writings of William Miller in Crypta Hereticarum?

If I wanted to seed some special writings of you-know-who into the Crypta Hereticarum, what would be appropriate to reveal to the players there?

It seems weird to me that the greatest heretic the Clergy has never known wouldn't have something show up in there. I know the Crypt was abandoned "shortly after the Great Malice", but it was operational long enough to have one of the swords of Srasama show up in there, so the timelines seem to match up.

I want to make sure William Miller stays on the party's radar, but I also don't want to tip my hand. It seems the only real dispensary for true Millerism (as opposed to Panoply-shtuff) is Capt Rutger Smith, which my party isn't really interested in talking to. Besides, they respond better to physical lore rather than random spoutings. I'm afraid Millerism is going to be a non-thing in my campaign.

So, what would be good to include? I'm thinking something about how he plans on transforming Pala into a great state, and how it would grow to include more and more people as time went on. But maybe there's something awesomer I could do there. I don't know if I want any bits of Millerism in the Crypt to have magical properties (like the Book of Lorem, for example), but I'm leaning away from it.

Then again, the original devs didn't have a hint of Millerism in the Crypt, and maybe they had a good reason for it.


Also, as an aside since I brought it up: where did the various swords of Srasama end up? One is in the Crypt (in Belcamp's stash), another is sitting in a bonfire outside Alais Primos in a memory facet, and another is being carried around by Asrabey (though its stats are a bit different format than the other two). It's implied that there's six of them total: where'd the other three go?

efreund said:

Then again, the original devs didn't have a hint of Millerism in the Crypt, and maybe they had a good reason for it.

Click to expand...

I think Clergy only puts very specific stuff in Crypt, the things that may be reborn if physically destroyed. There's nothing magical about physical books of William Miller, so there's no reason Clergy can't just burn them and be with it. In my head-canon every book there was originally enchanted/possessed, but most lost its power over the last 500 years.

efreund said:

Also, as an aside since I brought it up: where did the various swords of Srasama end up? One is in the Crypt (in Belcamp's stash), another is sitting in a bonfire outside Alais Primos in a memory facet, and another is being carried around by Asrabey (though its stats are a bit different format than the other two). It's implied that there's six of them total: where'd the other three go?

Click to expand...

I second this question

Hirou's got it. But if you want to have some Miller writings, you might even make them an item that the folks in the Blasphemous Artwork room want, in exchange for aid. They might be lost in one of the chambers the party otherwise wouldn't want to go into (like where the rust monsters are).

As for the content of the text, I'd put something in to highlight that early on Miller was more reasonable than he is as Nicodemus. Maybe the vault has his journal where he records the troubles of instilling in people the right culture of tolerance and inclusion. It was hard work, but without existing power structures to oppose him, he was able to gather many wise thinkers as well as simple idealists from the broader populace, and for half a generation the people of Pala focused on education and conflict resolution.

Show a bit of dark side too. He actually had to put on trial and ultimately execute an enchanter who was dominating trouble-makers. Using magic is of course dangerous in the Malice Lands, but more critical is that Miller believed people would choose the right course if they had proper understanding. Forcing people to 'be good' negates any value of morality; people might as well be rocks if they are unable to make their own choices.

Also include a mention of how he had a lot of success catering to former adherents of the Clergy who were disillusioned after they saw their system collapse. In times of chaos, people's instinct is to cling to the familiar, but if the familiar has failed their eyes may be open to other paths. You want to hint at his impatience for the slow pace of change, and lay the groundwork for an eventual contrast with the path he takes in the latter end of the campaign.



As for the swords of Srasama, I dunno. Sometimes matching sets are lost to history, and if I came up with an answer to everything, GMs would have less leeway.