Hello all,
Peeping out of spring paper-writing season to post some Ruidus notes from 4-Sided Dive Ep. 2.
It seems to me that Sam, Liam, Laura, and Talison were re-hashing information. They gave a few of their theories, but I don't believe they went beyond some of the theories discussed in C3 and in the books (EGTW, TCSR, CotN). They said specifically that they were throwing out their theories—so, there is room for them to be a little inaccurate here rather than giving definitive answers on canon; though, they do offer some enticing and juicy nuances. (It was quite fun to hear their speculation on a conversation we have sustained in the wiki!)
The second question of WTF Is up with That? segment concerned Ruidus:
Dani: Imogen's Mom is part of being researched; part of the study that was part of the study of dreams connected with Storms
Ruidus-born: Liam: it's up for debate* whether there is a magical influence on ill-turns of fate.
Orym's tattoo: big moon little moon. Symbols for Orym and his late half-elf husband. (See the page on Orym.)
Liam: Chetney's lycanthropy is associated with "the moon." (Namely, Catha. Ruidus is not connected to lycanthropy. See the Catha and Ruidus pages.)
Time, motion, space, and luck: dunamancy; but nothing moon-related.
What if the Luxon beacons are part of the moon?
Maybe Laudna died under the full moon of Ruidus? Sam: She did (full moon of Ruidus) in Legend of Vox Machina (See the page. I believe Matt said it is not canon in a tweet. It feels like LoVM is like the Exandria-related one-shots (excluding EXU). We can use it to color our understanding with the awareness that its status as canon is not solid.)
Laura: Ruidus is always full but you can't quite see it. (If memory serves, I don't think this is correct [but who am I to fact check the cast haha]. See the Ruidus page. Matt has talked about the phases of Ruidus in CotN and C3x19. Although Ruidus is erratic, its phases are not due entirely to being eclipsed by Catha or the Sun.)
A double eclipse is associated with "something special" (Laura). (See West's helpful comment below and the Ruidus page.)
Talison: Discussed the order of the moons in the double eclipse phenomenon: which one is in front of the other.
Ruidus is erratic and doesn't follow a set pattern (See the page; I believe this is partially accurate. See too my related comment just above regarding the phases).
In the Tower of Inquiry (Chenga) segment, Laura mentions that Matt has her take a point of damage related to her dreams (if I heard correctly).
Question from Tankard segment:
re: lightning strikes. Laura was under the impression that the lightning strike marks grew with magic use. She wasn't aware that they were connected with the dreams. (This revelation regarding the origin of the lightning strikes came up in C3x19 I believe.)
Figure in the dream of the red storm: Laura has no idea. Maybe Mom is evil? (Talison: evil version of Imogin?) If Imogen were to become evil? Matt and Laura: felt like Imogen would die if she didn't run into the storm.
Video game segment (courtesy of Sam):
Laura did not write that the dreams were connected to Ruidus. Matt let Laura know that her storms were red at the beginning. That's all she knew. She didn't know about the connection between the dreams until it was revealed (in C3x19).
*Ruidus-born is up for debate. Such is mentioned in CotN Intro. Nevertheless, the exposition within "The Rise and Fall of Alyxian" mentions that the gods made up the association of Ruidus with ill-omens as generating its own magical power to obscure the failure of the gods to shore up the extraplanar leakage of energy that crystallized into Ruidus during the Founding.
At a metalevel of considering the Alyxian myth in CotN Intro as the argument of a scholar in Exandria, that could be a view that was serious in 835 PD which during the 840s is only viewed as competing. Nevertheless that is not the sense I (personally) get from the CotN text. It would seem to me that the DM is aware of this falsity of the gods and scholars are still attempting to validate the null hypothesis of Ruidus's magical association that is still current among the few Ruidus scholars of the 840s.
Looking forward to our (the community's) further exploration.
-Wynfryth
P.S. My warm thanks to all who updated the wiki after the big C3x19 Ruidus lore dump.
