Forgotten realms general

Hopefully all of them, the stupid Mary Sue bitches.

I have a few questions you guys might be able to help me with.
I know of Thar and Veldorn but are there any other monster nations? Why were the psions of Jhaamdath called bladelords, and their cities named the cities of the sword?
Is psionics a type of magic that uses the weave or something else?

Note: I'm not an expert, just an enthusiast.

>I know of Thar and Veldorn but are there any other monster nations?
Not that I'm aware of. There might be a few obscure ones. There's the Sythscillian Empire, I guess?

>Why were the psions of Jhaamdath called bladelords, and their cities named the cities of the sword?
If I recall correctly, they had a strong martial tradition and trained with blades religiously. They were warrior psion kings as I remember. Pretty neat.

>Is psionics a type of magic that uses the weave or something else?
I believe it does use the Weave, but I don't know the Inner Art too well.

>I know of Thar and Veldorn but are there any other monster nations?
Many-Arrow used to be an orcish realm in the Silver Marches aiming to be an actual unified and centralized kingdom with settled diplomatic and commercial relationship with its neighbours. I don't know if it's still a thing as of 5e.

From Player's Guide to Faerun, page 172:

>Psionics and the Weave

>Unlike spells, which derive their power from Faerûn’s Weave (or the Shadow Weave), psionic ability taps only the inner reservoirs of the manifester. In a sense, each psionic creature is its own Weave, using the magic of its own lifeforce and mind to create psionic effects. Mystra and Shar have no ability to deny psionic creatures access to powers, and they do not control the promulgation of psionic lore and ability throughout the populace of Faerûn.

>While psionics does not require the Weave to function, psionic powers are magical in nature. Spells such as detect magic can also detect psionic abilities at work, and spells such as dispel magic or antimagic shell can negate, suppress, or completely cancel psionic manifestations. In Faerûn, psionics and magic are not transparent to each other; they interact exactly as magic interacts with other magic.

There's also an article that describes psionic organizations in Faerun:

>archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/frcc/20070703

Thanks guys, you're a big help.

Why does everything on the internet sound sarcastic?

No clue, there's probably a study somewhere that can explain it.
I just wanted a monster nation for the bad guys in a game I'm running and couldn't think of any, and next time I get the chance to play I'm planning on playing a psion so I was curious about psionics in the setting.

We're not used to sincerity.

There are more psionic organizations in Player's Guide to Faerun. You also could use Duergar, as mentioned in Underdark.

It's on the map of the Sword Coast in the SCAG, so I'd lean towards "yes".

Wizards have no concept of right and wrong.
Archwizards blow the fuck out of even that.

Good to see these threads.

If you consider half-drow to be monsters, there's the nation of Dambrath whose matriarchy follows the tenets of Loviatar rather than Lolth.

On the plains of the Shaar there are the wemic tribes. And occasionally Nobanion manifests there to lead the wemics to destroy evil.

Pharaun Mizzrym is best drow.
Could anyone remember which issue of Dragon he was given stats in?

>Pharaun Mizzrym is best drow.
Tbqhwyf I liked Ryld better, but Pharaun is certainly a close second.
Liriel and Gromph Baenre follow for 3rd and 4th.

The FR wiki says Dragon #302.

The long and short of it was the Netherese mages, after discovering the Nether scrolls and becoming too powerful too quickly, were casting spells that current FR has never even heard of.

Their rampant spellcasting was constantly fraying the Weave, and the era's Mystryl had to constantly maintain the fabric of the Weave.

The Netherese were also indirectly and inadvertently affecting the lives of the phaerimm, who decided to push back by casting lifedraining magic on Anauroch (which was then a fertile plain).

It could've been the phaerimm who whispered the doom of Netheril to Karsus, who then chose to steal the essence and power of the goddess of Magic to try to halt the desertification of Anauroch and ensure the hegemony of Netheril forever.

Alas, the mighty fall the furthest.

tl;dr Netheril archwizards are total dicks. They disrupt the lives of the phaerimm, who are also colossal dicks, perhaps even bigger tools. They engage in a cold war.
Fuck Mystryl.

I dunno, Ryld was a bit bland in terms of personality. We only saw fleeting characterizations of Gromp, didn't he do poorly against the Dyrr lichmage and the mind flayer? Liriel was Liriel.

Thanks heaps brah.

Is dnd.rem.uz safe?

Seems like it. Just picked up a few solid pdfs I didn't already have.

Excellent. Cool.

Speaking of Dragon magazine, those Elminster's Guide to the Realms articles was the fucking shit. Especially those fantastic accompanying illustrations.

Yeah, that was a solid series. Shame Dragon died a terrible death, I loved the old Dragon magazine.

Yeah, tell me about it. Definitely.

What was the reason for Dragon's and Dungeon's inglorious deaths? And can the 5e Wizards resurrect them as print-issue?

Something something paizo's retarded something something infinite sadness

In reality, I have no idea why they died, but it makes me super sad that they did.

In other news, has anyone seen a copy of Grand History of the Realms in person in the last few years? They've seemed to dry up entirely.

