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    Canonfire :: View topic - Lareth the Beautiful
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    Lareth the Beautiful
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    Apprentice Greytalker

    Joined: Apr 08, 2008
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    From: Australia

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    Tue Jan 12, 2010 8:11 pm  
    Lareth the Beautiful

    I recently heard that there was a mod or dungeon released online right before 4th ed. came out regarding an update of Lareth and what he is up to. Does anyone know anything about this? It was news to me...

    Ta.

    Damien
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    From: Stansbury Park, Utah

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    Tue Jan 12, 2010 9:43 pm  
    I Have It

    I have two adventures wherein Lareth makes an appearance. He is, of course, in The Village of Hommlet a level 4 elite controller.

    Before that he appeared in the Origins 2008 convention special Return to the Moathouse. In the convention special he is called Lareth the Vile and he is a level 6 controller.

    Both of his 4th Edition incarnations are available in the D&D Compendium if you want details. I have both adventures if you need them. Just let me know.
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    Don (Greyson)
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    Tue Jan 12, 2010 10:04 pm  

    Thanks very much. I know that Lareth has made appearances in 4th ed, but apparently this was a 3.5 adventure that listed him as 15th or 20th level....

    Ta.

    Damien.
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    Wed Jan 13, 2010 2:38 am  

    theres one more, i just forgot the name. theres something about tharizdun, and a dungeon who is actually a aspect of tharizdun or something (but i believe is 3x ed)
    Adept Greytalker

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    Wed Jan 13, 2010 2:45 am  

    oh, that was hard to find here:

    http://www.wizards.com/DnD/Article.aspx?x=dnd/duad/20071221

    thats the adventure, Essence of Evil
    Master Greytalker

    Joined: Jun 25, 2007
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    Wed Jan 13, 2010 6:02 am  

    Lareth also appeared briefly in Ekbir in a series of Living Greyhawk mods. He was doing...bad things...there. In most cases his appearance was only peripheral and the PCs spent their time figuring out what he was trying to do/trying to catch up to him.
    Adept Greytalker

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    Wed Jan 13, 2010 8:05 am  

    bubbagump wrote:
    Lareth also appeared briefly in Ekbir in a series of Living Greyhawk mods. He was doing...bad things...there. In most cases his appearance was only peripheral and the PCs spent their time figuring out what he was trying to do/trying to catch up to him.


    oh, how could i have acess to those?
    Apprentice Greytalker

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    Wed Jan 13, 2010 9:22 am  

    I believe he's also in RttToEE.
    GreySage

    Joined: Oct 06, 2008
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    Wed Jan 13, 2010 5:25 pm  

    Its never "wrong" to do whatever you want in your game. You're the boss (DM).

    You could call him "Larry" for any number of reasons; a pet name or even a name to be used disparagingly. Your call. Wink
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    Master Greytalker

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    Wed Jan 13, 2010 7:36 pm  

    I would tell you what my players once called him, but I'd probably get banned from the boards for using such language.

    In my current campaign my kids are the players, and they call him Cutey-pie. It's intended to be an insult to make him mad, and it works.
    Mad Archmage of the Oerth Journal

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    Mon Jan 25, 2010 10:07 am  

    Cutey-pie I think this name should be struck to canon!
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    Master Greytalker

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    Mon Jan 25, 2010 1:53 pm  

    If I had the power, I'd do it!
    Master Greytalker

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    Fri Mar 30, 2012 9:16 pm  

    In my PMeM campaign, Lareth was horribly burned in the climatic fight at his quarters under the moathouse. He was throwing around some pretty cool spells, stuff from netbooks and such that had the players going crazy! In the end, he was glorying in his near victory when the party's halfling thief grabbed a burning brazier and dumped it over him, after throwing oil in his face. The entire room went up in flames, and the thief pulled the unconscious party members out and slammed the door shut.

    Of course, Lareth escaped through a secret door and all the stuff in his room burned up. Sorry, no treasure there! Boy were they upset.

    Anyway, just recently they found him, huddled alone in the ruins of Nulb. It had been destroyed along with the ToEE at the end of that adventure. It scared them to death, but it turns out he was a totally broken man. They brought him back for "trial," but the party decided to spare his life when they realized how low he had sunk.

    He lost the favor of Lolth (who had only been using him), and basically wandered around aimlessly. Hedrack found him and brought him eventually to the Temple in the Lortmils as in RttToEE. When he learned of the Elder Elemental God (I do not use Tharizdun here at all, preferring the EEG to be a more Lovecraftian, primordial being), even HE recognized true evil, and he ran away.

