A daemon is summoned/employed outside Gehenna and gets paid, for example, 1000 in arbitrary currency. The rule is to immediately return home and report it, so of course the daemon quickly goes somewhere else and spends 600 moneys on magic items he will consume to increase his personal power. Then he returns to Gehenna and reports to his superior that the employer totally ripped him off and paid a measly 300, turning in 240 as tax. Superior daemon calls him out on his crap and threatens to give him to arcanadaemons for an investigation (aka torture and execution [the cost of which will be billed to the daemon on top of his taxes in the future]), so the daemon passes over a 100 to his superior from under the table. A mollified superior warns the daemon to never caught committing such crimes again and, once left alone, writes down that the employer ripped off the grunt daemon and paid 250, 200 of which was handed over as tax. The superior daemon then files this report with his own tax of 160 attached, and will be handing over an extra 40 from under the table to his own superior the next time they meet in person. The superior daemon will be doing this for each of the hundreds of daemons that answer to him and the even more superior daemon is extremely unlikely to waste the time needed to go over all the accounts of dozens of other superior daemons under his command. The accrued wealth (and greed and corruption) piles up the higher the chain goes. Every daemon knows how things work and they love it [love meaning wholly despise but do their utmost to keep it going for the neverending rush of greed and envy].

Greater daemons would (hypothetically) say that while, on average, the Gehennan taxation system adds up to about 40-20% of a lesser daemon’s wealth depending on how high up he or she is, and simply setting various tax rates at those levels could save a lot of time and effort and resources (because sometimes some numbers may appear to not add up and an unfortunate accident or ill timed natural disaster or random enemy attack might have to cause some records to be destroyed), it’d also ruin the elegance and simplicity of the daemonic order. No true Gehennan needs or wants stupidly long legal documents and once you start writing rules down, they gain a life of their own and begin to breed. Just look at the next door neighbors: archdevils started writing up their constitution with the worst of intentions but now devils can barely find time to get any evil done from all that paperwork their laws require.

Overall, everything is fine [fine meaning terrible] in Gehenna and all is as the greater daemons like. There’s only one problem for them and its name is Charon. Charon was a particularly strong and cunning fishdaemon who was against the arcanadaemons in the ancient days. He somehow managed to flee Gehenna and survive the purging; then he returned at the perfect time with the inexplicably perfect power to grab the greater daemons in the metaphorical neck. Somehow, the fishdaemon had gained control over the River Styx and was using this power to divert all the daemon vessels meant to aid the invasion of Hades. Styx was obviously the single best route into Hades, as it is for every other Lower Plane; while there were plenty of portals from Gehenna, hags knew and heavily defended all of them and it was pretty much impossible to gain a foothold. Using Hades portals from other planes was out of the question, no other fiends liked the idea of Gehennans going around invading other planes and greater daemons knew sending forces to seize their Hades portals would backfire. Which is why Charon’s diverting of their invasion fleets on Styx into other planes didn’t just doom their offensive against the hags, it caused daemons to lose most of their best warriors as the scattered invaders were captured or swept away by Styx when infuriated fiends of neighboring planes sunk their vessels. Even today, eons after the emergence of Charon, there are still daemons from those fleets stuck in nooks and crannies of the River Styx, unlucky enough to be frozen or buried alive without getting crushed, stuck in eternal darkness and cold.

The greater daemons were screwed. They had already suspended all outside mercenary work for the invasion and spent incredible amounts of their resources for buying land on Hades from the hags beforehand and building the Wasting Tower. It had been a genius move they were quite proud of, it was the Wasting Tower that let them completely blindside the hags and quickly gain a lot of ground (and more portals to bring reinforcements) but the initial surprise had worn off and the weight of hags was now breaking down daemonic frontline. Greater daemons were running dangerously low on liquid assets and almost all of their regular customers were now alienated thanks to Charon’s handiwork; even if they aborted the invasion now, daemons were extremely unlikely to get much mercenary work in the near future. They needed the invasion to succeed, they had to get that second plane’s worth of souls and slaves (and other assorted profits that comes from owning the Plane of Degradation), or their vaunted economy would collapse from the strain and the endless hordes of their lessers would descend on them like locusts to tear away all of that personal power and wealth arcanadaemons and ultrodaemons had spent the previous ages stuffing inside their own shells. Boatman Charon (as he’d taken to calling himself) had the greater daemons by the (metaphorical) balls.

