Inclusion of my Cthulhu Mythos Blogs to the page?

[FanofRPGs]

I have spent months writing these blogs up. They are (Especially the hauntingly tedious part 2) still mostly unfinished, but the overall feats analyses and information presented is written down. I just want to tie up loose ends and add in the philosophical element to Lovecraft's works.

Here they are:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Could these be included, or even if so just yet? Or should they first be scrutinized and fully fleshed out?

 

[Eganergo]

Wow, this is really long.

Bump!

 

[M3X_2.0]

Amazing work

 

[Eganergo]

I've read your blog, but you don't include the tiering system. The only character i saw you list as 1A is Yog-Sothoth (Cthulhu Mythos). What about the others?

Can you make a summary of which character/category get which tier if you're not busy? Just take your time though. I just don't want to misinterpret your blog.

 

[FanofRPGs]

I've read your blog, but you doesn't include the tiering system. The only character i saw you list as 1A is Yog-Sothoth (Cthulhu Mythos). What about the others?
Can you make a summary of which character/category get which tier if you're not busy? Just take your time though. I just don't want to misinterpret your blog.

Cthulhu: Unknown

Hypnos: High 1-A, possiblly 1-A+

Outergods: 1-A, possibly High 1-A

Azathoth and Yog Sothoth: 1-A, possibly 0

 

[ShivaShakti]

I've read your blog, but you doesn't include the tiering system. The only character i saw you list as 1A is Yog-Sothoth (Cthulhu Mythos). What about the others?
Can you make a summary of which character/category get which tier if you're not busy? Just take your time though. I just don't want to misinterpret your blog.

Cthulhu: Unknown
Hypnos: High 1-A, possiblly 1-A+

Outergods: 1-A, possibly High 1-A

Azathoth and Yog Sothoth: 1-A, possibly 0

"High 1-A possibly 1-A+" Huh?

 

[FanofRPGs]

I messed up, I mean High 1-B

 

[ShivaShakti]

I messed up, I mean High 1-B

Ah I see. Although i'm not quite sure why all the "Possibly" ratings. Seemed like enough info was there to justify the end quite clearly.

 

[FanofRPGs]

Basically, I will need to have higher dimensions be accepted as transcedental. The Kull stuff is pretty blunt so it stays

 

[ShivaShakti]

Basically, I will need to have higher dimensions be accepted as transcedental. The Kull stuff is pretty blunt so it stays

Ah so it's a matter of evaluation? Alright I see that then.

Question. How much stuff did you actually have to read through? Lmao

 

[FanofRPGs]

I read not enough. In fact I am planning on wanting books from Robert Bloch and Frank Belknap Long to satiate their rarity on the internet

 

[ShivaShakti]

I read not enough. In fact I am planning on wanting books from Robert Bloch and Frank Belknap Long to satiate their rarity on the internet

Oh jesus

Meanwhile these Dark Tower Revisions I have to read through like 19 damn books.

Man all of the verses with top tier cosmologies take forever to read through because of their length oof.

 

[AlexZiggy]

Well. Great job. Will you be touching the Dreamlands?

 

[LordTracer]

Cthulhu: Unknown

Hypnos: High 1-A, possiblly 1-A+

Outergods: 1-A, possibly High 1-A

Azathoth and Yog Sothoth: 1-A, possibly 0

I asked this on another thread but it wasn't really clarified, wouldn't Azzy and Yog be 'High 1-A, possibly 0,' not just '1-A, possibly 0?'

 

[Eganergo]

It's better to contact staff or Ant here.

 

[FanofRPGs]

Cthulhu: Unknown
Hypnos: High 1-A, possiblly 1-A+

Outergods: 1-A, possibly High 1-A

Azathoth and Yog Sothoth: 1-A, possibly 0

I asked this on another thread but it wasn't really clarified, wouldn't Azzy and Yog be 'High 1-A, possibly 0,' not just '1-A, possibly 0?'
It depends on the Interpretation of dimensions. The Kull stuff is indesputably High 1-B at least, but if higher dimensions = higher infinities, then it's 1-A+

 

[Azathoth_the_Abyssal_Idiot]

It depends on the Interpretation of dimensions. The Kull stuff is indesputably High 1-B at least, but if higher dimensions = higher infinities, then it's 1-A+

I'm personally of the view that the dimensions can easily be considered higher infinites (and, as I said before, would be happy to contribute to this discussion when we have it despite relinquishing my staff position and retiring), which, when looked at alongside Kull, Hypnos, and other such stories, should make "reality" 1-A+, and the majority of the beings later known as "Outer Gods" High 1-A.

Should make for a fun discussion, regardless.

