D&D General Roasting the Realms

[aco175]

Luckily I backed up before that particularly glitch so just pretend the whole thing never happened.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Guy, Ryan, Pedro and Matt stop reading now.

The forgotten Realms are great. They have history, high magic, fantastical locations and great organizations. I love DMing in the Realms. However it is fair to say it comes under some criticism. Chief of which is the presence of all Ed Greenwood’s high level game table PCs that litter the realms like tactical nuclear warheads waiting to be deployed.

I’m only kidding (partly), I think Elminster and the Seven Sisters are dandy and I’ve played many campaigns in the realms without problem. But I would like to do things little differently in the next campaign. Instead of making them busy elsewhere and therefore absent, I’d like to subvert the legends around them to be at best reliable narration at worst deliberate deceit. Here are some examples of characters and how I’ve given them a new spin.

The Knights of Myth Drannor
“Heroes? No. Survivors with good PR.”

The so‑called Knights of Myth Drannor are less a noble order and more a notorious band of opportunists who stumbled into legend through a mix of luck, manipulation, and the occasional accidental act of heroism.

They defended the Dalelands… after accidentally provoking the threat in the first place. They delved into the ruins of Myth Drannor not to preserve elven heritage, but because Elminster convinced them there was treasure “just behind the next door.”And they have a tenuous relationship with the elves mostly because the elves were the only ones who hadn’t yet realized Elminster was a fraud.

For those that read my thread on adventures making common folk wary… these boys and girls are the reason why! Their reputation as champions of Cormanthor is largely the result of one man’s relentless talent for illusion, misdirection, and narrative control. That man is Elminster.

Elminster Aumer, Sage of Shadowdale
“If Elminster says it’s true, then it’s true enough for me.”

Elminster isn’t a Chosen of Mystra or a cosmic wizard. He’s a competent but ethically flexible illusionist, a master of sleight of hand, glamers, and social engineering. He creates fake monsters to “heroically” banish while his Illusions of grandeur make the Knights seem far more powerful than they are. Realizing that any tale where the knights succeed with his assistance is a service to him as well.

A network of marks who owe him favors because they believe he saved them and a talent for rewriting events so the Knights always appear on the right side of history are responsible for his legendary power. He’s charming, infuriating, and impossible to pin down. Half the Dalelands think he’s a hero. The other half think he’s a menace. He also uses his fame to keep the attention of young female barmaids, supplicants, and would be apprentices, none of which get the implied training or assistance.

Elminster will prove to be a supreme disappointment and in discovering his truth, the party will have to decide how to handle him. Play his game, take revenge or turn the tables. Though that does mean his reputation can no longer keep the Dalelands safe from Red Wizards, Dragon Cultists and Zhentarim magi.

Lord Mourngrym Amcathra
“Lord Mourngrym still thinks milk comes from kitchens and roads fix themselves”

Instead of the earnest, duty‑bound lord of Shadowdale, Mourngrym is a vain, pampered noblefrom Waterdeep sent to Shadowdale because his family wanted him out of the way. Convinced he’s destined for greatness despite never having earned anything he is obsessed with appearances, titles, and ceremony.

What’s more he’s completely unprepared for rural life, danger, or responsibility. He’s not evil — just entitled, sheltered, and catastrophically unaware of how the world works. This means that Shadowdale is at terrible risk from the various forces surrounding it. It also means that if the PCs play up to his expectations and vanity they could actually be quite influential.

The Gods
“If the gods care for us, they’ve a strange way of showing it — like a parent who forgets your name.”

For this to work the gods need a little re-write. Instead of omniscient beings, the gods become ancient, powerful entities (or newly raised powers seriously out of their depth) with limited perception, bound by cosmic rules they barely understand and prone to mistakes, rivalries, and miscalculations. They are entirely dependent on mortal belief to maintain stability which gives them a certain self interest when it comes to deciding where to spend their divine currency. Their interventions are imperfect decisions rather than divine certainties. The Time of Troubles wasn’t a grand lesson for mortals. It was a catastrophic administrative meltdown among the gods, with Ao acting like a furious supervisor.

