afroakuma's Planar And Other Oddities Questions Thread VII

[aj77]

Suppose I wanted to revive the concept of Alignment languages using existing exotic languages. What would I use?
Infernal and Abyssal are obvious, with Celestial as either NG or LG. I'm not sure about the rest; are Modron and Slaad languages widespread enough to qualify?

[afroakuma]

Oof, sorry, now I gotta ask if Tharizdun could empower a Proxy from inside his Purple Crystal of Time-Out.

Of the options listed, definitely the easiest of the three, though there would likely need to be an elaborate ritual involved from the outside to allow that much of a transfusion of power. This was accomplished at least once previously through evil elemental agents working with the Orb of Oblivion, an artifact of Tharizdun.

Also, maybe I misread something in an earlier thread, but wasn't some sliver of Tharizdun related to the corruption of the Queen of Air and Darkness?

Yup. She was gifted an artifact, a ten-faceted black diamond, by a group of dwarves. The diamond is believed to be a creation of Tharizdun.

Suppose I wanted to revive the concept of Alignment languages using existing exotic languages. What would I use?
Infernal and Abyssal are obvious, with Celestial as either NG or LG. I'm not sure about the rest; are Modron and Slaad languages widespread enough to qualify?

Odd idea. Modron and Slaad are definitely not widespread languages. Apart from those you've listed, there aren't really clear alignment-associated languages. You could take Elvish for CG, I suppose, given the elven pantheon's ties to Arborea; might swipe other racial languages in a similar fashion for the rest.

And now something fun.

Spoiler: Lord of the Last Shroud

Show

In this campaign, a simple bear problem escalates into an on-again off-again alliance with an unlikely villain with a dire plan for the world.

• A small village has been having problems with bear attacks recently, believed to be the work of a local druid who does not care for the town. The simple woodland trouble is complicated by the mysterious nature of the injuries in a survivor, and by the presence of a mysterious protector figure.

• With the mayor revealed to have hired the druid to cause bear attacks in an effort to make the town's problems appear more manageable, attention turns to the supernatural source of the problems - a shadow-haunted wizard's ruin dubbed the "Tomb of Terrors." An ogre and his goblin lackeys, an irritable dragon, and the mage's guards and wards all make for a complicated hassle as the party looks to discover the origin of the undead menace.

• The shadows are stopped with the aid of a servant of the obscure god Mellifleur, bound to the town by the will of an evil deity, who has been attempting to protect the townsfolk from the escaping shadows. She gifts them the Book of Mellifleur, a magical tome that guides the holder to heroic deeds, which the deceased mage had stolen in order to plumb its secrets. The Book's first warning is of a coven of hags attempting to conjure a night hag, a servant of their foul goddess Cegilune.

• The dreamstone stolen from the hags is the key to the Book's next mystery, as the party follows its instructions and is drawn into a strange otherworldly auction for the fate of damned spirits, wherein they must oppose a devious devil and prevent the sale until Mellifleur's agent can liberate the "merchandise."

• As the party approaches the outskirts of a city where a strange black obelisk has appeared overnight, the Book goes silent, its pages blank. As they plumb the depths of this new threat, they discover the depths to which ancient gods of evil despise Mellifleur, and must thwart a mummy who plots to become the next Kyuss.

• The Book of Mellifleur has been revived and instructs the party to deliver it into the hands of the archmage Chitirr Desakh. Complications arise when it is discovered that Desakh was found near a murdered unicorn - and the verdant princes of the fey have taken him to stand a perfectly fair trial.

• Using the Book, Desakh learns that a war is brewing in the Underdark over a magical crown and the sleeping sapphire dragon it controls. To protect the world from the rampage of a great sapphire wyrm directed by an evil will, the party must descend into the depths and steal or destroy the crown.

• An army of goblinoids marches under the banner of Jaggrimeck, prompting Desakh to reveal that a decade prior, he and his companions, Mab Winyll and Taarchwilset, were forced to turn on former friend Jaggrimeck when he became a lich. They had believed him destroyed, but Jaggrimeck has risen anew, his true phylactery hidden away. With the aid of the Book, Desakh can locate the phylactery, but the party will need to brave the perils of Jaggrimeck's lair to destroy it once and for all.

• With Jaggrimeck destroyed and the truth of Mellifleur revealed, the lichdom that he once stole from Desakh returns to its rightful master. With a new, more powerful lich who knows and is prepared for them, the party has a challenging adversary to contend with and must follow Jaggrimeck's final clue, for the fallen lich was a foe of Mellifleur and the secrets of the Lich Lord's "revolutionary new method" of lichdom may yet lie in his old realm deep within Gehenna: Death's Embrace, the moldering and volcanic otherworldly necropolis that serves as the seat of the demigod Velsharoon.

