From: Roger Nolan (Roger.Nolan@Symbian.com)
Date: Tue 04 Jul 2000 - 02:02:26 EEST
Mark Galeotti said:
>
> Re: Cacodemon
>
> Nicely nasty ideas, Roger! The ritual is a good idea, as
> is the re-writing of the myths from the ogrish perspective.
> It raises an interesting question as to whether such
> nasties' myths would be self-consciously evil
It's difficult to put yourself in the mindset of a being who wishes to
destroy the world. I think that Ogres genuinely know that the world is a
bad thing which needs to be destroyed and that humans were put here for them
to eat etc. For them evil would be something like tending a garden or
building a big city - "how disgusting, the sad little food things are trying
to preserve the world, they truly are evil. We must eat them more
quickly..."
That's why I tried to rewrite the myth from the Ogre's perspective.
>
> As regards the Other Side, the whole question of where
> chaos gods reside is still (to me, at least - heavy hint
> for anyone able to enlighten me to do so!) unclear. I'd
> prefer to think that Cacodemon now roams and preys as he
> pleases, and therefore could be anywhere on the God Plane,
> in nooks and crannies between established realms.
I agree, I'm not happy with the situation where all Chaos gods tend to
become animist traditions. It seems unbalanced - it also doesn't fit with
the fact that Thed and Tein etc. are all gods, not great spirits. Perhaps
I'm being too literal that said, we do know that these guys live in the god
plane, not the spirit plane.
> He
> promises no afterlife - indeed, I'd say that part of the
> very foundations of 'Cacodemonism' would be "get what you
> can now, forget the future" - so that his worshippers
> either (as in the RQ version) become part of primordial
> chaos or (as I'd prefer) have their spirits consumed by him
> for sustenance. After all, he has a small worship base on
> which to rely, so needs everything he can get from them!
I like this, it also meshes fairly nicely with Ian Thomson's:
"the only comment I have is that whenever an ogre makes a successful DI in
my system, a fiend bursts forth from their remains (the body bloating and
expanding in cthulhic style)". Which I also like very much.
I guess the Cacodemon's "guarantees" of life after death become something
like:
After death, the Cacodemon eats his worshipers souls; there is no afterlife.
I think that you can also use this to explain the cacodemon's relative power
For Ogres who have been true to Cacodemon on the mundane plane a successful
appeal to Cacodemon will cause him to send a fiend to consume their soul.
The fiend will remain near the death site until the next cacodemon holy day.
next to his small worshiper base by saying that when someone is eaten using
Cacodemon's eat feat their soul is also eaten by the Cacodemon. This would
affect the hero quest needed to resurrect such people, indeed, you'd
probably want to go on a HQ just to save their soul, never mind resurrect
them.
> I don't think I'd take 'skills' to mean 'skills taught' -
> the latter implies structure and hierarchy, but it is more
> a case of what sort of skills would a Cacodemonist have or
> aspire to. In this context, I'd say:
Fair enough.
> Another thought that just occurred to me is that Cacodemon
> might work very well as an animist tradition
See above, I'm not happy with this as it makes the god's plane a little like
the AD&D happy hunting grounds. Lot's of bad stuff happened in the gods war
but, after time began all the bad guys had to retire to the spirit plane
because they didn't have enough worshipers.
I think that there must be something else going on - either like my
suggestion for sending souls to feed the cacodemon or, something someone
else suggested earlier that by worshiping (say) Urox and recounting the way
he slew Wakboth, you're also inadvertently worshiping Wakboth himself.
Anyone care to nip round to their local Urox temple and tell the lads this
theory?
Actually, this could be one of Nysalor's secrets.
> It's worrying how interesting one can find such an
> unpleasant bunch!
Hey, they're just misunderstood. They're not the most 'misunderstood'
either; can't wait until I need a Thanatari :-)
Cheers
rog
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