Subject: MYSTARA-L Digest - 7 May 2004 to 8 May 2004 (#2004-98) From: Automatic digest processor Date: 09/05/2004, 17:00 To: Recipients of MYSTARA-L digests Reply-to: Mystara RPG Discussion There are 4 messages totalling 137 lines in this issue. Topics of the day: 1. Averoigne (2) 2. Castle Amber and Amber Chronicles (was: Re: [MYSTARA] Tsathoggua) 3. Races ******************************************************************** 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: Sat, 8 May 2004 06:04:10 -0400 From: Michael McConnell Subject: Re: Averoigne I've been digging up some Clark Ashton Smith stuff recently and thought people would be interested in this link: http://www.eldritchdark.com/misc/cycle/index.html About half the Averoigne stories are actually on the site (those not in print), I haven't read them all yet. To my knowledge, Smith never used Tsathaggua in Averoigne, but there's always room for interpretation. The original stories make it out to be almost like Ravenloft, there's a lot of vampires, ghosts, etc. ________________________________________________________________ Get your own evilemail.com address at http://www.evilemail.com ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 8 May 2004 04:36:27 -0700 From: Andrew Theisen Subject: Re: Averoigne Michael McConnell wrote: I've been digging up some Clark Ashton Smith stuff recently and thought people would be interested in this link: http://www.eldritchdark.com/misc/cycle/index.html About half the Averoigne stories are actually on the site (those not in print), I haven't read them all yet. To my knowledge, Smith never used Tsathaggua in Averoigne, but there's always room for interpretation. The original stories make it out to be almost like Ravenloft, there's a lot of vampires, ghosts, etc. Actually, Tsathoggua was CAS' creation, and used pretty much throughout his "major" cycles (Zothique, Hyborea, and Averoigne). There is a synopsis on the website you mention (from his "Black Book") for a story he never got around to writing that was to take place during the Roman conquest of Averunnia (Averoigne) wherein the slumbering Sodaqui was to be encountered by the "hero" of the story. Other than that, though, I think you are right about Tsath not being used explictly in Averoigne. He was used (and named) more frequently in CAS' Hyborea stories (if you can, you might try and track down a copy of his Hyborean cycle in paperback. I got one a couple years back and it's awesome. Definitely material worth mining in there for Mystaran Hyborean campaigns). There are explicit ties between Averoigne and Hyborea, however (the Ring of Eibon- Eibon being a sorcerer of one of the Hyborean tales; several others). Most of the Cthulhu mythos beings aren't encountered very explicitly in Averoigne- usually just mentioned, if that. That, plus what is perceived as the "dark humor" of the Averoigne stories leads many mythos purists to discount their connection to the Lovecraftian mythos. Myself, I really love the Averoigne chronicles. They are a really interesting blend of "traditional" fantasy with the Cthulhu mythos, which makes them perfect for D&D types of games (presumably why Tom Moldvay used them as inspiration for X2). Vampires, werewolves, lamia (not the half-lion kind- more like the lamara half-serpentines from the Creature Catalog), gargoyles, golems (the flesh colossus from the Epic Handbook is definitely based on the Colossus of Ylourgne). Heck, most of the stories could be used as is in Glantri as inspiration for adventure. Anyway, some really great stuff there. That site is great (and they've redone it recently- looks really nice!) ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 8 May 2004 05:18:36 -0700 From: Andrew Theisen Subject: Castle Amber and Amber Chronicles (was: Re: [MYSTARA] Tsathoggua) Havard Faanes wrote: > In what ways have you used Zelazny's ideas IYC? I am also a big fan of the Amber >series so Id like to hear more about this part. Great! Didn't realize there were other Amberphiles here! Basically, I always assumed Moldvay's Amberites were inspired by the Amber Chronicles as much as the rest of the module was inspired by the CAS stories. Don't know what the story is behind this or not, but given that, I decided to try and match the characters as best I could with the characters from the Amber Chronicles. I go back and forth on this one (still), primarily due to there being more d'Ambrevilles than there are (major) Amber characters. There isn't an exact one-to-one correspondence, therefore, but I use them as general guidelines, instead. The idea is further complicated by the relationships given to the d'Ambrevilles in Gaz3 (X2 only said that Magdalene and Charles were brother and sister, Henri was Etienne's brother, and Catherine his wife.) Here's the correspondence I use, for what it's worth: Etienne= Corwin Henri= Brand Catherine= Dara Jean-Louis= Gerard Andre-David= Julian (my personal favorite) That's as straightforward as I could get. Even here, Etienne and Henri could be like Corwin and Eric. So there's room for interpretation. After this, I tended to stay as close to the relationships in Gaz3 as possible. Thus: Richard= Eric (brothers, antagonistic and competitive) Isidore= Fiona (most powerful sorceress, actively plotting) Magdalene= Deirdre (believed dead, dark haired) Janette= Llewella (the one character from the books to have the least impact on things) After that, it gets even tougher. Claude= Random. I could also go with Merlin (both characters who don't think/get along well with the rest of the family, and with close ties to Corwin/Etienne) Isabelle= Flora (the only daughter left unconnected, plus she's described as being somewhat of a debutante in the Mystara products) Gaston= Delwin (I'm stretching now.) I could also go with Dworkin the madman here (as I have him, he's the master Trump artist in the family anyway), but I backed away from that due to the age thing. Although, since