| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Arioch |
Posted - 13 Feb 2015 : 09:58:15
Does anybody knows (from official lore or personal guessing) what is Bane doing since the destruction of Zenthil Keep (in 1383 DR I guess) aside from making Fzoul his demigod?
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| 30 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| cpthero2 |
Posted - 15 Nov 2020 : 01:38:03
Senior Scribe Delnyn,
quote:
...he already promised his soul to Bane after 1,000 years - and seized his soul before the ritual finished.
This really begs the question: exactly how many times did Szass Tam try to thwart any and all efforts by Lord Bane, and when Bane died, did that restart the 1,000 years?
Best regards,
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| Delnyn |
Posted - 14 Nov 2020 : 18:51:39
I would not take the "Undead" trilogy too seriously. Assuming the Dread Ring ritual would have worked as Szass Tam thought it would, surely Bane would have detected Szass Tam's attempt - he already promised his soul to Bane after 1,000 years - and seized his soul before the ritual finished. One would also think Larloch kept a close eye on our most esteemed Zulkir of Necromancy after that deal with Thakorsil's Seat and the Death Moon Orb. He could have squashed Szass Tam's plans -and Szass Tam himself - before Bane lifted a finger.
quote:
Originally posted by sleyvas
quote:
Originally posted by keftiu
Damn, this entire thread and nobody mentioned that his was the state religion of Thay for all of 4e, helping Szass Tam consolidate power?
On a sidenote for that, so if one wants to destroy Szass Tam, one needs to bring other religions back to Thay in theory, such that he reneges his deal and has to give up his soul? Just a thought. Then again, I've been proposing that Mystra's resurgence has to do with Tam's failed ritual draining power into her and that the whole "Tome of Fastrin the Delver" was an elaborate lie that confused even him. It possibly even had some involvement with kicking off the second sundering.
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| cpthero2 |
Posted - 06 Nov 2020 : 21:20:07
Master Krashos,
quote:
Which leads to a further question: do undead have souls?
I think this is interestingly considered when judged against three RL philosophers quotes about the soul, and then considering what happens when someone in the Realms dies.
- "The body will not be identical to the soul. The soul is the form of a natural body having life potentially the soul is not separable from the body" (Aristotle, De Anima)
- "So that what I say is to the soul by which I am what I am is entirely distinct from the body, and it is even easier to know him (Rene Descartes, Discourse on Method)
I really think those are interesting considerations when contemplating the nature of undeath and a soul.
quote:
May depend on the undead? Don't liches have phylacteries for their souls, whereas lower level undead (like zombies) wouldn't, as their souls have already moved on?
That is also a great point too, Great Reader CorellonsDevout. I mean, it would seem to be that the notion that Descartes had would be correct. The soul is separate.
Best regards,
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| PattPlays |
Posted - 13 Oct 2020 : 07:04:44
quote:
Originally posted by sleyvas
quote:
Originally posted by George Krashos
Which leads to a further question: do undead have souls?
-- George Krashos
Oh, I hadn't seen this question until Corellonsdevout responded. Yeah, like they said, I feel it depends on the type of undead. I personally feel that liches DO have souls that they've tied up in phylacteries. Its intrinsic to their design. There's some other undead which seem similar (for instance, skeletal warriors... the ones who are tied to a circlet which seems to contain their souls... they seem to be like that. Later iterations of death knights also are more lich like). Skeleons and zombies don't. Now, when you get to a creature like a mummy and a vampire, that's when it gets a little more nebulous.
I think alongside all of the spells involved in the lichdom ritual go toward the extreme effort of preserving your soul in the transition, but I'd bet you would need a hell of a lot of self-obsession and ego to literally fuel yourself off of the souls of others and not slowly become a warped hating vortex of the suffering you inflicted upon others.
Also, hell yes souls and positive energy conversation? How ironic this all came from thread necromancy..
..as for Bane.. has he done anything any new player would care about? My archives have no data for him since one hundred and fourty years ago. |
| sleyvas |
Posted - 12 Oct 2020 : 23:07:55
quote:
Originally posted by George Krashos
Which leads to a further question: do undead have souls?
