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Wooly Rupert
Master of Mischief
USA
36779 Posts |
 Posted - 04 Jan 2017 : 21:32:20
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Earlier this day, I was reading a Golarion sourcebook, The First World, Realm of the Fey.
For Golarion, the First World is their kinda-sorta version of Faerie. It's called the First World, because the gods designed it first, as a kind of test bed for the Prime Material Plane. Once they figured out what they wanted to do with the Prime, they abandoned the First World. With no deific attention, several powerful fey rose to prominent positions, not quite deities but having some of the same roles. These are the Eldest.
So, with that background, I give you this quote, from page 37 of the book:
quote:
Rhoswen, the Fellnight Queen: Overly ambitious, the self-styled Eldest Rhoswen sought to combine her magic with that of the Shadow Plane, endangering not just the other Eldest but the entire First World. The other Eldest were forced to strip her of much of her power and cast her out into a demiplane called the Fellnight Realm.
My thought was, what if something similar happened in the D&D-verse, and that demiplane became Ravenloft? Having the Dark Powers as one or more evil fae could explain a lot, and the way Ravenloft the plane is somewhat mutable does remind one of some of the descriptions of Faerie...
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sleyvas
Skilled Spell Strategist
USA
11695 Posts |
Posted - 06 Jan 2017 : 02:22:49
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quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
Earlier this day, I was reading a Golarion sourcebook, The First World, Realm of the Fey.
For Golarion, the First World is their kinda-sorta version of Faerie. It's called the First World, because the gods designed it first, as a kind of test bed for the Prime Material Plane. Once they figured out what they wanted to do with the Prime, they abandoned the First World. With no deific attention, several powerful fey rose to prominent positions, not quite deities but having some of the same roles. These are the Eldest.
So, with that background, I give you this quote, from page 37 of the book:
quote:
Rhoswen, the Fellnight Queen: Overly ambitious, the self-styled Eldest Rhoswen sought to combine her magic with that of the Shadow Plane, endangering not just the other Eldest but the entire First World. The other Eldest were forced to strip her of much of her power and cast her out into a demiplane called the Fellnight Realm.
My thought was, what if something similar happened in the D&D-verse, and that demiplane became Ravenloft? Having the Dark Powers as one or more evil fae could explain a lot, and the way Ravenloft the plane is somewhat mutable does remind one of some of the descriptions of Faerie...
Replace the Fellnight Realm with "the shadow rift" and the shadow fey (aka the Arak). Then use Loht, Prince of the Sith, and Maeve, Princess of the Shee. |
Alavairthae, may your skill prevail
Phillip aka Sleyvas |
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Markustay
Realms Explorer extraordinaire
USA
15724 Posts |
Posted - 10 Jan 2017 : 02:45:36
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Its a cool concept.
I sometimes get the notion that a lot of the ideas those Paizo guys had - some of whom formerly designed for WotC/The Realms - were meant to be in FR, but never made it in, and now they're recycling a lot of stuff and using it for Golarion. |
"I have never in my life learned anything from any man who agreed with me" --- Dudley Field Malone
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The Masked Mage
Great Reader
USA
2420 Posts |
Posted - 11 Jan 2017 : 01:38:15
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quote:
Originally posted by sleyvas
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
Earlier this day, I was reading a Golarion sourcebook, The First World, Realm of the Fey.
For Golarion, the First World is their kinda-sorta version of Faerie. It's called the First World, because the gods designed it first, as a kind of test bed for the Prime Material Plane. Once they figured out what they wanted to do with the Prime, they abandoned the First World. With no deific attention, several powerful fey rose to prominent positions, not quite deities but having some of the same roles. These are the Eldest.
So, with that background, I give you this quote, from page 37 of the book:
quote:
Rhoswen, the Fellnight Queen: Overly ambitious, the self-styled Eldest Rhoswen sought to combine her magic with that of the Shadow Plane, endangering not just the other Eldest but the entire First World. The other Eldest were forced to strip her of much of her power and cast her out into a demiplane called the Fellnight Realm.