So a deal was made. Charon would personally be getting half of all the gross wealth the greater daemons make off of Hades in perpetuity, in exchange for all daemons to forever be able to move back and forth between Gehenna and Hades using the river, freely and quickly, safe from all the regular hazards of sailing the Styx. And Charon, wanting to make sure none of that famous daemonic “ingenuity” can be used to screw him out of his due (which they of course managed later on; by “demoting” an ultrodaemon to the Plaguedaemon, a brand new rank of “lesser daemon” that only ever has one member whose direct superior is the General of Gehenna and personally owns about half of all daemonic enterprises in Hades), insisted it be written down as a binding contract overseen by a very expensive devil lawyer (who later on disappeared in an unrelated boating accident on the River Styx).

With Charon’s support, the daemons were able to send their armies with previously unimaginable speed and the invasion of Hades was back on track. And while it was still ultimately Malcanthet, the Queen of Collaborators, betraying her own kind for profit that allowed daemons to decisively win the war, Gehenna wouldn’t have bounced back from economic ruin nearly that quickly without Charon’s power making it safe and efficient for daemons to send their spoils back home while the war was ongoing.

The source and extent of Charon’s control of the River Styx is still a great mystery, but all denizens of the Lower Planes are accustomed to the cloaked daemon sailing the river on a tiny boat with his little lantern and his oar, approaching any vessel to demand two coins (of any type) per head for everyone on board. His incredibly cheap toll, added to the fact that nobody who refuses or tries to cheat him ever reaches where they want, must have made him a world sized (yet still not all that valuable, for he does not care at all about the actual value of the coins he’s given) hoard somewhere. Adding in the unfathomable amount of money he's been paid by the greater daemons over the ages, Charon must be one of the richest fiends in the planes (or more likely the most powerful, as it's pretty much guaranteed that he'd have spent all of it on magical items he'd have consumed). The Boatman can also be summoned by anyone in all the Lower Planes by throwing two coins into Styx and he usually agrees to carry passengers on his own little boat personally, but in those cases his price is one petitioner or mortal soul per journey. Charon is known to be a pleasant companion in such trips, he likes to chat with anyone who isn’t a greater daemon and can be persuaded to also sell secrets that only a being who can see everywhere the River Styx passes by could know. He demands bizarre prices from his passengers for that sort of information, along the lines of a deaf baby dwarf or a bright green slaad skin or a cobblestone from some mortal town on a mortal world nobody’s ever heard of. None knows if he wants these things as part of some darkly sinister scheme or just to mess with his passengers and the Boatman isn’t saying.

The strange speed with which he can appear all over the Lower Planes has caused speculation that Charon is in fact a whole group of daemons pretending to be a single individual, for there’s many who want to sail the Styx safely and it’s very unlikely that two or more summons have never happened at the same time. Mysteriously, the Boatman seems to know when someone is trying to test him and doesn’t appear at all when there’s a deliberate attempt to summon him in multiple spots at the same time, and such inquisitive folks tend to have accidents if they try to sail the river afterwards. Charon sometimes admits to doing that if he’s in a particularly cheery mood but of course, it’s unknown how much one can trust the word of a daemon. There’s always rumors of various beings falling afoul of Charon for this or that reason and also no shortage of folks getting lost on the Styx, so after thousands and thousands of years of (presumably) ever increasing personal strength, no one can tell what is true or false when it comes to the Boatman’s powers or actions. The only thing well known is that if a vessel sails onto the Styx and Charon doesn’t appear to demand payment, it’s a bad sign and that journey should be aborted. It’s said there are shipfuls of fiends stuck sailing the Styx forever without ever finding a place to anchor or disembark (which is dumb, as all fiends can just kill themselves at any time to return home, but such rumors never care too much about logic).

Boatman Charon is as much a fixture of the Lower Planes as the River Styx. He never leaves the Lower Planes despite Styx extending far beyond them (he claims the air outside doesn’t agree with him), yet his influence is so pervasive that even mortals know of him in myths and legends. The greater daemons of Gehenna despise him for his freedom from their control (not to mention the mind numbing amounts of money they're paying him) and would love nothing more than to find out his secrets, but their deal with Charon is too lucrative to risk angering him. Boatman of the Styx isn't going anywhere anytime soon.*and slowly makes the multiverse a worse place for no actual gain for anybody
I know I don't normally approve of transferring real world duders directly into DnD but the Boatman is kinda exempt due to his phenomenal fame. He's simply a good idea, no matter how cliched he is. Also like half of all named fiends are already ripped off of real myths so it's not like we're breaking new ground here.

