Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Meldread 03-12-08, 08:05 AM	I am creating this thread to toss out ideas for a massive retcon of Realm's lore. Everyone is encouraged to throw in their suggestions, thoughts, additions, whatever - go crazy. This is mostly for my home campaign. I hope that other DM's may find something here useful and will run with it in their own games, either as alterations to the Realm's setting or something to shoehorn into their homebrew. At the very least, I hope DM's find the stuff here a good source of inspiration for their own ideas. ----- For me I want a darker world. I want to give the Realm's a survivalist feel that more closely resembles the dark ages but with a fantasy flair. I also want to include most of the lore related to Faerun (but other parts of the setting are up for grabs to be completely rewritten or removed). However, at the same time, I want to axe all the insane RSE's that have taken place from the Time of Troubles onward. So in order to accomplish that I'm going to do a complete roll back to the year 1358, the Year of Shadows, just hours before the Time of Troubles itself. My retcons may be more far reaching than even the Spellplague, but I am not looking to knock down the house, so to speak. I am more interested in throwing things out, knocking down a few walls, and building upon the foundation. Oddly enough, I may end up slightly closer to Ed's original vision of the Realm's. My first stop - the Planes, AO, the Gods, Magic and the truth. This is the "truth" about the creation of the planes, the gods, mortals and even AO itself. This truth is not known by any being - mortal or god - and various cultures have different tales of their own. Few mortals know about the planes or even their existence. AO: In the beginning there was nothing. Then for some unknowable reason - there was AO. Perhaps the being AO has always existed. It is hard to tell, because in truth there are neither beginnings nor endings. However, what is known is that upon the 'birth' of AO the being was so powerful it began to fragment. In the beginning, it split into two main parts: Alpha and Omega, one the yen to the other's yang, one representing creation and the other destruction. I conceptualize AO as a primordial entity that sprang into existence at the moment of creation. Though that is a misnomer. There is neither a beginning nor an end to the cosmos. AO literally represents creation and destruction - matter and anti-matter (and everything else). In effect, AO is the catalyst of the 'first' big bang and the struggle between Alpha and Omega is really a struggle between matter and anti-matter. Matter wants to 'expand' the cosmos while anti-matter wants to 'contrast / destroy' the cosmos. Naturally, like in the big bang Alpha wins and Omega seems to lose. However, here is where it gets tricky. In time, Alpha (matter) will eventually lose its struggle against Omega (anti-matter) and the cosmos will contract back to a single point. Immediately after that AO will 'merge back' into a single mind only to break apart again, forging another big bang and repeating the process in a never-ending cycle. To the mind of AO this all happens within fractions of a second. To the eyes of a mortal - and even a god - this takes eons upon countless eons. Effectively, this has no relevance on play - it is just a big picture backdrop - but it will serve a purpose for explaining the cosmos. The Planes: In the beginning, Alpha wins the struggle of expansion and the Astral Sea is formed. There is no real concept of time in the Astral Sea and it is a timeless place. There are no planes in the beginning - only Shadowfell. Shadowfell marks the center point of the Astral Sea where AO came into being. It is not so much a plane as a large swirling mass of darkness. It is constantly 'churning' and 'spinning' rapidly. In some cases, a part of Shadowfell 'breaks off' from the rest. It then creates a big bang that is similar to our own, creating a universe similar if not exactly like our own. Other times, nothing happens, and nothing comes into existence. The cosmos remain lifeless until Omega finally defeats Alpha and the cosmos contracts to be reborn again. Obviously, this time it happened. A part of Shadowfell broke off and forged a big bang. This big bang worked exactly like our own. Super heated gas first formed massive stars, those stars quickly died and spread heavy elements into the universe, smaller stars formed, planets eventually came into existence, solar systems were formed, galaxies were formed, etc. It all happened like our own universe. However, this introduces new concepts. The existence of this universe creates a chain reaction throughout the Astral Sea. All of existence exists within the Astral Sea, and from that point, you can see everything that is, was and ever will be. You can travel forward and backward in time, and you can view all possibilities. The birth of the first universe spawned countless other parallel universes. Everything that can possibly happen takes place in a separate universe that exists in the Astral Sea. However, as there are a finite number of possibilities there are a finite number of universes. (Though the number is too large to even contemplate with a mortal mind.) Each universe is effectively sealed off from another, thus there is very little interaction between universes. (Though it is possible to travel between them with magic.) This means that the world I have created can exist alongside the canonical version of FR, as well as any alternate version created by anyone else here, including completely alternate and homebrew worlds. Each universe appears as a large 'bubble' floating in the Astral Sea. This 'bubble' has smaller 'bubbles' floating on its surface - these are the Divine Realm's of deities and the like. Their 'smaller bubbles' can have 'even