    The party worked with him for months of "down time." A priest of St. Cuthbert, paladin of Trithereon, and a drow priestess (yeah, seems there's always one player who has to be a good drow these days!) worked tirelessly on converting him. He eventually grew closer to the paladin of Trithereon (a CG type I created years ago), feeling an affinity for the Vengeance aspects. I also allowed his alignment to gradually shift to CN. He's not good yet, but at least he's not quite evil either.

    Now the followers of EEG from the Temple of All-Consumption have kidnapped him, considering him to be their Champion. The party has set off in pursuit in an attempt to free him and bring down these evil elemental worshipers once and for all.

    I love how it's turned out. Lareth was the ultimate villain for them early, and his escape plagued them for months. Now his road to redemption has become one of the paramount themes. As hard as it is to believe, now they are risking their own lives to save him. It's testing their characters' beliefs in ways neither I nor they probably ever anticipated. Is he really coming around? Can he be saved from evil? What is their duty to this man, who's scars run far deeper than just his burned face?
    Grandmaster Greytalker

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    Sat Mar 31, 2012 10:00 am  

    ragnar wrote:
    ...Anyway, just recently they found him, huddled alone in the ruins of Nulb. It had been destroyed along with the ToEE at the end of that adventure. It scared them to death, but it turns out he was a totally broken man. They brought him back for "trial," but the party decided to spare his life when they realized how low he had sunk.

    He lost the favor of Lolth (who had only been using him), and basically wandered around aimlessly. Hedrack found him and brought him eventually to the Temple in the Lortmils as in RttToEE. When he learned of the Elder Elemental God (I do not use Tharizdun here at all, preferring the EEG to be a more Lovecraftian, primordial being), even HE recognized true evil, and he ran away.

    The party worked with him for months of "down time." A priest of St. Cuthbert, paladin of Trithereon, and a drow priestess (yeah, seems there's always one player who has to be a good drow these days!) worked tirelessly on converting him. He eventually grew closer to the paladin of Trithereon (a CG type I created years ago), feeling an affinity for the Vengeance aspects. I also allowed his alignment to gradually shift to CN. He's not good yet, but at least he's not quite evil either.

    Now the followers of EEG from the Temple of All-Consumption have kidnapped him, considering him to be their Champion. The party has set off in pursuit in an attempt to free him and bring down these evil elemental worshipers once and for all.

    I love how it's turned out. Lareth was the ultimate villain for them early, and his escape plagued them for months. Now his road to redemption has become one of the paramount themes. As hard as it is to believe, now they are risking their own lives to save him. It's testing their characters' beliefs in ways neither I nor they probably ever anticipated. Is he really coming around? Can he be saved from evil? What is their duty to this man, who's scars run far deeper than just his burned face?


    -Yeah, I like the idea of NPCs shifting alignment over time too.

    Of course, that can go L to C or G to E, and vice versa.
    Master Greytalker

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    Sun Apr 01, 2012 10:30 am  

    That sounds excellent, Ragnar.

    I love that the followers of the EEG want him to be their champion and he is resisting; this is almost tragi-comic in some respects. That the pcs are willingly risking their lives to save a complete villain from a fate worse than death is a great twist; if it makes the turgid RttTEE as written into a memorable adventure then you've produced a masterstroke.

    Good luck with it and keep us posted.
    GreySage

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    Mon Apr 02, 2012 8:04 am  

    Hello,

    Though I have only played the original module featuring Lareth, and have nothing new to contribute on the topic, I wonder how many of you played Lareth as a drow priest instead of human. That is how my DM and I at the time perceived him.

    -Lanthorn
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    Mon Apr 02, 2012 9:47 am  

    I can see how having Lareth as a Drow could work but, from my perspective, having him as a Human makes the situation more ambiguous. How many Humans actually revere Lolth? This adds a level of conflict right from the off as pcs struggle to understand what turns a man to such dark, and strange, paths. A Drow would be expected to be on this road already.
    Master Greytalker

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    Wed Apr 04, 2012 5:21 am  

    Yes, the male priest of Lolth caused me problems a bit, but then I just figured to ignore it. Some problems are better left alone! In the end, it worked well. After his defeat, Lolth abandoned him. This is what really left him a lost and broken man.