• Mellifleur's grand and terrible design is revealed: using five controlled great gem wyrms and a rite of unspeakable darkness, he will drag the planet into the dead void of Krangath and convert the world into a unique "hub phylactery" which will allow prospective liches throughout the Material Plane to attain their power without complex rites, dangerous preparations, or risk of failure. In doing so, each will contribute power to Mellifleur himself. Thanks to his plotting, Tiamat and her chromatic dragons are on his side, opposed by Bahamut and his metallic dragons. An unlikely alliance including servants of a death god, paladins, devils, and hags must help open the way to Desakh's sanctum, where a dragon must die and a Book must be destroyed to stop the plots of the Lord of the Last Shroud.

• The Lich Lord's plan has been thwarted, but the world is still plunging into Krangath - for Mellifleur's most devious adversary has waited until the end to strike! Now that Mellifleur's cult has been exposed on this world, the altraloth Typhus has seized the Pillars of the Dead Mountain on the Gehenna side and is determined to drag the planet to its doom in the icy silent void in order to extinguish Mellifleur's power base on behalf of his hag mistresses. With the lich god willing to provide aid to stave off such a grievous loss, bitter foes must become temporary allies to stop the yugoloths and night hags from completing their scheme and letting the world be swallowed into the empty darkness forever.

[Tzardok]

Deities and Demigods mentions the concept of powers being "outcast" from a tight pantheon, meaning a worshipper of the whole pantheon can't draw magic from those powers and doesn't offer them prayer. For example, Set and Apep are outcast from the Pharaonian Pantheon, Urdlen from the Gnomish Pantheon etc. Which of the other major pantheons (espcially interested in the Hindu, the Japanese and the Chinese Pantheon) have outcasts and who are those?

What alignments, domains and favored weapons would Amatsu-Mikaboshi and Chernabog have in 3.5? Where would their divine realms be and where would they be positioned on the Demipower - Greater Power scale?

Edit: If you are in a mood for inventing things wholecloth: the qorrash are still leaderless, and I am still clueless how the "Deep Mirror", where the karamel and the nerra live, would funktion and look like.

Edit Edit: I found another species of baatezu that isn't in the hierarchy yet: where do jerul (Dragon #353) fit? Also, where do the yugoloth, the voor and the corrupter of fate, from MM 4 fit into their ladder of ascension? Does anybody have ideas for proper yugoloth-like species names for them? Or are they to "ill-thought out" to even be 'loth?

[Dalmosh]

In general, how do Baatezu and Tana'ari feel about their respective Tiefling kin in Baator and the Abyss, particularly in terms of those who have managed to accrue a degree of local power and influence there?

Are there any canonical examples of Dretch with class levels?

[enderlord99]

Are there any canonical examples of Dretch with class levels?

There's one working for Graz'zt that has something like 18 of them. He does not announce his presence, ever.

Actually, that might have been a mane rather than a dretch; I can never remember which is which.

[Quietus]

Has there been a significant dive into Far Realms lore anywhere in these threads? I'm not so much looking for an answer to a specific question, as looking for inspiration for my own home game. Planning on using a plot with Kaorti attempting to seep through an otherwise sealed rift between the Far Realms and the prime material, with a small "bubble" of prime-esque rules on the Far Realms side of the rift being maintained by some giants who are slowly being corrupted themselves. I'm looking for a good place to look for Kaorti lore specifically, or general information I can use if the PCs need to explore outside of that singular safe-ish space.

[Brookshw]

Has there been a significant dive into Far Realms lore anywhere in these threads? I'm not so much looking for an answer to a specific question, as looking for inspiration for my own home game. Planning on using a plot with Kaorti attempting to seep through an otherwise sealed rift between the Far Realms and the prime material, with a small "bubble" of prime-esque rules on the Far Realms side of the rift being maintained by some giants who are slowly being corrupted themselves. I'm looking for a good place to look for Kaorti lore specifically, or general information I can use if the PCs need to explore outside of that singular safe-ish space.

Afro wrote this up back in Thread III. I've appreciated it though it's not Kaorti related and may be of minimal use to you.

Spoiler

Show

So, first you have Proxima, the margin of the Far Realm closest to a continuous planar link. The Vast Gate counts as such insofar as the Far Realm is disconnected from conventional time and so this portal is effectively a continuous link. This is the region most commonly described, the realm of the Amoebic Sea and the horrors discharged into known reality. That's right; everything commonly experienced, all the squamous tentacles and disorienting soup of insanity, that's the most hospitable the Far Realm ever gets. Being located near a continuous link, Proxima is "filtered" by the incursion of reality to appear comprehensible to mortal senses. Note that in this case, when I say "comprehensible" I mean "you look and see things," not "it makes any degree of sense."

