I have some questions about the Dragon of Tyr and Raajat:
1- What are the secret objectives of the Dragon of Tyr? What Boris wants? Stealing Raajat powers?
2- I know that Raajat wants to bring back the blue age, but how he will bring back the sun to blue, and recover all the water and life force of the world?
3- I also know that in some point of the old story raajat was freed and the Dragon of Tyr was killed, by a wizard ex-slave girl that obtained the power to cast spells using the power of the sun.
But how was rajaat freed? And how could he be imprisioned again without the help of the sorcery kings?
And what about the Dragon of Tyr? How he was killed? I know about the sword made by raajat, but what happened that a powerful being like him got killed?
How they released Rajaat?
4- How the power to use sun as a source from magic was obtained? I know that its because of the Pristine Tower, but how it happened?
5- How much powerful is raajat? 35 solo probably?
Does he had any kind of unique power? Something associated with him alone?
Or he was just really powerfull in Lifeshaping, Defilling and Psionics?
6- How Raajast was kept imprisioned without the constant sacrifice of slaves, by the dragon of tyr?
The sun magic is so powerfull that it could do that alone, without the need to strenght the spell again from time to time like Boris did?
7- Without the Dragon of Tyr, and with Rajaat securely imprisioned, how the world changed? Why the other SK's didnt united and killed the "sun wizard"?
She was the biggest threat to them. More even them the Dragon of Tyr was, because being a "hero" she have motivations to remove them from power, something the Dragon of Tyr never cared about.
How the world changed with the age of heroes?
Sorry to ask so many questions about what happened on 2ed DS story, but i really need to know this for a campaign im Dm'ing.
Thank you, and sorry for my bad english, not my main language.
I have some questions about the Dragon of Tyr and Raajat:
1- What are the secret objectives of the Dragon of Tyr? What Boris wants? Stealing Raajat powers?
Borys. Like any other sorcerer-king (SK), he seems to have no goal but mundane accomplishments - culture, life, growth, survival of his people, which might be defined as all those living within the Tyr Region. Keeping Rajaat imprisoned is paramount to this endeavor, and a constant toil for the Dragon.
2- I know that Raajat wants to bring back the blue age, but how he will bring back the sun to blue, and recover all the water and life force of the world?
The primal spirits (in the supplements and novels referred to as spirits of the land) invigorate the natural world, but they appear to be themselves powered by something, some source. Rajaat I assume would allow this source to go undefiled, untapped, giving them free rein to grow in power once again and by their very existence replenish the world.
3- I also know that in some point of the old story raajat was freed and the Dragon of Tyr was killed, by a wizard ex-slave girl that obtained the power to cast spells using the power of the sun.
But how was rajaat freed? And how could he be imprisioned again without the help of the sorcery kings?
And what about the Dragon of Tyr? How he was killed? I know about the sword made by raajat, but what happened that a powerful being like him got killed?
How they released Rajaat?
Rajaat long ago took possession of an uber artifact, unlike any in all of the D&D settings, a lens that magnifies one's power: the more power you got, the more powerful you become when using it, and it does this by tapping into mysterious sources, like the sun or the Elemental Chaos.
Tithian, the ex-templar and new king of Tyr, found the long lost Dark Lens and brought it to Ur-Draxa, where it touched the prison containing Rajaat's body, a massive stone cyst, and dissolved it. Rajaat's soul, trapped in a fabricated prison outside of space and time - the Hollow - was released along with it (the powerful binding spell that separated soul from body being one and the same). Soul and body joined, and Rajaat was freed to wreak vengeance on his former servants, the traitorous SKs.
Even though Rajaat was trapped (before his release), unable to affect the world, he was still linked to part of his soul he invested into many of the artifacts he crafted, such as the Scourge sword, Borys' former blade from his Champion days. It was this sword Rikus plunged in the Dragon's snout and broke, releasing a black ichor from which Rajaat could effect the world, choosing to kill the Dragon in that small window before the ichor lost its potency.
4- How the power to use sun as a source from magic was obtained? I know that its because of the Pristine Tower, but how it happened?
All sources of "magic" on Athas tap into something - life, the Elemental Chaos, the Gray, even the moons and stars. The same goes for the sun. As the ultimate source of life on Athas...one could explain the sun's potency as a source of power by saying it's what partly powers the primal spirits. It's a reductionist conclusion on the part of Troy Denning, the novels' author, in the vein of "the sun is the primary and ultimate driving force for Earth's ecosystem and all life, thus it must be the most potent source to tap for magic power".
5- How much powerful is raajat? 35 solo probably?
Does he had any kind of unique power? Something associated with him alone?
Or he was just really powerfull in Lifeshaping, Defilling and Psionics?
Apparently he didn't use lifeshaping as it was described in the supplements, but had a small cabal of ancient halflings allied to his ideals, whose knowledge of the workings of life dated back from the time before the Green Age, when the halflings were the masters of the world. Rajaat's powers seem to be a synergy of primal, arcane, and psionic. 4e's DSCG describes the aim of all powerful arcane power users is psionic enchantments, the blending of arcane and psionics, and in this regard Rajaat would have been one step beyond, blending primal with those two. A uniqueness indeed. I should remark that never is Rajaat seen defiling. Such "lowly" techniques of arcane usage appeared to be good enough for his minions, unable to comprehend or handle the type of magic Rajaat could muster.
6- How Raajast was kept imprisioned without the constant sacrifice of slaves, by the dragon of tyr?
The sun magic is so powerfull that it could do that alone, without the need to strenght the spell again from time to time like Boris did?
