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Originally posted by dazzlerdal

Whats Open Grave, ive never heard of it but it seems to have some FR lore

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Originally posted by Markustay

Thank you for pointing me in the direction of this Madrycoh dude.

I've decided to utilize him a bit differently than you, but I am hoping I can spin things where the two sets of lore don't have to be completely unbrigeable.

I am going to turn him into Thirayam from Open Grave. Once a student of Hilather, he later followed Tenchin (Tan Chin's name in Imaskar) when Tenchin opened his 'School of Necrotic Arts' in Bhaluin, and he later became headmaster after Tenchin left (he spent some time on Oerth).

So, since I've explained elsewhere how I going fudge the lore between Open Grave - that Thirayam WASN'T Tan Chin at all, but rather, an 'apprentice' of his, it all works out. This establishes an old connection between the two in MY lore, so that YOUR lore becomes 'a possibility' within that framework (the two of them may have even been using the same 'mortal vessels' when the other wasn't around, so that adds to the confusion).

Also, Open Grave's lore concerning Hantumah - formerly Khatiroon - works into where I've decided to go with Kara-Tur in 5e. Whatever Thirayam did there, he set off a necrotic chain-reaction, similar to what Szass Tam was trying to do with his Dread Rings. Thus, Tan Chin is now being blamed for all that, when in truth, he's probably all that's keeping it from spiraling completely out-of-control at this point (that would have to be one of those 'deep secrets', though, that PC's shouldn't never even suspect). Madryoch = Thirayam (and his Shadow Stone) makes all of this work out nicely - the stone could have been pivotal in reducing poor Ra-Khati to a land of undead.

We may now go back to our regularly scheduled thread...

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Originally posted by dazzlerdal

Oh, its 4e. That doesnt count as FR.

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Originally posted by Wooly Rupert

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Originally posted by dazzlerdal

Oh, its 4e. That doesnt count as FR.

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Officially, yes, it does count as FR. Your personal feelings do not affect what is and is not canon.

And was it really necessary to respond with nothing more than yet another pointless bash against the 4E Realms? A lot of us don't like what was done to the setting during that time frame... But continuing to whine about it is pointless. It's time to move on.

Besides, given your willingness to utterly twist and reshape prior editions of the Realms, does it really matter what happened in 4E? You've been pretty much rewriting the whole setting from the ground up, as it is...

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As REF5 Lords of Darkness tells us, "Widden Valley is a broad expanse of grassy fields and tree-lined hills. The narrow Widden River bisects the valley. To the south of it is the village of Meryn. To the north of it is the ruined city of Tor Mak...once a prosperous place, a center of learning that was home to scholars and wizards. But the walled city was laid waste in the Goblin Wars, now long past." Like Daufin, this locale was created by Deborah Christian for REF5 Lords of Darkness, and the whereabouts of Tor Mak was kept nebulous therein so DMs could most easily transplant it into their own campaigns. At the time, I chose to make the Widden the middle tributary of the River Nun (the one that on the mapsheet for The Vilhon Reach rises closest to Colletro), and placed Tor Mak about three miles north of the river and about fifteen miles east of the headwaters of the Widden, and Meryn about ten miles south of the river and about sixteen miles from its rising (in other words, farther west than 'due south' from Tor Mak). I didn't develop any backstory for either Tor Mak or the Goblin Wars, because play in the 'home' Realms campaign didn't reach the ruins, and because I like to leave mysteries lying around for other folks to build Realmslore on. :}
Readers of my lore-screeds on Chondath will recall that all of this area is in the hands of various self-styled lordlings. The closest of these is Faelae Windthrarn, who calls himself 'Crowned Lord' of the Malander-which is the valley occupied by the main River Nun, that (if one navigates upriver from the sea in a very small boat) is the westernmost branch, and reaches farthest south. The Malander is a small realm of verdant barley and root-crops farms, policed by the swift-riding 'knights' of the Crowned Lord. Lord Windthrarn dines on and exports a constant supply of sheep, too plentiful in numbers to be supported by the small number of fields he gives over to grazing, and Elminster suspects that the Crowned Lord has a captured deepspawn in a cavern somewhere busily disgorging an endless stream of sheep. In the original 'home' Realms campaign, this law-of-the-sword region is very much like the Border Kingdoms: adventurer types are endlessly arriving, butchering or running off the resident lordlings, and setting themselves up with grand titles (such as "The Overking of All Crommador" and "The Exalted Lord of the Great Realm") to rule over a few cow pastures, a village, a mill, a keep, and a woodlot or two-until the next would-be ruler comes along. It makes for great adventuring, with running feuds, lurking Thayan agents making alliances with one lordling against another and then backstabbing their recent allies, intelligent undead and mages who want to cast experimental spells and practice monster-crafting running amok, outlaws rushing in (hotly pursued) with stolen treasure to hide, and the works. When PCs need a breather, they can always seek the Underdark or a big war elsewhere as a place to relax in.

