Alignments of Monvesia 3: Temperaments Across Orbimond

RETCON NOTE:  The creation of this post has caused the two previous installments of the series to be edited--both "Alignments of Monvesia: Temperaments" and "Alignments of Monvesia 2: Codifying Perception."

While the basis of human religious tradition, the Temperaments of the Monvesia campaign setting are universal concepts that races throughout Orbimond accept as being representative of the basic attitudes of intelligent beings.  From a cosmological standpoint, they represent the six spheres that form the world itself.  On a legendary level, they correspond to the colors of dragons and even the ancient giant races.  In daily life, temperaments are associated with race, birth date, occupation, and the like.

Geographic Temperament

Nothing in Monvesia is free from temperamental association--not even its geography.  Even each geo-political region of Orbimond is associated with one temperament or another.  These are:

• Altruist Fuhon, a land where people are concerned with Honor.
• Materialist Prace, where the Drajan Empire is both church and state.
• Dynamist Ombo, a place where natural law trumps civilization.
• Idealist Henjal, the cultural center of psionic traditions.
• Vitalist Xahaca, which is subject to the whims of the Frenetic Ocean.
• Nihisit Raviq, home to the Desolation of the HMDJVNW.

The Crown is not listed above, for it is mostly uninhabited.  Races of the Crown are associated with a nearby region (neanderthals and duergar with Prace, firbolgs with Henjal).

Monvesia By Any Other Name

RETCON NOTE:  Several posts have been modified to incorporate the new names and naming conventions presented below.

What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other word would smell as sweet ...

William Shakespeare, Romeo & Juliet Act II Scene 2

Monvesia is the name I have used for this campaign setting as a whole since its inception.  However, the crude map posted earlier shows that the territory I've been exploring is part of a much larger world.  As my vision of this world expands, incomplete settings from the past have started to fold into it.

In the past, I had developed a top-down setting that included three major world regions--though I never developed much local flavor.  I realized that the world of Monvesia is also built on a similar fashion: the Monvesien valley, the Forest of Vines, and Desolation are iconic locations in three, distinct subcontinents of a larger landmass.  I have chosen, therefore, to take the names of these subcontinents from that earlier setting:  with the Monvesien valley in Prace, the Forest of Vines in Henjal, and Desolation in Raviq.

These three subcontinents represent different archetypes of fantasy gaming:  Prace for eurocentic fantasy adventures, Henjal for "Oriental" adventures, and Raviq for "Arabian" adventures.  Crossover between the worlds is not only possible, but both encouraged and expected.

HMDJVNW, Monvesian Great Old Ones

The warlock entry in "Mages of Monvesia" offered the briefest look at the Great Old Ones of Monvesia--a class of beings called the HMDJVNW (pronounced "am-DIV-new"), which had once been worshiped by ancient humans and goliaths in their homeland of Desolation.  Seven HMDJVNW were named in that early post, but little else was offered beyond these names and an epithet each.

In this post, I will take some time to explore each of the HMDJVNW, including their individual roles in the world of Monvesia.  Though these beings came to overthrow the giants and take over Desolation, they are daemon lords of Limbo--and as such have dominion over aberrations.

Behind the Scenes:  The name HMDJVNW is an adaptation of the initialism AMDIVNU--the the seven Temperaments, including Universalism.  Originally, AMDIVNU (whose name is always capitalized, and never replaced with a pronoun) was only one Great Old One; and AMDIVNU was once considered was the "god" of mages (or at least the originator of magic, see ENSHZRYD).  As the history of goliaths and humans has evolved with the setting, so has AMDIVNU also evolved--into the HMDJVNW.