Adivion Adrissant

[baron arem heshvaun]

Arise! Arise!

[DorianAdricus]

My version of Adivion, inspired by many of the great ideas in this forum (and a bit of an accident at the table)... As my campaign is just getting off the ground, I welcome any feedback.

Adivion Adrissant, the Fallen Hero

Born to minor, wealthy nobility in the county Caliphas, Adivion was always a precocious child. Brilliant by any measure of such things, he was a born polymath, flitting from the study of the natural sciences, to mathematics, to more esoteric lore, the young lord Adrissant was, unfortunately, a bit cursed. His natural abilities led him to almost organically begin to see himself as beyond the people he was surrounded with. His parents were loving, if distant. His tutors were diligent, and some even felt honored to work with him, but to him, they were... shadows. He could outhink them, outwit them, and see through their motivations. His entire life he felt as if he was the only truly real person, walking in a garden of images, with no more depth than a ray of sunlight.

When Petros Lorrimor came into his life, as his teacher at the University of Lepidstadt, it was a revelation. Here was a man who challenged him. He sought out the older man, made it a point to BE challenged by him. The two men became friends, as mentor and mentee. For Lorrimor's part, he saw in the young Adrissant a more than worthy mind, but was always troubled by what he saw as a certain... coldness. A disconnection to the greater whole of humanity. Lorrimor made it a point to try and be the anchor, the conscience of this young man. And it worked... for a time.

Together, Lorrimor and Adrissant, along with others, soon took up with the Palatine Eye, most especially in their work against the Whispering Way. It was a shadow game being played in full view of the nation, and Adrissant excelled. He reveled in being able to exercise his abilities against a coven of near immortals. The problem came when he, in his endlessly iterating series of probabalistic projections, came to an inevitable conclusion. That no matter how well they played the game, no matter how many pieces they removed from the board... the Whispering Way would win. In the end, entropy would take hold, the Palatine Order would succumb to its already burdensome secrecy and circumstance, and the Way would win. Adivion saw only one way out. The Palatine Order and the Way must... merge. The Palatine Order could give the Way leadership and direction, take control of it for the betterment of all. It was inevitable that Tar-Baphon would be unchained... sometime... and so it must be that if he would be released, let the Order do it, now, and under their command.

He knew that the leadership of the Palatine Order would rebel at this notion, even his good friend Lorrimor would be horrified, but he felt he must try. He owed his friend that. Thus began the fight that would break their bond and drive Adivion away from his friend and mentor. Adivion was not so foolish as to reveal his plans all at once, but he began testing the waters in debates and conversations, and eventually it was enough to poison the well. Lorrimor rejected him. Now knowing that if his good friend wouldn't listen, what hope was there for the rest, he opted instead to begin working on the Whispering Way. No enemy of the Way was better versed in their tactics and their knowledge than Adivion, so it was an easy matter to in turn infiltrate them, to make his way swiftly through their ranks.

As the years went by, and his double life grew more difficult to manage, he made another fateful decision. He created a simulacrum of himself and carefully manicured its memories and knowledge. False Adivion would continue, living his life, teaching at the Quarterfaux Archives as a Curate Professor of Ethics and Logic, and Adivion Prime would continue, rising through the ranks of the very organization he was sworn to destroy with the misguided notion that he could, he WOULD, control it.

Lorrimor's death was an accident. He was not even supposed to BE in Ravengro at the time. Adivion Prime himself met with the Professor in a bid to win the old man back, repair their relationship, and keep him away from Harrowstone long enough for that brute Vrood to be in and out with the required soul. But the Professor was a stubborn old man, and too curious for his own good. And so, he was were he was not supposed to be, and died for it.

The funeral was attended by Adivion... but not Adivion. The simulacrum that thinks of itself as Adivion was righteously indignant and furious at the death of his beloved mentor, even though they hadn't spoken in 7 years. He was even more confused and frustrated when the player characters pointed out that the professor's own journal indicated that they had spoken together not three months ago?! Absurd. There must be someone out there so conducting so convincing a performance that it would fool the old man. And so, this is where we are. Two Adivions exist, one, the prime, now risen to the top of the order he's sworn to destroy and another, the false man, determined to find out who in the Way would be so foolish as to strike at him. The two are now destined to collide, but unfortunately for the false man, as well intentioned as he may be, he is just ice and snow after all...

[Timeadol]

I may have made a mistake when combining the idea of having AA sending letters to the PCs (see "Letters from the main villain") and also introducing him to them in person.

