Alzrius wrote:
:angelhideOn the minus side, the more it changes from the original X1 Isle of Dread, which is still one of my favorites.
I am currently thinking about having X1 being in the distant past, while running Savage Tide in the post 1000AC era. Sort of like how X6 and X9 got retconned after Bruce Heard rewrote the lands on which those adventures were based.
Is there a particular reason WoTC does not want to see rakastas in 3.5E? Does it overlap with the cat people in the Miniatures Handbook?
They actually go into that in some detail. Apparently the original Olman settlers had some shamanistic animal cults form, and which later became shapeshifters. After the original savage tide, only the jaguar clan survived. After multiple generations, the werejaguars became the rakastas.
Unfortunately, the original savage tide had long since turned some of their number into skinwalkers (who'll be covered in more detail in "City of Broken Idols" in issue #145), who warred against their rakasta cousins, and succeeded in wiping them out a few years ago. The issue says that some may survive elsewhere on the Isle, and that it's "certain" that some escaped, but as a nation on the Isle, the rakasta are extinct.
So, not only do we get some backstory on the rakasta, we get the hint that some did escape, and we'll get even more info on them- via their nasty, altered descendants the skinwalkers- in #145.
(Not sure I care for the idea of the rakasta coming from the Jaguar clan, but as Savage Tide isn't set in Mystara, nominally, it's understandable that they made a change. Easy enough to alter for Mystara in any case, by making that part of the mythology of the island dwellers- over time, they merely came to believe the rakasta were once human.)
Is there a particular reason WoTC does not want to see rakastas in 3.5E? Does it overlap with the cat people in the Miniatures Handbook?
Still unknown. Even Mike McArtor of Dungeon magazine recently posted that there is some unknown mandate against it. His explanation seems to jibe with your own suggestion that they seem to want to only use the catfolk, though.
(Why they decided to create a completely different catfolk race rather than use a perfectly good and well-developed one that was already extant in the WotC/TSR catalog is beyond me, though. I could see if they were trying to create a baseline, +0 level race for PCs to use, but even the catfolk are a +1 LA, so...????)
I am currently thinking about having X1 being in the distant past, while running Savage Tide in the post 1000AC era. Sort of like how X6 and X9 got retconned after Bruce Heard rewrote the lands on which those adventures were based.
Why not make the assumption that X1=AC1000 and Savage Tide=AC 1010?
Depending on the details ofcourse, one might not need more than a decade to explain changes like the elimination of the Rakasta.
I like how that little detail was added BTW.
Havard
Depending on the details ofcourse, one might not need more than a decade to explain changes like the elimination of the Rakasta.
Especially taking into account what happened during the course of that decade (WotI), which had sweeping changes across the globe. Maybe the initial Savage Tide took place on the Isle during this time?
Why not make the assumption that X1=AC1000 and Savage Tide=AC 1010?
Depending on the details ofcourse, one might not need more than a decade to explain changes like the elimination of the Rakasta.
I like how that little detail was added BTW.
Havard
Good point, especially if you keep the general backstory with the demon presence on the Isle of Dread, as introduced in Dungeon #114.
Checking Dungeon Magazine #114 again, the basic history is kopru ruled the island for millenia, warring with devilfish and other aquatic races, the kopru lost the war and went into decline. So far, so good on compatibility.
Then the Olman(Greyhawk) humans settled the island 1300 years ago, the Great Wall was built to protect the way in(!) to the city on the plateau, and the kopru caused the downfall after about 300 years by introducing a pearl which eventually expanded the jungle, introduced the dinosaurs and demons, and destroyed the city on the plateau.
The biggest advantage for having 3E Isle of Dread and Savage Tide on Greyhawk is that we can pick and choose what we want to keep for backstory in Mystara. So when I mentioned having X1 in the distant past, I was thinking of the Isle of Dread having just dinosaurs and not Demogorgon's demon presence.
I like the idea of the dinosaurs always being there, but, as I am seeing in Savage Tide, having the demons there while running a straight X1 adventure without Savage Tide works well. With the kopru there worshipping Demogorgon, demon presence goes back as far as these do.
So after typing and thinking this, yeah, no reason you can't run X1 whenever you want.
Good point, especially if you keep the general backstory with the demon presence on the Isle of Dread, as introduced in Dungeon #114.
Checking Dungeon Magazine #114 again, the basic history is kopru ruled the island for millenia, warring with devilfish and other aquatic races, the kopru lost the war and went into decline. So far, so good on compatibility.
