Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Scrinoverlord Oct 10, 2008 19:35:36	I'm seriously stumped on this one. If he's just another agent of the Blood of Vol that makes him just another minion of Vol herself, and we all know Orcus is FAR more bad-ass than some pile of bones. He probably shouldn't be the "secret overlord" of the Blood of Vol either, or if he was, he could have been pulling the strings of Vol, using her as but cannon fodder. But aside from that, I'm honestly stumped. Any suggestions?
#2 Elton74 Oct 10, 2008 19:53:13	He has his own cult. Problem solved.
#3 Gilo Oct 10, 2008 20:00:03	It was covered in the Keep on the Shadowfell conversation to Eberron: A Cult of Orcus in Eberron? Orcus, like other demons, was sealed in Khyber by the couatls and dragons, yet not all of his champions met the same fate. Hundreds of years ago during the time of Galifar I, a powerful exarch of Orcus named Doresain was sealed away in the Shadowfell after he tried to raise an undead army to free Orcus. This prison is secure except during the Winterhaunt. For a few days, the seals keeping Doresain in his shadowy tomb weaken, and he and the foul forces he has amassed through the centuries try to break free.
#4 Scrinoverlord Oct 10, 2008 20:32:09	Uh-huh. So the Shadowfell suddenly explodes into existence in Eberron?
#5 mystrich Oct 10, 2008 21:11:58	Mabar has always existed. It's the Plane of Shadow for Eberron. Also, most associate him as a Rajah of Undeath, so a sect of The Dragon Below that worships undead.
#6 Nived Oct 10, 2008 21:31:26	There was an interesting discussion on this awhile back.
#7 Montonius1 Oct 10, 2008 22:18:49	Actually I confronted this problem in preparing the Grand History of Eberron, particularly the question of the Shadowfell. Orcus was easy. I made him, along with several of the other most powerful named tana'ri demon lords,into rakshasa rajahs, the fiendish Overlords, as suggested in the Keep on the Shadowfell Eberron conversion article. The current solution for the Shadowfell as laid out in that conversion is to make the Shadowfell a tripartite planar realm equally composed of Mabar, Dolurrh and the Plane of Shadows, with much closer links between them than the other planes of the cosmology. These links are so close that one could, for example, walk from Dolurrh into the Plane of Shadows without realizing that one had made the transition. Now is this a perfect solution? Far from it. Eberron's current cosmology was designed to reflect, though not duplicate, the 3.5 Edition's Great Wheel. As such, I would expect the 4E version of Eberron to produce a simplified cosmology in which the Plane of Shadows and the Ethereal Plane are deleted and either Dolurrh or Mabar is remade as the Shadowfell. The only problem from a lore standpoint with combining Mabar and Dolurrh into one plane is that the Eberron cosmology's planes are also meant to mirror the number of moons that encircle the world and serve as metaphysical representations of the mystical connections between Eberron and the different planes. For instance, the use of the Moon Breaker by the Sulat League's ancient giants to destroy Eberron's thirteenth moon during the Quori-Giant War in the Age of Giants also severed the link between Eberron and Dal Quor. So it would be a little difficult to just begin excising some of Eberron's planes without also removing the corresponding moons. However, I am fully confident that the designers will come up with some form of the new cosmology that both maintains the original flavor while more closely bringing Eberron in line with the 4E core, similar to what happened to the Forgotten Realms' cosmology. In the meantime, the above ideas offer a starting point to make the transition to 4E until the official solution is provided next summer.
#8 mhacdebhandia Oct 10, 2008 23:50:48	When Keith Baker wrote conversion notes for the Savage Tide adventure path towards the end of the print run of Dungeon magazine, he suggested that the demon lord Demogorgon could be "one of the mightiest fiends of the Age of Demons to remain unbound" - i.e., he's sealed in Khyber but not trapped in one single location like the true overlords. This allowed for the possibility that he would still have his traditional Abyssal realm, as a sort of pocket dimension within Khyber. Khyber itself was described in these notes as being an extradimensional realm within the physical planet of Eberron, not limited to being simply a network of subterranean spaces and passages. Since Orcus and Demogorgon are "peers", I think the same could apply to Orcus. I like the idea that beings like Orcus and Demogorgon are so powerful that, even trapped within Khyber, they have the strength of will to reshape part of that prison in their own image and to their own liking. I also love the idea that Khyber isn't just the physical interior of the planet Eberron, but instead an otherworldly fiendish realm.
#9 Gilo Oct 11, 2008 0:52:29	There was some 4e cosmology discussed over here
#10 grug_the_just Oct 11, 2008 22:19:56	Bury him. That's what they did with a lot of potential BBEG's. A strangely common theme is them being buried deep within Khyber. Usually followed by a cult anyway. The first vampires, some rakshasa, a whole bunch of villains to be dug up.
#11 Gilo Oct 12, 2008 3:41:08	E2: Kingdom of Ghouls looks like it will involve Doresain, which lends legitimacy to the theory that the adventure path will come full circle from H1: Keep on the Shadowfell (1st-level) to a grand confrontation with Orcus in E3 (30th-level). In case E2: Kingdom of Ghouls will get an Eberron conversation we'll probably see some more details there.