Clerics and paladins still get spells, but the gods frequently rely on the weave to interpret faith. They can’t possible respond personally to every prayer… though the clergy will often claim otherwise. A cleric’s miracle might be a genuine divine response, a weave generated effect shaped by belief or a coincidence interpreted as divine will. Mortals can’t tell the difference. Temples, priests, and bards have been telling stories for centuries. Much of what mortals “know” about the gods is exaggerated or politically motivated. This lets me keep every myth, every scripture, every divine appearance — but gives me license to reinterpret them as unreliable.

In Conclusion

All this creates lots of opportunities for humor and for the players to become the centre of attention. It’s a Counter-Realms which takes the big names and makes interaction with them far more interesting than them being the heroes who did it all themselves first.

It’s worth saying again that not all NPCs behave this way. There are good and honest people that the PCs will meet. They just tend not to be the big players in the area. Also I’m not precious about Lore. Mourngrym is my lord of Shadowdale even though in the canon realms he would be dead and buried. Same for the Knights of Myth Drannor.

What do people think, fun idea for a jaded set of long term players or a desecration of everything the realms hold dear?

I think the big concern that would descend from most of this is: You run the risk of the players deciding that nothing they ever hear is correct--ever. That it's all lies, all the way down, every time. When faith is repeatedly repaid with betrayals or brutal revelations of the true situation, the lesson that teaches is "faith is a sucker's game". That's....a dangerous lesson to teach your players, because it pushes them much closer to murderhoboism.

I'm not saying this is guaranteed, or even necessarily likely. I do think it is likely if you don't head it off at the pass, but that's my biases talking. Regardless of those biases, the risk is definitely there--and even a small risk of such a thing needs to be taken seriously.

If you're prepared for a game where the players view all authority figures as inherently corrupt, or at least duplicitous and suspect, then awesome, no precautions needed. But if you aren't, I would suggest making sure that there's a genuine mix of things that truly deserve a "roast", things that deserve way more than a mere "roast", and things which don't really deserve that harsh response at all even if they do still need to improve.

As a good example of that, let's take a deity the party might interact with and consider how they could LOOK like a jerk, while truly being completely sincere about doing the right things for the right reasons, they just weren't perfect about it. I'll put my favorite on the chopping block: Bahamut. As a dragon, he's inclined to being acquisitive and protectionist, so maybe he tries to get certain groups "on side" by tempting them with investments into their infrastructure, with the expectation of repayment over time, but lenient terms etc. Unfortunately, he only vets the people who actually come to speak to him, not the actual leadership. So the party finds out that Bahamut has--from their perspective--given massive loans to Zhentarim shell companies that are using it to further their human-trafficking business. Looks pretty naughty word, right? What a defender of "Justice" and "Hope", helping further the cause of slavery! But the truth is, he was doing his best and simply overlooked checking the paper trail; he gave people the benefit of the doubt and they abused his trust. Having the players actually see Bahamut glowing with incandescent, righteous fury over being misled in this way would go a long way toward showing that the gods, even if they are imperfect, can still be relied upon to be good, if that's in their nature. That the gods, even when they err, are not inherently doing so out of malice, or laziness, or greed, or whatever else--but rather because they can make mistakes or get hoodwinked.

Point being, be careful undermining the moral authority of EVERY figure or group of interest. You're liable to make the world look like grey-and-black morality, and that risks very corrosive effects on player investment and attention.

 

[Corinnguard]

Another thing about the OP's take on the deities, at least two Planescape factions would sit up and take notice of his initial post. The Athar and the Believers of the Source. Both would pay Toril a visit, but for different reasons. The Athar would come to see if the deities of the Forgotten Realms are truly fakes only pretending to be deities. The Believers of the Source otoh would come to see how some high-powered Primes became deities and try to copy whatever method they used to ascend to deityhood.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

The Time of Troubles wasn’t a grand lesson for mortals. It was a catastrophic administrative meltdown among the gods, with Ao acting like a furious supervisor.

Isn't this (or wasn't this at some point) basically canon?

I'm not an expert, and I was pretty young when that ordeal happened, but from the comics my friend had that followed the story I definitely got the impression that the whole thing was 100% the gods fault--their punishment from an equally questionable AI.

I don't remember anything in the game books I had at the time that contradicted that.

Was I just missing more explicit explanations to the contrary, or did TSR (or later WotC) retcon the presentation to make the FR pantheon not look like the self-absorbed jerks they had earlier presented them as?

