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  1. - Top - End - #181
    Firbolg in the Playground
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    Quote Originally Posted by Pronounceable View Post
    That'd be a nice unicorn knight. It would've been a great fit if I didn't hate them.

    Also I really wish this Ghaunadaur was real. It's probably the only one of the 100+ deities I've rejiggered here that I'd actually want out in the real world.

    [/SPOILER]
    I must say though from all the entries you made that one is kinda crappy. Because it has a suspicious stink of you're just pulling this one out of your ass. I feel like you're just cutting your weight here. But at least I can hope that you're just laying the brick as foundation for future ideas. It does seem like a fertile ground to make a splash. Fart fart poop fart.
    You got Magic Mech in My Police Procedural!
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    The OTP in the playground.
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  2. - Top - End - #182
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    Calling Ghaunadaur "elder seep" puts me in a mind of this. Now I want to work out how to put one of those into a D&D dungeon and have it be fair

    Quote Originally Posted by Pronounceable View Post
    No, there's no Ordial Plane
    Spoken like someone trying to hide the existence of the Ordial Plane from us!
    Last edited by Beneath; 2017-06-14 at 03:06 AM.

  3. - Top - End - #183
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    Hi there Pronounceable. I have some precedence for unicorns being creatures of pride and wrath. From William Shakespeare's Timon of Athens.

    If thou wert the lion, the fox would beguile thee; if thou wert the lamb, the fox would eat thee; if thou wert the fox, the lion would suspect thee, when, peradventure, thou wert accused by the ass; if thou wert the ass, thy dulness would torment thee, and still thou livedst but as a breakfast to the wolf; if thou wert the wolf, thy greediness would afflict thee, and oft thou shouldst hazard thy life for thy dinner; wert thou the unicorn, pride and wrath would confound thee, and make thine own self the conquest of thy fury; wert thou a bear, thou wouldst be killed by the horse; wert thou a horse, thou wouldst be seized by the leopard; wert thou a leopard, thou wert german to the lion, and the spots of thy kindred were jurors on thy life; all thy safety were remotion, and thy defence, absence. What beast couldst thou be, that were not subject to a beast? And what beast art thou already, that seest not thy loss in transformation!

    Timon, act vi, scene iii
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    It's worse than the time some friends used a silver piece, a platinum piece, a delayed blast fireball and a scroll of passwall to make a nuclear explosion in a game...
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    Chatter is usually a sign that it's time to break out the Lego pirates and start firing marbles at each other's ships instead of role playing. Some nights, we're just not in the mood!
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  4. - Top - End - #184
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    Quote Originally Posted by Agrippa View Post
    Frankly I'd go with a more classical pre-modern take on unicorn behavior to explain the presence of unicorn knights. Unicorns are beautiful, graceful, powerful and noble fey creatures of the equine persuasion. They are spiritually pure and perfect in every horsey way imaginable, with a big honking spiral horn sticking straight out of their foreheads. Yet they aren't truly free from sin, in fact they're big fans of two of them, namely pride and wrath. That's where young virginal women, and especially "unicorn knights", come in. When unicorns get angry everyone knows it and little can be done about it.

    Yes, just about anyone can calm down a unicorn if they've built up a sufficient rapport with one, but building up that rapport takes time and it's hard. But for reasons unknown even to unicorns, the presence of a virgin, especially a female one, quickly calms them down. That and it's much easier for a non-virgin to build a rapport with a unicorn foal or colt than with a fully grown one, so virgins are pretty much trotted out to calm down strange unicorns and keep them from acting stupidly.
    In Tales of the Five Hundred Kingdoms, male unicorns attached to, and defended female virgins, female unicorns attached to, and defended, male virgins, and both were pretty belligerent when it came to destroying non-attached "creatures of evil".

    Resulting in a clash between a female unicorn on a "destroy evil" hunt, and a male unicorn defending a malevolent, virginal female ghost.
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  5. - Top - End - #185
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    Quote Originally Posted by Beneath View Post
    Spoken like someone trying to hide the existence of the Ordial Plane from us!
    Ohnoes, they're onto me!!!
    Quote Originally Posted by Agrippa View Post
    Hi there Pronounceable. I have some precedence for unicorns being creatures of pride and wrath. From William Shakespeare's Timon of Athens.
    Hiya. This must mean time travelling Shakespeare stole my idea. Darn thief...


    So anyway, I'm now back from elsewhere. And I bring the thing I said I would.

    FENMAREL (intermediate god), Lone Wolf, Shadow Beneath the Trees, Lifeclinger, Hidden Hunger, Stalker of Seldarine
    Domains: survival, isolation, stealth, outcasts, shame, suicide

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    While the second betrayal hit all of the Seldarine deities quite hard, none took it as badly as Lifeclinger Fenmarel. But unlike the others who were in grief over the suffering of their followers or mourning the fall of their dear sibling, Fenmarel the Lone Wolf (not to be confused with too suspiciously similarly named deities from certain other settings) was burning with jealousy. The Seldarine God of Survival, befitting his nature, hadn’t fully died when Corellon executed him after Araushnee’s rebellion and had retained all of his memories and most of his original personality through the correction. He had played along afterwards, diligently performing the role of the angsty, emotionally unstable boy with a golden heart that King of Glory had seen fit to cast him in the neverending soap opera that was the new existence of the Seldarine, yet he secretly loathed his “lord and savior” (and all the other paper thin stereotypes his siblings had been reduced to) with all his soul. It was, of course, a completely hollow, meaningless anger. As the god of survival, the Lone Wolf couldn’t even imagine standing up to Corellon or revealing what had really happened back in Araushnee’s rebellion to his fellow deities; his portfolio wouldn’t let him endanger his existence by infuriating his master. So he sat and seethed while King of Glory had withdrawn to his quarters to contemplate the future after the Revenancer’s revenge. But it wasn’t the impotent rage against his creator and helplessness to change his loathsome portfolio that pained Fenmarel so, he’d had that even before the previous rebellion and was quite used to it; it was the knowledge that the stuffy, unimaginative, straight laced, boring Goddess of Justice had the balls to do what he could not and had hurt the Glorious Monarch as badly as it was possible to hurt an elder primordial deity.

    As he wiled away the time by continuing to be the overdramatic heartthrob tailor made to attract teenaged female mortals to Seldarine worship, Fenmarel waited with the rest of his siblings for Corellon to finish his contemplations. His only consolation was the brief moments of lonely isolation, where he could just lose himself in the forests of Arvandor and have some peace and quiet without any of that tiresome romance or dumb melodrama suffusing every moment of the rest of the Seldarine’s existence. While eventually one deity or another always came over to “cheer him up” and forced him back into the role of the dark and troubled heartthrob, at least he could have plenty of time to himself under the guise of emo angst (befitting his stereotype). And when the King of Glory finally came out after a lengthy period of soul searching and self reflection to lay out a new and exciting roadmap for the Seldarine, Fenmarel knew his worst fears were being realized.

    Having learned his lesson, the Coronal of Arvandor wasn’t going to be an overbearing meddler that micromanages every little thing his children do while arrogantly ignoring their worshippers anymore. He was going to be a chill patriarch from now on, a hands off father figure that trusts his family to deal with their own affairs. And he was also going to open up the Seldarine to the masses. See, Corellon had looked into what those wacky mortals were up to before the advent of the great Mechanus and found this thing called ancestral worship, where they worshipped the ghosts of their parents and their parents’ parents and so on. It was simple and ingenious and the Glorious Monarch was certain it could be even more popular now with the improvements he had in mind. From now on the best, most worthy worshippers of the Seldarine were going to be sanctified upon arriving at Arvandor; they would gain an actual bit of divinity in their afterlife that’d make them real (if puny) gods by Corellon’s will. The strongest, smartest, prettiest, skilledest and devoutest of mortal worshippers were going to become members of the Seldarine family and in time, Corellon’s family would become the biggest and the best family in all the planes (far superior to the families of his brothers). These Seldarine saints were going to get worshipped by their still living friends, families, neighbors, acquaintances and later descendants as valued members of the pantheon and they, in turn, would get to become minor deities of local importance to their families and societies. And also become servants, courtiers, consorts, advisers, soldiers, agents and companions to their eldest siblings here in Arvandor. They would help and surround their sworn deities at all times, serving them to the best of their ability. One day in the far future, everyone was going to be part of the glorious family and then everything would be cool and awesome (except for those who weren’t good enough, of course, but who cares about losers?). Fenmarel knew this meant the end of his peace and quiet forever, Corellon’s “new and improved faith” would certainly surround him at all times with souls of the idiotic mortals who ate up that angsty bad boy with hidden depths ****. He would never again be able to be his real self even for a moment and the mask would, sooner or later, become the real face.

    He had to do something, find an objection or, as a last resort, come clean about the past and try to rally his siblings against Corellon. It would’ve been better to be annihilated right there than become a cardboard cutout for good. He did nothing. He even cheered like the others to keep his cover intact. Hidden Hunger didn’t have the balls to speak up when he could, so the only thing that happened in the following ages as Corellon put his plan in motion and Arvandor overflew with sanctified dead mortals was that he was filled with even more hate and shame.

