Teaching new tricks to old gods

[Beneath]

So a basic Myconid adventure would be, like, tracking a band of Myconid grave-robbers and trying to intercept them before they get through their portal back to Mycelia? Or maybe they're gonna meet up with their necromancer and reanimate the corpses first.

Or maybe they'll get ambushed by a necromancer who's an unrelated third party to this chaos who reanimates the dead and then you have, like, a possible three-way battle between myconids, necromancer + undead, and PCs.

That could be interesting

[Pronounceable]

Shrooms of Mycelia wouldn't risk death out in the planes, Nirvana has plenty of corpses. The chaoticish circles hanging out on Material would probably bring their necromancer along but them carting around a wagonful of corpses seems a neat setpiece, so the impracticality of it shouldn't deter DMs. Undead can never pose any serious threat to myconids and necromantic magic is useless, various dogooders against necromancy would be interfering with their graverobbing. But the most probable myconid adventures would be various negotiation and escort missions of translators and/or undead destroyers or rescue of such from various baddies.

In other news, it's hard to build these posts without some sort of central a thing to act as a pillar. I'm still loath to just make up a new guy myself because that'd defeat the purpose of the thread. OTOH, I might as well've made up these Psilofwyr and Emma and Ilneval and etc wholesale for all their similarity to "canon" so why be gunshy at this point?


edit: I've gone and edited the Habits and Inhabitants of Outer Planes a bit. Eladrins don't suck anymore.

[Pronounceable]

Writer's block is a thing even when you're not a writer.

ATROPUS (a serious problem), the World-Born-Dead, Endstar, Paraelemental Prince of Flesh, Death’s Head, Granfalloon, Doppelmoon, Babyeater, Uncelestial Body
CR: too high

Spoiler

Show

Contrary to the ubiquitous hysterics about it, Atropus does not, in fact, eat souls of babies. It just prevents their conception, as a natural result of blocking the flow of positive energy into a Material Plane world and any unborn already on the way when Death’s Head manifests is safe (for a given value of safe). Atropus sitting in the orbit causes worlds to eventually be stripped of all mortal life as everything dies off without replacements is a serious problem, true, but it is clearly not the nightmarish horror from beyond the stars scenario it is often claimed to be^_*. The blame for all this is heaped at the feet of Sun Father by the other gods (as is typically the case when anything goes wrong), as if Pelor told the hidden lords of Elemental Chaos to nip their newest sibling in the bud before It could fully spawn. Or if it is somehow Pelor’s fault that a fetal (for the lack of a better adjective) elemental lord with a body of flesh became a ghost in a completely unprecedented and unique manner when killed. Sun Father is absolutely certain the moons are perfect as conduits between Material and Plane of Positive Energy with no faults in their construction, and it is not like anyone could have possibly expected a ghost massive enough to possess an entire planetoid (an impossibility) would also have command over a heretofore unseen fifth element (an even bigger impossibility) and use that to transform the astronomical amounts of earth making up a moon into virtually infinite numbers of dead bodies (which would be just ridiculous). While it might be harrowing for a mortal to witness the moon turn into a decapitated head locked in a silent scream of agony^** that rains down featureless corpselike things intent on killing everything they meet onto the world^***, calling an elemental lord ghost made up of an infinite number of notzombies that completely halts the propagation of mortal life on a world an “elder evil” is needlessly alarmist. It is ridiculous of lesser deities to accuse Pelor of incompetence in world building, especially since not one of them has created a single mortal world ever and are all, in fact, squatting on Pelor’s properties and poaching his mortals.

Besides, getting rid of Atropus isn’t all that complicated. One merely has to destroy the thing It is haunting completely to cut it off from Material Plane, exactly like ghosts of regular mortals that occasionally manage to avoid the pull of Mechanus by latching onto objects, which in this case is the moon. In fact it doesn’t even take some sort of apocalyptic artifact of mass destruction to destroy such an afflicted moon (though it would help), all that’s really needed is to dig through the functionally infinite angry corpses^**** and burn (or otherwise completely submerge in another element) the gigantic Atropus’ core^***** that should’ve formed in a spot somewhere near the center (which is admittedly pretty hard to find by blindly digging around a moon). Reaching the core of course gets easier the earlier an attempt starts, as the transformation of the moon’s mass into flesh starts from the surface and the number of creepy corpses that’ll stand between prospective heroes and the core increases exponentially with time. Starting early dramatically cuts down on the number of featureless bodies to be waded through to reach the core (the myth of dig-fighting through thousands of miles of creepy featureless bodies as they endlessly attack on all sides only happens if the transformation has penetrated into the depths of the moon due to tardiness). Not to mention, Endstar can be seen coming from literal millions of miles away as it appears as a half transparent star in the sky that grows each night until engulfing the moon, which might give mortals a decade or more to prepare.

Though digging into Atropus is certain death for mortals even if they win, they should be glad to give their lives for their world and Pelor might even reward them with ascension to his divine court if they succeed (generally as some sort of demigod with a few domains that always includes moon). As might other greater deities, assuming heroes of that caliber happen to be heretics worshipping Sun Father’s rivals (which is unlikely). And if the worst comes to worst, a world stripped of all mortal life can be repopulated easily enough (at least by Pelor) after Atropus moves on and the flow of positive energy resumes. Such repopulated planets are quite rare and can generally be identified by the unreasonably large numbers of ruins and artifacts from inexplicably lost and forgotten civilizations.

As an escaped fragment of the Elder Elemental Evil, Doppelmoon is particularly antithetical to divinity and no rational being of power from nonelemental planes will risk approaching It, for Moander’s rampage is still remembered throughout the planes. And neither will beings of elements, as even an unborn elemental lord of a nonexistant element has absolute power over all matter; the best any titanic or elemental being can hope for is being turned into a mass of soulless fleshy beasts when Paraelemental Prince of Flesh turns Its gaze upon them.

