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    Canonfire :: View topic - Oerth's Creation Myths
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    Oerth's Creation Myths
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    Adept Greytalker

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    Fri Nov 16, 2007 12:46 am  
    Oerth's Creation Myths

    Is there any canon creation myth for Oerth? If not, has anyone come up with one? I could always do my own, but I'm curious if there's a canon version (or several). I'm working on some ideas about the ancient history of Oerth, and it seems right to include the creation myth(s).
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    Fri Nov 16, 2007 6:00 am  

    I don't know of any official creation myths for Oerth, although I have had two approaches which I've considered.

    It's not a complete creation story by any means but the "races books" have two or three stories in them which are bent towards how a various races rose up from nothing so to speak. Obviously one doesn't work with the other unless you get creative and try and write them together pulling ideas from each. The other idea I came up with for my campaign (although most of it was never actually brought up in the game) so it still very much subject to question and alteration. This is a really rough sketch which isn't very well thought out so bear with me....

    Essentially what I was considering is that Oerth existed before the planes did. The gods that were alive back then lived on Oerth amongst their worshippers (who are referred to as mortals), this includes humans, elves, orcs, etc. In these days it was almost common to rub elbows with the gods, so there would have been many stories about deities and mortals (kinda like the greeks did), it also begins to account for the on and off approach Greyhawk has had towards deities being involved with Oerth. This would have been over 10,000 years ago. I come up with that number because the history of dragons in the books indicate that they are that old and that they taught other races civilization. This kinds helps me date things. I'd say more about this but it interferes with another effort I'm working on at the moment.

    Now far off in the Dramidj Ocean the gods had a giant temple of sorts where they dwelled. The temple consisted of several rocky peaks that rose hundreds of feet into the air. Each god had their peak in which a temple dedicated to themselves stood. Other towers were created to hold the essence of what the world of D&D is kinda about. For example, there were three towers, each dedicated to the three different alignment groupings of good, neutral, and evil. Other pillars were dedicated to the creation of various other planes. Others still, were dedicated to magic, one for arcane and another for divine. Each held the essence of its magic and it was here that mortals would tap into. Think of it as a well of magic that replenishes itself (or is suppose to). These two temples were to have guardians which would stay for centuries at a time before they sought out someone new to take the position.

    Now back in the day, mortals were very dedicated to one deity each. They didn't jump around offering prayers to every deity. Like clerics, each person had their one deity which they held dear. This worship gave the gods more power rather than worship one god here today, worship another god tomorrow.

    Now I had always been a fan of the white plume mountain module and the unique weapons lying within. What I decided to do was to have them be divine weapons belonging to different gods. At one point these gods were using these weapons while battling Hextor. Hextor being a great god of war, managed to disarm each one and their holy weapons fell to Oerth. The gods didn't retrieve them after the fight was over (not sure why) though. Eventually, mortals discovered them and started using them. Now up until this point the relation between mortals and gods was great. The deities were extremely happy with their creations.

    Now naturally mortals using divine magic such as the gods weapons wasn't going to go well. Eventually the weak willed minds of the mortals became corrupt with power, jealosy, hate, etc. Anyway, this slowly corrupted mortals further and further, eventually carrying over to the weapons themselves. The gods considerably disappointed with their mortal creations chose to leave the mortals and adapt new homes on the various planes, save but the couple that currently live on Oerth. Their home of Oerth was partially destroyed when they left and cleverly disquised to prevent mortal from finding it.

    The Deities waited for centuries upon centuries to see what direction mortals would take. This kinda takes into the account that the deties have that non-interferance pact. Nothing improved and in fact only got worse. After considerable debate, they finally gave mortals a dead line to straighten up, if they failed to, each deity would cast a judgment upon Oerth which was according to their individual influences, which pretty much brings an end to the non-interferance pact.

