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

[The Serge]

Beside, why please the dicefreaks and Planescapists that are all very adapt at comming up with their own stuff and indeed have done so, while ignoring the avarage gamer, who wants no epic gaming. Is your game hurt because Bobby and Sue can kill demogorgon and take his stuff. Or when I power down Grazzt with some plot devices, so my players can fight him at the end of our three years campaign that has just reached level 20?

No, my game isn't hurt... But then, neither would your game be hurt if WotC took the time to develop an internally consistent cosmology and placed the various archfiends and other planar lords in a more appropriate position.

As for this idea that the average gamer doesn't want to play epic games, how would the average gamer know? From what I've seen, most gamers who claim a disinterest in epic games have never played one to know if it would be appealing or even know if it works. WotC has done a pathetic job in offering any support for epic gaming, often siting the lack of customer interest in the concept... It's a catch-22: if you don't offer the product, people won't play and since people aren't playing, they're not offering the product. This attitude just feeds on itself.

Bottom line for me is that all this certainly is no reason to attack other playstyles or posters and get all worked up.

I haven't seen anyone attacking anyone else's playstyle. What's occuring here is folks asking for a reasonable explanation for some of the positions here.

I don't like being called an asskisser because I defend a certain position, or get put into a certain playstyle only because I'm against a certain position and then being insulted for that playstyle (that isn't even mine). There have been some harsh generalisations that I don't think where necessary or civil.

Who called you "an asskisser?" And I don't believe that anyone is making harsh generalizations... On either side of the debate.

 

[Ripzerai]

But I simply don't think it's worth the big outcry.

This is not a big outcry. This is very, very minor by Internet message board standards.

Things that have generated a bigger outcry include:

- Giving the Lady of Pain a LN alignment in the Planar Handbook.
- The concept of Planar Touchstones.
- Stats for deities.
- The phrase "Chant is, Oerth is dying."
- Halfling hairy feet, or the lack thereof.
- Gnomish noses.
- Female dwarf beards.
- Interpretation of the native outsider subtype.
- Epic guardsmen in Union.
- Gruumsh's alignment
- 3.5 edition weapon resistances
- The assassin PrC's spell list.
- The 3e revision of githzerai.
- Communities of mortals living in the planes.
- "Lizardfolk" versus "Lizard men."
- Pronouns.
- The revision of the Forgotten Realms cosmology.
- Dinosaurs and technology in Eberron.
- Whether or not Takhisis is the same as Tiamat.
- Whether or not Elminster is a Mary Sue character.

The flare-up over demon princes' CRs barely qualifies as a whimper in the scheme of things, let alone an outcry.

The reaction really is as minor as you think it should be.

 

[Psion]

But that is not the world shown to me with the Monster Manual 3.5. The world shown to me by the MM is a world where level 20 adventurers are powerful entities in their own right, but not world stomping invincible beings of godly power. The world shown to me by the MM has a CR 20 top tier regular demon called the balor. The world shown to me by the MM has a variety of challenges, and by no means are level 20 characters the top of the heap.

Herein lies the problem. You fundamentally do not understand the positions of those who think differently than you. Repeating the same assertion over and over again for every post in these two threads is not going to change it, because those who do not agree with you are operating under different assumptions than you.

And here it is: AFAIAC, the MM does not show me a world. It gives me a toolbox. If you think back, recall that the 3.0 MM had all the high end fiends weaker. They were up-sized for 3.5 because the design team thought it would better support play through 20 levels. It was a mechanical and gameplay consideration, not a canon one.

If you look at my post answering the OP, for the purposes of my game, I see archfiends in the uper 20s and 30s CRs. And I think canon supports that as well. And I think the fact the demonomicon articles putting fiends in the CR 30 range should show that the CR20 range was not a canon decision, but a toolkit one. Why? Most players don't play high enough for those stats to ever be used in play. The set of stats that would actually get used are most likely to be the ones printed, or close to them. Not the ones that reflect canon.

 

[Ripzerai]

And here it is: AFAIAC, the MM does not show me a world. It gives me a toolbox.

That's fine, but the tools in the MM are all calibrated based on the Metric system while the tools in the FC1 are still using Imperial measures.