    The new repackaging of ancestral worship was a resounding success, the “groundbreaking blend of ancient beliefs and modern philosophy” netted the Seldarine a significant worshipper base siphoned off of Sun Father and his hidebound ilk. As a pantheon, the Seldarine prospered, gaining massive numbers of mortal worshippers and forging alliances with more carefree and chaotic deities of Material Plane against the old bastions of traditionalism (aka Pelor and Chauntea). Stepping back and leaving the mortal affairs to his children let Corellon build a strong following from basically scratch for the third time; he really had learned his lesson, at least as far as enticing mortals were concerned. The saints of his children’s worshippers occasionally returning to mortal worlds to visit their descendants promise them a form of immortality even more appealing than that from Nerull and the bottomless well of drama created by the soapy nature of the Seldarine keeps their worshippers happily occupied with religious debate (which could be called fanfic contests and shipping wars by cynics or heretics). While Corellon’s power over his followers isn’t anywhere near that of his hated brother Gruumsh’s influence on the race of orcs or the degree of unshakeable fanaticism Pelor can inspire in mortals (as is his right as their creator), Coronal of Arvandor knows with certainty that those who choose to worship his children are better people and makes sure they’ll have so much more freedom and happiness than other mortals.

    All members of the Seldarine in Arvandor, deity and saint alike, are members of a big and happy family and the Glorious Monarch’s dreams of the bestest family are alive and well. All remaining original deities of the Seldarine have gained great divine power and fully embraced their roles as the cast of the neverending teen soap, whatever other tendencies and traits remained from their ancient personalities have long been swallowed up by the infusion of mortals’ hunger for overdramatic teen soap, divine gossip and erotic fanfiction. Fenmarel has become an angsty bad boy over the ages just like he’d once feared, with only a few flashes of despairing fury and jealous hatred today that he can’t quite remember the source of, and these have fossilized into the source of his random bouts of antisocial tendencies, angry bursts and the famous inner darkness. At all times, he’s surrounded by legions of adoring saints (mostly of the female persuasion) who all clamor to be the one who’ll set him straight and are all too happy to line up to be the next in line whenever one of his tempestous affairs with his fellow deities end disastrously.

    The Lone Wolf is the patron of the poor and the downtrodden, the depressed and the suicidal, the victim and the repentant. He urges the poor and the oppressed to endure their terrible lives and survive at all costs, while simultaneously preaching of death as a welcome escape from problems to those who’re well off. He encourages self imposed isolation and creepy/perverted gestures of obsessive love both. He demands endless hard work on the part of the guilty for absolution, yet is completely against anyone forgiving wrongs done to them. As a god of shame and isolation (and an unconscious expert at both), Fenmarel wants everyone to be unhappy; his apparently contradictory domains and teachings are all ultimately aimed at making lives of the Seldarine worshippers as miserable as possible by fostering and propagating unhappiness while sounding like good ideas for the moment. The Lone Wolf has no solid, predetermined dogma or tenets for supplicants; he judges every situation uniquely and determines the best (aka worst) course of action before advising it. Yet they love him and keep coming back for more, making him feel smugly superior for giving them what they deserve (and almost immediately feel terrible about being a massive ****, followed by doing it some more).



    Like father, like son; Douchenozzle Jr is on the case. On the plus side, we finally get around to the real Seldarine as seen by the regular Joe Peasant. I think this lot here a nice change of pace from all the individual gods, while being a much more individualist religion than most of the solo acts. It's not too much fleshed out because it was too much efforthere should be blanks for DMs to fill. Also they're neither elves nor treehuggers, but without any need to bar them from it.

    The rest of the muppets goes as Rillifane the Boy Scout, Sashelas the Skirt Chasing Jock, Solonor the Aggressive Dudebro, Aerdrie the Overenergetic Kiddie, Hanali the Airheaded Bimbo, Sehanine the Compassionate Doormat for your teensoap needs.
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  6. - Top - End - #186
    Troll in the Playground
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    You know elves realy need a god of sex and rock nroll cuzthey are angstier than angstiest mortal.
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  7. - Top - End - #187
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    So yeah. That last one was kinda boring, wasn't it? It was missing something. Like coolness, or interestinghood. Good thing I had a plan.


    MALAR (demigod), Beastlord, Bloodhunter, Dire Sire
    Domains: savagery, instinct, bloodlust, predators

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    Nobody is quite sure how a deity can be nonsentient but Malar is doing it. The beast in the Beastlord is certainly genuine, his actions are indistinguishable from that of ordinary predator animals and even various magics and powers allowing communicating with animals work on him (though he has nothing much to say and is unpredictably violent), leading to the leading theory of him being an ascended regular animal.

    His origin may not be known, but Malar is known as the origin of all the monstrously large and misshapen animals classified as “dire” thanks to his ability to reproduce with whatever mammal animal he wants to. He keeps going around randomly eating and mating with animals on the worlds of mortals until he’s eventually slain, then respawns on some other world to continue his savagely simple existence. The many strains of dire animals giving so much trouble to all civilized peoples (and druids) are either his direct offspring or their descendants, with larger and more monstrous ones being closer to him. Bloodhunter seems to despise civilization and sentient races, and almost always sticks to deep wilderness areas where wild animals would be his only company. He’ll attack any humanoid unfortunate enough to cross his path but he’s rarely very focused and it’s entirely possible to escape from him with a good headstart. Facing Malar in combat is a fool’s errand but he’s eminently killable, for he’s no smarter than any predator and any sufficiently large and armed group of mortals can bring the Beastlord down.

    Overall, Dire Sire is simply a roving monster (who generates other roving monsters) that poses no important threat in the grand scheme of things. As a mere beast (and one that avoids civilization at that), Malar doesn’t even warrant the sort of dread a regular orcish horde can inspire in the mortal lands. In fact, orcish hordes love to hunt him down when they find him on their world, for the Beastlord makes a great trophy. His relative harmlessness and obscurity are likely the only reasons Lord Corellon hasn’t bothered to destroy him for being an embarressment.

    Malar the Bifathered, as he’s known to absolutely nobody else, is the result of the Seldarine Goddess of Magic and Dreams (and many other things) Sehanine’s plot to keep her divine family safe and happy(ish). Having recognized the growing fury within her brother Fenmarel (who seemed to have settled into a menage a trois with Hanali Goldheart and Aerdrie the Eclipsed Skies for the moment but was the odd man out in the relationship and likely to be dumped by both soon) shortly after the establishment of Seldarine sainthood, the Moonbow feared a third great betrayal in Arvandor might be in the cards and resolved to preempt it. At that time, her current lover (who was cheating on her with Sashelas and thought she hadn’t noticed) Solonor the Black Hunter’s sadistic streak and bloodthirst was also bothering Sehanine (who’d began to retaliate with her best friend -and partner in affairs of defense- Leaflord Rillifane) as it could get worse and open him up to influence of the Seldarine’s enemies (aka Gruumsh). So she persuaded them for a threesome and used her own domains of magic, mysticism, femininity and secrets to transform the affair into a ritual that drained her brothers of their undesirable and potentially dangerous qualities. Fenmarel’s inner turmoil calmed down considerably and he became less abrasive. Solonor lost his excessive appetite for hunting and fighting, along with the restless boredom that enveloped him whenever he didn’t get his fix. Of course, all that badness had to go somewhere so a side effect of the ritual was Sehanine’s pregnancy.

    After she was done modifying her brothers’ minds to make certain all possibilities of betrayal had been eradicated (which she knew would work well, as she knew they’d all been down that road already [and not everyone was ungrateful for their newfound happiness and loyalty to their family like the Revenancer]), Sehanine turned to ridding herself of the monstrous being inside her. However, not knowing all that much about mating among deities, she’d miscounted the time she’d have and by the time she’d hidden herself away and ready to proceed with her (for the lack of a better word) abortion, Malar was already awakened and had sensed her intentions toward him. Bloodhunter tore her to shreds from within as she struggled to smother him with magic, performing his own C-section quite successfully. The Moonbow, for all her magical might, wasn’t a goddess of war or protection and unaccustomed to battle, whereas Malar was made of divine anger, hate and bloodlust; so he easily overwhelmed his mother and left her almost split in half as he Aliened his way out. He then turned on the severely weakened Sehanine, intent on devouring her. Luckily he was completely consumed by his urge to consume, so Malar couldn’t notice or resist the dreamcurse Sehanine laid on him as he was biting into her divine flesh. Since he was acting like a mindless beast lost to its urges, the Moonbow’s curse imprisoned him in a dream of beasthood: he would forever dream of being an animal following its base instincts and live in a permanent state of dreamwalking, unaware of his true nature as the (embarrassingly) Seldarine God of Violent Anger and Bloodlust. The Beastlord’s only escape would be to apologize to Sehanine and resolve to never let his instincts rule him again, which he’s not capable of doing on account of believing himself to be a nonsentient animal.

    This, of course, didn’t save Sehanine there. Malar ripped her apart and devoured her body and she died. But the Glorious Monarch resurrected her, as he’s wont to do. And he was so impressed with her dedication to the Seldarine family, he granted her a boon. So the Moonbow wished to forget what she did, both to make sure this morally questionable sequence of events would truly be behind them and any possibility of her mellowing out at some point and undoing the cruel yet richly deserved fate of her unwanted son wouldn’t exist. Corellon obliged, he erased Sehanine’s memory of the grisly and questionable bits (only leaving the memories of a particularly awesome threesome behind) and bound the Beastlord to worlds of Material Plane, where he remains to this day. Sehanine Moonbow got to get on with her life without horrible trauma, the most unstable members of the Seldarine were cured of their potential troublemakery and Corellon was reassured of the flawlessness of his handiwork.

    It was a good day for everyone in Arvandor. Except for Fenmarel, who’s a jerk and sucks and deserves all the bad things that’ll happen to him and shouldn’t have dared to touch Corellon’s beloved wife back in the day.



    So here's what's what: Douchenozzle is a total **** and junior ain't got **** on him. Junior is also wrong. About pretty much everything. Whereas Big Daddy usually turns out to be right despite being a total **** about it.

