Ilmatari Advice

[Pigdog]

Hi Guys, i'm looking at monastic orders for Ilmater and wanted to hear your views and advice as to how you'd think/expect one would be played? And if there any interesting monk tropes that would be within the setting to play off? I'm aiming for a kindof ascetic wandering/vagrant type character.

Thanks, any advice is welcome

[TarnishedSoul]

While I don't have any useful advice for you, I've sent a link to your thread to two very good players of Ilmatari and monks in hopes that they'll respond.

[Flasmix]

My PC is a Tormite raised by at an Ilmateri monastery. He has an interesting view of Mercy in that he gives everybody the benefit of the doubt that they can change for the better. Mercy is given once, with the hope and promise that they can change. If that promise is broken and they ask again, he grants mercy as well. But not too them, no, the mercy is for everybody else who would suffer because of them in the future. Thus, he would put them down.

And by everybody I mean civilized races because Drow are monsters and good Drow don't exist.

[Arn]

Hello! While I do not play an Ilmateri, I'm more or less familiar with their dogma, and I do play a monk.

In this list of monk orders, we find the following two canon Ilmateri monk orders:

Ilmater – The Broken Ones (LG)
- Of all the popular deities of Faerun, Ilmater is the deity most associated with an order of monks who act purely in his name. These kind and enduring monks are focused on defending the faithful and temples of the Broken God while acting as agents of punishment against those who would cruelly harm others.
- May multiclass as Divine Champion and cleric.

- Disciples of St. Sollars (Monks of the Yellow Rose) (LG)
- Greatly respected on matters of truth and diplomacy, the monks work hard to survive in their harsh remote sanctuary.
- May multiclass as Ranger or shadowdancer.

The multiclassing restrictions listed above are not applicable to the server, so I wouldn't worry too much about them (but brownie points for you if you follow them!)

The FR Wiki has more information about the Broken Ones here, and I've copy/pasted the information below (please check the sources for yourself, because it is only a Wiki, after all):

Organization
The Broken Ones numbered both monks and swordsages among their ranks. The order had no temple or monastery to call a base, and nor did they have a fixed hierarchy.[5]

Attitudes
The Broken One monks were kind and enduring,[4] and they acted purely in the name of Ilmater.[2] Swordsages of the order were ascetics who remained detached from the world and lacked zeal.[5]

Activities
Members of the order were responsible for the defense of Ilmater's temples and shrines, as well as his followers. They also sought to track down and punish those who inflicted cruelty, especially followers of Loviatar.[3][2][4] They performed good deeds and righted bad ones.[5]

The Broken Ones regularly traveled as pilgrims through the Dalelands, stopping at temples of Ilmater if no other lodging was available. They often visited the many shrines in the region.[2][5]

Abilities
A Broken One monk pursued the paths of a healer and a hunter in service to the faith. As a healer, they learned the skills of treating injuries and dispensing medicine, and could even develop the ability to lay on hands and heal injuries with a touch. As a hunter, they also learned the skills of wilderness survival and tracking. They were dogged in the pursuit of tormentors, and could develop supernatural skill in following the tracks of Loviatans. Such hunters had only to touch the body of one recently harmed by a Loviatan to see the true face of their attacker. Some could even learn a locate creature spell specific to locating worshipers of Loviatar.[4]

Some Broken Ones learned tactics in combat by which they could swiftly intervene and save an ally from an attack, at the cost of suffering the blow in their place. This effort could leave them wearied, if not slain by the blow.[6]

Monks of the Broken Ones could cross-train freely as clerics, as well as divine champions, divine disciples, divine seekers, hierophants, arcane devotees,[2][3][1] and swordsages.[5]

Relations
People often mistook the Monks of the Long Death, who regularly disguised themselves as beggars, for Broken Ones. This angered the Ilmatari.[7]

Monk tropes that you could play off might include kindness, patience, endurance, and a wish to diminish the suffering of others (these seem to be canon features of the Ilmateri monastic orders). My monk tries to be peaceful towards literally every living thing, but I seriously doubt an Ilmateri monk would be the same way. After all, Ilmateri monks hunt down and punish those who inflict cruelty on others.

Another monk trope is detachment from the world, but that only seems to apply to Ilmateri Swordsage monks. I would think carefully before RPing detachment from the world, because it can be hard to get involved in RP if your character values seclusion!

No matter which way you roll up your character, feel free to get in touch with me for RP! My monk would love to meet another monk, especially a monk of Ilmater.

[Pigdog]

Thank you guys, I like the idea of a wandering Broken One trying to right wrongs with a darker sense of humour and a healthy amount of fatalism and I hope one of the experienced Ilmater players can leave some advice too.

And absolutely! I'll hit you up when i'm in game and we can exchange beliefs , would be nice to see how you handle your Monk in the greater world.

[electric mayhem]

Will send you a PM with some of the RP my Ilmatari monk was about. May offer some ideas and insight.

[Tekill]

I literally rolled an Ilmatari monk today!

The wikis mention The Broken Ones, which is a monk order of the followers of Ilmater. Seems to be the main order or the most popular Monastic Order. Generally speaking they help those suffering and stop those causing suffering.
But then you have other monastic orders based on the various saints of Ilmater. Heroes that seemed to have made the ultimate selfless sacrifice perhaps.
There are also other temples and organizations and orders that consist of clerics, healers, monks, or paladins. Some of these orders are very militaristic even mercenary like, so logically, I would assume they would have a combinations of each of these classes. Of course you are going to find more of one class in certain order than others, but you catch my drift.
So my interpretation is that if you are a Monk of Ilmater you would be studying the way of "The Broken Ones". But you could also be a specialized member of a Monastic Order such as The Disciples of St. Sollars the Twice-Martyred of the Yellow Rose or The Disciples of St. Morgan the Taciturn. Lots of flavor, or then again you could just be a vanilla Broken One monk, positioned at a temple with the task of guarding it.