The secret to tapping the sun for magic was never revealed to the Champions (SKs), and required the Pristine Tower's steeple of crystals...protected by powerful shadow giants (Rajaat's former halfling followers) even the Champions feared. Sadira was able to gain this power only through the approval of the shadow giants, which had been shown in one scene to be able to communicate with Rajaat by entering the Black which brushes the limits of the Hollow. From his Hollow prison Rajaat could not effect the world...yet was able to simply speak out loud and the shadow giants could heed his commands, which included allowing this Sadira woman from gaining the sun's power, which Rajaat knew full well would allow her to be a serious threat to the Dragon....Rajaat's jailer, and precipitate his own release.
7- Without the Dragon of Tyr, and with Rajaat securely imprisioned, how the world changed? Why the other SK's didnt united and killed the "sun wizard"?
She was the biggest threat to them. More even them the Dragon of Tyr was, because being a "hero" she have motivations to remove them from power, something the Dragon of Tyr never cared about.
How the world changed with the age of heroes?
Denning didn't think through many of the threads he left hanging at the end of the fifth novel. Your guess is as good as anyone's.
Sorry to ask so many questions about what happened on 2ed DS story, but i really need to know this for a campaign im Dm'ing.
Thank you, and sorry for my bad english, not my main language.
Better than most English native speakers on this (and any other English) forum. Most of the time we show better spelling and use of grammar, us of other native languages. Hang in there.
As a suggestion, don't take the chain of events depicted in the novels too strictly if you want to use it in your campaign. The biggest flaw of the books was consistency, and if you try to make sense of everything, you'll end up with a big headache.
The plot was filled with deus ex machina - shadow giants being more powerful than SKs? Sadira finding what the Dragon couldn't in a dozen millennia? Tyr being left alone by the Dragon for so long after Kalak's death? Rajaat still being imprisoned after the Dragon's death? - pushed to make the story exciting before consistent. As usual, some events work very well in the context of the action but fail to stand to the test of time.
As a small feedback on your questions:
1. as Pennarin said, in the novels the Dragon wasn't depicted as being on any particular agenda. He's an immensely smart being, tho, so you can do whatever you want with him. Consider he had millennia for whatever plan he had in mind, so you should try to make sure that his eventual hidden agenda makes sense in that context.
3. Considering the ooze came from Borys' old sword, it's not unthinkable that Rajaat had prepared that all along. He made the sword, and he fundamentally made Borys. His rituals can have created a bond within the blade and the Champion, or he could simply have enchanted Borys with a weakness to the ooze and then planted the ooze in his sword. The Dragon didn't simply fall to a stab, it was a weapon probably designed to kill him from the get-go and carrying inside a substance that allowed Rajaat to project his power from his prison. The Athas equivalent of a nuclear strike.
5. As Pennarin states, Rajaat doesn't defile. That is something that worked better in times when magic on Athas was weaker, and defiling was what brought it on par - you could picture Rajaat as powerful enough to cast spells properly without needing to defile. Now you would need him to have unique capabilities that make him even better than a defiler.
In 4e, if you stat him, you'll probably want him as a lvl 30+ solo. The exact degree of his power is up to you to decide - the novels describe him as incredibly powerful, and he makes short work of a few SKs, but given the stats they have in 4e (most of them are mid 20s), any lvl 30+ "supersolo" could be depicted doing that. As for his source of power, he's the most powerful arcane caster in Athas' history (the Dragon being possibly the only contender) and his psionic power is probably even greater. In the novels he's depicted as having uniquely strong capabilities in terms of rejuvenating the land and altering the weather.
You answered fully my questions.
Does Rajaat knows what is happening in the world? And can he speaks with anyone besides the shadow giants?
Does Rajaat knows what is happening in the world? And can he speaks with anyone besides the shadow giants?
I imagine he is oblivious to the world, as only normal vision and hearing can traverse the Hollow, and outside is the Black, a realm anathema to most beings. He would be fed info verbally by the shadow giants, and issue appropriate orders or guidelines.
Anyone that reaches into the Black could travel towards the Hollow and attempt dialogue. Shadow giants should be a tremendous obstacle.
When Sadira threw the Dark Lens into the pool of lava, along with Rajaat's bones, and recast the prison spell the Champions had devised long ago, she didn't realize (according to Rise and Fall) that the Lens is connected to the Black and that that plane's cold would slowly solidify the lava around Rajaat's bones: instead of being fully imprisoned, Rajaat's stone cyst prison is slowly expanding as the lava turns to obsidian...so much so that some of his power has started to seep through.
Hamanu, once selected by Rajaat to be the Champion that would cleanse humanity and kill all the other Champions, becomes his target, for Hamanu is aware of what is happening with the bones and the obsidian and decides to become the Dragon of Urik to acquire the might to keep Rajaat imprisoned again. To stop him, Rajaat is sending Hamanu obsidian shards from his now enormous body, pieces which break off and are carried away by shadow giants (and then given to regular humans), and which carry a compulsion to bring them to Urik's king. As the interval between the pieces arriving diminishes, so does their lethality increases, as Rajaat's temporal power increases, until Hamanu decides to leave Urik so as to evade Rajaat's escalation.
It's stated in defilers and preservers that rajaat was both a master of preserving and defiling but he defiled more often because it was faster, easier and provided more power. I'm not sure where the idea came from that Rajaat didn't defile. As a master of preserver magic, he could grow huge forests if he wanted to, so defiling didn't matter to him.
It's stated in defilers and preservers that rajaat was both a master of preserving and defiling but he defiled more often because it was faster, easier and provided more power. I'm not sure where the idea came from that Rajaat didn't defile. As a master of preserver magic, he could grow huge forests if he wanted to, so defiling didn't matter to him.
Once again, consistency problems. Rajaat couldn't stop his Champions from turning the world into what it is now during the Cleansing wars. He needed the lends and soaking an incredible amount of the sun's power in order to just create them. He needed his Champions to carry out his plan and to survive. He was still trying to figure out a solution to the destruction of the planet.