    Malar has always been a cartoon animal too (albeit not from a Saturday morning), so that's what he gets here. You could even add in his werewolfery here thanks to Sehanine's moon connection and the main reason I haven't is because DoubleD made them in our planes. And dire animals are one of those weirdass DnDisms that's strangely compelling, so I wanted them in. This Beastlord here is admittedly just a footnote, little more than a random encounter for high level adventurers, but it's about time Corey got some love (for a given value of love) in our thread. All of his siblings have got crapload of cool(ish) stuff and he was seriously lagging. Hopefully these last two entries will help fix that.
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  8. - Top - End - #188
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    man i kill to see elven goddess raped by mindless beast. Nice story pronounceable
    so is beast lord born from goddess and whats the relation ship between malar and dire sire
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  9. - Top - End - #189
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    So Sehanine just ripped the parts that objected to being a cardboard cutout out of Fenmarel's mind? Brutal

    Also, huh. The Kiaransalee story made it look like forgetting what they'd been through was a standard feature of the mind-rebuilding after the first rebellion, but then Fenmarel gets to keep his memories 'cause he's god of survival and Sehanine just inexplicably has hers. So did Corellon deliberately choose who to amnesify based on whether he could make them loyal without changing their memory? Sehanine, as the doormat goddess, could be changed to just be made loyal to him (so she kept her memories); Kiaransalee, as the goddess of justice, couldn't let Corellon killing all of them and resurrecting them redesigned stand, so she did not?

    I'm starting to suspect, here, given all the supposed "ascended mortals" who are not, that no mortal actually ascends without one of the primordial gods' say-so, which might suggest that Sune and Nerull are someone's plot against someone else gone out of hand. This would make Mechanus/stopping ancestor worship less necessary, though (except that it gives fewer ancestors who a god might sneak off ascension onto)

    As for Fenmarel, I considered posting a "Fenmarel: The God that Hates You" thing with a link to the Sithrak comic but I decided against that 'cause that'd be, like, mostly content-free and Fenmarel's you-hate is different from Sithrak's you-hate (one of them just hates everyone, while the other has a particular hatred for each individual one of his worshippers)
    Last edited by Beneath; 2017-07-08 at 12:37 PM.

  10. - Top - End - #190
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    Quote Originally Posted by Beneath View Post
    Also, huh. The Kiaransalee story made it look like forgetting what they'd been through was a standard feature of the mind-rebuilding after the first rebellion
    It was. Just didn't work as well as Corey hoped and he didn't work on them all equally.
    I'm starting to suspect, here, given all the supposed "ascended mortals" who are not, that no mortal actually ascends without one of the primordial gods' say-so
    Any greater deity can empower mortals, don't need to be one of the five elders. Very few mortals manage to ascend without some sort of divine help or backing but it still happens through coincidence (Brandobaris) or hard work (Velsharoon). You're right in that mortals just love to call any god who doesn't advertise their origin "ascended mortal" and the actual number of those is much lower than it seems. Mechanus, though, is to protect Ethereal (and thus the multiverse) and the spontaneous incarnations of belief popping up is just a minor side effect (minor for Moradin at least, whose is the only opinion that counts).
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  11. - Top - End - #191
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    Just finished reading the whole thread. Awesome. Thank you!

  12. - Top - End - #192
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    Everything is proceeding per our unschedule (which is a schedule that doesn't exist).


    VAPRAK (lesser titan), the Runt, the Cursed, Exile Squared, Stunted Chieftain, Ugly Titanling, Unloved of Mother, Skullsmash
    Domains: strength, anger, stupidity, ugliness, revenge, ogres, sacrifice, ogre magi

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    The ogre mage is neither an ogre nor a mage. Not having come up with another name for themselves, the ogre magi feel no need to correct the layman either, who just sees large ugly humanoids too small to be giants that have magical powers and reaches the most obvious conclusion. The general opinion among them is that this is for the best, as being correctly identified would only make it harder to break or fulfill their curse.

    The stupid, malicious and ugly race of ogres have the habit of sacrificing members of other races in the name of the stunted titan they think is their creator, whom they revere as a god. Vaprak himself is neither their creator nor wants them to be generic baddies for bands of plucky adventurers, and would prefer they do something more directly useful to him. But humanoid sacrifice is about the only thing he can get them to understand from his prison in Jotunheim, therefore ogres keep capturing humanoid races (and very rarely giants) and ritually executing them in Vaprak’s name. The sacrifice ceremony is usually a quick affair where the bound victim’s head is crushed by chieftain or shaman of the ogre tribe with a big rock to the general applause of the rest of them, followed by the other ogres closing in to pulp the rest of the body with smaller rocks in a community spirit. The pulverized remains are considered sacred and are buried in a pit where, every once in a while, a titanic construct will spawn from the gore and crawl its way out.

    The creature will be inhabited by one of the sacrificed victims’ souls trapped in the monstrous body, cursed with ogrishly violent and stupid instincts, yet very clearly still themselves (plus a bunch of nifty magical powers and an immunity to aging and sickness). These newly reborn “ogre magi” quickly recognize that regular ogres believe them to be an old and respected member of their group who died a while ago and was blessed by Vaprak. This generally acts as a crash course on deception and manipulation for the cursed ex-humanoid as they struggle to not tip the ogres off (who’re used to the idea of their dumb god screwing up the blessing and sending the wrong soul back) and get rekilled. The ogre magi who manage to survive this welcoming (either by escaping or becoming a respected member among ogres) will generally turn their thoughts toward regaining their old form, which they’ll instinctively know to be possible. They’ll also know the exact method, which is a bit of a conundrum: true love.

    The ogre mage must find a humanoid (of their original race) to fall in love and marry them. Such a marriage will break the curse and transform the ogre mage back, restoring them to their original forms as long their partner is willing to stay married. Which is extremely hard, on account of ogre magi being fugly and prone to berserk rages, not to mention the general notoriety of the ogre race they’re believed to belong. Furthermore, the required true love is one sided; the partner doesn’t need to stay in love, so long as they stay married, while the ex-ogre mage must keep being fully infatuated, no matter how they’re treated or what the partner does, lest the curse returns and becomes permanent.

    Demanding a volatile emotion like passionate love to forever remain unchanged, especially in the face of any potential ill treatment from one’s partner, isn’t fair or reasonable, of course, but curses aren’t known for fairness or reason*. Therefore, all ogre mages instinctively know that the only way to regain their human(oid)ity with no strings attached is to fulfill the curse: find true love (almost an impossibility by itself) and then promptly kill their unfortunate lover shortly after the wedding before either of them can have a change of heart. As far as the ogre magi know, none of the other cunning and convoluted solutions they tried to get around the parameters of the curse work (and they tried a lot). This is the reason why all ogre magi are always ornery, on top of their habitual berserk fury; very very few souls are willing to either commit the evil and/or suffer the pain needed to complete the curse, or risk becoming a virtual slave to whims of someone else after miraculously surviving the ogres (assuming they even managed step one, ofc). Those that do, however, find that they’ll keep the nifty powers of ogre magi with none of the downsides; fulfilling Vaprak’s curse/blessing is one of the most obscure and risky methods of gaining a form of eternal(ish) life, so there’s always a few nutjob wizards and scholars willing to give it a try. They never come back to life, because Vaprak isn’t running a charity here and empowering a willing mortal doesn’t have the effect he wants.

    After the War Against Titans saw the fall and imprisonment of the giantish pantheon, his siblings blamed Vaprak for being the spark that ignited the wrath of deities. And since their traitorous mother wasn’t locked in Jotunheim with them either, the titanic demigods decided to take their anger out on Vaprak, their cursed youngest (and ugliest and weakest and dumbest) sibling. He protested, pointed out that he wasn’t even born then and had nothing to do with anything, to no avail. Buried alive under a mountain range on Jotunheim, Vaprak the Runt spent many centuries powerlessly cursing at all gods and titans of the multiverse. He holds a special loathing for goddess Araushnee, who’d cursed him with ugliness, weakness and stupidity before he was even born. And it was this weakness that prevented him from breaking free of the flimsy (for a titan) prison his siblings put him in. It was only much later, when he noticed he could sense the race of ogres out in the multiverse due to the curse they shared, that Vaprak realized something good could come from it. Jotunheim was blocked by the will of primordial elder gods, Vaprak knew none of his siblings could see or affect anything beyond their prison while anything from the outside could waltz in and out at will. He was alone in having any influence on the outside multiverse, assuming he could get the dumb ogres to do anything productive. Which he could, but only to a degree; he wasn’t strong enough to properly communicate with ogres and ogres weren’t smart enough to make sense of the messages he was sending, so they defaulted to smashing skulls in their god’s name.

    Stunted both physically and mentally he may be, but Vaprak was still a titan with great command over elements, and spawned off of a primordial elder deity to boot. Eventually he learned and trained himself and nowadays, he manages to sneak bits of his power out during sacrificial rites of ogres, capturing a few of the souls sacrificed in his name and building the ogre magi bodies to bind them. Every bit of his power spent this way in Material Plane takes a small bit of his curse away as well, pushing him towards his freedom in tiny human child steps. It’s too slow for his tastes but that’s all he can manage, which is still very impressive for a scrawny titan with mental retardation. He’s not particularly concerned about the havoc among the mortals, they can go complain to Araushnee if they have a problem with it (which is, ofc, whom the murder of spouses to break his curse represents).

