: i believe that the Fallen spoken of in that statement
: refers only to the six Fallen Lords themselves.
: because in-game it says you must fight the Fallen and
: their Undead armies, or Dark armies... the definition
: you use doesn't seem to fit the context of the quote
: about shades when you look at it while considering the
: presented definition of Fallen... thrall and shades
: aren't called Fallen, they're called minions of the
: Fallen, Undead, Dark armies, etc., but the confusion
: that would arise from calling them Fallen would imply
: they are Fallen Lords too.
Actually, "minions of the Fallen" is used to describe Fetch, not Thrall or Shades. Which would make sense, because Fetch are like Ghτls or Mauls--living creatures not directly bound to the Dark. As for the definition of "Fallen" itself:
"Having no loyalties, [Cave Spiders] will also attack the Fallen."
"[Alric] learned by chance that Balor had bound each of The Fallen to himself, to ensure their obedience to his will. The Fallen draw their power through these links, and were Balor to be killed they would all be powerless. The armies of the Dark would collapse."
"These men are all that remains of the Empire of the Cath Bruig. Formerly the guards of the Emperor, they disbanded and wandered the earth in self-imposed exile after the Fallen destroyed Muirthemne and everyone in it."
"Travelling across the continent, [the Legion] broke through the Fallen lines..."
The implication of these quotes is that "Fallen" encompasses many Dark units in low and high ranks, and possibly also Balor himself (since it was he who destroyed Muirthemne.) I think that "Fallen" is casually used to describe *all* of Balor's and Soulblighter's forces, from Balor himself on down to Thrall and Fetch. In its stricter sense, it refers only to those beings who are Fallen by nature--the undead and others who are bound to dark magics.
: besides, the Fallen Lords didn't treat anything with
: respect at all, not even each other... these are evil
: people, who would be glad to torture anything they
: could. since torturing a shade wouldn't have much of
: an effect on him, why not?
Well, you torture a rival Fallen Lord because you hate him and care nothing for his assistance...and you torture a Ghτl because you've got some sadism to work out and it doesn't really matter if your army's one Ghτl less...but if you take the time and trouble to make a Shade in the first place, you must at least want him as a useful tool. Creating a Shade just so you can waste your time and his by torturing him periodically is hardly practical. :-) And if they promised that kind of ill-treatment, then the whole revenge thing would be futile anyway. I mean, can you imagine a Fallen Lord telling you "Well, I'll make you into a Shade, and I'll work you to metaphorical death and torture you horribly...but I can promise that I'll be perfectly kind and conscientious about letting you run off and get revenge on your disloyal subjects!" Anyone who agreed to that would be too stupid to be worth Shadifying.
: there is no real evidence shades remain preserved
: immediately after they're creation. they're soft
: tissue and sinew is probably recreated in the same way
: an old thrall's is.
Many Shades have been Shades for an awful long time. Phelot has. Mazzarin (if it's the same Mazzarin) certainly has. Even if they were rebuilt perfectly intact at the moment of Shadification, they should still be rotting to bits after a few months. Some sort of magic is keeping their bodies preserved for decades or centuries--as it is for all the other undead/unliving creatures. Soulblighter's preservation perks are just higher-quality, that's all. Probably assisted by his limited shape-shifting abilities; if you can turn into a flock of crows and back again, you can probably fix minor things like a missing finger or two.
: how soulblighter can remain so
: absolutely perfectly preserved so such a long time in
: my mind cannot be explained by necromantic spells or
: the dream of unlife, but something totally different,
: something that can be done with 'ritual human
: sacrifice and self-mutilation' which was explained in
: Myth... note also the above ritual has no link to
: necromantic spells at all. therefore that process
: described in the canon-reference doesn't appear to be
: any kind of necromantic spell at all, rather something
: totally different, requiring a totally different
: spell-casting or dream-casting rite (viz. the ritual
: human sacrifice and self-mutilation). no other
: necromantic process requires anything even remotely
: similar to ritual human sacrifice and self-mutilation,
: so why should sb's?
We don't actually know what other necromantic processes require--for all we know, you have to mutilate every creature in some fashion before making it undead/unliving, and you always have to kill a few extra people. Probably not, but there's no evidence either way.
We do know that Thrall have to be made from damaged, old corpses; Soulless obviously get their legs taken off at some point; and Wights have to have lots of stitches put in (though by that time they're already so ugly that it's debatable whether you'd call it mutilation or not.) So mutilation is required for at least some kinds of un-making.
As for ritual sacrifice--well, come on, this is a fantasy world. Every outstanding work of Black Magic requires human sacrifice. Making a Soulblighter is a big job, and doubtless requires more energy and knowledge than most necromantic undertakings. Human sacrifice could provide power in the form of life energy, or it could propitiate dark gods or demons that would then enable the process. That seems as or more plausible to me than that killing a bunch of people somehow allows you to disinfect your body really well. :-)
: that is, of course, if ravanna dies after MWA. if she
: doesn't, GURPS is once again wrong. we just have to
: wait till the release to see.
She could die anywhere up until TFL...she doesn't have to die in Myth III.