I think you're really making him sound a lot more powerful than he actually was. Nobody is saying he wasn't capable of defiling, but he wasn't omnipotent, and defiling was something that brought him further from his goal. If Denning's interview about the Brown Tide being fundamentally the first effects of defiling is to be considered canon, we're safe to assume that Rajaat would hate even the idea of defiling.
Once again, consistency problems.
That depends on what you consider priority. I consider the game books to supercede the novels, whether the game books followed the novels or not. Because it was the game books we used to play the game.
Rajaat couldn't stop his Champions from turning the world into what it is now during the Cleansing wars.
Actually, this isn't entirely correct. Rajaat didn't care about the destruction cause by his champions defiling, because Rajaat could have repaired it according to the gaming material. Also, the defiling used by the champions were minor considering the devastation caused by the dragon. With no rajaat (master of preservering magic) to repair the damage, the world was stuck in its current state.
He needed the lens and soaking an incredible amount of the sun's power in order to just create them.
How else do you think he could have created all the champions? It would have completely obliterated the world of athas beyond repair and probably wouldn't have been enough to create every last champion, if he would have drawn the power from the planet itself.
He needed his Champions to carry out his plan and to survive. He was still trying to figure out a solution to the destruction of the planet.
He didn't need the champions to survive anything and he could have cleansed athas in a single day. He was already immortal. It could also be argued that he had connected his lifeforce to someone or something else before ever making the champions. As for healing the planet. That is simple. You can open up many of the gaming books and locate preserver and clerical spells that will accomplish this with time, including restoring defiled land. Rajaat could have done that in a heart beat. He didn't care about trees or grass though. He wanted the world to be covered by water and to change the yellow sun back to blue.
How could he do that? That is 100% speculation and while I have what I believe to be an awesome theory, it would require a massive post, maybe two. So I'll avoid it. I think rajaat had a pretty good idea on what he was going to do to restore the world to a blue age and murdering entire races was only a single step in his plan.
I think you're really making him sound a lot more powerful than he actually was.
Not at all, it's just that you don't really want him to be as powerful as he actually was because you don't like him and you don't like what his inclusion did to the setting. But the reality is, he was a master preserver, a master defiler, a master psionicist, he crafted powerful artifacts and experimented with powerful energy sources. He studied life shaping techniques. He changed the pristine tower to suite his needs and he's connected to the dark lens, which is insanely powerful and connected to the black, drawing its power not only from the sun, but also from shadow. Consider all that, then go look through all the game material in 2e and see what he's capable of. Then do the same with 3e. He is every bit as powerful as I'v been saying. He would be incredibly powerful in 4e as well.
Nobody is saying he wasn't capable of defiling, but he wasn't omnipotent, and defiling was something that brought him further from his goal. If Denning's interview about the Brown Tide being fundamentally the first effects of defiling is to be considered canon, we're safe to assume that Rajaat would hate even the idea of defiling.
Life shaping and defiling are two very different things. Again, I'v not read denning's interviews, but what's in the gaming material is what I follow and what I consider canon. It's what was used to play the game with. Also, I know rajaat wasn't omnipotent or we wouldn't be having this conversation because darksun wouldn't have ever existed and instead, it would have been a short story that began with "the history of athas" and ended with "Rajaat won."
PS: If anyone can post links or PM me the links to all these interviews people seem to like to use as ammo, I'd love to read them. Then maybe that could be factored into my replies in the first place instead of me dismissing them outright. Otherwise, it's just hearsay about a writers opinion. Thanks.
As for the rest, I agree on giving gaming books the precedence. For example, in 2nd edition defiling and preserving were lifetime choices, and Dennings goes in detail over that, while now they're much closer to a flexible system - so that's my new canon.
On how could Rajaat restore the world, if the answer is using clerical spells, we're already in the realm of speculation. My opinion is that if he went so far as making them Champions at the cost it took to make them, and if he needed the Champions to achieve immortality (I don't remember anything saying he couldn't be killed before he created them), then he certainly had a strong need for them. If he was as powerful as you state, why would he need the lens or even to make them? He could have won the war himself. I doubt he would defile the sun because he was too lazy to fight on his own.
Once again, I don't dislike Rajaat. I just think the kind of vision of him you're pushing is very personal and doesn't mix well with what I perceive Dark Sun to be. Someone who restores the planet in one day has no room in Dark Sun to me. Besides, there's Rajaat's psychology. You depict him as a cold, calculating genious, while his personality always seemed more complex to me. He was suffering, he had been wronged and not all of his actions were rational. His motives for bringing the blue sun back bordered madness.
And once again, the Dark Lens. That's the key piece. We don't know how powerful Rajaat was before obtaining it. Every spectacular thing he did, he did using the Dark Lens. I'd postulate he was a rather "average" superwizard of sorts before the Lens (an Elminster, so to say); it was the Lens that made him capable of all that. It's the Lens that allows him to oneshot SKs, and it's the Lens that stops him every time. The true all-powerful being on Athas is the Lens, and that's for sure.
I have no problem with your vision of Rajaat and Dark Sun - it's yours, and if it works for you, that's great. Mine is different - I see Rajaat struggling with his goals, and ultimately failing, and being defeated as pretty solid proofs of his limits - but it's mine, and we're both entitled to our interpretations. However, when people asks for information, we should leave our liberal interpretations (such as if Rajaat had access to clerical spells or not, or even if he could cast psionic enchantments) aside and give just the facts.
Personally, I'd be interested in hearing how you think Rajaat would have brought the blue sun back, and probably more in discussing WHY he wanted to do it.
Rajaat is not powerful enough to be able to wipe the other races of the world, without the aid of the SK's.
He was immortal (by age) before the creation of the SK, because he was a Pyreen.