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Originally posted by George Krashos

From Pages from the Mages VI (Dragon #164):

The Glandar's Grimoire: The Glandar was a mage-king of long ago, whose lands were somewhere near the Vilhon Reach. "The Glandar" is actually a title; his real name has been forgotten. It is known that the Glandar was an intelligent, powerful mage whose Art was skilful enough to create aerial craft even in those dim days, and whose small kingdom boasted irrigation, medicine, and Art far more advanced than those of neighbouring lands.

The Glandar was also a cruel tyrant who permitted no other being beside himself to study Art in his lands - and this policy proved to be his undoing. He was alone when attacked by a group of young, ambitious mages of Unther. Although he slew many of them, he was overwhelmed and utterly destroyed. His grimoire (so named because its first page bears only the inscription: "The Grimoire Most Perilous of the Immortal Glandar, Lord of the Undying, Scepter of Glandara") was seized by his slayers, whip battled each other for the spoils, wreaking much havoc in the fallen mage's land of Glandara. ("Scepter" was the title the Glandar ruled by; "Lord of the Undying" is believed to refer to his mastery of undead, through Dark Art).

-- George Krashos

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Originally posted by George Krashos

Oh, and to be a further pain ... from Polyhedron #96:

The Scarbarlatine

Of old, a realm of pirates and fisherfolk flourished in the northerly coastal regions of what is now Turmish. This land of Scabarla turned its attention to the sea and so expanded west and south into the dense forests of the day only slowly.

When expansion did occur it provoked raids from the satyrs and other woodland denizens. And then a war began that ultimately destroyed both sides.

Scabarla's piracy earned it no friends and many enemies, and in the end the Scarbarlatine found themselves attacked from the sea by men, harried by monstrous creatures inland, and worn down by a decade of severe winters.

One spring more than 500 years ago, the last survivors fled, leaving behind only stone walls and buildings. Today, a few of these ruins survive in the northerly coastal reaches of Turmish: a port whose harbour is almost entirely silted up, several walled towns, and two villages.

These ruins (plus the occasional isolated tower or mound of collapsed stone) are collectively known as "the Scarbarlatine" for the folk who built them. During the past 400 or so years, they've been rebuilt and inhabited by successive waves of visitors, restless Turmishan experimenters, and folk who dream of things being more as in Sembia, Cormyr, or wherever else they fancy.

-- George Krashos

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Originally posted by dazzlerdal

In fact if anyone comes across any stray mention of chessenta in a sourcebook or web article (or even a novel) then please post it here

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Ulgar Isle
Ulgar Isle, of all the islands in the Pirate Isles, is truly haunted. The undead rule this island, led by an ancient vampire from the empire of Chessenta: Ulgar.
Ulgar the Undying was made vampire during the height of the Chessentan Empire nearly 2,000 years ago. After preying upon that empire for over two centuries, he was trapped. Although he could not be destroyed (at least as far as the Chessentans knew), they shipped him to this island in the middle of the Sea of Fallen Stars, there to live out eternity.
Ulgar remained undisturbed, trapped within a sealed coffin for nearly two millennia. Then, during Immurk's time, a band of pirates who were searching for a new lair came across Ulgar's coffin and opened it. Starving for blood, he drained them all dry before his thirst was sated. He then went out to the ship, but found that he did not have the knowledge of modern sailing craft, and so was still marooned.
Other vessels visited the island, each falling under Ulgar's trap, until finally one of the ships managed to flee with someone still alive to tell of what occurred. The island was declared uninhabitable, and all on the Inner Sea were warned to avoid it.
Like many such items, however, there are always those who would tempt fate. Supposedly, Ulgar possesses secret magics known only to the Chessentan Empire which are otherwise unavailable. Several expeditions to gather Ulgar's secrets have landed on the island; most have failed.
Ulgar now has over fifty vampire servants. Most of them are sealed in coffins of Ulgar's making, waiting for victims to feed upon, as even a vampire of Ulgar's age cannot control fifty starving vampires. Those who did not become vampires have been raised as zombie servants, and these patrol the island, bringing all intruders to Ulgar so that he may feed.

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Originally posted by Markustay

IIRC, Vampires can't cross water, so islands are the perfect place to trap them - no curses necessary.

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Mesopotamia
Many cultures in ancient Mesopotamia had stories involving blood-drinking demons. The Persians were one of the first civilizations thought to have tales of such monsters; creatures attempting to drink blood from men are depicted on excavated pottery shards. Ancient Babylonia had tales of the mythical Lilitu, synonymous with and giving rise to Lilith and her daughters the Lilu from Hebrew demonology. Lilith was considered a demon and was often depicted as subsisting on the blood of babies. The legend of Lilith was originally included in some traditional Jewish texts: according to the medieval folk traditions, she was considered to be Adam's first wife before Eve. In these texts, Lilith left Adam to become the queen of the demons (she actually refused to be Adam's subordinate and thus was banished from Eden by God himself) and, much like the Greek striges, would prey on young babies and their mothers at night, as well as males. Because Hebrew law absolutely forbade the eating of human flesh or the drinking of any type of blood, Lilith's blood drinking was described as exceptionally evil. To ward off attacks from Lilith, parents used to hang amulets around their child's cradle.

