Here is someone's message that I started out answering before writing much more...
: This is a good point, but some of the new but
: non-contradictory information provided is just plain
: stupid, like the Tain being some disposable,
: mass-producable little thing. (God, the line
: "This is 'a' Tain" just enrages me!!!!) On
: the other hand, some is more acceptable, though Myth
: III's sloppiness on all points makes it less so.
: On to the contradictions, and some new ponderables of my
: own.
: 1) Damas needed to prolong his life with ritual sacrifice
: and self-mutilation, says Myth I. Damas was a Heron
: guard, says Myth III, and therefore already
: immortal...oops...
: 2) While I have not seen the game, it is probable that
: the Trow would have to fight alongside the Myrkridia,
: their bitter enemies, at some time if they fought for
: Moagim. Oops, another contradiction.
: 3) In their eagerness to set up absolutely everything
: (except the things they fundamentally screwed up) for
: Myth I's beginning, the developers of Myth III had
: Connacht name Myrdred "The Deceiver" after
: his betrayal of the Light. However, the journal writer
: in Myth II said that Myrdred was renamed "The
: Deceiver" when Balor bent him to his will. (This
: is not as unforgivable a mistake as the other two,
: since the journal writer could have gotten mixed-up
: facts. Balor is Connacht, after all.)
: There are more contradictions mentioned on this post, I'm
: sure, but I have a bad short term memory. On to the
: ponderables. I'll start with this quote: "Ah,
: Sinis! I thought you died when Mazzarin collapsed the
: Shrine of Nyx upon you!" Here is the first (and,
: in the reliable texts of Myth I and II, only)
: reference to Nyx, which Myth III's team later
: developed as the Trow god. But also, this quote makes
: reference to Mazzarin, who is (only in Myth III, mind
: you) said to be the first and greatest avatara. But
: Alric speaks like the event is in living memory, for
: he recognizes Sinis, who he thought was re-killed by
: someone named Mazzarin. Now we must examine the flavor
: text that the Thrall and avatara share. (There is only
: one for the avatara, though, since you only see one
: non-undead one.) It is this: "...the seventh wave
: of Thrall stumbled and climbed over the slippery,
: piled dead, and Mazzarin saw The Watcher with them and
: at last knew the number of his days..." It's
: obvious why this is on the Thrall: It makes references
: both to them and to their creator, The Watcher. And
: maybe it is on the avatara because it references the
: founder of their order, Mazzarin! So there are four
: possibilities (if Myth III is looked on as just a
: possibility): Mazzarin is the founder of the order,
: killed long ago by the Watcher, and a more recent
: avatara named after him collapsed the shrine of Nyx on
: Sinis, who escaped to get hacked to bits by Alric, OR
: Mazzarin founded the order during the Wolf Age and
: lived for a long time until he was killed by the
: Watcher and brought back as the shade you later kill
: (in which case Myth III is once again wrong) OR Alric
: was making reference to a long ago battle which he
: remembered from histories, in which case Sinis is one
: really old shade, OR Sinis was killed for the first
: time when the shrine of Nyx collapsed on him (he would
: have to have been some renegade avatara), in which
: case any of the previous three could be true. Keep in
: mind that in the first possibility, there is no way to
: know which Mazzarin is the shade and which is
: referenced in the flavor text, or if the same one is
: the shade and in the flavor text. I would go for the
: second possibility. The first is just too confusing,
: and was probably not what Bungie meant to be the truth
: in TFL. Of course the thing about Mazzarin being the
: founder is probably not either, but that can be later
: ignored. The third one doesn't make sense at all, and
: neither does the fourth, and they're not interesting
: enough to be defended.
: Tell me what I've missed.
About the Tain...try to understand it is obviously some device that the Callieach could make and that Connacht learned about from Mazzarin. In order to make just one of these devices, the Smiths of Muirthemne spent months on it and accidentally brought Syrkrosh into this world; it's very difficult to mass-produce these things, and when the Smiths of Muirthemne were killed or imprisoned inside the Tain, the ability to create another Tain is lost without their expertise. All these magical items in the world of Myth were created (usually by the Callieach) one way or another, therefore it is possible to create another Travist's Mirror or another SunHammer; nobody simply knows how to anymore nor do they know how to obtain or create the magical materials used to make these items. If the Callieach were able to create a bunch of Tains, the items probably wouldn't do much good against a massive Trow with a full health bar (like what happens with Syrkrosh) and would have gotten destroyed in the war with the Trow. Amongst the Callieach's known inventory of magical items, it appears that all Tains and SunHammers were destroyed, one Travist's Mirror survived, one Rod of the Callieach escaped destruction, and at least five Eblis Stones are still around. MOST OF ALL: we have ALWAYS know that the Tain was built, and that it was built by the Smiths of Muirthemne. In TFL it even says that its creators designed it with a back door escape route in case it was ever used against themselves by their enemies. It should come as no shock that a Tain is something that can be manufactured and can be referred to as "a tain" since it is quite possible, albeit difficult, for there to be more than one Tain in existence. Since Connacht described the workings of a Tain to the Smiths with the knowledge and memories of the Total Codex, he has someone else's fresh memories of Tains, and as far as he's concerned, this is just one more Tain; maybe Connacht is the only one who refers to it as "a Tain", yet everyone else, including the narrator at most times, calls it "the Tain".