Meanwhile, the real Elemental Princes of the four regular elements within their hidden enclaves in Elemental Chaos are not satisfied, as they all would lose a great amount of power if a fifth element and its prince is born. They unhappily watch as Granfalloon grows stronger on Ethereal, the single plane where masters of all matter hold no power; for an elemental being to gain the ability to feed on positive energy is unprecedented and their aborted sibling might yet birth Itself as an elemental/divine hybrid if It keeps absorbing Luminous Overmother’s power through those mortal worlds. Such a being would become an actual "elder evil"^******, dangerous not just to Elemental Princes but to reality itself. The Elemental Princes are on the lookout for potential champions and watch all beings brave enough to face Atropus with great interest (which seems to be pretty much exclusively mortals), patiently waiting for the World-Born-Dead to find the instrument of Its own destruction.



^{*the complete collapse of the world into anarchy, death, destruction and insanity as mortals give in to despair as they run out of food and manpower nonwithstanding
**which is just an optical illusion created by the unstable geography of the transforming moon surface (and the writhing of the trillions of soulless bodies that it consists of)
***which are simply elementals of the new element of flesh, albeit inhabited by a small piece of the elemental lord ghost instead of a regular elemental spirit
****just flesh elementals really, not all that different from the regular four types
*****which looks like a giant fetus but is not
******elemental lords can agree that the pretentious little candle isn’t always wrong}

While I've been on this one for a while, I couldn't get anything down until I found the proper entry gimmick today. Once I had the idea, the rest came pouring. Bonus for the aforementioned gimmick being taking another dump on Pelor. Not as amusing as Corey dumping but nevertheless.
Three guesses as to where the original inspiration came from.

I don't actually know how an epic DnD campaign would play out. I suspect pretty crappily, as DnD utterly breaks down from level 10 and up. Not to mention I've never played any of that high level stuff ever. This should be a suitably epic foe for a proper world saving epic campaign. Doubleplusgood for all my stuff here being system agnostic (theoretically everything I write could be made to work in any DnD or derivatives, cos there's just no way this **** will not break apart in DnD3.5, which is what I played most in), plus there's enough holes in this writeup to drive trucks thru. Any DM willing to put the effort into epic campaigns should be able to flesh it out as they see fit.

In other news, still failing to get anything good done from my preexisting ideas. No big surprise there.


extra random tidbit that I'll never ever manage to get into an entry at any point ever: Bensozia got zero respect after being crowned Domina Infernus due to being a demon convert, so swore to leave Big A and be demoted to imp if any devil could beat her on the arena. Only one devil took her up on it and only on the day she was expected to give birth. She popped Glasya out during the fight and left her screeching on the ground until she won. Then she tore off the challenger's entrails and fed them to the baby and nobody questioned her empressity again. Glasya still has the biggest chip of the planes on her shoulder cos she'll never be half as cool as mom.


edit from the future: vvv Only the moons bearing Luminous Overmother's silvery visage are conduits to Her. Once Atropus is settled on one, any others that even exist won't work.
Also It's visible for like decades before anything starts. Plenty of time to level up random shmucks off the tavern in time to meet the epic adversary.

[Starbuck_II]

Writer's block is a thing even when you're not a writer.

ATROPUS (a serious problem), the World-Born-Dead, Endstar, Paraelemental Prince of Flesh, Death’s Head, Granfalloon, Doppelmoon, Babyeater, Uncelestial Body
CR: too high

Spoiler

Show

Contrary to the ubiquitous hysterics about it, Atropus does not, in fact, eat souls of babies. It just prevents their conception, as a natural result of blocking the flow of positive energy into a Material Plane world and any unborn already on the way when Death’s Head manifests is safe (for a given value of safe). Atropus sitting in the orbit causes worlds to eventually be stripped of all mortal life as everything dies off without replacements is a serious problem, true, but it is clearly not the nightmarish horror from beyond the stars scenario it is often claimed to be^_*. The blame for all this is heaped at the feet of Sun Father by the other gods (as is typically the case when anything goes wrong), as if Pelor told the hidden lords of Elemental Chaos to nip their newest sibling in the bud before It could fully spawn. Or if it is somehow Pelor’s fault that a fetal (for the lack of a better adjective) elemental lord with a body of flesh became a ghost in a completely unprecedented and unique manner when killed. Sun Father is absolutely certain the moons are perfect as conduits between Material and Plane of Positive Energy with no faults in their construction, and it is not like anyone could have possibly expected a ghost massive enough to possess an entire planetoid (an impossibility) would also have command over a heretofore unseen fifth element (an even bigger impossibility) and use that to transform the astronomical amounts of earth making up a moon into virtually infinite numbers of dead bodies (which would be just ridiculous). While it might be harrowing for a mortal to witness the moon turn into a decapitated head locked in a silent scream of agony^** that rains down featureless corpselike things intent on killing everything they meet onto the world^***, calling an elemental lord ghost made up of an infinite number of notzombies that completely halts the propagation of mortal life on a world an “elder evil” is needlessly alarmist. It is ridiculous of lesser deities to accuse Pelor of incompetence in world building, especially since not one of them has created a single mortal world ever and are all, in fact, squatting on Pelor’s properties and poaching his mortals.

Besides, getting rid of Atropus isn’t all that complicated. One merely has to destroy the thing It is haunting completely to cut it off from Material Plane, exactly like ghosts of regular mortals that occasionally manage to avoid the pull of Mechanus by latching onto objects, which in this case is the moon. In fact it doesn’t even take some sort of apocalyptic artifact of mass destruction to destroy such an afflicted moon (though it would help), all that’s really needed is to dig through the functionally infinite angry corpses^**** and burn (or otherwise completely submerge in another element) the gigantic Atropus’ core^***** that should’ve formed in a spot somewhere near the center (which is admittedly pretty hard to find by blindly digging around a moon). Reaching the core of course gets easier the earlier an attempt starts, as the transformation of the moon’s mass into flesh starts from the surface and the number of creepy corpses that’ll stand between prospective heroes and the core increases exponentially with time. Starting early dramatically cuts down on the number of featureless bodies to be waded through to reach the core (the myth of dig-fighting through thousands of miles of creepy featureless bodies as they endlessly attack on all sides only happens if the transformation has penetrated into the depths of the moon due to tardiness). Not to mention, Endstar can be seen coming from literal millions of miles away as it appears as a half transparent star in the sky that grows each night until engulfing the moon, which might give mortals a decade or more to prepare.