Approxima is the margin that forms around any instantaneous or terminal incursion; smaller and less stable than Proxima, this region is most notable for the repulsing current in antireality that slowly drags intruders back out through the pinhole puncture they caused. Ostensibly, this bungee cord effect should make Approxima safer, but if you believe that then you've never been dragged backward through a pinhole.

Next up is Mesia, the region where reality's incursion begins to fail. Xaxox is located in Mesia, constantly refreshed by Daruth Winterwood's maddened work. Mesia is where the supposed "facts" of the Far Realm themselves begin to slip away. This margin fills with those entities that combine curiosity with caution, presences that are far removed from the penetration point itself but are near to it in thought. Mesia is severely taxing on the mind and body; reality wanes severely here and very little can be done to protect from that.

Distalia is the farthest of what can even semi-seriously be called the "safe" regions, and can run perilously thin at times. This margin often floods with the nothingness beyond, sucking the unwary well outside any possibility of retrieval. Recognition begins to plummet off here as any veneer of reality mutates into warped abstractions and the native entities shrug off their incursion-inflicted forms. Distalia is effectively the glimmer of light in the darkness for the lords of the Far Realm, and those that did not project forward into Mesia to observe an incursion will likely impose their presence here, should they be at all interested.

Finally, Ultimon is a... not so much a region as a borderline. Ultimon represents the terminus of reality's influence and the effective event horizon of the Far Realm. To enter Ultimon is to give up any reasonable hope of escaping the strange plane, and marks you for certain doom. The mind cannot interpret the nature of Ultimon.

[Roticet]

Would a death slaad ever try to help Orcus in any capacity to take over the material plane and turn everything undead?

If so, would something like that be explained as easily as saying they did it for the lolz? Or would there have to be a more specific reason? Like Orcus is making them work for him?

Also, would a death slaad try to leave clues, if any are to be left, that would say that said slaad is a lich, trying to throw a party of their tracks?

Final thing for now, any recommendations on books to read to research death slaad specifically?

[Efrate]

On Death Slaads, in Bastion of Broken Souls module for 3.0, you have a death salad assassin who is working for one of demogorgon heads. I believe his name is Norn. Other than that they're mentioned in one of the slaad description in the ELH.

[Quietus]

Afro wrote this up back in Thread III. I've appreciated it though it's not Kaorti related and may be of minimal use to you.

Thank you! I will definitely be keeping this in consideration as I build outward from the small, sealed, and slowly failing bastion of our reality floating among hostile planes.

[afroakuma]

Deities and Demigods mentions the concept of powers being "outcast" from a tight pantheon, meaning a worshipper of the whole pantheon can't draw magic from those powers and doesn't offer them prayer. For example, Set and Apep are outcast from the Pharaonian Pantheon, Urdlen from the Gnomish Pantheon etc. Which of the other major pantheons (espcially interested in the Hindu, the Japanese and the Chinese Pantheon) have outcasts and who are those?

If you ask about the Hindu, Japanese, and Chinese pantheons, you will almost always be horribly disappointed; D&D never gave them the attention of the Big Three. The only deity noted to be kicked out of the funzone in any of these was Susano'o, and he's not an outcast from the pantheon so much as he's not welcome to hang around Amaterasu's place anymore.

As for others,

• Lolth/Araushnee is outcast from the Seldarine
• Vhaeraun is outcast from the Seldarine
• Eilistraee is voluntarily outcast from the Seldarine
• Laduguer is outcast from the Morndinsamman
• Deep Duerra is outcast from the Morndinsamman

What alignments, domains and favored weapons would Amatsu-Mikaboshi and Chernabog have in 3.5? Where would their divine realms be and where would they be positioned on the Demipower - Greater Power scale?

Just getting me to straight-up make stuff up, are we?

Too bad for you, Amatsu-Mikaboshi was actually done (poorly) in canon. That said, there's no good way to do Amatsu-Mikaboshi, because he's apocryphal to the point of triviality even within the original source material. I have personally investigated this to a far greater extent than most any source you'd find.

Amatsu-Mikaboshi is an intermediate deity who makes his divine realm, The Brilliant Land, on Avalas, first layer of Acheron. He is lawful evil. His favored weapon would likely be the chokutou (short sword). His domains would be Corruption, Darkness, Evil, Law, and Liberation.

