: Which I guess is a good segue to this: I now ask you, the
: Asylum, to find all nitpicks and inconsistencies
: between Myth III and the story as we knew it from M2
: and TFL, and list them here, so we can start forming
: this outline better. Thanks.
Here are things I think need to be changed either for factual reasons or just to make a good story.
So looking at the timeline i posted above. Myth 3 seems to take place during 1426-1440 AE, the last few years of the age.
Things that need to be fixed and a sugestion:
Shiver/Culweh... They could be twin sisters (BOTH mages, as there doesnt seem to be anything implying 'Xena') mayhaps one beautiful and the other ugly... Could be sort of interesting.
The Deceiver, make him an Avatara who studies under Mjarin and his Warlocks. Gets used by Mjarin a few times. Realizes Mjarin's evilness and betrays Mjarin but then confesses his guilt at doing what he knew were suspicious actions. I like him being Exciled it makes him that twisted bitter man who joins Balor to destroy the empire that scorned him. We need something to make him hate the Watcher more too, more than Myth 3 gives... I say that the Deceiver was the full on best apprentice of Mazzarin, and the Watcher's killing of Mazzarin forced Mydred into finishing his apprenticeship with Mjarin. So essentially The Deceiver blames The Watcher for all his own guilt for turning evil. I like that.
The watcher's just pissed that the Deceiver out majicked him. He seems like that sort of guy...
The Watcher should be mentioned more in flavor text, as in this version he is the one controlling the undead armies. (Out of the Dire Marsh, oooh mad goat of the fens reference)
He doesn't control the Myrks directly though. I Imagine they just sort of rampage around, and are sort of pushed in the direction they are meant to rampage towards.
Mjarin: Just one of Moagim's Fallen Lords. No more, No less. Flavor mention that he appeared sometime around the beginning of the Age as an advisor, making him old, and appearing around the time that Moagim originally had.
Mjarin and the Head. I like Mjarin being the head, it still works...
Damas: Change that uniform to a Heron's. And the Name. I don't really have a problem with him being a Heron Guard but he HAS to actualy BE a Heron Guard if he is. it even gives us a double meaning for Twice Born. Born as a man, Reborn as 13 Burning Jaguar or whatever. Maybe suggest that his presence causes a jealous rivalry between the Ravanah/Culweh sisters. Just to make our Fallen Lords seem more disfunctional. Perhaps sometime in he can renounce his Heron Guard name, as he falls in love with one (or hey, BOTH) of them. I don't see the Herons liking love that much, they remind me of Jedi or something. Just a thought.
Mazzarin: Do we really need him? The Total Codex? It just seems to add unnessarily. Just mention him some in flavor texts. The Total Codex shouldn't be able to be read by Connacht. So far none of the 'good guys' have been able to. Alric couldn't, and Connacht shouldn't. It just seems odd. We could have a 'get the codex mission before the dark do' but that just seems like its been done before. The only reason I can see to include the Codex is that its traditional: it's been in every game.
The Trow: Ugh, don't have the Trow fight with the Myrkridian Army. Don't have them even be part of the Dark Army. Have them be big and mean and evil, yeah. Have them subjegate the north west, thats okay. I can see the Trow as being opportunistic in thinking 'well the biggest obstical in our way to controlling the north west is Muirthemne. They seem distracted by these Myrkridia. Let's wander around and rampage through their towns while they are busy defendinging Llancarfan.
I can see the Trow being mentioned and encountered in seperate armies of themselves and Ogre and perhaps Ghouls since they seem on the friendly side. But not with undead and DEFINATLY not with Myrkridia. Even sometimes show them attacking Myrkridia with a dark vs dark vs you ala 7 Gates.
The trow should be in some of the earlier missions, or mentioned early in the game, then have a mention like.
"Myrdred was rumored to have gone north west just around the same time the Trow began their massive Civil War. It took them two long years, but eventually they exterminated their Oghre slaves turned revolutionaries, and it seems that they put two and two together. Our scouts say we have less than a day before their Iron Armies reach the Walls. While we hold them off here Connacht has hatched a daring plan to destroy their cities behind them." something like that.