About Mazzarin...in TFL the journal writer mentions in the "Seven Gates" entry about The Watcher and The Deceiver: "One of the veterans said that these two had it out after the battle for Tyr, twelve years ago, and that the Watcher barely survived. I have a feeling the real reasons for what happened today go back even farther than that." Since The Watcher decided to find Mazzarin's crypt and bend the Shade, Mazzarin, to his will, it would make perfect sense for his Shade to have it out with The Deceiver's Shade somewhere in the world of Myth. Since the Trow were fighting alongside Balor, it would make sense for them to build a shrine or two along the way. Alric could either have been a veteran at Tyr and witnessed the fight, or he and his army could have come into confrontation with Sinis and his forces on an earlier occasion, in which both survived, and then heard news from Avernus or Rhi'anon about a shrine being collapsed upon Sinis by the Watcher-controlled Mazzarin.
About Damas...remember that much of the world's history had been forgotten and some rumors might be incorrect in I and II. Also, being a Heron Guard is like being a Jedi in regards to aging: you're not immortal, you just live much longer. Hence Nine Skull Crocodile in the Myth II epilogue jokingly saying that he might live long enough to see the rebuilt empire, since he is ancient by Heron Guard standards. The adjectives like "deathless" that are used to describe the Heron Guard are supposed to illustrate how long the HG live relative to normal people, since being specific would take up all the room in the flavor text. Damas probably died eventually as did Ravannah and Myrdred. When the Leveler returned, using Connacht as its vessel, Balor would obviously want to choose to bring back his former comrades in their new and evil forms. Connacht still dislikes the same things he did while alive, which is why he was not cool with Alric erecting the Myrkridian standard, and since he was still bitter towards Myrdred, he assigned him the same name he declared be used to refer to him 1,000 years ago. While still alive and not undead (it doesn't matter whether Myrdred was brought back to life or if he managed to stay alive through sorcery during those 1,000 years) he probably didn't refer to himself as "The Deceiver" when outside of Balor's control. Damas and the others are much more powerful than your average Thrall, so maybe some of them require certain rituals to keep those special undead bodies of theirs so powerful. It would explain why Soulblighter didn't perish with the destruction of Balor; Soulblighter needs these rituals because they prevent something that is supposed to happen...his death. Soulblighter was not supposed to be alive and able to attack the world a mere 60 years later, because he has these special rituals to prolong his undead life. These rituals make him autonomous from the Leveler whereas all the other undead that are brought back by the Leveler are kept alive by the Leveler's power; should the Leveler's power fall, so shall the undead. If he had let himself die he most likely would have had the entity of the Leveler breathe new life into him. If he continued to keep himself alive through these rituals but refrained from attacking until the next millennium came around, he would have been chosen to become the Leveler too.
About the Trow...the thing about both the Trow and Myrkridia fighting for the same guy bugged me too. But it doesn't contradict the first two games since we know from the TFL manual that it was Connacht who imprisoned the Trow in their iron prisons and that it was Balor who the Trow were indebted to after he freed them. We know from the manual that the Trow were imprisoned by Connacht 1,000 years before AND we know from the game itself that Connacht was around the same time as the Myrkridia, therefore simple logic shows that Connacht was battling the Trow and the Myrkridia at the same time. It should be safe to assume that the Trow and Myrkridia were fighting for the Leveler; the only change Myth III makes is having it turn out that Moagim (Reborn) was actually a puppet-Leveler that the real Leveler, Mjarin, used as his pawn. This doesn't even contradict the first game; in fact, it now causes the journal entries about The Head to make sense (The Head being Mjarin according to Myth III).
Out of The Barrier entry:
"They say Alric talked about The Head often, ridiculing The Nine's belief that it was one of the avatara of Connacht. Connacht was the great hero of the Wind Age, who drove the evil Moagim from the earth, and The Head claims to have been one of Connacht's closest advisors during this time.
Once Alric even spoke of The Head's defeat by Balor, where it lost its body. But I've begun to wonder how one of the avatara of the Wind Age outlived Connacht himself by hundreds of years, to fight Balor in a battle long before the West had even heard of The Fallen Lords."