He had become somewhat unkillable since he mastered the secrets of arcane magic.
About his powers, Rajaat needs to be stronger them all the SK's united including Boris, since all them thoughter couldnt kill him, just lock him in the shadows.
Hes so much more powerful them the Dragon of Tyr, that he needs to sacrifice 1000 slaves each yr just to maintain him locked up.
Some may argue that Boris could have killed him, but keep him alive to discover a way to steal his powers. But i disagree. Its not possible because the risk would not worth it, if the dragon could have killed him.
The Dragon of Tyr is already powerful enough that he can take multiple SK's and win. If Rajaat couldnt do the same, including the Dragon of Tyr, his power isnt that valuable, and risking your life and expanding huge amout of resources during so much time, would be pointless to obtain a power that isnt that great.
So we know that rajaat is by logic much more powerful them all Sk's. We also know hes virtually unkillable, and that even the Shadow Giants that serves him are almost as powerful as a SK, if not more.
Rajaat isnt struggling, hes waiting...
He have the entire eternity to have his plan accomplished. He tryed and failed because he was betrayed.
But his a calculating genious, so much that he crafted weapons that he later used to kill his imprisioners. And he allowed the sun mage to exist, the one that locked him away again, probably because have plans for her, but thats in the realm of expeculation..
He may be insane, but intelligence, and cold calculations have not to do with mental sanity. One might be crazy, and think that every purple object is alive and talkative, and still be a genious of the mathematics or even a social manipulator that could out-smart everyone.
About the Lens, i agree that they are really powerful, and with them hes almost invencible.
But, hes more them an avarege wizard...
First hes a Pyreen, what gives him some advantage in power.
Second, he mastered all the secrets of psionics, arcana, and primal magic.
Third, he was the creator of defiling and preserving magics.
Fourth, he made the ritual that created the SKs.
Fifth, he already knows that they might betray him at some point, because HE WILL betray them, so he will not create something he cannot control.
Six, the dark lens made him totally invencible, but without it hes still far more powerful them the dragon of tyr, by pure logic.
So hes the most powerful being of athas for sure.
Hes not omnipotent, he cannot simple kill all the other races by himself. ( He probably could kill every live being in athas with a single powerful ritual, but that would kill the halflings that he was trying to let alive, so that was his motivation to create the SK's the killing would need to be done at hand not simple blowing everything up )
He is crazy, hes a distorted pyreen, that wants to bring the world back to Blue Age, maybe because of the gratitude for the halflings, maybe he was a halfling himself. (i dont know what race he was before becoming a Pyreen)
The truth is, he is a crazy guy, that lost his paradise and suffers for not being able to recreate it. But hes powerful enough that hes sure that he could turn a word devastated by the defiling in a world were water covers the globe.
Now he just awaits, another chance to win... and in the end he will win. He have the enternity to plot hes victory.
The only way that rajaat may loose, is if someone discover the same truths about the psioniquism, about lifeshaping, and about arcana, that he knows, and becomes more powerful them him, so being able to release and kill him.
( Its almost sure that he knows atlast something about the lifeshaping because he is a pyreen that is the leader of one of the last group of guys that knows the life shaping... Maybe thats what make him so much more powerful them the others SK, but thats again is expeculation... )
Sorry again by my bad english.
There interview is here.
Thank you very much for the link. I do appreciate it. Doesn't really say much. But where exactly does he suggest that the brown tide is in anyway similar to defiling?
As for the rest, I agree on giving gaming books the precedence. For example, in 2nd edition defiling and preserving were lifetime choices, and Dennings goes in detail over that, while now they're much closer to a flexible system - so that's my new canon.
Actually he basically says that preservers can defile, but it's hard for a defilers to become a preserver. As for the new canon, that's fine. Personally, I don't find latest canon holds priority over the original canon. If blizzard (only company I can think of, lol) purchased darksun and changed the canon to include diablo, megaman and peter from family guy, I wouldn't hold that as a priority over the original either. I do consider 4e DS fluff to be canon, but not on the same level as the original. That's just me, but I completely loved the original darksun story.
On how could Rajaat restore the world, if the answer is using clerical spells, we're already in the realm of speculation.
No we're not, in the least. The clerical spells I'm talking about are the exact same ones a preserver can cast. I thought this would be obvious as I believed you were an old school DS fan. To be clear, preservers and clerics share some of the same spells.
My opinion is that if he went so far as making them Champions at the cost it took to make them,
That cost means nothing considering what he would get in return. Who cares if he wounded the planet and the sun if he can restore both to a better state than they were in before he created magic. It's like worrying about a dollar when you know you will get two dollars back.
and if he needed the Champions to achieve immortality (I don't remember anything saying he couldn't be killed before he created them), then he certainly had a strong need for them.
He didn't. He was immortal before he made the champions. Being pyreen, he was nearly immortal to begin with. IMHO rajaat probably became "immortal" during his time in his pyramid at the base of the jagged cliffs, but I really believe he became "immortal and beyond" during his time in the pristine tower when he merged psionics and magic and discovered a path to transformation into a higher existence, which wasn't exactly what he was looking for. (many believe this is when he discovered the dragon metamorphosis and preserver metamorphosis) This is also the point when he decided the rebirth was a mistake and he needed to undue that mistake. This is when his new vision of the world took shape. (to quote the book)
As for being connected to them, he could also be connected to the dark lens, to some of his experiments he created in his pyramid, to the halflings (shadow giants) and connected to the black as he does have a connection to that plane. So it could be entirely possible that in order to destroy rajaat completely, you would need to wipe out not only all the SKs, but also everything rajaat ever touched. (the dark lense, the halfling shadowgiants, the pyramid and all of rajaats creations) and the black itself.
