Yup.
The dark savant is actually the now bitter, cynical, and thuroughly evil version of the once ultra-benevolent cosmic lord Phoonzang, who decided that mortals should be able to join the cosmic circle, against the wishes of the other cosmic lords. It was his creation of several celestial artifacts that caused the whole ruckus to begin with.
Being a former cosmic lord, (basically a god), he had knowledge of EVERYTHING, but having been stripped of his power, he had to resort to base sorcery and high technology to keep up appearances, so to speak. He created a huge army of robotic servators called the savant troopers, who do his bidding tirelessly. His technology appears to be equal parts artificial biology and straight up robotics.
This whole sordid trilogy kicks off with a bit of a power squabble in the cosmic circle amongst the cosmic lords, which allows the Cosmic Forge, a super-magical pen that allows ANYTHING written with it to become instantly real-- to get stolen by a wizard who conjures it down into the normal world on a distant planet. This is the begining of Bane of the Cosmic forge, Wizardy 6. The inhabitants of this planet include anthropromorphic canids, felids, humans, and IIRC, Mook-- Large ape like aliens with absurd intelligence, that are basically there studying the inhabitants, who are quite primitive in comparison. (Mook have spaceships, teleporters, etc. The inhabitants are in the dark ages.)
When your party gets control of the Cosmic Forge, the cosmic lord's robotic butler (Altheides) shows up, and snatches it away. However, he also takes the party along with him in a tiny spaceship to the planet guardia, where the Astral Dominae is hidden. This artifact contains the secrets and powers of life itself, and was created by Phoonzang before he was expelled from the cosmic circle, and is part of the trilogy of objects required to permit mortals to become cosmic lords. Naturally, having been expelled, the dark savant wants nothing more than to get back into the cosmic circle, and kick some cosmic lord ass-- and he is quite ruthless in his desire to obtain these artifacts and get back what he lost, and get some vengence to boot. As such, once the magical obscuring hoodoo of the cosmic lords fails (due to the cosmic forge being stolen--- somehow.) the planet Guardia is suddenly exposed to the whole galaxy, and naturally, every advanced species wants in on the action. (Except the mook for some reason.)
On this planet, there are Ork-analogs called Gorn, anthropromorphic rats, called Rattkin, some blue demon worshippers called Dane, and some human analogs called Munk. According to one of the NPCs in the game, they were once all one people, but diverged, both politically and physically over time, becoming the various races. Another human-analog species is the scientifically capable Helezoid, who we learn later came from the planet Dominus, and are actually Higardi. These human-analogs are not native to Guardia, but have taken up residence and gone native, so to speak. Sadly, things end poorly for them, and there isnt anything you can do about it. Other aliens that have come to the planet are the rhino-like Umpani, and the insect/spider like T'rang, as well as the Dark Savant and his minions.
Guardia is very much a dark-age world itself, though the helezoid, the umpani, and the T'rang all possess high technology.
Depending on how your game ends, (there are 3 different endings!), you either hitch a ride with the Umpani, with the T'rang, or hop into Phoonzang's ancient space ship. (Or, if you dont beat the game/import your old save into wiz8, you start when the Mook pick you up and take you to Dominus). Regardless, you go on a trip to Dominus, chasing after the Dark Savant, who steals the Astral Dominae from you just as you are about to claim it on Guardia.
Earlier on, you are forced to assist a group of the Rattkin in ... appropriating.. a T'rang transport shuttle, who also head to Dominus.
Once on Dominus, you learn that there are 2 more such devices on this planet-- The Destinae Dominus, and the Chaos Moliri. The first has always been hidden on Dominus, the second has been brought to Dominus by the Mook, who discovered the device after it smashed THROUGH one of the moons of their home system like a speeding bullet, and they recovered the object when investigating the disaster. Being highly intelligent, peaceful, and devoted to scientific research, the object was of immense curiosity to them-- so they studied it in detail, which revealed the location of Dominus to them via inscriptions and maps on its surface. They are on Dominus just to learn more about the objects out of pure scientific interest. They are uninterested in ascendance.
The Higardi are the species that Phoonzang had intended to become cosmic lords via this ascendance, but there are 3 other species present on the planet. The marsupial like Trynnie (who are equal parts clever and dumb as rocks.), the demonic Rapax, and the cold blooded Rynjin-- a species of fishlike humanoids that basically hate everything that isnt rynjin.
Naturally, the T'rang and the Umpani tag along for the ride-- and as mentioned, so do the now space-faring pirate rattkin you helped take off from Guardia.
The trilogy concludes with the party obtaining all of the artifacts, and ascending to the cosmic circle. (There are several possible endings, but the best possible one allows you to redeem the Dark Savant and revert him back into being the benevolent Phoonzang, bring peace between the Umpani and the T'rang, and become the new peace-loving and benevolent cosmic lords, since it appears that the old ones have simply abandoned the post.)
End spoiler
Author
Topic: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O (Read 14950364 times)