Though digging into Atropus is certain death for mortals even if they win, they should be glad to give their lives for their world and Pelor might even reward them with ascension to his divine court if they succeed (generally as some sort of demigod with a few domains that always includes moon). As might other greater deities, assuming heroes of that caliber happen to be heretics worshipping Sun Father’s rivals (which is unlikely). And if the worst comes to worst, a world stripped of all mortal life can be repopulated easily enough (at least by Pelor) after Atropus moves on and the flow of positive energy resumes. Such repopulated planets are quite rare and can generally be identified by the unreasonably large numbers of ruins and artifacts from inexplicably lost and forgotten civilizations.

As an escaped fragment of the Elder Elemental Evil, Doppelmoon is particularly antithetical to divinity and no rational being of power from nonelemental planes will risk approaching It, for Moander’s rampage is still remembered throughout the planes. And neither will beings of elements, as even an unborn elemental lord of a nonexistant element has absolute power over all matter; the best any titanic or elemental being can hope for is being turned into a mass of soulless fleshy beasts when Paraelemental Prince of Flesh turns Its gaze upon them.

Meanwhile, the real Elemental Princes of the four regular elements within their hidden enclaves in Elemental Chaos are not satisfied, as they all would lose a great amount of power if a fifth element and its prince is born. They unhappily watch as Granfalloon grows stronger on Ethereal, the single plane where masters of all matter hold no power; for an elemental being to gain the ability to feed on positive energy is unprecedented and their aborted sibling might yet birth Itself as an elemental/divine hybrid if It keeps absorbing Luminous Overmother’s power through those mortal worlds. Such a being would become an actual "elder evil"^******, dangerous not just to Elemental Princes but to reality itself. The Elemental Princes are on the lookout for potential champions and watch all beings brave enough to face Atropus with great interest (which seems to be pretty much exclusively mortals), patiently waiting for the World-Born-Dead to find the instrument of Its own destruction.



^{*the complete collapse of the world into anarchy, death, destruction and insanity as mortals give in to despair as they run out of food and manpower nonwithstanding
**which is just an optical illusion created by the unstable geography of the transforming moon surface (and the writhing of the trillions of soulless bodies that it consists of)
***which are simply elementals of the new element of flesh, albeit inhabited by a small piece of the elemental lord ghost instead of a regular elemental spirit
****just flesh elementals really, not all that different from the regular four types
*****which looks like a giant fetus but is not
******elemental lords can agree that the pretentious little candle isn’t always wrong}

While I've been on this one for a while, I couldn't get anything down until I found the proper entry gimmick today. Once I had the idea, the rest came pouring. Bonus for the aforementioned gimmick being taking another dump on Pelor. Not as amusing as Corey dumping but nevertheless.
Three guesses as to where the original inspiration came from.

I don't actually know how an epic DnD campaign would play out. I suspect pretty crappily, as DnD utterly breaks down from level 10 and up. Not to mention I've never played any of that high level stuff ever. This should be a suitably epic foe for a proper world saving epic campaign. Doubleplusgood for all my stuff here being system agnostic (theoretically everything I write could be made to work in any DnD or derivatives, cos there's just no way this **** will not break apart in DnD3.5, which is what I played most in), plus there's enough holes in this writeup to drive trucks thru. Any DM willing to put the effort into epic campaigns should be able to flesh it out as they see fit.

In other news, still failing to get anything good done from my preexisting ideas. No big surprise there.


extra random tidbit that I'll never ever manage to get into an entry at any point ever: Bensozia got zero respect after being crowned Domina Infernus due to being a demon convert, so swore to leave Big A and be demoted to imp if any devil could beat her on the arena. Only one devil took her up on it and only on the day she was expected to give birth. She popped Glasya out during the fight and left her screeching on the ground until she won. Then she tore off the challenger's entrails and fed them to the baby and nobody questioned her empressity again. Glasya still has the biggest chip of the planes on her shoulder cos she'll never be half as cool as mom.

I actually semi-wrote (mostly rough ideas) a Dragonmech module where you end up on a mech fighting him and destroying him. You fight Lunar dragons, undead creatures, and eventually him.

Only issue if you are given only enough fuel to fly to the moon not back. But the kingdom does fortify mech so don't die while riding it.
My idea was "All Lunar creatures have Negative Energy resist 10 (to counter moon’s effects). "
Campaign never got that far.

[Beneath]

D&D3 breaks down past 10th level because originally post-10th levels were like epic levels in D&D3. I think as of the publication of AD&D1 the highest-level character in Gygax's game that had been running since OD&D was level 14

So if you make "drive off this god" an adventure that 14th-level characters can do, if they're careful with their preparations, that's entirely appropriate.

Also, I like the little tangent that explains why every world has a moon, but usually only one. Though, what happens to a two-mooned world (or a twelve-mooned world like Eberron) when one of the moons gets eaten? Does the other moon still work?

[Fable Wright]

Also, I like the little tangent that explains why every world has a moon, but usually only one. Though, what happens to a two-mooned world (or a twelve-mooned world like Eberron) when one of the moons gets eaten? Does the other moon still work?

Eberron, at least, has one moon per existing outer plane. It's likely that only one plane generates souls, and that's the moon Atropus takes over.

[Pronounceable]

I dunno if anyone'll actually care about it, but I happened to write this thing out so might as well post.