As for Czernobog, having gone and done the research, the reason Czernobog was never covered is because the mythological record for him is as poor as that for Amatsu-Mikaboshi, if not worse. I don't want to go into discussion of real-world religion so I won't elaborate further in this thread, but on the basis of my research I have no grounds to outline Czernobog in this context. If you mean Chernabog, the demonic figure from Disney's Fantasia, that's a different thing

Edit: If you are in a mood for inventing things wholecloth

Not at this time; try me again at some point.

Edit Edit: I found another species of baatezu that isn't in the hierarchy yet: where do jerul (Dragon #353) fit?

Just to save time in case any others crop up, assign new ones to the same tier as other things in their CR, or slightly below.

Jeruls do not appear to occupy a cosmologically useful role outside of the Realms context. They are likely of (or immediately below) the stature of osyluths but considered a demotion caste, as their role is limited and offers no promise for advancement.

Also, where do the yugoloth, the voor and the corrupter of fate, from MM 4 fit into their ladder of ascension? Does anybody have ideas for proper yugoloth-like species names for them? Or are they to "ill-thought out" to even be 'loth?

Non-'loth 'loths would be cognate to what 2E called "guardian yugoloths," essentially constructed outsiders meant to "stand in" for a yugoloth being summoned or called, as 'loths hated responding to mortal conjurings themselves. And yes, they are ill thought-out.

In general, how do Baatezu and Tana'ari feel about their respective Tiefling kin in Baator and the Abyss, particularly in terms of those who have managed to accrue a degree of local power and influence there?

Squishy and replaceable.

Are there any canonical examples of Dretch with class levels?

None come to mind offhand.

Has there been a significant dive into Far Realms lore anywhere in these threads?

I can address any questions you have here, to the best of my ability.

Would a death slaad ever try to help Orcus in any capacity to take over the material plane and turn everything undead?

Don't see that being outside the realm of possibility.

If so, would something like that be explained as easily as saying they did it for the lolz? Or would there have to be a more specific reason? Like Orcus is making them work for him?

Death slaad would want to be working toward their own personal accrual of power in some way. Orcus likely wouldn't compel slaad to work for him when demons are more predictable and undead more biddable.

Also, would a death slaad try to leave clues, if any are to be left, that would say that said slaad is a lich, trying to throw a party of their tracks?

It's a powerful magical selfish intelligent chaos frog, I don't think I could put most behaviors past it.

Final thing for now, any recommendations on books to read to research death slaad specifically?

Death slaad are never addressed tremendously well, unfortunately. Anything specific you were looking for, outside of "would a chaos frog do this unlikely thing?" (Maybe. It's a chaos frog.)

[Netbrian]

Does Sigil have a newspaper? If not, is there a close equivalent?

[Tzardok]

If you ask about the Hindu, Japanese, and Chinese pantheons, you will almost always be horribly disappointed; D&D never gave them the attention of the Big Three. The only deity noted to be kicked out of the funzone in any of these was Susano'o, and he's not an outcast from the pantheon so much as he's not welcome to hang around Amaterasu's place anymore.

Why am I not suprised?

As for others,

• Lolth/Araushnee is outcast from the Seldarine
• Vhaeraun is outcast from the Seldarine
• Eilistraee is voluntarily outcast from the Seldarine
• Laduguer is outcast from the Morndinsamman
• Deep Duerra is outcast from the Morndinsamman

So nothing I didn't know before? Well, confirmation is always nice.

Just getting me to straight-up make stuff up, are we?

Too bad for you, Amatsu-Mikaboshi was actually done (poorly) in canon. That said, there's no good way to do Amatsu-Mikaboshi, because he's apocryphal to the point of triviality even within the original source material. I have personally investigated this to a far greater extent than most any source you'd find.

Oh, I *knew* that he was done in canon. In fact, if you hadn't mentioned him in the 5. thread, I wouldn't have asked for him.

Amatsu-Mikaboshi is an intermediate deity who makes his divine realm, The Brilliant Land, on Avalas, first layer of Acheron. He is lawful evil. His favored weapon would likely be the chokutou (short sword). His domains would be Corruption, Darkness, Evil, Law, and Liberation.

A lawful deity with the Liberation domain? Now I've seen everything!
No seriously, if I understand him correctly, he is "just" a power of evil. Why does he have Liberation?

As for Czernobog, having gone and done the research, the reason Czernobog was never covered is because the mythological record for him is as poor as that for Amatsu-Mikaboshi, if not worse. I don't want to go into discussion of real-world religion so I won't elaborate further in this thread, but on the basis of my research I have no grounds to outline Czernobog in this context.