[deleted double paragraph]
If he was as powerful as you state, why would he need the lens or even to make them? He could have won the war himself. I doubt he would defile the sun because he was too lazy to fight on his own.
[my personal opinion] - Short and ugly version with a lot removed.
I think the SKs were energy containers and that's what rajaat's ultimate plan for them was. To gain as much power as they could before hamanu (the dragon) absorbed all of the combined life force to become the ultimate power source to be tapped. Then rajaat would have cast the "super awesome spell of plot device", using the dark lens, the sun, the black, the moons, the life force of everything and everyone on the planet (except the halflings rajaat deemed worthy) and the total lifeforce hamanu the dragon had absorbed to restore the world to the blue age. There is also a chance that rajaat would have sacrificed himself to further power his spell as long as he knew it would work. Changing the world back to the blue age, restoring the entire planet AND the sun, would have taken much more than the cleansing war. (complete and total speculation on my part and the opinion I'v formed over a decade of darksun discussions, reading and thinking)
Once again, I don't dislike Rajaat. I just think the kind of vision of him you're pushing is very personal and doesn't mix well with what I perceive Dark Sun to be.
No more personal than my opinion of the dragon or the SKs or the mindlords or the heroes of tyr. I don't believe what I do because I like rajaat more than anything else, I believe what I do because that is exactly what all the information in the novels and game books lead me to believe. I could go on and on and on about the dragon, too. To me, Rajaat is the ultimate threat to athas and it's ultimate savior. He is both the self sacrificing hero and the heartless villain. He's a really great character concept in a setting filled with really great character concepts. But the material has shown me that he is exactly what I think he is. The ultimate plot device capable of doing anything and everything the writers need him to do.
Someone who restores the planet in one day has no room in Dark Sun to me.
That's not exactly what I said. He could have cleansed athas of every rebirth race in a single day. But he didn't for a reason and it has nothing to do with him lacking in the ability. As far as restoring the planet, at the time, the world was green. I truly believe he could have healed the sea if that was his only goal. He could have done it. But he wanted to eradicate the green age completely because of his self hatred. The rebirth should never have happened in his mind. Although what he never considered was "WHY" the rebirth happened. He never had a real chance to talk to the original nature masters, or things would have gone very different IMO.
Besides, there's Rajaat's psychology. You depict him as a cold, calculating genious, while his personality always seemed more complex to me. He was suffering, he had been wronged and not all of his actions were rational. His motives for bringing the blue sun back bordered madness.
Oh, there is no question. He was completely insane. He wanted to return the world to the blue age and murder entire races all based on self hatred. He was completely bonkers. But he was also beyond genius and he knew what he was doing. Being insane didn't make him stupid or confused. It just made him utterly dangerous and most importantly, without self doubt.
And once again, the Dark Lens. That's the key piece. We don't know how powerful Rajaat was before obtaining it. Every spectacular thing he did, he did using the Dark Lens.
We also don't know when rajaat discovered/created the dark lens. But the dark lens channels the sun and the black while amplifying power. If he would have been using the dark lens during the battle at the pristine tower, he probably would have destroyed every single SK. Without the dark lens, rajaat is "The" master of both arcane magic and psionics. He has no equal. With the dark lens, he's a god capable of absolute destruction but not absolute creation.
To attempt to put this into a mechanical example to be easily understood, rajaat without the lens is a level 35 solo controller (humor me), with the lens, he's twice as powerful. Yes, I understand what I'm implaying completely.
I'd postulate he was a rather "average" superwizard of sorts before the Lens (an Elminster, so to say); it was the Lens that made him capable of all that.
I disagree completely. (IIRC) rajaat didn't use the lens during the battle at the pristine tower and he defeated Pen like it was nothing. (banished to the black) He also banished Andro to the black without the lens. Neither of them could do anything to save themselves. As for comparing him to elminster, I do not remember his stats in 2e and I don't have my 2e FR books here. So I cannot make an opinion either way. (IIRC) Elminster wasn't as powerful as borys the dragon, but I don't remember, honestly.
It's the Lens that allows him to oneshot SKs, and it's the Lens that stops him every time. The true all-powerful being on Athas is the Lens, and that's for sure.
The lens is without a doubt, nothing to mess with. But I honestly believe that the lens and rajaat are connected in an unknown way. I think the lens is also connected to the black, as if rajaat took the essence of the plane and forged it into the lens. All three are connected. So using the lens against rajaat is like using rajaat's own power against him. I'v also got my own opinion on the lens, like I do with rajaat's plan, but that's an equally long post. lol.
I have no problem with your vision of Rajaat and Dark Sun - it's yours, and if it works for you, that's great.
Again, my vision of rajaat is completely based on what has been writte about him and what he should be capable of based on the mechanics of each system. Nothing more.
Mine is different - I see Rajaat struggling with his goals, and ultimately failing, and being defeated as pretty solid proofs of his limits - but it's mine, and we're both entitled to our interpretations. However, when people asks for information, we should leave our liberal interpretations (such as if Rajaat had access to clerical spells or not, or even if he could cast psionic enchantments) aside and give just the facts.
I'd never say you're not entitled to your opinion of anything. But when it comes to "solid proof" I cannot agree because every defeat is met with a continqency. As for clerical spells, as I said before, every clerical spell he can cast that I know of, is also a wizard spell. (preserver) That's not an interpretation or opinion. It's simply a fact of him being a master preserver. As for casting psionic enchantments, I'm not sure how that can even be questioned. Of course he can. He created most of them, I'm sure.
Personally, I'd be interested in hearing how you think Rajaat would have brought the blue sun back, and probably more in discussing WHY he wanted to do it.