: that's because myrdred hasn't messed with his appearance
: in vanity-inspired fits as shiver has. it doesn't fit
: to believe that an undead person would even care about
: his or her looks. which is why i am convinced she is
: alive, though deformed due to her constant
: alterations. kind of like michael jackson.
Ah, I see...she's very old *and* a victim of botched plastic surgery. Well...um...okay. I won't try to argue with that. :-)
Why wouldn't an unliving person care about their looks, if they retain their original memories and personality? Myrmidons can't help being ugly, and that's half the reason they're totally insane. Shades care enough to dress themselves more classily than, say, Myrdred does. I see no reason why Shiver wouldn't care about it--particularly when she doesn't know how she really looks, thanks to the glamour clouding her eyes. Even Myth II Shiver, who was basically a souped-up Shade and perfectly aware of her own ugliness, still retained her old vanity.
: none of the other name mix up's were left in. the
: explanation you provide is adequate for normal
: gamemakers, but bungie wasn't a normal gamemaker. all
: the loose ends of the beta names were cleaned up. not
: only was the shade name present in the shade common
: names, but it was there in the scripting. which makes
: it way too obvious to be overlooked. PLUS: how can we
: expect the ignorant and uninformed berserks to know
: just who mazzarin was? 60 years later, people have
: forgotten almost everything about TFL, which is so
: painfully obvious in the game. How Can we Expect these
: berserks and the simple narrator to know about
: mazzarin when the people are so ignorant about their
: history? the scholar from Antero's bestiary didn't
: know about the Connacht/Balor connection! how can TFL
: guys know about Mazzarin, someone Generations and
: Generations ago? ?
Because Mazzarin was the greatest Avatara in history! That's like an American not knowing about George Washington. No one knew about Connacht/Balor because no one was there to see Connacht wander off and get Leveller-possessed. But they still knew who Connacht was, quite well. And the narrator knew quite a few of the major Wind Age facts.
: they work the same way, but it is evident that the
: Mazzarin shade wasn't the old mazzarin in the same way
: Turquine was the Turquine from before. there must be 2
: forms of shades, but that doesn't affect their
: performance at all. which answers why there is no in
: game difference.
If there's no difference between them, then there's almost certainly no undead/unliving difference between them, as one would expect from looking at the other Un-units. Hence the Mazzarin Shade was a mistake.
: and whether we like it or not, at least Some shades are
: the "reanimated corpses of long dead
: avatara" which means Not All are the volunteer
: Dark-mage kind like Turqine and Sciron and Sinis etc.
: some, like Mazzarin, are the corpses spoken of in one
: (or more i can't remember) of the manuals, which is a
: source of canon, which means there Must be at least
: two ways to make shades. whether this effects their
: performance is not known, but there is 2 ways to make
: them.
That's the old TFL Shade definition, same way there's an old Avatara definition. These are the mistakes that gamemakers make even when they're not normal. :-)
There would be no reason to have two kinds of Shade-making. If you can kill mages, raise them and get exactly the same kind of Shade, who cares about bargains? Just smack down any middling-powerful mage you see (an easy task for a Fallen Lord), resurrect him and make him do what you want.
: ahh! wait a sec. even if the mazzarin shade didn't have
: the memories and personality of the living mazzarin,
: it makes perfect sense for the Fallen Lords to name
: him Mazzarin anyway. why not? First, it reminds them
: of their monumental victory over the Light Maz, and
: although it doesn't remind the Light armies (because
: they are uninformed about basic history as evident
: throughout the games) it Does remind great, still
: living heroes of their monumental loss.
: besides, what else would you call it? Bob? Cletus?
You wouldn't call it anything. It would just be (Shade), same way the Thrall and Wights and Soulless are unnamed. The only named Un-units are those who retain their former personalities.
: again, the narrator was uninformed, as is everyone in the
: dismal myth world. the Myth II narrator seems to think
: of TFL events as legends... only sixty years ago! we
: are educated people today in our world, we know about
: the past... these people don't, therefore there was no
: "death" speech because they didn't know who
: the heck he was in the first place.
Then there's no reason to have him there. You have an
: yup you can be unliving and powerful, as evident with
: shades, but that appears to be the highest point.
: people of the power of the watcher and SB, shiver, and
: myrdred however in my mind must be alive simply
: because of the immensity of their power, shades,
: though next on the latter, don't stand a chance
: against them. nor do they stand a chance against the
: avatars either
Shades certainly do stand a chance against Avatara, at least in-game. TFL Alric and a Shade are close to evenly matched, and Alric's a mid-range Avatara. I agree that the average Shade is less powerful than the average Avatara, but that's because most of those who became Shades were less powerful than most Avatara when they were alive--the Avatara-class dark mages get recruited to be Fallen Lords, either while they're alive like Myrdred or after they're reanimated like Shiver. And you can't say that the Fallen Lords must be living because they're powerful, unless you've *first* proved that none of them are unliving. :-)
: PS; just to clarify, is this list below the list of every
: shade known to have existed in the myth world?
: Sciron
: Sinis
: Scaripant
: Cormorant
: Mazzarin
: Turquine
: Phelot
: Herod
: Nym
: Sycorax
: Gullveig
: Cailleac Bheur
: miss any?
Not that I can think of.
--SiliconDream