-- George Krashos
Oh, I hadn't seen this question until Corellonsdevout responded. Yeah, like they said, I feel it depends on the type of undead. I personally feel that liches DO have souls that they've tied up in phylacteries. Its intrinsic to their design. There's some other undead which seem similar (for instance, skeletal warriors... the ones who are tied to a circlet which seems to contain their souls... they seem to be like that. Later iterations of death knights also are more lich like). Skeleons and zombies don't. Now, when you get to a creature like a mummy and a vampire, that's when it gets a little more nebulous. |
| CorellonsDevout |
Posted - 12 Oct 2020 : 22:07:45
May depend on the undead? Don't liches have phylacteries for their souls, whereas lower level undead (like zombies) wouldn't, as their souls have already moved on? |
| Gary Dallison |
Posted - 29 Sep 2020 : 07:15:50
For me the answer is no.
I decided a soul is just positive energy.
A little bit of positive energy is enough to give life some semblance of life to something. So you can animate an object with the tiniest spark of positive energy.
Plants have a bit more positive energy. Animals have a bit more than that and humanoids have the most.
Now positive energy must feed off life experience and grow and replicate itself, that is why when people live and do lots of things they advance in levels.
Positive energy also retains some of that information and experience so that when you die your soul remembers pieces about its existence (the greater your experience, the larger the amount of positive energy, the more it remembers).
When you clone a soul it breaks a piece off and that piece of positive energy can start forming it's own experiences and growing itself. When you have children it breaks a piece off the souls of both parents (a much smaller piece) and that child makes it's own experiences and grows its soul larger.
Undead of course are created with negative energy, which is anathema to positive energy.
In the case of skeletons and zombies where the soul has already departed, the negative energy feeds animates the body like an automaton.
In ghouls and ghosts they must have enough negative energy to form their own anti soul of sorts but one with little more than animal intelligence.
Vampires infect a body with negative energy that feeds off and destroys the soul of the host, creating a mimic negative energy version of that soul.
Liches trap the positive energy soul in a phylactery and slowly drain it.
I'm gonna guess positive energy is very unstable and difficult to work with normally unless it has been tempered into a soul by living. So souls are highly prized as being one of the few workable sources of positive energy (everything else just explodes or burns). So outsiders really want this stuff.
Negative energy can form the anti version of souls but it's a longer, slower process (zombies left alone in a crypt for centuries developing their own little quirks. The results are always more feral and destructive as it hunters to feed on positive energy because negative energy is not self sustaining on the material plane (which is powered by positive energy).
That's just how I play it. Rather than make the soul something different I chose to make it just a basic building block of dnd life. |
| George Krashos |
Posted - 29 Sep 2020 : 02:43:40
Which leads to a further question: do undead have souls?
-- George Krashos |
| sleyvas |
Posted - 27 Sep 2020 : 19:13:50
quote:
Originally posted by keftiu
Damn, this entire thread and nobody mentioned that his was the state religion of Thay for all of 4e, helping Szass Tam consolidate power?
On a sidenote for that, so if one wants to destroy Szass Tam, one needs to bring other religions back to Thay in theory, such that he reneges his deal and has to give up his soul? Just a thought. Then again, I've been proposing that Mystra's resurgence has to do with Tam's failed ritual draining power into her and that the whole "Tome of Fastrin the Delver" was an elaborate lie that confused even him. It possibly even had some involvement with kicking off the second sundering.
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| keftiu |
Posted - 27 Sep 2020 : 18:32:20
Damn, this entire thread and nobody mentioned that his was the state religion of Thay for all of 4e, helping Szass Tam consolidate power? |
| Delnyn |
Posted - 27 Sep 2020 : 16:27:24
Thread Necromancy Alert.