That would require me to write everything out in a pdf, because there is simply too much for a thread, even if it was just you and me. I'd need to put down what I think in detail and then explain why I think that. If I ever have the time and motivation, I will do that and PM you a link. If you read it, then we can chat via PM or have a complete discussion on this forum, to include others. I provided a tiny portion of my opinion in this post, but again, it's very small and doesn't explain as much as I'd like.
There may be arcane magic that Rajaat has abandoned as too powerful, such as the first and only time he tried to tap into the planet itself for life force - cracking the world, letting its life force seep out, creating a section of the swamp at the base of the Jagged Cliffs, mutating everything in it, and nearly tearing the world apart and killing himself in the process.
So yeah, if he wanted to destroy and kill all, permanently, he could do it by tapping into the world's life force a second time, this time without hesitation, one big ritual that would bust the world like a crushed melon.
Rajaat would not be someone who became a Pyreen, but rather whom people who take the Pyreen epic destiny emulate, as per that destiny's fluff description.
There may be arcane magic that Rajaat has abandoned as too powerful, such as the first and only time he tried to tap into the planet itself for life force - cracking the world, letting its life force seep out, creating a section of the swamp at the base of the Jagged Cliffs, mutating everything in it, and nearly tearing the world apart and killing himself in the process.
So yeah, if he wanted to destroy and kill all, permanently, he could do it by tapping into the world's life force a second time, this time without hesitation, one big ritual that would bust the world like a crushed melon.
No, he was someone blessed to become a Pyreen. He wasnt someone to transformed himself into a pyreen.
The rules that are valid to PC's are not valid to "npcs" in 4ed... (sadly)
Hes someone that can use powers from Epic Defiler, Epic Preserver, and Epic Pyreen all at the same time, but the three of them, better them the respective epic paths... Thats because hes a monster and not a player, so he can do things players will never dream of...
The spell he was testing at that time, was probably a failed experiment, i dont think he dropped it, he probably learned how to use the arcana properly on his time on the pristine tower.
But you are right, he could blow everthing up, but he wants to save the halflings so its counter productive for him.
It just says you want to follow in the footsteps of these mysterious beings you met in your travels. It doesn't say if those beings were like you once, or were born Pyreen.
If one bases himself on the old fluff, from 2e, Pyreens were a race from the Rebirth.
Putting 2 and 2 together...Pyreen are a race from long ago, a few members still exist, and you may use your epic destiny to become like one, even though you are a human or an elf, transforming yourself.
4- How the power to use sun as a source from magic was obtained? I know that its because of the Pristine Tower, but how it happened?
All sources of "magic" on Athas tap into something - life, the Elemental Chaos, the Gray, even the moons and stars. The same goes for the sun. As the ultimate source of life on Athas...one could explain the sun's potency as a source of power by saying it's what partly powers the primal spirits. It's a reductionist conclusion on the part of Troy Denning, the novels' author, in the vein of "the sun is the primary and ultimate driving force for Earth's ecosystem and all life, thus it must be the most potent source to tap for magic power".
To be fair to Denning, it's hardly a new idea. It stretches back all the way to the Sun Cults of our own history waaaaaaaaaay in the past. It's not that big a stretch to imagine it being the actual truth in a a fantasy world.
Just a tiny bit of his essence that escaped non intencionally would be enough to finish the powerful dragon of tyr...
If that was true, rajaat would be FAR more powerful them most of deitys.
And why his essence would kill something if not commanded to do so?!
I imagine this ooze is some of his energy, his self. Everyone knows the Sauron/One Ring bit, no need to explain.
@satanicway: It does look like Rajaat is peering through the ooze from his Hollow prison. That's why the ooze kills...it's responding to his volition.
$0.02
But i dont think that someone with the Inteligence score Rajaat had, would not have many secoundary plans...
But you may be right about the ooze
But where exactly does he suggest that the brown tide is in anyway similar to defiling?
Question 14.
14th
Eric [edit, that's me 
]: Sadira's half-sister defiled a pool of water atop the Pristine Tower and a brownish color began to swirl around in it. Was this pool of water a remnant of the original ocean-water that the Blue Age halflings used for their bio-technology creations? Was the brown coloring a hint at the "brown tide" that the proto-halflings fought at the end of the Blue Age?
Troy: Sounds like something I'd do, doesn't it?
Yes, that's a very elliptic response.
4e defiling of a high caliber, like that of the Dragon, can defile inanimate objects now, like stone.
As a storytelling element, it's better. It now helps in imagining what the brown tide was. Maybe the process the halflings used to increase the life-giving properties of the ocean ended up causing defiling of a storytelling sort, without there ever being arcane users involved.
I strongly dislike the idea of it being possible to defile before the discovery of arcane magic. It feels terribly contrived and inelegant to me. It would be like if some archaeologist in our world dug up the remains of people who had been killed by acute radiation poisoning thousands of years before the discovery of nuclear power.
Your analogy might work if we didn't already have some idea that the bio tech going on in the Blue Age wasn't actually rather quite advanced. Just because it may not exist any more doesn't mean it wasn't more advanced than what Rajaat came up with. After all, isn't that part of the post apocalypse theme? That what you have to survive with now is a pale reflection of what came before? Dark Sun has seemed to have been a sequence of post-apocalypses after the other. . . not progress.
And about discovering magic... does the mathematic concepts were "discovered" or created?
The physics formulas are "discovered" or "created"?
You can "discover" what happens in the world, but you "create" a way to calculate and interact with it. So he created the way the arcane magic works in Athas.
And Dark Sun is not modern post-apocalypse scenario, were the tecnology is lost.
In Dark Sun, the same guys that did the apocalypse survived, and are more powerful them before.
So the "technology" isnt lost, its alive, and even more powerful them before.
And the Bio Tech of the Blue Age was REALLY advanced...
Pristine Tower?
A Brow Tide so powerful that needed the use of the first world-wide defiling the world has seem to be stopped?