    Over time, the weapons have passed in and out of history. Eventually some mortals even made replicas of the weapons although these were much weaker (thus the weapons in white plume mountain). One of the goals of our campaign is for the PCs to collect all the original divine weapons and return them to emissaries of the gods in an effort to show that mortals deserve some mercy. At this point, two weapons have been collected and given to celestial beings of the gods who originally possessed them. The weapons were then taken to the gods home plane to be purified (cleansed of the mortal corruption what eventually tainted them). We have two more to locate. The idea was to eventually collect all four (one was added in the Return to White Plume Mountain module) and have them purified, then the gods would return them to the PCs who would bring them back to the gods original pillar temples in the ocean where they would remain. I thought of this as the last step of a mortal apology to the gods as well as a final test of faith and dedication to them.

    The imitiations are quite powerful and would be basically like the epic versions of the weapons. The real ones were (are) all screwed up and pretty much mirror what is found in the module White Plume Mountain (except that they would be more powerful).

    I also worked in that Hextor made a pact with Tharizdun (before he was imprisoned). Tharizdun gave him his extra arms in return for service one day. Tharizdun is the primary evil force in the campaign, with Hextor slightly lagging behind as another related formidible force, along with all of their lackeys who obviously are rather powerful. This becomes important as the campaign develops. At this point, Tharizdun is still trying to get loose but in the meantime holds influence over Hextor. The evil god of war is making a move for power as well, trying to take over large swaths of land (as discreetly as possible) in order to prepare for a major invasion.

    Now the days of judgments have come. If the mortals don't change their ways the judgments will complete themselves and the gods will return to Oerth having divided it up into lots, and essentially start over with what is left. They won't destroy everyone or everything but many would die and those that remain would hopefully return to the proper way of worship as it was in the beginning. This explains Hextor's sudden grab for power, since his lot is the Flanaess. He's trying to get a head start on things plus try and figure out how to back out of he's deal with Tharizdun before its all to late.

    As a side note, prophecies play a big part in the camapign and a couple of them include a great war between divine and arcane casters of magic. This is something which Tharizdun is quietly instigating in order to try and put an end to resistance from other deities in regards to his escaping and trying to destroy the world. What he has essentially managed to do so far is have followers create Pillars of Spiritual Corruption which slowly bleed off the faith of worshippers of specific gods. He figures its a good place to start for all the trouble everyone has caused him.

    Another related prophecy is the waining of magic on Oerth as determined by Boccob. This is occurring because the current resident of either the good or netural pillar temple (haven't decided which) is dying and has yet to find a suitable replacement. I was considering offering the job to a worthy PC when the campaign comes to an end some day and everyone retires their characters.

    I know I went into a lot of other stuff which was more campaign related but the creation story (which is very incomplete) was designed around the campaign itself. Looking back on it, I would probably do something totally different now, but at the time it filled in gaps and kinda tied important campaign issues together. As I said, it was really little more than an idea or sketch, something which was and is subject to alot of change.

    What would I do now, probably try and take what is in the books, tie it together, fill in the gaps, use some of the story above and see if I could make a half way decent creation myth out of it all. What I have is strictly a bare bones skeleton. I had yet to go into specifics of how they races were created by the gods, how they related to one another, who changed from good to evil and vice versa over time and all the other countless things a complete creation story might involve.
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    Fri Nov 16, 2007 5:39 pm  

    Yeah, I was thinking of going through the various race and mythology books from all editions to see what I could find and work into a coherent creation myth. I was just bein' lazy Laughing . Some of the old Dragon issues might have some little tidbits, too.
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    Fri Nov 16, 2007 6:19 pm  

    There is no canon creation myth, per se. However, there is a general sort of theory that is somewhat widely accepted - unfortunately, it's so sketchy it barely qualifies as a myth. Basically, it asserts that prior to the creation of Oerth there were various "primordial" gods. Included among these were Tharizdun, the Earth Dragon, the Elder Elemental God, and various others. At some point and form some unknown reason, Beory came along and created Oerth, bringing into being various other gods at more-or-less the same time. See what I mean? No details, just a vague theory. I think Gary Gygax suggested something similar in his interview from Oerth Journal #1 (or was it #2? I can't remember.)

