| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Azar |
Posted - 21 Apr 2023 : 09:19:55
Hello!
Are there any arks in The Realms, whether they are sanctuaries to be preserved, nests of ancient evil requiring destruction or something in-between? |
| 23 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| sleyvas |
Posted - 21 Jul 2023 : 16:15:53
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
quote:
Originally posted by sleyvas
There is a strange druid of Talos named Nowuh who is noted for apparently setting up a lumber mill which takes in fallen lumber from the jungles of Chondath. He is building a giant ship with this lumber and collecting mateable pairs of numerous animals, including displacer beasts, axebeaks, disenchanters, rust monsters, etc... Its said he believes that another water rising similar to what happened during the second sundering or the sudden tidal wave that destroyed the civilization of Jhaamdath is coming. He says that it will be caused by "The Falling Tear of Coliar's Dragon Lords" and spouts nonsense about some interplanetary conflict between the dragons of Faerun and dragons on a completely different "world" that is nothing more than a collection of small moving lights in the night sky.
Perhaps this is another topic ...
But it seems to me that the denizens of the Realms have endured the Time of Troubles, Dragonrages, The Spellplague, The Sundering, Another Sundering, etc. Along with all the usual natural disasters and supernatural disasters, fires, floods, plagues, etc. A different cataclysmic storm of destruction hits the Realms every generation or so. Bodies and craters keep accumulating while whole continents have been overturned. It's almost a wonder that the Realms hasn't become a post-apocalyptic setting.
So it seems like priests "spouting nonsense" about impending doom, fire, floods, and death-from-the-sky cataclysms might actually be taken seriously. Should be taken seriously. Even if they just happen to worship an evil god.
Absolutely. Granted, a lot of that history is WAAAAYYYYY past human remembrance. For a comparison... in our own world, just how far back do we have really good documented history (and this is with the printing press available for centuries now).... I think good documentation might only go back maybe 3 or 4 millenia. So, if we look at dates... the fall of the Imaskari empire would in our world exist past most basic "earth historians" knowledge. The RISE of the Imaskari empire, Jhaamdath, and the genie led civilizations in southwestern Faerun would all be only vaguely documented. Granted, having elven, dwarven, draconic, etc... histories to call upon might help, but some folks might distrust those sources (perhaps rightly so). |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 18 Jul 2023 : 04:25:05
quote:
Originally posted by sleyvas
There is a strange druid of Talos named Nowuh who is noted for apparently setting up a lumber mill which takes in fallen lumber from the jungles of Chondath. He is building a giant ship with this lumber and collecting mateable pairs of numerous animals, including displacer beasts, axebeaks, disenchanters, rust monsters, etc... Its said he believes that another water rising similar to what happened during the second sundering or the sudden tidal wave that destroyed the civilization of Jhaamdath is coming. He says that it will be caused by "The Falling Tear of Coliar's Dragon Lords" and spouts nonsense about some interplanetary conflict between the dragons of Faerun and dragons on a completely different "world" that is nothing more than a collection of small moving lights in the night sky.
Perhaps this is another topic ...
But it seems to me that the denizens of the Realms have endured the Time of Troubles, Dragonrages, The Spellplague, The Sundering, Another Sundering, etc. Along with all the usual natural disasters and supernatural disasters, fires, floods, plagues, etc. A different cataclysmic storm of destruction hits the Realms every generation or so. Bodies and craters keep accumulating while whole continents have been overturned. It's almost a wonder that the Realms hasn't become a post-apocalyptic setting.
So it seems like priests "spouting nonsense" about impending doom, fire, floods, and death-from-the-sky cataclysms might actually be taken seriously. Should be taken seriously. Even if they just happen to worship an evil god. |
| Azar |
Posted - 18 Jul 2023 : 03:12:00
quote:
Originally posted by Barastir
quote:
Originally posted by Azar
(...)