Then the Olman(Greyhawk) humans settled the island 1300 years ago, the Great Wall was built to protect the way in(!) to the city on the plateau, and the kopru caused the downfall after about 300 years by introducing a pearl which eventually expanded the jungle, introduced the dinosaurs and demons, and destroyed the city on the plateau.
The biggest advantage for having 3E Isle of Dread and Savage Tide on Greyhawk is that we can pick and choose what we want to keep for backstory in Mystara. So when I mentioned having X1 in the distant past, I was thinking of the Isle of Dread having just dinosaurs and not Demogorgon's demon presence.
I like the idea of the dinosaurs always being there, but, as I am seeing in Savage Tide, having the demons there while running a straight X1 adventure without Savage Tide works well. With the kopru there worshipping Demogorgon, demon presence goes back as far as these do.
So after typing and thinking this, yeah, no reason you can't run X1 whenever you want.
I agree with you that there is no reason to explain a sudden appearance of dinosaurs on the Isle. They could easily have been there all along.
Demons were clearly not present (at least not in any noticable scale) in the X1 era, but is there any reason why they couldn't be more recent arrivals? The pearl could still be the source of the demons, but perhaps in was only recently activated?
Havard
Especially taking into account what happened during the course of that decade (WotI), which had sweeping changes across the globe. Maybe the initial Savage Tide took place on the Isle during this time?
Quite possible. I remember someone (you?) suggesting that the Age of Worms Adventure Path was also taking place during WotI explaining why the actions of Kyuss would go unnoticed by the Immortals. That made sense to me.
Havard
I agree with you that there is no reason to explain a sudden appearance of dinosaurs on the Isle. They could easily have been there all along.
Demons were clearly not present (at least not in any noticable scale) in the X1 era, but is there any reason why they couldn't be more recent arrivals? The pearl could still be the source of the demons, but perhaps in was only recently activated?
Havard
You and I, and I think most Mystara fans agree the dinosaurs having been there all along is better. We benefit from having an Immortal dinosaur known for managing preservation projects to answer any questions about the implasibility of having them last to the present day on the island while having died out almost everywhere else.
The original pearl is portrayed as having caused the downfall of the city on the central plateau, and all other settlements on the island other than those on the peninsula. IMO the original Savage Tide having occurred a long time ago works better, but if you come up with another way the kopru caused the downfall of the central civilization, you could have the first Savage Tide just corrupt the dinosaurs, or skip it altogether.
I get the impression that Mystara is being picked over for the spoils of plunder.
Yeah but still to tie the isle of dread with Greyhawk kinda sucks. it is as though these guys fail to see the big picture Mystara is in its own universe.
I get the impression that Mystara is being picked over for the spoils of plunder.
That, unfortunately, happened long before 3E. Forgotten Realms copied all sorts of stuff from Mystara, like the magic of the Minrothad Sea-Princes.
But honestly, I am glad Savage Tide is not set in Mystara. There are some devoted Mystara fans at Paizo, but they cannot take the time and effort to integrate Savage Tide and the 3E Isle of Dread with all the Mystara history and background. It simply isn't feasible while getting a magazine out the door every month. They would have to take shortcuts and make mistakes, and would only give us another version of Mystara(we already have the BECMI version, the Gazeteer version which varies slightly, the 2E version, etc).
This allows us to basically take the Savage Tide adventure path, jettison anything that doesn't work, without having people argue that what is being jettisoned is "essential Mystara canon". For example, I do not like having the dinosaurs show up when the Isle of Dread is connected to Demogorgon's realm 1000 years ago. I want those dinosaurs to always have been there as a lost world or possibly some link to the Hollow World.
It is also why I think we should concentrate on having several choices for marking major groups/locations in this adventure path, so people can pick and choose what works best in their Mystara campaigns.
Looks like the Rakasta of the Isle of Dawn are going to be taken into account somewhat after all... wonder what wiped them out? Darn genocidal humans and/or kopru! :fight!:
It was the deadly WotC plague.
(Why they decided to create a completely different catfolk race rather than use a perfectly good and well-developed one that was already extant in the WotC/TSR catalog is beyond me, though. I could see if they were trying to create a baseline, +0 level race for PCs to use, but even the catfolk are a +1 LA, so...????)
I wonder if it's that WIzards think that rakasta is too similar to rakshasa (the cat headed outsiders) and would confuse newbies?
Regards
Gary