In other words, does your campaign use a lot of spellplague tie-ins, or is it just a barely-mentioned historical fact?
I dont.
One of my players ran a very short lived campaign near Vilhon Reaches but the campaign died out before we could get much into it.
Another one of my players is getting ready to start up a campaign in Westgate so we'll see if he uses Spellplague at all in his.
My next session is going to use a Spellplague-infused underground mushroom forest with plaguechanged myconids. I've also got a plaguechanged sargasso sea coming up (which is otherwise ripped off from Paizo's Savage Tide).
My forthcoming conversion/rebuild of 3.5E's rather excellent The Sinister Spire is going to change the magical plague that devastated the city into the Spellplague the various features of the location, and the templated undead, will be Spellplague-related.
I don't overemphasise it but I do like having it as a feature, ditto for earthmotes (of course, my campaign is set in Akanul so I have no choice on the earthmotes!).
However, we played 2 complete 30-levels campaigns and we are yet to encounter it in a direct fashion and it was never included in our storylines.
The only mention of the spellplague in our games is like: "ah look at those weird twisted, magically blue-lighted trees... must be the spellplague effect on them". That's it.
We did not implement spellscars on characters or visit spellplagued terrain. We are just not really interested in this story-arc. It's there, but it's not our focus.
In my writing, it shows up a bit more, but mostly it's still "something that happened a long time ago," rather than a great big worldwide threat. I will confess that I've had two main characters with spellscars, but that shouldn't seem to indicate that it's a huge thing.
It's an accident of timing, the way I see it. It's new to *us* writers and gamers but old to the Realms folk, so we see it as a bigger deal than they do.
Cheers
cannon wise, isnt likely to happen.
well the magic 8 ball and the legendary d1000 die dont favor it too well
btw: I hate spellscars.... but I'm bias, I didnt like spellfire either
Yeah, I know--I try to write stuff you'll like anyway.
Cheers
btw: I hate spellscars.... but I'm bias, I didnt like spellfire either
Yeah, I know--I try to write stuff you'll like anyway.
Cheers
so far, I've enjoyed both the two books of yours that I've read, so I have no complaints.. spellscar or no.
How did her church dissolve, or did it? How do people view spellplague energy? People of the Realms worshipped a goddess of magic for millenia and then it all just stops. No deity to replace her, just a complete break without any explanation in the books as to how the people of the world dealt with her loss on both a religious and spiritual level, not to mention a magical level. There are so many questions to figure out, I need ideas! Any help on those levels would be great.
I think the hard thing for me is deciding whether or not to have a really immersive world or go with a more surface-level campaign. The last time I used the Realms, it was immersive such that it depended on more realistic elements like daily commerce and politics were a big deal for our roleplaying. My players loved immersion before, and I think that being older we'll need even more immersion. With Mystra being dead, I have to come up with some way to explain (and how to roleplay out) the common peoples' understanding of events. In an organic, realistic way.
Well, the potential for immersion is still there, you just have to do more of the creation yourself. (Though rest assured, there are many of us trying to fill in as much "official" lore as possible!)
There are so many questions to figure out, I need ideas! Any help on those levels would be great.
Well, how you want to do it should be a function of your campaign. But my understanding (not canonical) goes like this:
People of the Realms worshipped a goddess of magic for millenia and then it all just stops. No deity to replace her, just a complete break without any explanation in the books as to how the people of the world dealt with her loss on both a religious and spiritual level, not to mention a magical level.
How did her church dissolve, or did it?
Yes and no. Some people kept it alive, some people didn't.
There is canonical evidence of lorekeepers and sages who carry on the traditions of Mystra (see the novel Mistshore, for instance), but without an actual god to give them powers, clerics of Mystra wouldn't be actual spellcasting clerics. Then again, there may be all sorts of deities interested in impersonating Mystra to impressionable zealots (such as Cyric, Shar, Bane--any deity who doesn't have the respect and love for Mystra that the other deities did).
Some clerics left the church of Mystra and became clerics of other deities: Oghma, Kelemvor, Selune, Corellon (for the magic angle), and Mystra's other allies/peers make good choices. Some, embittered by their loss, might have gone over to Shar, and these might be some of the most dangerous antagonists your PCs will run across--archmages of Mystra, twisted by Shar's shadow? A thieves' guild based on gathering secrets and information, sworn to the lost goddess of magic?
