OK, some history. Before the founding of Waterdeep, well over 1200 years ago, a wizard settled on the slopes of Mount Waterdeep with seven apprentices. None know the origins of Halaster Blackcloak, the Mad Wizard, but he's said to have devised many spells now widely known.
Halaster is also known as the designer of Undermountain, the huge dungeon complex beneath Mount Waterdeep - that insane, chaotic maze of deathtraps, monsters, and disreputable beings of all shapes and sizes. The date and place of his birth are unknown, but he’s rumored to be older than even Elminster.
Regardless of his origins, Halaster left off his dealings with most of humanity more than 1,000 years ago. Accompanied only by his seven apprentices, Halaster came to the base of Mt. Waterdeep to build his new home. He summoned and bound fell creatures from other planes to build this tower and complex, as well as smaller towers for his apprentices. Once finished, even his apprentices saw less of their master.
As he dealt less and less with humans and more with the vile creatures from other planes, Halaster changed. He grew grim and became prone to long, sullen silences, broken by sudden, violent rages. He had his servant creatures dig storage areas and additional laboratories beneath his tower, and this work went on for decades.
Finally, his servitors broke into an area Halaster called the Underhalls. These tunnels had been dug by the dwarf Melairkyn clan, named after its founder, Melair. This clan had discovered mithral. The dwarves eventually died or were scattered by incursions of duergar and drow. When the mithral mines were played out, the duergar left, but the drow remained. Halaster is thought to have wiped out the last of the drow after they had been weakened in a war with the surface elves. The mage’s apprentices believed that Halaster kept some of the drow, magically transformed them, and held them as his new slaves.
In any case, Halaster soon faked his death, banished his otherplanar servants, and abandoned his complex on the surface, moving all to these underways. Halaster soon began “testing” his servants and traps against his seven apprentices. Only one survived, named Jhesiyra Kestellharp, who later became the Magister (goes to show how damn powerful this guy is). The Magister’s writings provide what little is currently known of the Mad Mage.
Now alone with his surviving servants, Halaster began his monstrous menagerie by visiting other planes and kidnapping creatures. He also built his network of gates to move them around his new home. In response to a guild of wizards from Myth Drannor buiding a gate to Undermountain and stealing some of Halaster's otherplanar creatures for study (when they thought he wasn't looking), he kidnapped several elven High Magi from the City of Song and set them loose around Undermountain to test the efficiency of his traps and monsters. He also had a hand in the destruction of Myth Drannor when he unleashed hordes of monsters, from gorgimera to darktentacles to daemons onto the elven city during the Weeping War.
Over time, Undermountain has slowly become what it is today, a reflection of its creator’s madness, a place of horrors, the lair of terrible monsters. Elminster described it best: "The most famous battlefield in which to earn a reputation as a veteran adventurer - and the largest known grave of heroes in Faerun."
So in other words, it's a pretty damn scary place - with huge potential for endless adventure.
The Ironworks Escape from Undermountain module is a campaign that Ziroc (and whichever of you want to volunteer to help
) is putting together for NWN based on the dungeon I've just told you above. It's going to be AWESOME. [img]graemlins/thumbsup.gif[/img]
[ 06-22-2002, 01:35 PM: Message edited by: Memnoch ]