    I hope you post whatever you come up with, though, since I've been tinkering with that idea for almost 30 years. Somehow, I've never quite found the time to come up with anything useful.
    GreySage

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    Fri Nov 16, 2007 7:17 pm  

    The dragons believe that their god of creation, Io, created the potential for existence by spilling his own blood into the Second Void. Only then could later creators spring into being and begin their work.

    The giants believe that their creator god Annam created the worlds of the Material Plane, perhaps from his dreams.

    The dwarves (and some humans) believe that the world was forged by Moradin.

    The Velunan Book of Incarum claims the moons were created by Rao in order to light way of the faithful in the midst of Tharizdun's darkness.

    I'm sure Lendor, Beory, Istus, Procan, and so on also receive their share of myths and credit. Perhaps the world was forged from Chaos by the Wind Dukes of Aaqa, or grew from a cosmic tree, or was conjured by one of Boccob's spells, or arose from the tug-of-war between Pelor and Nerull, or was pulled from the Abyss by the gods of good, or was fished from the mud by Ramenos, or was created by elementals, or was an artificial creation of the illithid empire.

    Why limit yourself to just one myth?

    Bubbagump, the interview in question was in Oerth Journal #12. I wouldn't credit the Earth Dragon with such antiquity, personally; I'd say he was no older than the Drachensgrab Hills.
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    Sat Nov 17, 2007 1:59 pm  

    There used to be a bunch of WoG creation myths on the web, but the websites seem to be defunct.

    Eric Filson once had a creation myth for the Flan pantheon on the now defunct Greyhawk Codex website.

    There also used to be creation myths (in English) for the various human pantheons of the Flanaess on a now likewise defunct Swedish Greyhawk website.

    There used to be a Creation Myth for Greyhawk on the AOL World of Greyhawk Fan Club site.

    Len Lakofka and Steve Wilson included some creation myths (The Time of the Gods) in their article "A History and Timeline of the Suloise", which you can find in Oerth Journal #1.

    All of the other sources mentioned above I have only in hard copy.

    I agree with Rasgon that different races, cultures and faiths probably have divergent creation myths... as is the case in the real world. There are probably inconsistences within each group's creation myths, as well (which also typifies creation myths in the real world, e.g., Greek myths).
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    Sat Nov 17, 2007 2:29 pm  

    I have included creation myths for four different races on my version of Greyhawk. The four articles are all availble on this web site. The Dwarves of Oerth, The Elves Of Oerth, The Gnomes of Oerth, and The Trolls of Oerth. If you read all four you can kind of see the similarities and differences each race has on creation and beliefs.

    Let me know if this helps!
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    Sat Nov 17, 2007 7:47 pm  

    At the beginning there were three things: Time, Life and Death. These three things, part of the very fabric of existence, blended together in balance and imbalance, chaos and harmony, everywhere and nowhere, eternity and the here and now.

    From this collusion of Time, Life and Death there arose the planes of existence, as notions of good and evil came into play through this clash. The Seven Heavens and the Abyss, the Tri-Paradises and Tartarus, the Nine Hells and the Holy Hunting Grounds, Nirvana and Limbo. These things existed in opposition to, and yet in harmony with one another.

    So too arose the gods, beings of good and evil and tremendous power, wielders of divine energy. Two of the most prominent were Beory, the Oerth Mother, who took the eternal cycle of Time, Life and Death within herself, using it to give life to the Oerth, even as Pelor, the Sun, existed in time with her to further nurture and encourage this cycle.

    Tragically, although this system seemed to be perfection, as a result it also breeded imperfection. There arose a wicked, malevolent being known as the the Dark Lord, Dread Tharizdun, a being of entropy, madness, hatred, sadism and malice, that seeks to define itself as the beginning and end of all things.