smaller bubbles' floating on them - demi-planes connected to divine planes, for example. So far, to the casual observer on Toril this changes nothing. It does not even change the gods - at least not yet. The Gods: What came first the chicken or the egg? Heh, heh. If we assume that gods require worshipers in order to exist then how do the first gods exist without worshipers? The answer is simple: They do not. In the beginning there is evolution just like on our world. On countless planets throughout the universe and in countless parallel universes life and eventually sentient life comes into being. Beings that possess sentient life, such as Humans, ultimately begin to invent religions, which then in turn invent deities. Does this matter to a mortal? No. However, it matters greatly when factoring in how the divine works. All things, from mortals, to gods, to stars and to blades of grass are a fragment of AO. AO has no central mind and thus no direct impact on the cosmos. Instead, it has many minds, and everything that exists is a fragment of itself, but each mind is independent from the rest and lacks full understanding of the whole. Mortals therefore have a spark of AO within themselves and that spark empowers a deity through the mortal's faith. Each deity is made up of not one, but many sparks, each spark representing a mortal believer. Their power waxes and wanes with their number of worshipers, but they also change and evolve as their followers needs dictate. In effect, a deity is an immensely powerful being whose power comes at the price of their freedom. Because everything is apart of AO anything can become the object of worship and therefore divine. A statue that is worshiped by thousands of people who ascribe a personality to that statue will therefore ascend to godhood and exhibit the traits ascribed to it by its mortal followers. A deities mortal worshipers are therefore their Achilles' heel - their greatest source of power and their greatest weakness all rolled into one. To destroy or manipulate a deity can only be done through their mortal followers. A deity can undergo massive changes to their personality or even their core existence through changing the way mortals believe in and worship the deity. To understand a deity however you must understand them in a different light than they are currently portrayed. The deities that interact with their mortal followers are nothing more than aspects of a larger being. They are avatars. Just as AO fragmented into two parts and then continued to fragment into even smaller aspects, so to do divine beings fragment into avatars. The true deity is abstract and anthropomorphic in nature, completely unknowable even to their avatar forms. A deity may have multiple avatars though there is a finite amount that can be made. Each avatar is both separate and a part of the larger being. They are separate because they are completely independent from one another. They are joined together because they are a part of a larger whole and are subject to the effects of the larger whole. In this way they are forced to cooperate and work together. An avatar reflects the beliefs subjected onto it by its followers. An avatar changes as those beliefs change. For example, if worshipers begin to believe a deity is cruel and mean spirited then the deity - and therefore the avatars - will change to reflect that belief. Finally, this does not detail everything to deal with the gods. For example, parts of a deity can break off and form into new gods entirely, weakening the original, avatars can likewise go rogue and turn on the other parts of the deity. In addition, an avatar can be slain unlike their true form, which has a number of… interesting… effects, least among them being the weakening of the deity's true form and its avatars. There is one last thing I want to touch on however and that is divine magic. Divine power manifests itself within individuals of incredible faith. Because all mortals possess a spark of AO, and when they worship a deity, their spark empowers a deity; they can likewise be empowered by a deity. Essentially, a mortal is manifesting a small fragment of a deity's power, and they get this ability through intense faith. It is generally believed that a deity can take away divine powers from mortals, but this is not the case. A mortal loses their divine powers through a lack of faith. However, this does not preclude them from altering their belief in the deity they worship, so long as they truly hold the beliefs that they profess. It is often because of this that deities fragment and change over time. As their most zealous worshipers change with time, and then in turn preach those changes to lay worshipers, so too does the deity change as a result. Magic: All magic originates from the Weave. The Weave itself is an abstract concept. It is used to try to understand the interconnectedness of all things in the cosmos. Everything is connected to the Weave, from gods to their mortal followers, to the lowest creatures and the most mundane of items. The Weave is the 'body' of AO, the energies from which all things flow and takes shape. Like Alpha it can be a creative force but like Omega it can also be a destructive force. Only a select few can access this power. All who wield it see the energies and how they flow through the world. Those who wield the power of magic draw upon the energies that flow through everything and 'weave' those energies into 'patterns' to create the desired effect. To understand and control the powers of the Weave is to have control over life and death itself. I am changing how magic works. Effectively speaking it will be an amalgamation of the 'Force' from Star Wars, the 'Weave' concept and the 'One Power' from the Wheel of Time novels. It won't be exactly like any of them, but that is the inspiration that I am drawing upon. I need to think of