| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| KanzenAU |
Posted - 03 May 2017 : 06:30:03
As a creative exercise, if you had to give a brief synopsis or tell the short story of an event that occurred in the time of the Second Sundering, what would it be?
Can be as long or as short as you like - even a sentence can tell an interesting story.
This is a period where the gods were very active on Toril (if only through their mortal servants) for a short time, but we have very few stories about it, and I thought it would be interesting to see what people here say.
The Second Sundering is still an event we know little about, and largely revolves around the gods becoming quite active on Toril through their Chosen from 1482-1489, with activity peaking around 1485-1486. In the background, Ao appears to be restructuring the way the gods operate on Toril, resulting in them going silent in 1488 before returning as more distant in 1489.
During the active period, the gods had hundreds of Chosen Toril-wide according to Ed. These may factor into your story, or they may not. If they are, there power could be as tiny as having darkvision as a Chosen of Amaunator (example taken from LotCS), or more significant such as the powers of the Chosen of Asmodeus in the Adversary.
A brief summary of the Second Sundering, mostly clipped from the Sword Coast Adventurers' Guide, to give people an idea that are out of the loop. The excellent thread of Lirdolin has more details.
quote:
1479: Although the SCAG argues that the first indication of "new turmoil" is in 1482, I would argue that the first signs come with the partial return of Mystra in 1479, as seen in the Sage of Shadowdale trilogy. In The Companions, characters experience the change, and are unsure of what to make of it. Mystra likely does not fully return and start answering prayers until the end of the Herald in 1487. However, magic does noticeably change for all users in 1479 - though it continues to operate for users both new and old, it operates in the way it did before the Spellplague, bringing some to suspect the Weave has returned.
1482: The return of Bhaal amidst much chaos in Baldur's Gate marks the first major turmoil of the Sundering.
1484: Strange calamities begin to occur, including a plague of locusts in Amn, an earthquake in Iriaebor, and droughts in southern lands as the sea receded in some areas. Sakkors falls on the Maelstrom at Ordulin, and cracks begin to be seen in the darkened Sembian sky.
1485: At least by 1485, people claiming to be "Chosen" of the gods begin to appear - such as a Chosen of Auril in Ten Towns. Conflict also reigns in many parts of the world - the dwarves against the orcs in the North, and Cormyr-Sembia-Netheril-Dalelands in the Heartlands. As the drought in the south deepens, the Great Rain begins to fall over the Sea of Fallen Stars, occuring during 1485-1486.
1486: The dwarven and the Cormyrean wars come to an end, and the Great Rain stops falling. The various Harper groups around Faerun begin to come together once more to face the great threat of Shade, after discovering the Shadovar have been collecting Chosen from across Toril - and that each individual group can do little about it.
1487: Abeir and Toril begin to drift apart once more. Earthquakes and volcanic explosions occur across the globe, as if the whole world is convulsing. Rumors spread of chasms suddenly vanishing that had suddenly appeared in the Spellplague, and of known destinations becoming farther away from each other, as if the world had quietly added miles of wilderness to the distance between them. Word begins to arrive that lost, Lantan, Evermeet, Halruua, and Nimbral have returned. Shade launches its gambit against Myth Drannor, but the gambit fails, and the Shades are mostly destroyed with survivors scattering.
1488: As 1487 closes into 1488, the stars seem to hang motionless, and the winter lasts longer than any on record. The gods go silent to their worshipers, the presence of their Chosen being one of the few reminders of their influence. The remainder of the Netherese forces battle the Bedine, and unwittingly awaken a hive of phaerimm who begin draining the Anauroch once more.
1489: By this time, the deities have stopped interfering with the world through their Chosen. By Flamerule, the gods return and bless their worshipers once more, but they are more distant than before, and some gods return that had been though gone for over a century.
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| 30 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Zeromaru X |
Posted - 07 May 2017 : 11:06:20
I'm like dazzlerdal, but instead of 1300s, I'm a "grognard" of the pre-Second Sundering stuff, lol.
I do like useful gods, non-"Vancian"-and-actually-useful-magic, a truly fantasy setting, and dead or crippled novel NPCs, making player characters THE heroes of the story. |
| Wooly Rupert |
Posted - 06 May 2017 : 13:54:09
quote:
Originally posted by dazzlerdal
Well im going to continue writing stuff for the 1300s on a wordpress site im working on that should hopefully present a coherent and as complete version of my realms as i can make it (im fed up of messing with pdfs).
