Gildesh
by John CalvinWhat do we know about Gildesh?
I’ve done some research on the subject which can be found in a couple of threads here (which I don’t want to re-hash, but I’m going to pull some timelines from) Most of this information can be found/derived from the Savage Coast Campaign Book and Orc’s Head Peninsula Campaign Book:
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From the Savage Coast Campaign Book
Savage Coast Campaign Book
Character Kits
Orc’s Head
Ee'aar and Enduks
BC 3000: Great Rain of Fire and subsequent Wasting disease devestate the planet. Gildesh is called upon by his patron to protect the faithful and devotes the next 700 years of his life to that service [See Tabernacle of Gildesh]
BC 2300: While elves and humans held power in the east, the enduks were created in the far west. Their first cities were built about 3,000 years ago on the Orc's Head peninsula. [ I moved this date back a bit from BC 2000 to allow time for Gildesh and his newly created followers to thrive before the betrayal of Minoides in BC 2000].
BC 2000: Minoides, corrupted by greed and violence, betrays Gildesh over a holy treasure and murders him. With his dying breath, Gildesh curses his murderer and his treacherous lackeys. They lose their wings, and flee Nimmur to become the minotaurs of the world.
BC 2000 - BC 500: Gildesh was slain, but not destroyed. He reappears to his followers every 300 years and rules over them for a mortal generation. Between BC 2000 and BC 500 he should appear to his followers another 5 tims.
BC 700: The manscorpions eventually arrived in the nation of Nimmur, the then-thriving kingdom of the enduks, where they were welcomed.
BC 500: At about the same time, the manscorpions betrayed the enduks and conquered Nimmur, causing the noble, winged minotaurs to relocate to a peninsula across the sea to the west.
AC 900: The orcs of the Dark Jungle attacked the manscorpions of Nimmur, and the enduks and ee'aar took advantage of the distraction to attack as well.
AC 990: Idu's herald Gildesh returns and is now ruling for another mortal lifetime. [Assuming Orc’s Head is set in AC 1000 - I can’t remember]
AC 1000: Once home to winged minotaurs known as enduks, Nimmur is now a nation of manscorpions. Recently, enduks and their allies, flying elves known as ee'aar, have retaken a small part of Nimmur and established a small, independent state (Um-Shedu).
While reviewing this material there are several interesting questions that occurred to me.
- What form does Gildesh return to Mystara as (shedu, enduk, or something else)?
- How long is Gildesh’s mortal life?
- Where does he go in between visits?
It seems obvious that Gildesh must exist in at least one other location while not living his mortal life on Mystara with the enduks. As he is a devoted servant to Ixion/Idu, that probably means that he spends some time on Ixion’s home plane helping out his patron (and maybe managing his own little section of the plane).
At a minimum, I’d cut that 300 year span in half, giving Gildesh 150 years on Mystara, and 150 years on Ixion’s Plane. Then I thought of something else. While Gildes is allowed to come back every so often and help out his enduk followers, those enduks aren’t exactly the same as the ones who founded Nimmur during the glory days (back in BC 2000 or thereabouts). Wouldn’t that also be a great excuse to move some of the golden era enduks to the Hollow World.
So now I’m thinking that it might be fun to populate a small floating continent with BC 2000 era enduks - golden age enduk. And if that was the case, then why shouldn’t Gildesh stop by and help them out as well. Maybe in their case though, it’s more like a period of rejuvenation for Gildesh, before returning to the outer planes.
So if we break his “lifetimes” down to periods of 100 years each, Gildesh can now visit 3 different locations. 1) Outer Mystara where he can help his followers regain their glory, 2) The Halls of Gildesh in the Hollow World where he can purify his soul before returning to 3) Ixion’s Home Plane. Then the cycle repeats.
How could we make the three locations similar, but different? The Mystaran enduks are obviously struggling, trying to reclaim their former glory from the manscorpions. The Hollow World enduks would be shining examples of their culture, but perhaps a bit stagnant. Then what kind of place would Gildesh return to on Ixion’s home plane? Any thoughts?
[Also - and I'm not sure this really stuck with me before, but Gildesh is on Mystara in the modern era! How come we haven't ever talked about that before!!!???]