    Far as Vaprak the Cursed cares, he can do whatever he wants now as payment for all the injustices he suffered. Yeah, he can’t do anything right now, being imprisoned and whatnot, but it won’t last forever. His curse shrunk noticeably. Sooner or later he’ll break it and gain the power that is his birthright; Giantmother Othea might’ve been an unfaithful bitch and a traitor to her kind countless times over, but momma ain’t given birth to anything weak, if Vaprak’s elder siblings are any indication. Once he breaks Araushnee’s curse, the Ugly Titanling will show all those bastards who’s the runt now. All of Jotunheim will bow before Vaprak when his siblings lie broken under his feet. And after he devours them all and adds their power to his own, it’ll be the gods’ turn.

    He’s starting to find some holes in this plan, now that he’s growing less dumb, but it’s still a solid roadmap and he’s sure he'll prevail. No one’ll win like Vaprak. No one’ll escape from Vaprak. No one’s revenge’ll be as sweet as Vaprak’s...



    *And neither is Araushnee nee Lolth, the original cursespewer



    I'm gonna assume everyone can figure out where this comes from. If not, you might have acute fairytale deficiency.

    It's also extremely far from DnD canon, true. Also no trolls because A) it's kinda dumb to have ogres closer to trolls than giants, B) regeneration is too weird.

    And does anyone actually care about weirdass giant derivatives like verbeeg and fomorian and ettin and ****? We could go for that trash by the rest of the titan demigods. Not saying I will, cos those are some dumb and pointless critters, but someday I might.
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  13. - Top - End - #193
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    So the murder-to-escape-the-curse thing, let's say an ex-human ogre mage (call her Fiona) marries her human true love and wants to off him because she's more in love with breaking the curse than him, does she have to do it herself, or can she arrange someone else to? Does it have to be deliberate murder or do accidents work? Can she just wait it out until her true love dies of old age, since she's immortal?

    If she does, can the widow Fiona then remarry? Does she have to do anything in memory of her dead True Love, or can she move on since she's slipped the curse and it's not coming back?

    If Fiona falls out of love with the human, she's an ogre forever, then? One shot at breaking the curse and if she blows it it's gone forever and she doesn't get a second true love even well after the natural lifespan of her original true love?

    To break the ogre-mage curse you have to be the kind of person who would off your True Love to get out of the curse, right? There's no like, deciding someone who isn't really that important to you is your True Love, or if you realize the person isn't that important to you after you marry them you're re-cursed.

    Do ogre-magi breaking the curse help Vaprak more than ogre-magi just being made?

    I don't know most of the weird giant-kin, but Ettins are cool, if a bit overdone since Warcraft. But you could steal from Warcraft and make them another ogre offshoot.
    Last edited by Beneath; 2017-08-05 at 09:25 PM.

  14. - Top - End - #194
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    Rise and shine, thread! Rise from your grave and shine!


    EMMANTIENSIEN (elemental anomaly), Heart of the Planes, the Evergreen, First Root, Primordial Shepherd, Treant Protector, He Who Eats All
    Domains: treants, patience, calmness, fury, elements, creation, trolls, genocide

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    While nobody can agree upon which exemplar race came first, every one of exemplar historians and scholars are certain that the trees predate all. Old myths and legends of all exemplar races mention that there were trees by the time they came to be during the Dawn War, whether they’re murderclaws of the Abyss, songstars of Celestia or Asgardian swordspines. One of the more outlandish and ridiculous of these ancient stories is from Acheron, about an army of rustroot trees rising up against a rakshasa raja and completely destroying the cube he rules and eating him and his armies (by shredding them to tiny pieces with their razory roots and sucking up the resultant minced rakshasi through their pores to forever trap their victims and prevent their respawning). It’s an obscure and maligned legend, as rakshasi are particularly touchy about their racial prowess and a story of defeat by trees is heavily frowned upon, even one as transparently silly as that.

    Except, of course, it’s true. Sure, it was actually rustroot treants that defeated them and there was no such thing as a tree back then, but the early Dawn War era multiverse did belong to creatures that looked identical to trees. And there were many. Each Outer Plane had its own types of treants and the total number of different treant species easily reached into tens of thousands, with each species having millions upon millions of individuals. What’s been known since the Dawn War as the “aligned flora of Outer Planes” are, in fact, those same treants that have lost their ability to act. From songstars of Celestia to cloudtops of Elysium, every single tree on the Outer Planes is a comatose husk of a primordial treant, regrowing elsewhere over and over each time they’re used up by the resident exemplars as natural resources. The reason this is virtually unknown is because the treants of pre-primordial ages were relentlessly hostile and devoured all exemplars they could get their branches and/or roots on, leaving extremely few witnesses to speak of them (and pretty much all of those were annihilated in one planar catastrophe or another anyway long before the Dawn War even ended). If the treants hadn’t suddenly stopped slaughtering all nontreant life, none of the exemplar races could’ve created anything resembling a civilization and deities (once they appeared) would’ve been forced to squeeze into the four elemental planes and the void of Material. Emmantiensien the Evergreen, progenitor of treants, is keenly aware of this at his abode inside Elemental Chaos. He’d be furiously plotting to regain the mastery of the multiverse that was stolen from him if his ancient anger hadn’t been squeezed out by the epheremerally infinite weight of Ethereal Plane.

    As one of the main locks keeping the Elder Elemental Evil outside reality, it didn’t take Heart of the Planes more than a few seconds to be completely infused with Tharizdun’s rage and coat itself with the four elements serving Him, becoming an astronomically large mass of elemental power (not to mention the first being outside the three supreme deities). While Ruinous Overmother has been shredding EEE’s power leaking into multiverse to pieces teeny enough to be harmless (aka elemantal spirits, whose harmlessness remains extremely debatable) ever since, she let his anger pass in case it’d give her an advantage against her daughtersister. As a gem that defies conventional geometry, Heart of the Planes (also of Emmantiensien) stored this omnicidal fury for the unfathomable amount of time it took for the battle of Overmothers to start creating the empty Outer Planes. By then First Root was so persistently angry on so many different levels, it caused the spontaneous creation of thousands of different treant species out of the shapeless aligned matter (which has an innate tendency to mimic real matter [aka elements]). While Luminous Overmother was content to leave treants to their victimless fury at first, the births of exemplar races and the ensuing massacres forced her to create Ethereal Plane to save dwellers of the multiverse from EEE’s rage. Obviously the Allmother wouldn’t let that pass uncontested and interfered. So creation of Ethereal Plane left treants on Outer Planes in an eternal coma/mindlessness as Emmantiensien’s ability to reach them was completely blocked.

    The upside of this for Primordial Shepherd was that he’d finally gained a measure of sanity as the infinite rage in his heart was smothered by the Shawl of Silver Tears enveloping the Inner Planes. And unlike the regular mindless elemental spirits getting past the blender of Yawning Void, he had enough of EEE’s power to retain a sentient mind (not to mention enough elemental strength to put most titans to shame). This pleased him greatly and he peacefully sat in his abode for untold ages, creating a calm and silent sanctuary for himself amid the raging whirlpool of power that is the Elemental Chaos. And Emmantiensien might’ve still been a calm and serene being if that accursed Knockoff Father hadn’t provoked him with the travesty that he calls the treeTM.

    Many many ages later, Pelor took a look at Treant Protector’s incapacitated subjects on the Outer Planes, and recreated bargain bin versions that were thoroughly inferior in every possible way on the little mudballs he’d filled Material Plane with. The imitations were small and feeble, with only the tiniest bits of cosmetic differences to tell them from one another. And they needed nourishment, grew old and died. Even worse, they were explicitly made to serve as food and shelter to other knockoffs of Pelor’s, those dumb critters he’d based on exemplars of Beastlands. All of which, in turn, only existed for the benefit of the other other feeble fakes that were a mockery of the children of Annam and Othea. And then Pelor had the gall to call these “humanoids” his crowning divine achievement and act as if he owned the planes.

    Something had to be done to teach this pretender a lesson. Except Material Plane also laid outside Ethereal and First Root’s power couldn’t reach there directly. Luckily, dwellers of Outer Planes had been thoughtful enough to create a pathway that conducted elemental power. So the new treant species Emmantiensien’s reawakened rage spawned (based on types of trees from Material) could go to worlds of these mortals and ruin their day. They even had some of their progenitor’s elemental power and were able to exert control on their mortal imitations. Sadly for Primordial Shepherd, most of the new treants were also sane and calm and peaceful (like he used to be) and preferred to hang out on the Tree of Worlds or take residence in Material’s forests instead of bringing ruin to humanoids and their assorted gods (many of whom, he’d discovered, were still more goddamn imitations of real deities, crafted out of belief). While a few treants sometimes obey their progenitor and move against humanoids, most of those eventually run into bands of plucky adventurers and are defeated or pacified.

    And then, there’s the crowning jewel of indignity. As if Pelor’s own mockery wasn’t enough, his whelp of a son went and made a second knockoff of the Evergreen’s subjects out of elemental spirits during his “rebellious” phase. While not as pathetic as the tree, this so called troll is even more infuriating to Treant Protector because it’s a sick and twisted version of the treant with its terrible appearance, endless fury reminding him of the unpleasant past and the disgusting compulsion to eat its putrid evergrowing flesh. The aforementioned height of indignity isn’t the awful beasts’ themselves, or their baffling decision to worship Emmantiensien (although it’s definitely upsetting) and it isn’t their ability to blithely survive in Outer Planes (which is even worse), but it’s their tendency to inflict harm on Pelor’s discount giants far, far better than his own subjects ever do. Except they’re not nearly smart enough to actually take part in any real plans First Root might have against deities of mortals, so all the pain and ruin they create is just fruitless sadism.

