Cuiviénen Flashback

[Rieno]

I have an idea for my campaign, which is currently running into "The Darkening of Mirkwood".

I would like to do a "1st age flashback" to Cuiviénen, as detailed in Other Minds #14. This is an early early setting around the awakening of the elves time. Utumno exists in the far north. Middle Earth lies in a twilight under the stars. Melkor is making creepy things in the North and Oromoe hunts the woods of Middle Earth.

My idea is to have a short adventure in this setting with some premade characters where they battle some ancient evil that becomes linked to one of the evils in the Darkening of Mirkwood. At the end of the early adventure, the evil is somehow locked away or banished.

Then we flash back to their regular characters and one of the evil's they face is revealed to be this evil baddie. Somehow the tale of the early age is related to them by Thranduil or someone.

Does anyone have any good ideas how I could make this work and what baddie would be ideal for this? I was thinking the werewolf of Mirkwood, or the butcher, or some spirit thing with an ambiguous past.

[Mytholder]

The Great Vampire (HotW, p.88) might fit the bill nicely.

[nazgul_2000]

As nasty as the Vampire is, I have to respectfully disagree. Go with one of the giant spiders from DoM - Tyulqin the Weaver or Tauler the Hunter. After all, they are the children of Shelob, and Shelob was the child of Ungoliant, who still walked the earth not too long before your flashback episode.

[Falenthal]

I don't know the birthday of Shelob, but I doubt it would be before the elves awoke in Cuiviénen.
I I'm still more uncertain about her having children also before the Awakening.

I might be totally wrong, however.

EDIT: Here's what I found in the Tolkien Gateway:

Having grown far larger and stronger than before by absorbing the light of the Two Trees, the Gloomweaver would have killed Melkor had not his cry of desperation been heard by his Balrogs, who took flight and saved their master.

Overcome by the Balrogs' fiery whips, Ungoliant fled to the Ered Gorgoroth in Beleriand. There, she had many offspring, including Shelob, which spread throughout the Ered Gorgoroth and gave it a reputation as a place of horror.

So, Shelob herself was born after the elves Awakening.

[Arthadan]

The Gibbet King is the obvious choice. Back then, he can be an emboided evil spirit. Taking in account he becomes a master torturer, his weapons should be terror and corruption (maybe some deception too). I'm thinking in the Sorcery trick Sauron played on Gorlim (see wiki here).

The Werewolf is out because he's meant to be Carcharoth and he wasn't born back then. However, another werewolf is an option, maybe related to Carcharoth.

The Vampire may work also and if you want something brand new, go for a "boldog" (evil maiar emboided in Orc form, however we have no Orcs yet so gave him an horrible form and something he can be recognised for when he changes his shape permanently to an Orc one in later times).

[Glorelendil]

The Gibbet King is the obvious choice. Back then, he can be an emboided evil spirit. Taking in account he becomes a master torturer, his weapons should be terror and corruption (maybe some deception too). I'm thinking in the Sorcery trick Sauron played on Gorlim (see wiki here).

I don't have TfW in front of me, but was GK originally a spirit? I thought he was a man who became a spirit. Or am I remembering that wrong?

The Werewolf is out because he's meant to be Carcharoth and he wasn't born back then. However, another werewolf is an option, maybe related to Carcharoth.

Oh! Really? I didn't pick that up. Then again, I only skimmed the material.

[Dunkelbrink]

The Werewolf is out because he's meant to be Carcharoth and he wasn't born back then. However, another werewolf is an option, maybe related to Carcharoth.

This is interesting, do you have support for this claim? I know that Cubicle 7 don't have the rights to use the Silmarillion and therefore have to bend a few things around a bit, but Carcharoth died fighting Huan, right? Of course both the Werewolf and the Great Vampire would be more powerful characters if you could connect them to actual names from the past, but I had not thought about them being Carcharoth reborn (or Thuringwethil in the vampire's case I guess). Have anyone here used them in that aspect and let the PCs research them with suitable Lore etc.?

[Rieno]

Thank you everyone for the ideas! My favorite is the "Gibbet King", and I think I'm going to be using him in some form in my flashback adventure. I'll let you know what develops!

[Arthadan]

I don't have TfW in front of me, but was GK originally a spirit? I thought he was a man who became a spirit. Or am I remembering that wrong?

The Werewolf is out because he's meant to be Carcharoth and he wasn't born back then. However, another werewolf is an option, maybe related to Carcharoth.

Oh! Really? I didn't pick that up. Then again, I only skimmed the material.

About the Gibbet King, I wrote a Necromancy Supplement and did some research about the topic.

Men spirits, unlike Eleves spirits which may linger if they are corrupted, must answer the Summon of Mandos and go to the Halls of Mandos. From there, they leave Arda for good, nobody knows their final destination save Eru. Only known exceptions are the Nazgûl due to the use of Rings of Power which weren't meant to be worn by mortals and the Oathbreakers who were cursed by a Maiar-related bloodline (Elendil, scion of Melian) using the sacred name of Eru himself as witness. For the record, Barrow-wights are "evil spirits" inhabitating the deceased bodies of kings of old.

About the Werewolf, Carcharoth tore Berem's hand apart swallowing it with the Silmarill (hence the relentless hate of the Werewolf for the Elven Lamps). Some quotes about the Werewolf from HOTW:

The Werewolf of Mirkwood is a spirit in wolf-form. In the Elder Days, it prowled alongside Dragons and other fell creatures in the armies of the Enemy, and guarded the gates of his fortresses.

Carcharoth was the guardian of the gate of Angband. From the Simarillion:

And Morgoth set him to lie unsleeping before the doors of Angband, lest Huan come.

It feasted on the flesh of Elves and Men, and grew large and strong and ever more ferocious until no foe could stand against it in battle.

From the Silmarillion:

[...]he fed him with his own hand upon living flesh, and put his power upon him. Swiftly the wolf grew, until he could creep into no den, but lay huge and hungry before the feet of Morgoth. There the fire and anguish of hell entered into him, and he became filled with a devouring spirit, tormented, terrible, and strong.

Elves of old struck it with blinding light, and brought it down with a hail of arrows and spears.

He swallowed the Silmarill (probably the "blinding light") and went mad because it was burning him from the inside. King Thingol assembled a hunting party ("hail of arrows and spears") and brought him down (Carcharoth killed Berem and Huan finished him off). I think it fits well enough.

[Falenthal]

Very, very interesting, Arthadan.
So, the Werewolf might be Carcharoth reborn? After all, Huan DID kill him.
Or, like it happens in DoM, he cannot be killed, but reincarnates in a different body.