Heck, in my multiverse (which includes Planescape, Spelljammer, and all the 2e settings), I have to do a good deal of interpretation to justify any of the FR deities having a good alignment, and it primarily comes down to them attempting to moderate the bad effects of their warped cosmology to try to help mortals, which, as citizens of the multiverse who have friends and acquaintances in other pantheons, they know is pretty messed up.

 

[TheSword]

Another thing about the OP's take on the deities, at least two Planescape factions would sit up and take notice of his initial post. The Athar and the Believers of the Source. Both would pay Toril a visit, but for different reasons. The Athar would come to see if the deities of the Forgotten Realms are truly fakes only pretending to be deities. The Believers of the Source otoh would come to see how some high-powered Primes became deities and try to copy whatever method they used to ascend to deityhood.

You’re kidding right? The Athar and the Godsmen don’t care about a flyspeck backwater prime like Faerun.

 

[TheSword]

I think the big concern that would descend from most of this is: You run the risk of the players deciding that nothing they ever hear is correct--ever. That it's all lies, all the way down, every time. When faith is repeatedly repaid with betrayals or brutal revelations of the true situation, the lesson that teaches is "faith is a sucker's game". That's....a dangerous lesson to teach your players, because it pushes them much closer to murderhoboism.

I'm not saying this is guaranteed, or even necessarily likely. I do think it is likely if you don't head it off at the pass, but that's my biases talking. Regardless of those biases, the risk is definitely there--and even a small risk of such a thing needs to be taken seriously.

If you're prepared for a game where the players view all authority figures as inherently corrupt, or at least duplicitous and suspect, then awesome, no precautions needed. But if you aren't, I would suggest making sure that there's a genuine mix of things that truly deserve a "roast", things that deserve way more than a mere "roast", and things which don't really deserve that harsh response at all even if they do still need to improve.

As a good example of that, let's take a deity the party might interact with and consider how they could LOOK like a jerk, while truly being completely sincere about doing the right things for the right reasons, they just weren't perfect about it. I'll put my favorite on the chopping block: Bahamut. As a dragon, he's inclined to being acquisitive and protectionist, so maybe he tries to get certain groups "on side" by tempting them with investments into their infrastructure, with the expectation of repayment over time, but lenient terms etc. Unfortunately, he only vets the people who actually come to speak to him, not the actual leadership. So the party finds out that Bahamut has--from their perspective--given massive loans to Zhentarim shell companies that are using it to further their human-trafficking business. Looks pretty naughty word, right? What a defender of "Justice" and "Hope", helping further the cause of slavery! But the truth is, he was doing his best and simply overlooked checking the paper trail; he gave people the benefit of the doubt and they abused his trust. Having the players actually see Bahamut glowing with incandescent, righteous fury over being misled in this way would go a long way toward showing that the gods, even if they are imperfect, can still be relied upon to be good, if that's in their nature. That the gods, even when they err, are not inherently doing so out of malice, or laziness, or greed, or whatever else--but rather because they can make mistakes or get hoodwinked.

Point being, be careful undermining the moral authority of EVERY figure or group of interest. You're liable to make the world look like grey-and-black morality, and that risks very corrosive effects on player investment and attention.

I think that with all things it depends on how much it’s used. If every wizard is a fraud then it becomes cheap. Elminster is so ubiquitous he’s almost a parody. I wouldn’t suggest using every wizard this way. Same for the Knights of Myth Drannor, they’re the anti-party. I wouldn’t have other adventuring bands also be false.

Regarding the gods, I think it’s less about making fun of them, and more about not being able to rely on them every time. Spells will be cast but the party cleric doesn’t have Lathander on speed dial. It’s not that faith is a suckers game. Instead folks have to judge for themselves.

I think this actually gets people to take more ownership for their behaviors and smooths out the black and white to a little more grey.

 

[Stormonu]

To take this another step, Elminster is the fraud and Volothamp Geddarm is an eccentric genius (on the level of Howard Hughes) whom Elminster has an unhealthy beef with to tear down.

<EDIT: Or, Volo's a brilliant Zhentarim agent who uses his books to foster trade and travel, but purposely flawed the books to leave those individuals vulnerable to the plots of the Zhents and their Black Network.>