It is my belief that this was Bungie's story all along and that they simply gave this fact to the company who bought the Myth franchise so that Bungie's plans for revealing the plot would still come to fruition; it is far too convenient for a new company to simply contrive a story that just happens to fit so perfectly that no other explanation makes sense of the TFL journal entries about The Head. As for the Trow and Myrkridia fighting each other, it is a fact established in TFL...the Trow don't have to like them do they? Heck, they even fought alongside the humans for a year and they don't like us. Their original reasons for fighting alongside Moagim are up for speculation, but it DID happen according to Myth I and II. My guess it was because the Trow were at the height of their decadence and allowed their greed to decide their actions.
About Smiths and Spider Cult...apparently some people misinterpreted the flavor text of the Cave Spiders in Myth II: "Connacht could no longer ignore the atrocities committed by the Spider-cult but when he assailed their shrines, no trace could be found of the Smiths of Muirthemne or their followers..."
Pleas understand that the Smiths of Muirthemne are NOT members of the Spider Cult. The words "their shrines" and "their followers" refer to that which belongs to the Spider Cult. The misunderstanding is a result of poor sentence structure; it would have been better if they had listed the missing people like this: "no trace could be found of their followers or the Smiths of Muirthemne." Originally, I thought it had meant that the Smiths had been kidnapped and brought to the Spider Cult shrines. It turned out that the Smiths of Muirthemne imprisoned the Spider Cult and its God inside the Tain, and then imprisoned themselves inside it because the spider god was attuned to those who accidentally brought her into their world and could find her way back to the world of Myth as long as the Smiths still lived there. According to what we know from Myth I and II alone, answer this: if the Smiths of Muirthemne were a spider cult then why would (especially how could) a group of people worshipping a spider build a Tain and then give it to their enemy, Connacht, to use against the Myrkridia? In Myth I and II, it is implied that there is a connection between the Smiths of Muirthemne, the Spider Cult, and the Tain. Since the flavor text in Myth II says that no trace could be found, the stage is being set for later games to reveal that the Spider Cult was imprisoned inside the Tain. There was no trace of the Spider Cult and there are a bunch of spiders inside the Tain. Hmmmmm... For those of you who still believe that the Smiths of Muirthemne are the Spider Cult, then why didn't they escape through their backdoor exit? Remember this journal entry?:
"Murgen believes that we are close to finding a backdoor. A secret exit from the Tain added by its creators so they could escape the thing if it were ever used against them."
Myth III actually makes sense out of everything regarding the Smiths of Muirthemne and the Spider Cult.
About the Myrkidia being mages...some people think the idea of pack-mages is ridiculous because they believe the Myrkridia are stupid. Simply put, the Myrkridia were never described as being stupid in the first two games. In fact, they are probably as smart as humans, and simply have no need of much weaponry other than their claws and incredible size and strength. The Myrkridia braid their hair into dreadlocks, they make loincloths to cover their private parts, they make necklaces with fangs, they stack skulls pretty well, they grasp the concept of flags and use a Myrkridian battle standard...they are vicious, sadistic, bloodthirsty, feral creatures, but that doesn't make them stupid. Their violent nature and primal behavior probably makes them prefer to live in caves and feast off people rather than creating a town structure with law enforcement, a post office, and a school, lol. Weren't they lying in ambush for King Alric and his soldiers on the ship called Vigilance? Did they not choose to attack Muirthemne, trying to prevent the coronation of King (Emperor) Alric? Are they not capable of taking orders from Shades and Fallen Lords? Are they not smart enough to order Ghols to throw satchel charges on the weak points of a wall and then have one of their giants throw explosives at it? Don't forget that there are different types (maybe even different species) of Myrkridia. The giants are described as being smarter than the regular Myrkridia. Why can't those bat-like Myrkridia be an even smarter species? Since they don't have the strength, speed, and vitality of their lupine (wolf-like) kin, these bat-like Myrkridia have nothing to lose by trying to make themselves dangerous through the use of magic.
About the Trow and Deceiver fighting Myrkridia...the passage some people bring up is this one:
"He has told us of their battles against the Myrkridia and believes he can win the Trow to our cause."
This is another case of a vague sentence structure. The word "their" refers strictly to the Trow. In the events leading up to "With Friends Like These" Myrdred talked to the Trow. The Trow told Myrdred that they have been fighting invading Myrkridia that Soulblighter probably sent because of his anger toward the Trow for not joining him. Myrdred walks back to rest of the men. Myrdred tells men that the Trow have had battles with the Myrkridia. Journal writer hastily writes down the passage above without thinking about how much trouble and confusion he is going to put his fans through by not using more specific words.