Please correct me if you think I am wrong about this.

The first time I read about The Disciples of St. Morgan the Taciturn was in one of RA Salvatores Drizzt books. Drizzt had just gotten to the surface and teamed up with these monks that all had a sort of death wish. They all wanted to really embrace suffering, and become Martyrs in the eyes of Ilmater. If I remember correctly Drizzt had to save one of these monk pals of his, who had charged into a dragons lair. Funny stuff.

The following is an interesting web page I found:
https://sites.google.com/site/templeofi ... ome/orders
This one too:
http://forgottenrealms.wikia.com/wiki/C ... of_Ilmater

I am playing my monk as being raised and trained by Broken Ones Order. I think I may make her a member of The Order of the Golden Maple. She is of the Illmatari faith and of the monk order. But not being pure monk or not having a whole heck of a lot of monk levels is not going to be end up being high ranking stereotypical monk. She will be more of an agent or hunter that will defend and aid the suffering but will focus more on hunting and stopping those causing suffering.

[kleomenes]

I think Arn covered the OP's question very well so I haven't responded before.

I figured it might be good to jot down some thoughts of my own as Ilmatari faith actually has lot of lore available beyond the core stuff in Faiths and Avatars/Faiths and Pantheons.

The chief thing to note is that the Ilmatari faith has a number of regional variations. The faith is strong in the south east of Faerun, based on many of the lands of the old Shoon Imperium (Calimsham, Tethyr, the cities of the Shining Sea, the Border Kingdoms, Lapaliiya (however you spell it!) ).

The Shoon Imperium originally persecuted Ilmatari but when an Ilmatari hermit cured one of the daughters of an Emperor, the faith received official protection - backed up with an empire wide magical curse that the superstitious in Calimsham think might still exist. It means that culturally in these areas there is a taboo on harming Ilmatari unless they attack you first, which seems to actually also still be law in Calimsham.

This arm of the faith is centred on the House of The Broken God in Keltar, Calimsham (well this is the most senior temple to all Ilmatari, its just the faith is tight knit in this region) although it is itself divided into two. The Calishite Ilmatari focus on alleviating suffering by raising the standards of living of those who suffer, an approach tinged by the Calish pursuit of luxury which also means its only their lunatic fringe that starts attacking slave markets. Meanwhile the Tethyrian Ilmatari are said to venerate Ilmater as a "breaker of chains", given their own mythic origins as Calish slaves. This is actually the origin of my Tethyrian character's rabid dislike of slavery and his zero tolerance approach to it.

What is notable is that while the Knights Kuldar of Barkamordin in Tethyr are Triadic, as are the Jannesar paladin bandits in Calimsham, Ilmatari temples in Calimsham and Tethyr are quite extensively detailed and seem to have few links with the other gods of the Triad. Especially in this timeframe, Tyr and Torm are not major gods in Tethyr in this time frame, and while Tyr is a god of justice in Calimsham it is the Ilmatari faith that seems much more powerful in influence, given it is mentioned as one of the power groupings of Calimsham in Empires of the Shining Sea.

Of note is the fact that there are something like a dozen temples of Ilmater in Tethyr and Calimsham that are within a days ride of each other, forming a network of support that allows the church to cooperate in the region and the faithful to be never far from aid. Its likely this isn't working currently however given the furious civil war in Tethyr and the Beshaban inspired distress in Calimsham. Whats notable is that the temples listed in the gazetters of the region are protected by monks, not paladins, for the most part, although a number of Ilmatari knightly orders are listed in the region. It seems there is a division, with paladins not commonly guarding temples in great number, rather focusing on deeds out in the world (perhaps paladins guarding temples is more of a temporary thing. I know we have such a paladin IG!)

In contrast to the faith in the former Shoon holdings, Ilmatari worship centred on Damara (thus, presumably covering the likes of Implitur and other eastern nations) is said to place a greater emphasis on saints, and have a great proliferation of them. Saints are a thing in all Ilmatari faith though, with the temples in Calimsham and Tethyr often being dedicated to one, and Saint Ramedar and Saint Liwan at least both arising in the region.

I have never been able to work out if Ilmatari faith on the Sword Coast, Cormyr, the Dales etc follows one of these two grand traditions, or if its forming his own. I do hypothesise that in those regions that have a greater prominence of Tyr and Torm, Ilmatari faith is more influenced as being part of the Triad rather than an independent institution.

The long and the short of it is, the nuance of your Ilmatari character can and probably should be very much defined by his theological background!

The key sources for Ilmatari faith are, I think:
Faiths and Avatars
Faiths and Pantheons
Champions of Valour
Lands of Intrigue Book One: Tethyr (including the temple references in the gazeteer)
Empires of the Shining Sea (including the temple references in the gazeteer)
Prayers from the Faithul (I can't recommend this one enough)

[Apis]

I am looking for a bit of help from you Ilmateri folk.

The other day IG, my bard was playing a song he wrote about Lathander and it was overheard by an Ilmateri priest. My bard told him he would write a tune about Ilmater, and he has, but I for the life of me can't recall the characters name I talked to.

He said to stop by the temple, and I've tried that, so I'm hoping to connect OOC to set up a time to meet IG.

Sound familiar to anyone? I would probably recall the characters name if I saw it. If anyone has a good list of active Ilmateri RPers (or just wants to be in the temple when I come by), please let me know!

Thanks

[electric mayhem]

Might be clues in the Character roleplay stories and Journals section on the forums. Sometimes people write up stories and journals for their characters.
Try and run a search in those sections and see what pops up.