Mysterious Places: The Lands of Robilar - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 extempus Jan 15, 2008 17:17:58	Here's the latest installment of Mysterious Places, The Lands of Robilar: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=lg/lgmp/20080109a
#2 mortellan Jan 16, 2008 3:37:04	Good to see the column is still going. Strange, this one might've been useful around August when the Castle Greyhawk mod came out.
#3 extempus Jan 23, 2008 2:11:54	The final paragraph is rather interesting: Some of the villagers of Furzehill have recently reported seeing a tall, middle-aged, bearded warrior poking about the ruins of Robilar's manor. Always encountered alone, the man is friendly enough to those who approach him but has eschewed all offers of assistance. He is also evidently a skilled warrior, as a group of unfortunate black-hearted adventurers discovered to their cost a few months ago. The warrior's true interest in the ruins remains unknown. Obviously, the implication is that the "tall, middle-aged, bearded warrior" is Robilar incognito, having returned from the Bright Lands for some reason. However, over at Pied Piper Publishing, there is a lot of information on Robilar (Robilar Remembered: Lord Robilar & Co.), including an alternate history that explains his strange alliance with Rary and betrayal of his former friends. In a nutshell, Robilar had brought back several scrolls from the City of the Gods near Blackmoor, one of which had clone inscribed on it, gave them to Otto and provided him with a piece of flesh. After he released Zuggtmoy from the Temple of Elemental Evil, he fled as Tenser, many adventurers from Hommlet, elves etc pursued him and sacked his castle, and told Otto he was going east over the Solnor to the Empire of Lynn in the western part of Oerik and to clone him "to cover his escape." The clone was not killed as Robilar expected, and Otto assumed the original Robilar had died since the clone did not go insane since that is what usually happens with the spell, so he never told anyone. Well, Robilar did survive and the clone slowly went mad over the years. If that is what happened, then the "tall, middle-aged, bearded warrior" seen poking about the ruins of Robilar's estate may be the original Robilar, having returned from the far west (or wherever else he's been for the past few decades), trying to piece together what happened all those years ago before possibly revealing his identity...
#4 rob_douglas Jan 23, 2008 6:34:37	That would work if you use that history of Robilar. However, the mystery of Robilar was "solved" officially in the Expedition to Castle Greyhawk product. I would expect this LIving Greyhawk product to support that interpretation: Show Robilar was actually swapped with an evil version of himself from another universe via a sphere found in the castle. The adventurers swap him back in the course of the adventure, and then the returned "good" Robilar swears them to secrecy as he goes off to try to clear his name and recover his lands. He is persona non grata in Greyhawk after all.
#5 extempus Jan 23, 2008 17:28:36	Interesting... but since I have almost zero interest in 3e and 3.5e, I had no idea, but both versions could still work... the evil Robilar is the one who was cloned and escaped east over the Solnor, and he's the one who returned from the Empire of Lynn (or wherever he's been) and started poking about the ruins of his estate. Actually, that idea works well, especially since most of our characters are from a parallel Oerth anyway... when they first came to the Universe they adventure in now, they encountered evil counterparts of themselves. We were in one vimana, spotted them in it's counterpart, and we all kinda looked at each other, stunned... it came down to a single initiative die roll, our side won, and we killed our evil counterparts (I sometimes wonder what would have happened had the evil counterparts won that die roll)...
#6 richtrickey Jan 24, 2008 10:30:11	Interesting... but since I have almost zero interest in 3e and 3.5e, Then, no offense, but why are you posting in this thread, and not on PPP?
#7 extempus Jan 24, 2008 19:55:17	This is about Greyhawk, isn't it? Regardless of the game mechanics of the edition, the basic information is still useful (and I might get Expedition to Castle Greyhawk anyway, but I'll wait till 4e comes out, then I can get a cheap one from someone trying to unload all their 3e and 3.5e stuff on ebay)...

Post/Author/DateTime

Post

extempus

Jan 15, 2008 17:17:58

Here's the latest installment of Mysterious Places, The Lands of Robilar: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=lg/lgmp/20080109a

mortellan

Jan 16, 2008 3:37:04

Good to see the column is still going. Strange, this one might've been useful around August when the Castle Greyhawk mod came out.

extempus

Jan 23, 2008 2:11:54

The final paragraph is rather interesting:

Some of the villagers of Furzehill have recently reported seeing a tall, middle-aged, bearded warrior poking about the ruins of Robilar's manor. Always encountered alone, the man is friendly enough to those who approach him but has eschewed all offers of assistance. He is also evidently a skilled warrior, as a group of unfortunate black-hearted adventurers discovered to their cost a few months ago. The warrior's true interest in the ruins remains unknown.

Obviously, the implication is that the "tall, middle-aged, bearded warrior" is Robilar incognito, having returned from the Bright Lands for some reason. However, over at Pied Piper Publishing, there is a lot of information on Robilar (Robilar Remembered: Lord Robilar & Co.), including an alternate history that explains his strange alliance with Rary and betrayal of his former friends. In a nutshell, Robilar had brought back several scrolls from the City of the Gods near Blackmoor, one of which had clone inscribed on it, gave them to Otto and provided him with a piece of flesh. After he released Zuggtmoy from the Temple of Elemental Evil, he fled as Tenser, many adventurers from Hommlet, elves etc pursued him and sacked his castle, and told Otto he was going east over the Solnor to the Empire of Lynn in the western part of Oerik and to clone him "to cover his escape."

The clone was not killed as Robilar expected, and Otto assumed the original Robilar had died since the clone did not go insane since that is what usually happens with the spell, so he never told anyone. Well, Robilar did survive and the clone slowly went mad over the years. If that is what happened, then the "tall, middle-aged, bearded warrior" seen poking about the ruins of Robilar's estate may be the original Robilar, having returned from the far west (or wherever else he's been for the past few decades), trying to piece together what happened all those years ago before possibly revealing his identity...

rob_douglas

Jan 23, 2008 6:34:37

That would work if you use that history of Robilar. However, the mystery of Robilar was "solved" officially in the Expedition to Castle Greyhawk product. I would expect this LIving Greyhawk product to support that interpretation:

Show

Robilar was actually swapped with an evil version of himself from another universe via a sphere found in the castle. The adventurers swap him back in the course of the adventure, and then the returned "good" Robilar swears them to secrecy as he goes off to try to clear his name and recover his lands. He is persona non grata in Greyhawk after all.

extempus

Jan 23, 2008 17:28:36

Interesting... but since I have almost zero interest in 3e and 3.5e, I had no idea, but both versions could still work... the evil Robilar is the one who was cloned and escaped east over the Solnor, and he's the one who returned from the Empire of Lynn (or wherever he's been) and started poking about the ruins of his estate.

Actually, that idea works well, especially since most of our characters are from a parallel Oerth anyway... when they first came to the Universe they adventure in now, they encountered evil counterparts of themselves. We were in one vimana, spotted them in it's counterpart, and we all kinda looked at each other, stunned... it came down to a single initiative die roll, our side won, and we killed our evil counterparts (I sometimes wonder what would have happened had the evil counterparts won that die roll)...

richtrickey

Jan 24, 2008 10:30:11

Interesting... but since I have almost zero interest in 3e and 3.5e,

Then, no offense, but why are you posting in this thread, and not on PPP?

extempus

Jan 24, 2008 19:55:17

This is about Greyhawk, isn't it? Regardless of the game mechanics of the edition, the basic information is still useful (and I might get Expedition to Castle Greyhawk anyway, but I'll wait till 4e comes out, then I can get a cheap one from someone trying to unload all their 3e and 3.5e stuff on ebay)...