Our Charon here is a dude who'll come in handy for any and all sorts of Lower Planes shenanigans. You could even drag him to mortal world if you feel like it, tho I like him better on the outside. And he's got the mysterious backstory going, feel free to throw in elemental lords or abominable godspawns or whatever else you feel like as the answer to the riddle (assuming you even want one, he's perfectly cromulent as a mystery box).

Also there's a ****load of incidental stuff on Gehennan politics, if anyone even gives a darn about daemons (general experience suggests not). Also also I guess I modified them a bit more.

Pronounceable
2018-04-26, 06:41 AM
So yeah, about that last one that was supposed to count? There wasn't a single new trick in it, y'all should've seen that, it was just straight up regular old DnD Charon. Good thing I had a plan to remedy that.


The Larethian Pact (cosmic artifact)
Power: pact magic

The activation of the great Mechanus was an event of such importance, Corellon and Gruumsh (who couldn’t have bothered to stop even when their elder brother locked them both into depths of Tartarus to stop their racket) took notice. They stopped brawling for a moment and looked at the multiverse around them, the first time in countless millenia. And they saw that their siblings had conquered it, filled it with life and reigned over vast territories. King of Glory had fallen so far behind his siblings in actual glory and influence, it was comical. His one eyed freak of a brother must’ve come to the same conclusion, so buggered right off, swearing that the fight wasn’t over and Corellon would rue the day he was formed when he returned for his revenge. But Corellon had lost all of his apetite for putting the dumb savage in his place after seeing the state of the planes, there was something much more important to do now: proving himself a better lord than his other siblings. So he watched and learned.

Moradin had all of the planes made of good essence under his control, however tenuously, but he was more repairman than king. The so called King of the Heavens was spending almost all of his power to keep the (admittedly ingenious) cosmic order he’d set up functioning because the fundamental nature of existence was chaotic and any order you impose upon it is fragile and fleeting; unless of course you’re Moradin and have infinite divine power to pour into your handiwork. But as could be seen here, the cost of this was being a bad king, one that neither inspired nor led his subjects, barely worthy of the title in Corellon’s expert opinion. Then there was little Pelor, who’d built thousands upon thousands of worlds in the once empty Prime Universe and filled them with mortal creatures. Now calling himself the Sun Father, the runt of the litter had made himself countless subjects and was now having his own authority over them challenged by the gods he foolishly let them raise. Then there were these titans, some sort of horrifyingly powerful elemental entities had spawned while Corellon wasn’t looking and were also fighting against Pelor and his creations alongside their own, bigger and better creations. And last but certainly not least was Tiamat, who lived in a multiverse of her own inside her own head, heedless to the fact that she’d functionally imprisoned herself in the dismal Plane of Water. The staggering number of various types creations she’d made seemed to outnumber the rest of the multiverse combined, though at least she wasn’t pretending to be a ruler of any sort and was completely ignoring all of them. But, and this was the crucial part in Corellon’s estimate, she was still the most successful in the family purely on the strength of her influence due to the pure terror she inspired in everybody; whenever Tiamat bothered send an order to any being, she was obeyed without question.

After learning all he needed, Corellon chose the obvious winning strategy (that seemed to have somehow evaded his siblings): quality over quantity. He would always pick only the best and the brightest, leaving the masses to wallow in their own mediocrity. Whenever he made something, he’d make sure it was going to be the best in the multiverse. Corellon would let his siblings have the unwashed masses, but those crowds would be gaping at the majesty of the elite that was under Corellon’s influence. Perfection would be his trade. But one couldn’t build an empire in a day. Well, Corellon could, he certainly had enough power for it, but it wouldn’t be “perfect” and then he’d have to improve it later, which would make him look incapable of getting it right the first time, aka imperfect. Corellon would have to make detailed plans for his empire to be truly flawless and eternal and for that he needed time.

