Explain the Elder Evils (the guys in the book of the same name) to me

[Leliel]

I have heard of a book known as "Elder Evils", which is, as it sounds like, a book detailing world-ending campaign villains. Since I do not have the book yet, I would like it if you could detail the fluff of the Elder Evils. By that I mean their forms, their backstories, their Signs, and what happens when you defeat them (if not necessarily "destroy" them). Note: I do not need their stats, or the fluff for Atropus or Kyuss.

[CASTLEMIKE]

A few excerpts:

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/4ex/20071203a

[Just Alex]

Stupid Worm that Walks. Hate it so much. Harder to kill than a freaking Quori in an Eberron campaign.

[Ramos]

Stupid Worm that Walks. Hate it so much. Harder to kill than a freaking Quori in an Eberron campaign.
Just epic-teleport it into the sun.

The Leviathan is a big CR 16 fish. (actually, that's an aspect of Leviathan-and it's actually a sea-serpent of sorts). Sign is sea disasters.

Zargon is a demon-thing somewhere between a minotaur and a borer beetle. Don't remember CR or sign off the top of my head.

Pandorym is a CR 25 far-realm abomination. CR 25 is only for a tiny mind-shard of his. His actual body is a 30 ft sphere of annihilation that cannot be destroyed. You should read the novel "Darkvision" as he's in it.


Overall, the entire book didn't seem very good or well-thought-of to me, at least stat-wise. I mean, CR 16 Elder Evils? That's less than a Balor. Even Pandorym's Mindshard is less than some of the bigger dragons. How do they justify that?

In addition, most of the Elder Evils there are pretty much unknown entities. We haven't seen them before. And they're not really scary at all-except for Atropus and the Worm that Walks. It's like a couple of ppl got in the same table, got drunk and started coming up with ideas of "cool", poorely-flavored, poorely-constructed, supposedly-uber monsters.

[Danzaver]

Sounds like stuff from the Cthulhu Mythos.... except... not... good.


...sorry, it just felt weird using the words good and cthulhu in the same sentence.

Seriously though, everybody rip off lovecraft. Can't say I blame them - except when they FAIL.

[WhyBother]

Overall, the entire book didn't seem very good or well-thought-of to me, at least stat-wise. I mean, CR 16 Elder Evils? That's less than a Balor. Even Pandorym's Mindshard is less than some of the bigger dragons. How do they justify that?

I've seen it argued that the CRs are artificially low, given that the entire campaign is supposed to lead up to the final fight, and thus you have time to discover weakness and prepare. DR 20/axiomatic & adamantine is a lot less powerful once you know at level 6 you should be shooting for all adamantine gear, and once you know that it needs to be enchanted to get axiomatic properties, for example.

Even so, I have agree that there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of reason for this book to exist.

[Xuincherguixe]

Dang, I was kind of looking forward to this. But it sounds like they really dropped the ball.

[Leliel]

Um, actually I've read a bit of the discussions about the Elder Evils, and one of the WizO's gave a reason why they aren't that powerful. The stats are only for each specific Elder Evil's aspect.

Multiply each one's stats by about a billion, and you're around the actual avatar of the Elder Evil, let alone the Elder itself.

And no one's yet explained to me the Hulks of Zorethra yet, or any requested Elder Evil's backstory.

[hamishspence]

They are designed to End Campaigns.

As in, you want to go out with a big bang.
How to use the Elder Evils and make them fun: play up to the end of the sweet spot (level 15 odd, have the Evil encroach slowly on the world, the next few levels focus heavily on the Evil, its effects, getting to it, finding out how to take it down, and then one, big, blowout battle.

They do not work so well for already epic campaigns. however one might drop an Elder Evil into the place of an abomination, early in Epic campaigns. Use them how fits your campaign best. Leviathan Aspects make great straight sea serpents, if you remove the power that makes PCs un-resurrectable.

Or keep it, if you know your PCs actually like a real consequence for failure.

Really, any supplement can be mined for interesting ideas.

Even without major crunch, some rather maligned supplements have good fluff, ideas, etc.

The only truly bad supplements are ones where both the crunch (items, monsters, classes) and the fluff (tournaments, mage duels, modified organisation rules) appear dire.

I was not too fond of Complete Champion for that reason: neither the crunch nor the groups seemed interesting.

[osyluth]

This is probably really illegal and stuff. I mean Elder Evils isn't Open Gaming
Content is it?

[puppyavenger]

This is probably really illegal and stuff. I mean Elder Evils isn't Open Gaming
Content is it?

no ones given any speicific crunch or fluff not in the excerpts