If the 3.0 MM, with its weaker balors, was still in print that'd be one thing, but it's not. Using the FC1 archfiends straight out of the box requires that you either still have a copy of the 3.0 MM or you're prepared to do the work to depower the 3.5 fiends. If you want to use the 3.5 balor as it is, and you want a consistent game, you're going to want to increase the power of the FC1 archfiends accordingly - and that requires some work, or that you buy some magazines in addition the hardcover book you've just purchased.

It doesn't seem unreasonable to me to base all your basic tools on the same measuring scale.

 

[The Serge]

Herein lies the problem. You fundamentally do not understand the positions of those who think differently than you. Repeating the same assertion over and over again for every post in these two threads is not going to change it, because those who do not agree with you are operating under different assumptions than you.

Psion, the claim you're making is applicable to both sides of this debate. There are plenty of folks who like these anemic stats who will have been supporting them repeatedly in two different threads.

And here it is: AFAIAC, the MM does not show me a world. It gives me a toolbox. If you think back, recall that the 3.0 MM had all the high end fiends weaker. They were up-sized for 3.5 because the design team thought it would better support play through 20 levels. It was a mechanical and gameplay consideration, not a canon one.

You don't think it was a canonical decision as well? 2ed stats for the pit fiend, balor, solar, and ultroloth were at the high end of the stat spread to support their cosmic statures. All were just below the rungs of true individual power. The increase in power may well have been partly a mechanical and gameplay issue, but I disagree that it was strictly due to these at the expense of canon.

If you look at my post answering the OP, for the purposes of my game, I see archfiends in the uper 20s and 30s CRs. And I think canon supports that as well.

Canon also supports (and with greater strength, I contend) the archfiends being essentially on par with at least demigods, if not lesser gods. As for the pending stats in FCI, the decision is clearly canon or else they wouldn't have bothered printing them in the first place. While 3ed is about options, it still remains clear that stats taken from the various texts are intended to serve as official. These stats appear in most official WotC material and even in third party texts if they're SRD.

 

[Psion]

That's fine, but the tools in the MM are all calibrated based on the Metric system while the tools in the FC1 are still using Imperial measures.

A bare juxtaposition does not a valid analogy make. See the sig...

If the 3.0 MM, with its weaker balors, was still in print that'd be one thing, but it's not.

I wasn't trying to suggest anyone do that. When I spoke of the 3.0 MM, I was trying to glean insight into why the books are written the way that they are and why, given this, it's a poor idea to pin canon on them.

Using the FC1 archfiends straight out of the box requires that you either still have a copy of the 3.0 MM or you're prepared to do the work to depower the 3.5 fiends.

I don't see that necessarily being the case at all.

As Jester47 so brilliantly pointed out in the other thread, there are plenty of ways to use fiends as is and consistently explain them. (For that matter I don't really have to use a balor at all.)

It doesn't seem unreasonable to me to base all your basic tools on the same measuring scale.

When it gives you stats that most people won't actually use in play, then the virtue of doing so comes immediately into question.

 

[Psion]

You don't think it was a canonical decision as well?

I do not.

The increase in power may well have been partly a mechanical and gameplay issue, but I disagree that it was strictly due to these at the expense of canon.

Well, it didn't have to be "at the expense of canon". But I don't see any canonical thrust that would have motivated such a decision.

Canon also supports (and with greater strength, I contend) the archfiends being essentially on par with at least demigods, if not lesser gods.

That's fine. If you want statistics consistent with prior incarnations of the beings, I recommend you check out the Demonomicon articles or use the provided guidelines. I'm not suggesting that historical orcus was only a smidgen mightier than a balor (lolth on the other hand...)

I'm saying versions of these demons lords that conform to historical versions better would be used less, precisely BECAUSE they have the power of lesser deities.

 

[Gold Roger]

No, my game isn't hurt... But then, neither would your game be hurt if WotC took the time to develop an internally consistent cosmology and placed the various archfiends and other planar lords in a more appropriate position.

No, my game propably wouldn't have been hurt. With my preference for slow advancement it would take years till I had a game from level 1 to 20. Before that it propably takes years before I could get such a game and then I'm not sure there would be a demon prince in that game.

I'm more about defending the underlying phillosophy I see in the decision rather than the actual gaming impact. I'm also not 100% satisfied with the path taken.

