Kevin's Watch

There have been many posts about large the army that fought Flesharrower's army could have been, and we know that Flesharrower's army was 400,000 strong, most of which were stone-warped beings rather than ur-viles or cavewights. A reserve twice the size of this army existed.

Question is, what were the stone-warped beings before the stone warped them? Were they supposed to be human? If so that many stone-warped beings is comparable with (perhaps greater than) the population of the land.

Perhaps many of them were large animals, but it still seems like a LOT of large animals.

Was there a human population of the lower land that could have supplied some of the stone-warped army?

Didn't a lot of Foul's raw materials for Fleshharrower's army come from the Sarangrave Flat and also the Great Swamp? I'm not sure but I do believe that it's mentioned at one point in the book that that's where he gets his pre-illearth stone warped beings/creatures...

enthralled wrote:Didn't a lot of Foul's raw materials for Fleshharrower's army come from the Sarangrave Flat and also the Great Swamp? I'm not sure but I do believe that it's mentioned at one point in the book that that's where he gets his pre-illearth stone warped beings/creatures...

The swamps, the flats, deep in the bowels, some I think were just plain made...that was my understanding. And he didn't get the army in just a year or two, it was a long time coming.

The warped people may have originally been people who lived in the lower land, and who were enslaved by Foul. Or they may have been people from the upper land who were kidnapped and such.

I've always presumed that this was long ago, and that Foul bred them for years, like Sauron's orcs, until his army was ready.

Sounds reasonable. Thanks to all the above.

As short and sweet a thread, and as neatly wrapped up could be - the japanese haiku of threads if ever ther was one!

... hmm .... if Foul needed the Illearth Stone to do the warping, and he only had it for about 40 years before the Illearth War, then maybe it's not as simple as we think.

Perhaps he had amassed an army before hand, and didn't warp it until late in the game. Or perhaps the warping was associated with some sort of forced growth.

Maybe he used something like Saruman's orc pods ...

Forced growth sounds about right.

Y'know, the orc pods, as shown in the film, are a Jackson touch- not Tolkien's; Tolkien was always vague about exactly how orcs were produced, only saying that they were spawned in pits (and that may have only referred to the origin of the orc species as opposed to orc procreation in general).

I'm leaning towards the mustering of all evil hypothesis. Remember what Manethrall Gay/Rue told the council in TIeW, that she saw a vast army marching INTO Fouls domain as well as the army moving toward the Land.

Where do you think they were mustered from? Perhaps she only saw the cavewights and ur-viles going there?

Lifeswallower, the lands around the crèche (remember the jerehium were not LF's only makings), the areas around landsdrop, southron wastes. Basically any area NOT the land, more specifically, any areas not covered by the interdict of the collosus.

Right, but what lived there?

kresh, griffians, mud creatures that kinslaughterer could corrupt with the illearth stone. Probably some form of people, remember the part in the ruined city, Troy's adversaries are described as being closer to human than ur-vile.

To be totally honest, i see it being comprised also of corrupted lands-folk. (shrugs and goes to read illearth war again.)

I dont see the curruption of once 'normal folk' rather a forced geneticly engenered use of base flesh by use of the IES to duplicate clone and grow deformed lifeforms that are fouls army

jackgiantkiller wrote:I dont see the curruption of once 'normal folk' rather a forced geneticly engenered use of base flesh by use of the IES to duplicate clone and grow deformed lifeforms that are fouls army

The Chrons are a lot less detailed about the Land, or issues such as the origin of Foul's army, than LoTR. The Stone warps flesh and blood to create noisome creatures, we don't know how or who, when or where. Perhaps they are all created by Foul's servants, but how did they use the Stone? Perhaps Foul conjured them all up at once. And where did he keep them in the meantime? Where do they get their supplies?

TheWormoftheWorld'sEnd wrote:

jackgiantkiller wrote:I dont see the curruption of once 'normal folk' rather a forced geneticly engenered use of base flesh by use of the IES to duplicate clone and grow deformed lifeforms that are fouls army

The Chrons are a lot less detailed about the Land, or issues such as the origin of Foul's army, than LoTR. The Stone warps flesh and blood to create noisome creatures, we don't know how or who, when or where. Perhaps they are all created by Foul's servants, but how did they use the Stone? Perhaps Foul conjured them all up at once. And where did he keep them in the meantime? Where do they get their supplies?

It's possible Foul had ur-viles helping him. The ur-viles had the ability to spawn more ur-viles/Waynhim and they did produce Vain eventually, so perhaps Foul recruited them to set up a mass spawning crypt operation in the 40 years before TIW that utilized the Illearth Stone to corrupt the final product. Either that or Foul wanted them to spawn the perfect army and instead the ur-viles outsourced the labor to Bhrathairealm or something, hence the crappy "twisted" creatures they ended up sending into the field.

The army probably lived in/under the Shattered Hills, I imagine. In TPTP, the jheherrin tell Covenant/Foamfollower about the catacombs under the Creche and the Hills. Maybe Foul was cool with letting them crash at his crib and rock out in the thronehall. I imagine there could have been some wild parties at Ridjeck Thome when the ur-viles got drunk on fermented vitrim or something.