They could create Pyreens that had the best of all races...
All races were derived from theyr creations...
Yes they were REALLY advanced at Bio Tech... really much much more them we are today IRL in fact.
They could transform a rat in a tiger... a halfling in a giant...
The regress in darksun was more a social, and economic feature to the populace, but the "powerful beings" of dark sun, lost nothing.
So he created the way the arcane magic works in Athas.
Really? Says who? Says Rajaat? Wanna believe his accounting on that? He lied to his Champions on quite a significant matter, what else did he keep hidden from them? Just saying there is a lot we can't know as "fact" when there are so few witnesses and so long of a time between then and contemporary game era. Just look at how the game describes shadow giants now.
I'm not saying he wasn't godlike smart, just that there is a case he didn't invent arcane magic but instead rediscovered lost knowledge.
Yeah, the intentional part about putting ooze in the artifacts is lame IMO. It's more logical that the ooze's there because the artifact needed to have it to be created in the first place...whatever that ooze is. Once broken, the artifact releases it...which turns out to allow Rajaat, now imprisoned, to briefly affect the world.
I understand that, but I guess the idea of lameness is extremely subjective. Personally, I find the idea of Rajaat one shotting the Dragon while imprisoned with a small bit of black ooze because he's over 9000 the very definition of lameness. Last thing DS needs is being turned into Dragonball.
In fact, whenever the word "logical" is brought into the discussion, I start thinking about how to justify Rajaat's power. He's not a god. He's not a primordial. He's a "normal" member of his race, which is clearly not divine in nature. He's a poweful caster, sure, but how exactly did he become an overgod? When? Where? He was lucky enough to stumble into the Dark Lens?
I mean, the Dragon is a being that was first created with the most powerful ritual the world had ever seen (as a champion) and then reborn through a ritual that needed so much power that it probably condemned a whole solar system.
And he gets one shotted by some ooze from a guy that did what to become powerful?
In fact, this would be a somewhat more interesting discussion. Assuming Rajaat is THAT powerful... why he is so? It can't be just magic (Mystra herself wouldn't be that powerful, and she IS magic - I know, other setting, but still). It can't be just psionics. How did Rajaat become an overgod? Sure, Dennings tells us he's over 9000, but does he do anything to make that statement feel consistent, credible or logical?
2e defiling only affected living things, not inanimate objects like water.
4e defiling of a high caliber, like that of the Dragon, can defile inanimate objects now, like stone.
As a storytelling element, it's better. It now helps in imagining what the brown tide was. Maybe the process the halflings used to increase the life-giving properties of the ocean ended up causing defiling of a storytelling sort, without there ever being arcane users involved.
I actually figured it to be something quite different. It wasn't defiling of the water itself that Sadira's half-sister caused. It was the killing of microorganisms within that water that was witnessed, which was similar to the Brown Tide (but not the Brown Tide).
In my campaign, the lifeshapers, as we have been told, were making the world a richer place for life to thrive in. To this end, the base of the food web and its capacity to self-perpetuate was dramatically increased. The oceans became mind-bogglingly abundant with life. Unlike our own oceans, there were essentially no dead zones. Just about every niche in every ecosystem was easily filled, from the base to the top predators, and everything in between.
Unfortunately, there are repercussions to such an act. Somewhere along the way either the lifeshapers miscalculated, or the lifebenders maliciously interfered (an unknown to anything still alive, possibly recorded somewhere in a biostorage device in some ancient halfling site still buried. A horrific disease that was extremely deadly to the world's microorganisms was born. That infectious disease, be it bacterial, viral, or parasitic, was extraordinarily prolific, efficient, and resilient. Said disease WAS the Brown Tide, spreading throughout the world without an end in sight, wrecking the fragile web of life.
At the Pristine Tower, the lifeshapers at last found a solution. They successfully killed off the Brown Tide. Unfortunately, it required a massive amount of energy to accomplish. Energy they took from the sun, the greatest power source they knew. The Pristine Tower, in my campaign, was not alone. It was the primary focus for the energy required, but it focused the energy to sites all over the globe, killing off massive amounts of life in addition to the Brown Tide.
The sun ceased to be a blue giant, and became a very large yellow star. With the sun changed, and cooler than it had previously been, the world experienced something it previously hadn't in the memories of the halfling archives: The oceans receded as the poles began to freeze, exposing the continents. New niches, new avenues for life were exposed. Life moved from the ocean to land in an explosion, once it had recovered sufficiently. The rest, as they say, is history.
Later, when the sorcerer-kings and Rajaat did their thing, the sun was changed again. This time, it became a red giant. It had less energy, yes, but it also expanded in size, meaning Athas itself was exposed to a much higher amount of energy. This, combined with the discovery of defiling and eventual Cleansing War to follow, and the war of the elementals swinging too far in one direction (water was losing this war, and fire gaining tremendous power; thus, water was actually disappearing from Athas thanks to metaphysical interactions with the elemental planes), caused much of the Athas seen today.
I like this idea. The Sorcerer has learned to tap into the sun and the stars for his power. It would be a rare discipline, which fits as the Sorcerer being a naturally gifted user that has come to understand how to draw his power from the cosmos and the sun of Athas.
Why there was a Cosmic Sorcerer in the Encounters pre-gens now makes sense.
Rajaat? Wanna believe his accounting on that? He lied to his Champions on quite a significant matter, what else did he keep hidden from them? Just saying there is a lot we can't know as "fact" when there are so few witnesses and so long of a time between then and contemporary game era. Just look at how the game describes shadow giants now.So he created the way the arcane magic works in Athas.
Really? Says who? Says
I'm not saying he wasn't godlike smart, just that there is a case he didn't invent arcane magic but instead rediscovered lost knowledge.
