Supplement II : Blackmoor - Temple of the Frog - Background

J'ai peu de temps en ce moment pour bloguer, aussi je découperais ce post en plusieurs parties faute de temps pour toutes les rédiger en une fois.

Commençons donc avec la trame de fond.
"Deep in the primaeval swamps of Lake Gloomey" notez le "primaeval" (=primitif). De un, cela rappelle bien sûr les dinosaures préhistoriques dont j'ai parlé dans un post précédent, et de deux, il serait difficile de ne pas faire le rapprochement avec ce post de excellente série de Wayne Rossi sur l'univers impliqué de OD&D. Blackmoor prend de plus en plus d'allures de Lost World.
"Combining the natural animals available with each other — through the use of biological mutations and methods discovered in old manuscripts — the Brothers began developing the giant killer frogs of the swamp." Inutile de commenter une énième fois cette fascination de Dave Arneson pour les grenouilles géantes (c'est sans aucun doute lui qui en a fait un monstre emblématique de D&D), le titre de ce module est déjà assez parlant. Ce choix d'un amphibien est assez révélateur : voici un autre monstre du fond des âges, lié autant aux monstres marins qu'aux reptiles. La grenouille est vraiment un animal qui gagne à se faire grosse comme un boeuf, contrairement à ce que suggère le très connu fabuliste ! Plus intéressant encore est la mention de mutations biologiques découvertes dans de vieux manuscrits : voilà qui est contradictoire. Les manipulations biologiques (déjà assez intrigantes telles quelles) demandent des connaissances à coté de laquelle l'imprimerie est un jeu d'enfant. Pourquoi alors des manuscrits ? Cet antique savoir a du être développé par des civilisations ou des races disparues depuis des éons, sans doute les mêmes qui sont à l'origine de la Cité des Dieux et des objets technologiques de Blackmoor. Leurs écrits originaux se sont perdus (peut-être en subsiste t-il quelques-uns, rares, très chers et indéchiffrables même aux meilleurs linguistes - qu'en est-il de lecture des langages ?) et seuls subsistent les traductions manuscrites de traductions précédentes etc. Un peu à la manière des grimoires du Mythe de Cthulhu, pour tracer un parallèle. Revenons à cette étrange science des manipulations génétiques. Elle ouvre des possibilités immenses : la science avancée revient-elle à de la magie magnifiée purifiée de tout ésotérisme ? quelle était cette antique civilisation (ses buts, son apparence etc.) ? pourquoi a t-elle "disparu" (exil, cataclysme, extinction, guerre...) ? quelles ont été les créations de ces biologistes de génie ? les monstres ? les dinosaures ? l'Homme ("a biological abomination which would ultimately threaten the existence of all life" selon la secte de la grenouille) ? toute vie ? La question vertigineuse de la Genèse de Blackmoor, en quelque sorte, et une source intarissable d'aventures en tous genres.

To be continued...

Lawful Mind-flayers ?

Mind-flayers are truly a fascinating monster. Their diet of brains, their psionic powers, their cthulhoïd look... And their background (they practice slavery, particularly on githzerai and githyanki ; and

they are at war with the Dark elves). 

They are now firmly embedded in the D&D players' mind as the "bad guys". What if... it was a completely false assumption ? What Gygax had in mind when he created illithids ? 

"Law :
Mind flayer [...] highly evil but otherwise lawful."
-Gary Gygax in OD&D, Supplement III : Eldritch Wizardry. 

It could hardly be more confusing... 

I spoke about OD&D alignment in my last post.
It means that mind-flayers fight alongside the Law against Chaos (and possibly the Great Old Ones if they exist in your world. In mine, that's the case).

These creatures created by Gary Gygax appear only in one set of modules which had been writen by EGG : D1-2, Descent into the Dephts of the Earth. In D1, we learn that they are opposed to the dark elves (Chaos), have Were-rat servants (Chaos) and beholder allies (Chaos). Strange dating.

Lately, porphyre77 (a faithful commentator of this blog) rewrote the mind-flayer for Epées & Sorcellerie (we both work with snorri to realease the version 2 of E&S which is the first French retro-clone - I'd probably review it this week) and came with the following interpretation :

"Cette race souterraine à l'allure humanoïde possède une intelligence supra-humaine. Bien que loyaux, ils agissent d'une façon perçue en général comme maligne pour les races plus jeunes qui ignorent tout de leurs objectifs et façon de penser."
-porphyre77 in E&S v2.

"This subterranean humanoid race has superhuman intelligence. Although loyal, they act in a way generally regarded as malignant by younger races who know nothing about their goals and way of thinking."
-porphyre77 in E&S v2 (english translation).

That's brilliant !

Before interpreting the oddity, I must admit it made ​​me think of the Carcosa Space Aliens :

"SPACE ALIENS [Law]: Roughly human in shape and size, though unmistakably alien, these invaders from outer space have hairless, light gray bodies. They tend to be slender, and they have unblinking, bulbous eyes with black irises. Thousands of years ago, an armada of them made a hard landing on the planet of Carcosa. Since then, others of their race have come and gone while establishing bases on the planet—undoubtedly for some nefarious purposes. The Space Aliens possess a highly advanced technology, though they mostly lack such things as art, emotions, religion, philosophy, etc.
[...]

Law is the alignment of those who oppose the Great Old Ones. This opposition need not be (and is usually not) active. If, however, an Old One were to be released from imprisonment, those of lawful alignment would fight against it."

-Geoffrey McKinney, Supplement V : Carcosa (emphasis added).

So basically, we have two solutions (not necessarily exclusive) to handle the situation. Let me develop them to see where they lead :

• Mindflayers are geniuses without morality who plan ahead the downfall of Chaos. Their devious plans may include providing assistance to their Chaotic enemies or may even include attacking other Lawful races if it can help them to strengthen their position. This disregard of their natural allies can be explained by their excessive pride that drives them to make light of the inferior races little able to fight against the Chaos and meant to be their slaves. This attitude may also be explained by their paternalism towards other races that they educate by reducing them to slavery in order to "civilize" them. 
• Mindflayers are evil beings who oppose Chaos with a highly advanced science. Why are they fighting Chaos and the Great Old Ones that they resemble physically and mentally (they have great evil in common)? Nobody really knows. Maybe the mindflayers were previously a servant race of the Old Ones... They may have rebelled and now seek revenge. Or maybe they were the ones that the dawn of time, have imprisoned the fouls Old Ones because of a feud? Perhaps they are the immemorial Elder Ones!

 

Their high technology relies certainly on the minds they consume. Perhaps even navigators of their spaceships are giant brains with surnatural perceptions and terrifying mental powers immersed in vats of amniotic fluid... This is undoubtedly the reason why they enslave the inferior races: they need a lot of brain matter to create such horrors!