D&D 4E 4E Cosmology & Yougoloths

[Baby Samurai]

I like the Baerneloth(sp?) analogy -- perhaps it's not too much of a stretch to suggest that the 'loths did create the other two races of fiends: the demons by helping Tharizdun with that seed business, and the devils by convincing a group of angels to turn on their deity.

I like that, but that would mean the cosmology would start with Gods, Primordials and Baernaloths?

 

[Elphilm]

You could get even more mathematical and have modrons based on various fundamental theorems of geometry, algebra or analysis. Pythagoras would be proud. But it might be a bit inaccessible to your average hobbyist gamer.

But it's a pretty damn sweet idea nevertheless. I've always liked this early depiction of a modron, even though sticking human limbs onto a tetrahedron only manages to look silly. Making modrons (or whatever you want to call them) into lifeforms with shapes based on various regular polyhedra, for example, is a really tempting idea.

 

[Simia Saturnalia]

Despite hating alignment I've always loved the 'loths. They'll certainly find their way into my 4e games, by conversion if need be, as beings older than the Abyss and hailing from somewhere in the Astral Sea, so wrapped in secrets that every sage and arcanist who knows about them knows a different set of myths for their beginnings - and none of them are pleasant.

As to their presence in the Blood War and the idiocy of demons and devils in hiring them, I think that's the wrong way to look at it. Nobody believes the 'loths won't betray them this time - all yugoloth contracts come with a side order of betrayal. You just have to convince yourself (or be convinced) that the cost of the asking price and the betrayal is outstripped by the advantage of having them on your side, even temporarily.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hey all!

Didn't WotC mention that Ice Devils were once Yugoloths (in 4E). Doesn't that suggest there still will be (or were) Yugoloths in 4E...?

 

[Desdichado]

Didn't WotC mention that Ice Devils were once Yugoloths (in 4E). Doesn't that suggest there still will be (or were) Yugoloths in 4E...?

Rich Baker (He Who Must Be Stopped!!!) said this:

- Ice devils don't look like other devils. We've decided that they are actually a demonic/yugoloth race... one that was entrapped by Mephistopheles long ago in an infernal contract. So ice devils hate other devils, retain their insect-like appearance, and have a special loyalty to Mephistopheles. It's one of the reasons why Asmodeus has never chosen to move against Mephistopheles. Asmodeus would of course win if he did, but that would let the ice devils out of their contract.

It's a wee bit confusing, because demonic/yugoloth doesn't make sense in the current scheme of things. Demonic is one thing, yugoloth is another. So which is it? Or is it just an offhand comment that can't be pressed sufficiently to confirm yugoloths existence in 4e because it's just referring to 3e terminology for simplicity and ease of communication at this stage?

That last is my guess.

 

[Shemeska]

The 'loths can serve a multitude of "roles" regardless of whether you're using the meta-setting elements of the Blood War, or the harcore trappings of Planescape. Even within their ranks you'll find different incarnations of just what Evil as a concept is. Their lowest are selfish and opportunistic, but as you go up their heirarchy towards what they would regard as more "pure" forms of evil, you'll find a paradoxical undercurrent of what amounts to quasi-religious zealotry in the service of universal misery from beings who yet care only about themselves. They're not evil trying to randomly destroy or control, they're an ancient and primordial evil that predates mortality but happily feeds upon it like a disease, and evil as the obliteration of hope.

I'm cynical on the matter since I suspect that 4e won't include them given the bullet in the head the guardinals received, but the 'loths would fit as servants of the so-called Primordials (and really that strikes me as being the same function that the baernaloths and other such hinted at beings already represented). Alternatively the 'loths could be strangers in the purest sense, beings of malignant mystery with their own unknown goals whose origins are an open question and their mercenary activities being much the same as now (and easily eating the ecological niche of the mercane as well). Maybe they themselves don't know their origin, or even what they are. They might be from another multiverse altogether; stranded, bitter, and ultimately willing to drag all beings down into a hell of their own creation. There's no reason to even define their history in a hard sense if you're trashing what already came before 4e, which I suspect will happen if they're used.

Of course, given the complete and utter silence on the DI's end regarding yugoloth proposals to Dragon, my hopes aren't up that they'll even be considered in 4e. Perhaps picked apart and shoehorned into the "role" of a 4e demon or devil rather than being reinvisioned as something distinct as they were previously, but if the former I'm probably not interested in them anymore.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Simplification can go too far.

The 'loths do (or at least can) fill a role distinct from that of demons or devils. They're not quite elemental beings of pure destruction, nor are they manipulative monsters of sin and depravity. They're distinct as creatures of the unknown. They are the shadow at the edge of your vision, the thing that goes bump in the night, the slight jealousy when your wife gets a catcall, the suspicion that your friend might be talking about you behind your back....

They're more psychological than moral or elemental.

I think they'd fit VERY nicely in the "points of light" setting, because they represent the "unknown evil" so well. You know a devil will tempt you. You know a demon will slaughter you. You don't know a yugoloth will do. You CAN'T know what a yugoloth will do. The evil comes from what you think it might do.

As far as the name goes....I'm kind of disappointed Shaitan (an Islamic term for fiends) hasn't been used...let's use that.

 

[Kunimatyu]

I like that, but that would mean the cosmology would start with Gods, Primordials and Baernaloths?

No, the Primordials would *be* the Baernaloths, just under another name.

 

[Baby Samurai]

As far as the name goes....I'm kind of disappointed Shaitan (an Islamic term for fiends)

Really, I could have sworn I read about it being related to a "Satan-like figure"?

 

[Soel]

The yugoloths could be soldiers of the primordials who escaped the final defeat at the hands of the gods. They fled to remote corners of the planes, eventually finding work as mercenaries for whomever would pay their prices. The daemons hold secrets of the primordials the gods never suspected, and ever-patiently they search for evidence of their creators that they might raise or release them.

Wow!

That's a far more interesting take on the Yugos, and one that I would use for 4e.