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Kiaransalyn
Senior Scribe
United Kingdom
762 Posts |
 Posted - 10 Aug 2005 : 12:05:08
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Honoured Sages and Readers of Candlekeep,
if it please you I would like a moment of your time as I have given great contemplation to a question that remains unanswered and requires your sagious insight.
A few months ago I posted about Zinzerena (and I apologise for not visiting since then). The game that I have been running has morphed from being concerned about an artifact of Zinzerena (note 1) to the hero deity herself. I'd best say that this game is based in Menzoberranzan, as are all my other games. And it is based just before Lolth's Silence.
In Demihuman Deities it says (if I remember correctly) that Lolth has assumed an aspect of Zinzerena having defeated that goddess's avatar during the Time of Troubles and is using this aspect to promote the faith of Zinzerena in Menzoberranzan.
One of my players from the 'artifact' game has suggested that if she became a cleric of Zinzerena the artifact would begin working. (See note 2.) This seemed a reasonable suggestion to me and a good avenue to explore in terms of gameplay.
Now as the Timeline of my game approaches Lolth's Silence the question will be what will happen to the Aspect of Zinzerena that Lolth has assumed? My player's PC is now praying to Zinzerena and receiving spells from that deity.
If Lolth goes silent will Zinzerena also fall silent thus revealing the fact that this new diety was just an aspect of Lolth? Or could something else happen?
I'm open to suggestions and looking forward to the debate (if any). I'm currently favouring the idea that Zinzerena herself may take Lolth's silence as an opportunity to return to Realms-space. However, I wonder on the likelyhood of that actually happening. Would Vhaeraun assume the Zinzerena aspect?
Oh, I'd best say I've read the six books of The War of the Spider Queen.
Note 1 - in actual fact the artifact was a fake made by one Qu'ellar with the intent to bring shame upon another.
Note 2 - since Lolth, according to Demihuman Deities, wants the Zinzerenan faith to grow in Menzoberranzan she replaced the fake with a real artifact and gave veiled and cryptic hints to Hesken-P'aj Symryvvin and Quenthel Baenre in their divinations.
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Death is Life
Love is Hate
Revenge is Forgiveness
Ken: You from the States?
Jimmy: Yeah. But don't hold it against me.
Ken: I'll try not to... Just try not to say anything too loud or crass. |
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Crennen FaerieBane
Master of Realmslore
USA
1378 Posts |
Posted - 10 Aug 2005 : 16:11:04
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Well, if Zinzerena's faith is being fueled by Lolth, her clerics would indeed become powerless once "The Silence" begins.
Ways around this are: If the cleric takes the feat (3E) Servant of the Fallen, she may still be able to garner spells from the original Zinzerena through worshipping the dead goddess herself, not just the aspect that Lolth has now put forth.
I doubt Vhaeraun would want to usurp his mother's role in granting spells to these worshippers. As many examples point - Vhaeraun is not exactly thrilled with female clergy. I know Ms. Cunningham uses a double-priest in Starlight and Shadows, but that should be looked at as a rarity. The majority of Vhaeraun's followers (as seen in War of the Spider Queen) are male and want nothing to do with Menzoberranzan.
This is just my take on things - have at it!
C-Fb |
Still rockin' the Fey'ri style. |
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Kuje
Great Reader
USA
7915 Posts |
Posted - 10 Aug 2005 : 16:50:23
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| This also affects Moander's remaining faithful because she supplies spells to Moander's faithful. So there's 3 different clergy that would realize that something is going on with thier deities. :) |
For some of us, books are as important as almost anything else on earth. What a miracle it is that out of these small, flat, rigid squares of paper unfolds world after world, worlds that sing to you, comfort and quiet and excite you... Books are full of the things that you don't get in real life - wonderful, lyrical language, for instance, right off the bat. - Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird
Scribe for the Candlekeep Compendium |
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Hoondatha
Great Reader
USA
2449 Posts |
Posted - 12 Aug 2005 : 20:50:24
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| That's a really good point about the Silence that I hadn't thought through. That means that someone could concievably figure out all of a diety's various "shells" by banishing that diety from Realmspace for a while. (a new twist on the old Scepter of the Sorcerer Kings power). Take out Cyric, for instance, and the priests of the Dead Three also lose their powers (or the Dead Two if you're playing after Bane's return). |
Doggedly converting 3e back to what D&D should be...
Sigh... And now 4e as well. |
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Zanan
Senior Scribe
Germany
942 Posts |
Posted - 07 Aug 2006 : 16:18:18
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Well ... AFAIK Zinzerena wasn't necessarily killed by Lolth, put possibly only her influence banished from the Realms. I doubt that the Wizards would allow another deity slip into Realmspace for some time.
