Kossuth

Kossuth, also called the Lord of Flames, was the god of elemental fire. Kossuth was symbolized by the holy symbol of a twining red flame and his portfolio covered elemental fire and purification through fire. In the late 15 century DR, he was considered not to be a true god but an elemental primordial, a being whose power rivaled that of a true deity.

Description
Kossuth appeared as a red-hot column of awesome flame more than high and  in diameter. His voice could be heard for hundreds of yards in every direction, a hissing whisper mixed with disturbing crackling and popping.

Relationships
The supremely powerful elemental being known as Kossuth had lorded over fire since the earliest moments of the multiverse, though whether or not the contemporary Kossuth was the same primordial being or one in a long line of similarly named successors is a matter of much conjecture. The Lord of Flames rarely intervened in affairs in the mortal world, spending most of his time embroiled in the intrigues of the Inner Planes.

Kossuth's doctrine of elemental supremacy virtually assured conflict with the other elemental lords. Kossuth was vehemently opposed to Istishia and his clergy. He was watchful of the upstart archomental Imix, who was always trying to undermine his better but while Kossuth remained clearly the true master of the element of fire, the Grand Sultan of the Efreet was the only being on the plane who held even a slightly comparable level of power. The Firelord interacted very little with the other deities of Faerûn. Moradin and Flandal Steelskin honored him for the heat of the forge, but he barely responded. The return of Bane pleased Kossuth, however; the two deities seemed to agree on the importance of a strong religious hierarchy and had a common intolerance for the ephemeral and unpredictable nature of chaos.

Domain
Kossuth dwelled in the Crimson Pillar, a globe made of the primordial power of fire that floated over the Sea of Fire on the Elemental Plane of Fire. It was said that the blue-white flames of the Pillar gave off a heat that made the rest of the plane seem chilly in comparison.

Early History
In the, powerful Raumatharan wizards managed to summon Kossuth from his elemental home and instructed him to destroy a besieging army of hated Narfell. This he did, but he soon turned against the wizards, incinerating their city for their arrogance. The resulting conflagration consumed much of the northern coast of the Alamber Sea, and the fires of Kossuth's anger burned strong for more than a decade after his withdrawal from Toril.

Kossuth appeared in the Realms once again in the, to assist some of his faithful with the destruction of a colossal octopus.

Modern History
Kossuth was credited by his faithful with limiting the disastrous Salamander War of the in Thay. Without his influence, they say, the War would have turned into an even greater debacle.

Kossuth was not among the deities sighted in Faerûn during the exile of the gods by Ao during the Time of Troubles in the.

Worshipers
The church of Kossuth was rather hierarchical and mostly impersonal. The Church's aims tended to revolve around the acquisition of land, power, and wealth. The followers and clerics were often lawful, without regard for good or evil.

Many Red wizards of Thay worshiped Kossuth and the Flaming Brazier of Eltabbar was supposedly the largest temple of Kossuth in all the Realms.

After death, bodies of worshipers were cremated.

Orders

 * Priesthoods


 * Burning Braziers
 * Black Flame Zealots
 * Brothers and Sisters of the Pure Flame
 * Order of the Salamander
 * Monastic orders

Kossuth's monks could learn to become clerics of the Firelord without sacrificing their potential as monks.
 * Disciples of the Phoenix: The good branch of the three. They rigidly ordered their members' studies and behaviors and put their focus on the purifying aspect of their deity.
 * Disciples of the Salamander: The evil branch of the three. They saw fire as necessary for the renewal aspect of their deity, though some members' view on destruction bordered on Talos's.
 * Brothers and Sisters of the Purifying Flame: The neutral branch of the three. Their goal was to strike a balance between purification and destruction and acted as the go-betweens of the other two monasteries.

Worship in Zakhara
On the continent of Zakhara, Kossuth was called one of the "cold gods of the elements". They were "cold" because those were seen as uncaring for human affairs and opposed to the Land of Fate's pervasive culture of Enlightenment. Only a few Zakharans were willing to worship a cold god in order to gain power.

Background
Originally, Ed Greenwood adopted Kakatal, one of Michael Moorcock's elemental gods appearing in the original Deities & Demigods, for an elemental god of fire in his home Dungeons & Dragons campaign set in the Forgotten Realms. He noted in "Down-to-earth Divinity" in Dragon #54 (October 1981) that Moorcock's elemental gods "may later be replaced in [his] universe by 'official' AD&D beings as these are published".

Kossuth proper first appeared in Manual of the Planes (1987), and was listed as an elemental god for the Forgotten Realms in the Forgotten Realms Campaign Set 's Cyclopedia of the Realms. Kossuth was further described in Forgotten Realms Adventures (1990), the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting 2nd edition 's Running the Realms (1993) and then fleshed out fully in Faiths & Avatars (1996). Kossuth went on to be one of the major deities of the Forgotten Realms in Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting 3rd edition (2001), and Faiths and Pantheons (2002).

Kossuth appeared in the 4-edition Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide, now as a primordial.