    The Dark Lord brought forth the Age of Night, perverting the cycle to create hideous, nightmarish beings as his servants, creatures that did not age, were not truly alive save as puppets of the Dark Lord's will, and did not die save to eventually be reborn after being tortured by the Dark Lord for their failures.

    Many were the battles between the gods and the Dark Lord and his minions. Although many of the gods were evil, they realized full well that the Dark Lord would destroy them and all they cared about or sought to control, and so cooperated with their divine fellows to battle the Dark Lord and his minions.

    For countless millennia the battle raged, with no end in sight, until there arose a solar, a spirit of goodness so pure it was said even Pelor wept at her kindness and compassion. A champion of the battle against the Dark Lord, she engaged Dread Tharizdun in single combat.

    Seemingly defeating her, the Dark Lord swallowed her whole, only to become ill from her goodness. In his weakened condition, he vomited up many hideous things, beings that would later become the devils, demons and daemons, beings that wanted nothing to do with their foul creator and set about pursuing evil agendas of their own.

    In his weakened condition, the Dark Lord was defeated and imprisoned, with even the gods of evil assisting to keep Dread Tharizdun from reviving and bringing about the Age of Night once more. The demons and other foul creatures that Tharizdun vomited up seized control of the Abyssal planes for themselves, falling on one another in hatred and rage, even as fractures of the Dark Lord's shattered mind and soul, including the Egg of Coot and the Elder Elemental God, survived their creator's imprisonment and arose as powers of evil in their own right.

    With the Dark Lord imprisoned, so began the Age of Legends, a time when the gods began allying and befriending, or quarrelling and warring with, one another in divine alliances, dalliances, and wars. In return for their assistance in battling the Dark Lord and his minions, Beory allowed many of these gods to begin creating races in their image, from the humans to the dwarves to the elves and many, many more. These races fought and allied with each other, although Beory birthed and nourished them all, indebted to even the gods of the orcs and goblins for their invaluable aid.

    Many are the legends and tales of this era, times of legendary heroes and gods. But now, in the Age of Mortals, the gods have generally departed this world, for many different reasons. While the gods have agreed to no longer set foot on Oerth themselves, they are permitted to grant powers to their mortal worshippers, and act through divine agents, whether planetars, baku and lammasu, or devils, demodands and demons.

    This, then, is but one tale of the creation of Oerth. It shall be noted, however, that the lurking presence of the Dark Lord appears in every tale of every race, and that his malevolent presence lurks over all, to destroy and ruin both the brightest good and the wickedest evil, should ever he get the chance.
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    Sat Nov 17, 2007 9:01 pm  

    Is this canon? Or drawn from canon sources? In any case, thanks CruelSummerLord! Pretty awesome stuff, very useful. And yes, of course I'm sure that there are other versions out there; I just wasn't aware of canon Greyhawk versions. Thanks again.
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    Sat Nov 17, 2007 10:28 pm  

    Hey, I stumbled across that Swedish site that Twiceborn mentioned above while I was looking for some stuff for Derfelca's Dwarven thread. Here's the url - http://hem.passagen.se/warlich/Greyhawk/World/orgin_of_the_gods.html.
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    Sat Nov 17, 2007 11:26 pm  

    smillan_31 wrote:
    Hey, I stumbled across that Swedish site that Twiceborn mentioned above while I was looking for some stuff for Derfelca's Dwarven thread. Here's the url - http://hem.passagen.se/warlich/Greyhawk/World/orgin_of_the_gods.html.


    Thanks for posting that link, Smillan. I must have mistyped the URL when I first tried to look up the site earlier this afternoon. Glad to see that stuff is still up...
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    Sun Nov 18, 2007 6:19 am  

    Wow, that was awesome! Thanks smillian!
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    Tue Nov 27, 2007 7:38 pm  

    Guide to Hell had a creation mythos not a lot of people cared for but which was interesting involving Asmodeus and Jazirian.

