After reading the new FR books, I was left with a few questions about my favorite things in the realms - Elves, and particularly the Elves of Evermeet (God bless ya Elaine Cunningham!). If you could toss some answers my way, or just give me some input on the way you see things with them now in 4E, it would be much appreciated.
• “Some suspect a Moonflower heir yet walks the Realms, severed from his or her native land.”
Who do you think this would be? As far as I can remember, the only three Moonflowers remaining in line of succession would be Lamruil, Illyana, and the unnamed child of Amnestria and Eliath. Illyana’s spirit moved on in the novel EoE (Although my memory isn’t clear on that: Was it a ‘She’s dead, Jim’ kind of moment, or a setup to a future return when…say…the Queen has moved on, nobody has stepped up to the throne, and the world of Elves is in upheaval?), Lamruil is a bit trickier because I would have said the whole Maura events would basically disqualify him from the Throne, but with the time jump, the issue of half-elves and Zaor’s royal Moonblade and the like are probably no longer ‘worries’. There are other left field contenders I guess, such as Lazzier perhaps just being lost and not dead at sea, or the fate of Hhora.
• Do the elves of the mainland settlements such as Myth Drannor and Evereska know about the relocation of the Island into the Feywild? The information in the DM Guide seems to set the tone that it’s basically lost to the Realms, and only the current inhabitants really know of it’s continued existence. (Failure of all portals, embassies, contacts… common wisdom is it has been destroyed… a Moonflower heir walks the realms, severed from his native land ) On the other hand (the big theme of 4E, I do believe), with the connection to the Feywild, and the Explorers League parties it’s possible it’s just the best kept secret of the Elves of Evermeet. Thoughts?
• The forces that settle Myth Drannor were originally an army of Evermeet, yes? The last I recall about the subject was that Lord Miritar led forces to fight the daemonfey. My lore after that just begins with the crumbs the 4E books gives me. I find it interesting that if so, and if Evermeet really is lost to much of the Realms, you would have quite the collection of nobles and persons of status marooned on the mainland so to speak, looking either for a lost homeland, or surviving kin. Nice little hook there.
• Moonblades, did they just accept those of Moon Elven blood? I want to say I remember reading about a Sun Elf House that was in possession of a Moonblade, but I can’t recall if that was actual canon, or a player invented bit of lore.
• Angharradh simply confuses me now; perhaps someone can clear it up? Angharradh is the merging of three of the Elven Gods and is listed as a God in the DM Guide. Yet in the article about Evereska the author states that Hanali was Sune and that Faenya was Akadi (You just want to slap some ret-con, no?) I am a little confused to the state of this Goddess. One of the best things I ever read in D&D (Planescape iirc), was that a God could never truly die as long as worshippers still believed in them. So, is this Angharradh a actual Godling that was formed because of the Elven belief made it so, or is it something else.
Thanks for taking the time to read this, and any answers or ideas you reply with :D
One survived the attack of the Ityak-Ortheel, but unfortunately Brian James didn't cover that with his otherwise excellent Moonshae article.
As for the rest, It seems most of that - like the stuff pertaining to Evermeet and the Elves 'left behind' - is up to the DM to decide, and was purposely left vague for that reason.
I personally think Evermeet got 'nuked' in 4e just because Myth Drannor came back... which I think was a HUGE mistake. Bringing back fallen civilizations is ridiculous in a setting based on exploring the ruins of those civilizations.
I think FR was much better when it was a 'Points of Light' setting.
Ilyrana is dead and Lamruil is out of succession, having founded his own kingdom of Aluseriel /which has been destroyed nonetheless/.
The moonblades accepted moon elven wielders, rarely the sun elven. AFAIK Durothil was one of the exceptions. And Starym.
Angarradh in 4 e. I don't think she exists anymore.
The residents of the current Myth Drannor come from Evermeet mainly.
And I think the elves know about the island being in the Feywild.
