Well the reason i mention vecna is because his story seems to have quite successfully "broken " reality twice, ie the rule changes from 2 to 3.x to 4 and since the rules are the only constant in the D+D universe, the only thing beyond the will of the DM, ( well in a good game anyway ) then his story is the place to find the actual truth of the gods,universe etc etc. And this also goes against the infinite layers concept, if there is a layer above the vecna story why do the uber powers above him not change the rules ? Answer; power comes to a stop, and there is a top of the hill. Simply saying he does/did not exist in the realms is like saying the ethereal plane does not extend to the sword coast, just cos you cant see or feel his power does not mean one is not affected by it. Anyway planular travel is just to easy, any access to the ethereal plane gives a traveler immediate access to any point in the multiverse, and any time in the universe, its just a matter of navigation and balls, likewise with the astral plane and the outer planes. So you can be damn sure vecna is aware of forgotten realms, greyhawk and a whole host of other places! ( I once had a very powerful character brought up in Greyhawk who spent years plotting the death of Elminster just cos he was a challenge )
As` for the pre-gods storyline not sure if its craftien, probably, but from the various hints by many different writers would say its a constant theme and thus campaign outline. But NOT Cthulhu, the whole pantheon was dealt with in detail in deities an demigods 1, the original edition ( before christian cultists had the whole section banned) and they were just not that powerful , MAYBE the big C himself who uniquely could be in many different places at once, without Avitars, and thus break the bounds of spacetime, but in the outer planes where time is under the control of the gods of that plane, then he would be calamari on toast,def not in AO's league and beyond AO, not a chance.
But on the right track, i am thinking big C is akin to a tadpole while what we are talking about with the old ones is the daddy bullfrog. Ao in my game/mod has its history exposed but thats my take on the story.

AO is a remnant of the times before the gods came into being, and before the modern races evolved, obviously the gods consider themselves eternal and like to propagate that line to their worshipers. Thus as a whole the gods have tried to destroy any hint of those times and that is why the origin and nature of The AO is such a mystery ( as with all things some of this lore has survived held at the moment by Vecna the god of secrets ) . They simply pretend The AO does not exist, and when it intervenes they pretend it had not

"You're talking about Planescape. Finite infinity is absolutely part of how it works. Here's a fundamental point of Planescape: the Planes are infinite. Every plane is infinitely large, but is contained within finite boundaries, and every plane has layers - each layer is itself infinite, yet also only a part of the plane. The Great Staircase is infinite. The number of planes is infinite. The number of worlds on the Prime Material Plane and near-identical Material Planes is infinite. The Abyss has an infinite number of layers. The mountain in the middle of the Outlands is of infinite height, yet Sigil circles its peak. "

Yep totally true, and accurate, but not an argument for infinite layers of power ( in my humble opinion ), infinity is not that a hard concept to integrate into a finite universe, mathematically it is simply 1/0 and when you meet it in an equation ( obvious case being infinite curvature in a singularity ) it means your equations are wrong. Philosophically the equivalent is that when we say infinite we mean " i do not understand how this works within my understanding of the universe, but it does work somehow, thus my understanding is incorrect " which is the situation with the planes. But that also implies that there are correct equations and a correct understanding, i would argue in light of the previous, that the infinite layers of power are not infinite at all, its just that they are incomprehensible to players, thus also leaving opportunities for DMs to slowly fill in those missing equations and make the incomprehensible into nice linear functions . Hopefully when quantum and enistinien maths are successfully integrated we can do the same with singularities.

So is there a ethereal plane in the realms ? And can a character/god etc travel between greyhawk and Forgotten realms? Cos if the cannon says no ive got a shed load of rewiring to do on my mod. I can certainly understand that campaign settings can be very seperate but if they share the same or similar rule set arnt they by definition linked? a potion of etherealness is a potion of etherealness, dont they both send the player to the same plane ?

I think in all the literature have read the ethereal plane connects to all points in the universe simultaneously, exactly the same as dimension 11 in current M theory, so is it an argument that if there is no mention to an ethereal plane in a campaign setting its the same as saying " there is a ethereal plane but we have no possible way of accessing or detecting it , thus to all intense and purposes it does not exist " again the exact same situation we have with dimension 11

fair enough, on the balance of things i am persuaded by tempest's view of totally separate settings, it seems to fit the cannon as presented better than a single universe with separate bits.

and i see what you mean about infinite realities as only part of Planescape setting

but given that, would the answer to the original question not be, "read the FR rule book with a magnifing glass, and if it does not give you a clear view you are stuffed ". Cos none of the other material in the rest of the D+D universe applies at all, apparently not even the rules. And what do i do about spelljammers? , so if they visit sigil then pop to the sword coast, thats sigil and the sword coast in the spelljammer setting not sigil in Planescape, and sword coast in Forgotten realms, so the spelljammer setting copies all the ones it touches? Well suppose that works within the concept.

