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Message: <blockquote data-quote="MerricB" data-source="post: 6492876" data-attributes="member: 3586">That adventure is rather interesting, as it's the first introduction of Tharizdun to Greyhawk. You learn that there's a chained god whose priesthood has deserted him (and plundered his treasure, as well!) and... that's about it. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />The next time Tharizdun properly appears in a Greyhawk game product, it's 2001 and Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil is released.In the meantime, Gygax used Tharizdun as the ultimate Big Bad in his Gord the Rogue books. The second book (Artifact of Evil) has Gord and his friends attempting to stop cultists gaining an item that could be use to free T. After that book, Gygax left TSR, but was able to finish the series, which culminates with T. being released and destroying Greyhawk. It'd be fair to say that Gary wasn't particularly happy at this point with what had happened at TSR. (The Gord books have lots of wonderful ideas, but are not particularly well-written).3E sees the use of Tharizdun once more in a Dungeon magazine adventure "The Cradle of Madness", and that's it for that edition as far as I'm aware.4E sees Tharizdun gain new prominence in the new cosmology created for the default setting. I find this use really interesting, as we actually get a creation mythology here, which he plays a chief part in. (Tharizdun puts a shard of pure evil in the heart of the Elemental Chaos, creating demons and the Abyss, and is imprisoned for it). In my opinion, the mythology of 4E is its strongest part and it informs a lot of 4E. Although Tharizdun wasn't really linked to Elemental Evil in his original conception, this version of him is explicitly linked to it.Tharizdun gets a starring role as part of the Abyssal Plague series of novels, which has a cult following him pop up in the Forgotten Realms, and in the D&D Encounters season The Elder Elemental Eye, set in the Realms.The original idea for Tharizdun seems to be as some sort of Lovecraftian deity. He's not presented that way in the Gord the Rogue books, especially not once he wakes up. Monte Cook linked him to Elemental Evil, a good reason for that was advanced in 4E, and that may well be the base we're starting with in 5E. 4E moved him more into the shared lore of D&D rather than being exclusively Greyhawk, which does fit with Gygax description of him as Multiversal in Oerth Journal #12.If there are any other significant mentions of Tharizdun, I'd love to know about them!Cheers!</blockquote>

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