Spoiler

Show

DIVINE RANKS aka DUMB POWER LEVEL BULLSH*T
Demigods (DR1)*
Obad-hai
Malar
Psilofyr
Haela
Selvetarm
Laogzed
Semuanya

Lesser Deities (DR2-9)
2: Great Mother, Ravanna, Erathis, Sharess
3: Lirr, Deneir, Panzuriel, Malcanthet (virtual)**, Gond, Azuth
4: Heironeous, Hextor, Wee Jas, General of Gehenna (virtual, true)
5: Vhaeraun, Brandobaris, Velsharoon, Sekolah
6: Blipdoolpoolp, Dumathoin, Ioun
7: Tymora, Beshaba, Raven Queen, Ilsensine, Pisaethces (apparent), Merrshaulk
8: Waukeen, Arvoreen, Oberon (virtual), Primus (virtual)
9: Loviatar, Titania (virtual), Torm

Intermediate Deities (DR10-19)
0: Apomps (special clause)
10: Yurtrus, Obad-hai (effective)
11: Panzuriel (old)
12: Abbathor, Duerra, Aoskar (dead)
13: Ilneval, Shargaas, Ilsensine (old), Vaati, Ygorl (virtual)
14: General of Gehenna (virtual, apparent)
15: Aerdrie, Fenmarel, Hanali, Rillifane, Sashelas, Sehanine, Solonor, Kiaransalee (true)
16: Eldath, Auril, Bhaal (dead), Great Mother (enraged)
17: Eilistraee, Erythnul, Angharradh
18: Mykrul (dead), Thaun (apparent), Shekinester
19: Luthic, Vaprak***

Greater Deities (DR20+)
0: Lendor (special clause)
20: Talos, Clangeddin, Boccob, Asmodeus (virtual), Kiaransalee (effective), Loviatar (old)
21: Silvanus (apparent), Amaunator (dead), Lathander, Oghma, Talisid (virtual)
22: Baghtru, Laduguer, Bane, Moander (dead), Pisaethces (true), Morwel (virtual)
23: Lolth, Berronar/Yondalla (apparent), Seldarine (combined), Erathis (old), Wind Dukes (old, single)
24: Garagos (old), Tempus, Demogorgon (virtual)
25: Umberlee, Mystra, Boccob+Oghma (tag team)
26: Sune, Grolantor, Karontor
27: Olidammara, Abbathor (old), Laduguer (old)
28: Memnor, Iallanis, Hiatea, Skoraeus
30: Stronmaus, Diancastra
33: Nerull
35: Wind Dukes (combined)
36: Silvanus/Chauntea (true)
42: Nerull+Sune (tag team)
45: Othea (Outer Planes)
47: Umberlee (enraged)
50: Pelor, Annam (Outer Planes)
65: Corellon, Gruumsh
75: Othea (Material Plane)
85: Annam (Material Plane), Moradin
120: Tiamat

404 Power Level Not Found
Selune (∞)
Shar (∞)
Tharizdun (9000+)
Ghaunadaur (?!?)
Emmantiensien (!?!)
Gith(-)
Queen of Chaos (...)
Lady of Pain (!!!)



_{*Tiamat’s abominable godspawn are all technically demigods with 1 rank but most can punch far above their weight.
**Some powerful immortals have virtual divine ranks but aren’t really divine (indicated).
***Titanic power is actually different from divine power (but walks like a duck-quacks like a duck).}

I reserve the right to partly or completely ignore this in the future on account of it being a pointlessly dorky idea. On the upside, numbers please the lizardbrain.

[Pronounceable]

Since the last one doesn't actually count, here's one that does.


CHARON (daemon paragon), the Boatman
Habitat: the River Styx

Spoiler

Show

The greater daemons of Gehenna weren’t always there. Before the first arcanadaemons appeared and started remaking the plane into today’s mire of institutionalized corruption, all the various types of daemons lived in harmony [harmony meaning the strong taking everything they can from the weak, by hook or by crook, as per daemonic standards]. The larger Gehennan society readily accepted the incredibly complicated new ranking system arcanadaemons proposed that was promising to teach them all a higher level of envy and greed (that, amusingly enough, boils down to the strong [i.e. greater daemons] being allowed to take everything they can from the weak [i.e. everyone else]). Some of the stronger daemons (who would lose the most) stood up and spoke out against the arcanadaemons’ new system but their voices didn’t carry enough weight. Once the new reign was established in the Plane of Greed, all those that spoke against it were hunted down and annihilated as the very first order of the General of Gehenna, the new leader of these newfangled “greater daemons”.

That was a very long time ago. Greater daemons and their General have been running Gehenna for eons now and they’re quick to remind all that they managed to get daemonkind to transcend its roots (though today pretty much nobody remembers what exactly those roots were). According to them, they have done this with mixing the grotesque with the elegant, and the impenetrable with the simple (as all evil should aspire to be); the grotesque and impenetrable daemonic ranking system that merely looks like utterly random whims of arcanadaemons to make daemonkind hardworkers, and the simple and elegant economy to endlessly increase the wealth of greater daemons and, more importantly, enflame the greed and envy of their lessers.

Ultrodaemons are particularly proud of daemonkind’s ever increasing power that owes much to their brilliant financial system. The Gehennan taxation is (or should be) the envy of all governing bodies of the planes. It’s neither nonexistent like all those crummy chaotic planes, nor an overburdened mess with thousands of pages of rules and regulations that nobody can even read (let alone understand). No, the Gehennan taxation is simple and elegant and consists of just one clear directive: you pay %80 of whatever wealth you earn to your direct superior as tax, or else. This has made Gehenna the richest plane of all (or at least its ruling caste the richest caste of all, which is basically the same thing anyway) because daemons are the most industrious, dependable and hardest working of all exemplars (thanks to their arcanadaemon ran ranking system). No job is too big or too hard or too lowly for daemons, so long as the pay is right. And they always, always get the job done (unless they’re paid better not to).

The system works flawlessly* as thus: A daemon is summoned/employed outside Gehenna and gets paid, for example, 1000 in arbitrary currency. The rule is to immediately return home and report it, so of course the daemon quickly goes somewhere else and spends 600 moneys on magic items he will consume to increase his personal power. Then he returns to Gehenna and reports to his superior that the employer totally ripped him off and paid a measly 300, turning in 240 as tax. Superior daemon calls him out on his crap and threatens to give him to arcanadaemons for an investigation (aka torture and execution [the cost of which will be billed to the daemon on top of his taxes in the future]), so the daemon passes over a 100 to his superior from under the table. A mollified superior warns the daemon to never caught committing such crimes again and, once left alone, writes down that the employer ripped off the grunt daemon and paid 250, 200 of which was handed over as tax. The superior daemon then files this report with his own tax of 160 attached, and will be handing over an extra 40 from under the table to his own superior the next time they meet in person. The superior daemon will be doing this for each of the hundreds of daemons that answer to him and the even more superior daemon is extremely unlikely to waste the time needed to go over all the accounts of dozens of other superior daemons under his command. The accrued wealth (and greed and corruption) piles up the higher the chain goes. Every daemon knows how things work and they love it [love meaning wholly despise but do their utmost to keep it going for the neverending rush of greed and envy].

