Go to Hell. Go Directly to Hell. Do Not Pass Go. Do Not Collect 200 Larvae.

[Rel]

As opposed to Heaven, where the cooks are Italian, the police are British, the mechanics are German, the lovers are French, and it's all run by the Swiss?

I'll withhold my opinion on Hell but I wanted to mention that among my very favorite restaurants in the world has those quotes on the back of their t-shirts. It is Little Italy in Marathon Key in the Florida Keys. If you ever get down there, do yourself a favor and stop in for dinner.

It's the opposite of Hell.

 

[IcyCool]

You know, I've never been a fan of the idea that Hell was a place where the Devil ruled over sinners. This answer is going to dangerously skirt the religion line, and if someone takes offense, please let me know.

I was always under the impression that Hell was "the absence of love" (more specifically, the absence of God's love), and being doomed to that for eternity. I like to think that this absence of love includes the inability to feel, express, and receive love as well, but still have the memory of what it was. Those doomed to Hell (demons, devils, etc.) have no special super powers, but they have a lot of time on their hands. Given all that time, you'll want to interact with others. And the only interaction you are capable of is pain, trickery, deceit, etc. If you do that for several hundred years, you're going to get really good at it, hence the image of demons and devils as tempters and liars. They can't MAKE you do anything, but they can try to convince you that it's your idea.

Thinking of it this way might lead one to think that those consigned to Hell should be pitied, or at their very core are pitiable beings. Not the sort of pity you might have for a homeless person. You might be inclined to help the homeless person out of their situation. Those consigned to Hell are there because they earned that punishment.

I read a really entertaining short story once about a guy and his "friend" sitting in a coffee shop. The "friend" is enjoying a piece of pie when he suddenly announces to the guy, "I'm the Devil, you know." He then goes on to tell a fairly vague story about a woman he knew (he was drawn to her because of her faith). After that he asks the guy, "What did I do that was so wrong?" Now I'm sure the Devil in this story was working up some serious scam, but that last sentence draws me to it. What if he really doesn't know what he did wrong? What if part of being in Hell is the inability to understand why you wound up there? There is a note of despair there that has a certain ... appeal.

Meh. *ramble ramble ramble* Hope you get something useful out of that.

 

[ThirdWizard]

"There's thousands of different kinds of Hells. You've got your fire Hell, you ice Hell, your ... ice Hell, your ... upside-down Hell."
"According to the girl, who's only reason for being is to see her pookie bear again."
"Just pointed out that this one sucks. We're looking for a Hell dimension in a haystack."
"Oh, I hope this is toy poodle Hell, I've had my fill of fire."

One hell might be an endless casino where you can never lose. Or it might be a torture chamber where your heart is cut out daily and the rest of the time is spent with a happy middle class life.

Generally, hell is bad.

 

[Greylock]

I always liked the Neil Gaiman - Sandman - version of Hell:

Hell is where you go if you think you deserve to be there.

I've always kinda favored Robert Heinlein's version from J.O.B. - A Comedy of Justice. Similar concept, but not such a horrible place.

 

[rbingham2000]

I think of hell as a gigantic prison.

And if you think about it, it makes a kind of sense -- prison, after all, is where we tend to stick those people that have committed heinous crimes against others in society, but that have either done something not worth death, or that we don't have the heart to out-and-out execute. Like prison, hell is where you will find humanity's absolute worst.

And being stuck in close proximity with the worst of humanity for eternity, knowing that nothing, not even dying, will grant you release, sucks beyond anything you can imagine.

 

[gizmo33]

To what end? that is the Why of hell, and that's what I'd like to understand.

I think this is an interesting question, but I agree with the poster who said that you, ultimately, must choose an answer that makes sense for your campaign.

Why are people tortured in certain representation of Hell? It's like asking why magic works in your campaign. Some DMs/authors answer that question, others don't. If you choose to want to answer that question for your campaign, then I can understand wanting to sample other folks ideas. Here's mine:

I liked the "stock" image of Hell as a place of tortured souls. I wanted to keep that imagery in my representation of Hell, but then I wanted there to be some sense to it. So my logic is: IMC, persons of alignment matching the planes alignment go there. So Lawful Evil people go to Hell. When they get there, they're still holding on some of their humanity. They're lawful evil, but not as lawful evil as a real devil. So they're given the form of a lemure and put in some pit to be tortured. That breaks down their sense of identity. Maybe this takes eons, or maybe just a few years. When the devil overlords are able to "detect" that a certain lemure has had enough hate and lawfulness instilled in them, they are able to leave the pit (or place of confinement) and be morphed into an imp. A century of service in that form, and sufficient "diabolicalness", and they can move on to better things. Whether or not in the real world being tortured for a century on a lawful evil plane would really make you more lawful evil is something I leave to philosophers and mechanical engineers.

 

[cmanos]

In my philosophical belief there is no hell. Going further would break the rules of the board about bashing religeon.

 

[FireLance]

Skirting dangerously close to the edge of religious belief, so I'll spoiler it and you can decide whether or not you want to read it.

Spoiler

Hell is a choice, and it boils down to whether you choose to be with God, or not. By definition, Heaven is where God is, and if you choose to be with Him, you go there. If you choose not to be with God, you go where He isn't. That, by definition, is Hell.

 

[BiggusGeekus]

Alone.

Forever.

 

[Toras]

1)Hell is where those parts of you that would hurt you or others are burned away, leaving you free to enter Heaven. So everyone goes to hell, just for a time equal to the amount of them they need to lose, and the only people who truly suffer are those who refuse to let go of the past.

2)Hell isn't a place of punishment but rather a twist shadow of Heaven, indulging in physical pleasure and pain rather than the spiritual contentment. Selfish Indulgence rather than any kind of peace or true happiness. So basically hell is LA after 10^x number of years.

3)Hell is wear the rebels gather, were Freedom > Happiness or Justice, and Do as thou wilt is truly the whole of the law.

4)Hell is what happens when you are outside Heaven but can still see in. Imagine if you had sit on the stoop outside the world's greatest party. You can here people laughing, see them enjoying themselves, but you are locked out. You see people being welcomed in constantly but when you go to the door it is barred. To add to this you can't go far enough not to hear or see them, and some of those outside with you can remember how good the party was before they got kicked out. They hate you because you don't know what you're missing and you hate them because they had it and threw it away.