And why'd he get mazed? What'd he do? Hit a dabus with a magical duck?
"The winds in my brain direct me." - Factol Karan
And Karan was mazed, along with all of the factols except Rhys (out of Sigil at the time), Sarin (assassinated), Hashkar (assassinated), Nilesia (sold into slavery before it all went down), and Darkwood (long story involving a closed, time-like loop, and The Lady of Pain showing how truly in control of Sigil She is...). [L'har of the Bleakers went insane the week before and so his brief successor was mazed instead of him. Lucky berk.]
Not all of them 'deserved' to be mazed, but The Lady wished to make a point and She certainly made it by mazing most of the factols that weren't already taken care of in one way or another.
Can anyone give me some basic info on him.? He sounds interesting. How exactly do you lead an organization that has no goals, headquarters, membership requirements, possesions, political power....
NoncanonicallY (all of the below is made up by myself):
Karan was born in the Hive Ward to a family of stern, traditionalist githzerai immigrants. Wild and unruly by githzerai and even human standards, his family despaired of the feral child of the Hive ever becoming a rrakkma warrior.
There was that one time when he surprised an illithid merchant at its home with a pasta dish, claiming the noodles were elf brains. The mind flayer wasn't amused, but it wasn't really the same thing as rrakkma.
He fell in with the Xaositects almost from the first. Even as a small githling he could often be spotted running on walls, eating the streets, and painting peoples' meals orange. By the time he grew into his spots he was the boss of several crews, wreaking both havoc and hygiene on the denizens of the Hive and beyond..
That's when he was sent to a monastery in Limbo in the hope that they could install some of the legendary githzerai determination into his wayward mind. They weren't impressed with his suggestion of a "rrakkma foe of the month." "Why not rrakkma against halflings this time?" he would suggest innocently. "It might make a nice change." He was disparaged for his "weak" control of Chaos. "Why would anyone want to control Chaos?" he would ask before being smacked by the sensei's walking stick.
It turned out, he knew enough of Chaos to survive in the wilds of Limbo for several years after the monks finally turned him out on his ear. It has been suggested that Karan is a natural anarch - he isn't. Chaosfire can still burn him; Chaosearth can still crush him; Chaoswater can still drown him. He is simply so "in tune" with Chaos that he is able to avoid these hazards never seem to touch him. His aimless wanderings through the Soup came to an end when he discovered a tower built by Xaositects, and through them he came back to Sigil, aflame with new ideas for bringing Chaos to the cage.
Thrruppt is a death slaad who has been Karan's ally for over a decade now, even when it has been Karan's foe. They share ideas about Chaos, and though the slaad may harry and bedevil the githzerai more often than not, ultimately they are on the same side.
Karan's primary sidekick in Sigil is Rimifred Humm (male human/expert 5/NG), an unwilling accomplice who was randomly chosen by Karan one day to be his partner in crime. Over the years he has grown to like Karan in spite of himself, and has begun to gain a bewildered sense of enjoyment on those times when Karan declares him factol and he ends up in the Hall of Speakers advocating this or that insane bit of policy. The other representatives in the Hall of Speakers generally see these times as a welcome relief - if his policy proposals make no sense, at least he does.
Karan has an older brother, Gerzok, who calls himself Dicefreak. Where Karan became firmly aligned with the Xaositects, Dicefreak fell into organized crime and the trade of illicit substances like the blood of celestials and fiends. He's become an addict, dependent on celestial blood to live. Karan goes to him occasionally when he wants to stir things up with or in the criminal underworld, but generally they avoid one another.
There was that one time when he surprised an illithid merchant at its home with a pasta dish, claiming the noodles were elf brains. The mind flayer wasn't amused, but it wasn't really the same thing as rrakkma.
ROFLMAO
to the Rip!an organization that has no goals, headquarters, membership requirements, possesions, political power....
The Chaosfolk have all these things. The catch is, these things aren't stable for them.
They have goals, but their goals change with the whims of the individual Xaositects, and the whims of its bosses and factols. They change day by day, hour by hour.
