I'm not as versed on the Forgotten Realms as I could be, but my understanding is that there have been campaign/literature elements that were aimed at the edition changes, which would account for major rules updates, etc.
If I'm accurate, those would be:
1E to 2E Transitional RSE = Time of Troubles
2E to 3E Transitional RSE = ??
--3E to 3.5 - Anything here?
3E to 4E Transitional RSE = Spellplague
4E to 5E Transitional RSE = The Sundering
Anyone know what the 2E-3E event was?
There wasn't one, really.
Or to be more exact, there was nothing to explain the change in the rules. However, the "Return of Shade" was the big event marking the transition.
Righto, thanks!
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Cloak and Dagger details much about what happened then in the timeline. Basically, the Manshoon wars and the Sundering of the Harpers were pretty big events. Shade was the start of 3.0, really. Also a number of things were redesigned, such as the mercantile focus of the Red Wizards.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
While there was nothing official, there were several events taking place (as mentioned in the game supplement book "Cloak and Dagger" that Sissyl mentions) that you could consider as a major change.
I would also suggest looking at "Into the Dragon's Lair", which was the first third edition adventure book just after 3.0 was released. It was set in ravaged Cormyr after the death of King Azoun - who had been a Realms staple character for years. While it is based in 3.0, it serves as primer for how third relates to Forgotten Realms (for example - there's simple breakdown on how the best alter Torillian clerics to fit the new system and their gods). Moreso than later material, it's a very skeletal framework for 3rd edition material related to Forgotten Realms specialized rules.
For my campaign at the time, I also used the "Netheril, Empire of Magic" campaign material to make the switch. There were rules in the set for time travel - which they accessed temporarily - and basically had the characters accidentally alter the past enough so that when they returned to the present the 3.0 rules were in effect. It seemed a nice story concept that allowed my group to settle into the new rules set with less hand-waving. Adding the return of the Shade enclave also allowed us to expand the storyline further in the present.
Wait, do the Realms get Sundered yet again in the transition from 4e to 5e?!?
Wait, do the Realms get Sundered yet again in the transition from 4e to 5e?!?
Apparently so. From what I have heard, in 4th edition, Abeir got fused with Toril, and the Sundering (4th - 5th transition) splits them again. I could be wrong, as I really don't give a damn about the Forgotten Realms, so I will let someone more knowledgeable confirm or deny that.
The belief is that they will get sundered again. Thus far, almost no information has been given on it, even the Sundering book series really doesn't give you any information on that or what is happening from what I can tell.
I suppose I could say the changes that have occurred...but that would be big spoilers...
but nothing like a sundering or transitional realms shaking event of that scale that I've seen yet...
Spoil away - but maybe with a spoiler "button" to avoid complaints.
Just looking at the deities list in the 5e Players Handbook shows many of the dead (or otherwise changed) deities are back. We have Lathander again (not Amauntor), Mystra is back. As is Bhaal, Azuth, Mask, Helm, and Talos.
Basically, everything 4e changed about the gods is seemingly been undone somehow. So at the very least, something will need to happen to the Realms.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm glad to see them return.
I remember the deity culling that occurred going into 4e FR: stupid "honour duel" stories and the like (WHY would Tymora agree to be bartered off as a bride to a LG deity?!?), and many demotions to "powerful sorta-divine servants of another deity". For me, part of the charm of the Realms was the multitude of pantheons (like in the real world mythology) so I never felt much sympathy for those players who complained that it was "too complicated". Hence my lack of interest in 4e FR and lack of knowledge of 5e FR.
The 2e to 3e transition was partly handled by Die Vecna Die!, which was an all-setting-encompassing planescape adventure (a pretty bad one, too, sadly). Forgotten realms was rolled up into that.
Well... not exactly. DVD! was never released under the Planescape product line, and deviated pretty seriously from what Planescape was. You could just as well call it a Ravenloft scenario. Most likely, it was the module for the Generic AD&D line that updated from 2nd to 3rd. Also worth noting is that the proposed changes to the settings laid out in the appendix never happened whatsoever (though some were sort of awesome). It also didn't touch on Forgotten Realms, but rather Greyhawk.
It was released along with Warriors of Heaven and The Apocalypse Stone, IIRC, the latter of which was intended as a "campaign ender" for a generic setting.
As you say, Alzrius. I guess I was a bit unclear. What I meant was that TAS was meant to end homebrews and similar campaigns in style, while DVD! ended the general continuity of 2nd edition campaigns everywhere. Ah well, a good while back now. Still, I found all the things published at the tail end of 2nd except DVD! to be quite interesting.
Edit: I said that it deviated seriously, not specifically. It is not a matter of teleporting into Sigil, or gods entering it, or her speaking. It is about the presentation of the city, about the language used, and about how the Sigil sequence is too short in favour of the dungeon delving. It makes it feel like they could have used any bloody city.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Ahh yes, Bhaal is back along with Myrkul and much previously Bane.