 

[AlexZiggy]

FanofRPGs managed to clarify most of the connections between Lovecraft and co's works, revealing a (mostly) coherent cosmology, which I something I wanted to do for a while but never got around to it. From what I gathered, given what happens in *Hypnos*, I don't think it would be such a bold assumption to say that higher dimensions are higher infinities, since each higher dimension seems to render the lower one incomplete and infinitesimal

 

[Antvasima]

I and the others would be very grateful for your help Azathoth.

 

[Kepekley23]

If all "Outer Gods" were required to beat Azathoth into sleep, why doesn't he naturally scale? (or is this non-canon 'cause other authors?)

 

[FanofRPGs]

If all "Outer Gods" were required to beat Azathoth into sleep, why doesn't he naturally scale? (or is this non-canon 'cause other authors?)

August Derleth wrote it so it's "canon" but I am tempting to ignore his stuff, but IDK

 

[EmperorRorepmeThree]

I mean dimensions should be higher infinities in Lovecraft pretty comfortably. I think Hypnos could be classified as High 1-A having transcended through an infinite hierarchy and went beyond the First Gate.

 

[EmperorRorepmeThree]

"Then the waves increased in strength, and sought to improve his understanding, reconciling him to the multiform entity of which his present fragment was an infinitesimal part. They told him that every figure of space is but the result of the intersection by a plane of some corresponding figure of one more dimension—as a square is cut from a cube or a circle from a sphere. The cube and sphere, of three dimensions, are thus cut from corresponding forms of four dimensions that men know only through guesses and dreams; and these in turn are cut from forms of five dimensions, and so on up to the dizzy and reachless heights of archetypal infinity. The world of men and of the gods of men is merely an infinitesimal phase of an infinitesimal thing—the three-dimensional phase of that small wholeness reached by the First Gate, where 'Umr at-Tawil dictates dreams to the Ancient Ones. Though men hail it as reality and brand thoughts of its many-dimensioned original as unreality, it is in truth the very opposite. That which we call substance and reality is shadow and illusion, and that which we call shadow and illusion is substance and reality."

I think this quote quite clearly indicates infinite dimensions having the qualify of higher infinities.

 

[Azathoth_the_Abyssal_Idiot]

@Fan Considering a lot of Derleth's stuff contradicts and goes against many themes of the mythos, I think it's pretty safe to ignore. What he describes is directly antithetical to the Other Gods/Ultimate Gods/Archetypes as they are described by Lovecraft on a conceptual level. I also don't even remember if said bit was written while HP was alive, which makes it more dubious. He and Lovecraft had very different world-views despite being close, which reflects on their work.

 

[FanofRPGs]

Yeah, that's one reason why I like Bloch and Long's works the most of the circle. It feels like Lovecraft had greater correspondence with them and so Lovecraft's themes and Cosmology were more apparent in their works. Howard and Smith tended to avoid the greater cosmic scope in the first place so they don't do anything too anithetical. Derleth outright butchered both the fantastic and cosmic elements in his works and while they are canon, they are too thematically inconsistent compared Bloch, Long, Smith, or Howard's works which were relatively faithful.

 

[ShivaShakti]

Yeah alot of Derleth's work can be considered EU

 

[Azathoth_the_Abyssal_Idiot]

To be fair, we may also not need to just write it off as "never happened" (I'm not huge on a lot of Derleth's work, but have some serious respect for what he did to get Lovecraft's work out there after his death). There are in-universe ways to rectify such information.

This probably isn't as hard as it may be otherwise to rationalize, as Lovecraft kind of made it canon that many of the ideas of these beings (what they are, what they want, what they do, etc.) are fractional, incomplete, and wrong. If we consider what Derleth wrote "canon", then it is likely one of these incomplete perceptions of gods and events.

As an example, anything we hear about "Yog-Sothoth" outside of Through the Gates of the Silver Key is an small, localized conception of a completely unknowable being. This is also why the narration never calls the being Yog-Sothoth (except when saying that's what some Earth cults have referred to it as), but instead uses words such as "BEING", "PRESENCE", "IT", and "SUPREME ARCHETYPE".

"In the face of that awful wonder, the quasi-Carter forgot the horror of destroyed individuality. It was an All-in-One and One-in-All of limitless being and self—not merely a thing of one Space-Time continuum, but allied to the ultimate animating essence of existence's whole unbounded sweep—the last, utter sweep which has no confines and which outreaches fancy and mathematics alike. It was perhaps that which certain secret cults of earth have whispered of as YOG-SOTHOTH, and which has been a deity under other names; that which the crustaceans of Yuggoth worship as the Beyond-One, and which the vaporous brains of the spiral nebulae know by an untranslatable Sign—yet in a flash the Carter-facet realised how slight and fractional all these conceptions are." - Through the Gates of the Silver Key

Not to mention the fact that Carter directly ponders that the ideas many have about beings who are vastly beyond the scope of humanity (referring to the Ancient Ones, who are notably below the Archetypes and ultimate abyss) are probably incorrect and as ludicrous as a mammoth seeking vengeance upon an angleworm. They are far too great to care about such things.