If I had more time I would do the research myself. Maybe I'll have a breakthrough at the weekend and post my own version of him. I couldn't troble you for your notes?

If you mean Chernabog, the demonic figure from Disney's Fantasia, that's a different thing

Do you mean a different in thing in general or a different thing in that you could (and would) stat him?

Not at this time; try me again at some point.

I'll hold you to that.

Just to save time in case any others crop up, assign new ones to the same tier as other things in their CR, or slightly below.

One last thing on exemplar pro- and demotion before I let the topic go:

The ascension ladder for archons is the following, right?

• Lantern Archon
• Hound Archon
• Warden Archon
• Sword Archon
• Trumpet Archon
• Throne Archon

Where do the Owl Archon (BoED), the Hammer Archon (Races of Stone), the Word Archon (ToM), the Sibyllic Guardian (Complete Psionics) and the Justice Archon (MM 4) fit?

Edit: What effect, if any, do the Mists and the other planar pecularities of Ravenloft on nonstandard ways of doing magic, like Pactmagic, Shadowmagic or Incarnum?

[enderlord99]

The ascension ladder for archons is the following, right?

• Lantern Archon
• Hound Archon
• Warden Archon
• Sword Archon
• Trumpet Archon
• Throne Archon

Absolutely not. The stronger ones go at the top.

[Tzardok]

Absolutely not. The stronger ones go at the top.

But the Throne has be at the bottom. It's where people sit!

[Bartmanhomer]

Was Tamara was a malevolent deity? I understand that she's very sensitive but what I also heard that Tamara was very malevolent.

[afroakuma]

Does Sigil have a newspaper? If not, is there a close equivalent?

Doesn't get addressed in canon that I can recall, but you could take inspiration from this. There's no reason there wouldn't be at least one (probably more) periodical circulating in the Cage.

Why am I not suprised?

I'm surprised you even tried.

A lawful deity with the Liberation domain? Now I've seen everything!
No seriously, if I understand him correctly, he is "just" a power of evil. Why does he have Liberation?

The sole attestation of Ame-no-Kagaseo/Amatsu-Mikaboshi in the Nihon Shoki identifies the nature of his conflict with the other deities as his being the final holdout/rebel against their takeover of Japan. While he was eventually forced to submit and abide by the law, he's not at all pleased about that and remains a spirit of rebellion.

If I had more time I would do the research myself. Maybe I'll have a breakthrough at the weekend and post my own version of him. I couldn't troble you for your notes?

My notes would definitely transgress board rules if posted openly. I will send the relevant material in PM. You will not like it. Gaiman is a fabulist.

Do you mean a different in thing in general or a different thing in that you could (and would) stat him?

To be clear, you want me to stat a Disney character on the basis of having appeared in seven minutes of dialogue-free animation almost eighty years ago?

The ascension ladder for archons is the following, right?

• Lantern Archon
• Hound Archon
• Warden Archon
• Sword Archon
• Trumpet Archon
• Throne Archon

Correct. In prior editions, tome archons topped the list, but 3.5 for some reason chose to use "tome archon" as the name for the members of the Hebdomad. I don't really buy into that myself.

Where do the Owl Archon (BoED), the Hammer Archon (Races of Stone), the Word Archon (ToM), the Sibyllic Guardian (Complete Psionics) and the Justice Archon (MM 4) fit?

Neatly into the garbage bin?

We would likely have to contextualize them as being lateral to the main hierarchy, not in the punishment sense like we saw with the baatezu, but perhaps more akin to "you have exceeded your current role but not yet demonstrated the qualities required of the next central role." Owl archons would be at or around the level of sword archons, gaining the opportunity through their oversight of the celestial skies to move about and see the greater lines of organized Good and Law in action as they work to become trumpets, the voices of the thrones. Word archons have advanced similarly and may be promoted from hound archons or warden archons; they fight for concepts sacred to Good but cannot become sword archons until they understand the value of Law in balance as well. Hammer archons are in the same boat, too devoted to the cause of championing Good to take their eventual rightful place. Justice archons are promoted from hound archons but possess too much pride to understand the charge of the wardens. Sibyllic guardians are promoted justice, word, or warden archons who need to earn the charge of the sword. In each of these cases, the caste is an incomplete step, a progression of virtue detained by some flaw that must be worked past through the experience gained in that role.

Edit: What effect, if any, do the Mists and the other planar pecularities of Ravenloft on nonstandard ways of doing magic, like Pactmagic, Shadowmagic or Incarnum?