No ethreal travel between campaign settings is a real problem for my mod, i need to do a lot of thinking and maybe abandon the idea.

Yep just checked the refs and all come from Dragon Magazine and unofficial ( actually i think one is " official" at least the cover looks TSR ) FR add-ons. Dragon magazine though is close to cannon ( i remember Fiend Folio 1 and 2 came 95% straight from Dragons pages with VERY little change ) but not quite since some of the articals were pure crap, I would have to find a direct or indirect reference to " campaign travel" within the original FR campaign box set ( which luckly i have in original glory ) i assume.
I think the Vecna mod story line is prob still a go, so far DEFINATLY not cannon, but in the spirit of lots of other addon material which is also not quite cannon, i certainly dont mind standing next to Die Vecna Die !

Ya know, the BG series is far from consistent in it's own story line, much less FR cannon. If I were you, I'd just assume that the players are no longer in the FR setting when they start going after Vecnas artifacts and have done with it.

Such is the theory behind Ravenloft anyhow. You walk through the strange mist and are suddenly in a different plane ... it's now your problem to figure out how to get back

Thats a fair idea, i would be effectively taking them to my own campaign setting, BUT i have to explain how they get there ( the connection ), if not to them then to myself

Your right on your previos post i could use that pocket plane Ravenloft is located on, it does indeed mention links to other campaign settings within its core material, but its bloody complicated !! LOL

ok poped onto the Forgotten realms Wiki (http://forgottenreal....com/wiki/Oerth)

"Oerth is home to prominent wizards such as Bigby, Drawmij, Tenser, and Mordenkainen whose spells have spread even to the Forgotten Realms. Mordenkainen is an acquaintance of Elminster Aumar's; the two have met on numerous occasions at Ed Greenwood's house on Earth to exchange spells and lore.[1] Mordenkainen, when he had newly mastered interplanar travel, used to visit Waterdeep with some regularity.[2]

In the book Passage to Dawn by R.A. Salvatore, when Harkle Harpell enters into an unorthodox contest of wizardry with the Sea Sprite's wizard Robillard, Harkle and Robillard cite a number of Oerthly wizards, including Bigby, Melf, Otiluke, and Tenser. "Robillard blanched despite his own impressive display. Of course he knew of Bigby! He was one of the most powerful and impressive wizards of all time, on any world."[3]

The Oerthly bard Gwydiesin of the Cranes has also chatted with Elminster on occasion.[4]

Both Elminster Aumar and Khelben "Blackstaff" Arunsun have spent time on Oerth, and Elminster suspected that Khelben Arunsun the Younger settled there to begin a life away from the elder Khelben.[5] "

Assuming this is correct, and Derived from the Forgotten realms setting content itself, ( have yet to check the reference notes, but wiki is usually pretty good ) then i think my history/universe setup will fit within the cannon quite well !! I think i can make a very powerfull argument for every piece of of my universe as long as connections can be made, but if the above is wrong/misleading then i need to continue down the route of rewriting things.

Unfortunatly i am and always have been a bit of a d+d purist ( i even loath the rule changes past rev2 ) so if i cant make my ideas fit into the agreed D+D universe then thats it, start again or give up.
At the moment the VecnaV23 mod is quite big, by next year it will be one of the biggest mods in terms of new content and game hours. All this NEEDS to be based on firm D+D rules and principals, i dont want people saying " yea great mod but breaks the rules "

Ok now totally lost.....went to wiki,looked up vecna

"Ten years later, in the second edition Dungeon Master's Guide (1989), Vecna's history was expanded under the description of his Hand and Eye. This information was further developed in 1993's Book of Artifacts.

With the release of the adventure Vecna Lives! in 1990, written in support of The City of Greyhawk boxed set, Vecna finally appeared in person, re-imagined as a demigod, and the chief antagonist of the adventure. At the end of the adventure?presuming the players defeat Vecna?he is transported to the Ravenloft campaign setting.[7] However, it wasn't until 1998 that there was a Ravenloft-centred follow-through, Vecna Reborn.[8]

In 2000, Wizards of the Coast released the last adventure to be written for D&D's 2nd edition rules, Die, Vecna, Die!, a three-part adventure tying Greyhawk to the Ravenloft and Planescape campaign settings. In this adventure, Vecna was given the rank of a lesser god"

Ok am i wrong or does that say Vecna appears in Greyhawk, Ravenloft, and Planescape campaign settings, and that these settings are tied together by him ???????????? And am assuming thats the same vecna, not 3 different Vecnas ??? Given the separate campaign cannon isnt that impossible ???

