Black Lotus

Zulgyan · Post by **Zulgyan** » Mon May 19, 2008 12:21 am

What class suits better the agents of black lotus?

Assasin

or

Ninja?

sieg · Post by **sieg** » Mon May 19, 2008 3:04 am

Weren't the original members of the BL a variety of classes? More membership than "class"?
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Zulgyan · Post by **Zulgyan** » Mon May 19, 2008 6:45 pm

I dunno...

But if you had to decide which class would be a normal agent. What it would be?

What did Bob say? Did he say they where Ninjas? or the OD&D Blackmoor Assasin? or what??

jamesmishler · Post by **jamesmishler** » Mon May 19, 2008 8:17 pm

As Sieg said, the agents of the Black Lotus were from many classes, not one specific class. The Black Lotus Agent PRC in the Necromancer CSIO book was created, AFAIK, because it was expected with 3E that such a group would have a prestige class. Bob never expressed to me that the Black Lotus would have a specific class as the bulk of its organization.

According to Bill Paley (a nom de plume for Chuck Anshell) in the article "Black Lotus" in Judges Guild Journal # 16 (Aug/Sep 79), the Black Lotus has three divisions: Intelligence, Punitive Activities, and Police Operations. Count Kaledric "The Coordinator" (12th level fighter) is the leader of all three, while each division is run by a Chief with several officers, each officer commanding 2 to 20 informants (each with 1 to 10 sub-informants) and 0 to 5 followers of their own:
Intel: Begra Zin (8th level fighter) commands at least 12 major foreign spy leaders (qualities unknown) plus two networks in the CSWE, and six spy leaders in the Roglaras:

Kostbera (Female 9th level wizard, Thunderhold)

Jetra Phy (3rd level wizard)

Tenel Grish (4th level fighter)

Markus Regel (2nd level cleric)

Somar Kana (4th level rogue)

Agratak (2nd level fighter)

There are more than a dozen messengers, including sailors, caravan merchants, and at least one minstrel.
Punitive: Krag Slike (9th level fighter) commands five officers:

Gridol (3rd level wizard)

Maketpa (4th level fighter)

Lee Dorg (5th level fighter)

Lee Frash (5th level fighter)

Lee Koyshin (5th level fighter)

Punitive actions usually leave the target maimed rather than dead, though dead can be good, too.
Police: Gary Crainek (6th level wizard) commands not only the secret police, but also (secretly) oversees the constabulary (which Chuck/Bill lists as being run by a "Karo Thons" (3rd level LG fighter) rather than Bull Jirelmor (5th level LE fighter)). Crainek commands five additional officers:

Kreel (4th level wizard)

Sheven (3rd level cleric)

Stek (2nd level fighter)

P.D. (3rd level assassin)

Laremo (2nd level rogue)

All chiefs, agents, officers, and such listed are evil or neutral, with Lawful Evil being the predominant alignment; only Karo Thons is LG.

As this was written by Chuck/Bill under Bob's tutelage, I assume this is as official as it gets. So the leadership are all fighters (I'd actually make some of them knights), and the breakdown of the major underlings is as follows:

1 Assassin

2 Clerics

8 Fighters

2 Rogues

4 Wizards

12+ Unknown

So fighters and wizards actually predominate; I would presume that many of the underlings in Intel are rogues and bards.

Other than that, there were no further official listings of the Black Lotus of which I am aware.

The Black Lotus is something I hope to cover in a future AGJ article.
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Traveller · Post by **Traveller** » Tue May 20, 2008 3:07 am

Good thing I read this thread, or I might have thought you meant this Black Lotus:

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