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Old 08-05-2018, 10:39 AM   #1
Dalin
 
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Default Elder Things

One of my players has a cleric who has "Hidden Lore: Elder Things" and would like to speak and read/write the Elder Tongue. Basically, just some fun plot hooks.

I've realized, however, that I don't have a firm idea of what role I want Elder Things to play in the campaign. I've looked over the five Elder Things listed in Monsters and read the few snippets relating to them in the other books. I'm mulling a number of ideas but thought I would mine the collective intelligence for additional inspiration.

How do you use Elder Things in your games? Are they a common feature? Just monsters to be defeated or a significant component of your campaign backstory? How do Elder Things relate to gods, angels, and demons? (Do Elder Things have gods?)

Last edited by Dalin; 08-05-2018 at 10:49 AM.
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Old 08-05-2018, 11:13 AM   #2
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Welcome traveller! Kromm's posts in this thread have the answers you seek.
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Old 08-05-2018, 01:21 PM   #3
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Default Re: Elder Things

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Originally Posted by Dalin View Post
How do you use Elder Things in your games?
My 'Elder things' is a broad category that runs from Joe Squidface right up to Primordial Outsider (so from 'adventurer type' to 'deity').

Quote:
Are they a common feature?
Ehhh... depends. Sometimes I decide the 'villiany' needs to be from Team Squid, but most often it's just a Joe Squidface, or even maybe Lesser Outsider (think 'demon level' Elder Thing) getting up to their own thing while the actual problem in the background has nothing to do with them. And honestly I try to use them less than half the time, about as often as I might interject demons.

Mostly this boils down to 'motivations'. Are they personal (Joe Squidface), impersonal (Elder Deity), or externally motivated ('demon' servitor)?

Quote:
Just monsters to be defeated or a significant component of your campaign backstory?
They're a part, but I'm not sure I'd call it significant. More, "took advantage of what they could when things fell apart" than "made things fall apart".

Quote:
How do Elder Things relate to gods, angels, and demons? (Do Elder Things have gods?)
See the first line above. Some Elder Things worship their own gods (some of which aren't even Elder Things) and some can be considered on par with deities.


So, the five in Monsters would fit in like so:

Demon From Beyond the Stars is roughly 'demon' level. It might serve a more powerful Elder Thing. Might not.

Eyes of Death are just monsters.

Mindwarpers are powerful Joe Squidfaces. These guys are basically potent adventurers and probably worship some dark, dread, dead Elder Thing 'god'. They usually have personal motivations.

Spheres of Madness are just monsters.

Watchers at the Edge of Time. These guys a re 'demon level'. They probably serve some other Elder Thing 'deity' or maybe not.
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Old 08-05-2018, 04:08 PM   #4
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Default Re: Elder Things

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Originally Posted by martinl View Post
Welcome traveller! Kromm's posts in this thread have the answers you seek.
That was a revealing reference, thanks.

What really surprised me about the Elder Thing, Demon from Between the Stars, in Monsters was their low IQ (6). This is reinforced in the description where they are "about as intelligent as apes."

Furthermore, on a quick check, other Elder things such as the Eyes of Death and Watchers on the Edge of Time show them to have average IQ of 10.

I had always assumed that part of the terror of such alien beings came from their advanced intelligence that was perceived to humans as incomprehensible and mind-warping. That being said, I am not that well-versed in the Cthulhu mythos.

Maybe the intention in the DFRPG is that the Elder entities are so alien that any translation in terms of human intelligence is irrelevant. Therefore, we would witness their behavior as inexplicable even though they had terrifying abilities that quite affected us.