Wooly is being nice. Once every edition is too often, even excluding the "Mystra is the Kenny McCormack of the Faerunian Pantheon" trope. If Tiamat can go through the Well of Dragons in that Tyranny of Dragons module, what would stop other gods from following suit? This is just another invitation for a ToT free-for-all, and I (naively) thought 5e wanted the gods to distance themselves from direct interventions.
At what point does RSE stand for Really Stupid Effluvia?
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
quote:
Originally posted by George Krashos
Maybe we can have a Realms where the gods don't play a direct role in the events that occur every ten-day. Just saying.
-- George Krashos
Agreed. Once a month is enough.  
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| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 24 Jan 2017 : 03:28:55
Okay, the spammer has been hit with the banhammer, and his post removed. I've also removed the URL from the people that quoted that guy, because I'm not giving out free advertising.
Also, let's be careful with this conversation. Y'all know I'm always ready to make jokes, but I'd prefer not to see this one veering into deeply unfunny territory. |
| sleyvas |
Posted - 24 Jan 2017 : 01:39:59
quote:
Originally posted by George Krashos
quote:
Originally posted by Monok
If you are looking for your real soulmate or love you can visit Some dating site that has had its URL cast into the Abyss
I'm not sure I'd pick Bane as a life partner, but I guess he could be less tyrannical if you got to know him.
-- George Krashos
Battered wives syndrome. |
| George Krashos |
Posted - 23 Jan 2017 : 22:58:53
quote:
Originally posted by Monok
If you are looking for your real soulmate or love you can visit Some dating site that has had its URL cast into the Abyss
I'm not sure I'd pick Bane as a life partner, but I guess he could be less tyrannical if you got to know him.
-- George Krashos |
| Brimstone |
Posted - 23 Jan 2017 : 21:00:14
quote:
Originally posted by Monok
If you are looking for your real soulmate or love you can visit Some dating site that has had its URL cast into the Abyss
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| Veritas |
Posted - 30 Aug 2015 : 01:56:06
Heck I say it should be all gods all the time. There should be an epic godly throwdown every ride. Players should start the campaign as demigods or lesser gods :P |
| Gary Dallison |
Posted - 16 Feb 2015 : 08:27:47
Must learn to control my ranting impulses, but i'm with George.
This soap opera god drama is way beyond a joke now. I dont mind reading the Silmarillion, greek, sumerian, egyptian and other mythologies for a laugh and sources of inspiration but i would never want to play or run a world in any of those settings. New FR is fast becoming a giant parody of a campaign setting (although until there is a sourcebook for it i wouldnt even call it that) where super powerful babies have giant tantrums and squabble over the latest and greatest teddy bear.
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| Arioch |
Posted - 16 Feb 2015 : 07:48:10
In almost any polytheistic society I've knowledge of, people do believe that gods play a direct role in their lives.
I like to keep this true in my campaigns, from the small things (scratching the Beshaba symbol under your opponents seats to win a Smashcastle hand) to bigger ones (a famine that strikes an area, assumed to be a punishment from a displeased Talona or Chauntea).
I do not like Realms-shaking events. I think the gods really enjoy their positions of power. They are more interested in preserving their status quo instead of risking it so often. Even the most power hungry knows that gods may die. And this may be one of the reasons why gods do have proxies to act on their behalf: they don't have to expose themselves to direct risks. So, gods plans can only be glimpsed behind events. I see gods, more than often, used as a plausible excuse for mortal decisions. And if the consequences of those decisions can be of benefit for maintaining a god's power or even increase it, then such a god may bless the mortal(s) involved.
As a DM, I like to leave my PCs with doubts like: is this happening because some god have plans? Are we played into helping some evil gods? Am I, as a cleric/paladin, really following my god's expectations? But they will never know the answer for sure, they, as the overall population, in the end, can only create their own truth based on what the dogma say about a given god or their personal experience.
But as a DM I have to know such answers. That's why I'm curious about the interests/activities of gods relevant in the current part of the plot. |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 15 Feb 2015 : 14:30:49
quote:
Originally posted by George Krashos
Maybe we can have a Realms where the gods don't play a direct role in the events that occur every ten-day. Just saying.
