
Failed Saving Throw |

Geez, do you guys read at all? The incest overtones were obvious and I plan to play them up as the PCs unravel more of the truth about Vanthus. It makes him more despicable, but it also makes things a bit more complicated, morally. I may even have it that Vanthus has always been in love with his sister but tormented by it, warping his soul.

Christopher Carrig |

DMFTodd wrote:>> I wrote a lot more detailed journal for them to discover with a lot more sordid details
Don't suppose you could make that available for us? Maybe on RPGenius or by email: todd@paladinpgm.com
Sure it is not really sick or anything (most of the gamers have families, including myself) but shows Vanthus as he becomes increasingly more unstable. I will e-mail it to you shortly.
Fee free to let me know if anyone else would like a copy.
My players read everything they find and the more detailed the backstory, the better. I'd love a copy. charlatans.web@gmail.com

Peruhain of Brithondy |

OK--I didn't quite get the bit about the prank with the love potion the first time through (guess I'm not completely corrupted), but it was pretty obvious by the time we got to Divided's Ire. It's an adult topic, but we dealt with it in my freshman (Catholic high school) religion class--about halfway through genesis, in the story of Lot and his daughters. The OT has just about any "mature" theme you care to explore. And it should be noted that different cultures have different ideas about what constitutes incest, although I'm not aware of any that condone sex between siblings who share the same parents.
In the 1960s there was a famous anthropologist who explored the question of whether the human aversion to incest of the latter sort is part of human nature or culturally determined. He did this by examining a sort of marriage practiced in parts of China where families adopt young girls as "little daughters-in-law" and raise them alongside the boys they will be marrying. (I don't think this practice is legal now on either Taiwan or the mainland, but it was not uncommon on Taiwan before the 1960s). The anthropologist compared the birth-rates produced by these marriages to those of "normal" marriages, and also looked at reported marital satisfaction, and concluded based on lower birth rates and a higher rate of serious marital discord that humans generally have an inherent aversion to brother-sister incest. The idea being that being raised together as siblings created the psychological effect of them regarding each other as such, and therefore severely dampening the kind of sexual attraction that makes marriage relationships work. ("Little daughter-in-law" marriages only work, of course in a society where parents have authority to arrange marriages for their children and where the married couple continues to live with the man's parents until they die. The chief advantage of this kind of marriage was for the mother-in-law--it's much easier to boss around a daughter-in-law that you've raised as your own daughter than to break in a daughter-in-law raised by someone else, whose natural loyalties are to her own parents).
But there are lots of marriage practices that we consider weird and icky in Anglo-American culture that are (or once were) common elsewhere. Levirate marriage, where you are supposed to marry your sister-in-law if your brother in law dies, for example. (See the biblical story of Judah and Tamar in Genesis for a particularly twisted example of how that might work out). Cross-cousin marriage was quite common both among European aristocrats and in various East Asian societies--a "kissing cousin" in China or Korea was any cousin who didn't share your last name, even first cousins. Families might swap brides back and forth for generations--without a knowledge of genetics, they didn't necessarily have a concept of inbreeding (and recent explorations of this topic in the world of science are not so negative about it as all that--it's more important to know what genetic diseases you might be passing on with recessive genes from both sides than to avoid marriage to a close cousin, from a health of offspring point of view).
OK--I guess that's a digression from the topic at hand. I can't think of any literary examples of brother-sister incest except

Smarnil le couard |

Nice piece of erudition, Peruhain...
Indeed, it was customary to marry between cousins in the european aristocracy, both to avoid dilution of "blue blood" and dilution of property (by keeping the inheritance within the immediate family).
This said, I had not caught the reference to the "potion of love prank" neither. Pure me.
Terok, would you be so kind to send me your work at 'smarnil at club-internet.fr', please ?
It will make a very enjoyable reading, and will be very welcome on the future day when I will submit my players to the evils of the Savage Tide !

Tatterdemalion |

I can't think of any literary examples of brother-sister incest except...
Kullervo, from Finnish Mythology; he was the primary inspiration for your example. He also shares a great many similarities with Elric of Melniboné.
Interestingly, Finnish mythology was also an inspiration for Mordenkainen, one of Gygax's PCs and arguably D&D's most iconic wizard (the Finnish character is Lemminkainen).
Just thought this was interesting :)

TwilightKing |
1 person marked this as a favorite. |

I thought the love potion prank as described in the first episode was multiple love potions poured into a water reservoir. That story seemed to mutate as the AP progressed.
I thought it was just a prank. But knowing what we know of Vanthus now, it is entirely possible that this 'prank' was actually an attempt uh, 'seduce' Lavinia. She probably does see it as no more than a childish prank.
But Vanthus's little plan backfired when they got caught and separated. No wonder he sank into further depravity in his exile. The object of his lust was now completely and utterly unattainable. Until a certain Demon's involvement, that is.