I think its time to kill Cyric, he's pissed of damn near every deity in existence. Several of the gods he killed or was responsible for the demise of have returned to life. I imagine him running through the outer planes being pursued by a horde of angry deities to the tune of "Benny Hill Chase"
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Ahh yes, Bhaal is back along with Myrkul and much previously Bane.
I think its time to kill Cyric, he's pissed of damn near every deity in existence. Several of the gods he killed or was responsible for the demise of have returned to life. I imagine him running through the outer planes being pursued by a horde of angry deities to the tune of "Benny Hill Chase"
I always hated Cyric. Hated him. He was, in my opinion, the worst thing.
...
...
... which actually means, he's a pretty solid bad-guy all-round. Like, he's actually really good at getting good guys to hate him. Really good. And sure, yeah, his time was inherently limited because of it, but that's sort of the charm/beauty of the horrible disgusting little cretin.
It's kind of marvelous, like watching a self-aware train-wreck that's taking as many down with it as it can before it looses all momentum.
To be clear, I still don't like him and want him to die and go away forever, but by the same token, I have to acknowledge that he functions excellently as a foil for pretty much everyone.
Also, I don't think he's ticked Shar off yet (as he helped enact her scheme)? Other than that, though, yeah.
(Looking over my older deities list, outside of the gods that were dead, it looks like maybe Beshaba, Gargauth - does he still exist? - and Talona might not care. But I dunno - none of them are too likely to come to his aid... at all.)
Speaking of Shar, I'm not entirely sure why the gods continue to tolerate her existence.
Because she is the Night. Killing her is pretty much impossible.
Nope. She is the incarnation of the night. Kill her and a new one* will come back, but she is not "the night" any more than Kelemvor is death or Midnight/Mystra is Magic.
* By which I mean, a new "incarnation of the night", not "a new Shar" - those are important distinctions. Not all that has been lost has been recovered, and a dead entity is, in fact, dead.
^ That, uh, that came off as more... arrogant than intended. Heh. Mostly, I meant it as a funny rejection of the idea that the god is the thing they represent. That was, for quite some time, the default presumption/display in FR-lore, but that was proven untrue by Mystra (three times), Lathander, Leira, and the death three* (and probably Torm, or something, I dunno).
I mean, it was also proven true by Jergal waaaaayyyyy back when, when he simply... stopped being death.
Sure, it's a point that I would argue, and often use in my home games, but from established lore, it really doesn't seem like that's true.
Also, while Shar predates, like, everyone** (except Selune and Ao), in the end, she's been shown to be exceedingly fallible, and cost everyone just as much as Cyric did - moreso, because she put the idiot in a situation to ruin everything for everyone on purpose, and she didn't even get what she wanted out of it. After, like, millennia of planning.
That seems pretty much perfect for various gods to decide, "Yeah, she's gots ta go."
* Which, to be fair, are no longer dead, it seems.
** Although given how much we knew for "fact" about Mystra and Amaunator has proven entirely false, I'm less than convinced that this is accurate anymore.
((To be fair, and to fit in with what you were saying Syssil, in my home game, I make it a point that Shar is a fundamental aspect of physical reality, such that she cannot be truly undone - just like Selune, Chauntea, and Mystra***. Instead, when I had a player successfully assassinate her, that player became Shar. Not "oh, gee, I get the power of Shar!" but rather, she actually became the new Shar, complete with all the memories and a personality gestalt from the old Shar overlaid on her. Kind of like Dr. Who, I suppose, though I was mostly unaware of that show at the time. The player - a worshipper of a sun-goddess named Basha^, who was killed in the assassination attempt - then took her new-found divine power, and used it to crush everything associated with herself at the same time that she could - her divine realm (and the gods within it), her worshipers and their holy sites, and a couple of other evil gods and their divine realms, evidencing the most important title of Shar for that incarnation: the Lady of Loss. It cost her most of her divine power, and all of her former allies to do this, but, hey, she ruined enormous swaths of the abyss, an awful lot of Hell - and blamed it on the other one - and destroyed something like twelve evil gods and a ton of evil forces/powers/etc in Faerun at the same time. She was left without her family, friends, or anything else, but knew that such was the nature of Shar, the Lady of Loss. She retired to a life of slow rebuilding and darkness.^^^))
*** She still existed elsewhere, just... poorly... during the Spellplague.
^ Home-brewed result of our games; basically an avatar-daughter of Pelor shoved into FR through shenanigans, infected with shadow by Shar, who eventually became the <avatar/wife of an avatar> of Lathander, and the patron of Turmish^^. Yes, that is as weird and convoluted as it sounds.