I'm just doing personality matches, mostly... Guillaume= Dalt (see- stretching). He's big, blond, and likes to beat people up. He's also anti-religionist (as Dalt was- his mother hated the Amberite cult of the Unicorn). Camille= Dworkin (she's mad, she's older than the rest). Marie-Helen= ? I don't really know. I guess, given her martial and antagonistic nature, as well as being an "elder" of the bunch, she could be a match for Oberon. Simon= Bleys (again, a stretch, but my Simon is different from the one in Gaz3 and later. Mine is evil from the beginning, not just when he goes to Averoigne. He also plotted with Henri and Catherine to oust Etienne. He's somewhat changed after the Grey Mists, though.) Charles= Caine (another of my favorite characters. He's different, too. In the beginning, more cunning and conniving. The Land of Grey Mists really does a number on him.) If you notice that I left out Benedict- you're right. I thought Richard might be a good match for B, but that would change the whole dynamic. So my "Benedict" character is actually an illegitimate child of Michel d'Ambrevilles who didn't quite make it to Mystara. Exactly why is a story known only to a few, but most of the family think Etienne had something to do with his death. Anyway, as I said, I mainly use these characters as "blueprints". The actual characters as I have them are somewhat different. Plus, I have added characters to the history (past and current). The original temple plans from X2 have all the statues in the front being historical members of the family, so I'm still filling in the family tree, plus I have at least one illegitimate currently alive (Petit-Singe, as I mentioned) and the "Countess" who is living in Ne'er-do-Well (which is my Freeport for Mystara, to bring this thread to another area... someone mentioned Freeport recently, IIRC.) I make use of the Trumps- the family has them, and uses them. I actually started to write a story (only have the first chapter done) set during the Forty Years' War in Glantri, with Andre-David as the narrator, wherein the family is beset by plotting- all of it directly related to Halzunthram and the rest of the backdrop of that era. Hope to get back to it soon- been writing a lot more recently. I even had a sequel planned (too ambitious, I know) set during the Land of Grey Mists, with Claude as narrator. Anyway, I'm still trying to figure out how to do Trumps 3E style- the magic item rules are... difficult. It comes out way too expensive, even when I tone it down, power wise (using only Greater Teleport rather than Gate for the transport effect). Yet some of the items WotC has made don't add up the way they say they should... so I'm still working on that. > Actually, that gave me an idea. What if Etienne's > spell allowing the Amber Family to escape to Mystara > also brought with it other things... Including the > dark god Tsathoggua, who is now sleeping below > Nouvelle Averoigne? As I recall (from my Cthulhu books), Tsathoggua is an entity often appealed to for transportation type spells in particular (one of the reasons I used him aside from the CAS ties). It was always my intention that it was through lore gleaned via Tsathoggua that Etienne was able to transport the family- that, and the gates used to travel to other lands from Averoigne, such as the fey homeland of Sephora (whose daughter, IMC, Genevieve de Sephora, was formerly his lover). So taking the big T over could very well have occurred- perhaps the "price" of transportation? As for why? I don't know. The big T and the other Great Old Ones (Cthulhu, etc.) are all very similar to the Burrowers- the B's descriptions have always reminded me of the GOOs (entities on a par with the gods/immortals, slumbering/dead underneath the earth, awaiting being awakened/revived, reaching out to the dreams of mortals, etc.). Maybe that could be a tie- maybe there's a tie with the Outer Beings? All possibilities. Or how about- one thing that always bugged me about the Klantyre/Sylaire relationship was the antagonism between them didn't seem too clear. The McGregors lost one of the d'Ambreville's portals or something? Didn't seem all that compelling to me. So how about this- Part of Tsath's bargain with Etienne was that he would be transported along with the d'Ambreville clan, but Etienne reneged and tricked the GOO. Seething, the GOO managed to make contact with a group of people- similarly magically inclined- with whom the d'Ambrevilles had recent history with- the McGregors of Scotland. (IMC, the McGregors and d'Ambrevilles first came into contact during the Hundred Years' War, when Scotland had allied itself with France against England. A few of the d'Ambrevilles had gone overseas to aid the Scots in their battles, and met the McGregors... I can't recall the specifics offhand- most of this is on a disk I can't seem to find, but I based it on the RW McGregors who actually weren't well liked at the time... anyway). The McGregors, persecuted for heresies similar to their allies the d'Ambrevilles, were given the same deal by Tsathoggua- take me with you, and I will teach you how to leave this world and enter another. The McGregors, not knowing (or caring) any better, agreed, and brought the elder evil with them, earning them the eternal enmity of the d'Ambrevilles (whom they likewise grew to despise, for not bringing them in the first place). ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 8 May 2004 13:39:02 -0700 From: Joaquin Menchaca Subject: Re: Races For half-elves, there's some problems with the books saying different things. Some say, no half-elf (or half-sylvan race) period. Other sources say they exist. Then there's the GAZ5 true half-elf. Then there's a magical race, that has the same stats as half-elves, and their creation is a mystery. -- Joaquin __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Win a $20,000 Career Makeover at Yahoo! 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