I can see a Dwarven kingdom on the verge of collapse channeling divine power to build the fantasy equivalent of terracotta soldiers to house their souls...waiting to be born again as living, breathing Dwarves when a certain prophecy is fulfilled.
The "fantasy equivalent of terracotta soldiers" already exists in Kara-Tur, an entire army turned to stone by a magical mirror, IIRC, and to be awaken at a certain time.
That isn't terribly surprising (at the least, it's no more surprising than genies in Calimshan/Zakhara, dinosaurs in Chult, feathered serpents in Maztica and knights in shining armor/tower-bound princesses in most other parts of Faerun inspired by European mythology). Thank you  . |
| Barastir |
Posted - 16 May 2023 : 16:41:41
quote:
Originally posted by Azar
(...)
I can see a Dwarven kingdom on the verge of collapse channeling divine power to build the fantasy equivalent of terracotta soldiers to house their souls...waiting to be born again as living, breathing Dwarves when a certain prophecy is fulfilled.
The "fantasy equivalent of terracotta soldiers" already exists in Kara-Tur, an entire army turned to stone by a magical mirror, IIRC, and to be awaken at a certain time. |
| TBeholder |
Posted - 14 May 2023 : 20:41:26
See also: "How do elves contain evil forces?" scroll.
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
"The Lords Who Sleep were not slain; one of the ghazneths modified the spells protecting them. A few Lords were awoken, but the modified enchantments caused them to recklessly attack all who were near. By the time the modified enchantments were undone and it was safe to awaken the remaining Lords, the Devil Dragon had been slain. The remaining Lords were left in their enchanted slumber, against the rise of a future threat to the Forest Kingdom.
However, changes were made to the enchantments protecting the Lords, and they no longer await their future in just one location. To prevent future attacks on the Lords, groups of them were moved to other locations."
Why would this happen? That's a fanfic grade contrivance.
quote:
Originally posted by George Krashos
has them arrive on the battlefield and save Azoun from a dragon attack and all die in the process. Same end result - they are all dead, but they get the heroic send-off they deserved. I'm no novelist, but that's not a difficult idea to come up with.
That's plot point balancing, with narrative causality sticking out. It would not stick out if they were reactivated before ghazneth was in range, but only managed to delay the enemy "off-screen".
I may join in wincing at "yet another RSE", but when something unusual does happen, the best laid plans of men and mice should not automatically prove useful.
A lot of preparations just get wasted when running into "unknown unknowns". Not having those is a contrivance. Those failures have effect too. Sure, this can quickly get ridiculous when poorly written, but anything can get ridiculous when poorly written ("the tough guy who gets beaten as a benchmark for the new threat... again", etc). |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 09 May 2023 : 22:16:03
quote:
Originally posted by George Krashos
To be clear: Troy was writing the Tanalasta scenes, Ed was writing the Azoun scenes. What would it have cost Troy to have his party come to the tomb of the Sleeping Sword and find it empty, with the heroes therein, mysteriously gone? Nothing. And then Ed has them arrive on the battlefield and save Azoun from a dragon attack and all die in the process. Same end result - they are all dead, but they get the heroic send-off they deserved. I'm no novelist, but that's not a difficult idea to come up with.
-- George Krashos
Oh, a much better idea than I had. |
| George Krashos |
Posted - 09 May 2023 : 09:45:40
To be clear: Troy was writing the Tanalasta scenes, Ed was writing the Azoun scenes. What would it have cost Troy to have his party come to the tomb of the Sleeping Sword and find it empty, with the heroes therein, mysteriously gone? Nothing. And then Ed has them arrive on the battlefield and save Azoun from a dragon attack and all die in the process. Same end result - they are all dead, but they get the heroic send-off they deserved. I'm no novelist, but that's not a difficult idea to come up with.
-- George Krashos |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 05 May 2023 : 05:59:07
quote:
Originally posted by George Krashos
If you're talking about the Lords Who Sleep, they were put in stasis a long time before there were High Knights. Or Purple Dragons for that matter. They were all killed off in a paragraph by Troy Denning in "Beyond the High Road". One of the most wasteful, egregious and insulting uses of Ed's lore in the history of Realms writing.