If people use anything then great but i fail to see how any of it will be useful for the 1400s as it will be mostly people and places and organisations and history. All of which will be wiped out by 1490.
Yup, the 1490s have no organizations or places, and no long-lived people that have been around for a while. |
| Gary Dallison |
Posted - 06 May 2017 : 08:16:33
Well im going to continue writing stuff for the 1300s on a wordpress site im working on that should hopefully present a coherent and as complete version of my realms as i can make it (im fed up of messing with pdfs).
If people use anything then great but i fail to see how any of it will be useful for the 1400s as it will be mostly people and places and organisations and history. All of which will be wiped out by 1490.
|
| xaeyruudh |
Posted - 06 May 2017 : 05:39:32
quote:
Originally posted by dazzlerdal
Well even if im the only one left, i just cant find anything to love or relate to in the 1400s. Even if im the only one left ill do it to the end just because i love it.
You are absolutely not alone in condemning the 1400s and 4e FR changes. There's probably not many outside the ones who played D&D for the first time during the 1400s who like it.
I like a lot of the bits and pieces that were added in 2e and 3e, but with the "attitude" of 1e. In the old gray box, the Realms was mostly untamed, and TSR screwed that up, and then WOTC blew it up with Shade and the map warping, and then hit it with a bigger "better" TOT...
For myself and my games, I choose to take the stuff I like, redo or take a scalpel to the stuff I don't like... and imagine how it would have looked if Ed wrote all of it, sans interference from the bean counters. It's the happiest and most productive approach I've found since the TOT was published in 1989.
In this way, setting it in 1500 DR works for me, just as well as setting it in 1357. Ed left plenty of room for DM interpretation and expansion, and those who followed his lead (Eric & George, and probably a few others) as well as some who just set up shop and fleshed out what they loved (Bob Salvatore ftw) -- the examples they set are awesome and I find plenty to challenge myself in trying to see setting development through their eyes.
So thank you, George, since I know you're here. I can relate with feeling like a stranger in 5e, but I hope you don't let it get you down. I for one look forward to anything you want to share with us. |
| KanzenAU |
Posted - 06 May 2017 : 04:23:20
I agree that straight lore isn't too appealing to most folks, they want something they can use at the gaming table - adventures, monsters, new classes, etc. The product of my own that has sold the most by far is my map of the North (now an "Electrum Best Seller") - because a lot of people are playing there right now, it's immediately useful to them. I've earned more from that than I have from my Ardeep map/guide and my west-central Cormyr map combined, I think simply because more people find it useful.
So how could our lore be useful to people? I know for my own game, what I really want to know that hasn't been well covered in the SCAG or even the 4e FRCG is the immediate history of the Sword Coast. So that takes in the Sundering time period (hence the creation of this thread), but also the decades leading up to it. If Candlekeep could create lore for that, I'd be a very happy man. But the Spellplague divided the community, and that's not likely to change, so we have to work with that.
An "Era of Upheaval" project can still use people on both sides of the divide. Those of us that care about the modern Realms can write some recent history, and the grognards can write about the era they care about - all under one banner. If we wanted to, we could connect stories from the 1350s to stories from the 1480s through characters of the long-lived races, or maybe even just through related themes and a "history repeats itself" vibe. We can weave in maps and feats or whatever to make the lore even more usable and relevant - but I think even if the lore stood alone, understanding the world is more appealing to people than many realize. The people over at WotC certainly don't seem that invested in lore creation at all - leaving a gap I think people yearn to have filled, a gap we could fill!
Even if people aren't invested in spreading Realms-love via the DM's Guild, it could just be a satisfying undertaking in itself - we'd each be building stuff relevant to what we individually want. Releasing it under a collaborative banner would also bring in some funds to the site we spend so much time on. |
| George Krashos |
Posted - 06 May 2017 : 02:57:28
I don't think the DMs Guild can deliver anything that really benefits the Realms in terms of returning it to the forefront of D&D gaming consciousness (if it ever was at that forefront). I write in the Realms for me. As a hobby. I've used this place to showcase my work. I've used the DMs Guild too. The only difference there is in that regard is that I can track numbers-wise how many people are interested in my musings at the DMs Guild. My most popular articles are "Soargar's Legacy" and the "Impiltur Timeline" at 654 and 653 downloads respectively. Is that a good number? High? Low? Expected? Unexpected? Who knows. If I wrote 5E lore, would that be more popular? I highly doubt it. Be that as it may, I'll continue to write stuff when and how I can. And likely continue to put stuff up there. Someone, somewhere might find it useful. And at the end of the day, for me, that's the only thing that counts.