    Dieties and Demigods has Pelor and part of the dogma is that the energy of life originates from the sun. the Greyhawk Player's Guide has his origin as FC (Flan/Common)

    Beory is Mother Oerth so you would think she has a part in the creation mythos and her origin is Common.

    Istus is Fate, Destiny and the Future with a Bc origin Baklunish/Common so she could have played a part.

    Most of the other race's have Greater Powers.
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    Tue Nov 27, 2007 10:18 pm  

    Damn you Gargoyle for makin' me think about this crap!

    The Serpent (Vecna Reborn) and Lady of Pain (Planescape) are both rumored to be among the Ancient Brethren, which are hinted at being older than the gods. They have plenty of company in the form of the Obyriths, and I think even the Aboleth are supposed to be older than the gods, at least the gods that are worshiped now.

    The war between law and chaos that seemed to end (at least on Oerth) with the Battle of Pesh is indicated by some sources as having taken place before good and evil were solid concepts, so we could hypothesize that the Outer Planes weren't even in the current form, there was just a plane of chaos and a plane of law. Well, and probably the Concordant Opposition. This idea is backed up by Fiendish Codex 2 which indicates that Baator didn't exist until the gods of law allowed Asmodeus to create it as a place of punishment before he got his rebellion on. So all of the outer planes weren't necessarily created at the same time/event. The elemental planes had to have existed because the archoelementals fought in the war, and the material plane had to exist because (duh) the Battle of Pesh was fought on it.

    IMO the multiverse began when Chaos sprang from an act of creation (Big Bang) within what we now call the Far Realm.

    Chaos then spawned what I would call primordials and the Greeks (at least some of the Greeks) called Protogenoi, and DC comics called the Endless. These could be beings such as Time, Inevitability/Fate, Magic, Matter, Thought, Darkness/Shadow, Light, Life/Creation, Death/Destruction. Some fragment of these might be found in the aforementioned Ancient Brethren - the Serpent could be primordial magic (although I think the rumors say he only personifies arcane magic). Anyway the primordials might have spawned children who were the primordials of "lesser" concept e.g. , from primordial Light may have been born the primordial Sun. The primordial sun may then have spawned lesser gods who are lesser suns, such as the sun of a particular world, or maybe somebody just iced the primordial sun and took over the sun domain or his child inherited it. Uranus begat Hyperionon who begat Helios who somehow got replaced by Apollo at some point. Likewise Istus could be a daughter of Inevitability/Fate. Beory could be the granddaughter of Matter. Nerull and Erythnul, the grandsons of Death. Boccob the son of Magic. Lendor the son of Time. You get the picture.

    IMO the Obyrith have a Far Realm feel to them so my theory is that they were a fragment of the Far Realm that got sucked up by Chaos in the act of creation. Of course the primordials and gods didn't find out about them until later on, after all Chaos is a big place.

    That's all I got for now, but I guess now I'm going to have to write an article on this. Smile
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    Wed Nov 28, 2007 8:13 am  

    smillan_31 wrote:



    The Serpent (Vecna Reborn) and Lady of Pain (Planescape) are both rumored to be among the Ancient Brethren, which are hinted at being older than the gods. They have plenty of company in the form of the Obyriths, and I think even the Aboleth are supposed to be older than the gods, at least the gods that are worshiped now.

    IMO the multiverse began when Chaos sprang from an act of creation (Big Bang) within what we now call the Far Realm.

