Avatars during Forgotten Realms Time of Troubles

[redking]

During the Time of Troubles (https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Time_of_Troubles) in the Forgotten Realms, the gods were forced to possess mortal bodies in the realms. Has there been any material for 3.5e that shows the mechanics of this? Alternatively, is there any homebrew template? Or did the possessed mortals simply get Divine Rank 0 slapped on them?

Please discuss.

[LunaticChaos]

During the Time of Troubles (https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Time_of_Troubles) in the Forgotten Realms, the gods were forced to possess mortal bodies in the realms. Has there been any material for 3.5e that shows the mechanics of this? Alternatively, is there any homebrew template? Or did the possessed mortals simply get Divine Rank 0 slapped on them?

Please discuss.

Its best to reference the ADnD 1st Edition book Faiths and Avatars for the Forgotten Realm's Campaign setting. Specifically this section from page 15.


The Time of Troubles was an exception to many of the normal rules for how deities work in the Realms. During the Time of Troubles, the powers of the Realms were forced to either place all of their divine power in one mortal avatar or, if they exist on multiple planes, were forced to create avatars upon whose existence their entire future divine connections to the Realms were staked. Since the powers of the Realms were forced to stake so much on their avatars, these avatars were acutely vulnerable. While the death of an avatar did not mean the death of the power (Bane and Bhaal, at least, went through multiple avatars in succession before finally dying), powers could only maintain themselves in one avatar form and could not connect with their homes and power bases in the Outer Planes (if they had them).

However, during the Time of Troubles, the general rule that only a deity can kill anything other than a demipower was not violated. Bhaal was killed by Cyric using die sword Godshane at Boareskyr Bridge. Godsbane was Mask in sword form (evidently an avatar form of Mask). Thus, a power killed a power.

The second part is not a hard rule, but rather "Anything other than a demipower is too powerful for most mortals to kill" thing. But this is primarily due to their nature of being outer planar, having multiple avatars one would have to hunt down, and them just being really bloody tough. During the Time of Troubles only the last point was still relevant.

So to answer your question, I don't believe there have been any rules for the Time of Troubles written for 3.5. But this is because the Time of Troubles was set in 1358 DR, which is when 1st Edition is set, while 3.5 is set in 1372 DR.

But its actually not that difficult to adapt that info if you really want to run a Time of Trouble's game in 3.5. They'd be just as strong as their stat block says they are, but without the multiple avatar thing that non demigods get. So if you can actually MANAGE to destroy that avatar in some way you'll kill the god.

[Buufreak]

Not to steal a thread, but what happened to clerics?

[Tzardok]

Not to steal a thread, but what happened to clerics?

During the Time of Troubles, you mean? They lost their magic powers when they got too far away from their god. I don't know exactly how far "too far" was, but the cleric of Sune in the Avatar trilogy (which took place in the Time) lost his powers when he moved more than a few miles from the city where she ensconed herself.

[Biggus]

These are the rules for Avatars in 3.5:

https://www.d20srd.org/srd/divine/divineAbilitiesFeats.htm#avatar

I'm not sure how well they fit the Time of Troubles though, your DvR 0 idea might be closer.

[redking]

These are the rules for Avatars in 3.5:

https://www.d20srd.org/srd/divine/divineAbilitiesFeats.htm#avatar

I'm not sure how well they fit the Time of Troubles though, your DvR 0 idea might be closer.


From my reading of the avatar's trilogy, the avatars did not have the 50 or so character levels of their regular avatars in 3.5e's Faiths and Pantheons.

I think perhaps the best way to handle them is to apply a template to the creature that these gods possessed. Here is what I have in mind.

Apply Divine Rank 0
Change type to Outsider (native)
Add 10 racial outsider hit dice and recalculate hit points, skills and so on.

So in the case of the possessed (by Bane) Fzoul Chembryl, he would be: DV0 Outsider (native) (human) 10, Cleric 17, Hierophant 2.

I think that appromixates the power level of the avatars of the time of troubles.