-- George Krashos |
| KanzenAU |
Posted - 06 May 2017 : 02:18:48
quote:
Originally posted by dazzlerdal
I absolutely love the 1300s realms and would quite happily spend 8 hours a day developing it (and have in my last job).
Conversely i absolutely hate the 1400s realms, it contains nothing of joy or value. You can tell the designers chucked it together to make a quick buck. Why would i want to invest any time developing it. In fact i cannot invest time in it because i hate it so much. Its like being forced to eat meat if you are a vegetarian and then only being able to get a job designing food dishes for meat eaters. It is just so distasteful anything i tried to make would show my hatred. Much better to stay with what i love.
You should absolutely stay with what you love - but we could still use whatever you write about the 1300s, even if a CK product was targeted at the 5e generation. Like the Compendiums of old, we could have a bunch of articles on a bunch of topics from different eras - there were plenty of historical pieces in the old Compendiums that had heaps of gems for whatever time you're playing in.
I still like the idea of a targeted "Era of Upheaval" series of Candlekeep stuff, as we could each focus on the era of time we care most about - from immediately before the ToT in 1356 right up to the end of the Era of Upheaval in 1489. |
| Markustay |
Posted - 06 May 2017 : 01:43:02
I loved the Stormtalons, but then they broke my heart.
The way I look at it, this 'new thing' isn't the old thing, but we aren't getting the old thing back, ever, so we may as well try and enjoy the new thing. At least the terrain is back the way it should be (which is probably what first sold me on 5e). |
| Gary Dallison |
Posted - 05 May 2017 : 22:01:38
Well even if im the only one left, i just cant find anything to love or relate to in the 1400s. Even if im the only one left ill do it to the end just because i love it.
Ive tried looking into hellmaw and stormtalons but i dont love them enough to try (maybe that will change as they develop and more info is available). I quite like ravenloft and darksun. But none of these is good enough to make me want to develop such a setting (i might play games there but developing is a considerable investment of time).
The Star Wars universe is good and i really really like it but only enough to run games and try to make them mesh alongside events in the original trilogy.
I absolutely love the 1300s realms and would quite happily spend 8 hours a day developing it (and have in my last job).
Conversely i absolutely hate the 1400s realms, it contains nothing of joy or value. You can tell the designers chucked it together to make a quick buck. Why would i want to invest any time developing it. In fact i cannot invest time in it because i hate it so much. Its like being forced to eat meat if you are a vegetarian and then only being able to get a job designing food dishes for meat eaters. It is just so distasteful anything i tried to make would show my hatred. Much better to stay with what i love. |
| Markustay |
Posted - 05 May 2017 : 19:26:53
quote:
Originally posted by Cyrinishad
Also, despite my enjoyment of discussing the divinities here on the forums... my actual games don't involve the gods coming down and stomping through the realms. I very much embrace dazzler's approach when it comes to practical applications of divinity in the game-world.
Neither do I - I can't think of a single time when I used 'the gods' when running FR.
Funnily enough, I have in Greyhawk, but just once, when players decided to go in the opposite direction I wanted them to and 'walked off the map'.
Then their Characters met ME... and I was not a happy god.  |
| Markustay |
Posted - 05 May 2017 : 19:24:20
Now I want to write a time-jumping AP called "The Era of Your Ways". 
The only thing I have so far is that in that final event, the PCs have one of those "OMFG!!!" moments of clarity, where everything else they did and went through falls into place like a brilliant, interlocking puzzle. A twist, but a time-twist, where the ending is directly connected to the beginning in a way they never saw coming.
I've managed to pull-off similar stuff, and its so satisfying when it all works out 'as planned', but the problem with all this is that its nearly impossible to get rightwith a pre-fab adventure, because you have to be intimately familiar with your gaming group, and know precisely who would do what in certain situations (so when you reveal the 'Timey Wimey' stuff, your players will look at you like you are some sort of magician).