My thought was, what if something similar happened in the D&D-verse, and that demiplane became Ravenloft? Having the Dark Powers as one or more evil fae could explain a lot, and the way Ravenloft the plane is somewhat mutable does remind one of some of the descriptions of Faerie...
Replace the Fellnight Realm with "the shadow rift" and the shadow fey (aka the Arak). Then use Loht, Prince of the Sith, and Maeve, Princess of the Shee.
Problem there is that the Arak were the victims so you'd have to re-write their story, though Gorian (name might be a little off), their tormentor would line up pretty well with this Fellnight Queen.
Alternatively, Rhoswen might line up well with the "Queen of Air and Darkness" from back in Monster Mythology.
I like to think of Ravenloft's Dark Powers as fiction created by the people of the plane. The demiplane of dread is a forgotten experiment of some gods or powerful mortals (like Imaskari, etc.) that has grown over tens of thousands of years bit by bit. It is a semi-sentient demiplane. So the deliberate capture of powerful evil that is ascribed to the Dark Lords is really the demiplane drawing their energy into itself to grow in an instinctual way. |
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Cyrinishad
Learned Scribe
300 Posts |
Posted - 17 Jan 2017 : 19:14:37
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Great observations in this scroll! I'm definitely on board with the idea of the plane itself being an instinctive semi-sentient entity. If we consider the Realm of the Fey as the First World, it could literally be formed from the First Fear of the First World. (If I recall correctly weren't there monsters connected with Ravenloft called Feyr? Fey...Feyr...coincidence?)
In this scenario I think it's entirely plausible that the Queen of Air and Darkness isn't actually Titania's sister, but instead was something more akin to an imaginary friend Titania had as a child, that made her feel like she wasn't alone, didn't need to be afraid, and enabled her to have "someone" she could confess her fears to... until it wasn't just imaginary anymore... |
To know, is to know that you know nothing. That is the meaning of true knowledge. -Socrates
Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened. -Dr. Seuss |
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Shadowsoul
Senior Scribe
Ireland
705 Posts |
Posted - 20 Jan 2017 : 06:56:47
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quote:
Originally posted by Cyrinishad
Great observations in this scroll! I'm definitely on board with the idea of the plane itself being an instinctive semi-sentient entity. If we consider the Realm of the Fey as the First World, it could literally be formed from the First Fear of the First World. (If I recall correctly weren't there monsters connected with Ravenloft called Feyr? Fey...Feyr...coincidence?)
In this scenario I think it's entirely plausible that the Queen of Air and Darkness isn't actually Titania's sister, but instead was something more akin to an imaginary friend Titania had as a child, that made her feel like she wasn't alone, didn't need to be afraid, and enabled her to have "someone" she could confess her fears to... until it wasn't just imaginary anymore...
Feyr are creatures that are created from people's nightmares. There was actually a race of elves who lived in the Shadow Rift known as Shadow Elves. |
“Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisioned by the enemy, don't we consider it his duty to escape?. . .If we value the freedom of mind and soul, if we're partisans of liberty, then it's our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as we can!”
#8213; J.R.R. Tolkien
*I endorse everything Dark Wizard says*. |
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Ayrik
Great Reader
Canada
7969 Posts |
Posted - 22 Jan 2017 : 18:58:37
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Meh. Fey have already infested far too many settings, no reason to let them also pollute Ravenloft. This Golarian sourcebook is clearly nothing more than elven propaganda.
The Dark Powers of the Demiplane could - to my mind - more easily have origins in any of a dozen places in the D&D cosmos, even the Far Realms beyond.
