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The dark lord of the 4th age?

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Has it ever been revealed who is the dark lord of the 4th age? Is it Davos?

 

If yes, the whole Father/Davos/Urdak/Argent D'Nur story line would happen within the 4th age. This would also be a hint for even more powerful beings/primevals. This might also open the possibility Classic Doom happened in the 1st/2nd/3rd age.

 

If no, the identity of the dark lords 2, 3 and 4 have never been revealed.

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The whole concept of there having been more than one Dark Lord seems to have either just been forgotten or was actively tossed out in Eternal, at least by the point TAG2 came out, because Davoth is stated to have been the creator god and thus he would have always been the Dark Lord.

 

2016's lore mentions two other Dark Lords. The first was called the Serpent (which is usually an epithet for Satan). If Hell was still meant to really be Hell at that point, and not some ex-heaven called "Jekkad", then this would probably be some primal age of reality. The Serpent held the order of Hell knights in high regard.

 

The Serpent was defeated by the second Dark Lord mentioned, which was called the Guardian. The Guardian is also a boss in Doom 3, and in that game it was stated to be an ancient prehistoric demon that once terrorized the dinosaurs on Earth. It's of course not clear these are one and the same, but if so, that'd be during a prehistoric but geological age. The Guardian cast the Hell knights into Hell's battle pits and forced them to fight for the amusement of the higher demons as gladiators.

 

The narrator in 2016 is referred to as the Nameless One, and is said to be the Dark Lord of the Fourth Age. Davoth uses the same voice actor, or at least somebody trying to imitate the same voice, so there seems to be some effort to equate Davoth with the Nameless One. But the game waffles on this, as the lore clearly wasn't thought about for more than a few minutes apparently - another similar voice occurs in Urdak screaming "NOOOOOO", and id themselves are so unsure and unfamiliar with the constantly changing whims of Hugo that the name in the caption for this one line of dialog changed TWO TIMES, from "Mysterious Voice" to "Dark Lord" and then back to "Mysterious Voice".

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Sadly the lore got kinda butchered during Eternal and especially after TAG.  In 2016 we had four lords who each ruled during different epochs of Hell's history. 

 

1.  Serpent

2.  Guardian

3.  Chimera (mentioned only in older unreleased alpha codex entries)

4.  Nameless One

 

Whether the Dark Lord Davoth was actually one of these or if the Dark Lords themselves were above him or just lesser demons who acted as stewards remains unknown. 

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I miss the simplicity of Classic Doom, when the boss of hell was either the Icon of Sin or, in Doom 64's case, the Mother Demon.

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I feel like there's 2 ways to even look at Doom:

 

  • There's the "soft" way: The idea that Doom can be reinterpretated in different ways, which applies to fan interpretation like fanart or discussion and even later official games. like when Romero said that Doomguy lacked a name for the sake of being a blank slate, Doom's very simple and "lacking" presentation, along with some abstraction lead to the setting itself be seen in different ways. this even applies to the series' staying power and creative fanbase.
  • Then there's the "hard" way: A way that goes a bit too literal over "investing" in Doom: looking up influences behind the games' developments and how some assets were made, looking up obscure media for the sake of lore, looking up what was in strategy guides, instruction manuals and intermission screen texts, trying to figure out what certain wall textures would look like in HD, Realm667 and mods that tried to "expand" the original setting and so on:

To me, 2016/Eternal are their own version of Doom that do a lot of creative takes but label their setting as "The Doom Universe" and connect themselves to the previous games, whereas 3 was always its own continuity.

And these modern games do have some fanservice and roots from the fanbase ("rip and tear" as an example) but also formed a new audience on their own, regardless if they cross with the older fans or not.

 

Whenever i think of "fixing the lore", i feel like it'd be easier if Doom was seen as this sort of "blank" that could be a lot of things, even if people dislike some comic books having too many versions of a superhero setting.

Like i wouldn't stop Hugo Martin from writing his stuff, i'd just have it so someone else is writing their version of Doom so the series isn't "locked" to just one universe/set of rules.

Because they never really existed in the first place and its original creators barely set up rules besides maybe the green space marine killing demons part. (which was rather broken in novels and a movie starring The Rock and Karl Urban)

 

It would also be "fair" because both things would happen at once: more of "the Doom universe" but also an alternate universe that did things differently, as long as both games or so have interesting stuff in them and feel justified.

 

In general, the Dark Lord either has a lot to learn for or at least opens up for some fun creativity.

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A few months ago they were calling him 'Brandon.' But now its all 'Dark Lord of the fourth age'? I don't buy it.  

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On 8/11/2022 at 1:01 PM, Zemini said:

Sadly the lore got kinda butchered during Eternal and especially after TAG.  In 2016 we had four lords who each ruled during different epochs of Hell's history. 

 

1.  Serpent

2.  Guardian

3.  Chimera (mentioned only in older unreleased alpha codex entries)

4.  Nameless One

 

Whether the Dark Lord Davoth was actually one of these or if the Dark Lords themselves were above him or just lesser demons who acted as stewards remains unknown. 

Interesting that the 3rd may have been "Chimera" since that would be a fitting term for Betruger from Doom 3. I'm fairly convinced that the four ages of Hell were originally an idea tied to the series itself: Doom 1/2, 3, and then 2016. The matter of how they were all meant to fit together wasn't supposed to be an issue to worry/think about too much: Hell was a dimension of pure chaos that connected to many universes, and the Doom Slayer was the one to walk between them all in his never-ending quest to destroy evil.