Ryld's okay.

Ryld as statted in Dragon would completely rekt Drizzt in a fight. It's not even a fight, it'd be a curbstomp.

Paizo would definitely be involved for infinite sad.
It was super lame.

Nah, but have a pdf of it. Maybe they were just on a limited print run like that mind flayer cover for Volo's.

Yeah I've got a pdf, but I want to complete my Faerun 3e books and am missing like three: Silver Marches (which sucks and I don't care), City of Splendors (which is insanely hard to find but I'm not excited about so whatever), and Grand History (ditto, and I really want it). Hope I can find one for Christmas as a gift to myself this year.

>It's not even a fight, it'd be a curbstomp.
Would it? They're just one level apart, and their magic equipment should be pretty much on the same level too.

How would an archduke of the nine hells get an airship onto the material plane? A player of mine drew the Flames card from the Deck of Many Things last session, and now has a devil after his ass. I chose the Zariel as the devil that wants to kill him. At first it's only assassinations and ambushes. Then it gets a little more direct and personal. The party has an airship. I want a monstrous, gun laden airship from hell to attack them, but I'm not sure how a devil would actually go about having that accomplished. I don't want to just wave my hand and say "she just did".

Gate? Gate can totally do that. Or just plane shift the entire ship, I feel like it's reasonable for an archduke to be able to arrange that. Seems like a lot of effort just to kill one yobbo when sending one super powered diabolic killer is so much easier, though.

The how is easy: a Gate or Portal or Planar Shift spell, but why would be a more fun question to answer.

The party is very good at taking what are supposed to be hard encounters and making them look easy. After a series of failed attempts, I imagine the devil will make a personal appearance and take the airship with her just for funsies.

OG user already answered the Why though: Deck of Many Things and an archdevil with nothing else going on.

Fun fact. One of the 11th level spells Netherese Archwizards could toss around was a spell that completely closed off the entire Torilian crystal sphere from spelljamming travel.

Mystryl reincarnating into Mystra and putting in some extra rules on high end magic is the best thing that ever happened to Toril.

It's still around, but it's basically falling apart because orcs are too difficult to keep aligned in that sort of common goal.

Didn't help that the drow used them as a puppet kingdom for a while, either.

Gromph got weird in the Homecoming books. Including randomly trying to seduce Catti-brie by putting psionic images of her banging him into her head, giving her sex dreams of him, and so on.

>Gromph got weird in the Homecoming books. Including randomly trying to seduce Catti-brie by putting psionic images of her banging him into her head, giving her sex dreams of him, and so on.

I don't remember that part.

It was in the second book, Maestro. He learned psionics from Kimmuriel in the first book and accidentally the Underdark by summoning the Demon Lords, but in the second he used it exclusively to try and NTR Drizzt by fucking Catti-brie for I don't even know why. Shit was weird, a very noticeable departure from how RAS has written both Catt-brie and Gromph before, and pretty much completely out of place.

Ditto Yvonnel Baenre, Gromph's daughter (who acts a lot like Liriel, now that I think about it), trying to seduce Drizzt.

Then there was the casual rape/sex of Dahlia while her mind was broken by what seemed to be half of the main antagonists.

Maestro was a pretty rapey book.

Was someone else moonlighting as Salvatore?

Yes. Drizzt only has a certain number of items. Not even statboosting items, while Ryld has a plethora.
It also makes sense for Drizzt to go into combats raw.

This is fucking great.

Maybe he was just feelin' rapey that week? Or he developed a new rape fetish and shoehorned it into the book because he's stupid?

Fucking wat.

Proposing reasons why Maestro was such a rapey book.

Let's not be that creepy.

doyouknowwhereweare.png

Favorite FR gods of peeps?

Joke answer: Ibrandul
Real answer: Illmater

I homebrewed one for my FR story, but of the defaults, I like Eldath and Eilistraee.

Damn, Ilmater is popular. Why he's not a greater god is beyond me.

I like him because he feels real, a god people would really turn to in times of need or strife.

Is he the FR Jesus?

The Triad are basically the Catholic Divine. You've got Ilmater, Jesus on the Cross (the God on the Rack and the Martyred God), Tyr the Father (justice, impartiality, might in anger, perseverance), and Torm the Holy Ghost (the empowering spirit, the most loyal of all the Gods, but asking much trust and faith).

Bahamut (or Marduk if you prefer) is a favourite of mine.

Also, I honestly have a soft spot for Mystra. Not necessarily her NG incarnation, but Mystra as a whole.

Bahamut the Platinum Dragon?

When did Mystra start popping out the Seven Sisters while possessing that sorcerer? Was this as or after Mystryl?

Yeah, that Bahamut.

Mystra popped out the Seven as Mystra, starting around 760 DR with Sylune. It was after her most recent failure at finding a mortal who could handle her essence (she had Khelben, Elminster, the Srinshee, and one or two others, but it wasn't enough), so she decided she'd produce them herself.

When you put it that way, it's not even subtle.