All still work in the Demiplane of Dread, though there are obvious risks:

• What is given to a vestige may be more than was intended, and will be harder to get back. Checks to resist a vestige's influence or conceal signs are more difficult, and these elements may become exaggerated or twisted in new ways by the plane. Sense of self may be imperiled. The Vistani are familiar with pact magic and avoid its practice, with those who engage with vestiges known as laugotte if they can resist the signs and influences, or folto if they cannot. Some Vistani possess the skills to help a folto, but such a service is entirely at their discretion and associated with two personal costs - the one required to sever the pact, and the one imposed to teach fools not to toy with dangerous forces.

• Shadow magic is enhanced in Ravenloft, though its use risks attracting the attention of entities who believe that darkness and shadow are their province uniquely, and some effects conjured may linger beyond their intended limits or take on a life of their own, a phenomenon dubbed zsalev by the Vistani. The Vistani call giorgios and untrained Vistani shadow magic practitioners elmero and consider such people foolish. Trained Vistani shadowcasters are called eberi (sing. ebera) and are found among the Canjar (who decorate their hands with bands of black and silver), the Corvara (who paint their eyelids black and weave silver strings through their hair), and the Vatraska (who wear silver marks on the face and paint their fingernails black). Other tribes may include eberi as well, though they are not known. The capacity to discern the safe limits of shadow magic is one of the innate gifts of the Vistani, and any mortu who continues to practice does so as blindly as a giorgio.

• Truename magic is uniquely dangerous in the Demiplane of Dread, where the Dark Powers possess the capacity to alter the truenames of those within. Its potency may alternately be impeded or enhanced with limited warning, and some acts of truenaming may become permanent, especially those at risk of distorting the target or the land in some way. The truenamer may find themselves changed by their own power when not cautiously used. Truenaming bears some similarities to the curses of the Vistani, and there are many Vistani words for truenaming and truenamers - modebrie, vaumal, laissa savaque and more are all less than friendly names for the art of truenaming, while the practitioner is called a seliuque. One of the highest crimes the Vistani recognize is that of consequential truenaming - utterances that result in the permanent mutilation or alteration of a person, an animal, or the land. Both the crime and its perpetrator are called ninda, and for nindi there is only one punishment: the mitana, the curse of identity separation.

• Incarnum magic is all but unheard of in Ravenloft; a soulborn who escaped the Demiplane of Dread described the nature of incarnum within the Mists as "stale and hostile," and swore soulmelds "remembered" her and displayed attitudes of their own. She expressed fear of her own abilities while being interviewed. The entity called Illurien has sent at least one sage with expertise in metaphysics of the soul to his apparent doom in Ravenloft in order to further investigate a theory he laid out that better understanding the interactions of incarnum in Ravenloft could hold the key to understanding the true nature of the demiplane and its unknown masters. Conjecture on the strange properties of Ravenloft incarnum include that it is the constituent stuff of the Mists; that the non-Darklord residents of Ravenloft are all nothing but figments and incarnum is what gives them character and a semblance of reality; that the supply of incarnum is attainted by the pain of myriad lost souls and wandering spirits suffering in the Demiplane of Dread; and at least one abstract theory positing that all use of incarnum in Ravenloft is in fact necrocarnum, akin to a type of unnatural magic practiced on a remote Prime world in a sealed sphere. The Vistani do not seem to be familiar with incarnum, save for possibly the Zarovan, and if they know anything they have kept entirely mum on the subject. The word videshi has been heard to describe both incarnum and other unusual supernatural abilities not understood by the Vistani; the practitioners of such are pardeshi (sing. pardesha) and each band may have varying attitudes toward such individuals, though skepticism and suspicion predominate.

Was Tamara was a malevolent deity? I understand that she's very sensitive but what I also heard that Tamara was very malevolent.

Definitely not. Tamara is neutral good and explicitly noted to be the kindest of the draconic deities.

[Tzardok]

The sole attestation of Ame-no-Kagaseo/Amatsu-Mikaboshi in the Nihon Shoki identifies the nature of his conflict with the other deities as his being the final holdout/rebel against their takeover of Japan. While he was eventually forced to submit and abide by the law, he's not at all pleased about that and remains a spirit of rebellion.

Ah, clear.

My notes would definitely transgress board rules if posted openly. I will send the relevant material in PM. You will not like it. Gaiman is a fabulist.

Thank you!

To be clear, you want me to stat a Disney character on the basis of having appeared in seven minutes of dialogue-free animation almost eighty years ago?

To be honest, there isn't much D&D-related I wouldn't believe you to be capable of. If anybody could do it, it would be you.

Correct. In prior editions, tome archons topped the list, but 3.5 for some reason chose to use "tome archon" as the name for the members of the Hebdomad. I don't really buy into that myself.