The Dark Powers might also be described as "Primordials". They do seem actively malign, cunning, and deceptive; but they also seem to not really be conscious, intelligent, and aware in any normal sense - they seemingly lack sentience or sapience yet they possess a passion for inflicting evil and creative cruelty. Almost like they aren't proper thinking entities so much as insane, malformed, or wounded entities; almost like they're fiends or beasts drawing sustenance and surviving on hateful instinct. If they were once indeed "Primordials" (or "Eldest Fey") then they are now insane, corrupted, twisted, empty, monstrous caricatures of what they might have become. "Primordial" (and "Eldest") beings are categorically inchoate by definition, some of them might be so harshly warped and stubbornly petulant that their entelechies must manifest as horribly ugly things in the most horribly ugly places in the universe - places like Ravenloft.
My personal theory is that the Dark Powers are a sort of amalgamation of the collective underconsciousnesses of all the demiplane's inhabitants. An instinctive pool of all the dark, selfish, lustful, vengeful, hateful, sadistic, animal-like fears and drives and motivations (Freudian Ids) which lurk under the surfaces of everyone's mind (Freudian Egos); richly perverse and intense and complex enough to become emergent and tangible through the unique physical and magical properties of the demiplane itself. It happens on other planes, it's arguably the genesis mechanism for some of D&D's other deities and powers. Look at other extraplanar Realms formed by godlike entities, imagine what would happen to such a Realm if such an entity were irrevocably insane and wounded (tortured by fiends, had its faith corrupted by mortals, brain-sucked by some Cthulhu-spawned Far Realm horror, etc) ... the Demiplane of Dread (once briefly known as the Demiplane of Dread and Desire) seems to clearly be the "domain" and last twisted refuge of an immortal unable (and afraid) to "live" or to "die". A husk, a remnant, and a terminally pathological patient. |
[/Ayrik] |
Edited by - Ayrik on 22 Jan 2017 20:01:46 |
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The Masked Mage
Great Reader
USA
2420 Posts |
Posted - 23 Jan 2017 : 12:32:30
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quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
Meh. Fey have already infested far too many settings, no reason to let them also pollute Ravenloft. This Golarian sourcebook is clearly nothing more than elven propaganda.
The Dark Powers of the Demiplane could - to my mind - more easily have origins in any of a dozen places in the D&D cosmos, even the Far Realms beyond.
The Dark Powers might also be described as "Primordials". They do seem actively malign, cunning, and deceptive; but they also seem to not really be conscious, intelligent, and aware in any normal sense - they seemingly lack sentience or sapience yet they possess a passion for inflicting evil and creative cruelty. Almost like they aren't proper thinking entities so much as insane, malformed, or wounded entities; almost like they're fiends or beasts drawing sustenance and surviving on hateful instinct. If they were once indeed "Primordials" (or "Eldest Fey") then they are now insane, corrupted, twisted, empty, monstrous caricatures of what they might have become. "Primordial" (and "Eldest") beings are categorically inchoate by definition, some of them might be so harshly warped and stubbornly petulant that their entelechies must manifest as horribly ugly things in the most horribly ugly places in the universe - places like Ravenloft.
My personal theory is that the Dark Powers are a sort of amalgamation of the collective underconsciousnesses of all the demiplane's inhabitants. An instinctive pool of all the dark, selfish, lustful, vengeful, hateful, sadistic, animal-like fears and drives and motivations (Freudian Ids) which lurk under the surfaces of everyone's mind (Freudian Egos); richly perverse and intense and complex enough to become emergent and tangible through the unique physical and magical properties of the demiplane itself. It happens on other planes, it's arguably the genesis mechanism for some of D&D's other deities and powers. Look at other extraplanar Realms formed by godlike entities, imagine what would happen to such a Realm if such an entity were irrevocably insane and wounded (tortured by fiends, had its faith corrupted by mortals, brain-sucked by some Cthulhu-spawned Far Realm horror, etc) ... the Demiplane of Dread (once briefly known as the Demiplane of Dread and Desire) seems to clearly be the "domain" and last twisted refuge of an immortal unable (and afraid) to "live" or to "die". A husk, a remnant, and a terminally pathological patient.