 

By trying to be "bigger" than this original idea, I feel like Eternal actually diminished the series and the characters in it rather than expanding them. The idea from 2016 of the Doom Slayer as an elemental unstoppable force that had an unknown (implied countless) number of battles under his belt spanning whole mortal ages seems to have just been reduced to a linear progression of classic Doom -> Argent D'Nur -> back to Hell -> '16/Eternal. Boring by comparison.

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Maybe the Doom Slayer should have been an original character completely unrelated to Doomguy.

 

However, that would have required redesigning the Praetor Suit to make it look not man-made - or at least, not UAC-made.

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2 hours ago, Quasar said:

By trying to be "bigger" than this original idea, I feel like Eternal actually diminished the series and the characters in it rather than expanding them.

 

Indeed, it absolutly feels like that story wise.

As mentioned in other threads, sometimes it is better to have less Lore that "explains" Things.

Especially something as Hell, just let it the chaotic Evil Thing that is something Mortals can not comprehend.

 

I have the same Problems with Starcraft 2.

The Zerg became from a natural organic Force that consumes everything like an Tumor to: The Overmind wasn't evil, he created Kerrigan to stop the evil Xel'Naga from the Prohphecy (because they changed it from dark Sci Fi to epic Story).

Kerrigan is now also not the evil b"tch of the Universe with incredible War Crimes (genozid) and evil Tactics, she's the Darling of Raynor.

 

Imo it is a modern Style i just can't stand, that everything must be an full outwritten Lore of a Epic Story.

 

Same with Diablo 3.

 

Btw. i really really like the Games gameplay Wise and have fun with them :)

I love the Skill System in Diablo 3 and the diverse Missions in Starcraft 2.

Doom Eternal got me crazy for Months, i dreamed of it haha.

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3 hours ago, Quasar said:

I'm fairly convinced that the four ages of Hell were originally an idea tied to the series itself: Doom 1/2, 3, and then 2016.

 

I think so as well. The Doom Slayer's conquest against Hell began in the First Age (i.e. Doomguy in Ultimate Doom), an epic battle took place during the Third Age involving a Baalgar/Cyberdemon (i.e. final boss in Doom 3), and both the Spider Mastermind was prophecized to return in the Fourth Age and the Barons of Hell are noted to be the the "current royal guard of the unknown Dark Lord of the Fourth Age" (i.e Doom 2016).

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Maybe adding "ages" could be seen as another issue: adding time to Hell when the concept of Hell could have predated even time which is a concept part of the universe.

 

Since Doom is that series where "story isn't the main point, there's contradictions and different versions of it", i feel like that could have taken to a certain "meta" aspect: Hell is so surreal that information about it becomes misleading, so you get ancient stone tablets magically changing texts or illustrations.

So nobody really knows how things work in Hell, that even specific locations can change visually or where they're supposed to be.

Who rules Hell? Icon of Sin? Davoth? The Archdemons? Hell being a creature itself? nobody knows, so it's a mix of Hell being too complex for humans to understand or Hell just messing with humans.

With the one limit being basic things like how an Imp can die from a shotgun blast.

 

And with that in mind, you could still focus on crazy art direction and weird gameplay ideas because of how weird Hell is.

 

Anyway, it does seem like the Slayer could have been a seperate character from Doomguy but (like a crazy lunatic beating a dead horse over a conspiracy theory) like i keep saying: the Slayer is a product of fanservice.

He exists because of how people perceived Doomguy, even if he's a very different of him.

So in a way, the Doomslayer is at least a portion of what some people wanted Doomguy to be or at least joked about him being.

I also remember stories of 2016 where before the Night Sentinels, Doomslayer would still be another UAC marine.

Some old marketing ads show this, like that one where the helmet has a peace sign.

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It could be that Davoth isn't counted amongst the dark lords of the 4 ages because he's creator god of hell, so the 4 Dark Lords were actually powerful demons who were supposed to have succeeded them after The Father imprisoned him. I recall reading some lore blurbs in Doom 2016 stating that the Aranea Imperatrix was supposed to have become the Dark Lord of the 4th Age.

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On 8/20/2022 at 2:38 PM, Azuris said:

Kerrigan is now also not the evil b"tch of the Universe with incredible War Crimes (genozid) and evil Tactics, she's the Darling of Raynor.

What war crimes? She turned on her temporary military allies sooner than expected, had a couple of expendable military commanders killed, kicked the UED out of the sector and then had the Swarm retreat and leave everyone alone, and the whole "Queen Bitch of the Universe" thing is just a random boast at the very end of the game. Incidentally, the only game where she gets to be an actual villain is StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty: that - and Heart of the Swarm, although she is not the villain in this one - is where she gets to commit actual war crimes. And no, they did not make her the "darling of Raynor": he was her romantic interest, sure, but there was more going on to her character than that.

 

All in all, I do not think it is even remotely comparable to what Id did with Doom Eternal - which is to actually try to put a lore together where there was barely any. While I do not think it was necessary, I reckon it is not the same as Blizzard taking the story in a semi-unexpected direction (as Brood War made it clear that whatever came next would involve Hybrids and Kerrigan would play a pivotal role).

Edited by Rudolph

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