Dread Elemental Domains

[ewancummins]

I like the idea of a darklord who is looking for the grave of a loved one- perhaps a child or a parent.

We should avoid using Von in any names, yeah.

[doctor-evil]

I always thought of the elemental plane of blood to be a huge sea, but I like the idea of a swamp, with rust red water, leeches, and vast swarms of mosquitos. Many carnivorous plants perhaps? I like the idea of red fogs.

The forest fire idea for the elemental plane of pyre also makes a lot of sense. Here's an image I found that I thought evokes an idea for a possible (druidic) nemesis for the darklord ent and an ally for characters who reach the quasi plane
http://www.sanhueza.com/pic_pages/forestfire_page.htm
Perhaps some parts of the plane are a raging forest fire (and magic is required to survive there) but others are smoke filled pockets of burnt trees and embers, with a small community of witches/druids/cleric heretics that survived burning, but passed into the plane, and now try to survive and raise small plots of crops in a desolate landscape.

Love the plane of grave idea too - how about a darklord who was a grave robber/body thief, but one day descovered that he had robbed and defiled corpse of his beloved, but long-lost daughter. In remorse he tried to kill himself by collapsing an open grave (the exhumed grave of his daughter) around him. However, instead of suffocating he dug himself out in a strange subterranean-seeming world full of tombs. Unable to end his life, he now subsists by eating the putrid rotting flesh of corpses in the plane of grave...

[ewancummins]

I like that pic of the forest fire and the antlered lady.

I like both ideas that have been put forth for a darklord of 'Graves.' It may even be possible to combine the two ideas.

Maybe the darklord could be a ghoul lord? I'm not aware of any canon darklord's who are ghouls, and a ghoul might be a nice change of pace from the more commonly employed ghosts and vampires.

[Galeros]

I like that pic of the forest fire and the antlered lady.

I like both ideas that have been put forth for a darklord of 'Graves.' It may even be possible to combine the two ideas.

Maybe the darklord could be a ghoul lord? I'm not aware of any canon darklord's who are ghouls, and a ghoul might be a nice change of pace from the more commonly employed ghosts and vampires.

A Ghoul Lord would be good. I too like both ideas for the Darklord of the Domain of Graves. I do feel we need to add something to the crime other than just Graverobbing though, maybe the Darklord hired other unscrupulous people to help him search for his loved one, but kills them after they are done helping him so they do not give him away. I mean sure, they may have been graverobbers too, but murdering them is going a bit too far.

[ewancummins]

A Ghoul Lord would be good. I too like both ideas for the Darklord of the Domain of Graves. I do feel we need to add something to the crime other than just Graverobbing though, maybe the Darklord hired other unscrupulous people to help him search for his loved one, but kills them after they are done helping him so they do not give him away. I mean sure, they may have been graverobbers too, but murdering them is going a bit too far.

Yes, more is needed. We have a good beginning.

Adding betrayal and murders to the list of the grave-robber's crimes sounds good to me.

To be a darklord, our villain needs great passion as much as great sins.

What is his great goal?

[Galeros]

What is his great goal?

I would say to find his loved ones body. He could have been pulled into the Domain of Graves when he was looking for his or her body and got stuck in a Mausoleum with some of the people he hired to help him. He murders them and eats their flesh to survive for a while. When he finally manages to escape somehow, he notices that he is in a different graveyard than he was in before, and that there are no stars or moon in the eternal night sky. He has been taken to the Domain of Graves and he is shortly thereafter transformed into a Ghoul.

[ewancummins]

Why and how did his loved one die?

[Galeros]

Why and how did his loved one die?

...Well, first we need to decide what the gender of his loved one will be, and then what kind of relationship he had with them.

Sister: His sister died, perhaps she was an adventurer of sorts and simply ran into some bad luck and got killed by one of the many evil creatures that lurk in the Demiplane. News of her death reaches him and he goes to where he heard she was killed and supposedly buried. He decides the news that reached him must have been wrong and perhaps she was killed elsewhere and so he decides to start looking for her, leading him to hire other people to help him.

Of course, for ironic purposes, she could very well not be dead at all.

[ewancummins]

Sister works for me.
I think the darklord (let's call him 'Mister Graves' as a placeholder- no, I'd never really use a name this corny!) should have been very close to his sister.
Does he perhaps blame himself for her death?

[Galeros]

Sister works for me.
I think the darklord (let's call him 'Mister Graves' as a placeholder- no, I'd never really use a name this corny!) should have been very close to his sister.
Does he perhaps blame himself for her death?

Well, he could have perhaps been very protective of her, and was against the idea of her going out adventuring. He himself was a bit of an adventurer, but he had mostly retired (He could have been in his early-mid thirties, and she in her late teens) from that life by now. She could have been his younger sister, she could have always looked up to him and liked to hear stories of his adventures. She decided that she too wanted to go on adventures, but he forbid her from doing so. She then asked if he went with her would it be okay. He still refused. She then left on her own. He was upset enough with her that he did not go looking for her right away. ("If she wants to go out and get killed, then fine!", said to himself in anger and frustration).

[ewancummins]

That's good. It gives him a sympathetic side. The best villains of gothic literature often have such an element in their make-up.

[Galeros]

That's good. It gives him a sympathetic side. The best villains of gothic literature often have such an element in their make-up.

Yup, I am aiming for that.

I will post more about the other Darklords of the other domains when I think of them.

I still really like my idea for the Darklord for the Domain of Blood.

[ewancummins]

We should decide what motivated him to retire (mostly) from the adventuring life. A brush with death? Got married? Courting a girl?

[ewancummins]

That's good. It gives him a sympathetic side. The best villains of gothic literature often have such an element in their make-up.

Yup, I am aiming for that.

I will post more about the other Darklords of the other domains when I think of them.

I still really like my idea for the Darklord for the Domain of Blood.

I like your suggested DL for Blood- but I think we should avoid making him Lamordian. We want to distinguish him from Mordenheim, after all.
Lamordia is a good choice mainly because of the lack of healing magic, yes?


What about making Blood's DL a native of Krynn? The world has a well-established history that includes long periods in which divine magic (healing) was pretty much non-existent for mortals. That lack of healing magic would tend to encourage medical experiments, IMO.

[Galeros]

We should decide what motivated him to retire (mostly) from the adventuring life. A brush with death? Got married? Courting a girl?

I think the reason could be he simply got tired of risking his life all of the time. A brush with death may be a good reason for this. He may have simply had a desire to settle down. He may have been looking for someone to marry, but was in not hurry to find anyone.