D&D 5E 5e: Stat the Lady of Pain...so we can overthrow her

[Stormonu]

Beings thousands of years old wiped out in a weekend by a bunch of mortals with an inflated self-worth? No thanks. Statting out these sort of beings is an exercise in killing my immersion.

There was a reason I clung to my old "If it has stats, we can kill it" quote for so long. These sort of entities have no business being statted out.

 

[Haplo781]

At least within the BECMI "rules universe", it seems that the Old One character class--like the Immortal class--would have 36 character levels: 36 mortal levels, 36 Immortal levels, and 36 Old One levels, for a total of 108 levels.

In the Second Edition Reality, with its divine ranks, the Overdeities are Divine Rank 21+. It probably extends up to Divine Rank 40, just like mortals extend up to 40 levels in Player's Option: Skills & Powers.

In the Fourth Edition Reality, the overgods are probably level 41 to 50, since the lesser and greater gods are squeezed into levels 30 to 40.

So even if the Lady of Pain is an especially powerful overdeity, she's only so powerful.

Same goes for those other guys and DM.

I'm not aware of any 4e NPCs over level 36.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Isn't it unmanly

Literally falling at the first hurdle and smacking his face into the asphalt. Pretty sad.

But it does take me back to the internet in 1990s when so many weird dudes had incredible one-sided rage-beefs with the entire concept of the Lady of Pain (not at all connected to her gender of course, mmmm definitely not lol) and just wrote elaborate and definitely not at all troubling fantasies about how they were going to kill her.

This isn't as bad at that but it's definitely taking me back.

 

[Vaalingrade]

The LoP is the second biggest obstacle to me ever wanting to deal with PS. A petty tyrant that always wins because the writers say they do and in the context of the game world, the PCs can't knock down a peg from their smug tower is always something I will hate.

To me, she's basically just D&D's version of Stone from Deadlands or that dude that was a vampire werewolf but also a mage and Hunter from World of Darkness. A creator's pet that should only appear in-game to get a blanket beating..

 

[Ruin Explorer]

To me, she's basically just D&D's version of Stone from Deadlands or that dude that was a vampire werewolf but also a mage and Hunter from World of Darkness. A creator's pet that should only appear in-game to get a blanket beating..

I think that comparison shows you're profoundly missing the point of the LoP.

The LoP exists for one reason - by messing with portals, sooner or later, the PCs will figure out a way to wreck or destroy Sigil.

The LoP exist to stop that. She doesn't interfere in day to day stuff, so the "petty tyrant" thing is literally nonsensical, as a claim. She's not messing with the PCs. She's strictly there to stop the PCs destroying the setting, because it's inevitable that they will figure out a way to do so, especially when the other gods are banned from Sigil (which is essentially done for simplicity and sanity's sake). This defiant attitude to her is senseless. It's like being enraged by a parking attendant. The pettiness isn't on the LoP's side, nor the parking attendant's. It's the on the side of the person enraged.

I don't remember "Stone" from the Deadlands (I do remember some other ghastly GMPC though, who actually got retcon'd out of the setting, I believe), but I do Sam Haight, which is who you're referring to in World of Darkness:

Samuel Haight

Samuel Haight was a kind of "Ultimate Badass" to the World of Darkness. Former Kinfolk, former ghoul, former Skin Dancer, former Mage, currently an ashtray somewhere in the ruins of Stygia. Kin to the Children of Gaia, he was haunted by his failure to Change. Setting out on his own, Haight...

whitewolf.fandom.com

He's almost the polar opposite of the LoP. The LoP exists to NOT be used. The entire point of her existence is to NOT intervene. She's not floating around handing out petty edicts on a daily basis. She's there to have a divinity to stop the setting being blown up or collapsing into anarchy. If you want either, it's easy, just say she vanished, because the natural consequence is Sigil will collapse into warfare, and someone will do something like open a bunch of portals to really bad places and usher people/stuff through, fuelling the warfare further.

You could probably replace her with some sort of semi-omniscient council or the like, with strike teams to achieve the same goals, but you're really just adding extra steps.

Sam Haight isn't that. Sam Haight is essentially a GMPC specifically for messing with the player. Not to stop them destroying the setting, but to cause problems and be unstoppable in causing those problems. That's again literally the opposite. One exist to solve problems, the other to cause them. Also, the LoP takes nothing from the players. She's just a weird divinity hanging out in Sigil. Whereas Sam Haight is basically everything the PCs are, but better.

 

[Vaalingrade]

She's floating around tossing people into mazes for trying to play in the campaign setting and there's no agency in dealing with her. She's basically the avatar of the worse impulses of a bad DM.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

She's floating around tossing people into mazes for trying to play in the campaign setting and there's no agency in dealing with her. She's basically the avatar of the worse impulses of a bad DM.