    As for making him a Drow, i never considered it. I would prefer to have less drow around.
    GreySage

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    Wed Apr 04, 2012 9:36 am  

    When my best friend and I read that module, we were both skeptical about a male (drow) priest of Lloth, too, but decided that perhaps Lareth was exceptional. His stats in the original module sure were impressive! At any rate, I guess it never occurred to us that Lloth would accept anything other than a dark elf priest, so a human Lareth was out of our scope of reasoning. Although I don't have it right in front of me, I don't recall anywhere in the module about it specifying one way or the other about Lareth's race. DM call on that, I guess, or how you interpret the character.

    -Lanthorn
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    Wed Apr 04, 2012 9:47 am  

    RttTEE lists Lareth as "Male, Human Cleric". ToEE just says Cleric but throughout the mod any character of a race other than Human is stated as such, so I guess by implication that makes him Human.

    Nothing wrong with doing what you like, of course. I'm notorious for it Wink .
    GreySage

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    Wed Apr 04, 2012 9:50 am  

    I guess I should clarify that I first encountered (and read about) Lareth in the original version of 'The Village of Hommlet.'

    -Lanthorn
    Grandmaster Greytalker

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    Thu Apr 05, 2012 7:19 am  

    ragnar wrote:
    In my PMeM campaign, Lareth was horribly burned in the climatic fight at his quarters under the moathouse.


    I love this! Lareth the Not So Pretty Anymore Since that Unfortunate Incident with the Halfling and the Brazier. Laughing

    Seriously though, the way you've worked his redemption into you campaign is brilliant.
    Master Greytalker

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    Thu Apr 12, 2012 4:43 pm  

    smillan_31 wrote:
    ragnar wrote:
    In my PMeM campaign, Lareth was horribly burned in the climatic fight at his quarters under the moathouse.


    I love this! Lareth the Not So Pretty Anymore Since that Unfortunate Incident with the Halfling and the Brazier. Laughing

    Seriously though, the way you've worked his redemption into you campaign is brilliant.


    Actually, I just rolled with the PCs. I was going to likely use him as written, but the ranger Berenn, who was granted lordship over the old moathouse and surrounding land by the Viscount, decided to go on patrol to Nulb. There he came across Lareth in the ruins of the old inn and captured him. When he tried to send him off to face the Viscount's justice, the Viscount basically said, "You're lord there now. You deal with it."

    It took quite a while for this to all happen, traveling back and forth and such, and in the mean time the party learned about the Temple of All-Consumption (I just renamed it the Temple of the Elder Elemental God since the other name is, well, lame.) RoToEE makes him out to be angry, vengeful, and "more powerful than ever." All I did was drop that last part, make him a broken man with no power. Abandoned by Lolth (he should have seen THAT coming), and actually repulsed by the Elder Elemental God (and perhaps a bit fearful), he fled. That explained his presence in Nulb better than the module, which didn't really deal with that very well.

    The drow priestess actually started as a fighter/song mage. Through an Expanded Tarot Deck of Many Things (from a dragon magazine, and yes, I always have liked that item!) she gained some spiritual insight. I let her "add" a class as a priestess, and the player totally started being less munchkiny and really playing the "born again" kinda thing. Anyway, between her and the CG Paladin of Trithereon (yep, another thing of my own creation! Remember, this is 2nd ed.) they worked on him until he "saw the light." Actually, it's important to remember that these are all polytheists who really DO believe in ALL the gods, so it's not really hard to believe he'd become more focused on another one now, especially the God of Vengeance!

    So, to make a short story long, they decided to commute his sentence. He is basically on parole, and they were going to be watching him, while continuing to work with him. But, I decided to intervene as my evil DM self. While the party went back to the ruined ToEE, I had the badguys sneak into the moathouse and capture Lareth. So, the stage is set for an interesting run of RtToEE.
    GreySage

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    Thu Apr 12, 2012 6:24 pm  

    ragnar wrote:
    ...the CG Paladin of Trithereon (yep, another thing of my own creation! Remember, this is 2nd ed.)


    For some additional creative inspiration and canonical support for this idea, see Paladins of Greyhawk: Holy Warriors of the Flanaess, by Gary Holian, in the Living Greyhawk Journal, #20, Fireseek 593 CY.

    Actually, Tritherion's Paladins appear in the next issue, Paladins of Greyhawk: More Holy Warriors of the Flanaess, page 112. This one is listed as Dungeon/Polyhedron, Nov 3.

    Hope this helps. Smile

    SirXaris
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    Wed Apr 18, 2012 6:24 am  

    ragnar wrote:
    smillan_31 wrote:
    Seriously though, the way you've worked his redemption into you campaign is brilliant.