ways to make using magic dangerous. I do not want magic to be commonplace - there needs to be some type of kickback to using it. I want it to be powerful but it has to come at a hefty price. The Concept of the 'Forgotten' Realm's: The Forgotten Realm's is a setting based on the planet of Toril, which is based in its own solar system, and in its own galaxy. Traveling between planets and even alternate and parallel universes is possible with magic. Toril is a largely forgotten and lost world, but at many points throughout its history various races - such as the Elves and Dwarves - discovered its existence and opened portals from their home world to Toril. There are few newcomers now-a-days and the vast majority of those living on the planet are native by birth. Many have forgotten the journeys made by their ancestors and the portals to their home worlds largely lost if not forgotten as well. Quick and Dirty Guide to Deities and their Avatars: This is just a rough outline. Becoming a Deity: To become a deity something needs at least 1,000 worshipers. Manifesting Avatars: An Avatar can only manifest itself within a certain range of its followers. In general this rule is 1 mile per 10 followers. In order to manifest an Avatar at all a deity needs at least 10 followers within a 1 mile radius of each other. This radius continues to increase as the followers increase. However, in order to gain the most benefit the followers must at least be within manifesting range of each other. For example, to manifest an Avatar a distance of 100 miles a deity requires 1,000 followers to be within a 100 mile radius of one another. Manifesting Signs: A deity can manifest a sign to anyone who worships him or in any sacred place built to honor him. Other Manifesting Limitations: Manifesting Signs and Avatars is a tricky business for a deity. Let us assume that there are 10 followers of a deity in Village Y and that they are heretics of the faith, having a completely different view of the deity than those held by those in Village Z. A deity cannot simply manifest an avatar or a sign that he wishes. A deity at its most basic form is literally faith and belief manifest. When a deity manifests to followers it is therefore literally their own belief and faith manifesting to them. It strives to reinforce their beliefs. Thus, if a deity wished to discourage the heretics from Village Z from worshiping him heretically it would be difficult unless he sent one of his mortal followers to do it. If he himself manifested to them - he would literally manifest to them in the form that they believe him to be - not the form that he wishes to be. Yeah I know this is all choppy. I'm going to clean it up later. I'll add more later. I encourage others to suggest changes that could be made, as well as comments and constructive criticisms for improving what I've put forward. It's all a work in progress and nothing is set in stone.
Meldread 03-12-08, 05:56 PM	After I've had time to reflect on it I'm axing the idea of Deific Avatars. I had originally hoped to keep the same setup as the current Realm's and only change the backend of things. The concept of Avatar's creates too many paradoxes and opens an assortment of problems that I just don't want in my Realm's. I want a feel that is somewhere between Eberron's take on the gods and the Realm's take. In other words, I want there to be a mystical aspect where worshipers perceive their deity to be real and interactive with the world, and I want there to be an abstract aspect. I don't want gods walking around in avatar form and blasting avatars of other deities. What happens if one avatar meets another avatar who manifested differently to worshipers who hold a different concept of the same deity? What happens if one avatar kills another avatar of the same deity? More importantly, what are Avatar's made of and what happens when one is destroyed? Yeah, it's better not to even go there. It will lead me down the same road as WotC and TSR. Instead, the gods will remain abstract and anthropomorphic in nature. After all, if the current FR deities have INT, WIS and CHA scores above 50 how do you even perceive that with a mortal mind when the average INT, WIS and CHA score for a human is 10? The whole concept of 'gods doing battle with other gods' is more a thing of myth and legend than fact. If most worshipers believe that such a thing takes place, and another deity is killed in the battle, then that deity dies as a result. That means gods can still do battle, but their 'wars' are by proxy - through their mortal followers. Deities will retain the ability to manifest 'signs' and 'omens' to any of their worshipers. However, similar to how it was described in the first post, those signs and omens will be perceived differently by each individual based on their belief and concept of the deity. In that way, each manifestation is very personal. Five different people, with different concepts of a deity, may walk away from a manifestation of a 'sign' or 'omen' by that deity with different takes on what was experienced. A deity will lack the ability to communicate in verbal ways to worshipers, and thus cannot say - "I want you to do this." A deity is so powerful and so beyond the scope of mortal understanding that their manifestations can only convey symbolism and emotion - and even that is filtered through an individuals own faith and belief in the deity. I may run with Wizard's conception of exarchs, though they would not be divine beings. They would just be powerful priests so enraptured in their own zeal for their deity that they gain powers beyond that of even mortal priests. In our world they'd be roughly equivalent to historical founders of new religions such as Siddhartha Gautama, Muhammad, and Jesus. They'd possess like powers as attributed to those individuals. I'll make the changes to the original post later.
