Demon Lords and Princes: How *Bad* Should They Be?

[Sepulchrave II]

In this thread a heated debate is raging about the CRs of the demon lords and princes as they appear in the forthcoming Fiendish Codex I: Hordes of the Abyss. All other aspects of the new book have been ignored in light of the revelation that the CRs will be modest - in the 20-24 range.

These are among our favourite BBEGs, so it's only natural that passions run high on this subject.

I'm curious to know whether the market research conducted by WotC in this area reflects the thoughts and feelings of those of us at ENWorld (or at least those of us who are vocal and passionate about demons), or whether they really did drop the ball on this one - we represent a sizeable chunk of the community, after all.

 

[Gold Roger]

I like how it has been done.

However I think that if the game is build with twenty levels baseline it should stick to that baseline and be build around it. That means some other stuff should propably be lower level than it is (certain mages called elminster, ancient wyrms, balor/pit fiend).

It would also have been good if it was said the stats given where for out of lair demons and some rules/fluff had been given to draw the demon lords out and permanently banish them instead of just going "here's some stats, have fun", I guess low page count does this.

But in general I think the game should be build that it ends at 20th level (or else the base classes should have gone up to 25 level a la AE) and at that point a party should be able to beat a demon prince.

 

[hong]

I like how it has been done.

However I think that if the game is build with twenty levels baseline it should stick to that baseline and be build around it. That means some other stuff should propably be lower level than it is (certain mages called elminster, ancient wyrms, balor/pit fiend).

It would also have been good if it was said the stats given where for out of lair demons and some rules/fluff had been given to draw the demon lords out and permanently banish them instead of just going "here's some stats, have fun", I guess low page count does this.

But in general I think the game should be build that it ends at 20th level (or else the base classes should have gone up to 25 level a la AE) and at that point a party should be able to beat a demon prince.

Ditto. For me the game falls apart mechanically past 20th level anyway, so that's a good endpoint to aim for.

 

[Sammael]

I don't think that we represent a sizeable chunk of the community. But I also don't believe that WotC did any market research whatsoever regarding this topic. They worked under a set of presumptions set by the developers - which apparently differ from the writers' own presumptions (since James had more freedom in setting demon lords' CRs for the Demonomicon articles and decided to make them higher, we can guess that the lowered CRs were prescribed "from above").

As for me, I would prefer absolutely statless demon lords, with statted CR 20+ avatars. It this were not an option, my second preference would be to make their stats realistically reflect their status as incredibly powerful planar rulers, on par with the gods. This would mean Dicefreaks-style epic stats (CR 70 Orcus, CR 78 Demogorgon, etc.).

 

[Psion]

IMC:
CR 25-30+
lords: dr 0
princes/queens: dr 1+
avatars: cr 20+

I only ran one game over level 20, and then barely (22-23). I don't forsee the players challenging the true princes directly any time in the near future, though facing an avatar is possible.

 

[Psion]

I don't think that we represent a sizeable chunk of the cummunity. But I also don't believe that WotC did any market research whatsoever regarding this topic.

They did a lot of market research on what levels people play their games at.

 

[Sammael]

This is irrelevant. I haven't played in an epic game yet and I don't think demon lords should be killable at level 20. Neither do my players. What matters to us the most is verisimilitude.

 

[Odhanan]

What a DM can do is just consider these stats in the FC to be for "Greater Aspects" instead of the "real thing", which would be unkillable unless under very specific conditions, such as a quest, as justified by the Lord's background. That's what I intend to do.

 

[Gold Roger]

This is irrelevant. I haven't played in an epic game yet and I don't think demon lords should be killable at level 20. Neither do my players.

To me it's not the question if people play epic level, but if people think the existance of epic levels should be part of the games core assumptions.

To me it shouldn't. Core assumption should be that the maximum level is the maximum amount of power a mortal can reach.

From then it's the question if a mortal should be able to stop a demon prince and I think the answer should be yes (would be awefully depressing otherwise and canon has enough examples of demon lord imprisoned by powerfull mages).

Epic level is an added option for those that really want it, but with that they move out of the games core assumptions.

 

[Sammael]

Epic levels are a built-in core assumption for most settings (Greyhawk and FR being the most prominent) and have always been there (albeit they weren't called "epic" or another fancy name). Even Eberron has epic-level Lords of Dust (see recent Dragon magazine) despite its overall lower-level NPCs. Now, if three core worlds support epic play, I think that we can safely say the epic play is not really optional (as far as official materials go).

DMs are, of course, free to set the cap as low (or as high) as they desire. I am in favor of natural caps - keep playing as long as the game is fun.