    Chaos then spawned what I would call primordials and the Greeks (at least some of the Greeks) called Protogenoi, and DC comics called the Endless. These could be beings such as Time, Inevitability/Fate, Magic, Matter, Thought, Darkness/Shadow, Light, Life/Creation, Death/Destruction. Some fragment of these might be found in the aforementioned Ancient Brethren - the Serpent could be primordial magic (although I think the rumors say he only personifies arcane magic). Anyway the primordials might have spawned children who were the primordials of "lesser" concept e.g. , from primordial Light may have been born the primordial Sun. The primordial sun may then have spawned lesser gods who are lesser suns, such as the sun of a particular world, or maybe somebody just iced the primordial sun and took over the sun domain or his child inherited it. Uranus begat Hyperionon who begat Helios who somehow got replaced by Apollo at some point. Likewise Istus could be a daughter of Inevitability/Fate. Beory could be the granddaughter of Matter. Nerull and Erythnul, the grandsons of Death. Boccob the son of Magic. Lendor the son of Time. You get the picture.

    IMO the Obyrith have a Far Realm feel to them so my theory is that they were a fragment of the Far Realm that got sucked up by Chaos in the act of creation. Of course the primordials and gods didn't find out about them until later on, after all Chaos is a big place.

    That's all I got for now, but I guess now I'm going to have to write an article on this. Smile


    Great post.

    I really liked the Guide to Hell creation mythos and like to think that the The Lady of Pain (LN) and OverDieties* were created during the painful separation of Asmodeus and Jazirian as Two Champions of Law (Over-Power Rank) who were the Greatest Champion of Law (Grand Over-Power) when combined before each of them lost much of their own and combined power, so much power that they are only lesser weakened Greater Powers in the present which is one of the Great Secrets they both guard (They are both fallen Over-Powers and retain that knowledge, they were instrumental in the Creation Mythos, plus the fact Asmodeus the Prince of Lies is actually a Greater Power pretending to be much less than he is in his weakened state striving to regain his lost power). Still works with the Manual of the Planes and the latest Fiendish Codex.

    I like to think The Lady of Pain is actually the Guardian of one of the Greater Bastions of Souls for Powers (if you recall the Planescape Harbringer House adventure with Kaydi the Demi-Power of Sleep and preferably the ascension of Trolan the Lesser Power with Lawslayer over Sougad) and one of the reason the Powers are forbidden entry to Sigil partly because of rules in the Bastion of Broken Souls adventure and partly because Sigil is a fulcrum point for reality (Which is why Vecna broke in to order reality about to his tastes leveraging his power despite the wishes of all the other Powers in the various multiverses being almost powerless against him). Once the new Powers are born they need to leave within several hours for a being like Trolan a Lesser Power while less powerful beings like Demi-Powers can resist a little longer.


    The Lady of Pain is a Unique DR16+ Greater Paragon (Paragon are usually DR1 which do not require or encourage worship) and the Lady of Pain who is seen in Sigil is just one of her Aspects like the Dabus (Similar to the Asmodeus Aspects in the Minatures Handbook) while her primary Aspect is similar to the Asmodeus Aspect in Fiendish Codex Tyrants of the 9 Hells. She was limited to ousting Vecna a Power with her Aspect form because bad things happen to reality when she manifests in her true form in Sigil.

    *Regarding the Over-Dieties IMO all cosmos have them but most are unknown except to the Gods who rarely share that secret that they are subordinate to an overseer which would lessen their stature in the eyes of their worshippers. FRCS has a history spanning millenia but it was only in 1358 DR thatmore than the occassional learned religious scholar learned about AO the Over-Power.

    This probably doesn't work for a lot of games, particularly with Asmodeus being The Serpent a wounded elder being of enormous size (hundreds of miles long).
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    Wed Nov 28, 2007 10:42 am  

    Ok, is anybody interested in this idea:

    Various folks posted some really good facts here. Would they or someone else be able to or interested in posting the known facts with book references. This would allow others to form a story based on fact for their home campaign and give many of us a similar version in which we at Canonfire could "share". By just bringing the facts together and individual people writing their own version based on these events, everyones creation story that is similiar yet they could fill in the details for their specific campaign.

    Kinda just like the World of Greyhawk....Here's the map and the core details, now add what you want to make it complete and your own.