Hi all as promised VecnaV22 is uploading now. I am designating this release as "Vecna Beta 1" from now on releases will be MUCH fewer as my time for modding is now very limited, i will still be responding to bug threads but further dev is on hold, its still a beta cos there are still issues, some monsters have to high ac and THAC0, to many items early on with timestop immunity, a lot of the cutscenes could be better.

Any experienced modder is welcome to iron out any bugs they find, and or add content to the planes, a post on the vecna thread to let me know would be nice

BP Compatibility..... I think at this stage Vecna is ready to go in the BP tactics list, although designated a beta i believe it is ready. But a warning that the difficulty level is astronomic is a good idea

hi all V23 is now finished and posted. no bugs now so RC1.Next version will be with sound music and text screens, oh yes also with spelljammer ships, cosmic battles, the whole AD&D meets Traveller experience

Hi all just a quick post to say the Vecna mod is back with release of V16, hopefully all the bugs are now squashed, and i am actively supporting the mod ( expansions are comming and am here to squash future bugs )

Thanks

Jube

Hi all VecnaV21 i now uploaded, as mentioned before MUCH harder than v20, a real challenge, and have kept my original design goals, take whatever overpowered / uber / items or spells and you will still get a good fight

Still few things not perfect so not calling it RC1 yet, but nothing a player will notice, v22 will be done in approx a week and WILL be perfect, and WILL be RC1

Oww now thats quite a load of game playing to get to vecna levels , i had a similar thing for the past 2 days the little Win tablet i do BG2 stuff on picked up a nasty virus/trojan/worm, had to reformat and reinstall, win,drivers etc etc etc, so put me back a bit. Just finishing up now and getting back to v19 which i hope is not far away, scripting is a pain!!!

Hi all Vecna V19 is uploaded and ready for DL.

Thats about it for the core adventure, have checked all keys and subquests are there, everything needed to get to the final battle is correct. I think i can now, with some confidence, say we are out of alpha and into beta1.

Hi all V18 is up for download, the only things not checked now are Android1 encounter and final fight, all other reported bugs should be done with this version.

Thanks

Ps Hand and eye must be equiped/activated again to apply fixes

Think the set would become immediately damn unpopular

Good point mate, in a "proper" BW setup there is more than enough xps available to get to around 18-30th lv and launch off into plane travel ( the hunt for the eye and hand being the first of several extraplanar adventures ). And if a character/party has the skill power and balls to complete hand/eye quest and the BALLS to own the said items they would only do TOB for a laugh
I am very wary of changing the game plotline though that would make vecna a mega mod? and i would be getting into a world of pain when it comes to compatibility, so virtually all the vecna content is offworld or places where one recalls or teleports to.
But yes i totally agree with you some change at the end of tob would be good to lead into vecna if not attempted before that. And yes if vecna was completed before that he/she would prob refuse godhood since they are effectively god killers. ( gods are children compared to the forces characters and plots in Vecna )
The current expansions are
Start of the search for the Rod of Seven Parts
"If you own the hand and eye, things are never the same again"

There is an open invite to other modders to write high/extream level adventures in the planes ( vecna curently provides 14 unpopulated, out of 50, areas where other modders can host their adventures, they just have to populate and script ) but as yet have had zero response, so doing it myself, but there is only me so its Slooooooow

Well... dunno how to start, 'cause i got no complains nor bugs to report.

Let's put it that way: You mess with ToB!

A couple of weeks ago I enjoyed v12 of Your mod in a tactics install playing a solo C/M dwarf on insane.
As a member of the german kerzenburg forum I posted a review there, which, stressing by the way Fennek's one month ago post, may be condensed like that: ToB doesn't permit a Vecna Artifacts mod!

In fact, one could say the same thing in a much more polite way: If there had been a version x of Vecna in 2001, nobody would ever have designed ToB.

Vecna Artifacts (for me) is the natural continuation of HC's struggle to godhood: Saving his/her soul and fighting and gaining reputation amongst avatars of different gods until HC proves worthy of having the choice to accept or deny the throne of the god of murder. And obviously slaying yet another halfbreed like Ilasera=Nice Butt or Yaga-Shura=The Dumb or Sendai=The multiple schizophrenic should not be sufficient nor qualifying.