^^ Such an awesome country in FR! She was known as the Dusk Goddess, and represented the setting sun, whereas Lathander was the rising sun, and Amaunator was the noon sun. Basically, the player, at the time, used the Threefold Sun heresy to her fullest advantage in establishing a worship-niche for herself. Fun game.
^^^ And then woke up from the nightmare created by a hag as part of a bargain she'd made previously. The players were all so mad at me. Sure, they were alive again, but they'd all died to end a huge number of the most major evil forces in Faerun and the great beyond all in a large, sweeping blow, and had found their sacrifices ultimately worth it, even as the new Shar resigned herself to bitterness and loneliness, forever shunned by the very light she'd once worshiped (the incarnation of which had been killed... by her actions, albeit on accident). They'd all started crying a bit, and then to have that pulled from them... weeeeelllll... let's just say we now have two campaign settings - one where that actually happened, and one where they woke up...
... given how much we knew for "fact" about Mystra and Amaunator has proven entirely false ...
Apparently I've missed some Realmslore here. To what are you referring?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
As you say, Shar predates EVERYONE. She is the background against which all other things appear. The light of the sun is the shield against Shar's ever-present malice and desire for annihilation. Within this tiny bubble of light, there can be all sorts of good things, but the void is still infinitely larger than the Light. So, even if other gods have died, they are still different entities than Shar. I would not see any problem with simply having her eternal and indestructible even if the others are not. Now, when you look at it, even if other gods have died in FR, it is hardly a permanent thing. Bane was reborn through Iyachtu Xvim, his own son. Myrkul left a variety of legacies, most notably the Crown of Horns, which is a sentient artifact. Bhaal left his Bhaalspawn (of questionable canonity), all possible ways to return. Leira too left several different resurrection routes, such as the metatext. Mystra, well, she was never really away, was she? Even after destroying herself as Mystryl, she lived on, notably as the goddess in charge of Time, including time travel. Death is such a mortal concept, and doesn't seem to apply much to the FR gods.
Apparently I've missed some Realmslore here. To what are you referring?
... given how much we knew for "fact" about Mystra and Amaunator has proven entirely false ...
1) Mystra is the weave and magic cannot exist without her (except it did in 4E, before they allowed Ed Greenwood to re-retcon that Mystra was totally there; still, the weave was unwoven and Mystra wasn't in charge of it
2) Amaunator was definitively, totally, and absolutely for realsies definitely dead, and his corpse was in the astral, and you could summon his vestige 'cause a god is, like, super-dead... (except in 4E, he was totally Lathander the whole time! ... although now that "Lathander" is back in 5E, I dunno.)
As you say, Shar predates EVERYONE. She is the background against which all other things appear. The light of the sun is the shield against Shar's ever-present malice and desire for annihilation. Within this tiny bubble of light, there can be all sorts of good things, but the void is still infinitely larger than the Light. So, even if other gods have died, they are still different entities than Shar. I would not see any problem with simply having her eternal and indestructible even if the others are not. Now, when you look at it, even if other gods have died in FR, it is hardly a permanent thing. Bane was reborn through Iyachtu Xvim, his own son. Myrkul left a variety of legacies, most notably the Crown of Horns, which is a sentient artifact. Bhaal left his Bhaalspawn (of questionable canonity), all possible ways to return. Leira too left several different resurrection routes, such as the metatext. Mystra, well, she was never really away, was she? Even after destroying herself as Mystryl, she lived on, notably as the goddess in charge of Time, including time travel. Death is such a mortal concept, and doesn't seem to apply much to the FR gods.
No. Shar does not predate EVERYONE (all-caps). She predates everyone except Ao and Selune. Ao is the first. Selune and Shar are coequal seconds. And Selune can very, very seriously be weakened to the point of near-irrelevance. This is a worthy goal for Shar.
It is absolutely canon-fact that Shar is not only surmountable, but kind of dumb. "Hey, I'll plan for millennia, weaving prophecy, plots, secrets, and manipulating even other gods to gain control of the weave-OOPS, I LOST EVEN MY OWN SPECIAL WEAVE, MY BAD! Oh, geez, sorry, all, I kind of messed things up, even for me. OOPS."
Another interesting thing about the divine "they get better" thing is... it's new as of 5E. In Realms Lore, it happened, like, twice, maybe? Bhaal's failed (by novel/game-canon), and Myrkhul's did as well (if I recall correctly, the crown eventually canonically being destroyed, and the spirit eater curse canonically being eradicated). Leira's resurrection was always "iffy" (as was her death, but, much like Amaunator's it was totally canon).
And the thing about Mystra: she's still dead. The first Mystra is still gone, as is Mystril before her. And none of the three Mystras (well, Mystril and two Mystras) have been like each other. At this point, Mystra is almost a title, like "Magister" or "Archmage" instead of an actual name.
