Heresiarch = Scrapped 2nd Serpent Rider?

Perhaps the Heresiarch is the risen form of D'Sparil. Korax could have ressurected him to serve him. The fact that the Heresiarch looks so much like D'Sparil and Korax and Eidolon look nothign like them would support that.

I don't think so. One, Hexen takes place on a completely different world, maybe on the other side of the universe for all we know. And two, there's two of them in Hexen, and in the expansion.

Weren't there multpiple D'Sparil's in episode 4 or 5 of Heretic too? Also, the name is a little suggestive. Heresiarch = Heretic/Heresy + Monarch. If I remember correctly, in the Heretic storyline, the Sidhe were a race of elves who had a different belief from the rest of the world, so were branded heretics (thus the name). When D'Sparil's forces invaded, they killed all the believers (the non-heretics), which would mean they themselves were heretics. Thus, D'Sparil was the monarch of the heretics...the Heresiarch.

I'm just saying...

Vile said:

Yep, that was the really goofy story written in the Hexen 2 manual.

But that was before Eidolon was killed. (and at the end of Hexen 2 it says that the mages are weaving spells to keep their souls away) Unless you mean the mission pack. Anyway, it means I can link the story behind my pipeline Hexen project to it.

There was only one D'Sparil. At the end of episode 4 were around 10 Iron Liches, and at the end of episode 5, there were 8 or so Maulotaurs.

Ichor said:

And two, there's two of them in Hexen, and in the expansion.

Thats kind of moot isnt it, since we were talking about whether heresiarch was originally supposed to be more than it was?

Not when we're discussing whether the Heresiarch is D'Sparil or not. Anyway, perhaps they were having trouble deciding on a boss for the third hub. That's when they decided to make the Heresiarch the boss of hub three. They probably began working on Korax at around this point. They still had the problem of a hub four boss. They couldn't come up with anything decent, so they just used another Heresiarch (that and they most likely thought that it was too cool of a monster to use just once in the game).

Of course, this is just a wild guess, heh.

Well, it would be really cool if someone built and rendered a new monster, and did some sort of "people's cut" of Hexen. There's plenty of ugly in that game that didnt need to be there.

edit: doh. read "new monster" as "three whole bosses", thats what I meant to say.

The Ultimate DooMer said:

But that was before Eidolon was killed. (and at the end of Hexen 2 it says that the mages are weaving spells to keep their souls away) Unless you mean the mission pack.

It was indeed before Eidolon was killed... given what the story was referring to. In response to your question "While we're on the subject, wasn't there also something about the edge of space got torn and the Serpent Riders' souls got released?" I said that it was the story written in the Hexen 2 manual. The story was referring to a legend hypothesizing how they were first allowed into the universe so they could begin causing mayhem.

That said, I'm gonna stop getting into specifics about the Heretic/Hexen timeline, since the background story is mostly filler. :)

Ichor said:

There was only one D'Sparil. At the end of episode 4 were around 10 Iron Liches, and at the end of episode 5, there were 8 or so Maulotaurs.

Heh...I still gotta play those episodes. Anyway, that doesn't neccisarily mean he couldn't have been ressurected twice.

I think my version is best and I'm going to stick with it. :P

Ichor said:

I've heard it before. I've also heard that Korax indeed looked something like D'Sparil, but at some point merged with the serpent he rode on to produce...that.

That's the way i see it too. And when you think of it, WHAT THE HELL happened to him for that to happen anyway... Another mystery to solve!

Same thing for Eidolon: the "red hand" at the end would be his "human-like" form, but then, it could be another Heresiarch too...

If you people would look closer, Hexen is a fucking chess game in an alternate reality. So if you think about it, maybe they have different chess rules, involving "king me" and all that shit, so since there are 2 heresiarch(e)s, this sort of makes some kind of deranged and convoluted sense.

That's right! There's that, too. What WAS that chess thing about, anyway? It was cool and all, but why was it in the game? It just happened to fit well at least, Raven pulled it off good... but what's the relevance?