    Being immobile, lacking direct power on Material Plane and Yggdrasil both and incapable of creating obedient treants; Emmantiensien can only sit and stew and hatch schemes to draw deities of humanoids into Elemental Chaos where he can actually destroy them. Only, such things will likely never come to fruition due to a lack of treantpower. Nothing is going as well as it should and anger is slowly building again inside Heart of the Planes, this time entirely his own. The odds of this causing any weakening on the locks of reality and let the First Son send in even more horrors is statistically insignificant and nobody needs to bother trying to appease or calm Emmantiensien at all.

    Top secret behind the scenes stuff(shhhdonttellanyone): For about 10 seconds I thought Emma as Ordial Plane, connecting Inner and Outer Planes. Then I said lolnope
    I think someone wanted this at some point. Y'all wouldn't believe how many iterations this took. Emma is pretty much nothing but a name in DnD so there's like 45 million ways to go with him. I put in the Tree and the Gem, but skipped Rillifane. I'm also ashamed at how long it took for me to remember where trolls first came from. How the hell did I not remember old JR's stuff? Mind boggles in hindsight.

    Anyway, this is the Unbearable Lightness of Taking A Dump On Pelor. Not as satisfying as the Corey version but I enjoyed it. Also, trees would be intimidating in DnD, Durkon's right. They eat earth, water, air and fire (sunlight is totally fire). Complete elemental mastery right there. Inspiration! Lightbulb!

    I'm not gonna talk big and say the thread is back, but the thread is back for now. How long it'll stay back is a different question, as I have nothing to post next. Still trying to find some more Nerull goodness (aka badness). If I wasn't utterly ignorant in those subjects, Wonderbringer Gond would've been coming up for the god of transhumanism and general cyberpunkery. Alas, it wasn't meant to be.
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  15. - Top - End - #195
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    This kinda snuck up on me. There I was, thinking about whether making the drow a form of shadow possessed half undead is a lame knockoff of shadar-kai or not*, then bam. It just happened.
    *It was

    ILNEVAL (intermediate god), Karaash, Horde Lord, Everseeping Blood, Gruumsh’s Left Hand, Warmaker, Eater of Phalanxes
    Domains: war, leadership, order, strategy, weaponry, ambition, jealousy, inferiority, grudges

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    Ilneval aka Karaash is the orcish god of war. Which isn’t saying much, for every orcish god is a god of war in some form (except Luthic, who’s female and therefore inferior and unworthy of notice).

    What seperates the Horde Lord from the rest of his orcish fellows is his emphasis on the more cerebral aspects of warfare. Tactics and strategy, martial organization, training, research, civilian (for a given value of civilian, which is a pretty small one for orcs) infrastructure behind military actions all fall under his purview. When orcs go to war, it’s the shamans and warmasters of Warmaker who do all the required prep work so the powerful orcish warriors will display their might on the battlefield and have the necessary training, equipment and information to crush the enemy. All of which is entirely boring for your average orc, so Ilneval isn’t popular or respected by majority of orckind. Especially when compared to Legbreaker Baghtru, the Son of Gruumsh, the mighty god of mighty warriors and mightily bashing faces and screaming angrily (in a mighty manner), who gets all the glory and the spoils and the adoration. Who cares he’s dumber than a rock made of bricks and couldn’t find his own ass without a map (likely provided to him by the Horde Lord)? He’s mighty! And tough! And loud! That’s all that matters, every orc knows that...

    Karaash is miserable. He’s sick of Baghtru reaping all the rewards of his hard work and would like nothing more than to put the idiot down and claim the orc warriors to himself. Unfortunately, like all orc warriors, Gruumsh’s Left Hand knows that might makes right and to the victor goes the spoils and also he does not have what it’d take to defeat Baghtru. He can do nothing but bide his time and work hard, hoping to grow strong and maybe one day challenge the Legbreaker. And so long all that orcish belief and sacrifices and riches keep flowing to Baghtru and his followers, the chances of that happening is none; therefore Eater of Phalanxes is forever destined to be the god of being not good enough. Why Godfather Gruumsh saw fit to bless the lazy dumbass with that much divine power while the most intelligent and dedicated god of orcs thanklessly slaves the days away for the betterment of orckind is a mystery to Ilneval. The Horde Lord was even made by One Eye’s own hand, without being sullied by an association to a female. And it’s not like Gruumsh even cares about Luthic (evident by his regular murderings of her) so he can’t be showing preferential treatment to her son. It makes no sense.

    Still, Ilneval refuses to scheme and plot to advance himself. He’s devised thousands of different ways to topple Baghtru (coming up with even more almost daily) as a hobby but refuses to act on those for one second. Strength is the only virtue and taking what belongs to others without rightfully earning them by might of arms is the sort behavior the honorless scum that worship Shargaas the Shameful stoop to. Better be trampled underfoot forever than win with skulking in the dark and stabbing in the back. Nightlord Shargaas, who’s unfortunately almost as smart as Ilneval, is aware of this and mocks Warmaker incessantly, disparaging his honor as “pathetic romanticism befitting an elven child”. When he’s not sending his scum to murder and rob the Horde Lord’s followers of what little they glory earn, that is. Of course, Everseeping Blood can never retaliate, for the orcish god of darkness and trickery cannot be found when he doesn’t want to. Even Yurtrus, the Yurtrus who got killed 99 times, the same Yurtrus who failed to even embody his own domains and forced the Godfather to take them away to appease Nerull and brought shame upon all orc gods, the greatest loser of all the planes, looks down on Karaash’s desire for validation and fruitless envy. Not that White Hands ever said anyhing (having his mouth ripped away permanently as punishment and all) but Ilneval can tell from the look in his eyes, the look that says at least I tried. As if throwing yourself into guaranteed failure over and over is something to be proud of or Ilneval should also humiliate himself by publicly losing to Baghtru. And the Horde Lord can’t bring himself to punish Yurtrus either, any victory over his cripple of a brother would make Ilneval look petty and (much more importantly) weak.

    All of which is par for the course, of course. Like the rest of the orcish godlings, Gruumsh made Ilneval to these exact specifications for his own entertainment. The Horde Lorde is an unrepentant ******* and his envy, despair and rage at the treatment he gets is so funny (not knowing what a sitcom is didn’t stop Gruumsh from making one). The Godfather is very amused every time he turns his eye towards Karaash and thinks he knows enough of him to know he’ll forever be miserable. A downside of having only one eye is having to look at things only from a fixed perspective, especially when one spends all of his time sitting back on his couch and watching the fifty thousand channels on his TV (in a manner of speaking).

    On the surface, the Seldarine Goddess of Love and Friendship couldn’t possibly be anything even remotely similar to Warmaker. Hanali is the most popular deity among the Seldarine; she has the most saints dedicated to her, the largest compound in Arvandor, adored the most by mortals and stars in the highest number of fanfics written by their believers. She’s the hottest and friendliest among the Seldarine, the most prestigious partner to have in the eternal hurricane of tangled relationships, the one with most suitors/fans/stalkers outside the pantheon and the absolute best in the sack.

    But behind all that is a goddess who’s fully aware that she’s a substitute Sune, created just because Corellon was too scared to handle the real thing. As anyone can plainly see, the Crimson Companion is almost a mirror image of Lady Firehair; the same degree of extrovertedess, the same friendly flirtiness, the same tone of voice, the same manner of speech, even the same facial expressions on her avatars... Yet with none of the iron will or the sharp mind behind the pretty facade: Hanali is dull and easily manipulated, she can’t help but go along with the flow and do whatever she’s told because she doesn’t have a better idea of her own. She always feels like everyone’s taking advantage and, just like Corellon, using her as a safe and easy Sune. Lady Goldheart is sick and tired of being everybody’s attainable fantasy and just wants to be acknowledged and liked for a thing of her own that’s not a lesser version of something Sune has. Except she’s got nothing of the sort, she was created as the dumb hot girl who goes down easy (what Sune habitually pretends to be) and (unlike the real deal) it’s all Hanali is capable of being. She can do nothing but suppress her inferiority complex and burn with a furious jealousy.

    So, despite outwardly showing all signs of complete happiness, the Seldarine Goddess of Love and Friendship was the most miserable of the bunch. And therefore a perfect match to the Horde Lord that she met by complete accident during a feast at Pelor's palace. Instantly recognizing the self loathing for not being good enough and the all consuming envy hidden behind his blustering macho facade, Hanali was immediately intrigued by this disgusting godling of an orc. Not that she’d ever touch this thing with a ten league pole, but she thought he could be someone who’d understand her. Maybe he could even acknowledge her as something other than a hot chick to lust after, seeing how much Ilneval seemed to loathe female anything. Ilneval, in turn, first assumed it was some sort of Seldarine trick to get at Gruumsh and pretended to play along with this dumb slut, hoping to turn around whatever the pansies had planned and present a shrewdly won victory to Gruumsh; the sort of thing Baghtru could never in a trillion years manage. His opinion did change however, after recognizing that she was acting alone and not as bait for some cunning plan her betters had concocted. The envy and fury inside the Crimson Companion was as genuine as his and Ilneval was shocked to find common ground with a member of the Seldarine. And a female one, no less!