Greater daemons would (hypothetically) say that while, on average, the Gehennan taxation system adds up to about 40-20% of a lesser daemon’s wealth depending on how high up he or she is, and simply setting various tax rates at those levels could save a lot of time and effort and resources (because sometimes some numbers may appear to not add up and an unfortunate accident or ill timed natural disaster or random enemy attack might have to cause some records to be destroyed), it’d also ruin the elegance and simplicity of the daemonic order. No true Gehennan needs or wants stupidly long legal documents and once you start writing rules down, they gain a life of their own and begin to breed. Just look at the next door neighbors: archdevils started writing up their constitution with the worst of intentions but now devils can barely find time to get any evil done from all that paperwork their laws require.

Overall, everything is fine [fine meaning terrible] in Gehenna and all is as the greater daemons like. There’s only one problem for them and its name is Charon. Charon was a particularly strong and cunning fishdaemon who was against the arcanadaemons in the ancient days. He somehow managed to flee Gehenna and survive the purging; then he returned at the perfect time with the inexplicably perfect power to grab the greater daemons in the metaphorical neck. Somehow, the fishdaemon had gained control over the River Styx and was using this power to divert all the daemon vessels meant to aid the invasion of Hades. Styx was obviously the single best route into Hades, as it is for every other Lower Plane; while there were plenty of portals from Gehenna, hags knew and heavily defended all of them and it was pretty much impossible to gain a foothold. Using Hades portals from other planes was out of the question, no other fiends liked the idea of Gehennans going around invading other planes and greater daemons knew sending forces to seize their Hades portals would backfire. Which is why Charon’s diverting of their invasion fleets on Styx into other planes didn’t just doom their offensive against the hags, it caused daemons to lose most of their best warriors as the scattered invaders were captured or swept away by Styx when infuriated fiends of neighboring planes sunk their vessels. Even today, eons after the emergence of Charon, there are still daemons from those fleets stuck in nooks and crannies of the River Styx, unlucky enough to be frozen or buried alive without getting crushed, stuck in eternal darkness and cold.

The greater daemons were screwed. They had already suspended all outside mercenary work for the invasion and spent incredible amounts of their resources for buying land on Hades from the hags beforehand and building the Wasting Tower. It had been a genius move they were quite proud of, it was the Wasting Tower that let them completely blindside the hags and quickly gain a lot of ground (and more portals to bring reinforcements) but the initial surprise had worn off and the weight of hags was now breaking down daemonic frontline. Greater daemons were running dangerously low on liquid assets and almost all of their regular customers were now alienated thanks to Charon’s handiwork; even if they aborted the invasion now, daemons were extremely unlikely to get much mercenary work in the near future. They needed the invasion to succeed, they had to get that second plane’s worth of souls and slaves (and other assorted profits that comes from owning the Plane of Degradation), or their vaunted economy would collapse from the strain and the endless hordes of their lessers would descend on them like locusts to tear away all of that personal power and wealth arcanadaemons and ultrodaemons had spent the previous ages stuffing inside their own shells. Boatman Charon (as he’d taken to calling himself) had the greater daemons by the (metaphorical) balls.

So a deal was made. Charon would personally be getting half of all the gross wealth the greater daemons make off of Hades in perpetuity, in exchange for all daemons to forever be able to move back and forth between Gehenna and Hades using the river, freely and quickly, safe from all the regular hazards of sailing the Styx. And Charon, wanting to make sure none of that famous daemonic “ingenuity” can be used to screw him out of his due (which they of course managed later on; by “demoting” an ultrodaemon to the Plaguedaemon, a brand new rank of “lesser daemon” that only ever has one member whose direct superior is the General of Gehenna and personally owns about half of all daemonic enterprises in Hades), insisted it be written down as a binding contract overseen by a very expensive devil lawyer (who later on disappeared in an unrelated boating accident on the River Styx).

With Charon’s support, the daemons were able to send their armies with previously unimaginable speed and the invasion of Hades was back on track. And while it was still ultimately Malcanthet, the Queen of Collaborators, betraying her own kind for profit that allowed daemons to decisively win the war, Gehenna wouldn’t have bounced back from economic ruin nearly that quickly without Charon’s power making it safe and efficient for daemons to send their spoils back home while the war was ongoing.

The source and extent of Charon’s control of the River Styx is still a great mystery, but all denizens of the Lower Planes are accustomed to the cloaked daemon sailing the river on a tiny boat with his little lantern and his oar, approaching any vessel to demand two coins (of any type) per head for everyone on board. His incredibly cheap toll, added to the fact that nobody who refuses or tries to cheat him ever reaches where they want, must have made him a world sized (yet still not all that valuable, for he does not care at all about the actual value of the coins he’s given) hoard somewhere. Adding in the unfathomable amount of money he's been paid by the greater daemons over the ages, Charon must be one of the richest fiends in the planes (or more likely the most powerful, as it's pretty much guaranteed that he'd have spent all of it on magical items he'd have consumed). The Boatman can also be summoned by anyone in all the Lower Planes by throwing two coins into Styx and he usually agrees to carry passengers on his own little boat personally, but in those cases his price is one petitioner or mortal soul per journey. Charon is known to be a pleasant companion in such trips, he likes to chat with anyone who isn’t a greater daemon and can be persuaded to also sell secrets that only a being who can see everywhere the River Styx passes by could know. He demands bizarre prices from his passengers for that sort of information, along the lines of a deaf baby dwarf or a bright green slaad skin or a cobblestone from some mortal town on a mortal world nobody’s ever heard of. None knows if he wants these things as part of some darkly sinister scheme or just to mess with his passengers and the Boatman isn’t saying.