It's just a way of describing the cosmic game of power.

http://www.hexenworld.net/eidolon.php

That was quite fascinating & amusing, Niguel. Thanks dude.

Bah, if it's true that they forgot that Eidolon was supposed to be red, then it just goes to prove that they are winging it on the story side. But his point that anyone watching the demise of D'Sparil had to be a serpent rider is very sound. At the time they made that pic, I have no doubts that they intended the Heresiarch to be the next villain. The fact is that Hexen reeks of shortcuts and corner cutting, and this was just one of the victims. After all, they can just do whatever they want and claim that it was always intended that way, and they'll have an army of Raven fans standing behind them all they way.

I mean, just the fact that they were really worried about Eidolon being a giant snail with laser eyes shows their lack of common sense.

Ok, I did only read the first post here, but I was once in the forum of Raven´s, and asked the same question to Ken Hoekstra (One of the Raven officials). He admitted that the Heresiarch (as shown at the end of Heretic) was originally supposed to be Hexen´s final boss (and thus D´sparils brother). Later, they decided to make the boss very different, but kept the original concept for the Heresiarch.
Hope this will answer it.

And his steed shall be a six armed bug with silly teeth, and yae shall his enemies giggle with righteous derision at its tiny legs.

Nanami, where are you with that sprite?

Darkhaven said:

If you people would look closer, Hexen is a fucking chess game in an alternate reality. So if you think about it, maybe they have different chess rules, involving "king me" and all that shit, so since there are 2 heresiarch(e)s, this sort of makes some kind of deranged and convoluted sense.

Hey, whose hand is that placing the Korax chesspiece?

Korax! He's just manipulating himself...

Nah seriously, Eidolon I presume. Or it could have just been random art that they used to leave the story open. After all its just a hand.

Deathmatcher said:

Ok, I did only read the first post here, but I was once in the forum of Raven´s, and asked the same question to Ken Hoekstra (One of the Raven officials). He admitted that the Heresiarch (as shown at the end of Heretic) was originally supposed to be Hexen´s final boss (and thus D´sparils brother). Later, they decided to make the boss very different, but kept the original concept for the Heresiarch.
Hope this will answer it.

Kenn Hoekstra was one of the best dudes on that team, IMO. Why the heck did he have to resign?

And...seriously, if that tall skinny cockroach a.k.a Korax is deemed to be a Serpent Rider then where the heck is the serpent that he is supposed to be riding? Did he even get to ride a single serpent in his entire life? If he did, it must have been one GIGANTIC unimaginable serpent.
And also, what about Eidolon's missing Serpent?

Guys, maybe instead of calling these characters "The Serpent Riders", we should just refer to them simply as "The Unholy Trio" or something like that....That is, unless someone creates the new sprite WADs which Chilvence has requested.

chilvence said:

Nanami, where are you with that sprite?

I've taken up Ragnarok Online and my life now has no other meaning.

Nanami said:

I've taken up Ragnarok Online and my life now has no other meaning.

Well...that's very unfortunate! Are there any other good sprite artists out there who are willing to do the job?

DarkJedi188 said:

Guys, maybe instead of calling these characters "The Serpent Riders", we should just refer to them simply as "The Unholy Trio" or something like that....

But Serpent Riders sounds a lot cooler than any other title you could give them.

Yeah, you're right, Darkman.
I've been so busy giving so many titles to so many various things lately, that i'm just feeling too exhausted to come up with more original and cool-sounding things...

I wonder if theyll release the source of the Heretic series.

I think it's been.
Just not many people caring about this great game.

There already exist major source-ports for Heretic1, Hexen1, and Hexen2.
The only game in the series which sadly doesn't seem to have any major source-ports is Heretic2, which is my favorite game in the series.
It's too bad that I'm only a mapper and not a programmer/scripter, eh?

Heretic2 woulda been waaayyy better if it had been a FPS and not a 3rd person ala Tomb Raider. That was lousy...