Regarding the giant carving of Karzoug's face in Xin-Shalast

[ShadowFighter88]

I'm trying to remember but it's been too long, was that carving somehow connected the Oliphant of Jandaley or was it just a vanity project from a past Runelord of Greed?

If it was connected, then what happened to it after the Oliphant was let out during Return of the Runelords? And, if not, would Sorshen have demolished it after taking charge of Xin-Shalast?

Actually planning stuff for a 2e campaign and it'll have at least a few scenes in Karzoug's old tower as the party meet with Sorshen and the face will come up. If only from me using that old establishing shot of the city from Rise of the Runelords (the one on the city's page of the PF wiki) that has the carving prominently placed.

[ShadowFighter88]

Should've done this as an edit but forgot there's a time limit for edits on these boards. Basically I'm mostly wondering so I know whether the face is there, gone, or if there's a giant crater where it used to be and how Sorshen would explain the first and third possibilities if the players ask.

[The_Mothman]

So the face on the mountain was there long before Kaladurnae (the first Runelord of Greed) or any other Runelord actually discovered it. The original face on the mountain was that of the Great Old One Mhar from when he attempted to break through onto Golarion from, I want to say, Leng. When Kaladurnae discovered the face mountain he chose this location to be the site of Xin-Shalast and had the mountain sculpted to resemble himself. Since then, each subsequent Runelord of Greed has reformed it to resemble them, it currently looks like Karzoug.

I can't answer with 100% certainty what the canonical answer is to this question, or if it's even been brought up. However, I suspect that destroying the face runs the risk of opening a rift to Leng, which nobody wants, and Sorshen can't cast the transmutation spells she would need to rescuplt it so I wouldn't be surprised if the face is still there, at least until she can get enough powerful transmuters together to change it to something else.

But it's your campaign, so you're free to change the lore however you want. In my campaign one of my Rise players took charge of Xin-Shalast and changed the face to match their own.

[ShadowFighter88]

Ah, now I see where my confusion came from - it was tied to some extradimensional nightmare, just not the one I thought it was.

Since I can't think of a way for Sorshen to deal with a Great Old One (I don't care that she's a 20th level wizard with ten Mythic Ranks of archmage, a GOO takes a little more elbow grease than that :P ) I'll cover it with scaffolding and cloth and whatnot so she doesn't have to look at his ugly mug every day while searching for enough skilled mages to rework it.

Or, since this is gonna be for a 2e campaign which has since ditched spell schools, for her to expand her own magical knowledge into what used to be called transmutation in order to modify it herself somehow.

And saying that is just setting me up for the new post-Remaster Runelord archetype in February to still have banned schools, I just know it. :P