After concluding THoH the PCs received a letter signed with "A" congratulating them on their success and also mentioning regret about Petros Lorrimor's death.
Thinking that this was not enough I also decided to have the PCs meet AA in person during TotB. They met him talking to Judge Deramid after the second day of the trial and were introduced to him. When he learned that they were the people he had sent the letter to he got intrigued which they noticed. They also learned that he was one of the professor's students.
One of the PCs got suspicious and suspects that Adivion Adrissant could be "A". However, I don't know yet if she wants to further investigate. While I don't want to stop her from doing so I also don't want to reveal too much just yet.

I just hope that the names "Alpon Caromarc" and "Auren Vrood" will avert her suspicion.

[Sunderstone]

Timeadol wrote:

I just hope that the names "Alpon Caromarc" and "Auren Vrood" will avert her suspicion.

I'd suggest building up Auren Vrood as the BBEG, maybe let them find a witness that stumbled upon the WW and hid. If they confront AA, he can describe seeing the same person (don't think he would care about the attention going to his lackey) previously on his way to the professor's funeral back then.

In my outline of CC:

I had the Professor, Alpon Caromarc, Adivion Adrissant, Horace Croon, and Abraun Chalest as a retired adventuring band of Archaologists that explored/plundered Osirion's ancient ruins back in their day. Alpon, a former Pharasmin Cleric, went bat guano crazy (and was shunned since) over his experiments to prolong life and is a shut-in at schloss caromarc, Horace became a tad eccentric over the years and threw himself into his inventions, etc.

Anyone of them could vouch for Adivion, not knowing anything beyond him being a genius and a driven man when he set his sights on something.

[Grankless]

A good way to present Vrood as the "obvious" A is to have him show up at Vorkstag & Grine's (preferably as an illusion of some sort) - I made them WW agents, and had him show up to ostensibly take out the alchemists for f&+@ing up bad enough for their stuff to get noticed. I had him monologue at the players from the balcony at the front door while they were down in the vat chamber, then just leave/turn invisible.

Fortunately, they also already knew what he looked like/who he was since they started with an Occultist in the party, who object read a letter from A... which, me knowing they had one, I decided ol' Adivion had dictated the letter to Vrood, knowing the party's capabilities already (advantages of introducing him in Ravengro!)

[Lacdannan]

Drakli wrote:

Brandon Hodge wrote:

Drakli wrote:

Speaking on the matter of Broken Moon...

** spoiler omitted **

The specifics of your campaign brought a couple if things to mind that you could consider working in. Don't overdo it, of course, but I thought of the following connections:

** spoiler omitted **

I know it's a long time to wait for a reply to a reply, but I just wanted to let you know your ideas on the General and (more immediately,) the vampire countess/diplomat in Shadows of Gallowspire have struck fertile ground. Most importantly, the Countess Natisha Pavalanis serves as a handy reservation writer for Vrood and his lackeys so I can allow Adrissant to appear in Broken Moon without the players finding his name in the journal and going, "Oh man, we gotta kill him!" ahead of schedule.

However, I decided to present her in a different way... one that demonstrates her usefulness to the Whispering Way without making the players feel like betrayed doofuses, should they choose to parley and work with the vampires of Caliphas (who I'm planning on keeping very Anti-Whispering Way.)

==== Below is my version of Countess Natisha Pavalanis ====
** spoiler omitted **...

How about 11 years for a delay in a reply? My thought is to utilize the above with the slight alteration of changing the name of the Vampire Countess to Countess Atisha Avalanis. Cheeky, I know, but then gives the party another suspect of who might be author of the "A" letters for a period of time.

[Keethor]

Here are my plans, I am making more changes since my players will be Lorrimor's Kids. Kendra will be positioned as a distant cousin who stayed with the family periodically. When The professor pushed away his children she stayed with him....

Spoiler:

Adivion Adrissant and Lorrimor were business partners. Adrisant admired Lorrimor, he studied under him for a time at university. After Adrisant graduated he approached the professor to help fund his research expeditions independently. Other organizations tend to have more political motivations, and working with larger organizations there would be restrictions on that research.

In fact Adivion who felt that only he could control the inevitable return of Tar Baphon. While he knew that his ideas would not be supported he created an alter-ego and psychically compartmentalized his mind into a new alter-ego in Whispering way circles he became only known as the "Archimandrite"

As the Archimandrite he was able to form a following within the whispering way. Even eventually brought The Lorrimor kids childhood friend Auren Vrood into the fold to oversee his requests in Ravengro and to Ensure the their asset Kendra is keeping the professor from meddling with their plans. Adrisant has had false memories of Kendra imprinted with Petros and even with most of Petros Lorrimors kids (couldn't track down the youngest one but no one will believe them anyway.)

Petros death was a reluctant mistake which has escalated their plans. I was thinking about altering the campaign traits but from feedback, I have received I'll keep those the same except the payroll one is someone who worked for the company that Adivion and Petros started.