-- George Krashos
So, on the one hand, I can kinda see why Denning may have done this -- he was looking at existing lore and saw that the Lords would mess up the plot as written. So he neutralized them, to keep from having to change anything.
This is not to say that was definitely his reasoning; I don't know that. And it's not a defense of what he did; I think there would have been better ways to address this.
In fact, I've got a file of changes I would make to my Realms, deviating from canon. And I just added this to my file. It's obviously rough and needs a bit of work, but the basic idea is, I think, sound.
"The Lords Who Sleep were not slain; one of the ghazneths modified the spells protecting them. A few Lords were awoken, but the modified enchantments caused them to recklessly attack all who were near. By the time the modified enchantments were undone and it was safe to awaken the remaining Lords, the Devil Dragon had been slain. The remaining Lords were left in their enchanted slumber, against the rise of a future threat to the Forest Kingdom.
However, changes were made to the enchantments protecting the Lords, and they no longer await their future in just one location. To prevent future attacks on the Lords, groups of them were moved to other locations." |
| sleyvas |
Posted - 04 May 2023 : 15:38:19
quote:
Originally posted by Azar
Ah. I am not on a first-name basis with any Forgotten Realms writer and so I wondered if there was a board member around these parts either with the real name of "Eric" or with the username of "Eric" that happens to be fairly renowned...yet also happened to slip beneath my radar  . That said, I have a good deal of respect for the imagination that Mr. Boyd laid down in his hallowed trilogy of deity supplements; those works inspired this DM to flesh out at least a handful of religions.
Anyhow, a story featuring Dwarven statues transforming into actual Dwarves isn't exactly an idea out of left field, given that Moradin himself forged his people into existence. The "why" is what's crucial.
Nah, I don't personally know them (wish I did, of them all I've talked more with George than any of them), but Eric is Eric L. Boyd... Steven is Steven Schend... George is George Krashos or sometimes Krash... Ed is Ed (like Elminster, there is only one Ed... even if there are more).. Elaine is Elaine Cunningham.... and Wooly really is a giant space hamster, don't let him tell you otherwise. There's a few other less well known names around here too who actually published for TSR or wizards.
Me... I'm just an old Thayan bounty hunter whose wife was killed by a paladin on accident, whose life then went dark.... travelled to ravenloft, then a gothic version of earth's late 1900's, then back to the realms.... where I changed time to rescue my wife while making my past self believe she was still dead.... only to realize I couldn't protect her from my fellow Thayans who would use her against me, so I arranged with a Chosen of Mystra to hide her in return for spy services against my fellow Thayans... which put me on the run in Chessenta where I became involved with the church of the red knight... until I eventually went to Waterdeep, got involved with my daughter-in-law's attempts to find what happened to some fat moneylender... and got turned into a talking spellbook that hangs around with a pompous floating sai with a penchant for history and the weaveghost mage-priestess of Deneir that is my daughter-in-law now. You know... the usual. |
| Brimstone |
Posted - 04 May 2023 : 14:59:02
quote:
Originally posted by George Krashos
If you're talking about the Lords Who Sleep, they were put in stasis a long time before there were High Knights. Or Purple Dragons for that matter. They were all killed off in a paragraph by Troy Denning in "Beyond the High Road". One of the most wasteful, egregious and insulting uses of Ed's lore in the history of Realms writing.
-- George Krashos
Thanks Krash. I read that book over ten years ago. Good thing my Realms are set in the OGB. |
| George Krashos |
Posted - 04 May 2023 : 12:33:51
If you're talking about the Lords Who Sleep, they were put in stasis a long time before there were High Knights. Or Purple Dragons for that matter. They were all killed off in a paragraph by Troy Denning in "Beyond the High Road". One of the most wasteful, egregious and insulting uses of Ed's lore in the history of Realms writing.
