Well, now. It's back to me again already.
John Diamante (somehow the "ia" in his last name seems to have been transposed) and Scarabraech have been problematic for me from the beginning. Frankly, I am astonished the domain and darklord have gotten as far as they have; Scarabraech was my least favorite of the five domains I submitted originally, and I put it in mostly because I had already mentioned it in the article on the Umbra (QtR 13, see sidebar "The Fate of John Diamante"). The mention of him there explains his present relationship with the Fraternity--he's permanently out of contact with them, but extremely eager to regain contact with them. (His being unable to communicate his discoveries to "the right people" is part of his curse.) I'm not surprised he's not a satisfying villain to you guys; he's not satisfying to me. I doubt that a formal withdrawal of the domain from the contest is necessary, but I doubt I would vote for it.
That said! Let me tell you a little about what I am trying to do with the domain, and open discussion on a couple of points.
A big part of the problem is that John Diamante doesn't have the level of detail given to his past to make him feel like a "real person". I think this is partly because I've been writing him as a sort of study of a particular
kind of evil, rather than a individual--more like an essay than a story, in a sense. Which is ironic and amusing because it is a mild version of the kind of evil Diamante is intended to embody--treating the actual people around oneself as objects and/or philosophical abstractions, while claiming (and even believing) that one loves the philosophical abstraction "humankind" and is struggling to benefit it.
(I'd say his most direct historical/literary inspirations are Lenin and Kurtz, from
Heart of Darkness.)
As Gonzoron mentioned, this makes the "blankness" of his misdeeds thematically appropriate. The other reasons for his relative lack of texture are a) I wrote this at the last minute, because b) inspiration for specific events totally failed to come, possibly because c) I wanted to portray somebody descending, smoothly but with ever-increasing speed, into extreme evil. No jolts! No big moral dilemmas! John Diamante decided on his course a long, long time ago, and he's followed it ever since, and the wild discrepancy between his actual word and deeds and his stated motivations doesn't even occur to him.
In a way, that "blankness" is his real weakness as a character; as written, he just doesn't doubt that he's been doing the right thing all along and his present situation is just an insanely frustrating anomaly which he's
sure will be straightened out eventually. He might be a better candidate for an oubliette of some kind, although I think the "ruined world" aspect of Scarabraech is an important part of his curse that would be difficult to convey in less space (physically and thematically) than a domain.
The other big problem with the domain, which Igor alluded to by implication, is that the domain itself has given me all kinds of headaches to visualize and write out in a way that will distinguish it from Vechor and the Nightmare Lands. I want it to be somewhat reminiscent of "after the bomb" apocalyptic fiction (especially the technology-hatred of
A Canticle for Leibowitz), combined with something like Nosus--but with magical, rather than technological, pollution.
At any rate, I can't in good conscience plead for your vote on this one; its flaws are too deep and too obvious. Maybe when 5th edition inspires another project along these lines it will be ready.
, they might be useful during the future developments (especially when and after Baccio is gonna kick the bucket...).
! I guess the PCs should bet more on their investigative capabilities...
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