-- George Krashos
Agreed. Once a month is enough. |
| George Krashos |
Posted - 15 Feb 2015 : 08:49:48
Maybe we can have a Realms where the gods don't play a direct role in the events that occur every ten-day. Just saying.
-- George Krashos |
| Arioch |
Posted - 15 Feb 2015 : 07:59:14
There was a spark of sense behind my random confused thoughts, I see. Thanks Baltas!  |
| Baltas |
Posted - 14 Feb 2015 : 21:21:19
quote:
Originally posted by Arioch
Ok, I'm glad not to have missed something about Bane. Still... I have to invent something about his current activities otherwise it is not of much use for my campaign as it is now 
Shar got all the attention while other greater powers (those alive) supposedly sat idly waiting for her to destroy the world. Shar's empire was quite tyrannical: does this tyranny fueled Bane's power or was he angry for the actions of an emo deity, best left in a corner to cry while hoping to disappear?
Aside ... taking control of the goblinoid pantheon doesn't seem a fitting accomplishment for a deity returned from oblivion with such an interesting plan.
[RANDOM CONFUSED THOUGHTS]
Maybe connecting Bane's return with Bhaal return... I mean: both (with Myrkul too) were mortals that took power from Jergal. What if with this power comes some sort of curse, like a corrupting sickness that inevitably and cyclically push them on the edge of destruction? This to change the way of perceiving the plans they developed to survive: they split their essences in order to avoid destruction due to this sort of curse.
And what if all this is a millennial plan of Jergal himself? He divided himself in three, each of the three (well... two of them up to now ) divided in thousands.
[RANDOM CONFUSED THOUGHTS]
You may be interested in Eric L. Boyd's conversion of the Age of Worms, especialy the part from the web supplement for Dungeon #130.
Low resolution:
http://paizo.com/dungeonissues/130/DA130_Supplement_L.pdf
High resolution:
http://paizo.com/dungeonissues/130/DA130_Supplement_H.pdf
It has details of what Jergal's plans include... |
| hashimashadoo |
Posted - 14 Feb 2015 : 12:05:54
Well, the Tyranny of Dragons storyline gives players the chance to stop Tiamat from becoming too powerful. As long as she's stuck in Hell (again, according to Ed), she's prevented from getting too big for her boots (or dragon claw equivalent) by the archdevil Bel and Asmodeus. Only part of Bane's power was used to increase her own, most of it she used to heal Azharul's shattered body.
And you can bet Bane will try to get his power back. He's obsessed with increasing his divine rank - that's why he stole the Tablets of Fate in the first place. |
| Arioch |
Posted - 14 Feb 2015 : 08:36:13
quote:
Originally posted by hashimashadoo
Some time between 1479 and 1489 DR, Tiamat wrenched Azharul out of Banehold, along with a good portion of Bane's divine power - effectively reducing him to an intermediate power (in 3rd edition terms).
That's interesting! Thanks.
Only... To reuse the same literary device used for Azuth doen't make be very happy, but still... And, more annoying: before we had Shar as the over powerful badass, now we really need another one as Tiamat? 
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| hashimashadoo |
Posted - 13 Feb 2015 : 23:49:41
Well, one of Ed's recent posts in his thread does feature what Bane's been doing since the Spellplague - he does mention that if WotC publishes anything to the contrary it will supercede him though.
Tiamat had subsumed the body and realm of another draconic god named Azharul but when Dragon Eyrie dissolved due to the Spellplague, Azharul's body was violently transported to Banehold (much like Azuth was transported to Nessus I'd assume). When Bane discovered Azharul contained part of Tiamat's consciousness, he enslaved it. Tiamat couldn't hope to rescue Azharul from Bane so instead bided her time, pretending to be Bane's loyal servant, all the while stealing his secrets and passing them on to Asmodeus. Some time between 1479 and 1489 DR, Tiamat wrenched Azharul out of Banehold, along with a good portion of Bane's divine power - effectively reducing him to an intermediate power (in 3rd edition terms). |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 13 Feb 2015 : 22:21:32
Bane owns the goblin gods now? Seems a bit stupidly thought out, since goblinoid deities like Bargrivyek and Meriadar represent "emo" portfolios and philosophies which are entirely antithetical to Bane's interests. They are unworthy of even being ground beneath Bane's iron boots and he gains nothing useful by possessing their power. I would think he should destroy them, or perhaps reformat them into beings more to his liking.