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Originally posted by Wooly Rupert

I can't say I like the idea of a newborn deity... Why wouldn't a deity be born mature? They skip out on other aspects of mortal existence, so I don't see a reason for a deity to need to grow up. (And the thought of divine Terrible Twos is a scary one indeed!)

I can dig a newly ascended deity, perhaps a former mortal, growing into their place in the pantheon and the cosmos. But a baby divinity? That idea does not work for me.

(And yes, I realize the real-world implications of that statement. I prefer to leave that angle alone)

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Vlad Tolenkov - A sometimes consort to and advisor of Lolth, he resides in a Nightmare World trapped in the Demonweb Pits.

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Originally posted by Markustay

Yeah, but England didn't have a vampire problem until after they built that damn tunnel.

But seriously, I actually can't see a vampire charming a human and then ordering them to take them across the water. Its like a phobia to them. That would be like someone with a fear of heights telling his friends to force him to go skydiving. What I CAN see happening is the vampire getting a minion, and it making its desires known (in a round-about way), and then the minion acts on its own (taking the coffin aboard a ship during the day). The vampire(ss) in RLB's Undead trilogy trembled when she looked at open water - the text explicitly said she had to 'fight with all her will not to go running screaming in the opposite direction', and she was VERY powerful. Its not something that's easy to override (although she managed, so I suppose Ulgar could as well).

And getting back to the original topic - I'd prefer to make him a bit different than a standard vampire anyway. Whereas 'the West' has its liches and vampires', the 'East' (and I would lump the Old Empires into that) should have mummies and... something else.

For example, from Wikipedia -

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Mesopotamia
Many cultures in ancient Mesopotamia had stories involving blood-drinking demons. The Persians were one of the first civilizations thought to have tales of such monsters; creatures attempting to drink blood from men are depicted on excavated pottery shards. Ancient Babylonia had tales of the mythical Lilitu, synonymous with and giving rise to Lilith and her daughters the Lilu from Hebrew demonology. Lilith was considered a demon and was often depicted as subsisting on the blood of babies. The legend of Lilith was originally included in some traditional Jewish texts: according to the medieval folk traditions, she was considered to be Adam's first wife before Eve. In these texts, Lilith left Adam to become the queen of the demons (she actually refused to be Adam's subordinate and thus was banished from Eden by God himself) and, much like the Greek striges, would prey on young babies and their mothers at night, as well as males. Because Hebrew law absolutely forbade the eating of human flesh or the drinking of any type of blood, Lilith's blood drinking was described as exceptionally evil. To ward off attacks from Lilith, parents used to hang amulets around their child's cradle.

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So perhaps Ulgar is one of these more demonic-looking vamps, like the ones from Buffy (we could probably just use Nosferatu). An 'eater of babies'. I still like the idea that he drank a godling (either a dying one during a war, or a newborn... the newborn is MUCH creepier). And that's why he is now 'undying' (practically unkillable), and they had to go through extreme measures to get rid of him. I'm thinking if they stake him, he'd just turn into mist and reappear elsewhere, and if he was tied down in sunlight he'd just respawn from his ashes as soon as the sun went down. Something like that. Come to think of it, its almost like he has the powers of a Chosen (from my take, no anything canon, of which there is so little).

EDIT:
I kept reading, and interestingly, vampires in Mesopotamian myth are associated with Lamashtu, who is in Pathfinder and called "The Mother of Monsters". She also has affiliations with Pazuzu (so she SHOULD be D&D canon as well, because of her RW mythos). She is associated with Lilith, who I associate with Lolth. Lamashtu seems more like a primal version of Tiamat to me, tbut that could screw a lot of things up (maybe, maybe not - I don't want to start discussing Cosmological cross-pollinations again!). However, I've also spun a rivalry between Tiamat in Lolth in my D&D, and I have to wonder if it isn't possible that Araushnnee didn't learn from/serve tiamat for atime after she was cast-out of the Seldarine, and then she did in the Abyss what Tiamat did in the Hells - become a 'fiend lord' by association (in other words, her time as a 'Demon Queen' was something she learned from Tiamat, as a way to rebuild he power-base). Tiamamt may have betrayed by all that, so she would take on both a 'mentor' role, and a hated rival, for Lolth (which would shoe-horn nicely with the associations between Lilith and Lamashtu).

Of further interest is that Pazuzu was invoked (by Sumerians) to protect women and their babies from Lilitu ('Lilith's daughters'). Invoking one Deon Lord (an Obyrith) to counter another... interesting. I'm glad they made him an Obyrith - it makes more sense that way (his motives are 'mysterious', and he desn't always behave in a manner expected of a demon).

And I did it anyway... i need to stop thinking about Gods!!!

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