D&D Beyond: Shadar-Kai

[epithet]

You mean, unless they reprint the hexblade and/or shadow sorcerer in a book that has the SK. Of course I admit that is ridiculous, everyone knows WotC never reprints anything

I wish they wouldn't. I find it annoying to have pages of a new 5e book devoted to re-printing, verbatim, already published material just to accommodate a stupid rule for the Adventurer's League.

I've decided in my campaign to make Shadar-Kai a discrete race of half-elves instead of the warped humans of 4e, but the new fluff for the Raven Queen doesn't work for me. I didn't ever play 4e, but the Raven Queen fluff from that edition was just too good for me to discard. I have a tragic (human) villain from an older campaign who tried to sacrifice an NPCs soul to gain the favor of Nerull, and who became trapped as his consort when that backfired. Renamed Nera and (Nerull thought) stripped of her mortal identity, she nevertheless came to claim his power, seal him in his fortress of black ice, and become the Raven Queen (goddess of death, fate, and winter.) Other than the call back to my old campaign, that's the 4e fluff for her, and it's (in my opinion) a much better story than some ancient elf wizard striving for apotheosis just because she didn't like either Corellon or Lolth.

I do like the recharacterization of Corellon, making him more like Loki. I am not crazy about the recharacterization of Lolth, I think she makes more sense as a demon who became a goddess rather than a goddess that became a demon.

All in all, I am really looking forward to Mordenkainen's Tome. Even if I only use about half the fluff, whatever I dismiss will help solidify my campaign cosmogony/theogony as I consider why I dismiss it. The crunch is, so far, looking like stuff I can and will use.

 

[gyor]

Dems da breaks of organized play.

The breaks of organized play that was designed to resolve issues of previous editions, issues not present in 5e.

 

[gyor]

I wish they wouldn't. I find it annoying to have pages of a new 5e book devoted to re-printing, verbatim, already published material just to accommodate a stupid rule for the Adventurer's League.

I've decided in my campaign to make Shadar-Kai a discrete race of half-elves instead of the warped humans of 4e, but the new fluff for the Raven Queen doesn't work for me. I didn't ever play 4e, but the Raven Queen fluff from that edition was just too good for me to discard. I have a tragic (human) villain from an older campaign who tried to sacrifice an NPCs soul to gain the favor of Nerull, and who became trapped as his consort when that backfired. Renamed Nera and (Nerull thought) stripped of her mortal identity, she nevertheless came to claim his power, seal him in his fortress of black ice, and become the Raven Queen (goddess of death, fate, and winter.) Other than the call back to my old campaign, that's the 4e fluff for her, and it's (in my opinion) a much better story than some ancient elf wizard striving for apotheosis just because she didn't like either Corellon or Lolth.

I do like the recharacterization of Corellon, making him more like Loki. I am not crazy about the recharacterization of Lolth, I think she makes more sense as a demon who became a goddess rather than a goddess that became a demon.

All in all, I am really looking forward to Mordenkainen's Tome. Even if I only use about half the fluff, whatever I dismiss will help solidify my campaign cosmogony/theogony as I consider why I dismiss it. The crunch is, so far, looking like stuff I can and will use.

That's not a recharacterization of Lloth, it goes waaaayyy back.

Lloth used to be Corellons SO, although her name wasn't Lloth then, but she betrayed Corellon big time and had her divinity stripped from her and was turned into a demon.

Her daughter who was still good, but manipulated into serving helping Lloth and her son who more willingly helped her (and hated her afterwards for what it cost him) we're also exiled from Arvandar, but we're allowed to keep their divinity and not turned into fiends. During this period one of Corellon's Solar's was also implicated and turned into a archdevil and cast into Hell.

It was only after she conquered a layer of the Abyss and had grown bored, that she worked to regain her Godhood and succeeded, big time, and became the head of the Drow Pantheon that included her son, daughter, her grandson (who she corrupted by tricking him into killing and absorbing the essence of a demon lord), as well as a creepy God of slime and aberrations, and a Drow Goddess of Necromany, and a Drow Goddess of Assassins (who Lloth killed and absorbed into herself, but whose cult was maintained separately).

 

[epithet]

That's not a recharacterization of Lloth, it goes waaaayyy back.

...

Funny, I was certain she started as a demon and took on the Araushnee identity when she seduced Corellon. That might be waaaay back enough that my headcanon has become indistinguishable from the original treatment.

 

[gyor]

Funny, I was certain she started as a demon and took on the Araushnee identity when she seduced Corellon. That might be waaaay back enough that my headcanon has become indistinguishable from the original treatment.

Yeah she didn't start off as a demon, in fact she was good.

 

[gyor]

Funny, I was certain she started as a demon and took on the Araushnee identity when she seduced Corellon. That might be waaaay back enough that my headcanon has become indistinguishable from the original treatment.

Yeah she didn't start off as a demon, in fact she was good at first, it was betraying Corellon that turned her evil.

 

[gyor]

Funny, I was certain she started as a demon and took on the Araushnee identity when she seduced Corellon. That might be waaaay back enough that my headcanon has become indistinguishable from the original treatment.

Yeah she didn't start off as a demon, in fact she was good at first, it was betraying Corellon that turned her evil.

 

[gyor]

Funny, I was certain she started as a demon and took on the Araushnee identity when she seduced Corellon. That might be waaaay back enough that my headcanon has become indistinguishable from the original treatment.

Yeah she didn't start off as a demon, in fact she was good at first, it was betraying Corellon that turned her evil.

 

[Azzy]

That's not a recharacterization of Lloth, it goes waaaayyy back.

By "waaaayyy back", you mean 1998.

Lloth used to be Corellons SO, although her name wasn't Lloth then, but she betrayed Corellon big time and had her divinity stripped from her and was turned into a demon.

This is a Forgotten Realms thing that originates (as far as I can tell) in the 1998's Forgotten Realms supplement Demihuman Deities. This story is not present in earlier FR material (like the 1991 Drow of the Underdark), or non-setting-specific books (like Monster Mythology, or The Complete Book of Elves, both from 1992), and certainly not in earlier materials.

 

[Parmandur]

By "waaaayyy back", you mean 1998.



This is a Forgotten Realms thing that originates (as far as I can tell) in the 1998's Forgotten Realms supplement Demihuman Deities. This story is not present in earlier FR material (like the 1991 Drow of the Underdark), or non-setting-specific books (like Monster Mythology, or The Complete Book of Elves, both from 1992), and certainly not in earlier materials.

20 years is pretty way back; at any rate, 5E isn't introducing the fallen Lloth idea, though I like the direction they are taking the material.