Still, the Realms might enjoy some powerful new incarnations of Bane - such as Maglubaneyet and Khurgorbaneyag and Nomog-Baneya - who would represent such things as authority, oppression, bullying, dominance, slavery, torture, pain, fear, antagonism, vengeance, and blind hatred. Excellent vessels for promoting Bane's agenda, even if in no other way than to manipulate his enemies into weakness. The strong dominate the weak, dominance or submission, disobedience is death. That is Bane's true purpose. |
| Arioch |
Posted - 13 Feb 2015 : 21:00:52
Ok, I'm glad not to have missed something about Bane. Still... I have to invent something about his current activities otherwise it is not of much use for my campaign as it is now
Shar got all the attention while other greater powers (those alive) supposedly sat idly waiting for her to destroy the world. Shar's empire was quite tyrannical: does this tyranny fueled Bane's power or was he angry for the actions of an emo deity, best left in a corner to cry while hoping to disappear?
Aside ... taking control of the goblinoid pantheon doesn't seem a fitting accomplishment for a deity returned from oblivion with such an interesting plan.
[RANDOM CONFUSED THOUGHTS]
Maybe connecting Bane's return with Bhaal return... I mean: both (with Myrkul too) were mortals that took power from Jergal. What if with this power comes some sort of curse, like a corrupting sickness that inevitably and cyclically push them on the edge of destruction? This to change the way of perceiving the plans they developed to survive: they split their essences in order to avoid destruction due to this sort of curse.
And what if all this is a millennial plan of Jergal himself? He divided himself in three, each of the three (well... two of them up to now ) divided in thousands.
[RANDOM CONFUSED THOUGHTS]
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| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 13 Feb 2015 : 20:26:41
There's too much evidence that Xvim remains, whole or in part, within Bane. And a tyrant who can't conquer his own son isn't that much of a tyrant.  |
| Jeremy Grenemyer |
Posted - 13 Feb 2015 : 20:01:09
I miss Bane. Xvim is just a poser who's been subsumed by Bane's greater essence.
Seriously, the Realms needs more Bane in a big way. There'd be a lot more stuff to do with Bane going on around the Lake of Steam, if I had my way. |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 13 Feb 2015 : 17:04:06
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
Bane seems to have been put on the back burner. Shar gets all the attention these days. Mask always seems to always grab some screen time, always promoting some sneaky agenda or other, but more and more he seems to fit his manipulations and opportunism into grander schemes engineered by Shar. Other evil gods like Talos and Malar are, in my opinion, somewhat neglected and under utilized.
I wonder if this is a deliberate decision by WotC to turn away from the potentially offensive male-vs-female theme which tended to dominate earlier Realmslore. The sad truth is that Realmslore has fallen into a pattern where the machinations of powerful gods and goddesses and godlike NPCs draw the focus of the story and consequently shape the history of the Realms in subsequent lore. But that being said, I find it interesting that these mighty foes are more and more often paired off against adversaries of the same gender.
Bane will eventually get dragged back into the spotlight, once people begin to indicate that nasty old Shar (vs Mystra/etc) has begun to get a little tiresome. A natural nemesis to deploy against Bane would be Tyr.
I think the focus was on Shar because the shadow thing is kewl. It is, admittedly, a nice change from the megalomaniacal "I want to rule everything!" schtick, but they swung it far too hard in that direction.
Me, I want to see some of the other evil power groups of the Realms -- mostly neglected since the end of 2E -- coming back to the fore. It's more interesting and offers a lot more potential for roleplaying when you've got multiple players in the mix, instead of always being GI Joe versus Cobra. |
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