But we do have ToB!

So how can You suppose me to even CARE about some hostile drow in ToB, after that I've killed Orcus, Demorgorgon and Lloth(!) united in the final Vecna battle? A fingertip on there forehead should be sufficient to let them evaporate from the living side of the world. Whatever gelugon or pitfiend comes up to me I should adress: Well, I've already talked to your boss about your life. I'm sorry!

Well... dunno how to end, 'cause i got no complains nor bugs to report.

Just thinkin'....

What can i say, you are perfectly correct!! ( and very well put )
But i suppose same can be said for many Tactics games, where you can get to 30th lv+ before even bothering to sail to spellhold.

My only answer is to keep adding content to vecna, currently there are 50 new areas, when they are all fully populated that should be a LOT of hours of gameplay, maybe over 100, hopefully no one will miss TOB if they embark off-world before.

An obvious problem i have to address, and am really open to suggestions, is how to handle Watchers keep, I have 2 options,

1) Write code to modify watchers keep to reflect having faced demigorgon once before
2) Use another god for the final battle

I quite like the first option, it would tie Vecna more into the TOB plot-line, but then it would be logical to make many more changes to the TOB plot-line, and obviously rewrite the ending, but then we are into partial-conversion territory, and would immediately become incompatible with a lot of BW mods.

I would like to know what the BW community thinks.

As you said in one of the posts above, I think it would be nice if one could play Vecna after one decided to become some sort of demi-god at the end of ToB. That doesn't mean that it should become impossible to start Vecna during ToB, but if it is encouraged to start it afterwards, it would be better in ways of storyline. Just my point of view...

And thanks for the new version!

Cool i agree, and if i make that mod an optional component then vacna will still be compatible with the other tob mods such as prophecy. Will start looking at it, expect something around v21

Hi all what is this about a "fix" for vecna on BPv10?, what is the issue the fix is for? is it for versions pre v20? cos fairly confident v20 is free of serious bugs. If so what is the fix doing to v20 and v21 which am just about to release?

It seems to fix several script errors, though I don't know if they're still present in the latest version of Vecna. All those patch files will be applied to their corresponding baf namesakes. Every - in front of a line means that this line will be removed and eventually replaced by the next line beginning with a +.

If you already fixed those script errors, the corresponding patches won't be installed, as they've got no faulty code to replace.

10th

Ur ok that sounds fine, as long as the patching code recognizes rewriting and/or extending of dialogs and scripts then all is cool ( oh and possible renaming )
Yes i believe everything is fixed, am waiting for any bug reports for v20, if there are none then v21 should be a wrap, will call it release candidate 1 and have a well earned rest from modding.

Thanks for that mate, i assume the patch was made for versions before v20, but i would advise people to download v20 rather then using the patch on previous versions, but each to their own

Hi all what is this about a "fix" for vecna on BPv10?, what is the issue the fix is for? is it for versions pre v20? cos fairly confident v20 is free of serious bugs. If so what is the fix doing to v20 and v21 which am just about to release?

this is a real pain i use the Twisted rune as one of the doorways to the Vecna mod, my mod places rings of recall on the TR members, and if other mods make it difficult or impossible to get to the TR encounter that buggers one of my routes the the extended TR compound. ( fortunately there is another , harder, route via the astral plane ) Which mods modify the TR plotline? so i can check for them on setup and change my dialogs accordingly.
Still a pain, i chose the TR because it seemed no one else had modded that encounter already, well thought wrong there

the rings at for sale at Ribalds are rings of Astral travel, and that is the alternate doorway to the vena quest ( one can plane shift to Hades, or Astral then to Hades, kill a shed load of daemons, then find a ring of recall to take you to the extended TR compound ) But is a tougher fight than getting the rings of recall from TR.
But if am reading this right the bug that prevents TR access only affects a few games with SCSII so nothing for me to worry about? Alternatively i was thinking of supplying the, correct, key items to the party when they talk to the "messenger to the gods" in the temple district, that would ensure they can get to the TR compound, but would effectively negate the Balderdash extensions.
Exactly the same thing happened to me when i was play testing Vecna, i got to the TR doorway with my rogue stone and could not get in, if i was just a player trying to play Vecna i would at that point assume Vecna was a bunch of crap and give up
So i think at least i am going to have to check for Balderdash and modify my dialog ( to point to where the players need to go to get the correct scroll ) accordingly ?

Hi all making this new thread just for people reporting bugs in VecnaV21 or later ONLY. ( if you are playing versions pre 21 please post in the other thread thanks )