Beholders & Illithids and their "thralls"; how does that work out?

[Calico_Jack73]

The 2e Illithiad book has some details on how slaves become "thralls".

(And that's where the references in Underdark came from.)

Yep... The Illithiad was a great book! All fluff with just a little bit of game mechanics thrown in.

According to The Illithiad, Flayers don't need to eat brains all that often but they do find pleasure in it. SO... being the enterprising villains that they are they construct huge ampitheaters for "Performance Eating". The Performance Eater is an Illithid who is reknowned for his ability to enjoy eating brains to the very utmost. They bring in a victim and the Performance Eater forms a telepathic link with all of the Illithids in the amptheater so the can all experience his pleasures and sensations while he is eating the victims brain. Sometimes, he'll also create a link with the victim so the victim senses the anticipation of the feeding, the pleasure and taste of feeding on his own brain (until he dies of course).

If this were a 3E book it'd have a "Mature Reader" sticker on it.

You can get it from RPG Now at:
http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=1487

 

[Cerubus Dark]

It cares for you, and likes you; it told you, and your best friend would never lie to you, would he? He tells you you're a worthless slave, so of course that's what you must be. He only beats you or drills holes in your head when you anger him. If you tried harder, if only you were not such a useless sack of dung, he wouldn't have to hurt you. Indeed, you are the one making him hurt you! It's your fault, you filthy useless thing. How dare you? You should be good. If you cared, you would be good. And we all want to be good, don't we? Of course we do.

Dang that was good to read, now I have an idea for using some of these creepies.

 

[frankthedm]

I treat it as a form of insanity that comes from being continually charmed. Kind of like stockholm [orc-home] syndrome backed up with magic. Kicks in after being continally charmed for extended periods of time. Player characters are immune to this just as they are immune to falling in love unless they choose otherwise.

It cares for you, and likes you; it told you, and your best friend would never lie to you, would he? He tells you you're a worthless slave, so of course that's what you must be. He only beats you or drills holes in your head when you anger him. If you tried harder, if only you were not such a useless sack of dung, he wouldn't have to hurt you. Indeed, you are the one making him hurt you! It's your fault, you filthy useless thing. How dare you? You should be good. If you cared, you would be good. And we all want to be good, don't we? Of course we do.

Oh yeah, it is like that.

 

[pawsplay]

Although that may well all be true Wayne, I would think that these alien abberations, namely the mind flayer, would be quite distant and too dispassionate to be involved in what I would call an "intimate relationship" (remember sadism is intimacy on a different tangent). If someone is to be involved in a master and slave relationship that you describe he would have to invest quite some time and energy just to properly bring a creature in line as a thrall. And I imagine there are many more thralls than Illithids in any given mind flayer community (barring the influence of an elder brain). Bottom line: I just don't see the super genius "superior than thou" alien-like creatures stooping to even bother doing such a thing for every single slave....Maybe just the special high level ones.

Have you ever wondered what rats think of their insane, incomprehensible masters who make them run mazes?

 

[Sejs]

Although that may well all be true Wayne, I would think that these alien abberations, namely the mind flayer, would be quite distant and too dispassionate to be involved in what I would call an "intimate relationship" (remember sadism is intimacy on a different tangent). If someone is to be involved in a master and slave relationship that you describe he would have to invest quite some time and energy just to properly bring a creature in line as a thrall. And I imagine there are many more thralls than Illithids in any given mind flayer community (barring the influence of an elder brain). Bottom line: I just don't see the super genius "superior than thou" alien-like creatures stooping to even bother doing such a thing for every single slave....Maybe just the special high level ones.

They can detect your thoughts at will and are staggeringly intelligent. Make no mistake, there is no intimate relationship. In no way do they care even in the slightest about the false relationship they're nurturing with their thrall.

But they -do- know what the thrall needs to hear and feel in order for it to bend, and then break, and then serve. So they lie.

They are alien, and dispassionate, and superior. Distant and domineering. Just because they know what the tool requires in order for it to function doesn't reduce that even slightly.

As for the issue of induction, there are probably illithids whose job that is, to batch-process servants when they're first brought in. Starve them into submission then turn on the juice when they're weak, one by one, right down the line. And that's not even getting into the issue of thralls they breed themselves. Easiest solution, really. Crossbreed your already broken slaves and raise the offspring in an environment where unswerving loyalty comes factory standard.