Now I have to think on how to take all of that and try to make it work in a pre-fab AP. |
| Cyrinishad |
Posted - 05 May 2017 : 19:00:11
Sieze the Day!... and win the Future!
I unabashedly jump back and forth between eras during my campaigns. If something is developed for earlier eras, it is still totally relevant and usable in the current era of the game.
Also, despite my enjoyment of discussing the divinities here on the forums... my actual games don't involve the gods coming down and stomping through the realms. I very much embrace dazzler's approach when it comes to practical applications of divinity in the game-world.
So, what I'm saying is I think everybody here at Candlekeep should keep using their creative energies to build up the Realms Lore wherever and whenever possible. Regardless of Era or Edition or whatever... As always the Realms is whatever we make it, and we have the power to craft it as we wish... All good things. |
| Markustay |
Posted - 05 May 2017 : 18:34:39
LOL - Dazzler, you know I love you dude, I'm just trying to warn you that sometimes you can become so enamored with a particular aspect of something, no-one else sees it, and that's a lonely road.
Some of my most popular maps are of places that I myself would never play in. If you are just doing this for yourself, then that is fine, so long as you realize that. As for me, I live for those moments when people tell they use my maps all the time. Sadly, some of my favorites - like Erlkazar and the Hordelands - I get very little feedback on. But that's okay - some are for me, and some are for the community. If I just focused on my favorite bits, I'd soon find myself getting disheartened.
And thats the LAST thing I want to see great designers doing. So much potential around here I feel is just going to waste now, because people are still hung-up on what was lost.  |
| KanzenAU |
Posted - 05 May 2017 : 15:49:56
We could always write about old lore - Time of Troubles or whatever - and then relate it to the 5e era. For instance, we could have a series of articles on the "Era of Upheaval". The first couple coukd be about the ToT, dazz could do his alternate take for one, and later articles could work through the Spellplague all the way up to the end of that Age in the Sundering. Surely there's got to be some project we could all come together on. |
| Gary Dallison |
Posted - 05 May 2017 : 15:29:00
Im happy to be the only soldier left in the jungle. Im busy building my bunker now out of all the non 1400s lore i can find.
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| Markustay |
Posted - 05 May 2017 : 15:09:53
I'm not doing the 'quotey thing'...
First up - 'little return' for the CKC on the DM's Guild? You're right! How silly of me. Why do that when we were making SO much money with them before.
Your logic = 'Totally Free' > 'Free with the possibility of pay' 
"I don't do 1400's" - Yes, Krash said pretty much the same thing. Did anyone bother to read what I posted above? If you write a piece set in the past, then that same 'widget' (artifact, crown, Dead princess' locket, etc) is still up for grabs, or that same locale is still 'spooky AF' and needs some adventurin'.
"That secret society of Mages that practiced 'lama magic' back in the 900's in Grungyfluke hills? I don't mind if anyone finds and raids the place up to 1385 DR, but if someone finds and raids that same exact place (filled with the same exact threats and treasure) in the 1400's, well, I ain't havin' none of that, because... stuff".
Thats what that sounds like to me. Unless you're just saying you can't be bothered doing the 'crunchy bits' for 5e, but if you are sticking with 1e/2e/3e or even 4e at this point for 'your stuff', good luck with that. Let me know how that goes. I totally get 'talking to yourself' - I do it all the time. You're like one those Japanese soldiers they found on islands 20 years after WW2 was over (still 'fighting the god fight'). Just understand that there were only a few of those... and now there are none.
"I don't really change anything... I'm just rewriting the ToT without the gods in it".
Okaaaaaaaaaaaaaay...
That's like rewriting WW2 without the Nazis in it. Maybe you can focus on those crazy bastards that were on those islands for 20 years. 
I'm not trying to belittle people efforts - just about everyone who comes here to the keep does some amazing things with the lore - I just want folks to realize that you're putting a LOT of 'wasted effort' into stuff that almost no-one will use. If you just tweak the stuff y'all are working on so that it could be used in the 1400's (or just about in any era), you might get much more satisfying 'returns' for your time investment (and by 'returns' I don't mean money, necessarily - lord knows I have never done anything game-related for a paycheck).