    As they became actual friends, Hanali discovered that orcs are loathsome only due to Old One Eye’s evil influence and Ilneval found that the King of Glory was just as ****ty a father as his nemesis. A degree of mellowing out nobody could’ve expected from Warmaker and Lady Goldheart happened, lessons were learned and prejudices eroded on both sides as they starred in a private romcom of their own. The unlikely pair of deities managed to make each other happy, since their completely unrelated lives had somehow managed to make them soulmates (or at least the godly equivalent, what with not having actual souls and all), it wasn't even surprising. They eventually admitted to being in love, if only from faraway. Because, of course, neither one’s family would welcome this turn of events and if they were ever discovered, their existences would be forfeit. So they’ve never met in person ever since they became friendly with each other and their affair is entirely chaste, consisting of secret messages going back and forth between Arvandor and Nishrek. Hanali finds it extremely romantic and refreshing compared to every other relationship she’s ever had, while Ilneval is glad that he’s not with his beloved in person where he could **** things up with his reflexive *******ry or engrieve her with the endless variety of wounds and maimings Gruumsh heaps upon him.

    While both are so much happier than they used to be, they still have to pretend nothing of the sort has ever happened to protect themselves. This, coupled with their normally miserable existences, is slowly but surely pushing them toward the ludicrous idea of eloping from their pantheons. Which they both know is impossible; there’s nowhere in the whole multiverse they can go that Gruumsh and Corellon’s combined power couldn’t reach, even other primordial deities wouldn’t be able (or willing) to protect the star crossed lovers. Nevertheless the longer their forbidden love continues, the more desperate they’ll get to get together; both are quietly certain that at some point in the future they’re gonna have to reenact that famous mortal play and it’ll end even worse for them than it does there.



    I blame Pushing Daisies for this. Should've never watched the damn thing.


    vvv in the interest of not needlessly bumping the thread: Not that it'd be impossible for them to get in Emma's good graces, but they'd prolly die before reaching him. Elemental Chaos hates everything nonelemental.
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  16. - Top - End - #196
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    ... Man, it's like looking at and some kind of Klingon God of Logistics. I just feel sorry for the guy. On the plus side, no one in Gruumsh's pantheon but Gruumsh himself could even find Ilneval without his support. Unfortunately, that's enough.

    I do have to wonder, though. What would happen if the lovers ran away to the primordial chaos, where there's a powerless deity only handicapped by the logistics of sending orders and organizing his followers who rather hates the orcish, and elven, pantheons and has a fair deal of primordial power to protect the two?
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  17. - Top - End - #197
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    Doesn't said primordial deity hate them too?

  18. - Top - End - #198
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    Now I know I bashed DnD's demon obsession quite a lot in this thread. But I had good reason. You'll just have to trust I still have good reason for this one.


    BAPHOMET (demon prince), Demon Prince of Beasts
    Domains: corruption, violence, weaponry, barbarism, chaos, evil, minotaurs

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    As the story goes, once upon a time there was a foolish wizard who wanted to impress a druid he’d fallen in love with. So he designed a spell to uplift animals, thinking that making all of the druid’s beloved animals as smart as humanoids would be a good way to win her heart. Then the foolish wizard bought a bull to test it. This was a prized animal with good breeding; big, strong and tough, with a spotless white hide and an aura of majesty. Once awakened to sentience, the bull could remember his life clearly and recognized exactly how his kind was being used by humanoids. Deciding it was time for payback, the bull killed the foolish wizard and escaped. Soon, the bull recognized that it was quite easy to kill people when they thought they were dealing with a regular animal. Pretending to be a normal bull and targeting lone travellers and tiny farming communities, he became an accomplished serial killer and managed to rack up quite the body count among the peasants of the land.

    So when the bull finally died, his soul found himself in Mechanus instead of reincarnating like a regular animal. Modrons weren’t strangers to sentient animals, so just examined his life like a regular mortal. Unsurprisingly, they judged him to be chaotic evil. So the bull’s soul was branded with chaos and evil, transformed to a petitioner and sent to the Abyss as a hapless pile of chaotic evil soul matter. Back then, the Demon Prince of Demons was at the height of their campaign and any demon with two enslaved petitioners to rub together was proclaiming itself Demon Prince of Something, so the former bull was promptly grabbed by an ambitious demon and reshaped into an enslaved monster. Then the wannabe demon prince was squashed by a badder demon and the damned bull soul was shaped into a different monster by his new owner. The process repeated dozens of times, sometimes he was taken as loot from a loser, sometimes traded or stolen, but the ex bull had many many owners and suffered a massive variety of tortures and monstrous forms; as was the case for billions of other petitioners unlucky enough to land in the Abyss during Demogorgon’s conquests.

    Then, for some reason, he drew attention of the ancient demoness called Pale Night. Known to be a primordial being (and also the oldest surviving demon of the multiverse), the Shrouded Shape of Evil was one of the unimaginably small number of demons that could mate and breed. None could ever say why the Mute Demoness ever did anything she did, except that everything she did was to further the power of chaotic evil and the closest thing to a monarch demonkind has ever had. And she’d chosen to mate with him, which was the worst pain the bull petitioner had experienced in his centuries in the Abyss but it was fine, since this resulted in his rebirth as a real demon. Perhaps she’d seen high CE potential in this petitioner, or perhaps she was just curious because of his unique being, but the Mother of Princes gave birth to the new demon going by the name of Baphomet, one who was destined for greatness. The future demon prince could therefore be considered a sibling to other Pale Night spawned demonic rulers like Graz’zt, Luperico, Rhyxali and Vucarik.

    The Demon Prince of Beasts is very much unlike what his name suggests and despises demons that are all about mindless violence and unthinking rage, such as the Demon Prince of Cannibalism, his mortal enemy. In fact, Baphomet just might be the smartest among demonkind today, with a skill dwarfing even Demogorgon in technical and scientific matters. Baphomet is one of the greatest artificiers of the planes and can construct technomagical terrors rivaling most advanced machinery the genies of Inner Planes have to offer with only one hand (not that he has a choice there, what with having replaced his left arm with a massive magic cannon that shoots green balls of materialized dread (named Big Fear Gun), but I digress). The Demon Prince of Beasts gets his name from his outlook instead; he believes all mortals are just barbaric beasts merely pretending at civilization, simply waiting for an excuse to turn on each other, with a savagery equal to the demons hidden just below the facade. Baphomet’s goal is to strip away the illusions of morality and break down the trappings of civilization, so the beasts chained inside mortal minds, the true people will be freed. And he’s figured out the best way to accomplish that too, which is giving them destructive power unmatched by their fellows in impossibly advanced weaponry: firearms made of and powered by demons. While a number of mortal worlds have reached the technological level to invent guns and bombs, Baphomet’s demonically enhanced living guns are infinitely more reliable and powerful. They don’t need ammo, they don’t need maintenance, they don’t malfunction and when they do get destroyed, they reassemble themselves. They’re also cursed; the tiny demons inside slowly corrupt the owner, eroding their sanity and morality to free the beast within as the Demon Prince of Beasts commands, sometimes even magically fusing into the mortal’s soul after prolonged use.

    All this and more is thanks to the revolutionary breakthrough Baphomet made soon after becoming a true demon. He was new and not very good at reshaping damned souls, so his army of monstrous petitioners were small and weak. Demons he’d enslaved were no match for the much bigger and badder demons serving his rivals even with teamwork. And he himself was nothing more than an ant compared to the demon princes feeding on the suffering of millions. His solution was sealing what few demons he’d enslaved into boxes, endless imprisonment would be a much worse torture than being sent out to fight. Even fights doomed to failure were still fights and demons enjoyed fighting, so Baphomet correctly figured out depriving them of even that would increase the nourishment he’d get from their pain. The nano (as he named it after the word for “box” in the ancient language of his mortal world) was a great success that gave him a large spike of personal power but the aforementioned breakthrough was miniaturization. Baphomet figured out a way to cut demons into ever smaller pieces without killing them and, more importantly, decreasing their power; this let him shrink his “demon in a box” to about the size of a thumb. That is the secret to the weapons of the Demon Prince of Beasts: his special boxes siphon off the trapped demon’s inherent ability to power up from pain/fear/hate and use that chaotic evil essence as a power source for incredible technomagical feats. It’s also how he enhances his demon slaves, transforming them with demonic implants to twisted amalgamations of machine and flesh. Baphomet’s minions are capable of taking on much bigger and badder demons than themselves, which was how he could eventually amass enough power to declare himself a prince.

    Baphomet is best known by mortals as the lord of minotaurs, an ogre sized race of bull-man hybrid creatures. However they’re less a race and more a strange type flesh golem, animated by a damned petitioner of the Abyss instead of a mindless elemental spirit of the regular golem varieties. Baphomet’s bound petitioners are incapable of leaving their plane (like all other petitioners) and his demon slaves need to be summoned from the outside to leave their homeplane (like all other demons due to Soulforger’s seal upon the Abyss), so he needed a different type of being to spread his influence into Material Plane. Researching golem making and finding a way to stuff a petitioner or demon into it was childplay for the Demon Prince of Beasts, thus the minotaurs were born in the manufactories of Icon of Sin. Becoming a minotaur is the most prized goal for Baphomet’s minions, as it’s a much less painful form of being compared to abyssal petitionerhood or twisted half mechanized existence that’s the hallmark of Baphomet’s servitude. Since they come straight out of an assembly line, all minotaurs are identical except for their personality, which is the personality of the animating petitioner or demon. Far too many of the first minotaurs went rogue once they reached Material, recognizing that living as an outsider golem thing is infinitely better than serving Baphomet in the Abyss, so there’s a small but enduring number of them scattered all over the worlds of mortals to this day. These are all somewhat calm creatures prone to living alone in remote locations and leaving mortals in peace, completely averse to any sort of danger, for being destroyed will mean going back to Icon of Sin where Baphomet awaits. But they’re still powerful CE monsters and will not be pushed around. The newer, more loyal minotaurs are ex mortal cultists of the Demon Prince of Beasts, rewarded for their work on his behalf during their life by immortality in the form of a minotaur. These ones work to hasten the collapse of civilization and help free the beasts from cages of morality, becoming cult leaders and armsdealers, knowing that they’ll be rewarded with another minotaur body and further chance at mayhem by their master if they get destroyed.

