Challenging my high-lvl group (NPCs and monsters; my players shouldn't read this!)

[The_Warlock]

It's Carceri. Or at least that's what Piratecat told us at one point. You know, plane of Lawful Evil? Although, that does beg the question of why none of them ever learned how to Plane Shift to somewhere more interesting...

Ah, I must have missed or forgotten about that at some point...because there's a deucedly interesting visual...the pearl like "worlds" of carceri strung through their own infinity...and either the worms eating an endless buffet of doomed prisoner proto-worlds and never getting sustenance, but tied inexorably to the plane and unable to flee because they are literally "full of it", or a point in the depths of Othrys (is that the "deepest" layer with the tiny frozen worlds with the greatest gaps between them??) where the next "world" is the deepest prison of Spira...and is nothing but the tangled ball of dead/undead/still writhing Great Worms. (That's not moon, it's a Worm Station!)

 

[Steverooo]

Yes, posting again, I'm at work and got bored. Just went back and re-read the seer's actual words that you posted in the SH:
http://www.enworld.org/showpost.php?p=259124&postcount=218
Specifically, this paragraph:

"But the First God Abbath called to him his love Aedrae and her clever friend Trea, and showed them the world, and showed them the worms and the mumbling dead. It was Trea the clever, Trea the Deceiver, who thought of the plan. It was she who tricked the worms, and convinced them to trust her, and soon all but two were locked in a red prison where they would never escape. The Gods set the lock in stone and breathed life into the key. And they looked upon the worm-riddled world, and Abbath breathed upon it. He fathered a child with his wife, and called him Aeos, and lifted the incandescent child into the heavens. There, the Godling ignited the endless night and brought the sun to a world that knew only darkness, and he forged chains of light to bind the last two worms within the earth. The dead were burned from the pitted world, and the globe was made anew."

Okay, the elf might not have been perfect. He DID say that Aeos was the one who locked the last two worms down, after all, and you're saying that it was heroes who did it (or maybe they did all the dangerous work, but needed him to finish the job by putting a lock on the door?).

Nope, read it, again: "...and he forged chains of light to bind the last two worms within the earth." He forged the chains. No mention of him using them, nor binding the worms... Insert Heroes, here.

 

[Steverooo]

The big problem with this idea is that it'd mean he was effectively dead well before any living beings were there to make him the "God of Explorers", and he DID give birth to Quenntil and Celian before dying.

That is not dead, which can eternal lie,
And with Strange Aeons, even Death may die!

 

[Steverooo]

Steve-a-Ryu Interprets Ancient Prophecy:

"...But the First God Abbath called to him his love Aedrae and her clever friend Trea, and showed them the world, and showed them the worms and the mumbling dead. It was Trea the clever, Trea the Deceiver, who thought of the plan. It was she who tricked the worms, and convinced them to trust her, and soon all but two were locked in a red prison where they would never escape. The Gods set the lock in stone and breathed life into the key. And they looked upon the worm-riddled world, and Abbath breathed upon it. He fathered a child with his wife, and called him Aeos, and lifted the incandescent child into the heavens...

Abbath & Aedrae = the lock/capstone
Aeos = the sun/son
Spira = the Key into which Life was breathed/earth/daughter

Thus, Abbath & Aedrae passed from mortal ken, becoming the lock (capstone) which binds the worms to the world, and their daughter the key which allows access to/escape from it. And though they are bound, sleeping, keeping the world safe, and the worms locked away, they are not dead, and together they brought forth two children, in time: Aeos, the sun, elder brother of Spira, the world.

And Aeos, seeing the two free worms with his new, piercing vision, forged chains of sunlight to bind the worms, and at the end of an age, when they had cooled, sent them to Tulkas, who wielded the chains, and wrestled with the twain. And with the aid of his companions, they were bound to the new-born babe, Spira, and a new age of life began...

And it endured... until Galanna slew Imbindarla, and magic died. The powers of darkness were released... the light was overcome, and for a brief time, Aeos' chains ceased to be.

Then Elder and his mate, wisest & wariest of worms, were freed. For a long age they have plotted, and hated. Countless lives of man have they had to plan... And yet, they do not seek to turn the Key, and open the Lock? Why?

Perhaps they fear Abbath & Aerdre, who even yet bind all their kin? Perhaps they fear their children? Surely they wish ALL of us harm? So why have they not sought to free their kin? Surely the other worms' thirsts for vengeance is as great as their own, and they will not trust the gods, nor be bound, again...

So what else can they be planning? To take the Key, but not open the Lock? But why?... To harmthe children? If a man in a wood encounters bears, and is trapped in their cave, when he is freed (knowing that he cannot defeat the bears), does he attack the cubs? For what purpose?...

It must be the Key... You say Teliez took Imbindarla's power of Undeath, but what of Crawling Things, and Darkness? Did he take those? If not, then perhaps the Worms did... Darkness to defeat Aeos' Light; Crawling Things... Things that Crawl in Darkness... and the Key of Life... Surely this all adds up to something, if I could just wrap my mind around it...