And why do this stuff under the 'CKC banner'? Because we are a known and trusted source of quality FR lore, and because by doing projects under an 'umbrella group' they remain internally consistent. Did you guys know I have never downloaded ANYTHING off the DMs Guild (other than Krash's stuff)? Not that there isn't lots of good material there, its just that 99% of it is just 'floating in a vacuum'. People are writing stuff that over-writes what others are doing. If people see consistent projects by a group of talented people, they may adopt that as their own 'unofficial canon'. With one-offs, that is far less likely to happen.
And never fall FR the trap of becoming 'enamored with your own cleverness' (*cough* 4e *cough*) - been there, done that. Got a box load of tee-shirts. One of my favorite projects/threads from back in the old WotC boards was the one for the Utter East. Not so much because it is such a fascinating place (anyplace can be fascinating once you start fleshing it out), but because I worked with a bunch of other very talented FR 'experts' who were there to reign me in when i was pursuing a lore-path that should have been scraped. Quite a few things I was 'called on' (being over-done, or overly-connected to the point of absurdity, etc), and I thought they were just plain wrong about, that now I look back upon and say, "what was I thinking? Pee-U!"
We have all have our 'lichlings' moments. Just don't get too caught up in them. Not every lump of coal can be turned into a diamond. If your like me and thought working within a group might curtail your creativity, then maybe some of that creativity actually needs to be curtailed... and thats what you are afraid of.
You know what most of the lore up on the DMs Guild looks like to me? 4e... and you still can't convince me that any of the designers of that fiasco actually listened to what others were saying while it was getting designed. 4e FR was the biggest pile of noncohesive, random bits of 'kewl' in the history of gaming. Its like they just took five years of sticky notes and C&Ped it to make a campaign guide. It was just tons of ideas - great and terrible - all just run together in a mish-mosh that we are STILL trying to figure out a decade later. And that the DM's Guild now... but at least its not canon. |
| xaeyruudh |
Posted - 05 May 2017 : 08:00:09
quote:
Originally posted by KanzenAU
Even if just the seven people in this thread wrote just one page on something we could agree on, that would be amazing.
True.
 |
| Gary Dallison |
Posted - 05 May 2017 : 06:40:39
Not me. I dont do 1400s |
| KanzenAU |
Posted - 05 May 2017 : 01:19:06
Even if just the seven people in this thread wrote just one page on something we could agree on, that would be amazing. |
| sleyvas |
Posted - 04 May 2017 : 15:05:55
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
We've tried to get that restarted before, but the haziness of 4e's GSL was nothing like 3e's OGL, and everyone was afraid that by doing 'old lore' (pieces set in a time other the 4e era) could be construed as as a violation of the VERY limited 'license' (and I use that term very loosely - only an idiot would have signed that heinously one-sided agreement). Basically, we couldn't 'mix old with new', and no one really wanted to do 'new', so it never got restarted. 4e killed the CK Compendiums.
HOWEVER, with 5e here and this new DMs guild thing - why couldn't we publish a volume ON THAT under the header of 'Candlekeep', with a 'pay what you want' price, and have all proceeds go to the upkeep (and maybe update?) of this site? It might be the way to go. Maybe even revisit the old ones and update them for 5e (I wouldn't mind going back in and tweaking the names in my article, for instance).
Quite frankly, the effort versus return on DMs Guild using pay what you want (at least on the stuff that I've put up as pay what you want) has been minimal. I've barely broken $100 on a 100+ page rules addition, and I've had looks like 889 downloads in the last year (of which 55 paid). I may be the odd man out though.
However, I'm not saying that to discourage anyone, just to point out that the endeavor to put a group name to it may be a little cumbersome especially if you do PWYW. It might be better to do it individually or setting a price. I'm still writing (as time permits)... granted for areas mostly unexplored previously. However, I know I'm slow due to real life work, so I've started posting a lot of my concepts here (as a lot of you know) just to "air" them. I still plan on doing my stuff for the united tharchs as PWYW, but then I honestly could care less about the money and really just want to share with the community.
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| Gary Dallison |
Posted - 04 May 2017 : 13:59:16
Ive always taken Eric, George, Steven amd other designers philosophy when writing lore and that is never to ignore a reference already in existence. Sometimes it is explained away by unreliable narrator getting it wrong, sometimes its reinterpreted slightly, but i rarely remove or change anything.
I was going to start at 1356 and rewrite the ToT. Keep the rumours and then add in details about the cloak societies spreading rumours in order to bring down certain churches such as the church of Mystra by saying she was dead (something they were paid to do by rivals like the church of Bane).