Connacht obviously needs to destroy the Trow, and have a reason to do it, and I like the whole mydred sparking the civil war thing, because it seems like something he could do (but I would much rather not have a mission based on it, make it a bit more... mystical exactly what he had done, and make it seem a bit more 'did he do it or didn't he?' remember the trow seem to like The Deceiver on a later time.
Also make the SunHammer not be destroyed but lost or something. I like the idea of Balor using it to torch Muirthemne.
"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..."
This can be taken too ways, the 'dull' way and the 'grim' way. The dull way is the way it's taken in Myth 3 right now. The Spider-Cult is something entirely different and are not the Smiths of Muirthemne. The Spider Cult was some small time cult of humans that decided one day to capture/kill the Smiths, who were important and forced Connacht to stop ignoring them. This is shaky and not very interesting either.
This is the cool way:
The Spider Cults: Have the dwarves start it obviously, perhaps the Smiths of Muirthemne found a new dimension with their mucking about with things like the Tain and all that, and the Spiders started coming through, and they started a religion of sacrifice, (known only to the upper levels of the Smiths) to appease their great spider leaders. Sacrifice a peasant here, a peasant there, what with all those refugees it wouldn't be too hard. Maybe even have all those 'special dwarves' have some hints in their flavor texts that Connacht even KNOWS about the evils of the Spider Cult/Smiths of Muirthemne but tolerates them in return for cool gadgets like the Sun Hammer and the Tain. Then have them sacrifice randomly some refugee that Connacht knows (maybe a warrior captain from the earlier levels or something. Maybe some dwarves that disagree with the Smiths are killed and sacrificed) which then forces him to exterminate them. Of course he goes in, and he can't find any of the higher level members as they've gone to a different dimension. You could still have the lower members be brainwashed/spider eaten humans like in the level, with the higher level cultists being dwarfish mage technologists or something. Have them run away as you constantly have to go behind them, running into all their dwarvy traps (dwarves are good at traps, and it would put you in a position that was opposite of all those thrall you usually satchel to death) Then at the end they open up a void, out pops one of the 'spider gods' (in reality just a real big queen spider) and the dwarves jump into their own little pocket dimension, never to be seen again.
People I'd like to have narrating:
A New Heron Guard/Warrior. A warrior in the beginning of the game who turns Heron later. 20 years of fighting beforehand so he has some experience with fighting off the Watcher and Trow armies... This is okay I guess.
A Grizzled Heron Guard in the Present who was that guy above: Alows us to fill in the holes of myth 3 by saying stuff like "Now the way the legends go aren't entirely true... They just bring connacht up to be a little greater than he already is) but has that 'past tense' thing going on. "Now we had all gathered up cold and shivering in the walls of Llancarfan, unable to light even a single fire for fear of..." while it still has some of the grimness, it lacks the 'right there' moment, and you lose a sense of the urgency. Then again it is a prequel. There isn't much urgency to begin with.
A Warrior: Tried and true, he's knowledgable about the battles he's in but doesnt know anything about the up and ups until they tell him. Keeps you out of knowing all the information, to keep a sense of mystique. The Heron Guard seem to know a lot, and they wouldn't be as subject to rumours and myths as the normal grizzled warrior... Call me a traditionalist but I still like this one. You hear about the deeds of the heros in secrecy and you don't have the story of life with them. You get a
'And I heard from another soldier in passing that the Captain of the Heron Guards had fallen in love and renounced his status as Heron... It's hard to beleive one of such dignity would give up his rank like that, but in these trying times who could blame him, if it's even true at all.'
compared to "Damas and Ravanna's constant quarreling became more playful, and Connacht spent most of his time hunting game and scouting the dense wilderness before them."
It's just too.. Up close. I want my heros to be seen from a blurry 'did they do it or didn't they' distance. I only want to see them every once and a while as they do great things. I don't care about the intamcies of their love life.
Well... This is what I could think of, hope I didn't prattle on for TOO long.
: -Forrest