However, what would have been a consistent cosmology solution for one, wouldn't have been for another, and most people clamoring for it already have their own solution. So why not satisfy the others?

As for this idea that the average gamer doesn't want to play epic games, how would the average gamer know? From what I've seen, most gamers who claim a disinterest in epic games have never played one to know if it would be appealing or even know if it works. WotC has done a pathetic job in offering any support for epic gaming, often siting the lack of customer interest in the concept... It's a catch-22: if you don't offer the product, people won't play and since people aren't playing, they're not offering the product. This attitude just feeds on itself.

Well, I've never played epic, haven't even read much of epic rules.

For one, many people simply aren't interested in over the top gameply, while others don't like all the number crunching. But I'm not one of those and these people have a problem with D&D anyway.

So what's my problem with epic? I think the game should have, in general core sense, a locking point. A point where you've done it all. Been there, done that, have all the power a mortal can take. If people want to remove that point for their homegame I'm cool with that. But I belief that for both generaly design principle and for personal expectation there should be a level cap in the core assumptions.

My point here is: Would we have all that hassle now, had the game been build for 20 (or 25 or 30) level play in the first place. The lack of a professional complete definition of powerlevels all build into the core mechanism of game is what annoys me.

Hell (teh he), since current D&D obviously doesn't work that way and I'm not exactly for being adamant in one's position for the lone sake that it's my position, you and some others may even have convinced me that I should propably try it one day or another. But I still maintain that a game should be build in a way that it can be played "start to finish" within it's natural boundries and premise.

I haven't seen anyone attacking anyone else's playstyle. What's occuring here is folks asking for a reasonable explanation for some of the positions here.

Who called you "an asskisser?" And I don't believe that anyone is making harsh generalizations... On either side of the debate.

Ironically I generalised when complaining about generalising attacks. I'm sorry for that and would like to appologise.

The generalizing attacks where in the other thread. One poster was especially of fault of this, though I don't want a personal war or somesuch and intentionally didn't call names. The asskisser comment was actually made after the mods had already called people on their behavior. Maybe it's already deleted by now.

 

[Sammael]

I think the game should have, in general core sense, a locking point.

This is a fine personal point. However, it also completely and utterly antithetical to the core philosophy of 3E: options, not restrictions. Thus, it can never be supported by the current core rules.

 

[Ripzerai]

there are plenty of ways to use fiends as is and consistently explain them.

No, there are really aren't. I think I and others rebutted Jester's points more than adequately. The dissonance in power scale between the MM and FC1 is as obvious as it is indefensible, and repeating the same assertations over and over again doesn't change that.

(And the metric/imperial analogy was spot-on, or I'd like to know why not).

(For that matter I don't really have to use a balor at all.)

No, you don't. You don't need to use Juiblex either. But if you remove balors from the game then isn't their inclusion in the MM a waste of space? If you can only use one or the other, then one of them is a waste.

But I think that's a bad argument. Both books, as you keep reminding us, are books of options. In a rational design, that would be an excellent reason to use epic-level demon lords as the base assumption - so people would have the option to use them if they wanted. And then provide rules for scaling them up even further.

But basing the MM on one set of assumptions and the FC1 on another is just weird. Again, my analogy was perfect.

When it gives you stats that most people won't actually use in play, then the virtue of doing so comes immediately into question.

Of course, I'd rather they used the space on describing new Abyssal layers than on stats for Yeenoghu. But if they're going to include stats, I'd rather they were at least consistent with Core Book 3.

The idea that "most people won't actually use" them is dubious. If the price of making them "usable" is to make them so weak that killing Yeenoghu is no more an accomplishment than killing one of his balor servitors would be, then the price is too high. It makes Yeenoghu superfluous to the game. The minimum level at which Yeenoghu is "usable" is the level at which he's distinguishable from his own servants.

Kain's analogy - making a great wyrm as powerful as a very old dragon - is also apt. Why not just use a very old dragon?

And you know this. Most of your arguments had been predicated on the idea that the Abyssal lords were at least slightly tougher than rank-and-file demons, until it was shown that this wasn't the case. Can we at least agree that they should be slightly tougher than balors are?

Come on. Making that concession isn't going to insult anyone's home games or chosen playing style. The book could have perfectly well started the scale at CR 21 and brought Demogorgon up to CR 27 without requiring epic play to make them usable.