Then it gets out of hand and other people start paying for rumours to be spread about other gods dying in counter actions (or spreading rumours themselves for organisations like the Harpers).
Some organisations and independents try to take advantage of the spreading hysteria by taking overtly magical actions themselves (like a necromancer seen in waterdeep and a lion man in tantras and poisoned water at the boareskyr bridge).
It takes almost a year for the public hysteria to die down. By the end of it the common people really do believe that certain gods are dead and new ones have risen. There are new churches and old ones have fragmented or died.
Everything stays the same except that its all now rumour and nothing is certain. Only those in the know are aware of the cloal societies spreading rumours. |
| Markustay |
Posted - 04 May 2017 : 09:16:45
quote:
Originally posted by dazzlerdal
I already proposed this idea for redoing the original realms timeline when 5e was just some bean counter's horrible nightmare.
Maybe it was my involvement that put people off but it had less than a handful of people interested. Im guessing that 5e realms wont get half as many interests.
As George said, creating good quality lore is hard enough. Creating it with no background detail to bed it into will require a genius the likes of Ed Greenwood or Tolkien.
Good luck.
First, I don't think 'redoing' something is a good project, if what you mean is 'making things come out different'. Now, adding new/more details, and putting a new spin on things - but yet mostly the same results happened (in such a way that the 'common man' wouldn't know the difference between the new version and the original), then I'm on board with that. Thats just adding more 'depth', so long as its done in an intelligent manner. For example, Shar's involvement with Karsus and the fall of Netheril was something a lot of folks didn't care for, and felt was a retcon, but I didn't mind it, because I thought it made some sense (after all, Shar does spend ALL of her time making grand plans against Mystra - some of them have to bear fruit). It didn't actually change any of the results - the history remained intact. it just gave us a new perspective.
The other thing is, I don't understand how 'creating in a vacuum' is too hard. Thats the ultimate freedom. Plus, its not really true - you still have thousands upon thousands of years worth of Realms history to base all your stuff on. Sure, tying your new stories to old, stray bits of lore is awesome, but its not necessary. I almost feel like we've been brainwashed into thinking it is ("Hey! That was never in the Realms before! It doesn't belong here!"). We don't have to connect new lore to old stuff. Its nice when it happens, but there is nothing wrong with creating stuff whole-cloth.
Have we become hipsters? Is it because now everyone can 'write FR lore', its not 'cool' anymore? Now that its not a 'private club', its no fun? 
The opportunity we have right now is something most of us yearned for two editions ago - the ability to actually write FR lore that other people would except, and maybe even pay for. Just imagine if we had that available to us back when the CKC's were being made. I just don't get it. |
| George Krashos |
Posted - 04 May 2017 : 09:04:43
quote:
Originally posted by KanzenAU
That's really very sad to hear George, though I get the sentiment - the 5e Realms doesn't really have the solid base of history the pre-Spellplague Realms had. Still, I had held out hope that you would be the Chosen One, the loremaster who knew all the lore, from every edition! Alas, perhaps it is too much for anyone to keep up with over so much time and so many drastic changes. I just really hope Ed is keeping up, and will continue to advise and contribute to the Realms as it goes forward.
I lost track of the later lore with the 4E novel releases. I've got most of the 5E "FR" releases - but there is no real lore in them other than an update on people and places in a very basic manner. As for being THE loremaster ... that's a tough job. I've done better over the years riding shotgun and throwing in a few thoughts here and there to the real creative types like Eric and Steven (Ed has never needed my help, although I note that he does keep track of my musings!). My own stuff grows organically in my head and on my PC hard drive. Some will see the light of day, some won't. The stuff that does escape will be soon lost in the morass of the DMs Guild - like the Ark of the Covenant in Raiders of the Lost Ark. I'll likely do a "cluster" release of 4 or 5 pieces later this year. No rush.
-- George Krashos |
| xaeyruudh |
Posted - 04 May 2017 : 08:44:41
quote:
Originally posted by KanzenAU
Even if other people's ideas only consist of a sentence or two, if we got 20 members to submit short ideas, that's a whole lot of interesting tales to fill gaps, and some great history hooks for DMs.
I'm either off-topic or adding another dimension, but a while back a few scribes challenged me with their constructive optimism in spite of WotC's abuses (Jeremy), dogged hamstered refusal to see things my way (Wooly), and refreshing snarkery (Markus). Over time I think my viewpoint shifted a bit, and I found something resembling a positive attitude. 