Ah, thanks.

She certainly gets around doesn't she.

Have Azuth and Elminster banged Mystra?
Which others?

Azuth, Elminster (when she was in a mortal body, though, and she wound up dying in it and losing part of her essence, so she doesn't do it much now), Dornal Silverhand (minimum seven times because it resulted in the Seven, probably much more), probably others here and there. Kelemvor, in her Midnight incarnation. Usually she avoids it if she can.

I always haven't gotten why elves in the Realms were so fucking short.

What a hussy. Her picture in F&P makes her look like a bikie hussy.

F&P Mystra is the Midnight version.

Please give me the names of all these books, and tell me where I can read them online.

Can anyone tell me about Lathander? I wanted to make a super positive cleric of Lathander that tries to convert anyone he comes across but now I read that Lathander is actually some other god instead? Can I still make a cleric of Lathander in 5e?

Lathander is back in 5e he became amaunator during 4e, so yes you can.

That was always shit, they should've been two different deities, each representing different aspects of the sun.

Lathander is based af. Unlike other chumps he actively tried to better his pantheon by rekting evil gods.

Wait, what? He's a sun god? I thought he was a god of fertility, aka sex god.

He kinda is, sorta. In the 2e Faiths & Avatars he's the god of spring, dawn, birth, renewal, creativity, youth, vitality, self perfection, athletics.

He's a powerfully exuberant god of good and fears no evil, but I'm also pretty sure he has form of godly adhd. He will start shit and finish shit, but what happens in the middle is a bit muddled.

He started the Dawn Catacyclsm by trying to reorganize his pantheon in his own image by destroying evil gods. It's heavily implied once he finished the persecution of evil deities he was going to cleanse all Faerun of evil.
His avatar rekt'd Sammaster.
He's had many dalliances with female gods, currently he's with Chauntea but was with Tyche.

>destroying evil gods
It wasn't just evil gods he destroyed.

He indirectly caused the death of Murdane. Now he's in Helm's Shitbooks.

i grabbed a torrent with many fr novels in txt form a few years back off demonoid.

wotc wanted to do it in-house, cut paizos main income source. they switched to online issues. theyre not going to come back in 5e in any official capacity. they have their web aeticles now under the name unearthed arcana

these days ive been leaning away from trying to hunt down original 2e books, and toward editing the pdfs to be edition neutral and get them custom printed and bound in a hardcover.

Oh man, I truly miss Zodonia. Those comics were fantastic.

Update Lathander to 5e, fucker.

Decent books.
Sub-plot with sharkgirl felt meh and rushed after all the build-up how she wanted the shark dick.
Iakhovas himself was neat until the TWEEST about his true identity.
Human MC was insufferable, the build up about him being the chosen one terrible too.
The side cast aka Paladin-Mentor, Half-Elf Pirate and qt Shipmage were best things about the books.

Looking at Dragon #312, I think he was given magic items equivalent to a PC of his level, instead of an NPC value like Drizzt.

The Red Knight.

>His avatar rekt'd Sammaster
Only because the Harpers and his church got the drop on him.

I would have liked to get more stories about them.

>Only because the Harpers and his church got the drop on him.
Hah, no. You severely underestimate how powerful the 2e avatars were.

Even acting like a retard in battle, Lathander one-shot Sammaster's dracolich. His mere presence caused the undead surrounding their confrontation to be obliterated. He also essentially dropped a nuke of sunlight on Sammaster.
Meanwhile, Sammaster's attacks on Lathander were largely ineffectual.

Do you even praise the Sun?

...

Despite 3e and 4e FR being a goldmine of absolute crap, I did like the Red Wizards of Thay essentially monopolizing the commercialization of minor magic items and installing embassy-tradehub-enclaves in most cities.

Is Gilgeam truly dead?

At the end of the Sundering he showed up back on Toril, apparently. 5th book of Brimstone Angels.

Do any of them ever die?

Turns out that it's really, really hard to kill a god permanently.

They can die. It's just really, really fucking hard, especially for mortals, since most gods have various schemes in place to ensure their resurrection.

So their massive corpses on the Astral plane is but a temporary and momentary set up for them?

Corpses on the Astral won't necessarily stay corpses forever.

Unless the corpse is Aoskar.

Someone said Ao exploded? Who else will foil the shenanigans of the gods and teach them humility?

Lathander is pretty based, I really like his transformation into Amaunator. It felt like he matured and became more lawful as a result, but unlike the original incarnation of Amaunator, he retains a inter goodness to temper his dedication to justice.

Cyric. You seldom encounter a god who decides that his whole purpose is making other people miserable. He is the closest to a Deity that would take a look at 4chins and then gigglesquee with delight. He is THE go-to power if you want to be Cobra Commander. If you are an asshole and want to be rewarded for it, you join the Church of the Black Sun.

I've been re-reading the Wyrms of the North articles in the Realms archive on the Wizards site Ed is a fantastic world designer and fluffer, but as an author he's not actually that great.

What edition? If it's 2e, Spelljammers end up everywhere.