    Actually, I just rolled with the PCs. I was going to likely use him as written, but the ranger Berenn, who was granted lordship over the old moathouse and surrounding land by the Viscount, decided to go on patrol to Nulb. There he came across Lareth in the ruins of the old inn and captured him. When he tried to send him off to face the Viscount's justice, the Viscount basically said, "You're lord there now. You deal with it."


    You did make the players deal with the situation, but, yes, you do have some very cool players. You are one lucky DM.
    Novice

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    Mon Apr 23, 2012 6:22 pm  

    I've always wanted to use Lareth as a continuing villain, but players always manage to take him. One version of him was a Drow and my daughter (playing an Elf) wanted him dead. She managed to solo him during the brawl with his guards.!
    Black Hand of Oblivion

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    Mon Apr 23, 2012 11:48 pm  

    There is also the "A Plethora of Paladins" article by Christopher Wood in Dragon #106, which covers Paladins of all alignments other than LG (standard paladins) and CE (anti-paladins).

    The variant paladin class names and alignments as presented therein are as follows:

    Myrikhan- NG
    Garath- CG
    Lyan- LN
    Paramander- TN
    Fantra- CN
    Illrigger- LE
    Arrikhan- NE

    It is a nice little article, and is easily adaptable to 2E.
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    Apprentice Greytalker

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    Tue Apr 24, 2012 1:54 pm  

    he is in the "Essence of Evil adventure". he is 20th level!
    Master Greytalker

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    Fri Oct 26, 2012 6:05 pm  

    So, the adventure is over. Players returned to the previously ruined ToEE where they defeated the doomdreamers and eventually confronted Lareth, the First, and Imix himself. I changed things from RTTOEE so that The First was the Aboleth, not some weird half-medusa. whatever! Also, I used the much bigger Imix from the 3rd ed module. Finally, Lareth was there as the Champion of ELemental Evil, wearing the Rings of Force (I had them be WAY more powerful, like creating a wall of force force field all around him. He could not be hurt. Thing was, and the players figured it out, he was under psionic domination from the aboleth.

    They successfully killed the aboleth, which freed Lareth. Oh, I forgot, I gave the Orb of Oblivion ability to create Spheres of Annihilation, like the 9th level magicuser spell. The party was REALLY feeling they were in for it! Anyway, Lareth came out of the domination with the death of the aboleth, and the party for once didn't attack. Even the paladin of Trithereon who had invoked his Pursuit of Vengeance power (he'd been tracking Lareth for a month!) held back.

    Lareth pulled a Darth Vader moment and turned the sphere on Imix who backed off, summoning help from the Plane of Fire. An Effreet lord showed up, and Lareth destroyed it with the SoA! Anyway, Lareth told them they couldn't bring the Orb with them, or it would open the way to Oerth, so they had to destroy it here, and the only way was with the sphere it had created. So, he gave teh party the fire gem to get out.

    THe one member who had worked towards aiding him in turning from evil stayed with him, and they leaped into the Gate to the Plane of Fire just as Lareth tossed the Orb into the Sphere. Gone was the orb, gone the nodes, gone Imix!

    So, they ended up in the Plane of Fire. They got out by using Leomunds Labile Locker, which the player had from the first time through the temple. It doesn't work with people in it though, but they had to try or they were doomed. So, she and Lareth got inside it and rode it to the Ethereal, or so they thought.

    Ether Cyclone blew them around to other planes, well, to border ethereal planes, and eventually to the Astral. That's when they were really screwed. So, she started telling Lareth that he should pray to Trithereon (he had started leaning that way earlier). That led them to a pool to Trithereon's plane, Arvandor (Olympus).

    Now they entered, and since the player, remember it's just one player and Lareth here, the rest of hte party being back in Hommlet now, was a good drow follower of Ellistraee (I know!), they are going to meet her now. Eventually, maybe tonight, Lareth will come face to face with Trithereon himself.

    I envision this as the ultimate final chapter, with him becoming a priest of Trithereon. They will eventually return, and he will go to Verbobonc to "take the cloth" so to speak. All in all, a very interesting and unexpected turn of events for Lareth.
    GreySage

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    Fri Oct 26, 2012 7:10 pm  

    Very cool tale Ragnar. Happy

    SirXaris
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    Sat Oct 27, 2012 7:17 pm  

    That worked out pretty well! Good job, to the DM and the players! Happy
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