It's pretty clear according to the revised 2e material on the subject that Rajaat did create the methods of using arcane energy every preserver and defiler used. It's not an opinion or view point of rajaat. It's the facts of the setting made clear in the rule books. But Rajaat didn't "Create" arcane energy, he simply discovered it and created the methods of preserving and defiling. Hence, being the first wizard sorcerer.
It's also not a case of "witnesses" as it's not written in the view point of anyone. It's simply stating truth so that those reading it know what the lore actually is. No one, not even rajaat, had recorded what he had done in such detail. If written as a view point, we wouldn't know most of what we do about Rajaat's actions. This way of writing puts the reader in the position of being the one who perceives the events as they actually happened. So we know the truth.
The Brown Tide, resulting from an increase in the oceans productivity, makes sense as microbes, plankton, and algae, the base elements of the ocean ecosystem, multiplying out of control, until clear water is a brown soup of microbial life. The Silt of the sea, could also in fact, be the particulate remains of these innumerable microbes.
The actual brown tide was caused by "the inadvertent creation and release of a life leeching brown plant that caused the waters to recede." To quote the book.
This way of writing puts the reader in the position of being the one who perceives the events as they actually happened. So we know the truth. [/quote]
If you say so. Sort of how the shadow giants are written in that way in 4e. Uh huh. It's factual then.
[Edit: Damn I'm loving WotC's broken quoting software.]
4e shadow giants reside in the Gray, not the Black. (Different dimensional home, implying Rajaat is either not canon in 4e or imprisoned in a different dimension also.)
4e shadow giants are undead. (No longer still alive)
Basically, the essence of 2e shadow giants is there, even enough that we can say what is written is a story twisted through oral histories over centuries. But if we're taking the written word in the rulebook as "truth" then we're way off now from what we knew about shadow giants in 2e.
None of these changes make them unusable. But they are different now in ways that a factualist we be required to jettison the previous 2e history.
For Dark Sun DM's, there are interesting times! (<- that's a good thing™!)
(Different dimensional home, implying Rajaat is either not canon in 4e or imprisoned in a different dimension also.)
Rajaat is stated to have been imprisoned in "a place of nothingness outside the world" in the 4e DSCS and "outside time and space" in the DSCC.
For Dark Sun DM's, there are interesting times! (<- that's a good thing™!)
Oh, indeed. Rajaat doesn't need the shadow giants as servants in my version of DarkSun, since he's got the tieflings instead (who are harvesting souls to help free him from his prison). I'm seriously thinking of jettisoning the whole "halflings were the original humanoid race" thing and making them just the first race to evolve from the pyreen, who would then be the true progenitor race in my version. I'm also considering making it at least implied that Rajaat didn't necessarily want to eradicate all the Rebirth races, but rather wanted to turn the "best" (by his estimation) of them back into pyreen.
The original 2e DarkSun was cool, but I'm big-headed enough to think I can probably do better with the framework given by the 4e books. ;)
In 2nd ed Rajaat would be higher level than the champions but not high enough to auto win vs all of them. Probably around level 40 or so and he was DS equivilent of a archfiend IMHO and weaker in some ways(couldn't grant spells to clerics). IN 4th Ed Rajaat is probably a level 33-35 solo critter. IN 3.5 the SK's should probably be epic monsters around CR 21-33-34 or so with Rajaat clocking in around CR 40. He was about on par with Karsus from the Forgotten Realms setting -a uber Netherese archwizard level 41-42 in 2nd ed terms).
That would get across the idea of his being an unparalleled sorcerer and almost unkillable while not completely usurping the Dragon and and the Sorcerer Kings like he did in the novels.
Ok, I'm admittedly a little ignorant re: 4e mechanics. Would elemental magic be considered primal? Or primordial? Or what?
Rajaat told Tithian not to defile in the areas Rajaat had begun to restore. Which he called the Blue Lands. Beyond that, he wouldn't care as he never did. Rajaat could erase any defiling damage done to the world when he spread the blue lands. Although he wasn't willing to allow anyone to defile what had already been changed.
Sadira's magic is arcane, but also linked to both the sun and the black. Rajaat gains his power many ways, but he has a connection to the black, which he's had (IIRC) since before he was ever defeated. I also don't think anyone hurt him after tithian freed him. His cloud body seemed to act as a defense and he simply repaired his defenses with more clouds.
Also, as to another poster's idea, I have to disagree. Officially, I do not see Rajaat being anything but a Solo. He doesn't really need allies and even as a solo, he could still have allies, even at level 35-36.
Also, as to another poster's idea, I have to disagree. Officially, I do not see Rajaat being anything but a Solo. He doesn't really need allies and even as a solo, he could still have allies, even at level 35-36.
Well as he's written he's a walking plot device and needs no stats. Incidentally this is why I dislike him. Having the Dragon and most of the Sorcerer Kings killed off by NPCs and replaced with a plot device that can only be dealt with by said NPC's and other plot devices did not enhance the setting in my opinion.
Which is not say that the idea behind Rajaat is bad, I just don't care for the execution. Again speaking only for me I'd find him much more interesting if he was not better then everyone at everything.
Rajaat could have been a threat to the powers that be on Dark Sun without being so overwhelming that he destroys them with a wave of his hand. That may have even left room in the setting for the player characters.
If I were to use Rajaat he would be a lv 35 elite; stronger then most of the Sorcerer Kings but he's real weapon would be knowledge. He's go about recruiting new champions (my players) to take on the ones that betrayed him; promising to restore the world when they are done.
Once the Sorcerer Kings realise what has happened they would confront the players with the knowledge of the Cleansing Wars and that while Rajaat wants to bring life back to Athas there would be no place left in it for them...
Again speaking only for me I'd find him much more interesting if he was not better then everyone at everything.
Duke's Wall of Text Rebuttal in 5... 4... 3...