There are also people who seek to revive Mystra. Whether these are eccentric wizards or cultists or an organized secret society looking for a new potential Midnight, it's up to you and your group. I personally think this would be a great plotpoint. What about an *undead* goddess of magic, less powerful than Mystra was (like a female Vecna)? Seriously. (Lots of options.)
Keep in mind that a century has passed since there was an official church of Mystra. Education is not terribly common in the Realms, so some people might not even recognize the name. But since followers and devotees of Mystra are the sorts of beings that live a long, long time, it's entirely possible to have former high-priests of Mystra running around making things all manner of crazy.
How do people view spellplague energy?
The FRCG and FRPG have guidelines on this, but generally speaking, people fear the spellplague and its powers. That said, spellplague-powered magic isn't necessarily easily distinguished from any other sort of magic, so spellplague practitioners may not necessarily intimidate people by the mere fact of their abilities.
How you treat it in your game is entirely up to you, but it's generally safe to assume that spellplague powers are unpopular and perceived as dangerous.
Cheers
Of course, there may not be a lot of clerics of Mystra left by now... (I know one, but she is an undead).
Gomez
with ideas like that Delta, you should write for wotc.....
And probably come up with better stuff than the drivel that wotc has spat out so far....
We are currently adventuring in 1479 DR and while I do let my PCs know that Spellplagued creatures exist and that it happened, I don't necessarily make it a major focus in my campaign. It's there, but not a main concern.
As a PC, I want to run an FR setting game and try out spellscars.
power at the cost of one's life isnt worth the tradeoff..... and thatm ind you is my initial idea at looking at the spellscars.
you can look at this way, in the end there can be only one, but it wont be your spellscarred dwarf that thinks he pwent from mythryl hall reincarnated
100 years in the future? The Spellplague?? What is all this?? This should tell you something about our Realms games.
It shows us you have yet to conform and thus must be assimilated!
Resistance is futile.
Well, the potential for immersion is still there, you just have to do more of the creation yourself. (Though rest assured, there are many of us trying to fill in as much "official" lore as possible!)
And I for one am happy about that. I love the fact that I can make changes and it doesn't heavily impact canon lore.
Some people kept it alive, some people didn't.
There is canonical evidence of lorekeepers and sages who carry on the traditions of Mystra (see the novel Mistshore, for instance), but without an actual god to give them powers, clerics of Mystra wouldn't be actual spellcasting clerics. Then again, there may be all sorts of deities interested in impersonating Mystra to impressionable zealots (such as Cyric, Shar, Bane--any deity who doesn't have the respect and love for Mystra that the other deities did).
Some clerics left the church of Mystra and became clerics of other deities: Oghma, Kelemvor, Selune, Corellon (for the magic angle), and Mystra's other allies/peers make good choices. Some, embittered by their loss, might have gone over to Shar, and these might be some of the most dangerous antagonists your PCs will run across--archmages of Mystra, twisted by Shar's shadow? A thieves' guild based on gathering secrets and information, sworn to the lost goddess of magic?
There are also people who seek to revive Mystra. Whether these are eccentric wizards or cultists or an organized secret society looking for a new potential Midnight, it's up to you and your group. I personally think this would be a great plotpoint. What about an *undead* goddess of magic, less powerful than Mystra was (like a female Vecna)? Seriously. (Lots of options.)
Keep in mind that a century has passed since there was an official church of Mystra. Education is not terribly common in the Realms, so some people might not even recognize the name. But since followers and devotees of Mystra are the sorts of beings that live a long, long time, it's entirely possible to have former high-priests of Mystra running around making things all manner of crazy.
The FRCG and FRPG have guidelines on this, but generally speaking, people fear the spellplague and its powers. That said, spellplague-powered magic isn't necessarily easily distinguished from any other sort of magic, so spellplague practitioners may not necessarily intimidate people by the mere fact of their abilities.
How you treat it in your game is entirely up to you, but it's generally safe to assume that spellplague powers are unpopular and perceived as dangerous.
Cheers
I still have clerics who attempt to worship Mystra in my campaign. They receive magical abilities (but they don't know that the Raven Queen has secretly attempted to take her mantle of Magic). It was a quick fix and a way for me to incorporate my Dweomerkeeper paragon path conversion.