-- George Krashos |
| Brimstone |
Posted - 03 May 2023 : 14:12:03
Didn't Cormyr put some really powerful Purple Dragon High Knights in stasis to be used in times of DIRE need? |
| AJA |
Posted - 03 May 2023 : 07:15:40
quote:
Originally posted by Azar
Ah. I am not on a first-name basis with any Forgotten Realms writer
Really, neither are the vast majority of the rest of us, but it is to the credit of the fandom here that those writers and contributors who use their given names (Eric, George, Erik, Elaine, Erin, etc.) don't mind a bit of first-name familiarity. Especially in the case of Ed, who has explicitly stated in the past that he prefers just 'Ed', and that 'Mr. Ed' either refers to his father, or to the talking TV horse.
That said, and back to topic, no it's not out of left-field. The 'why' is simple; I can easily imagine dwarven society where those warriors who survive to reach an accomplished elder age, where their martial abilities began declining, instead voluntarily surrender themselves into that sort of stasis, to be called upon in time of dire need ("The Dwarves Who Sleep," to steal a Cormyrean phrase). Very similar to the elven concept of Baelnorn, as eternal keepers and protectors of dwarven communities. So yes, I'd say there's plenty of room for those terracotta soldiers in the Realms (by either an actively-collapsing community, or a future one where that option was overwhelmed before it was able to be triggered, and so, prophecy).
|
| Azar |
Posted - 03 May 2023 : 03:51:51
Ah. I am not on a first-name basis with any Forgotten Realms writer and so I wondered if there was a board member around these parts either with the real name of "Eric" or with the username of "Eric" that happens to be fairly renowned...yet also happened to slip beneath my radar . That said, I have a good deal of respect for the imagination that Mr. Boyd laid down in his hallowed trilogy of deity supplements; those works inspired this DM to flesh out at least a handful of religions.
Anyhow, a story featuring Dwarven statues transforming into actual Dwarves isn't exactly an idea out of left field, given that Moradin himself forged his people into existence. The "why" is what's crucial. |
| sleyvas |
Posted - 02 May 2023 : 22:15:39
quote:
Originally posted by AJA
quote:
Originally posted by Azar
Who?
One messr. L. Boyd, most famously known through the following Internet meme:
https://i.imgur.com/QVwN9gT.jpg
(more seriously, I think sleyvas may be thinking of the DUNGEON Magazine #69 adventure, 'Sleep of Ages', perhaps?)
Yeah, that one. |
| AJA |
Posted - 02 May 2023 : 06:17:31
quote:
Originally posted by Azar
Who?
One messr. L. Boyd, most famously known through the following Internet meme:
https://i.imgur.com/QVwN9gT.jpg
(more seriously, I think sleyvas may be thinking of the DUNGEON Magazine #69 adventure, 'Sleep of Ages', perhaps?)
|
| Azar |
Posted - 01 May 2023 : 23:50:13
quote:
Originally posted by sleyvas
quote:
Originally posted by Azar
Come to think of it, a certain early 2000s CRPG set in The Forgotten Realms features a kind of ark. Anyhow, I can see a Dwarven kingdom on the verge of collapse channeling divine power to build the fantasy equivalent of terracotta soldiers to house their souls...waiting to be born again as living, breathing Dwarves when a certain prophecy is fulfilled.
Didn't Eric do almost exactly that in a module in dungeon?
Who? |
| sleyvas |
Posted - 01 May 2023 : 18:12:21
quote:
Originally posted by Azar
Come to think of it, a certain early 2000s CRPG set in The Forgotten Realms features a kind of ark. Anyhow, I can see a Dwarven kingdom on the verge of collapse channeling divine power to build the fantasy equivalent of terracotta soldiers to house their souls...waiting to be born again as living, breathing Dwarves when a certain prophecy is fulfilled.