Really? It was my understanding that the Hebdomad as unique beings didn't exist in 2e and that their role was filled by the tome archons. I thought 3.5 simply decided to make them into unique beings instead of a species with just seven members.

We would likely have to contextualize them as being lateral to the main hierarchy, not in the punishment sense like we saw with the baatezu, but perhaps more akin to "you have exceeded your current role but not yet demonstrated the qualities required of the next central role." Owl archons would be at or around the level of sword archons, gaining the opportunity through their oversight of the celestial skies to move about and see the greater lines of organized Good and Law in action as they work to become trumpets, the voices of the thrones. Word archons have advanced similarly and may be promoted from hound archons or warden archons; they fight for concepts sacred to Good but cannot become sword archons until they understand the value of Law in balance as well. Hammer archons are in the same boat, too devoted to the cause of championing Good to take their eventual rightful place. Justice archons are promoted from hound archons but possess too much pride to understand the charge of the wardens. Sibyllic guardians are promoted justice, word, or warden archons who need to earn the charge of the sword. In each of these cases, the caste is an incomplete step, a progression of virtue detained by some flaw that must be worked past through the experience gained in that role.

A very fitting way of formulating archon pecularities. I'll take it with pleasure.

All still work in the Demiplane of Dread, though there are obvious risks:

• What is given to a vestige may be more than was intended, and will be harder to get back. Checks to resist a vestige's influence or conceal signs are more difficult, and these elements may become exaggerated or twisted in new ways by the plane. Sense of self may be imperiled. The Vistani are familiar with pact magic and avoid its practice, with those who engage with vestiges known as laugotte if they can resist the signs and influences, or folto if they cannot. Some Vistani possess the skills to help a folto, but such a service is entirely at their discretion and associated with two personal costs - the one required to sever the pact, and the one imposed to teach fools not to toy with dangerous forces.

• Shadow magic is enhanced in Ravenloft, though its use risks attracting the attention of entities who believe that darkness and shadow are their province uniquely, and some effects conjured may linger beyond their intended limits or take on a life of their own, a phenomenon dubbed zsalev by the Vistani. The Vistani call giorgios and untrained Vistani shadow magic practitioners elmero and consider such people foolish. Trained Vistani shadowcasters are called eberi (sing. ebera) and are found among the Canjar (who decorate their hands with bands of black and silver), the Corvara (who paint their eyelids black and weave silver strings through their hair), and the Vatraska (who wear silver marks on the face and paint their fingernails black). Other tribes may include eberi as well, though they are not known. The capacity to discern the safe limits of shadow magic is one of the innate gifts of the Vistani, and any mortu who continues to practice does so as blindly as a giorgio.

• Truename magic is uniquely dangerous in the Demiplane of Dread, where the Dark Powers possess the capacity to alter the truenames of those within. Its potency may alternately be impeded or enhanced with limited warning, and some acts of truenaming may become permanent, especially those at risk of distorting the target or the land in some way. The truenamer may find themselves changed by their own power when not cautiously used. Truenaming bears some similarities to the curses of the Vistani, and there are many Vistani words for truenaming and truenamers - modebrie, vaumal, laissa savaque and more are all less than friendly names for the art of truenaming, while the practitioner is called a seliuque. One of the highest crimes the Vistani recognize is that of consequential truenaming - utterances that result in the permanent mutilation or alteration of a person, an animal, or the land. Both the crime and its perpetrator are called ninda, and for nindi there is only one punishment: the mitana, the curse of identity separation.

• Incarnum magic is all but unheard of in Ravenloft; a soulborn who escaped the Demiplane of Dread described the nature of incarnum within the Mists as "stale and hostile," and swore soulmelds "remembered" her and displayed attitudes of their own. She expressed fear of her own abilities while being interviewed. The entity called Illurien has sent at least one sage with expertise in metaphysics of the soul to his apparent doom in Ravenloft in order to further investigate a theory he laid out that better understanding the interactions of incarnum in Ravenloft could hold the key to understanding the true nature of the demiplane and its unknown masters. Conjecture on the strange properties of Ravenloft incarnum include that it is the constituent stuff of the Mists; that the non-Darklord residents of Ravenloft are all nothing but figments and incarnum is what gives them character and a semblance of reality; that the supply of incarnum is attainted by the pain of myriad lost souls and wandering spirits suffering in the Demiplane of Dread; and at least one abstract theory positing that all use of incarnum in Ravenloft is in fact necrocarnum, akin to a type of unnatural magic practiced on a remote Prime world in a sealed sphere. The Vistani do not seem to be familiar with incarnum, save for possibly the Zarovan, and if they know anything they have kept entirely mum on the subject. The word videshi has been heard to describe both incarnum and other unusual supernatural abilities not understood by the Vistani; the practitioners of such are pardeshi (sing. pardesha) and each band may have varying attitudes toward such individuals, though skepticism and suspicion predominate.

