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Message: <blockquote data-quote="GVDammerung" data-source="post: 2858854" data-attributes="member: 33060">As Shade notes, they never lost "kickable" status; it was rather a matter of how and by whom.  What has been done here, apparently, it to make them easily "kickable."  Or reasonably "kickable" by a 20th Level party, if you prefer.  I might see that if there were no such thing as a campaign, if every progression to 20th level occurred in isolation.  They do not.In published settings, one campaign follows the next.  So if party No. 1 kicks Demogorgon, he is kicked when party No. 2 comes along.  That degrades the metatext of that setting.In a home brew, most DMs I know do not create a new homebrew everytime they start new characters.  Their homebrews build over time and many character archs, so the same dynamic is in effect.  Once Demogorgon is kicked, he is kicked, degrading the metatext.And once Demogorgon, Grazzt and Orcus are each kicked, each by a different party?  The Abyss just lost a huge and major dynamic that animates the whole.  The game is poorer.Kickable need not, and should not, mean easily kicked.  Kicking a demon prince should not be something any party, even a 20th level one, calmly contemplates, let alone sees as a reasonable possibility.  I agree that demon princes should, by some measurre, be kickable.  I do not believe they should ever be easily, reasonably or predictably kickable.Demon princes represent the pinnacle of evil given form.  Consider that for a moment.  And what does a 20th level part represent?  The pinnacle of anything other than character advancement?  No.  So, the pinnacle of evil incarnate should be kickable by any group that has managed to obtain 20th level (with all the magic that emplies)?  No.  Not unless one is a hopeless power gamer and/or PC egotist.Special.  Demon princes are, by defination, special among their kind, even unique.  20th Level PCs are not, not to the same degree, among their kind.  They are exceptional, perhaps, but the next campaign will see another set rise to an equal level.  They are not then as special, and certainly not unique.  When you consider that the PCs embody no metaphysical archetype, they are even less special and far from unique.The idea of easily, reasonably or demonstrably kickable demon princes then completely falls apart.  Demon princes should be kickable only under conditions or circumstances that fully meet their role in the D&D cosmology.  Not as just another big monster.  Demon princes should never been seen as just bigger monsters.  While not deities, neither are they overgrown umberhulks.</blockquote>

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