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Originally posted by Foxhelm

If gods can come back from the dead, the Tree of Souls might not be as far gone. Of course resurrecting the Tree might need a great and mighty adventure.

But given the issues I have gain from the web, Mystra might want to make amends with Corelleon and the Elves for the troubles connected to her and her predicessors. Even if Shar was a major source of the problems. While she might not be able to duplicate the Tree (unless she can with the elven gods help), she might be able to create an artifact or series of artifacts which could duplicate most of the effects (again with elven help).

Of course, those might also need a great adventure as well.

Many of the non-human races have been setback but they have found bounce back. Say like the Elven version of the Dwarf's Thunder Blessing.

PS: When it comes to RSE, they break it but you/your heroes/your DM have to fix it... till wizards fix it. So ask your self, if Myth Drannor and the Tree of Souls are broken... how do you and your game fix it?

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Originally posted by Demzer

@ Aldrick: my memory is a bit fuzzy but i think it's been already established in canon that the Tree can be moved after planting, i think it was in the Year of Rogue Dragons trilogy? With Amlauril's son building a "secret haven" in northern Faerun that got promptly overrun by dragons or somesuch. My main point is, the problem of the impossibility of moving the Tree of Souls was already raised there and then and the canon response was "it can happen". So if it happened once it could happen again i think, and it's logical to assume that in the face of impending doom the elves would do everything to get the Tree to safety, let's hope they succeded.

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c. -17600 DR
The Sundering: Hundreds of High Mages assemble in the heartland of Faerūn at the Gathering Place. Ignoring the lesson learned from the destruction of Tintageer centuries earlier, they cast a spell of elven High Magic designed to create a glorious elf homeland. On the Day of Birthing, the magic reaches its apex as the spell extends both back and forward in the mists of time. Faerūn, the one land, is sundered apart by the unbridled force of the Sundering. As a result, hundreds of cities are washed away, thousands of elves lie dead, and the face of Toril is changed forever. The name Faerūn, no longer the One Land, is given to the largest continent. Surrounded by vast expanses of water, the island of Evermeet, thought to be a piece of Arvandor and a bridge between worlds, breaks the surface of the Trackless Sea. Blessed by the goddess Angharradh, verdant forests and wildlife soon flourish across the island. Corellon Larethian wards Evermeet against Lolth, Malar, and the other powers of the anti-Seldarine and entrusts a unique seed to the Fair Folk of the isle. The seed soon sprouts, growing into a miniature tree known as the Tree of Souls. Over time, the souls of ancient elves who choose to stay on Toril, rather than pass on to Arvandor, merge into the Tree of Souls, slowly augmenting its power. Prophecies reveal that the Tree of Souls will someday be planted on Faerūn when the Fair Folk finally return to the mainland after a period of exile on the Green Isle.

1371 DR Year of the Unstrung Harp
Prince Lamruil of Evermeet, his human consort Maura Silverhand (daughter of Laeral Silverhand), and their followers travel to the far northern reaches of Faerūn to establish a hidden city called Auseriel. They bring the Tree of Souls with them, given to them by the prince's mother, Queen Amlaruil of Evermeet, intending to plant it at the heart of a new refuge for the Fair Folk once the city begins to flourish.

Year 1373 DR Year of Rogue Dragons
Mirtual 2: Auseriel comes under concerted attack by a family of white dragons led by the great wyrm Harashnalthyn. At Maura's insistence, Prince Lamruil returns the Tree of Souls to Evermeet, while the princess and their remaining followers provide a valiant rearguard defense.

1377 DR Year of Haunting
The Srinshee returns to Myth Drannor and offers Ilsevele Miritar the Rulers' Blade in recognition of her wise and resolute leadership in the realm’s refounding. Ilsevele humbly accepts the Rulers' Blade and takes the title of coronal. Queen Amlaruil arrives to congratulate the new coronal and brings with her the Tree of Souls as a gift to the new realm. The artifact is planted in a ring-shaped colonnade at the heart of the city known as Seldarrshen Nieryll, the Starsoul Shrine.

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Originally posted by Blueblade

Reading your posts, you sound upset. The events of the novel ARE upsetting, agreed, but you haven't even read it yet!

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Originally posted by Mapolq

Aldrick, until 1375 DR the elves didn't have Myth Drannor and the Tree of Souls was essentially inert. You seem to be overreacting - there seems to be no reason to assume elvenkind is any worse off now than after the assaults on Evermeet and Evereska in the 2e/3e era.