And it's pretty clear in-canon that, while Mystra existed, she wasn't really a goddess anymore. Not really. She was more just a magic ghost possessing a bear and a few objects she'd bled on once.
But anyway, my point was simply this: kill off the current Shar would be beneficial for everyone. Just have a bunch of divine guiding hands for who the new Shar would be, maybe have, like, four very different candidates. It could even be a game, you know? "TWELVE GODS; SIX CHAMPIONS; ONE NEW SHAR!" Fun times.
Really? Because if she's as dumb as you say, and as she seems to be in many described situations, killing her to get a "new Shar" would mean dumping INSANE amounts of power on someone who would very probably be far more competent...
Really? Because if she's as dumb as you say, and as she seems to be in many described situations, killing her to get a "new Shar" would mean dumping INSANE amounts of power on someone who would very probably be far more competent...
More to the point, someone hand-picked by you. This is an important point that cannot be over-stated.
And being dumb does not mean she's harmless. It just means she also screws up a lot when she brings everyone down with her.
Competency isn't necessary to be... effective... as a deity in FR (or in many settings).
I actually don't think Cyric was all that bad to tell the truth, at least at first.
What wrecked him was making him insane and changing the character of Cyric to be utterly despisable. He's not a great foil, but a villain with no purpose (probably because they made him insane). He doesn't even promote his own agendas in a good or great fashion...normally outright failing his objective, or destroying what his objective is himself.
Which is why he's such a bad villain...IMO.
He had a decent start, it's just what they did with him that made him terrible.
Plus...he's part of the reason that many got that bad taste in their mouths for 4e realms...and a lot of the blame gets put on him.
|
I always hated Cyric. Hated him. He was, in my opinion, the worst thing.
As a god, yes. But in the first and second Time of Troubles novels, the writer was apparently not with the program, because he was written as more sympathetic, likable and a better friend to Midnight than that jerk Kelemvore ever was, and then, bang, his characterization just changed and he went batcrap crazy and evil-for-the-lulz, for, like, no reason at all.
And Kelemvore didn't change at all. He remained a colossal @$$hat, and yet, for some inexplicable reason, we were supposed to like him...
Very frustrating books. (Although they did make me love Torm!)
Cyric as 'keystone cop' / incompetent bumbler who would have beaten himself if the heroes just stayed home and blazed up a fatty (making heroes utterly irrelevant to the survival of the Realms) was pretty much a Realms standard, following in the footsteps of the totally inept Zhentarim. ("Ooh, we blew up our city again!") Also the hapless Cult of the Dragon. ("Ooh, we spent 750 years recruiting and empowering these dracoliches, and Spellfire-chickie just annihilated six of them in a three month period!")
It's hard to take the 'heroes' of the Realms seriously when their foes are such losers. Good (as in effective and scary, not moral or nice!) villains make for good heroes.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Heroes are kind of irrelevant to the survival of the Realms. Playing an FR campaign takes a bit of a MERP attitude, I think. Players, generally speaking, will stamp out the smaller fires while the cadre of Mary Sues wipe up the big stuff.
I love FR, mostly for the lore and whatnot, but I generally only run a game there if I am with players as into the setting as I am, and who kinda get that their story might not be THE story of the setting.
I have my homebrew with only a few ex-characters in NPC roles (and they're generally absorbed in their own stuff, running kingdoms and thieves' guilds and the like) for the players who want to really drive the setting and become the Biggest Heroes Ever[™].
You can do that with FR, and I've had fun in those games, but I guess I'm too much of a fan of the place to want to mess it up too much when I am running stuff in it.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
To be fair, it was Cyric who destroyed Zhentil Keep during his attempt to grab power.
It's unfortuntate that for at least part of the time (1e, 2e), the Powers That Be (at TSR) insisted that evil never win in FR. Hence evil deities were bumped off and replaced by either LN Kelemvore or insane/incompetent Cyric. Bane at least had the sense to go underground and wait for a change in the political climate (3e). :)
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Exactly. There was even a clear document about how evil never could be allowed to win/destroy innocents/destroy children/whatever. This was a product of 2nd edition sensibilities... but with 3rd edition, this changed. Scyllua Darkhope, the church of Bane, the Red Wizards, the Shades, and so on, the villains did get far more credible.
Now, what is really interesting: If you look carefully, reading through the 2nd edition books, it really isn't the classic picture you imagine, with heroes everywhere very successfully protecting everything and everyone. Instead, it's a few people trying their best to hold things together and keep it going for another week, all while the evil forces are pretty much everywhere. Yes, the Chosen of Mystra are powerful, but without their constant vigilance, even the areas they have chosen to protect would crumble under the onslaught. Much of the material is really interestingly written.