To borrow a phrase from you, the Far Realms and Primordials "have already infested far too many settings." |
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Wooly Rupert
Master of Mischief
USA
36779 Posts |
Posted - 23 Jan 2017 : 14:29:56
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quote:
Originally posted by The Masked Mage
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
Meh. Fey have already infested far too many settings, no reason to let them also pollute Ravenloft. This Golarian sourcebook is clearly nothing more than elven propaganda.
The Dark Powers of the Demiplane could - to my mind - more easily have origins in any of a dozen places in the D&D cosmos, even the Far Realms beyond.
The Dark Powers might also be described as "Primordials". They do seem actively malign, cunning, and deceptive; but they also seem to not really be conscious, intelligent, and aware in any normal sense - they seemingly lack sentience or sapience yet they possess a passion for inflicting evil and creative cruelty. Almost like they aren't proper thinking entities so much as insane, malformed, or wounded entities; almost like they're fiends or beasts drawing sustenance and surviving on hateful instinct. If they were once indeed "Primordials" (or "Eldest Fey") then they are now insane, corrupted, twisted, empty, monstrous caricatures of what they might have become. "Primordial" (and "Eldest") beings are categorically inchoate by definition, some of them might be so harshly warped and stubbornly petulant that their entelechies must manifest as horribly ugly things in the most horribly ugly places in the universe - places like Ravenloft.
My personal theory is that the Dark Powers are a sort of amalgamation of the collective underconsciousnesses of all the demiplane's inhabitants. An instinctive pool of all the dark, selfish, lustful, vengeful, hateful, sadistic, animal-like fears and drives and motivations (Freudian Ids) which lurk under the surfaces of everyone's mind (Freudian Egos); richly perverse and intense and complex enough to become emergent and tangible through the unique physical and magical properties of the demiplane itself. It happens on other planes, it's arguably the genesis mechanism for some of D&D's other deities and powers. Look at other extraplanar Realms formed by godlike entities, imagine what would happen to such a Realm if such an entity were irrevocably insane and wounded (tortured by fiends, had its faith corrupted by mortals, brain-sucked by some Cthulhu-spawned Far Realm horror, etc) ... the Demiplane of Dread (once briefly known as the Demiplane of Dread and Desire) seems to clearly be the "domain" and last twisted refuge of an immortal unable (and afraid) to "live" or to "die". A husk, a remnant, and a terminally pathological patient.
To borrow a phrase from you, the Far Realms and Primordials "have already infested far too many settings."
Agreed. I've no issues with the fae; there are legends of them from all around the world.
Primordials were a weak concept to explain a retcon, and I don't want Lovecraft in my FRPG unless -- as it was in Golarion -- it was written in from the start. Bolting it on afterwards, like they did with the Realms, just doesn't work. |
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Ayrik
Great Reader
Canada
7969 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jan 2017 : 02:40:22
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I never liked the notion of Primordials either. At least not in WotC's 4E context.
I do like the notion of half-formed gods which can (at least in their local domain) command all the power of the universe, but which also lack sufficient mentality or identity to do so in a coherent fashion. Unconscious gods, dreaming gods, or (as in Ravenloft) nightmarish gods.
Cthulhu stuff doesn't bother me. Still got him in my ancient Deities & Demigods hardcover. Ravenloft was horror-genre. Illithids walk the Realms. The Far Realms are a handy dumping ground for unexplainable "abominations". It all fits in well enough. Though I agree trying to inject non-Realmslore into the Realms isn't a great idea, and WotC seems to always invent the least palatable methods of doing so that they can. Shade worked out well enough, for a time at least. Mephistopheles and Asmodeus, too. So why not Hounds of Tindalos, or their non-IP-violating generic D&D counterparts? |
[/Ayrik] |
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Markustay
Realms Explorer extraordinaire
USA
15724 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jan 2017 : 04:35:38
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I actually think FR had all of these concepts, right from the beginning (Fey, Primordials {'old gods'}, Elder Evils (Lovecraftian Horrors}, etc), but they were not dirctly addressed, but rather, alluded to in very subtle ways (like all the stuff about the 'Creator races').
