Lore Compendium

[Mage Slayer]

I just scanned through everything from D1 and I can't find anything else that references how long it took for the Horadrim to catch the Three.

There are other sources which say the Exile lasted many decades, so that does seem off compared to "countless centuries", though in a medieval society anything more than a few generations can get distorted pretty quickly, so it seems like a fair error, in-universe.

Re: Mephisto being buried under Eastern sands; while we know he was caught in Aranoch, then transferred to Kurast, we don't know when that happened. I would assume it didn't happen until after Diablo was caught, at the earliest. Anyway, wasn't the fact he was transferred first established in Diablo 2? And there's an in-game lore tome entry, The Tale Of The Horadrim, which repeats that almost word for word, but I can't find anything from D1 that says otherwise.

That brings me onto something else:

Hratli (after being given The Guardian quest:

Mephisto, along with Baal, was originally captured in the desert near Lut Gholein. But imprisoning two of the Brothers together was far too dangerous. The Horadrim built the Guardian Tower to hold Mephisto. When Zakarum came to power in this land, it took over the Temple City without paying any heed to what was locked within the Tower. And it became their doom.

He doesn't seem to agree with Sankekur. Hratli's no fan of Zakarum, but taken at face value it supports my theory that Sankekur's letter is false righteousness to cover his own corruption. That's also supported by Zakarum appearing (according to the D3 timeline) just as the Horadrim faded - it doesn't make sense for the Horadrim to specifically entrust the soulstone to some upstart new religion as Sankekur implies, but if Zakarum just took over the abandoned tower (as they did Tristram cathedral), then the events leading up to Diablo 1 were just history repeating itself. It also helps explain how Mephisto corrupted Zakarum so quickly and easily.

[Scorch Hellfire]

Is the exact origin of Zakarum documented anywhere? It's starting to sound like it was mostly a tool of Mephisto like the Triune before it... even though there were some good people that came out of it that were not corrupted like the player Paladin and Fara in Lut Gholein...

And I'm still puzzled about the whole mechanics of the destroying the soulstones and the banishment of the Three (if Baal's was destroyed too)... I've been trying to find clarifications, but it really only talks about what happens to their spirits in Tyrael's speech at the end of D2 Act 4... I'm still suspicious of his behavior, but I guess we will find out more in Diablo 3... or at least I hope we will... They better not just say something like "Diablo has somehow returned from the Black Abyss and you must stop him again!" because it just seems so obvious that it would eventually happen and that it was a bad idea to send them back there if they could easily return... There has to be more to it...

[Brokenstorm]

Why did they use "Take heed and bear witness to the truths that lie within, for they are the last legacy of the Horadrim" as the opening text of the book of cain instead of "Take heed and bear witness to the truths that lie herein, for they are the last legacy of the Horadrim" like it was in D1.

[Tanith]

Not sure, though it may simply be an oversight. "Herein" sounds nicer, though.

One thing I'm curious about...how long has the "official" timeline been up on the DIII site (by that I mean this one)? It doesn't appear to have been updated with the information from The Book of Cain and indeed lists Albrecht as Leoric's "only son".

[Brokenstorm]

As far as I can tell the last update was in early 2010.

[Brokenstorm]

In rereading the Sin War trilogy I came upon something interesting that might have a tie to the black soulstone

In the midst of everything, a black gemstone nearly as large as a man sat embedded in a triangular column of red-streaked marble. “Blood marble,” it was named, naturally. The stone was called by Malic’s master the Kiss of Mephisto, although the cleric had, from past comments, reason to believe that it had once been named for another of whom Lord Lucion would not speak.

[acceleration turkey]

anyone feel like we learned anything new from the opening cinematic? taken literally, imperius, auriel, and tyrael will descend from heaven and fight demons in sanctuary. we've seen tyrael fight before, but only in cinematics. will we have cooperative angelic partners for any battles?

[marshmallow]

If that cinematic happens ingame I doubt it'll be in Sanctuary.

[Brokenstorm]

Just added the main events of Birthright and Scales of the Serpent.
I'll do The Veiled Prophet next.

[Brokenstorm]

I think it's more or less complete now, at least as far as the Sin War trilogy is concerned.
Still waiting to be able to get my hands on the book of cain so I can compare and maybe add some more info (particularly about the Mage Clan Wars and the discovery of Sanctuary by the Burning Hells)