For the sake of completeness: psionics and warlock/dragonfire adept invocations work normally in Ravenloft? And how would invocations interact with Athasian defiling?

[Eldan]

I think the answer for most magics in Ravenloft is "darkly twisted".

Warlock magic sounds like an especially bad idea, though, because both fey and demons on Ravenloft are interesting.

[Delvin Anaris]

To be clear, you want me to stat a Disney character on the basis of having appeared in seven minutes of dialogue-free animation almost eighty years ago?

Oh, come now! He's appeared at least twice as a boss in Kingdom Hearts games!

[Quietus]

I can address any questions you have here, to the best of my ability.

Alright, keeping in mind that I am probing for ideas/inspiration, then..

I know I've read something about a lost library (Xaxox?) somewhere in the Far Realms, where elven mages had tried to learn the realm's secrets and were twisted - I think that was where the Kaorti came from, if I'm not mistaken. Are there any known details about this library, or how one would get there?

Are there any other known locations or features of the Far Realms that might be interesting to present? Particular allies or enemies to be made, if one can somehow withstand the influence of the Far Realms themselves?

[enderlord99]

In previous iterations of this thread, it has been put forward that you should never have a campaign be set, even partially, in the Far Realm. It's unimagineable, which is a big problem for a game that takes place mostly in the imagination.

It is not just extremely strange; that's the Deep Ethereal.

It is not just distant from reality; that's the Deep Shadow.

It is not just maddening and hostile; that's the Abyss.

It is not just mysterious and hard-to-reach; that's the Ordial.

It is inconceivable in the sense that we cannot possibly think about it.

EDIT: Apparently that only fully applies to Ultimon.

[Tzardok]

To quote myself mangling a quote:

The Great Wheel is that what is. Alternate realities are that what could be. The Far Realms are that what never was, never will be and must not be.

Edit: The problem with asking about allies and enemies and the Far Realms is that our reality is just as anathema and corrupting to the Far Realms as they are to our reality. So smart Far Realms entities stay the hell away from us. The only Far Realms entity I remember that is crazy enough to have an active interest in our world (and therefore could be talked into an alliance) is Mak Thuum Ngatha, the Nine-Tounged Worm. He is worshipped as a deity by Tsochari, Psurlons and similiar creatures.

[Sepultra]

I read back to the first thread after digging it up and I was wondering if someone could link me the essay about the Ordial Plane referenced in the first one of these threads? It was post 24. I'd link it but I don't have enough posts. It sounds really interesting, but I've been completely unable to find anything similar to it.

Also @afroakuma a question: what do you think the Prisoner of Elysium is?

Thanks in advance!

[enderlord99]

what do you think the Prisoner of Elysium is?

Spoiler: Afro's peviously-mentioned headcanon on this subject

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Spoiler: I think it's tradition to nest this in a set of three spoiler-tags for some reason

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Spoiler: this is the last one

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The first Fallen

[Sepultra]

Thanks for that. I have never heard of this before in a D&D sense. Is there anywhere I could read anything on it?

[enderlord99]

Thanks for that. I have never heard of this before in a D&D sense. Is there anywhere I could read anything on it?

There is not.

[FearlessGnome]

Who are some deities who offer a particularly gruesome afterlife for their worshipers? I would have asked which is the 'worst' afterlife available to large groups of people, but the number 1 spot would of course be subjective.

[Tzardok]

Spoiler: Afro's peviously-mentioned headcanon on this subject

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Spoiler: I think it's tradition to nest this in a set of three spoiler-tags for some reason

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Spoiler: this is the last one

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The first Fallen

Oh, regarding that a question just came to me: Do you think that happened after or during the War of Law and Chaos? On one hand, the close cooperation between good and evil during the war and the atrocities done would invite it. On the other hand it would fit better with the heightened import of Good and Evil after the war. Or did it happen, maybe, before the war? Were the Guardinals already around?

Spoiler: Follow up question

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And it invites the question: what happened to the First Risen Fiend? Was that one earlier or later? Did they happen at the same time and maybe in reaction to each other?

[enderlord99]

Spoiler: Follow up question

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And it invites the question: what happened to the First Risen Fiend? Was that one earlier or later? Did they happen at the same time and maybe in reaction to each other?

Spoiler

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It could be the same thing, since "falling" in the relevant sense doesn't actually indicate direction.