Furthermore, the cultist need not to be organized or include that many priests either, in a way somewhat like Finder and his support. If Lolth could gather up those fighters, rogues, assassins et al who have left their original cities, even fewer drow would actuaölly end up in Vhaeraun's or Eilistraee's corner.
BTW, some Ibrandulin Underdark druids and priests also receive/d their spells from Lolth after he was slain by Shar - according to DD.
As for artifacts ... since I run a drow campaign during the Silence, one priestess got a mission from a yochlol - quasi her test of Lolth - and a rod containing 50 spell levels to help her somewhat. It also powered her rebuke undead ability ... and she was required to use it wisely, which she did. That is one way to keep the folk alive during the Silence, even though outliving it without any help could be testing indeed. (But tell that to characters playing clerics and the like.) |
Cave quid dicis, quando et cui!
Gæð a wyrd swa hio scel!
In memory of Alura Durshavin.
Visit my "Homepage" to find A Guide to the Drow NPCs of Faerûn, Drow and non-Drow PrC and much more. |
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Kalin Agrivar
Senior Scribe
Canada
956 Posts |
Posted - 07 Aug 2006 : 20:44:19
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quote:
Originally posted by CrennenFaerieBane
Well, if Zinzerena's faith is being fueled by Lolth, her clerics would indeed become powerless once "The Silence" begins.
Ways around this are: If the cleric takes the feat (3E) Servant of the Fallen, she may still be able to garner spells from the original Zinzerena through worshipping the dead goddess herself, not just the aspect that Lolth has now put forth.
I doubt Vhaeraun would want to usurp his mother's role in granting spells to these worshippers. As many examples point - Vhaeraun is not exactly thrilled with female clergy. I know Ms. Cunningham uses a double-priest in Starlight and Shadows, but that should be looked at as a rarity. The majority of Vhaeraun's followers (as seen in War of the Spider Queen) are male and want nothing to do with Menzoberranzan.
This is just my take on things - have at it!
C-Fb
I agree with most of what people have said except my question is, as I understand it (at least in 2nd Ed.), Lolth slew Zinzerena as soon as she entered Toril's crystal sphere and I'm not sure if the servant of the fallen feat would work with Zinzerena as she never really had the chance to become a god in the Realms...Lolth immediately subsumed her before she had any realmsian followers...kind of like Gond and that gnome tinker god (can't remember name, started with a N)
and I do think Vhaeraun would want to usurp his mother's role in granting spells to these worshippers as the more worshippers she has the more power she gets plus he himself could have posed as Zinzerena to get the extra worshippers |
Kalin Xorell El'Agrivar
- High Mage of the Arcane Assembly
- Lore Keeper of the Vault of Ancestors
- 3rd Son of the Lord of the Stand |
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Zanan
Senior Scribe
Germany
942 Posts |
Posted - 08 Aug 2006 : 09:01:50
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Well Kalin, as I have said, it is not clear whether Lolth slew or banished Zinzerena. Yet, it is clear that it is her who grants the spells ...
Demihuman Deities
ALIASES: Araushnee, Lloth (Menzoberranzan and Uluitur), Megwandir, Moander, Zinzerena
Since the Time of Troubles, Lolth has assumed additional aspects as two of her many stratagems to increase the ranks of her faithful and thus her own personal power. In the drow city of Menzoberranzan, in the Underdark beneath the North where Lolth - or Lloth, as she is known there - appeared during the Time of Troubles, the Spider Queen has allowed rumors to spread of a new demipower of chaos and assassins, Zinzerena the Hunted. While Zinzerena was once a legendary drow assassin and later an emerging demipower of a world other than Abeir-Toril, the Spider Queen recently slew Zinzerena - or at least banished her influence from the Realms - and assumed her aspect as a test to see if additional divine aspects increased or decreased the total (albeit fragmented) divine power available.
The only chance Vhaeraun, or any other Underdark deity with interest in the drow - might have had was during the Silence. But we'll never know that for sure unless the designers tell us. Obviously, I'd rather have a CN deity (in disguise) running about catering to neutral or less-than-stereotype-evil drow than a simple switch to the "opposite" or rival faith. Gives far more options to a DM wanting the not-so-mad-bad-and-dangerous-to-know drow. |
Cave quid dicis, quando et cui!
Gæð a wyrd swa hio scel!
In memory of Alura Durshavin.
Visit my "Homepage" to find A Guide to the Drow NPCs of Faerûn, Drow and non-Drow PrC and much more. |
Edited by - Zanan on 08 Aug 2006 09:05:14 |
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Lolth's Silence and Zinzerena