"He wondered at the vast conceit of those who had babbled of the malignant Ancient Ones, as if They could pause from their everlasting dreams to wreak a wrath upon mankind. As well, he thought, might a mammoth pause to visit frantic vengeance on an angleworm." - Through the Gates of the Silver Key

One could say that Derleth's versions of events are one of these countless, fractional viewings of things too big to be put into words, hence why they outright contradict the primary source material we have on the greater entities. This would be a relatively easy view to support with the actual text, I'd imagine. You could always point out that Derleth's interpretation goes against and cannot be reconciled with the original author's actual words and primary source material should people refuse to accept that, but I believe it's a pretty reasonable view, and shows how these things are separate from and don't affect the entities at the very top of the food chain.

A lot of the most contradictory stuff is also sorta EU, so there's that.

 

[FanofRPGs]

Do you think Lovecraft knew of the concept of "Turtles all the way down" like how Howard used it in Kull? That may be very helpful

 

[Planck69]

Definitely love the new and improved Mythos and thanks for putting so much time and effort into it. Small question though. What do you personally think the tier of the Great Old Ones will be? I'm of the opinion that higher dimensionality refers to higher infinities and I know this will affect their overall power and place in the cosmology.

 

[FanofRPGs]

Unknown, unless the Lovecraft Circle gives me something

 

[MasterOfArda]

If higher infinity=higher dimensions, then wouldn't the strong Great Old Ones by 1-A+, the Outer Gods High 1-A for transcending the Great Old Ones, and Yog-Sothoth and Azathoth tier 0 for transcending the Outer Gods.

 

[FanofRPGs]

If higher infinity=higher dimensions, then wouldn't the strong Great Old Ones by 1-A+, the Outer Gods High 1-A for transcending the Great Old Ones, and Yog-Sothoth and Azathoth tier 0 for transcending the Outer Gods.

We literally know nothing about the GOO, unless I am missing something from Bloch or Derleth

 

[AlexZiggy]

We know that Cthulhu is among the weaker GOOs, but yeah outside of his position in the hierarchy in relation to them we don't have much to go by.

 

[ShivaShakti]

I can agree with making the GOO's unknown

However there is one thing I need to point out regarding their speed. Cthulhu is heavily implied to have travelled and flew to earth from another timeline. Wouldn't that give him immeasurable speed?"

 

[Azathoth_the_Abyssal_Idiot]

@Fan

I wouldn't be surprised if it's a concept he knew of, but I don't know if such a thing is ever specifically mentioned.

Also, in regards to the GOOs, we know that they still have some effect on reality, but while their actions may be perceived, they cannot. We know they are undimensioned (sans Cthulhu and some other minor GOOs), and that they are basically eternal. If we agree on Lovecraft equating higher dimensionality with a higher state of existence, this could make them pretty high tier, but I am honestly not opposed to unknown (while still including information about their possible placement in the grand scheme of things), since they're so vague and don't scale to things as clearly as something like the ultimate gods.

I also recall something about Chaugnar Faugn's true essence being from a higher reality or something (when the entity is defeated at the end of the story), but it has been a long time and I no longer have any books containing Long's The Horror From the Hills.

@MasterOfArda

Nothing in the Mythos outside of actual GOOs really needs the GOOs to scale to anything, since pretty much every higher tier is based more so on the actual cosmological structure.

 

[MasterOfArda]

So, what tier would the Outer Gods be? 1-A+? High 1-A?

 

[Azathoth_the_Abyssal_Idiot]

We're going to work that out, though as I said before, I'm currently leaning more towards "reality" being 1-A+ and the Outer Gods being High 1-A.

 

[ShivaShakti]

So, what tier would the Outer Gods be? 1-A+? High 1-A?

If dimensions are to be proven higher infinities (Which is where all the evidence is pointing towards so far) Outer Gods will be High 1-A.

 

[KingPin0422]

Someone on Discord is doubting that those "limitless vacua" Hypnos crossed are hierarchical levels. May I have some input on this issue?

 

[Azathoth_the_Abyssal_Idiot]

Someone on Discord is doubting that those "limitless vacua" Hypnos crossed are hierarchical levels. May I have some input on this issue?

Is the doubt just in regards to where this places Hypnos' tier, or is this a doubt in the proposed structure of reality? I'd like to know which thing to address.