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Originally posted by Mapolq
And all nonhuman races have been pretty much doomed to find a way of peacefully coexisting with the world-dominating humans for a few centuries. That could mean ghettoes in some places, but it could also mean flourishing diverse communities like Silverymoon in others. Again, there seems to be no reason to assume what you state, and every reason to assume it will pan out in various ways across the Realms.

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Originally posted by Mapolq
Your other point, though, is very spot-on, I think. RSEs are gimmicks, the geopolitical version of a MacGuffin. And it's an old and overused gimmick. The only saving grace I can see in using RSEs now is that which I argued some time ago - that the Realms could not be fixed without large amounts of cheese.

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Originally posted by The Hooded One

Hi again, all.
Faraer, I'm not sure how much Ed has seen of the forthcoming rules and/or artwork, but off your questions go to him, and we'll see what he has to say.
BenN, Ed did send me replies to your questions, so . . .

SPOILER WARNING!







SPOILER WARNING!







SPOILER WARNING!




QUESTIONS AND ED'S ANSWERS:

1) Now that Shade has landed on top of Myth Drannor & destroyed it, what has become of the Tree of Souls?

Ed: Ah, yes. Over the years, I have been slowly trained to resist including every last game-relevant lore detail in my novels, in the interests of shaping a better narrative storyline. Guess I erred too far in pruning, this time around. Sorry; this should have made it into my final draft, but didn’t (in the interests of keeping the pacing and the “fog of war” feel up). My bad.
When the POSSIBLE danger of Thultanthar crashing became apparent (i.e. when the city started flying towards Myth Drannor, not when what El did became obvious) the Srinshee contacted all the Myth Drannan baelnorn she could and commanded them to get to the Tree of Souls and magically shield and defend it, warping the Weave to form a protective barrier around it (so when Thultanthar came crashing down, it would punch through the city like a spike, and protect the Tree). This was done, and the Tree has survived. There has been some consternation among certain readers about Myth Drannor being entirely in ruins, but not so. Like any city that’s been fought through, a big cleanup is in order, but Thultanthar is a pretty small city, and Myth Drannor, being “at one with the forest” [growing trees as dwellings, trees and moss and open forest terrain everywhere, not human-habit “pave over everything” architecture, is a very large (in footprint) city. So a relatively small area of Myth Drannor was pancaked under the shattered remnants of Shade.

2) Assuming that the 4e Campaign Guide info about Myth Drannor's population (10K) is correct, how many survived along with Ilsevele and Fflar?

Ed: The 4e population figures are ROUGHLY correct, but the siege took some time to develop (mercenary armies being mustered in Sembia and then marched north), so the elves had warning, so many of their skilled artisans, pregnant shes, young children and families with young children, ailing elderly, wounded, and so on, GOT OUT (to Semberholme first and foremost, and to Evereska and elsewhere, too). Anyone who wanted to relocate rather than fight was given that option, without shame or recrimination.
In other words, the city was down to 6,400 or so “determined and able defenders” before the siege started, and they took heavy losses in the fighting by being worn down under the weight of sheer numbers; although they were inflicting very heavy losses on the attacking mercenaries, they were slowly beaten back - - and the very “open” nature of the city made it very hard to defend. The Coronal sent some vital individuals out of the fighting by making them envoys that she sent to elven communities all over the Realms to try to get volunteer reinforcements (few of which arrived on time). So in that way she saved another hundred or so.
However, the defenders died rather than surrender or flee, so the elves still in the city were reduced to around 1000 when it became apparent that the city couldn’t be held, and the children, wounded, and elders still in the city were rushed out through the gates (as seen near the end of THE HERALD). The Coronal and Fflar were literally fighting back to back at the end, with a handful of defenders still standing, when Thultanthar came down - - and almost all of that last handful made it out to Semberholme.
So at the end of THE HERALD, a few blocks of central Myth Drannor are rubble, under the shattered remnants of Thultanthar. Scavengers (monsters) are roaming the corpse-littered vicinity, and there’s minor damage to the outlying city, which is abandoned - - probably not for long. The surviving mercenaries are foraging/pillaging/behaving like brigands, and Sembia is in such disarray that there’s no chance of Sembia (or for that matter, any other realm) “reaching in” to annex or occupy the ruins. Perhaps 5,000 elves perished defending Myth Drannor - - and yes, the Tree of Souls survives. All indications are that the Srinshee did not; she sacrificed herself to save her people and smash Larloch (did HE survive? Unknown, but my bet would be that he did). Did Dove? Doubtful; she was “out of” silver fire, and wanted to die (to be with her beloved Florin), but may end up surviving as “a voice in the Weave” (the same fate as some of the Tanthul princes, and possibly The Simbul).
Many things were left “up in the air” for later stories, or for DMs to decide for themselves, for their campaign. Certain matters will be revealed in my NEXT Realms novel.
Hope this helps. Sorry for causing upset to some Realms readers!
Ed


So saith Ed. And there you have it. Please convey this to Aldrick.
love,
THO

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Originally posted by Mapolq

Aldrick, I honestly can't understand where you came up with your numbers. Most of the elves who were in Evermeet didn't go back to Faerūn and massed up in Cormanthor, or that would have been felt much more strongly. Rather, from the wording we see, it's pretty clear that when Evermeet left Toril, the elves still there (most of the 1-2 million) left with it.

