Subject: MYSTARA-L Digest - 12 Apr 2003 to 13 Apr 2003 (#2003-102) From: Automatic digest processor Date: 14/04/2003, 17:00 To: Recipients of MYSTARA-L digests Reply-to: Mystara RPG Discussion There are 7 messages totalling 310 lines in this issue. Topics of the day: 1. Aligment Languages: The rationale (3) 2. Forgotten Places of Davania (2) 3. Ettin's Riddle 4. Ettin's Riddle Session ******************************************************************** The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp The Mystara Homepage: http://www.dnd.starflung.com/ To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 13 Apr 2003 01:21:47 -0700 From: Joaquin Menchaca Subject: Re: Aligment Languages: The rationale Alignment Languages is some Gygax thing presented in AD&D, 1st Edition. It's really retarded and no one that I know uses it. I used it initially because it was in the rules, but over the years abandoned it as it was just silly. Now, after several years, and knowledgeable in 7 languages ranging from Japanese to Amharic, I think even more so than ever that it is silly. Fortunately, it was never carried on in AD&D, 2nd Edition, nor D&D 3rd Edition. - Joaquin __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Tax Center - File online, calculators, forms, and more http://tax.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 13 Apr 2003 04:35:24 -0500 From: Magister Mystaros Subject: Re: Aligment Languages: The rationale Actually, the concept of "Alignment Tongue" originated in Original Dungeons & Dragons, in the original, very first set. There are three influences on the concept, adn how languages work in OD&D: 1) The most important one is that the game was early on influenced by the work of Michael Moorcock, specifically, the Elric series. In the Elric series, and in all the Eternal Champion series, the concepts of Law, Chaos, and Neutrality (as in the Balance) were not merely an ethical compass, but as of "firmaments of reality." When you aligned yourself with Law, id didn't just mean that you were "acting in a manner according to the laws of the land," but that you were part of an organization/brotherhood/extra-planar power-bloc called Law. That Law would have it's own language was no more unusual that to state that the Roman Catholic Church had it's own tongue (Latin). 2) From the Tolkien side of things (which actually was less of an influence on Gygax than Dunsany, Clark Ashton Smith, and Howard), you could see the origin of the concept of the "Common" tongue, which was really more than simply a "lingua franca," as it has been considered for some time. It was not "a" common tongue, it was "the" language known as Common. This is reflected in how it works in Greyhawk; it is Common, not a language commonly spoken. It doesn't even have it's own name, unlike in many later game settings. Mystara branched off from this with "Common" merely being the lingua franca, the "language commonly spoken" in the region (Alphatian, Thyatian, Slag, or Thratian, being the four most "common" tongues.) The Forgotten Realms maintained the idea of the "Common" tongue, though that was one of the bits of Toril lifted wholesale from Middle Earth (in the best D&D tradition). 3) All creatures that could speak were given their own language, though there was no list of the different languages at the time. Thus, elves spoke Elf, dwarves spoke Dwarf, and so forth. However, humans did not speak "human," they spoke "Common." Using the original definition, as it being an individual language separate and distinct from any one culture or society, you can then view the Alignment tongues as being the languages of the "Lawful Peoples," "Neutral Peoples", and "Chaotic Peoples," in the absence of a distinct setting. You just had to remember to cry out "Be ye for Law or be ye for Chaos!" in the right language... James ****************************** James "Mystaros" Mishler Freelance Writer and Troubleshooter mystaros@earthlink.net ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 13 Apr 2003 14:17:00 -0400 From: Geoff Gander Subject: Re: Forgotten Places of Davania I wrote: > It could be, if you wanted it to be. To be honest, I never had an exact > place for it, save only that it should be located somewhere in the > Aryptian Desert, or its fringes. Upon further reflection, you could probably place the ruins of Yath-Khe just to the west of the ruins labelled "3" on my map of that region, so that they would be located in the desert. "3" was supposed to be the ruins of a Varellyan city, dating from the time when that nation was an empire in its own right. The Davania online discussion group debated it for a time, but nothing really official was decided upon - at least to the extent that someone took the idea and wrote something about it. So in that sense, those ruins could be anything the DM wanted them to be (including Yath-Khe). I hope that clarifies things a bit, Geoff -- Geoff Gander, BA 97, MPA 02 Carnifex Loremaster/Mad Roleplayer Master of the Elemental Plane of Bureaucracy au998@freenet.carleton.ca : www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Realm/2091 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 14 Apr 2003 00:04:03 +0200 From: Thibault Sarlat Subject: Re: Forgotten Places of Davania ok, i'll complete my 8 miles per hex maps of the region accordingly. thanks Thibault Sarlat. ICQ 16622177. Personal homepage http://www.mystara.fr.st thibault.sarlat@wanadoo.fr ----- Original Message ----- From: "Geoff Gander" To: Sent: Sunday, April 13, 2003 8:17 PM Subject: Re: [MYSTARA] Forgotten Places of Davania > I wrote: > > >It could be, if you wanted it to be. To be honest, I never had an exact > >place for it, save only that it should be located somewhere in the > >Aryptian Desert, or its fringes. > > Upon further reflection, you