What I'm getting at is that yes we can fill in the missing years, but we can also right the wrongs.
For example, I've ranted before about the Time of Troubles. A significant percentage of the current player base didn't play 2e and don't care about 1358, I get that. I care about it, and I've (finally) realized that instead of getting amped up about it, I can just rewrite it the way I think it should have gone. Then I don't have to say "The TOT didn't happen in my Realms." I can instead say "It turned out a little differently in this campaign."
And in terms of the players' immersion in the game, there's a huge difference between those statements. If an RSE didn't happen, they're left to wonder what else didn't happen, or what happened instead, or whether I'm just calling it FR when in fact it's a totally different world. If it happened, but a little differently, then it's just a parallel universe sort of thing, where 99% of the world is the same as what they've read in the novels or experienced with other DMs.
The reason I'm on about it here is that filling in the missing history is essentially the same idea... righting a wrong. We won't all agree about what happened in each year, and we have to be okay with that. I like the idea of stories because other people like stories, and because the more of them we can generate, develop, and link, the more we can weave the tapestry back together.
The TOT redo is huge and barely begun, so in the meantime I'll use this thread as motivation to finish my Leira-and-Halaster-are-not-so-easily-extinguished script.
As far as something I'd like to see, but don't have the knowledge to do myself, I'd like to see smoothing of the edges between 4e and 5e. Where did Halruaa, Lantan, Luiren, Nimbral, etc go? Unther and part of Chessenta went to Abeir... what happened there, how did it possibly alter the culture? How they were brought back to Faerun is less important. What impacts are their experiences having now that they're back in Faerun? Each of those lands should have a different story, but they all need to be believable. (Within the context of magic and gods, of course, but there is still such a thing as "not believable.")
Anyway, that's my plan & thoughts. Also looking forward to seeing what others want/suggest. |
| Gary Dallison |
Posted - 04 May 2017 : 08:33:45
quote:
Originally posted by KanzenAU
quote:
Originally posted by George Krashos
You know, and for me this is sad to say, I've finally got off the bus. I'm not interested in writing for a 5E Realms. I'm more than happy to write pre-Sundering lore or general stuff that applies across all editions. My focus has always been history and there are still so many gaps to fill from earlier editions - which due to a better "lore skeleton" around them, are somewhat easier to address - that the thought of trying to write coherently in the 5E Realms is in the "too hard basket for me".
That's really very sad to hear George, though I get the sentiment - the 5e Realms doesn't really have the solid base of history the pre-Spellplague Realms had. Still, I had held out hope that you would be the Chosen One, the loremaster who knew all the lore, from every edition! Alas, perhaps it is too much for anyone to keep up with over so much time and so many drastic changes. I just really hope Ed is keeping up, and will continue to advise and contribute to the Realms as it goes forward.
Though, we could always do a project on the "lost century" instead of the Sundering - fill the gap that separates the old grognards from the young blood! Too ambitious, they said, it can't be done, they said! One Candlekeep scribe per region, witing about one decade per month, whilst sharing ideas here so we can coordinate large scale changes and events together. If we got 20 scribes together, we could have a substantial history done in a year!
I already proposed this idea for redoing the original realms timeline when 5e was just some bean counter's horrible nightmare.
Maybe it was my involvement that put people off but it had less than a handful of people interested. Im guessing that 5e realms wont get half as many interests.
As George said, creating good quality lore is hard enough. Creating it with no background detail to bed it into will require a genius the likes of Ed Greenwood or Tolkien.
Good luck. |
| Markustay |
Posted - 04 May 2017 : 02:25:08
I think I was a fiend in another life... or maybe that was just the 80's... |
| KanzenAU |
Posted - 04 May 2017 : 02:12:55
I like it Markustay, get him via the Pact Insidious... |
| Markustay |
Posted - 04 May 2017 : 02:03:17
quote:
Originally posted by George Krashos
You know, and for me this is sad to say, I've finally got off the bus. I'm not interested in writing for a 5E Realms. I'm more than happy to write pre-Sundering lore or general stuff that applies across all editions. My focus has always been history and there are still so many gaps to fill from earlier editions - which due to a better "lore skeleton" around them, are somewhat easier to address - that the thought of trying to write coherently in the 5E Realms is in the "too hard basket for me". It's akin to trying to write about "Gondolin" after reading the Hobbit. So without trying to sound curmudgeonly (sp?),I'm happy to see what people come up with. I admire their creativity.