So since he had spare time, Corellon decided to spend it preparing for whatever dumb scheme the one eyed freak was surely preparing. It would certainly be a crude, brute force approach involving having more servants and followers than Corellon; Gruumsh’s simplistic mind was unlikely fathom anything beyond the numerical superiority. And since quality over quantity was to be his motto, Corellon started looking for existing beings of great potential that would be of use in case of an emergency. He would grant these chosen beings great powers, secretly investing his own divinity into them, in exchange for a promise of support if, someday, on the extremely unlikely event that Corellon is personally threatened. Corellon would stipulate all of his lareths (a word he’d picked up from one of the hundreds of elven languages in Material that meant choice) to use the powers he grants them to amass as much respect, fame, fear and/or influence (if not outright power) as they could. That would still be leaving them a lot of freedom to pursue their own goals, it was a great deal, if Corellon says so himself.

The beings King of Glory chose weren’t always pleasant, of course, such as the Demon Prince of the Depths, but whatever Old One Eye was going to do wasn’t going to be pleasant too. They didn’t always act in good faith either, such as the complete turnaround into pacifism the Queen of Stars did to spitefully squander the gifted power (and after haggling on the strength of her forces too). And worst of all, some of them let Corellon down and failed to even survive, like the Grand Khan of Dao. But most of the ones that took the deals were (and still are) solid, using their “mysterious powers” to gain glory and influence for themselves. He might not have mentioned that he’d be gaining some small (by his standards) measure of power from his sleeper agents’ fame and glory perpetually but it’s such an insignificant thing to be bothered about, King of Glory still cannot understand why the Arborean queen would overreact so much.

Nevertheless, since he needed plenty of time to design flawlessest of all realms Arvandor, hottest of all wives Araushnee and most competent of all servants the Seldarine, Corellon wandered around (incognito obviously) and recruited more than a dozen (potentially extremely influential) beings all over the multiverse. He also saw that Gruumsh had, somewhat predictably, chosen to beat up poor little Pelor to take his least desirable toys for his “masterplan” against King of Glory. That alone was proof that Corellon was being paranoid about this backup plan but he’d already started, so there was no harm in completing it. It wasn’t like the bits of his divinity lareths were taking caused any significant loss to his own strength and; being a secret backup plan that nobody else would know anyway, it didn’t have to be that flawless - unlike the glorious realm he’d decided to build in Plane of Positive Energy (which One Eyed Freak would later call mom’s basement out of a misplaced belief that he has a sense of humor).

When he was done, the future Coronal of Arvandor materialized the Larethian Pact as a physical item (a scroll of neverending length filled with unreadable writing) and hid it inside Mechanus without anyone, even modrons, noticing (which was no easy feat, even for one with his skill and power). The intensely lawful nature of the great machine should help compel its beneficiaries to obey if Corellon ever calls for help, which seems highly unlikely.

It was only much later that King of Glory noticed he was getting quite a bit more power than expected from the Pact. When he surreptitiously looked into it he discovered that, by sheer coincidence, the specific spot on Mechanus where Larethian Pact had been hidden was subverting the Emperor of Artifice’s cosmic design to create various interplanar power conduits that aren’t supposed to happen between beings that aren’t supposed to be connected. That was the reason for the rise of those strange and mysterious new pact magics among the mortals, allowing them to illicitly use Mechanus to take powers from extradimensional beings of power in exchange for various favors and services, mirroring the relationship between Corellon and lareths. Though Coronal of Arvandor isn’t particularly happy about being the ultimate source of all that pact magics, not to mention all those profits he's making off the backs of unwashed masses all over the planes, he doesn’t have a way of putting a stop to this without compromising his backup plan or, more importantly, royally pissing off his stronger brother. He’ll just have to suck it up and grow more powerful through some particular subset of unwashed masses instead of the very best.

Once again, it was me, thread! It was my plan all along. Also; turns out Douchenozzle really is a nozzle. Who'd have thunk it?*
*me
e: Yea I know it's not nearly as awesome as I pretend it is. Just roll with it.
ee:vv No changes to rules.

Beneath
2018-04-26, 04:08 PM
Making Warlocks be Correlon's accident instead of, like, Asmodeus or whatever is an awesome twist, I have to say. Are warlocks under this system random, or does an actual deal still have to get struck before the conduit is of any use to anyone?

Pronounceable
2018-05-09, 09:50 AM
Just because I hate kids doesn't mean everyone does and there's no reason why there shouldn't be kid appropriate stuff in DnD.