    Anybody....Anybody....
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    Wed Nov 28, 2007 8:17 pm  

    We could start a new thread where people just list facts and legends concerning creation, although I'm afraid there aren't that many that would directly concern creation, so it would probably be a pretty short list. The only things I can think of that directly concern creation (and then just the creation of the OUter Planes) is the legend of Ahriman (Asmodeus) and Jazirian from "A Guide to Hell." And most people seem to hate that one, regarding it purely as myth or just ignoring it. You could infer that since Obyriths existed before the gods they were probably around about the time of creation but that's really just a guess. Maybe someone has some more.

    If this was expanded to a compilation of facts and legends (And maybe you meant to include that, Eileen) from the Age Before Ages, as Erik Mona has referred to it, that could be kind of cool and useful.
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    Wed Nov 28, 2007 8:27 pm  

    Related to the above there is an interesting old EN World thread on the archomentals http://www.enworld.org/archive/index.php/t-134392.html in which someone mentions a war between the Greyhawk gods and the Far Realm, which gets mention in "Quadripartite" in Dungeon #99. Anyone have that issue of Dungeon who can give us the skinny on that? Pleeeease!

    The thread is also interesting in that you get an early hint at the development of the Obyriths.

    Isn't there also some reference somewhere to the Oerthstone as being a fragment of the original matter of the Prime Material or am I just imagining that?
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    Wed Nov 28, 2007 8:33 pm  

    Smillan:

    I think including facts and myths would be excellent. Most myths have their bases obscured in long lost facts anyway. The important part would be to indicate where one found the information so we could referance it when writing our own version using the facts and myths. I'm feeling kinda shy today so you go and start the new thread.....ok
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    Wed Nov 28, 2007 8:47 pm  

    EileenProphetofIstus wrote:
    Smillan:

    I think including facts and myths would be excellent. Most myths have their bases obscured in long lost facts anyway. The important part would be to indicate where one found the information so we could referance it when writing our own version using the facts and myths. I'm feeling kinda shy today so you go and start the new thread.....ok


    For you... sure thing. Smile Let me put some suitable info together and then I'll start it up.
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    Wed Nov 28, 2007 9:36 pm  

    Looking forward to your thread. I'll be on the lookout for bits and pieces in my books to add to your list.
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    Wed Nov 28, 2007 10:09 pm  

    smillan_31 wrote:
    Related to the above there is an interesting old EN World thread on the archomentals http://www.enworld.org/archive/index.php/t-134392.html in which someone mentions a war between the Greyhawk gods and the Far Realm, which gets mention in "Quadripartite" in Dungeon #99. Anyone have that issue of Dungeon who can give us the skinny on that? Pleeeease!


    It says when Oerth was but newly formed and the gods were young upstarts in the cosmos, the tentacled whatsits of the Far Realm tried to assert domination over "our" reality, sending their goopy minions to scour the Oerth of sentient life. Pelor, Obad-Hai, and Nerull, who at the time were all true neutral in alignment, agreed that neither the gods of Law nor of Chaos should be permitted to stop them, so they became determined to do so first. Kord joined them too, just because he likes a good scrap.

    Problem was, goopy whatsits from the Far Realm are hard for even gods to fight. They tend to drain divine energy and squirt it back to their unfathomable masters, who use it to make new goopy whatsits. So our team of four each sacrificed a bit of their essence to make a primal anchor, which severed the ties of the goopy whatsits to the Far Realm and imprisoned them on the Prime Material Plane, or thereabouts.

    A kajillion years later, the primal anchor breaks, and everyone's forgotten about the whole thing anyway. Even the gods. Only a few old greybeards still remember. A goopy whatsit escapes in Shiboleth, and it's up to the PCs to reassemble the pieces of the primal anchor and stop it. Or something like that.

    Oh, and you might be interested in this thread.
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    Wed Nov 28, 2007 10:32 pm  

    Gee Rasgon, the guy in the other thread looks just like you. Clone spell?
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    Wed Nov 28, 2007 10:36 pm  

    EileenProphetofIstus wrote:
    Gee Rasgon, the guy in the other thread looks just like you. Clone spell?