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Originally posted by Mapolq

You also say the elves will live in their cities instead of human-like farming, and that is sensible. But there is no reason to assume Myth Drannor was the only such settlement in the entirety of Cormanthor (excepting Semberholme).

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Originally posted by Mapolq

Well, that gets down to very subjective assessments. I just don't see more than, say 200,000 elves migrating to the whole of Cormanthor over the last century. Which would be more than enough to lay claim to the forest, by the way, given how sparsely populated it was before that. Myth Drannor is stated in Cormanthyr: Empire of the Elves to count 54,000 permanent inhabitants during its height (650 DR), 80% of which were elves. Surely 10,000 seems a bit of a low number to make the entire place active again, but it seems clearly enough to make a claim and do rebuilding, and much more reasonable than a population in the hundreds of thousands.

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Originally posted by Lilianviaten

I was furious with the ending. Telamont is an extremely accomplished mage with all kinds of combat experience. Plus, he had just absorbed the power from every magical device in his throne room. Then Elminster comes along and pimp slaps him.

I was fine with Telamont being killed. He's awesome, and the Shadovar characters were a lot of fun to read about (especially from Kemp and de Bie). But they had their time to shine; now we must make way for new villains to develop and new empires to rise.

The way he was killed was preposterous, though. What should have been an epic spell duel was reduced to Telamont looking like a chump. He couldn't even get off 1 counter spell or effect Elminster in the slightest way. Elminster just beat him down and bullied him, without even exerting much effort.

Now I thought Larloch was being made into the main villain, because Larloch had already embarrassed Telamont and all of Shade's other mages at once (when he stopped them from draining the mythal and nearly killed them all with his crippling psionic power).

But after that incredible showing by Larloch, and his near draining of the mythal, BY HIMSELF, the Srinshee blasts Larloch ONE TIME and lays him low. Larloch is hurled a great distance away, and he's screaming from the agony of her spell.

Finally, Mirt the Moneylender spends hours talking to Manshoon, and easily distracts him until reinforcements show up. So with Cormyr vulnerable, and the Chosen distracted elsewhere, Manshoon is still completely incapable of winning.

And might I add, shouldn't Cormyr have been a wasteland??? All the previous Sundering books made it clear that Cormyr was losing the war to Shade. In "The Reaver", Cormyr has all but fallen. Then the Shadovar inexplicably allow Cormyr to recover, while they suddenly go after Myth Drannor. They could have dealt the deathblow to Cormyr, and then gone after Myth Drannor anyway. Was there some reasoning presented for this that I have overlooked?

In the final analysis, we have Larloch, Telamont, and Manshoon in the same novel. That should have been an epic, once in a lifetime experience. Instead, all 3 archmages are neutered by Mary Sue's, and they don't even put up a hint of resistance.

I've never been critical of Mystra's Chosen (or the Harpers) to the extent that many readers are, because I've always felt that plenty of evil archmages and power hungry organizations exist to balance them out. Now I've seen that I was wrong. Apparently, even the greatest sources of evil in the Realms can be casually smacked down by Mystra's Power Rangers. And to make things worse, Elminster is determined by the end of the novel to be more proactive than ever in hunting down evil.

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Originally posted by Lilianviaten

I was furious with the ending. Telamont is an extremely accomplished mage with all kinds of combat experience. Plus, he had just absorbed the power from every magical device in his throne room. Then Elminster comes along and pimp slaps him.

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Originally posted by Lilianviaten

Finally, Mirt the Moneylender spends hours talking to Manshoon, and easily distracts him until reinforcements show up. So with Cormyr vulnerable, and the Chosen distracted elsewhere, Manshoon is still completely incapable of winning.

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Originally posted by Lilianviaten

And might I add, shouldn't Cormyr have been a wasteland??? All the previous Sundering books made it clear that Cormyr was losing the war to Shade.

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Originally posted by Lilianviaten

Apparently, even the greatest sources of evil in the Realms can be casually smacked down by Mystra's Power Rangers.

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