Herosmith14
First Post
To all players who do not want lore spoilers, this might not be an ideal thread.
So, I've been reading through the MToF lore, and there are plenty of places with inspiring, mysterious lore, like the lore on Zariel and Moloch and such, and others where that was less so. *cough*Dwarf and Shortfolk*cough*
Here I am going to discuss what you would do if you had to run a storyline using the lore from one of the most open ended sections of the book: the Gith.
I really like the Gith lore and the mystery to it. What happened to Gith? What exactly is Menyar-Ag? How are the Githyanki not suspicious of Vlaakith?
I find this leaves this really open to story crafting while still maintaining the framework for an epic story about a divided and deceived species.
Final disclaimer, I am leaving (mostly) mechanics out of this and focusing almost solely on story.
In my mind, the Gith conflict is a race war that is painted pretty clearly as black/white (or black/grey kinda) on the alignment spectrum. However things are never so simple.
Both factions have lost their original leader, while their second has preserved their life through various means(lichdom, astral plane, whatever Menyar-Ag is). Both factions are highly ordered and focused on war with each other, the illithids, and, for the Githyanki, miscellaneous.
Let's start there. To start, let me ask you; who declared the Githyanki's imperial destiny? Who guided them to the astral plane? Who pressured who to seek guidance with the queen of dragons? Who uses a hoax of 'ascension' to suck out the souls of her most powerful people and possible rivals? Vlaakith. Not Gith.
What I'm getting at her is, even though the MM lore, and possibly MToF, lore says that Gith was (or is) evil, there is very little evidence in her leadership of the Githyanki that supports that. Most all of the actions, all of the declarations that set them down the path of militaristic raiders, were conducted by Vlaakith, or Vlaakith's pressure. Gith herself, might have truly been the pure-hearted Washington of the Gith in their revolution against the Mind Flayers.
Then where is she? Well, it obviously seems that Tiamat had and possibly has an arrangement with Vlaakith to set her up as Githyanki Queen. Of course, Tiamat being a resident of the Hells, would be smart enough to have counter card if the lich-queen tries to screw her or stops fulfulling her end of the deal; Gith, alive and well except for spending the last couple eons of life imprisoned in the heart of the Dragon Mother's fortress.
Gith being her true alignment would also make sense in how the Githzerai and the rest of cosmology sees her and her people. After all, over as many generations as must have gone by, legends and history grows distorted and out of proportion. Gith had a greedy lich for a first lieutenant. It doesn't matter that Vlaakith may have puppeteered her removal and set her people on so dark a path, Gith trusted her, and there is no way that she couldn't see through the suspicious guise of someone so evil. This only adds fuel to the fire between the Githzerai and the Githyanki, the latter of whom reside in the astral plane, where they don't age, meaning many of them remember that time, and nostalgia tends to warp less than hundreds of decades retelling. The Githyanki see the Githzerai as hypocrits because of this, for they are blamed for Zerthimon's fate, even though they had very little hand in it.
Zerthimon, and his lieutenant Menyar-Ag, lived during the time of Gith. Zethimon was close to Gith, and understood the tremendous strain she was under to free her people. He tried to help her see Vlaakith's deception, but Gith trusted her with her life, as the lich was the one who first helped get her revolution off the ground. Zerthimon never flat out confronted Gith about her lieutenant, and besides, Vlaakith hadn't done andy of her obivously evil acts by that point.
Menyar-Ag, who was stubborn, determined, and second in his psionci mastery only to Zerthimon, even if it was by far, always saw this dicotamy from outside Gith and Zerthimon's friendship. He saw Vlaakith's evil, and pressured Zerthimon heavily to give up on Gith, and take their followers and confront Vlaakith and her puppet. Neither Gith nor Zerthimon wanted all out civil war, but when Zerthimon's hand was forced after Menyar-Ag initiated the conflict with a splinter group. In that final battle against the Githyanki, Zerthimon was holding his own, just barely. Seeing his lieutenant behind, him, he thought nothing of it, but Zerthimon still hadn't given up on Gith, and had risked many battles trying to mend the gap.
Menyar-Ag, who was the only other Githzerai left to help Zerthimon at that battle, saw this as weakness, and believed that soon Vlaakith would corrupt Zerthimon as well, and he could not let that happen, so he slew his friend and destroyed his body.
In the eons coming, Menyar-Ag took helm over his people, and led them to Limbo. He preached out Zerthimon's acts, partly out of guilt, and partly because then he could change the stories, try to lead his people down the "right path," which led through the destruction of Vlaakith and her regime at all costs, and so, the Githzerai kept their legend through lies told to them by their cherished leader. The undying leader also preached of Zerthimon's return, to give his people hope, though in secret, Menyar-Ag fears the event, and feels it is inevitable true, as he feels his master's energy growing. He has tried to stop it, to "protect his people," though, even if he cannot admit it to himself, it is to protect his power and his concsious more than anything.
Since that terrible time, many have attempted to divine the true fate of Gith and Zerthimon, and most have failed, and those who succeed find themselves transformed into babbling, maddened allips, doomed suffer under the knowledge of the two betrayals.
Basically, if I were to run an adventure using this, I would start by having the first quest be to deal with an Allip, which passes on fragments of its secret (either the betrayal of Menyar-Ag, or the location of Gith) to a character, who will be haunted by dreams and nightmares of the secret, as well as visions of a cloaked figure (Zerthimon, on the brink of return). Z would guiding them on their quest, and to freeing Gith, learning the truth, and dodging and oustind the two usurpers, and unifying the Gith at last, after so many eons of lies and violence.
So, what do you think, and what would you do for a Gith story line. I know I kinda lore dumped at the beginning, but a lot of my storylines involve "villains" who are secretly good and behind the scenes schemes and plots that have set up the adventure.
