Whaaa? Weren't powries supposed to be girls?

hustin1 · February 2021

What. the. heck? Did WOTC demand a change or something? Should there be a lore entry to explain the...um...metamorphosis?

On a related note, the overwhelming sentiment in my alliance is that they hate the redcap change: we can't tell them apart now and it makes fighting them a major PITA.

pitshade · February 2021

They redesigned them to look like 5th Edition monsters. I suspect the new look for the zone is at least partially driven by WotC's desire to bury everything related to 4th.

I don't know if the Neverwinter lore from them is based on 4th, but it makes them corrupted gnomes. I don't remember them being monogender though. The 5th edition version has them as little old men, in line with folklore. They aren't even a true species there, but rather arise from incidents of bloodshed and murder in areas in or adjacent to the Feywild.

Not sure, but I assume they changed the one in the Wandering Emporium. Probably not the pet, as the original Erinyes pet was left unchanged. I thought about checking on the troll models in Icespire and Rothe Valley at some point.

It is definitely hard to tell them apart now. I've only seen Powries and Witherers but one of them yelled Bramble Curse as if it were a Thorn. Well there was a new Hunter but my pet killed it before it left the undergrowth.

hustin1 · February 2021

@nitocris83 @cwhitesidedev#9752

I hate insomnia. I especially hate it when I feel lousy (long story short, my prescription provider is on my you-know-what list). Nevertheless, I've had an epiphany.

A Tale of Two Redcaps: Real and Fake

Anyone who tried the mod today surely noticed a jarring change when it comes to redcaps. They're smaller, and while they sound largely the same, there's one huge change: the new ones all look like old men, i.e. they're all male.

The new ones are actually the ones that comply with D&D sourcebooks and with old-world legend. Here's the deal: the ones in the old Sharandar campaign were fake.

What do I mean by this: simple. There is only one "true" redcap, and that is the new kind: they are born directly of the Feywild, they look like little old men, and they are *required* to kill something at least every three days or they cease to exist. And they are well aware of this fact. This is the 100% lore-compliant Feywild redcap. They don't multiply by making little redcap babies: they are born *directly* of the Feywild and multiply indirectly by the spread of bloodshed and murder (thanks @pitshade for correcting me!).

The redcaps that we encountered in the original Sharandar campaign are not and never were "true" redcaps. They were the Fomorians' attempt to create a better, more "reliable" redcap. They used gnomes for this purpose. They weren't true redcaps any more than if a tribe of dwarves, or orcs, or even elves turned evil and started soaking the blood of their enemies in their caps. They were called "redcaps" simply out of convenience.

If you're an evil Fomorian, using true Feywild redcaps for your army is extremely problematic. They ***must*** kill something (some form of animal life) at least every three days or *poof* they vanish from existence. So, to the average Fomorian, this presents an enormous, arguably insurmountable, logistical problem. You have to supply a constant stream of things for them to kill, without fail. If a supply of fodder is late, parts of your army start vanishing from existence. Making matters worse, those supplies of fodder become enormous vulnerabilities: you not only have to protect your army, you have to protect the fodder to keep your army existing. A troll can go an extra day two without food and not die, but if that fodder for your "true" Feywild redcap is a day late, *poof*! For an enemy, those supplies of fodder become irresistible targets.

The solution? Create a better redcap. So they took all those gnomes they had as slaves and twisted them into reasonable fascimiles. The "fake" Gnomish redcap had the same bloodthirsty behavior bred into them, but for the Fomorians it was even better: they did so not out of sheer necessity but out of *desire*. To a Fomorian it was the best of both worlds: a "redcap" that they could treat like any other minion and one that might be even more bloodthirsty than the "true" ones, if that was possible.

But the Iliyanbruen elves called them "redcaps", you might think. Doesn't this invalidate your premise?