MrFish |

I didn't really get it until Divided's Ire either--I had thought it was a little odd but to be honest my first read through of an adventure series is usually about practicalities--are my pcs going to enjoy the general atmosphere and story and stuff? How much will I have to modify? Do I have the rulebooks to cover monster references? Etc. Once I had all the magazines for the AP then I began reading through it again more for a clear sense of the fluff and drama and then it hit me...

savagedave22 |

Terok the Sly wrote:I jumped on the incest wagon with my players.Bet that was a fun trip...
My girlfriend saw me reading this thread, and asked me what you were all banging on about now (no, she's not a gamer...); I told her, and showed her the pictures of Lavinia (Mm, Hmm!) and Vanthus, and she went "Phwoarr! I'd totally do him...!".
I showed her the other picture, "And later, he turns into that...", and she was even more aroused! Hell's Belles!
I myself picked up on the incest thing since "There Is No Honor". Actually before Savage Tide ever even came out I was working on my own idea for an adventure with Demogorgon as the main bad guy. And oddly enough It Involved these two evil,twisted,creepy siblings a brother and sister"Vangyss" and Vascha" who could trace their bloodline back to Demogorgon. They were shipwrecked on an "Isle of Dread" type Island when they were young along with their father who knew their dreaded secret. The children lived but the father died. The children were raised by demons disguised in human form, and were trained to fight cast spells and be as wicked as they could. Well these siblings had a thing for each other produced a child, an albino son. well a ship made It's way to the Isle one day from some far off mainland led by one Lord Angus Gryffonshield, 30 men arrived but only a handful would make It back. They encountered the siblings a horrible battle ensued and they managed to overpower and kill the twisted brother and sister. They tried to leave shortly after that but not after noticing a child all alone In It's crib. Lord Angus took the child and would raise him as his own. His own son Krystoff who accompanied his father on the journey grew very Ill on the beach before reaching the ship. He was transformed Into an Anomorphous Baboon(Mandrill). Lord Angus was heartbroken with grief as his own son had been afflicted with such a curse, they left went home but krystoff was locked away like an animal, while his adopted son enjoyed the benefits of being Lord Angus's new favorite son. The boy Ian grew up to be very tall strong,Intelligent and heroic, eventually he gains paladinhood and all Is good...NOT! people that he's known all his life family ,friends.loved ones are not whom he thought they were these different people unlock through betrayel,lust and murder the demonic legacy trapped Inside. (Think the fall of Anakin Skywalker). He becomes a blackguard first then his fiendish side comes out as well, he Is slain In battle only to rise as a badass Death Knight. Meanwhile In the beginning of my adventure the PC's come across Krystoff, who comes across as a drunk,sarcastic overgrown monkey. But earns their trust only later on to hear the call of Demogorgon with promises of power and a place to fit In and betrays the PC's and Is awarded with a lemorian template and then later on death knight. Didn't mean to ramble but that's weird the coincidences I had down before the STAP came out minus the Lemorian template that was added later on. My point In picking your post was how your girlfriend liked Vanthus as a Lemorian, I was kinda hoping to see Lavinia as a sexy little Lemorian lust bunny that would have been HOT!
DAve
MrFish |

savagedave22 that's a good rather mythic feeling plotline; it must have been an interesting game.
For me it wasn't so much the topic of incest that was disturbing but rather Vanthus' approach to it and his violent passion about it. It really isn't until Tides of Dread that you have a clear idea of how he wants to go about it--I mean having his own sister as a slave and all.

Hired Sword |

Journal sent!
I am resurrecting this thread to provide an update and because I think its may be a nice enhancement to campaigns that follow.
My group just finished Tides of Dread and I was able to present them with my edited version of Terok's journal (I added some detail that integrated my campaign's details and inserted the official journal content from the Lightless Depths). All our combined efforts elicited the proper amount of revulsion I am happy to say. So much so that the Teifling rogue suggested they keep the Journal from Lavinia to spare her its vile contents. I even made a dramatic change to the font to emphasize the change in his 'demeanor'.
Thanks again for the great idea and the great work!
Cheers!