-- George Krashos
But I wasn't thinking 'in the 5e era', I meant just rules-wise we could update them (they were rules-lite or rules-neutral anyway). For new compendiums, people would write in any era they wanted, but any rules attached to the articles would have to be done for 5e (so if you didn't have any rules, then no worries).
In other words, they wouldn't really be much different then what we did before - you can write all the 'history pieces' you want. In fact, if we did focused books (regional or whatever), then we could do some really clever stuff: ie., YOU could do a piece about Impilturran 'dungeons' - 'places of mystery' from Impiltur's past, and all the history that goes with that.
Then someone else who knows 5e rules could write-up one of those dungeons. I could do a map showing the locations of said dungeons, and maybe even a dungeon map itself. That sort of thing - everyone does what they want, and the whole things comes off as '5e', even though you could easily use that lore in a different edition (because, after all, if the dungeon isn't less than a century old, people could still use it in any published era). I backwards-engineered a bunch of '5e' locales that way - adventure sites that would have been there pre-Spellplague.
I can totally see a CKC entitled 'Impiltur and the Vast' for our very first project... tell me you'd just walk away from that?
You wouldn't want us to get it 'wrong', would you?
{Yes, I am aware that I am evil... my ex has been telling me for years...} |
| KanzenAU |
Posted - 04 May 2017 : 01:21:02
quote:
Originally posted by George Krashos
You know, and for me this is sad to say, I've finally got off the bus. I'm not interested in writing for a 5E Realms. I'm more than happy to write pre-Sundering lore or general stuff that applies across all editions. My focus has always been history and there are still so many gaps to fill from earlier editions - which due to a better "lore skeleton" around them, are somewhat easier to address - that the thought of trying to write coherently in the 5E Realms is in the "too hard basket for me".
That's really very sad to hear George, though I get the sentiment - the 5e Realms doesn't really have the solid base of history the pre-Spellplague Realms had. Still, I had held out hope that you would be the Chosen One, the loremaster who knew all the lore, from every edition! Alas, perhaps it is too much for anyone to keep up with over so much time and so many drastic changes. I just really hope Ed is keeping up, and will continue to advise and contribute to the Realms as it goes forward.
Though, we could always do a project on the "lost century" instead of the Sundering - fill the gap that separates the old grognards from the young blood! Too ambitious, they said, it can't be done, they said! One Candlekeep scribe per region, witing about one decade per month, whilst sharing ideas here so we can coordinate large scale changes and events together. If we got 20 scribes together, we could have a substantial history done in a year! |
| KanzenAU |
Posted - 04 May 2017 : 01:11:00
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
We've tried to get that restarted before, but the haziness of 4e's GSL was nothing like 3e's OGL, and everyone was afraid that by doing 'old lore' (pieces set in a time other the 4e era) could be construed as as a violation of the VERY limited 'license' (and I use that term very loosely - only an idiot would have signed that heinously one-sided agreement). Basically, we couldn't 'mix old with new', and no one really wanted to do 'new', so it never got restarted. 4e killed the CK Compendiums.
HOWEVER, with 5e here and this new DMs guild thing - why couldn't we publish a volume ON THAT under the header of 'Candlekeep', with a 'pay what you want' price, and have all proceeds go to the upkeep (and maybe update?) of this site? It might be the way to go. Maybe even revisit the old ones and update them for 5e (I wouldn't mind going back in and tweaking the names in my article, for instance).
I was thinking the same thing, re: having Alaundo upload it as a work of Candlekeep to DM's Guild, with him keeping all the profits for site maintenance (and maybe even site promotion, is such a thing is desired). My personal experience with DM's Guild has garnered a few hundred dollars for myself since I posted my first thing around July last year - not anything amazing, but I imagine such funds couldn't hurt the site.
The DM's Guild is an opportunity to spread FR knowledge like never before, and it would be awesome if Candlekeep was a part of that.
Though I'd settle for people just getting some creative juices flowing. Still gearing up for my next campaign, and despite the Sundering novel series there's still swathes of blank history to be written. I'd argue that the scribes of Candlekeep are as qualified as any to write that history. |
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