CAOIMHIN (lesser archfey), Brown Lord, Count d’Killmoulis, Master of the Oven, Terror In The Pantry, Bakemaker, Chocolate Chief, Chef Kevin
Domains: food, community, baking, chocolate, coffee, killmoulis, buckawns, brownies, vengeance

Feylord Caoimhin took one look at the dryads and hamadryads spreading all over the forests of mortal worlds to be “alone” with their beloved oak trees and decreed it was dumb and stupid and his subjects weren’t to do that. Instead, killmoulis and buckawns would gather copious amounts of their beloved grain crops from there and grow them themselves in their Feywild domain. However, mortals took a dim view of the small fey taking away their crops and started to treat them like pests, going so far as to train their pet animals to hunt them down as if they were rats. Caoimhin was furious and swore bitter revenge, but unfortunately killmoulis and buckawns were very timid, not to mention tiny and weak, so the Brown Lord couldn’t possibly utilize his subjects to strike back at the big meanies. Frustrated, he sought advice from his king. Sadly, King Oberon was too busy with nonstop banging his thousands of nymph concubines to spare a moment for Count d’Killmoulis. And since the Summer Queen would not lift a finger without some “tribute”, Caoimhin was forced to pray to Deadbeat Grandpa.

For his unfathomable reasons, Silvanus sent a vision to Caoimhin. Inspired, the Count made buckawns build a humongous stone oven and killmoulis to prepare great mounds of dough from all the materials they had taken from mortals until then. He then covered half of his kicking and screaming subjects with the dough and stuffed them into the oven. Caoimhin was going to bake a better, braver class of fey according to his vision. In the end, the freshly made race of pastry crusted fey had the strength of earth baked into them from the all the ingredients harvested from it and also had been tested in fire. As expected, the new subjects were much more brave and powerful than their weak killmoulis and buckawn predecessesors. They had also turned out brown, for there was much cocoa and coffee beans in the ingredients because most mortals hadn’t discovered the uses of those plants back then, so the timid killmoulis and buckawns had gathered great amounts of those from uninhabited wildernesses of Material Plane. The brownies, as a result, were singularly obsessed with the brown seeded plants and would go on to invent all sorts of foods and beverages using them.

And now that he had an army of brave (yet still quite weak and tiny) fey at his disposal, the day of reckoning was at hand, Ch(i)ef Caoimhin could finally get his revenge upon those uppity mortals. From that day onwards, the brownies went forth with courage and determination, they filched and nicked and stole and then stole some more. Flour, milk, eggs, oils, fruits and vegetables; no (nonmeat) cooking ingredients were safe from the thieving hands of the brown fey. The killmoulis back home in Brunnheim used their ill gotten gains to bake breads, pies and (most importantly) cakes, while the buckawns tend to the vast fields of grains belonging to their master, happily saturated with the grain crops their fey madness craves. Thus Count d’Killmoulis was avenged upon the mortals and the big mean pooheads have been living in fear of brownies ever since, or so Caoimhin and his subjects like to think. More importantly, his brownies’ eventual discovery of the secret of chocolate catapulted the Bakemaker to the top of Summer Court, as Queen Titania fell in love with it and rained favors and accolades upon him, going so far as to elevate him to archfey (much to intense jealousy of the rest of the lords and ladies of the Summer Court). Even King Oberon, in a rare display of awareness of any events beyond his bedchamber, ordered large amounts of coffee and chocolate delivered to him; though it’s probably best not to ask exactly what he does with that stuff.

As sometimes happens with such promotions, Master of the Oven managed to refine and focus his own fey madness to a fine edge beyond that of his subjects and shifted his personal obsession to baking sweets in general and chocolate cakes in particular. Which, while all well and good in abstract, caused problems in practice; for Caoimhin was mouthless like all killmoulis and couldn’t actually taste his own cakes. They always smelled great and other fey always told him they tasted great but how was the Brown Lord to assure himself that they really did taste great? It’s not like you could take the damned fickle fey of Summer Court at their word. He needed impartial observers. Though he’d rather them not be too impartial, he wanted his handiwork to be appreciated after all, so whoever was brought in for tasting should like sweets. That was why he decided on the mortal children and told his brownies to get some of those.