could probably place the ruins of Yath-Khe > just to the west of the ruins labelled "3" on my map of that region, so > that they would be located in the desert. "3" was supposed to be the > ruins of a Varellyan city, dating from the time when that nation was an > empire in its own right. The Davania online discussion group debated it > for a time, but nothing really official was decided upon - at least to the > extent that someone took the idea and wrote something about it. So in > that sense, those ruins could be anything the DM wanted them to be > (including Yath-Khe). > > I hope that clarifies things a bit, > > Geoff > > -- > Geoff Gander, BA 97, MPA 02 > Carnifex Loremaster/Mad Roleplayer > Master of the Elemental Plane of Bureaucracy > au998@freenet.carleton.ca : www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Realm/2091 > > ******************************************************************** > The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp > The Mystara Homepage: http://www.dnd.starflung.com/ > To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM > with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. > ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 13 Apr 2003 18:09:51 -0700 From: Joaquin Menchaca Subject: Ettin's Riddle Hi, There's this really nice small adventure form Wizards. I modified to use Karameikan names and religious background, e.g. swap out Heironeous and replace him with Halav. Anyhow, I used it personally, and I was wondering if anyone else wanted it. It's a rather large file though. The file was originally 500KB, but once I edited in Acrobat 5.x (and after several crashes) it grew to 5 MB. I think printed to PDF, and now it's at 400KB. Go figure... Anyhow it's at: http://www.angelfire.com/ca4/ShadowTriad/books/er2.pdf __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Tax Center - File online, calculators, forms, and more http://tax.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 13 Apr 2003 18:11:36 -0700 From: Joaquin Menchaca Subject: Ettin's Riddle Session Hi, I actually had the opportunity to run this session, and if anyone's curious, here's the details: -------------------------------------------------------- A druid of Irenke asked the Weeping Wench Party to go on a small mission for him, and adds further enticement to anyone by offering a 100 gold to anyone whom participates. The party enters a town and witnesses the atrocity of a rampaging ettin, a 13-foot 5200 pound 2-headed giant. The party immediately investigates and discovers that these disturbances have occurred within the last 5 weeks. It seems almost daily the ettin rampages through town destroying buildings and people to get at one of the cattle. At night, the ettin curiously sneaks around town. The party forms plans to see if they can communicate with the ettin believing that perhaps there is something more to the ettin mystery and sure enough they reveal that the ettin was once a priest named Circu that was somehow polymorphed into his current form by a vanquished evil wizard Stanislav. Now, he seems cursed in this form, and is desperately trying to figure out a riddle inscribed on the walls of a shrine to Halav. The party trails the ettin upstream and discovers a fallen tree that crosses the river. Moric gets separated from the party as his horse falls off the log when crossing. The trio: dwarf, hin, and Dorine gypsie, trail the ettin, while Moric retrieves his horse a second time after falling off the log. The trio discovers a pair of orcs that parley with the party, and give them directions to OldKeep, where the ettin lairs. The trio later encounters a pair of ogres that attempt to clumsily ambush the party. Moric encounters the same pair of orcs and draws his bow. Six other orcs come out of the woods and engage in combat. Meanwhile, the trio, with some well placed crossbow bolts fired from Bolto and Matai, drop the two ogres. The trio eventually tells Circu why he is cursed, and Circu ponders this. At this time a mob of villages led my Matiatias, whose father was killed by the ettin, is bent of vengeance. Their anger is diffused and they are convinced to defer any action for a day. The next morning arises, and Moric is nowhere to be seen. The ettin comes rampaging out of the keep, and a battle ensues. Bolto manages to command one of the heads to "sleep", and at this moment Circu casts a spell, which causes him to revert back to his original self. Meanwhile, Moric recovers, but finds himself completely naked and stripped of all of his belongings. In the aftermath, order is restored, the villagers are grateful, and Moric is hellbent of bringing vengeance to the orcs and also zealous in retrieving his belongings. In this pursuit of this he accuses gnomes of being thieves and fires upon a lone satyr in the woods. -------------------------------------------------------- I have it in HTML format at: http://www.angelfire.com/ca4/ShadowTriad/er1.html __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Tax Center - File online, calculators, forms, and more http://tax.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 13 Apr 2003 22:06:34 -0700 From: Beau Yarbrough Subject: Aligment Languages: The rationale At 01:21 4/13/2003 -0700, Joaquin Menchaca wrote: > Alignment Languages is some Gygax thing presented in > AD&D, 1st Edition. It's really retarded and no one > that I know uses it. It predates AD&D. It was in the original booklet version of D&D. Check out the Best of the Dragon, Volume 1, if you want to see some wacky stories about languages from that era. ("My character speaks Wall.") BEAU http://www.LBY3.com/ ------------------------------ End of MYSTARA-L Digest - 12 Apr 2003 to 13 Apr 2003 (#2003-102) ****************************************************************