    Baphomet poses a grave threat to Material Plane and its mortals, for his insidious cults always ultimately plan to drag the world itself into the Abyss. And he can do that, evidenced by the corrupted planets floating in the skies of his domain, Icon of Sin. The cursed weapons his cultists peddle don’t just corrupt mortals but they corrupt the fabric of Material Plane itself, suffusing the planet and its surroundings with essence of chaotic evil in the form of smoke and ash from their discharges. Once this planar corruption reaches critical levels, the Demon Prince of Beast’s machines can summon the entire world to the Abyss and cut it off from the multiverse, letting his technomagical demon legions to storm the planet and destroy all remaining vestiges of civilization. Baphomet then withdraws his demons and leaves the world alone, a utopia of freedom where beasts can be as beastly as they want without any of those pesky ideas of morality. The binding machines also ensure the souls of all remaining mortals of the world are forced to forever reincarnate on their now postapocalyptic madmaxian world of savagery and barbarism. The worlds Baphomet has captured are few in number with extremely diminished populations but their evil and chaos output is immense, feeding and strengthening him in ways most other demons of the Abyss can only dream of. While he still has a long way to go to catch up to the toppest of Abyssal topdogs like Demogorgon or Kiaransalee, Baphomet is most likely to get there eventually (proving Pale Night was right, as she was wont to be).

    Once a world is captured this way, it is doomed (unless some mortal proves badass enough to somehow fight through armies of mechanized demons, assault Icon of Sin, maybe even face Baphomet himself in combat, and destroy the machines holding their world trapped in the Abyss, but what are the chances of that happening?).



    Well there we have it. If you can't tell what my reason for this particular entry is, I don't even know what you did with your life until now...
    And the parallels to real minotaur myth is neat too, I guess.
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  19. - Top - End - #199
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    There is a bunch of references to doom.
    But I think it would be kind of cool to do a doom and dnd crossover.
    doom in dnd 3.5 would probably be a level 4(or maybe a bit higher) fighter(maybe a bit more but the fact he dies to a rocket means that he can not be that high level but when he have armor and temp hp he can survive rockets which is hard below level 4(12d6 damage but since half is fire and half is blunt you can apply two different kind of damage reductions))
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    That is an awesome backstory for Baphomet, and it really makes sense. Now it's given me some ideas...

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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    Quote Originally Posted by noob View Post
    Dungeons&Dooms
    That's a thing I'd thought about many years ago but never really did anything with it. And since these are magic demon guns and rockets, they deal as much damage as DM wants, so it can be played at any level.
    ...
    And since so many people are reading without commenting (or a few people are refreshing the thread repeatedly to increase view count for some reason), I might as well post some postbait about what y'all would like to see in the future:

    -Nerull is still messing around with reincarnation for nefarious reasons.
    -Titans imprisoned in Jotunheim haven't been idle.
    -Something extremely unexpected appears when you split the atom.
    -Genies can, with great difficulty, possess mortals.
    -Lizardmen are lizardmen for a reason.
    -Kobolds' fey obsession is surprising people, and not necessarily with traps and ambushes.
    -Celestials are terrible at raising mortal children.
    -Elves spend far too much time and effort at elaborating why they're better than humans.

    These are all the half baked and half cocked ideas I have at the moment. A few of them are bound to make it into the thread, which is rather lifeless these days. Why's everyone previously around so silent now, did I finally exhaust reader interest in this?

    Also, has anyone around here ever used any ideas from the thread in their games? That certainly would've been neat to hear about.
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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    I never used any idea here in my game not for the lack of coolness in your writings. More that I don't have anyone to play my games
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    Quote Originally Posted by Pronounceable View Post
    -Celestials are terrible at raising mortal children.
    -Elves spend far too much time and effort at elaborating why they're better than humans.
    These. Always good to hear about better-than-thou types completely messing up.

    Quote Originally Posted by Pronounceable View Post
    These are all the half baked and half cocked ideas I have at the moment. A few of them are bound to make it into the thread, which is rather lifeless these days. Why's everyone previously around so silent now, did I finally exhaust reader interest in this?
    I assume people are still interested, but it's easy to miss updates on a slower-moving thread.

    That said, I've seen the idea of smoke from firearms having unusual magical properties thrown around a lot, and this is a refreshing take on it. Also, kudos on describing the horrors of Awakening.

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    Oh, hey, I look away for a bit and you've been busy I see.

    I really like your Baphomet. I'm also curious about your atoms and genie possession and lizardmen

    My standard for goblins now is pretty much in line with yours (little suicidal murder faeries)

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    Would you believe this idea just randomly occurred to me this morning? I dunno why all the cool looking ideas I've had for a long while keep clicking less the more I think on them while random bits of inspirations produce immediate results.


    THE GREAT REVEL (centennial planar event)
    Location: Upper and Lower Planes (minus Asgard)

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    Olidammara himself might be an intellectually inclined coward but he’s nevertheless beloved by the warlike, strength/courage/idiocy worshipping exemplars of Asgard. And not for being the comic relief either; the einherjar really love the Laughing Rogue for his immesurably valuable (in their opinion) gift to them: the Great Revel, a simple excuse to cause widespread havoc and violence.

    Once every century, Olidammara hides a few million bottles of his sacred wine all over the Outer Planes and dares the conan knockoffs of Asgard to find them. The individual Asgardian who can find and drink the highest number of the sacred wine bottles and then return unkilled by the infinite dangers of the planes becomes the Guest of Honor in Winesong, the fabled Feasthall of Olidammara until the next revel. So they go forth, either on their lonesomes or in small squads that’re destined to eventually tear themselves apart with infighting over the spoils, and make a nuisance of themselves in the multiverse. It’s the highlight of the century for every einherjar, the greatest opportunity any of them are ever likely to get to be a spotlight hogging braggart and be adored for their greatness in the endless revelry in the house of the God of Rogues (which is normally closed to all except souls of his mortal worshippers). So during a Great Revel, pretty much all of Asgard is emptied of its exemplars and becomes quiet and peaceful for a moment for the rest of the critters inhabiting it. Of course, 99.999% of all einherjar are killed during the revel and thus disqualified, so this peace and quiet ends abruptly as the vanquished Asgardians respawn cantankerously, ready to fight anything they encounter to work out their frustration at losing.

    Obviously, every other exemplar race hates these massively destructive einherjar invasions into their planes. Nobody likes rampaging hordes of obnoxiously cheerful barbarians tearing their home apart to look for some random crap hidden by an ******* of a trickster god, especially ones that go out of their way to provoke everything they meet into a fight. While Asgardian troublemakers are far too disorganized to pose any real danger to the established powers that be in the grand scale, they’ve grown quite adept at doing exactly what will infuriate other exemplers to get their glorious battling on and the Great Revel takes a different form in each plane. Einherjar beat up and bully Elysian petitioners to make angels kick them out, destroy all valuable looking stuff they see in Gehenna to offend the endless covetousness of its daemonic owners, burn and pollute and despoil nature to enrage Beastlanders, disrupt logistics of devilish armies and interfere in strategically important spots of the Blood War, arm and train Tarterian petitioners to be able to resist depradations of demodands, and so on and so forth. Even Celestia, where the Soul Forger’s divine power bars any and all chaotic creatures from setting foot on its soil, isn’t safe from the einherjar taking up piracy on the holy water ocean surrounding it; for the God of Rogues is cunning enough to smuggle his sacred bottles without Celestials noticing and Asgardians foolishly believe threatening archons with sunk ships and bombarded ports can force them to find and hand over the spoils.

    No precaution or preparation has ever worked to turn away the Great Revel. In fact the better a plane is defended, the more Great Revellers are likely to flock to it. Thousands of Asgardians are not just killed but annihilated or captured/converted in the Lower Planes on every revel, yet the greater danger makes einherjar even more eager to throw themselves at it. This makes Hades and Pandemonium the primary targets of each Great Revel, as the preposterously high chance of eternal damnation by falling to Gray Wasting and the Howling is sooo heroic (in einherjar opinion). Conversely, the relentlessly pacifistic kami of Bytopia allow the “heroic warriors” to wreck and ruin anything they want and never ever defend anything, even themselves when bored/ornery einherjar kill them. Asgardians hate Bytopia and opt to get out of the Plane of Boring Losers asap to find a good scrap, leaving behind a largely ruined plane in need of unfathomable amounts of hard labor to rebuild (which is perfectly ideal for the laborvorous kami, not that they’d ever say that aloud).

    Obviously, Nirvana and Limbo without any indigenous exemplar populations hold zero interest for einherjar heroes so are completely ignored in the Great Revel.

    Nobody knows exactly what Olidammara gets out of this. Except possibly his jollies, which most assume is the correct answer. None of the large scale violence, chaos or destruction caused by the Great Revel is particularly relevant to his divine domains and the Asgardians’ troublemakery is far too aimless and unreliable to be a stealthy method of attacking his enemies. Einherjar are also nothing at all like the sorts of smart/subtle/rich/civil souls he prefers as his worshippers from among mortals but it’s still extremely strange for a deity to actually turn down any large group (especially powerful outsiders like einherjar) when they offer to worship him, which the King of Thieves keeps doing. When asked about it directly, the Laughing Rogue just goes ;)



    Modron March? Meh. They're comic relief and are not at all suitable for an actual campaign where we're expected to take them seriously. It might not have been what they were made to be, but it's what they became. The main idea of a large scale planar event is good, it just needed to not involve the resident cute cartoon robots. So here we are. Bonus for involving Olly I guess, who I notice is a whole lot more passive than a god with his age and influence should've been in my little Planescape.