Who do you think this would be? As far as I can remember, the only three Moonflowers remaining in line of succession would be Lamruil, Illyana, and the unnamed child of Amnestria and Eliath. Illyana’s spirit moved on in the novel EoE (Although my memory isn’t clear on that: Was it a ‘She’s dead, Jim’ kind of moment, or a setup to a future return when…say…the Queen has moved on, nobody has stepped up to the throne, and the world of Elves is in upheaval?), Lamruil is a bit trickier because I would have said the whole Maura events would basically disqualify him from the Throne, but with the time jump, the issue of half-elves and Zaor’s royal Moonblade and the like are probably no longer ‘worries’. There are other left field contenders I guess, such as Lazzier perhaps just being lost and not dead at sea, or the fate of Hhora.
-See Elves of Faerûn concerning the children of Amlauril and Zoar.
Do the elves of the mainland settlements such as Myth Drannor and Evereska know about the relocation of the Island into the Feywild? The information in the DM Guide seems to set the tone that it’s basically lost to the Realms, and only the current inhabitants really know of it’s continued existence. (Failure of all portals, embassies, contacts… common wisdom is it has been destroyed… a Moonflower heir walks the realms, severed from his native land ) On the other hand (the big theme of 4E, I do believe), with the connection to the Feywild, and the Explorers League parties it’s possible it’s just the best kept secret of the Elves of Evermeet. Thoughts?
-We don't know. Given that we've been given all of the 4e information that will be presented in book form, it is likely that we'll never know. As far as hypothesizing, I am under the impression that they don't know, and Evermeet mysterious disappeared.
The forces that settle Myth Drannor were originally an army of Evermeet, yes? The last I recall about the subject was that Lord Miritar led forces to fight the daemonfey. My lore after that just begins with the crumbs the 4E books gives me. I find it interesting that if so, and if Evermeet really is lost to much of the Realms, you would have quite the collection of nobles and persons of status marooned on the mainland so to speak, looking either for a lost homeland, or surviving kin. Nice little hook there.
-More on the reclamation of Myth Drannor cn be found in Elves of Faerûn. The Last Mythal trilogy was the book series in which all of the aforementioned events take place.
Moonblades, did they just accept those of Moon Elven blood? I want to say I remember reading about a Sun Elf House that was in possession of a Moonblade, but I can’t recall if that was actual canon, or a player invented bit of lore.
-Elven Houses generally blur subracial lines. That is, there exist Sun Elves Moonflowers, and Moon Elven Durothil.
Angharradh simply confuses me now; perhaps someone can clear it up? Angharradh is the merging of three of the Elven Gods and is listed as a God in the DM Guide. Yet in the article about Evereska the author states that Hanali was Sune and that Faenya was Akadi (You just want to slap some ret-con, no?) I am a little confused to the state of this Goddess. One of the best things I ever read in D&D (Planescape iirc), was that a God could never truly die as long as worshippers still believed in them. So, is this Angharradh a actual Godling that was formed because of the Elven belief made it so, or is it something else.
-4e has made a mess out of Angherradh. Personally, I'd ignore everything that the 4e sources say about it.
• Angharradh simply confuses me now; perhaps someone can clear it up? Angharradh is the merging of three of the Elven Gods and is listed as a God in the DM Guide. Yet in the article about Evereska the author states that Hanali was Sune and that Faenya was Akadi (You just want to slap some ret-con, no?) I am a little confused to the state of this Goddess. One of the best things I ever read in D&D (Planescape iirc), was that a God could never truly die as long as worshippers still believed in them. So, is this Angharradh a actual Godling that was formed because of the Elven belief made it so, or is it something else.
Basically Angharradh was kept around to be a consort of Corellon since "Sehanine" and Selune were revealed to be the same entity. According to Bruce Cordell, Angharradh hasn't been seen much so it seems there is a behind the scenes plot with her. It seems like the designers couldn't agree on what they were doing with her.
The merging of the 2 gods & primordials just don't make sense in 4E especially since the primordials seem like "bad guys" now kinda like the Titans in Greek myths so why would Akadi merge with 2 gods when they are supposed to be foes.