A whole squad of brownies would be needed to drag even a small halfling child so brownies, always preferring to use brains over brawn, started to hand out sweets to small children to make them follow the tiny fey into Feywild. Chocolate was especially effective for this and a single brownie could lead one humanoid child with a bag of sweets, leaving the rest of them free to find some foodstuffs to collect for Brunnheim’s kitchens. And it’s not like these children Caoimhin takes has any owners, the brownies always bring the ones abandoned by the adults in gardens and fields and stables and chicken coops; and he feeds them very well (with cakes and pies and sweet cookies). The results are good, Bakemaker’s pastries pass the kids’ taste tests with flying colors. Sometimes the kids can get silly and ask for food that isn’t cakes or pies but they all come around and go back to eating their sweets once the hunger comes calling. Unfortunately, mortals being what they are, these kids all eventually grow sick and die and need to be replaced. Some of Count d’Killmoulis’s subjects point out that the kids they bring to Brunnheim seem to be dying much faster than other mortals, sometimes not even growing up to adult size, and they’re at a loss to explain why that’s the case. It would be blasphemous indeed for any brownie or killmoulis or buckawn to even suggest it might have something to do with exclusively eating sweet baked goods but none of them could ever conceive of that kind of idea anyway, so it’s not a problem.

Meanwhile, in an unrelated evolutionary behavior, mortals recently developed a habit of warning their children against strangers offering sweets. This might cause mortal children to refuse following them and really frustrates the brownies, even to the point of having to come in large groups to drag this type of stubborn kid back to Feywild when they need to find a new taster right now. Brownies are hopeful whatever this weird fad mortals are into will pass soon.

The Chocolate Chief is a high ranking and respected (also envied) member of the Summer Court and the personal pastry chef to the Queen of Waves and Flames, owns great tracts of Feywild land chock full of various valuable crops and massive kitchens staffed by his subjects and is in command of a vast number of jolly and pacifist tiny fey. Even his only “enemy” in court, the jester Squelaiche, who once stole 40 cakes he brought to the Queen in tribute, and was never forgiven; has nothing truly bad to say about him. He’s even known on certain mortal worlds as the inventor of chocolate, and sometimes coffee. Overall, Caoimhin the Brown Lord is an upstanding and exemplary member of the good court of Feywild.

Ok maybe not everything is kid appropriate here. Sue me.
Also what the hell is wrong with Irish? This is madder than French, why even use Latin letters if you're gonna do this? I'd managed to let Eachthighern pass uncommented before but this was the straw that broke Ceasar's back (or possibly pen).
e: Also yes, another idea I randomly got like yesterday.

Fable Wright
2018-05-09, 11:33 PM
Even his only “enemy” in court, the jester Squelaiche, who once stole 40 cakes he brought to the Queen in tribute, and was never forgiven;

That's as many as four tens! And that's terrible.

Great Dragon
2019-07-03, 11:27 PM
@Pronounceable:
I have captured Princess Glasya, and am holding her for Ransom in my "To the 9th (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?591202-To-the-9th)" thread.

I expect to see your chosen Champion/s within the week.
I'll have roast Pheasant (are you sure?) and all the trimmings prepared.

muhahahaha!!!


D&D3 breaks down past 10th level because originally post-10th levels were like epic levels in D&D3. I think as of the publication of AD&D1 the highest-level character in Gygax's game that had been running since OD&D was level 14


Heh. Nerdout!

IME, oD&D had that "past 10th level is epic" bit.
With AD&D 1 & 2 just continuing that.
Some of the Names for Class Levels was cool.

3.x was just fine (Except Quadratic Wizards, which the DM could deal with 👹)
until the Epic Level Handbook was pulled out.
That was a Super Nuclear Mess!

And yeah, since Gygax was gone before the buy-out of TSR (1997?) I think he ret-conned his old Character (Mordy) to at least 14th level.

But, I can be wrong - since I wasn't anywhere near the Legends of D&D.
*******



I really, really, really hate Maglubiyet. It's not just a dumb****ed name like Mask. It's straight up hypocritical and (fictional) racist. If calling the racial deity of a race literally defeat isn't the highest order of fictional prejudice, I dunno what is.

I wasn't aware that his name meant that, or have any clue in which language.
So, yeah. Need a new Name for this guy.

I'm thinking:
Nezaustav
And
General Euwigaien

flat_footed
2019-07-18, 02:28 AM
The Fullmetal Mod: Thread Necromancy is a forbidden art.