TheWormoftheWorld'sEnd wrote:

jackgiantkiller wrote:I dont see the curruption of once 'normal folk' rather a forced geneticly engenered use of base flesh by use of the IES to duplicate clone and grow deformed lifeforms that are fouls army

The Chrons are a lot less detailed about the Land, or issues such as the origin of Foul's army, than LoTR. The Stone warps flesh and blood to create noisome creatures, we don't know how or who, when or where. Perhaps they are all created by Foul's servants, but how did they use the Stone? Perhaps Foul conjured them all up at once. And where did he keep them in the meantime? Where do they get their supplies?

I'd suggest that Foul would keep the warped creatures and sub-humans in gulag-like conditions in areas in and around Ridjeck Thome (and remember that in the First Chronicles we only see a small part of Ridjeck Thome, the Shattered Hills, Spoiled Plain, Sarangrave Flat, etc., so there's plenty of places where Foul could have secreted breeding pits and slave camps). Foul would primarily be interested in having vast numbers of wretched creatures to make up the "squaddies" of his armies and, being who he is, would not only not care about the squalid conditions of their lives but would be richly amused by it.

This discussion prompts another thought of mine, namely that there is reason to believe that one of the social innovations of the Old Lords, which would have been carried on by the New Lords, was population stabilisation. It would be entirely consistent with an ethic of Landservice to (a) recognise the pressures that constantly increasing human numbers were placing on the forests and seek to redress this and (b) recognise that the quality of human lives lived in the Land was more important than sheer numbers. Also, in The First Chronicles we see gender equality amongst the people of the Land, virtually no large families, significant characters who are clearly unmarried and/or not parents, etc.

Encryptic wrote:

TheWormoftheWorld'sEnd wrote:

jackgiantkiller wrote:I dont see the curruption of once 'normal folk' rather a forced geneticly engenered use of base flesh by use of the IES to duplicate clone and grow deformed lifeforms that are fouls army

The Chrons are a lot less detailed about the Land, or issues such as the origin of Foul's army, than LoTR. The Stone warps flesh and blood to create noisome creatures, we don't know how or who, when or where. Perhaps they are all created by Foul's servants, but how did they use the Stone? Perhaps Foul conjured them all up at once. And where did he keep them in the meantime? Where do they get their supplies?

It's possible Foul had ur-viles helping him. The ur-viles had the ability to spawn more ur-viles/Waynhim and they did produce Vain eventually, so perhaps Foul recruited them to set up a mass spawning crypt operation in the 40 years before TIW that utilized the Illearth Stone to corrupt the final product. Either that or Foul wanted them to spawn the perfect army and instead the ur-viles outsourced the labor to Bhrathairealm or something, hence the crappy "twisted" creatures they ended up sending into the field.

Hmmmm, I was thinking more along the lines of Evil Conservative Industries.

Encryptic wrote:The army probably lived in/under the Shattered Hills, I imagine. In TPTP, the jheherrin tell Covenant/Foamfollower about the catacombs under the Creche and the Hills. Maybe Foul was cool with letting them crash at his crib and rock out in the thronehall. I imagine there could have been some wild parties at Ridjeck Thome when the ur-viles got drunk on fermented vitrim or something.

Who built Ridjeck Thome?

TheWormoftheWorld'sEnd wrote:
Who built Ridjeck Thome?

The Creator. Foul sued him in court for emotional distress caused by being imprisoned in the Land and the Creator had to build him a new house as part of the settlement.

That does raise another question though - I never understood what the point of the "guardian" was at the front door of Ridjeck Thome near the end of TPTP. It seems like it was only there so Foamfollower didn't have to waltz into Ridjeck Thome butt-naked after losing his clothes in Hotash Slay. I guess SRD didn't want to have poor Foamfollower be humiliated by Foul cracking a few cheap dick jokes before he killed him.

Encryptic wrote:

TheWormoftheWorld'sEnd wrote:
Who built Ridjeck Thome?

The Creator. Foul sued him in court for emotional distress caused by being imprisoned in the Land and the Creator had to build him a new house as part of the settlement.

That does raise another question though - I never understood what the point of the "guardian" was at the front door of Ridjeck Thome near the end of TPTP. It seems like it was only there so Foamfollower didn't have to waltz into Ridjeck Thome butt-naked after losing his clothes in Hotash Slay. I guess SRD didn't want to have poor Foamfollower be humiliated by Foul cracking a few cheap dick jokes before he killed him.

Foul would have been remiss if his Fantasy Castle lacked a guardian "mook."

You've recently started a new RPG. Your characters are low level, and don't have any remarkable powers or weapons. Suddenly, you run into a Giant Mook! You prepare yourself for a nasty battle...

...but the Giant Mook goes down in three hits. What a joke!

In that instant, Foamfollower came leaping over the abutment above the entrance to the Creche.
The warder was beyond his reach; but as he landed, he dove forward, rolled at it, swept its feet from under it. It went down in a whirl of limbs and blades.
At once, he straddled it. It was as large as he, perhaps stronger. It was armed. But he hammered it so mightily with his fists, pinned it so effectively with his body, that it could not defend itself. After he dealt it a huge two-fisted blow at the base of its necks, it went limp.

Ummm, I knew that...