You can do one of the the following suggestions to "explain" Angharradh:
1) Sehanine is Angharradh who gave up her moon aspect to Selune which along with Mystra's destroyed essence helped elevate Selune to Greater God status. The moon was just one of her many domains anyway as Sehanine.
2) Ignore Angharradh
3) Another lesser "elven" divine being rose up to claim the name Angharradh when Sehanine ascended to become Selune
4) Selune/Sehanine uses the Angharradh persona when she visits the Seldarine & Corellon
So until some 4E writer decides to write about Angharradh in a novel, we aren't going to get much more information on it as even Rick Baker himself said that the initial plans with her are not the same as what the final result ended up being.
Personally I think Selune should have become Sehanine in the Realms since Sehanine is in the Core book anyway....why add further to the confusion?? But the designers said that the name Selune was more well known in the Realms than Sehanine but then why did they changed Lathander's name to Amaunator?? Lathander's name is more well known than Amaunator.
basically there is no apparent logic to it
This is how I explained it - an Avatar is a clone of the original deity. For all intents & puposes, it is a copy with far less power (I figure Exarch level in 4e). When a god first creates these (which they need a damn good reason for), they lose a bit of their own power, but get the benefit of being able to have a seperate entity represent them.
However, if an Avatar stays seperate from it's Godly essence for too long, it begins to achieve a seperate sentience, and after a time it may not want to re-merge. For good deities, this could be untold millenia; for evil deities, this could be as little as 20-50 years (I have a feeling thats how Iatchu-Xvim(sp?) came about).
This is also more likly to occur when the Avater has a different personality, name, and certain traits associated with it from the original deity (see Teylas and Etugen from The Horde campaign). What this means is that a god can have completely seperate, self-aware 'pieces' of itself running around. Although they usually keep track of these, over time they may lose enough of their connection to these 'lesser selfs'.
On VERY rare occssions, a god may chose to create one of these seperate, self-willed Avatars on purpose, by pouring in a little more of their 'godly might' - assume they use two DvR levels, rather then one... which can 'heal' over time (we're talking around a millenia here). This is exactly what happened when the Pharaonic Pantheon (of earth) created the 'Manifestations' that they sent to Toril through the Phlogiston (which I believe gets 'translated' into the Astral Plane in 4e).
My Point...
Since seperating Avatars from your godly essence is magic, and all magic got 'screwed' by the Spellplague, most of these Avatars were pulled back into their original gods - wheather either or both beings wanted it or not. This lead to some very weird moments directly following the Spellplague - some seperate Avatars (aspects) of a deity were so different that they may have even been unaware of the connection to other seperated Avatars, if enough millenia had passed since either were created from the original god.
These Avatars are what form together into 'new deities', like Angharradh, NOT the god itself. Normally they are created for just such a purpose... but not always.
In the East I have created a Hecate-like goddess of magic, who is a combination of Selune and Mystra. Post-Spellplague, that 'Mystra' essence gets ripped from the conjoined-goddess and falls to earth... to be reborn as Midnight - a wandering Wu Jen (Mage) with no memeory of her past.
I don't kill-off things I like. ;)
That will leave just a moon-goddess in charge of magic in the East post-spellplague, which is what I was shooting for all along anyway.
Anyhow, if you look at all those 'gods that never were' as seperate and distinct Avatars that "just went home", it makes more sense.
Yet in the article about Evereska the author states ...
I was just wondering where this article about Evereska is. I've searched the Wizards site and can't find it. Apparently all of the information that is discussed here came from that article and no where else, because I hadn't seen any of it before I read this.
Although I have not yet read the article, here is my opinion regarding the deities, including Angharradh. To start the Realms has always had the "main" gods (Mystra, Kelemvor, Torm, et al.) who are the ones responsible for controlling the Realms (i.e. Mystra controlled the Weave, Sune and Shar created the universe, etc.), and then there were the various racial deities who basically served the same function but were race specific (Sune - "main" goddess of love, Hanali - elven goddes of love). It therefore makes sense that each race specific deity is actually just an aspect of the "main" deity. So when the elves worship Hanali, they're are actually worshiping Sune. Now, what being an "aspect" of a deity actually entails is probably best left to each individual DM to define. Whether Sune just answers to the name Hanali when the elves call, or if she broke off a part of herself to be Hanali making Hanali a separate yet connected "aspect" is a little metaphysical for a D&D book.