So, I've been reading through the MToF lore, and there are plenty of places with inspiring, mysterious lore, like the lore on Zariel and Moloch and such, and others where that was less so. *cough*Dwarf and Shortfolk*cough*
Here I am going to discuss what you would do if you had to run a storyline using the lore from one of the most open ended sections of the book: the Gith.
I really like the Gith lore and the mystery to it. What happened to Gith? What exactly is Menyar-Ag? How are the Githyanki not suspicious of Vlaakith?
I find this leaves this really open to story crafting while still maintaining the framework for an epic story about a divided and deceived species.
Final disclaimer, I am leaving (mostly) mechanics out of this and focusing almost solely on story.
In my mind, the Gith conflict is a race war that is painted pretty clearly as black/white (or black/grey kinda) on the alignment spectrum. However things are never so simple.
Both factions have lost their original leader, while their second has preserved their life through various means(lichdom, astral plane, whatever Menyar-Ag is). Both factions are highly ordered and focused on war with each other, the illithids, and, for the Githyanki, miscellaneous.
Let's start there. To start, let me ask you; who declared the Githyanki's imperial destiny? Who guided them to the astral plane? Who pressured who to seek guidance with the queen of dragons? Who uses a hoax of 'ascension' to suck out the souls of her most powerful people and possible rivals? Vlaakith. Not Gith.
What I'm getting at her is, even though the MM lore, and possibly MToF, lore says that Gith was (or is) evil, there is very little evidence in her leadership of the Githyanki that supports that. Most all of the actions, all of the declarations that set them down the path of militaristic raiders, were conducted by Vlaakith, or Vlaakith's pressure. Gith herself, might have truly been the pure-hearted Washington of the Gith in their revolution against the Mind Flayers.
Then where is she? Well, it obviously seems that Tiamat had and possibly has an arrangement with Vlaakith to set her up as Githyanki Queen. Of course, Tiamat being a resident of the Hells, would be smart enough to have counter card if the lich-queen tries to screw her or stops fulfulling her end of the deal; Gith, alive and well except for spending the last couple eons of life imprisoned in the heart of the Dragon Mother's fortress.
Gith being her true alignment would also make sense in how the Githzerai and the rest of cosmology sees her and her people. After all, over as many generations as must have gone by, legends and history grows distorted and out of proportion. Gith had a greedy lich for a first lieutenant. It doesn't matter that Vlaakith may have puppeteered her removal and set her people on so dark a path, Gith trusted her, and there is no way that she couldn't see through the suspicious guise of someone so evil. This only adds fuel to the fire between the Githzerai and the Githyanki, the latter of whom reside in the astral plane, where they don't age, meaning many of them remember that time, and nostalgia tends to warp less than hundreds of decades retelling. The Githyanki see the Githzerai as hypocrits because of this, for they are blamed for Zerthimon's fate, even though they had very little hand in it.
Zerthimon, and his lieutenant Menyar-Ag, lived during the time of Gith. Zethimon was close to Gith, and understood the tremendous strain she was under to free her people. He tried to help her see Vlaakith's deception, but Gith trusted her with her life, as the lich was the one who first helped get her revolution off the ground. Zerthimon never flat out confronted Gith about her lieutenant, and besides, Vlaakith hadn't done andy of her obivously evil acts by that point.
Menyar-Ag, who was stubborn, determined, and second in his psionci mastery only to Zerthimon, even if it was by far, always saw this dicotamy from outside Gith and Zerthimon's friendship. He saw Vlaakith's evil, and pressured Zerthimon heavily to give up on Gith, and take their followers and confront Vlaakith and her puppet. Neither Gith nor Zerthimon wanted all out civil war, but when Zerthimon's hand was forced after Menyar-Ag initiated the conflict with a splinter group. In that final battle against the Githyanki, Zerthimon was holding his own, just barely. Seeing his lieutenant behind, him, he thought nothing of it, but Zerthimon still hadn't given up on Gith, and had risked many battles trying to mend the gap.
Menyar-Ag, who was the only other Githzerai left to help Zerthimon at that battle, saw this as weakness, and believed that soon Vlaakith would corrupt Zerthimon as well, and he could not let that happen, so he slew his friend and destroyed his body.
In the eons coming, Menyar-Ag took helm over his people, and led them to Limbo. He preached out Zerthimon's acts, partly out of guilt, and partly because then he could change the stories, try to lead his people down the "right path," which led through the destruction of Vlaakith and her regime at all costs, and so, the Githzerai kept their legend through lies told to them by their cherished leader. The undying leader also preached of Zerthimon's return, to give his people hope, though in secret, Menyar-Ag fears the event, and feels it is inevitable true, as he feels his master's energy growing. He has tried to stop it, to "protect his people," though, even if he cannot admit it to himself, it is to protect his power and his concsious more than anything.
Since that terrible time, many have attempted to divine the true fate of Gith and Zerthimon, and most have failed, and those who succeed find themselves transformed into babbling, maddened allips, doomed suffer under the knowledge of the two betrayals.
Basically, if I were to run an adventure using this, I would start by having the first quest be to deal with an Allip, which passes on fragments of its secret (either the betrayal of Menyar-Ag, or the location of Gith) to a character, who will be haunted by dreams and nightmares of the secret, as well as visions of a cloaked figure (Zerthimon, on the brink of return). Z would guiding them on their quest, and to freeing Gith, learning the truth, and dodging and oustind the two usurpers, and unifying the Gith at last, after so many eons of lies and violence.
So, what do you think, and what would you do for a Gith story line. I know I kinda lore dumped at the beginning, but a lot of my storylines involve "villains" who are secretly good and behind the scenes schemes and plots that have set up the adventure.
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