In any event, this lack of IQ made it more difficult for me to relate to the real nature and role of the Elder Thing in the DFRPG universe.
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Old 08-05-2018, 07:09 PM   #5
Dalin
 
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Originally Posted by martinl View Post
Welcome traveller! Kromm's posts in this thread have the answers you seek.
That is a great thread! Now that I see it again, I recall reading it last year, but I wasn't building my own campaign at the time. Thank you for the tip.
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Old 08-05-2018, 10:24 PM   #6
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My concept is that Elder Things are part of the original chaos that the Creation was made from. The chaos has existed even before the gods. The gods are spiritual and thus live outside of creation and they are divided into good and evil. Creation was created by the Divine but there were still pockets of chaos within this Creation which defy the laws of reality. Elder Things seek to destroy Creation because they are chaotic and creation is ordered by the Divine. Elder Things are a threat to all that exist mortal, Divine and Infernal because they wish to destroy both the spiritual and material world, both Heaven and Earth. Luckily, Elder Things are so chaotic that they do not mount organized wars on reality often. The Elder Things are served by aliens that were not created by the gods.
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Old 08-06-2018, 08:16 AM   #7
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I had always assumed that part of the terror of such alien beings came from their advanced intelligence that was perceived to humans as incomprehensible and mind-warping.
This is true of the Elder Things that fill a role outside Creation analogous to that filled by dwarves, elves, humans, etc. within Creation. That's why even Joe Boring Mindwarper starts at IQ 18. But most of the Elder Things met within Creation fill a role outside Creation analogous to that filled by sharks, fungus, rabid dogs, etc. within Creation: They're a menace or an all-consuming blight or a disease leaking in from Outside. The smarter Elder Things don't particularly like visiting Creation because it's dimensionally constrained and has linear time, and there are deities with the power to affect them there. When they want cultists eaten, they send their IQ 6-10 hounds.
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Old 08-07-2018, 09:01 AM   #8
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This is true of the Elder Things that fill a role outside Creation analogous to that filled by dwarves, elves, humans, etc. within Creation. That's why even Joe Boring Mindwarper starts at IQ 18. But most of the Elder Things met within Creation fill a role outside Creation analogous to that filled by sharks, fungus, rabid dogs, etc. within Creation: They're a menace or an all-consuming blight or a disease leaking in from Outside. The smarter Elder Things don't particularly like visiting Creation because it's dimensionally constrained and has linear time, and there are deities with the power to affect them there. When they want cultists eaten, they send their IQ 6-10 hounds.
You don’t have any Elder Things lurking in the blackest part of space? I always liked the idea from Call of Cthulhu where a cultist summons an Elder Thing which flies down to Earth from space and of course needs some food before performing his duty. Also the fungi from yugguth were cool to me as an alien race plotting against humanity. I always thought of Elder Things as being the aliens of the horror genre while demons, undead and other evil beings were the Infernal type.
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Old 08-07-2018, 09:19 AM   #9
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You don’t have any Elder Things lurking in the blackest part of space?
The Dungeon Fantasy Roleplaying Game doesn't have "the blackest part of space."

The laws of physics clearly aren't the same as ours in dungeon-fantasy worlds, as magic routinely violates conservation laws, laws of motion, quantum principles, etc. In a universe where things can be conjured out of nothing, disintegrated, teleported, changed in nature, and be spookily acted upon at a distance – and the future divined, and probability altered – there's no reason to believe that there would be astronomical objects tracing orbits through the vacuum of space.

Beliefs about stars sitting on the dome of the sky and the sun being pulled by a chariot are probably true, as the gods associated with those beliefs exist, grant magic to clerics, and sometimes even intervene directly. The most likely result of flying too high isn't suffocating in a vacuum but being cooked by the sun or struck down by the gods.

So to give Elder Things a place to live, the DFRPG puts them Beyond Time And Space.
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Old 08-07-2018, 09:35 AM   #10
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Kromm View Post
The Dungeon Fantasy Roleplaying Game doesn't have "the blackest part of space."

The laws of physics clearly aren't the same as ours in dungeon-fantasy worlds, as magic routinely violates conservation laws, laws of motion, quantum principles, etc. In a universe where things can be conjured out of nothing, disintegrated, teleported, changed in nature, and be spookily acted upon at a distance – and the future divined, and probability altered – there's no reason to believe that there would be astronomical objects tracing orbits through the vacuum of space.

Beliefs about stars sitting on the dome of the sky and the sun being pulled by a chariot are probably true, as the gods associated with those beliefs exist, grant magic to clerics, and sometimes even intervene directly. The most likely result of flying too high isn't suffocating in a vacuum but being cooked by the sun or struck down by the gods.

So to give Elder Things a place to live, the DFRPG puts them Beyond Time And Space.
So there is no “stars are aligned” in DF?
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