The strange speed with which he can appear all over the Lower Planes has caused speculation that Charon is in fact a whole group of daemons pretending to be a single individual, for there’s many who want to sail the Styx safely and it’s very unlikely that two or more summons have never happened at the same time. Mysteriously, the Boatman seems to know when someone is trying to test him and doesn’t appear at all when there’s a deliberate attempt to summon him in multiple spots at the same time, and such inquisitive folks tend to have accidents if they try to sail the river afterwards. Charon sometimes admits to doing that if he’s in a particularly cheery mood but of course, it’s unknown how much one can trust the word of a daemon. There’s always rumors of various beings falling afoul of Charon for this or that reason and also no shortage of folks getting lost on the Styx, so after thousands and thousands of years of (presumably) ever increasing personal strength, no one can tell what is true or false when it comes to the Boatman’s powers or actions. The only thing well known is that if a vessel sails onto the Styx and Charon doesn’t appear to demand payment, it’s a bad sign and that journey should be aborted. It’s said there are shipfuls of fiends stuck sailing the Styx forever without ever finding a place to anchor or disembark (which is dumb, as all fiends can just kill themselves at any time to return home, but such rumors never care too much about logic).

Boatman Charon is as much a fixture of the Lower Planes as the River Styx. He never leaves the Lower Planes despite Styx extending far beyond them (he claims the air outside doesn’t agree with him), yet his influence is so pervasive that even mortals know of him in myths and legends. The greater daemons of Gehenna despise him for his freedom from their control (not to mention the mind numbing amounts of money they're paying him) and would love nothing more than to find out his secrets, but their deal with Charon is too lucrative to risk angering him. Boatman of the Styx isn't going anywhere anytime soon.

*and slowly makes the multiverse a worse place for no actual gain for anybody
I know I don't normally approve of transferring real world duders directly into DnD but the Boatman is kinda exempt due to his phenomenal fame. He's simply a good idea, no matter how cliched he is. Also like half of all named fiends are already ripped off of real myths so it's not like we're breaking new ground here.

Our Charon here is a dude who'll come in handy for any and all sorts of Lower Planes shenanigans. You could even drag him to mortal world if you feel like it, tho I like him better on the outside. And he's got the mysterious backstory going, feel free to throw in elemental lords or abominable godspawns or whatever else you feel like as the answer to the riddle (assuming you even want one, he's perfectly cromulent as a mystery box).

Also there's a ****load of incidental stuff on Gehennan politics, if anyone even gives a darn about daemons (general experience suggests not). Also also I guess I modified them a bit more.

[Pronounceable]

So yeah, about that last one that was supposed to count? There wasn't a single new trick in it, y'all should've seen that, it was just straight up regular old DnD Charon. Good thing I had a plan to remedy that.


The Larethian Pact (cosmic artifact)
Power: pact magic

Spoiler

Show

The activation of the great Mechanus was an event of such importance, Corellon and Gruumsh (who couldn’t have bothered to stop even when their elder brother locked them both into depths of Tartarus to stop their racket) took notice. They stopped brawling for a moment and looked at the multiverse around them, the first time in countless millenia. And they saw that their siblings had conquered it, filled it with life and reigned over vast territories. King of Glory had fallen so far behind his siblings in actual glory and influence, it was comical. His one eyed freak of a brother must’ve come to the same conclusion, so buggered right off, swearing that the fight wasn’t over and Corellon would rue the day he was formed when he returned for his revenge. But Corellon had lost all of his apetite for putting the dumb savage in his place after seeing the state of the planes, there was something much more important to do now: proving himself a better lord than his other siblings. So he watched and learned.

Moradin had all of the planes made of good essence under his control, however tenuously, but he was more repairman than king. The so called King of the Heavens was spending almost all of his power to keep the (admittedly ingenious) cosmic order he’d set up functioning because the fundamental nature of existence was chaotic and any order you impose upon it is fragile and fleeting; unless of course you’re Moradin and have infinite divine power to pour into your handiwork. But as could be seen here, the cost of this was being a bad king, one that neither inspired nor led his subjects, barely worthy of the title in Corellon’s expert opinion. Then there was little Pelor, who’d built thousands upon thousands of worlds in the once empty Prime Universe and filled them with mortal creatures. Now calling himself the Sun Father, the runt of the litter had made himself countless subjects and was now having his own authority over them challenged by the gods he foolishly let them raise. Then there were these titans, some sort of horrifyingly powerful elemental entities had spawned while Corellon wasn’t looking and were also fighting against Pelor and his creations alongside their own, bigger and better creations. And last but certainly not least was Tiamat, who lived in a multiverse of her own inside her own head, heedless to the fact that she’d functionally imprisoned herself in the dismal Plane of Water. The staggering number of various types creations she’d made seemed to outnumber the rest of the multiverse combined, though at least she wasn’t pretending to be a ruler of any sort and was completely ignoring all of them. But, and this was the crucial part in Corellon’s estimate, she was still the most successful in the family purely on the strength of her influence due to the pure terror she inspired in everybody; whenever Tiamat bothered send an order to any being, she was obeyed without question.

After learning all he needed, Corellon chose the obvious winning strategy (that seemed to have somehow evaded his siblings): quality over quantity. He would always pick only the best and the brightest, leaving the masses to wallow in their own mediocrity. Whenever he made something, he’d make sure it was going to be the best in the multiverse. Corellon would let his siblings have the unwashed masses, but those crowds would be gaping at the majesty of the elite that was under Corellon’s influence. Perfection would be his trade. But one couldn’t build an empire in a day. Well, Corellon could, he certainly had enough power for it, but it wouldn’t be “perfect” and then he’d have to improve it later, which would make him look incapable of getting it right the first time, aka imperfect. Corellon would have to make detailed plans for his empire to be truly flawless and eternal and for that he needed time.

So since he had spare time, Corellon decided to spend it preparing for whatever dumb scheme the one eyed freak was surely preparing. It would certainly be a crude, brute force approach involving having more servants and followers than Corellon; Gruumsh’s simplistic mind was unlikely fathom anything beyond the numerical superiority. And since quality over quantity was to be his motto, Corellon started looking for existing beings of great potential that would be of use in case of an emergency. He would grant these chosen beings great powers, secretly investing his own divinity into them, in exchange for a promise of support if, someday, on the extremely unlikely event that Corellon is personally threatened. Corellon would stipulate all of his lareths (a word he’d picked up from one of the hundreds of elven languages in Material that meant choice) to use the powers he grants them to amass as much respect, fame, fear and/or influence (if not outright power) as they could. That would still be leaving them a lot of freedom to pursue their own goals, it was a great deal, if Corellon says so himself.