Too much Fey(elves)? Too much 'antideluvian horrors'? More like 'too much information about them' (now), and besides, the further back you go, the more you realize ALL of these things are interconnected. Which means you are not talking apples and oranges, just splitting hairs.
When we are talking about TRULY ancient beings of IMMENSE power - that can change their form at will - does it really matter what mortals are calling them? For all we know, 'Elder Evils' could be semi-divine, ancient (insane) fey, and 'primordials' could just be Archfey who have evolved (devolved?) into a quasi-sentient state from merging with too much prime matter over time (like what happened to Othea, Annam's broodmare). The more powerful the Fey, the larger the 'anchor' needed to maintain their presence on the Prime Material - this means that over time (countless millennia), they continue to 'spread themselves thin' into the firmament, and thats why they go into that comatose, quasi-aware state. The ability to merge with the elements gives them immortality (like unto a god), but its a double-edged sword, because it eventually subsumes them.
People talk about not liking 'this flavor', or 'that thing', but to me, they are just different faces of the same (11-dimesional) coin. And what some people might construe as 'evil' is really just because these ancient beings are inscrutable, and unknowable, and most of all, ALIEN.  |
"I have never in my life learned anything from any man who agreed with me" --- Dudley Field Malone
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The Masked Mage
Great Reader
USA
2420 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jan 2017 : 11:55:33
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| I'd say it matters because the names are lame :), and the creation of the categories or Primordial and Abominations lumped large groups of otherwise dissimilar beings into nice little pigeon holes where they didn't fit very well... this then led to the AB.SOVERIENGTY... nuff said there :) |
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The Masked Mage
Great Reader
USA
2420 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jan 2017 : 11:57:09
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| In fact, the "Dark Powers" are interesting precisely because we don't have a pigeon hole for them... or know much of anything about them at all. As a result we are here guessing 30 years later. |
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Shadowsoul
Senior Scribe
Ireland
705 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jan 2017 : 12:37:47
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| Looks like Wizards just adopted more of the Greek Mythology with regards to Titans. |
“Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisioned by the enemy, don't we consider it his duty to escape?. . .If we value the freedom of mind and soul, if we're partisans of liberty, then it's our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as we can!”
#8213; J.R.R. Tolkien
*I endorse everything Dark Wizard says*. |
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Wooly Rupert
Master of Mischief
USA
36779 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jan 2017 : 14:15:04
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| I'm wondering if the first Dark Power wasn't someone or something like Rhoswen, and the whole gig of torturing the Dark Lords and the general suffering of the populace is intended to power a return to the First World (or other origin place that the Power is now banished from). |
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The Masked Mage
Great Reader
USA
2420 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jan 2017 : 18:54:41
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quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
I'm wondering if the first Dark Power wasn't someone or something like Rhoswen, and the whole gig of torturing the Dark Lords and the general suffering of the populace is intended to power a return to the First World (or other origin place that the Power is now banished from).
I like the thought, but it doesn't make much sense that if they were banned from the world that they would be able to so easily reach into it to abduct people with their mists. |
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Wooly Rupert
Master of Mischief
USA
36779 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jan 2017 : 19:02:36
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quote:
Originally posted by The Masked Mage
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
I'm wondering if the first Dark Power wasn't someone or something like Rhoswen, and the whole gig of torturing the Dark Lords and the general suffering of the populace is intended to power a return to the First World (or other origin place that the Power is now banished from).
I like the thought, but it doesn't make much sense that if they were banned from the world that they would be able to so easily reach into it to abduct people with their mists.
Ah, but they're not reaching into the world they are banned from. That's where they want to go back to. |
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New thought on Ravenloft's Dark Powers...