    Simulacrum is cheaper.
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    Wed Nov 28, 2007 11:42 pm  

    smillan_31 wrote:
    We could start a new thread where people just list facts and legends concerning creation, although I'm afraid there aren't that many that would directly concern creation, so it would probably be a pretty short list.

    That could be quite useful. Would we use true Greyhawk canon, or all the pseudo-Greyhawk 3.$ material out there? BTW, I like the ideas and work others have done on this so far. All of my books are packed until next month (I'm moving), or I'd have been digging around on my own.
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    Thu Nov 29, 2007 12:06 am  

    Gargoyle:

    If your moving to Greyhawk City, stop by and leave a donation at my temple.

    I would like to see the Greyhawk Splat book information included as well as Dragon magazine. Each entry is suppose to include a referance point (page xxx in such and such a book) in order for the reader to look it up, read it for themself, and decide how that (if at all) would be incorporated into their World of Greyhawk History. If people include things that they made up 100% for their campaign I think that some sort of special note should be made to make sure that confusion is avoided.

    Perhaps when this project is well underway, folks could post their final version and how they tied these events together and share with everyone else.

    Smillan started the new thread....see Ages before Ages Info.
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    Thu Nov 29, 2007 12:37 am  

    smillan_31 wrote:
    The war between law and chaos that seemed to end (at least on Oerth) with the Battle of Pesh is indicated by some sources as having taken place before good and evil were solid concepts, so we could hypothesize that the Outer Planes weren't even in the current form, there was just a plane of chaos and a plane of law.


    Hellbound: The Blood War indicated that originally there were just four Outer Planes: a plane of Good, a plane of Evil, a plane of Chaos, and a plane of Law. And yes, possibly a plane of Balance as well. While the planes of Law and Chaos are the only ones that factor into some of the early myths in the Fiendish Codex series, this doesn't mean that Good and Evil didn't exist. It merely means that they had not yet blended with Chaos and Law, so that the primal gods of Law who allegedly ordered the planes were not themselves good or evil at the time. They would become so, later, and this would result in the fall of such beings as Asmodeus.

    Quote:
    This idea is backed up by Fiendish Codex 2 which indicates that Baator didn't exist until the gods of law allowed Asmodeus to create it as a place of punishment before he got his rebellion on.


    Actually, Fiendish Codex 2 says specifically that Baator did exist
    beforehand, and Asmodeus didn't create it. It was, however, described as a barren plain inhabited by the shadowy beings who would eventually become the dogai, or assassin devils. What Asmodeus did was transform the plane into a place of punishment. His Fall, too, created the lower layers; originally there seems to have been only one.
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    Thu Nov 29, 2007 8:28 am  

    rasgon wrote:
    Actually, Fiendish Codex 2 says specifically that Baator did exist
    beforehand, and Asmodeus didn't create it. It was, however, described as a barren plain inhabited by the shadowy beings who would eventually become the dogai, or assassin devils. What Asmodeus did was transform the plane into a place of punishment. His Fall, too, created the lower layers; originally there seems to have been only one.


    That explains some stuff that had seemed contradictory to me before. Thanks for setting me right. It all -- well, most of it -- makes sense now.
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    Thu Nov 29, 2007 10:17 pm  

    Of course... if you're looking for the creation of the entire Multiverse (and not just Greyhawk), this is the place to go... ;-)
    http://melkot.com/mysteries/multiverse.html

    Denis, aka "Maldin"
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    Fri Nov 30, 2007 8:15 pm  

    Maldin wrote:
    Of course... if you're looking for the creation of the entire Multiverse (and not just Greyhawk), this is the place to go... ;-)
    http://melkot.com/mysteries/multiverse.html

    Denis, aka "Maldin"
    Maldin's Greyhawk http://melkot.com


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