Not at all. The elves, the Fomorians, even the new gnomish "redcaps" themselves referred to them as "redcaps". Everyone, including the gnomes themselves, knew they weren't the true Feywild kind. The name was purely descriptive. It was simply a lot easier to say than "Fomorian-twisted gnomish redcap". As long as everyone was on the same page, there wasn't any confusion. And everyone *was* on the same page, because Fomorians never used true Feywild redcaps as their minions. To do so was simply too impractical. The gnomes-turned-redcaps multiplied the usual way, by getting busy and making little Fomorian-twisted gnomish redcap babies, and the Fomorians were just peachy with how it all worked out.

Then Malabog was defeated. Were all those gnomish redcaps killed? Perhaps yes, perhaps no. Perhaps there are pockets of them in isolated villages here and there, but without any direction from Fomorian overlords they are simply keeping to themselves. They could attack the elves if they wished, but they could very easily be smart enough to see what happened to Malabog and decide that war with the elves just doesn't carry any benefit for them. Who knows, maybe they quietly resent being under the thumb of Malabog's trolls, who might have been making meals of their friends and family members.

So the redcaps that we're seeing today are true Feywild redcaps, while the fake Fomorian-created ones went and found some quiet corners of the Feywild to do their own thing. Maybe without Fomorians keeping them under their thumb they'll revert back into normal gnomes someday. Maybe the Fomorian magic that twisted them will need to be undone. The Iliyanbruen elves would surely know the answer to that question. Maybe we'll encounter them as an epilogue to the new campaign and help speed that process along a little.

I seem to remember a little nameless "redcap" village that might be a good candidate...

hustin1 · February 2021

pitshade said:
They redesigned them to look like 5th Edition monsters. I suspect the new look for the zone is at least partially driven by WotC's desire to bury everything related to 4th.

I don't know if the Neverwinter lore from them is based on 4th, but it makes them corrupted gnomes. I don't remember them being monogender though. The 5th edition version has them as little old men, in line with folklore. They aren't even a true species there, but rather arise from incidents of bloodshed and murder in areas in or adjacent to the Feywild.

Not sure, but I assume they changed the one in the Wandering Emporium. Probably not the pet, as the original Erinyes pet was left unchanged. I thought about checking on the troll models in Icespire and Rothe Valley at some point.

It is definitely hard to tell them apart now. I've only seen Powries and Witherers but one of them yelled Bramble Curse as if it were a Thorn. Well there was a new Hunter but my pet killed it before it left the undergrowth.

The troll model in Rothe has changed. I checked while it was on Preview. I don't think the ice trolls changed, though, thank goodness. At least, they hadn't the last time I checked Preview.

They haven't changed the pet. If they had, I'd be in the process of turning my guild over to someone else and leaving the game for good.

No joke.

eladonwarps · February 2021

Admittedly I'm more versed on my 3.5 lore than 5th, but since when did the Fey give two sparks about gender? Many Fey creatures have existed outside humanoid binary notions of gender since they were first known, not unlike Corellon themself.

+1 on your lore interpretation though, well written.

pitshade · February 2021

The redcap in the Emporium is still there.

blargskull · February 2021

You humans always attempting to label things. Look at the Barovian deer, the stags in that land have been reproducing asexually for years now! I keep killing them and more keep popping up like flowers. I try not to think about it. The weird thing is when I kill any guy as my warlock and capture his soul as my soul puppet, turns out he was female all the time.

greywynd · February 2021

blargskull said:
You humans always attempting to label things. Look at the Barovian deer, the stags in that land have been reproducing asexually for years now! I keep killing them and more keep popping up like flowers. I try not to think about it. The weird thing is when I kill any guy as my warlock and capture his soul as my soul puppet, turns out he was female all the time.

They're undead. They respawn at dusk.

hustin1 · February 2021

The gnomish type of redcap could conceivably be found anywhere (such as in Avernus) as they're a true species, but you'd never find the "true" 5e Feywild ones there as Avernus doesn't adjoin the Feywild. So changing the one in the pic to non-gnomish type would make no sense whatsoever.

There's no reason why we couldn't still encounter gnomish "facsimile" redcaps here and there. D&D sourcebooks have always been loaded with monsters who masquerade as something else. This would be just another example.

Whaaa? Weren't powries supposed to be girls?

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