What are you even talking about? That's not how she's described as operating the in the main Planescape book at all. You seem to be confusing her with a bad DM who used her as an excuse, just as they can use any divine figure. She's not supposed to be messing with players doing anything except trying to blow up Sigil. If you want a "blow up Sigil" campaign, obviously the first thing the DM needs to do is remove her from the picture.

Are you perhaps talking about the legendarily terrible Monte Cook (not Zeb Cook) adventure Faction War? Which was essentially "blow up Sigil"-themed.

Because yeah, in that, because Monte Cook was a numpty (soz Monte but you were), he suddenly turns the distinctly non-interventionist LoP, who only does things when Sigil is actually threatened, into a ridiculous heavy-intervention character. It's basically some White Wolf/WoD metaplot nonsense, and much worse because the resolution was never published (according to Monte, anyway), so Planescape is kind of stuck (canon-wise) in a horrible state where the Factions are exiled and Sigil is intensely boring. 4E followed this canon, sadly (possibly 3E too).

5E did say no non-5E stuff was canon so they may yet fix it.

 

[Willie the Duck]

Seriously, the designers have someone else writing their paychecks. Sounds like you've already got a reading list and plenty of passion for it. Do it yourself, and put it on DM's Guild or wherever they put homebrew these days.

I just want to make sure you realize you're responding to a decade-old post.

Literally falling at the first hurdle and smacking his face into the asphalt. Pretty sad.

But it does take me back to the internet in 1990s when so many weird dudes had incredible one-sided rage-beefs with the entire concept of the Lady of Pain (not at all connected to her gender of course, mmmm definitely not lol) and just wrote elaborate and definitely not at all troubling fantasies about how they were going to kill her.

This isn't as bad at that but it's definitely taking me back.

Almost halfway back to the 90s, at this point. Anyways, I remember getting nerd-raged about various canon in game settings. I think there was a bunch of AIs being held hostage on Vesta in GURPS:TransHumanSpace that I desperately wanted to see rescued in an in-print module. And of course, Bargle must die!

The LoP is the second biggest obstacle to me ever wanting to deal with PS. A petty tyrant that always wins because the writers say they do and in the context of the game world, the PCs can't knock down a peg from their smug tower is always something I will hate.

I am utterly surprised by the number of times I have seen something like this. I always considered the LoP as being the end to the debate as to why Vecna, Ka the Immortal Dinosaur, Takhisis and Elminster don't charge into Sigil and battle for control of the inter-fiction nexus (and who would win) -- answer: none of them, instead a nearly personality-less intelligence keeps them all out and nopes PCs trying to do the same break-the-system. It saves the DM from having to explain away or argue down any player plans or table fights over each person's preferred setting-gods or the like.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I am utterly surprised by the number of times I have seen something like this. I always considered the LoP as being the end to the debate as to why Vecna, Ka the Immortal Dinosaur, Takhisis and Elminster don't charge into Sigil and battle for control of the inter-fiction nexus (and who would win) -- answer: none of them, instead a nearly personality-less intelligence keeps them all out and nopes PCs trying to do the same break-the-system. It saves the DM from having to explain away or argue down any player plans or table fights over each person's preferred setting-gods or the like.

Exactly.

The LoP doesn't have opinions. Doesn't really have feelings. Doesn't have name. Doesn't have a face. Doesn't take sides. Doesn't have an agenda beyond "do her job and protect the integrity of Sigil". She's basically a traffic bollard (errr not sure what the American term for that would be), that stops the NPCs driving their cars onto the sidewalk, as it were, and people are so SO GODDAMN MAD with that traffic bollard. Like outraged. Throwing things. When they're often simultaneously claiming they'd never drive onto the sidewalk, and it's like, well why are you so mad then?

EDIT - Also who is Ka the Immortal Dinosaur? They sound amazing but the internet has no record of them!

 

[ersatzphil]

I am utterly surprised by the number of times I have seen something like this. I always considered the LoP as being the end to the debate as to why Vecna, Ka the Immortal Dinosaur, Takhisis and Elminster don't charge into Sigil and battle for control of the inter-fiction nexus (and who would win) -- answer: none of them, instead a nearly personality-less intelligence keeps them all out and nopes PCs trying to do the same break-the-system. It saves the DM from having to explain away or argue down any player plans or table fights over each person's preferred setting-gods or the like.

Same - I've always imagined her as a figure who acts only when forced to by outside factors. Those factors might be inscrutable, of course.

In fairness to Sam Haight, according to Phil Brucato, he started as a joke that perhaps went too far. I always took him less as a serious NPC, and more as a jab at munchkin players who wanted to be an awakened abomination who also had hedge magic but also had some glamour and cantrips. And a katana.