The beings King of Glory chose weren’t always pleasant, of course, such as the Demon Prince of the Depths, but whatever Old One Eye was going to do wasn’t going to be pleasant too. They didn’t always act in good faith either, such as the complete turnaround into pacifism the Queen of Stars did to spitefully squander the gifted power (and after haggling on the strength of her forces too). And worst of all, some of them let Corellon down and failed to even survive, like the Grand Khan of Dao. But most of the ones that took the deals were (and still are) solid, using their “mysterious powers” to gain glory and influence for themselves. He might not have mentioned that he’d be gaining some small (by his standards) measure of power from his sleeper agents’ fame and glory perpetually but it’s such an insignificant thing to be bothered about, King of Glory still cannot understand why the Arborean queen would overreact so much.

Nevertheless, since he needed plenty of time to design flawlessest of all realms Arvandor, hottest of all wives Araushnee and most competent of all servants the Seldarine, Corellon wandered around (incognito obviously) and recruited more than a dozen (potentially extremely influential) beings all over the multiverse. He also saw that Gruumsh had, somewhat predictably, chosen to beat up poor little Pelor to take his least desirable toys for his “masterplan” against King of Glory. That alone was proof that Corellon was being paranoid about this backup plan but he’d already started, so there was no harm in completing it. It wasn’t like the bits of his divinity lareths were taking caused any significant loss to his own strength and; being a secret backup plan that nobody else would know anyway, it didn’t have to be that flawless - unlike the glorious realm he’d decided to build in Plane of Positive Energy (which One Eyed Freak would later call mom’s basement out of a misplaced belief that he has a sense of humor).

When he was done, the future Coronal of Arvandor materialized the Larethian Pact as a physical item (a scroll of neverending length filled with unreadable writing) and hid it inside Mechanus without anyone, even modrons, noticing (which was no easy feat, even for one with his skill and power). The intensely lawful nature of the great machine should help compel its beneficiaries to obey if Corellon ever calls for help, which seems highly unlikely.

It was only much later that King of Glory noticed he was getting quite a bit more power than expected from the Pact. When he surreptitiously looked into it he discovered that, by sheer coincidence, the specific spot on Mechanus where Larethian Pact had been hidden was subverting the Emperor of Artifice’s cosmic design to create various interplanar power conduits that aren’t supposed to happen between beings that aren’t supposed to be connected. That was the reason for the rise of those strange and mysterious new pact magics among the mortals, allowing them to illicitly use Mechanus to take powers from extradimensional beings of power in exchange for various favors and services, mirroring the relationship between Corellon and lareths. Though Coronal of Arvandor isn’t particularly happy about being the ultimate source of all that pact magics, not to mention all those profits he's making off the backs of unwashed masses all over the planes, he doesn’t have a way of putting a stop to this without compromising his backup plan or, more importantly, royally pissing off his stronger brother. He’ll just have to suck it up and grow more powerful through some particular subset of unwashed masses instead of the very best.

Once again, it was me, thread! It was my plan all along. Also; turns out Douchenozzle really is a nozzle. Who'd have thunk it?*
_*me
e: Yea I know it's not nearly as awesome as I pretend it is. Just roll with it.
ee:vv No changes to rules.

[Beneath]

Making Warlocks be Correlon's accident instead of, like, Asmodeus or whatever is an awesome twist, I have to say. Are warlocks under this system random, or does an actual deal still have to get struck before the conduit is of any use to anyone?

[Pronounceable]

Just because I hate kids doesn't mean everyone does and there's no reason why there shouldn't be kid appropriate stuff in DnD.


CAOIMHIN (lesser archfey), Brown Lord, Count d’Killmoulis, Master of the Oven, Terror In The Pantry, Bakemaker, Chocolate Chief, Chef Kevin
Domains: food, community, baking, chocolate, coffee, killmoulis, buckawns, brownies, vengeance

Spoiler

Show

Feylord Caoimhin took one look at the dryads and hamadryads spreading all over the forests of mortal worlds to be “alone” with their beloved oak trees and decreed it was dumb and stupid and his subjects weren’t to do that. Instead, killmoulis and buckawns would gather copious amounts of their beloved grain crops from there and grow them themselves in their Feywild domain. However, mortals took a dim view of the small fey taking away their crops and started to treat them like pests, going so far as to train their pet animals to hunt them down as if they were rats. Caoimhin was furious and swore bitter revenge, but unfortunately killmoulis and buckawns were very timid, not to mention tiny and weak, so the Brown Lord couldn’t possibly utilize his subjects to strike back at the big meanies. Frustrated, he sought advice from his king. Sadly, King Oberon was too busy with nonstop banging his thousands of nymph concubines to spare a moment for Count d’Killmoulis. And since the Summer Queen would not lift a finger without some “tribute”, Caoimhin was forced to pray to Deadbeat Grandpa.

For his unfathomable reasons, Silvanus sent a vision to Caoimhin. Inspired, the Count made buckawns build a humongous stone oven and killmoulis to prepare great mounds of dough from all the materials they had taken from mortals until then. He then covered half of his kicking and screaming subjects with the dough and stuffed them into the oven. Caoimhin was going to bake a better, braver class of fey according to his vision. In the end, the freshly made race of pastry crusted fey had the strength of earth baked into them from the all the ingredients harvested from it and also had been tested in fire. As expected, the new subjects were much more brave and powerful than their weak killmoulis and buckawn predecessesors. They had also turned out brown, for there was much cocoa and coffee beans in the ingredients because most mortals hadn’t discovered the uses of those plants back then, so the timid killmoulis and buckawns had gathered great amounts of those from uninhabited wildernesses of Material Plane. The brownies, as a result, were singularly obsessed with the brown seeded plants and would go on to invent all sorts of foods and beverages using them.