Didn't Eric do almost exactly that in a module in dungeon? |
| Azar |
Posted - 01 May 2023 : 00:03:27
Come to think of it, a certain early 2000s CRPG set in The Forgotten Realms features a kind of ark. Anyhow, I can see a Dwarven kingdom on the verge of collapse channeling divine power to build the fantasy equivalent of terracotta soldiers to house their souls...waiting to be born again as living, breathing Dwarves when a certain prophecy is fulfilled. |
| sleyvas |
Posted - 30 Apr 2023 : 01:21:49
quote:
Originally posted by Azar
quote:
Originally posted by sleyvas
There is a strange druid of Talos named Nowuh who is noted for apparently setting up a lumber mill which takes in fallen lumber from the jungles of Chondath. He is building a giant ship with this lumber and collecting mateable pairs of numerous animals, including displacer beasts, axebeaks, disenchanters, rust monsters, etc... Its said he believes that another water rising similar to what happened during the second sundering or the sudden tidal wave that destroyed the civilization of Jhaamdath is coming. He says that it will be caused by "The Falling Tear of Coliar's Dragon Lords" and spouts nonsense about some interplanetary conflict between the dragons of Faerun and dragons on a completely different "world" that is nothing more than a collection of small moving lights in the night sky.
So sayeth Mendacity Spinayarn of Nimbral
Supplement?
Sorry, I figured you'd catch on that I was making all that up with the name at the end. That being said, when I do things like that... I like to make them still plausible/usable. Using the above in a game with players could be very fun, as they SEE a very different version of Noah happening, etc.... |
| HighOne |
Posted - 28 Apr 2023 : 01:44:57
quote:
Originally posted by Azar
quote:
Originally posted by sleyvas
There is a strange druid of Talos named Nowuh who is noted for apparently setting up a lumber mill which takes in fallen lumber from the jungles of Chondath. He is building a giant ship with this lumber and collecting mateable pairs of numerous animals, including displacer beasts, axebeaks, disenchanters, rust monsters, etc... Its said he believes that another water rising similar to what happened during the second sundering or the sudden tidal wave that destroyed the civilization of Jhaamdath is coming. He says that it will be caused by "The Falling Tear of Coliar's Dragon Lords" and spouts nonsense about some interplanetary conflict between the dragons of Faerun and dragons on a completely different "world" that is nothing more than a collection of small moving lights in the night sky.
So sayeth Mendacity Spinayarn of Nimbral
Supplement?
It's a joke. Nowuh = Noah. |
| Azar |
Posted - 27 Apr 2023 : 11:02:03
quote:
Originally posted by sleyvas
There is a strange druid of Talos named Nowuh who is noted for apparently setting up a lumber mill which takes in fallen lumber from the jungles of Chondath. He is building a giant ship with this lumber and collecting mateable pairs of numerous animals, including displacer beasts, axebeaks, disenchanters, rust monsters, etc... Its said he believes that another water rising similar to what happened during the second sundering or the sudden tidal wave that destroyed the civilization of Jhaamdath is coming. He says that it will be caused by "The Falling Tear of Coliar's Dragon Lords" and spouts nonsense about some interplanetary conflict between the dragons of Faerun and dragons on a completely different "world" that is nothing more than a collection of small moving lights in the night sky.
So sayeth Mendacity Spinayarn of Nimbral
Supplement? |
| sleyvas |
Posted - 21 Apr 2023 : 14:21:31
There is a strange druid of Talos named Nowuh who is noted for apparently setting up a lumber mill which takes in fallen lumber from the jungles of Chondath. He is building a giant ship with this lumber and collecting mateable pairs of numerous animals, including displacer beasts, axebeaks, disenchanters, rust monsters, etc... Its said he believes that another water rising similar to what happened during the second sundering or the sudden tidal wave that destroyed the civilization of Jhaamdath is coming. He says that it will be caused by "The Falling Tear of Coliar's Dragon Lords" and spouts nonsense about some interplanetary conflict between the dragons of Faerun and dragons on a completely different "world" that is nothing more than a collection of small moving lights in the night sky.
So sayeth Mendacity Spinayarn of Nimbral |
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