But I am very tired... I cannot sleep, for every time that I try, I wake. screaming...

 

[Steverooo]

Hence, Abbath & Aerdre's "abscence" from the world, while still being "worshippable", and granting high-level spells (in 1e, minions could grant mid-level ones).

Hence, the Worm's wanting to gain control of Spira, to use her to both breath life into new wormlets, and take it from her. They could also use her to open the Lock, freeing their fellow Worms, as well as Abbath & Aerdre (which is pro'ly why they won't DO that)!

If Trea also needs to be tied up/gotten rid of, she can be down in the hole with all of the other Worms! That'll teach Her!

Any problems with this one, PC? From what I understand of your plans, it seems to combine all the needed elements... Using Spira's powers of Life to breed more Worms, killing her in the process; making heroes necessary to chaining the Worms; tying up the original godlets, while still allowing for Abbath & Aerdre to (somehow) form new ones, while they're "asleep"... Any No-nos?

 

[Spatzimaus]

Yet again, I'm at work, a bit bored, and I've started thinking on this.

One question we mentioned earlier: when the gods did their big, powerful thing and banished all of the Worms to Carceri, how'd they miss two? And coincidentally, they missed a mated pair? (Okay, maybe they weren't a mated pair at the time, and worms are hermaphroditic, so the whole one-of-each-gender coincidence isn't really important if you don't want it to be.)

My thought was this: what if they didn't miss any? What if Elder and his mate were banished to Carceri, right along with all the others, and he's just the only one that had the ability to ESCAPE? Something must be holding the other worms there. Okay, if they're now an integral part of a plane, with a constant stream of worlds fed to them for consumption, then they're probably not too put out about it. But something must be preventing them from leaving, and maybe Elder's the only one who figured out a way around that. Or maybe more of the Worms COULD leave, but only Elder and Elderette chose to try coming back to Spira; the rest of the Worms could have written it off. Who knows why; unpleasant climate, hostile gods, bad access to schools and shopping...

Either way, the Eldertons come back to Spira after a few eons have passed, to try and regain power now that the gods are being less "hands on" about the place. Unfortunately, they underestimate the ability of the new inhabitants to resist, and get trapped. But time passes. Dragons get replaced by elves and later, humans as the dominant lifeform. The gods fight among themselves, while having less and less direct contact with the mortals. Elder foresees a big opportunity, as one major god will die in a way that'll disrupt things (including his prison), as well as providing a means to gain even more power.
And that's the real downside to this concept: if Elder had the ability to leave Carceri, then he also has the ability to leave Spira. So, if his kid-spawning plan fails as badly as his Imbindarla-eating one did, he could always just leave the plane.

But, this also explains one other discrepancy in the prophecies: there's just too much time to work with. That is, too much happened in between the time the rest of the Worms were banished and the time when Elder and his mate were found and imprisoned. A pantheon of gods were born, life was breathed into the world, the lizard race grew into a civilization, complete with heroes... and THEN they find two planet-devouring Worms still around? What were the two doing in the interim? How'd the gods not notice them when life was being breathed into the world? If you can say that they simply weren't there, it solves all of these.

 

[The_Warlock]

Well, there are other options with regard to the amount of time that passed, especially since we aren't limited to scientific measurements of life being created.

Elder and Elderette could have been deep in Spira, plotting and planning, and it was finally the trembling of the world which made the living races (created by the gods) recognize the danger and call for aid to trap the beasts.

Perhaps they were dormant...essentially they escaped the first binding, but were horribly wounded, burrowed deep into Spira, and went into hibernation to heal and recharge their power, actually parasitizing the newly living world. This would explain their disappearance and why they were hard to find, even Aeos light/sight doesn't pierce all the depths of the world.

Another thought is maybe they dispersed, shattering their vile spirits into the lesser worms of the world (from earthworm to purple worm), so that they could not be seen as whole entities, while they watched the growing world, regained their strength and plotted in secret, since who thinks a lowly earthworm in a spy. When they thought they had a plan, they reformed, only to find that Aeos had been wise to them, and set in motion a series of events so that Elder thought he would have a chance to bring destruction - instead Aeos had the heroes of the day lay a trap with the chains of light, because he needed the worms in undispersed form to truly bind them.

Not that I don't think him escaping from Carceri is a valid option, it just seems to go more against the grain of what we've heard before.

Of course, frankly, I think the first gods should have captured the worms, put them in a celestial bucket, and used them to fish for far realm entities, but some people might think that's too much.

 

[Piratecat]

The best kind of designing is the kind where you are on vacation, and other people are coming up with better ideas than yours.

On my way to the beach in Santa Clara -- comments this evening.

 

[Steverooo]

Comments?

???

 

[Piratecat]

I'm back! And an update is posted. Stay tuned for comments hereabouts -- I'm trying to make some decisions about my game before I go too far.