As for Angharradh, it was my assumption that each of the three goddesses (or two goddesses and one primordial, according to the above) combined a part of their essence to create her. Therefore, she became a separate deity. I never pictured it like a Voltron scene where the goddesses had to get together and "form" Angharradh every time that goddess was needed. As far as I'm concerned, no matter what is revealed about the deities that created her, there is no reason to believe that Angharradh is anything but what she's always been.
Just a quick note on Primordials from the 4E FRCG (which seems to be met with some derision around here), "The few primordials that remained in Toril when Abeir split away never fought the gods as their fellows did. These primordials are sometimes worshiped as deities despite their elemental origin." (pg. 78, FRCG) If in fact Faenya is (was/became?) Akadi, it only stands to reason that she is one of those spoken about above. As one of the primordials who didn't fight against the gods and was therefore not removed to Abeir, she could still have been on good terms with members of the Seldarine and been able to give part of herself for the creation of Angharradh. Perhaps even an "aspect" of Akadi walked among the Seldarine as Faenya.
I was just wondering where this article about Evereska is. I've searched the Wizards site and can't find it. Apparently all of the information that is discussed here came from that article and no where else, because I hadn't seen any of it before I read this.
I believe the "article" in question is the Evereska entry in the 4e FRCG. They have not done any articles for Evereska, but hopefully that will change.
And you have a good point about various aspects of the gods. Ed Greenwood has stated this on the subject: "Here's the real secret: if you read my Realms novels, you'll occasionally "hear" characters swearing by 'all the Watching Gods.'
Well, unbeknownst to all but a few sages and ancient elves, that phrase, "the Watching Gods," refers to an old, old belief among intelligent races that there are far fewer actual gods than most mortals believe, and that these fewer "Watching Gods" are unwittingly worshipped under several names by clergies and devout lay followers who see them as a variety of different beings. Some sages believe the gods themselves are partially or wholly unaware that they are "split personalities" or "aspects" of the same mighty being, while others cling to the view that this is a deliberate deception (insurance, if you will, on the part of a divine being that they will always be venerated regardless of whether this or that named god falls out of favour). A few sages believe Ao and the goddess of magic best known as Mystra are the only "uber-gods" mortals have glimpsed, and that the others are hidden behind their arrays of names (for example, just one being is behind Silvanus, Eldath, Mielikki, and most of the other nature deities).
No mortal knows the truth behind all of this, mind you, so a DM can decide whatever he or she wishes - - or choose to NOT decide, being as they can arrange matters so that mortals (including PCs) never know.
(Here, I believe, is where I'm supposed to make "Bwoohahahaha" noises.)"
So yeah the whole this god is really an aspect of this other god as been around for awhile, and not just a 4e thing.
yes, but only if the DM goes with it......
Yes but in this case Ed IS the DM! They make it a point that its YOUR Realms, and that your realms is like an alternate Reality from the "Real" Realms or the published Realms, but the way I see it, The published Realms is merely an alternate timeline as well, the "Real" Realms is Ed's own version.
yes, but only if the DM goes with it......
Yes but in this case Ed IS the DM! They make it a point that its YOUR Realms, and that your realms is like an alternate Reality from the "Real" Realms or the published Realms, but the way I see it, The published Realms is merely an alternate timeline as well, the "Real" Realms is Ed's own version.
and also as ED has pointed out before, it ceased to be his Realms, when he gave the rights over to TSR....... and then to wotc/hasbro.
I still see Ed's Realms as being the "real" realms, all others, even official stuff from TSR/Wizbro are alternate realities, Thats my story and Im stickin to it!
guess I didnt.
And thats my story....