And now that he had an army of brave (yet still quite weak and tiny) fey at his disposal, the day of reckoning was at hand, Ch(i)ef Caoimhin could finally get his revenge upon those uppity mortals. From that day onwards, the brownies went forth with courage and determination, they filched and nicked and stole and then stole some more. Flour, milk, eggs, oils, fruits and vegetables; no (nonmeat) cooking ingredients were safe from the thieving hands of the brown fey. The killmoulis back home in Brunnheim used their ill gotten gains to bake breads, pies and (most importantly) cakes, while the buckawns tend to the vast fields of grains belonging to their master, happily saturated with the grain crops their fey madness craves. Thus Count d’Killmoulis was avenged upon the mortals and the big mean pooheads have been living in fear of brownies ever since, or so Caoimhin and his subjects like to think. More importantly, his brownies’ eventual discovery of the secret of chocolate catapulted the Bakemaker to the top of Summer Court, as Queen Titania fell in love with it and rained favors and accolades upon him, going so far as to elevate him to archfey (much to intense jealousy of the rest of the lords and ladies of the Summer Court). Even King Oberon, in a rare display of awareness of any events beyond his bedchamber, ordered large amounts of coffee and chocolate delivered to him; though it’s probably best not to ask exactly what he does with that stuff.

As sometimes happens with such promotions, Master of the Oven managed to refine and focus his own fey madness to a fine edge beyond that of his subjects and shifted his personal obsession to baking sweets in general and chocolate cakes in particular. Which, while all well and good in abstract, caused problems in practice; for Caoimhin was mouthless like all killmoulis and couldn’t actually taste his own cakes. They always smelled great and other fey always told him they tasted great but how was the Brown Lord to assure himself that they really did taste great? It’s not like you could take the damned fickle fey of Summer Court at their word. He needed impartial observers. Though he’d rather them not be too impartial, he wanted his handiwork to be appreciated after all, so whoever was brought in for tasting should like sweets. That was why he decided on the mortal children and told his brownies to get some of those.

A whole squad of brownies would be needed to drag even a small halfling child so brownies, always preferring to use brains over brawn, started to hand out sweets to small children to make them follow the tiny fey into Feywild. Chocolate was especially effective for this and a single brownie could lead one humanoid child with a bag of sweets, leaving the rest of them free to find some foodstuffs to collect for Brunnheim’s kitchens. And it’s not like these children Caoimhin takes has any owners, the brownies always bring the ones abandoned by the adults in gardens and fields and stables and chicken coops; and he feeds them very well (with cakes and pies and sweet cookies). The results are good, Bakemaker’s pastries pass the kids’ taste tests with flying colors. Sometimes the kids can get silly and ask for food that isn’t cakes or pies but they all come around and go back to eating their sweets once the hunger comes calling. Unfortunately, mortals being what they are, these kids all eventually grow sick and die and need to be replaced. Some of Count d’Killmoulis’s subjects point out that the kids they bring to Brunnheim seem to be dying much faster than other mortals, sometimes not even growing up to adult size, and they’re at a loss to explain why that’s the case. It would be blasphemous indeed for any brownie or killmoulis or buckawn to even suggest it might have something to do with exclusively eating sweet baked goods but none of them could ever conceive of that kind of idea anyway, so it’s not a problem.

Meanwhile, in an unrelated evolutionary behavior, mortals recently developed a habit of warning their children against strangers offering sweets. This might cause mortal children to refuse following them and really frustrates the brownies, even to the point of having to come in large groups to drag this type of stubborn kid back to Feywild when they need to find a new taster right now. Brownies are hopeful whatever this weird fad mortals are into will pass soon.

The Chocolate Chief is a high ranking and respected (also envied) member of the Summer Court and the personal pastry chef to the Queen of Waves and Flames, owns great tracts of Feywild land chock full of various valuable crops and massive kitchens staffed by his subjects and is in command of a vast number of jolly and pacifist tiny fey. Even his only “enemy” in court, the jester Squelaiche, who once stole 40 cakes he brought to the Queen in tribute, and was never forgiven; has nothing truly bad to say about him. He’s even known on certain mortal worlds as the inventor of chocolate, and sometimes coffee. Overall, Caoimhin the Brown Lord is an upstanding and exemplary member of the good court of Feywild.

Ok maybe not everything is kid appropriate here. Sue me.
Also what the hell is wrong with Irish? This is madder than French, why even use Latin letters if you're gonna do this? I'd managed to let Eachthighern pass uncommented before but this was the straw that broke Ceasar's back (or possibly pen).
e: Also yes, another idea I randomly got like yesterday.

[Fable Wright]

Even his only “enemy” in court, the jester Squelaiche, who once stole 40 cakes he brought to the Queen in tribute, and was never forgiven;

That's as many as four tens! And that's terrible.

[Great Dragon]

@Pronounceable:
I have captured Princess Glasya, and am holding her for Ransom in my "To the 9th" thread.

I expect to see your chosen Champion/s within the week.
I'll have roast Pheasant (are you sure?) and all the trimmings prepared.

muhahahaha!!!

D&D3 breaks down past 10th level because originally post-10th levels were like epic levels in D&D3. I think as of the publication of AD&D1 the highest-level character in Gygax's game that had been running since OD&D was level 14

Heh. Nerdout!

IME, oD&D had that "past 10th level is epic" bit.
With AD&D 1 & 2 just continuing that.
Some of the Names for Class Levels was cool.

3.x was just fine (Except Quadratic Wizards, which the DM could deal with 👹)
until the Epic Level Handbook was pulled out.
That was a Super Nuclear Mess!

And yeah, since Gygax was gone before the buy-out of TSR (1997?) I think he ret-conned his old Character (Mordy) to at least 14th level.

But, I can be wrong - since I wasn't anywhere near the Legends of D&D.
*******

I really, really, really hate Maglubiyet. It's not just a dumb****ed name like Mask. It's straight up hypocritical and (fictional) racist. If calling the racial deity of a race literally defeat isn't the highest order of fictional prejudice, I dunno what is.

I wasn't aware that his name meant that, or have any clue in which language.
So, yeah. Need a new Name for this guy.

I'm thinking:
Nezaustav
And
General Euwigaien

[flat_footed]

The Fullmetal Mod: Thread Necromancy is a forbidden art.