They have headquarters. Broadly, their headquarters are the Hive, also known as the Chaos District, in the Hive Ward. Though the buildings there are destroyed, moved around, rebuilt, and renovated continuously, and though the district changes size and location, it's nonetheless a specific, identifiable place filled with factioneers of Chaos meeting, debating, planning, and butting heads, just like any faction headquarters. Specifically, they have gathering points like Quake's Place, Quake's Place is a tavern that looks different all the time, but it usually has the wild mage Quake Lavender in it, as well as many busy Xaositects.
They have membership requirements, and these are often quite complex and strict. It's automatic for the people that these requirements should always be different for each initiate, but each propective Chaosfolk must always be sponsored by another member. How this happens is up to them.
They have many posessions, and are constantly making more out of random junk, expensive foodstuff, and the raw stuff of Limbo. Because they recognize no laws, anything in the multiverse is free for the faction to use, as long as they can get away with it.
They even have political power, or at least they did before and during the Faction War. They had a seat in the Hall of Speakers and therefore had a vote in all of Sigil's laws. It's just like having a representive in Congress or Parliament. After the War, none of the factions have such direct political clout.
It's been claimed that 'Karan' isn't an actual person, but an identity that Xaositects sometimes blame their shennanigans on.
I remember reading something about that. You don't happen to recall the exact source, do you?
I remember reading something about that. You don't happen to recall the exact source, do you?
Nope, sorry. I read stuff all over, and I don't own any of the PS books so I can't go rooting through them to find it. Although if I were to hazard a guess, you could check the Factol's Manifesto.
Ended up playing James O'Rance's 60-player freeform The Door to Everywhere run by the man himself, as "Sly" Nye (for those of you who don't know DtE was on Mimir for ages, but the files section's gone now
).Karan was a PC in that, but the player kept getting himself stuck in jail for the most part, and I kept having to bail him out. Got kind of tiresome. The first time the Harmonium came looking for the "Factol of the Xaositects" I tried to explain to them that we had no one factol. They wouldn't believe me so I tried to explain to them that it was dependant on any number of factors, including time of day, wind resistance, and the air-speed velocity of an unladen dabus. Hell for all I knew, that blade of grass could be the factol.
They arrested the blade of grass and myself. We ended up breaking out of the jail. The next time Karan got himself stuck in jail, I told him I would only get him out if he carried the blade of grass around with him to protect him from the Harmonium. Then nabbed the grass (when the player went to work) and played a complicated shell game with the Harmonium of "who has the blade of grass" (where the player had to admit if they did actually have the blade of grass, and therefore were the factol).
Towards the end of the game, the GM let the "you must be this faction" stricture go, and the Xaositects gained about 10 Illusionists and Zadara (a titan) because we seemed to be having the most fun. We put an illusion of the Dabus deconstructing the Door on the Door itself, and Invisibility on Zadara and the Door, and had Zadara wander off with the Door to the Shattered Temple to destroy the gate (because everyone was fighting for it, and if we got rid of it, then all their "plans" would be disrupted).
Does Karan exist? Maybe. Maybe he's a githzerai (or githyanki). Maybe he's just impersonated by the other Xaositects. Maybe he's just a piece of grass. Maybe he's an embodyment of an idea (that the other Xaositects take with them to show faction backing).
The Xaositects are a meritocracy, where the best idea wins (even if it is the worst idea). They differ from the Ciphers (first idea is best), because there is random sorting involved (unless they decide there's not). Why do they have a factol? Because everone would expect them not to.
It's all about the ideas, baby.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going try to tie-dye the Harmonium's armour stores.
Ended up playing James O'Rance's 60-player freeform The Door to Everywhere run by the man himself, as "Sly" Nye (for those of you who don't know DtE was on Mimir for ages, but the files section's gone now
The Mimir's file section is not gone, but it has become very hard to find.
http://mimir.net/torment/files/index.html is where it is now.
And I do recommend that everyone download The Door to Everywhere.