    Unrelated tidbit: Pelor sealed Olidammara's junk after he had a few flings with Sune cos he didn't trust his dickbrained son to not become an unwitting patsy. Olly hasn't had any action for thousands of years now and his portfolio shifted so much more towards drinking and singing and whatnot. Pelor will only unseal it if Olly finds an agreeable wife to settle down with (ain't happening, obv).
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  26. - Top - End - #206
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    For a real party, the Einherjars and the Modrons conduct their march at the same time. That'd be good for a laugh.

    But I do sympathize with bolt from the blue inspiration being easier to work with than longstanding inspiration. Something about the potential for the new inspiration not having been explored, while longstanding ideas have everywhere they can go already mapped out ahead of time. It's a fact of life.

    And... huh. I hadn't thought of Greyhawk deities in Planescape. They are rather underrepresented. Blipdoolpoolp definitely got a raw deal, considering just how numerous (and how insanely devoted) kuo-toa are.
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    Another post, another three days old idea. Maybe I should just stop planning for the future altogether...


    PSILOFYR (communal dream), Fungus Father, Great Contemplator, Monarch of Mycelia, Meldwalker, King of the Colors, Lord in Peace
    Domains: peace, imagination, community, fungi, rot, necromancy, law, tripping balls

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    The fungal abominations of Mycelia are ridiculously dangerous for a race dedicated to order and pacifism. Created by the Mother of All Abominations just to metaphorically thumb her nose at her brother’s crude methods to protect existence from the Allmother, the myconids are the only living beings in existence that are animated by the entropic negative energy. Carefully constructed to be a conduit to the Allmother’s ruinous power without falling under Her sway, the shroomfolk have what might be called anti-souls (made of negative energy) and feed on disorder (something distinctly different from chaos). As a result, the myconids’ mere existence defies thermodynamics and their feeding on entropy itself through decay and undeath results in a decrease of total entropy in the multiverse.

    This incredible quality does little to endear them to others however, as the mushroom men all have strong negative energy auras and appear necromantic to all senses and magics, fostering the instinctual dislike all positive energy souled live beings feel for the negative energy powered undead despite being literally the opposite of undead. And they don’t help their cause by becoming necromancers either; myconids raise undead the way other mortal races raise livestock for consumption (because feeding on regular carrion isn’t nearly as nutritious for the shroom abominations), most myconid groups love to collect (i.e. steal) corpses, have at least one necromancer among them and keep herds of zombies and skeletons. Luckily, the negative energy coursing through their bodies tends to violently explode outwards upon injury and makes attacking myconids a daunting prospect for most. They’re also some of the most effective undead destroyers of the planes and can quickly consume any corporeal undead(’s animating necromantic essence) from the lowliest zombie to mightiest of liches, easily bypassing most traditional protections such creatures have against positive energy toting wizards or clerics. Therefore, in the rare instances where myconids choose to live on worlds of humanoids, they can manage to get by without being wiped out by angry natives.

    Their entropy reducing nature made them a natural fit for the plane of Law and they migrated to Nirvana aeons ago at the urging of their beloved deity Psilofyr. Like all abominable godspawn of Tiamat, Fungus Father was a manifestation of his people’s idea of a perfect specimen. This meant he was a calm and peaceful giant shroom who loved nothing more than to sleep the fungal sleep and dream technicolor mushroom dreams and broadcast them to entertain his subjects. And not only was the chaotic, wartorn environment of Water was distressing to the myconids, their neighboring abominations also didn’t approve of their corpse scavenging and industrial scale reanimation of their fallen (mainly because the necromantic taint prevented them from eating corpses themselves); so he felt there was no recourse but to leave their plane. While nobody was sad to see them go, the krakens, de-facto rulers of Water, felt letting the fungal abominations leave freely would make them look weak. So Panzuriel the Wavemaster, the vain lord of krakens, made the mistake of attacking the Great Contemplator and crippled himself with the burst of negative energy blasting off of Psilofyr’s wounds. Killing Fungal Father was little comfort to him, for the horrible unhealing wounds allowed Umberlee to beat him up and take his worshippers soon afterwards.

    Strangely enough, death of their deity didn’t actually kill off the myconids like usually happens with abominations. Instead, he lived on in the Meld, the shared waking dream of trippy colors and sounds that happens whenever multiple myconids rest and mingle their meditative spores together. This was significant. The one side effect of having souls made of negative energy was being immediately annihilated upon death, a uniquely final end that befell to no other creature in the multiverse, but Fungal Father had managed to overcome it. He’s not entirely certain how he did it but suspects it had something to do with his subjects Melding on the Plane of Purified Order at the moment of his death. Since then, all myconids who’ve died on Mycelia have also lived on in the Meld, which is the main reason why the mushroom men are so incredibly rare outside Nirvana. To make certain their dead don’t fall to oblivion, myconids have arranged an extremely ordered way of living for their whole race. At any moment a third of all myconids are in the Meld, while another third works on corpse gathering and undead handling. Nirvana’s nature makes it quite easy to keep track of such things and the organized and predictable way of life pleases most myconids. Generally, the only myconids to be found outside their realm are the rebellious, reckless ones with chaos in their soul. Myconid society considers them insane both for risking oblivion just to reject order and wanting to be any closer to the fleshy beasts of the planes than is strictly necessary. The fungal abominations’ relations with all other races until now have convinced them there’s very little to be gained from associating with fleshy beasts (at least while they’re alive), be they nautical terrors or soft skinned earthwalkers.

    The few myconids that leave can live the good life, since they’re quite useful as both undead destroyers and universal translators. The shroomfolk have some psionic power like most abominations (as should be obvious from the Meld) and they can use their spores to grant telepathic ability to any number of creatures simultaneously. Myconid spores allow everything sentient to directly communicate with everything else sentient, ensuring there’ll be no accidental or “accidental” mistranslations on the interpreter’s part that might lead one or both sides to ruin. On account of the Plane of Nirvana already doing this for all of its inhabitants, the traditional myconid society has completely forgotten how vital (and lucrative) this ability can be over the millenia, especially for the exemplars of Outer Planes who’re all barred from entering the Plane of Purified Order to protect the great Mechanus.

    As for Psilofyr himself, he’s dead and therefore can’t really do anything except have psychedelic technicolor dreams and broadcast them to his people in the Meld. Which is still enough for him to lead his people, as any myconid waking from the Meld will know if its deity wants something specific. It’s very hard for any nonmyconid to even hear about the Meldwalker, let alone meet him (shroomfolk are loath to let any other creature into the Meld due to their upsetting tendency to subconsciously infect the beautiful technicolor dreams with their inherent violent instincts and the unfathomable and disgusting fleshy impulses). In the extremely rare event of his subjects letting a fleshy beast that proves its worth into the Meld, Lord In Peace will allow them to experience the full bliss of myconidhood while mining their entire mind about information about the greater multiverse. So far, he’s never found anything indicating that the fleshies have evolved any further than their baseline and sees no reason to not continue the isolation of his people.



    In my apparent quest to rewrite the entirety of DnD, I've made yet another race lift. I believe the scientific number of things to do with this for any potential DM is called a truckload and Psilofyr is one of those gods that have absolutely nothing of interest going on with it in "canon" (except hanging in Mechanus for some unfathomable reason). His people has always been cool tho, which is how he got in. Everybody loves shrooms, just ask Mario.

    Also I'm proud of myself for not mixing this up with Zuggtmoy in any way, shape or form. We don't need more demons.

    Meanwhile, Nerull thing still got nowhere so screw it, it's officially dropped from possible future things. In its stead, you're gonna get a goddess of the moon who's not Selune and has armies of lycanthropes. Maybe. Possibly. But don't hold your breath.
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  28. - Top - End - #208
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    The real question here is, what happens if a Myconid becomes a vampire? A 404 possibility not found error, or do they feed on other undead and come back when killed? When they meld, are they eaten by their fellows?

    And would the last humanoid individuals allowed into the Meld be a princess hounded by one of the immortal spiked beasts of the Plane of Earth, and the two great Plumber-Monks of Mechanus?
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    Nov 2006

    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    Myconids already ping as undead and unaffected by any sort of undeadification and any undead dumb enough to touch one gets death-drained and consumed. Meldlife is same as us dreaming about a recently passed away person every night, except a dream myconid lives on.

    Quote Originally Posted by Fable Wright View Post
    And would the last humanoid individuals allowed into the Meld be a princess hounded by one of the immortal spiked beasts of the Plane of Earth, and the two great Plumber-Monks of Mechanus?
    That is %100 for realz what happened. Yes. Definitely.
    Founder of the Fanclub of the (Late) Chief of Cliffport Police Department (He shall live forever in our hearts)
    CATNIP FOR THE CAT GOD! MILK FOR THE MILK BOWL!
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    Ogre in the Playground
     
    Kobold

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    Default Re: Teaching new tricks to old gods

    I'll likely comment on specific entries at some point, but I wanted to chime in and say I just found this thread the other day and read through it since. It's good stuff, and I'm enjoying how you're building on what you've already done.

    I'm currently working up a campaign setting with Eberron-style remote/possibly unreal gods, and this is the first thing that's made me question that decision.

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