sckeener said:
To each his own....I'm having trouble with the concept or at least wrapping my head around it. I prefer to have my Far Realm be beyond morals and the Abyss by its nature has morals...Choatic evil morals.
Well, here's my take on it for what it's worth. The Far Realm is the place of ultimate chaos, a seething mass of protoplasmic stuff that would make Lovecraft proud. Mortals are unable to comprehend the Far Realm because our minds are based on order, 2+2=4 and all that, and attempting to causes what seems like madness, but is really another state of mind based on pure chaos (like a mental mutation).
Does this make the Far Realm intrinsically evil? It's certainly detrimental, it is certainly lacks anything to do with morals, but I am of the personal opinion that this does not necessarily equate to 'evil' except from our perspective of it. Lovecraft's personifications of chaos, upon which the Far Realm is based (Yog-Sothoth, Shub Niggurath, Azathoth) care nothing for morals of any stripe, they just are and they just do what they do. You can't blame a hungry Lion for eating you, you just keep out of its way.
But then, in the Lovecraft cosmology, you have Cthulhu and Nyarlathotep who are undoubtedly evil. Aza's an idiot, Shub and Yog don't care about anything, but Cthulhu and Nyarlathotep knowingly worship, exploit and abuse everything around them. Nyarlathotep actively spreads corruption because he enjoys it. He has no mandate from the Gods he supposedly represents because they couldn't care less about us insignificant little specks in the grand scheme. Cthulhu willingly advances the cause of a God who hungers to destroy reality and who also lacks the capability to care if he suceeds or not. This would be nonsensical unless power were Cthulhu's only agenda.
Back to DnD cosmology, technically the Far Realm and its inhabitants exist only to satisfy its instinctive desires without care for morality or sanity, and therefore could indeed be classed as Chaotic Evil (as opposed to Chaotic Neutral, CN people at least care about something). However, they won't go out of their way to bother us because they simply don't care.
Cthulhu and Nyarlathotep are, to me, more like the demons of the Abyss: Chaos and Evil personified. They don't have to do what they do, but they enjoy it. They LIKE eating your child's brain in front of you just to see how you'd react. They want you to turn to evil so that they can increase their own power by taking your soul. They actively recruit, corrupt and debase mortals to further their own selfish ends and they have no respect for any law other than might makes right, which is more a guideline anyway. In short, they care about mortals in their own twisted way.
This is why I welcome the inclusion of the Obyriths. The Far Realm is a place of such utter madness that it has no time or reason (considering that pure madness excludes reason) to bother us unless we bring it upon ourselves. The denziens of the Abyss want our souls and they are coming for them. An reasoning being such as FC1's Dagon doesn't belong in the Far Realm, even if he was spawned of it, because he desires power for his own ends. Sure, he's a psychotic lunatic, but he's not the babbling idiot in the corner, he's Hannibal Lector.
At least, as said, that's my take on it. Insert usual 'feel free to regard or disregard' disclaimer.
) ??
- is there ANY BOOK AT ALL coming in our direction about the Limbo and Slaadi ??