Meldread 03-12-08, 06:45 PM	I want to ditch the concept of alignments. Absolute good and absolute evil are fun concepts to toy with but present certain problems in actual practice. I've never heard of anyone in the real world - living or dead - to be absolute evil or absolute good. It has always been a matter of perception based on your relationship to that individual and your cultural belief system. For example, my personal belief is that slavery is evil because it deprives an individual of their freedom and self-worth. That is a common belief that is held in the western world. Yet, in another time and place, growing up in a cultural environment where slavery was acceptable, I may have held a completely different point of view. This poses some interesting problems. It kills the concept of demons and celestials entirely. Sure, they could exist as manifestations of belief (like deities) but that is not the same. They lose their flavor entirely. There may be a place for them but for now, I am shelving them until a later date. ---- To replace alignments I am toying with the idea of using something similar to the d20 Modern Allegiances System though it would be completely optional and it should be possible to play without it. In a nutshell a player would list their allegiances, listing them in order from most important to least important. Their allegiances would be indications of what their character values in life, and could encompass people, organizations, or ideals. Their character may have no allegiances or may change allegiances as the character goes through life. However, that doesn't mean if a character is a member of the Harpers, for example, that the character has to have them as an allegiance. If a character acts in a way that is detrimental to their allegiance, I'd have the ability to strip the character of their allegiance (and any benefits they may gain from it) and assign an allegiance that is more suitable to their actions. For example, if a player has a character that is a member of the Harpers, but begins to secretly work with the Moonstars against the interests of the Harpers, I'd change their allegiance. An Allegiance could cover anything in the game world: Individuals and Groups, Organizations, Nations, Belief Systems and Ethical Philosophies (this would largely replace the good / evil and law / chaos axis). The most common benefit to having an Allegiance would be influence with individuals who share the characters affiliation. However, more importantly, it is useful to me. It allows me to look at a players character sheet and instantly come up with a number of plots surrounding a character and their various allegiances. For a player, it helps keep them grounded in the same way alignment does without the abstractions of good / evil or lawful / chaotic getting in the way. It helps them stay in character by reminding them of what is important to their character. Additionally, it gives me an easy starting off point for a campaign. "Okay, create new characters. Everyone is going to be members of the Emerald Enclave. So put down Emerald Enclave as an Organization that you're loyal too, and the Emerald Enclave Code as an Ethical Philosophy that your character believes in strongly. Here is a copy of the code, try and think of a nature themed character that could embrace that code, and once everyone is done with character generation we'll begin." Doing it that way ensures that everyone is on the same page in the same way alignment was often used. Getting rid of the abstraction and embracing more concrete concepts should be a good thing.
Meldread 03-12-08, 10:00 PM	Scope of Power: The "power level" of the Realm's should change drastically. I am unsure of the gaming system I will use, but to use D&D terms this is how I would like to see it. Epic NPC's: They are virtually non-existent. Epic NPC wise throughout the entire setting - the entire planet of Toril - there should be no more than a handful of Epic level NPC's. Period. In terms of "power" Epic is considered anyone over 20th level. They should equal roughly 0.000001% of the population. Therefore, in all of Faerun and its island nations (including Evermeet) there would be 8 epic level NPC's. High Level NPC's: They are very rare - they are the exarch type individuals - they are the powerful movers and shakers. For terms of power they are the levels 10th through 20th. There would be no more than 8,133 of these folks throughout all of Faerun with other regions (such as Kara-Tur) given their own numbers. These people make up approximately 0.001% of Faerun. The total population of Faerun and the island nations (including Evermeet) is approximately 81,335,966 individuals. This does not include the Underdark. Magical Inclination: Of those living on Faerun and its island nations approximately 5% have the potential to wield either arcane or divine magic. Of these individuals 40% actually have learned - either through accident or training - how to wield magic. There are 4,066,798 potential magic users on Faerun and its island nations, with 1,626,719 actually wielding either arcane or divine magic. Of these individuals 20% (325,343) are divine magic users and the remaining 70% (1,301,376) are arcane magic users. There are 32 level 10-20 divine magic users, and 130 level 10-20 arcane magic users in all of Faerun and its island nations. Putting this in prospective: Cormyr has a population of 1,360,800 and 5% of that population has the potential to wield either arcane or divine magic which comes to roughly 68,040 individuals. Of those individuals 40% actually wield some form of magic which equals 27,216 individuals. Of those people, 20% (5,443 individuals) are divine magic users, and the remaining 70% (19,051 individuals) are Arcane Magic users. Of those individuals who can wield magic there are no level 10-20 divine magic users, but there is one level 10-20 arcane magic user. There are no epic NPC's in Cormyr but there would be 136 level 10 - 20 NPC's in Cormyr, including the arcanist mentioned above.