Demon Lords

[grodog]

oh right, i remember her now, then! is that the only place she has appeared? has she been mentioned elsewhere?

Sepulchrave makes use of Rhyxali in his famously-overridden-with-demons Story Hour. All folks seeking inspiration for the Abyss should go read it: http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=58227

 

[grodog]

how would you know i mentioned that if the link's not working?

the site does appear to be down now, but it was working this morning...

the magic number is "64". also, see the 24th post of the thread you are currently viewing.

All hosted sites on greyhawkonline.com were down for a little while, due to some issues with spyware being propogated from them. I think we're fixed now, since I was able to reach the main domain today; as a result, I put my site back online too.

If anyone sees problems with the sites, please email me immediately, and I'll call our host owner to work further on it.

 

[BOZ]

yeah, the link in post #65 is working again.

Yep, I never got into PS: the cant in the Dragon previews was enough to turn me off (and I never played 2e, which didn't help my liking for PS, since I never liked the logic for renmaing to bateezu and tanari, and the Blood War always seemed lame to me, etc., etc.).

i know, a lot of old schoolers were turned off by the approach of the designers to the planes. however, if you can ever find someone to translate it into english for you ( ), you'd be surprised how much highly detailed info there is on gods, gods' realms, planar races and locations and such that could easily be plugged into any 1E or 3E planar camapaign with a bit of tweaking here and there. the level of imagination used in the setting itself (once you get past the sticking points of the factions, cant, and blood war) is quite simply astounding. if used as nothing else than a source for mining for ideas, you'd be surprised how much non-faction, non-blood war stuff you'll find, much of which was based largely on older existing material, if you can get past the initial bias.

 

[Grover Cleaveland]

Rip, as always, has some F'ing awesome stuff. But don't expect that all to be direct from 'canon', he's got a mix of whatever seemed like cool ideas from various sources, his own creations, etc. They're all seriously inspired in most cases however.

This is Rip, in my goofy ENWorld name. Yeah, that list comes from all over the place. I stole quite a bit from Grodog's site, actually, though a lot of it got mangled in the translation as I spliced it with other sources. Hope he doesn't mind.

Astaroth was listed as a demon in the original MMII. The original description of Gargoth in Dragon #91 is based directly on a devil named Astaroth from Dragon #28 (which preceded the MMII by a number of years); it's likely that Greenwood changed his name from Astaroth to Gargoth (after the MMII, trying to salvage something of the #28 article) solely to avoid having two powerful fiends with the same name from opposite ends of the Law-Chaos spectrum. As far as I know, the idea that Gargauth slew the demon Astaroth originated in Powers and Pantheons.

Thralhavoc was a balor who ruled Abyssal layer #348, which is now dominated by the nalfeshnee Taphaon, of the Fortress of Indifference. The best source of info on this is Hellbound: the Blood War though bits of it get mentioned in the 3e Manual of the Planes and in the Book of Vile Darkness.

BOZ, are you limiting yourself to TSR/WotC demons?

- Rip

 

[grodog]

This is Rip, in my goofy ENWorld name. Yeah, that list comes from all over the place. I stole quite a bit from Grodog's site, actually, though a lot of it got mangled in the translation as I spliced it with other sources. Hope he doesn't mind.

Nope, Rip, I have no objections

 

[BOZ]

BOZ, are you limiting yourself to TSR/WotC demons?

for legal reasons, it's the safest thing.

 

[grodog]

i know, a lot of old schoolers were turned off by the approach of the designers to the planes. however, if you can ever find someone to translate it into english for you ( ), you'd be surprised how much highly detailed info there is on gods, gods' realms, planar races and locations and such that could easily be plugged into any 1E or 3E planar camapaign with a bit of tweaking here and there.

Yeah, given the setting's popularity, I figured it couldn't be as abysmal as the introductory articles in Dragon made it look. I do own Dead Gods (it has GH stuff in it), but I haven't read it cover-to-cover yet. Is that a good, representative PS product in general, in terms of the scope of the setting, it's flavor, etc.?

the level of imagination used in the setting itself (once you get past the sticking points of the factions, cant, and blood war) is quite simply astounding. if used as nothing else than a source for mining for ideas, you'd be surprised how much non-faction, non-blood war stuff you'll find, much of which was based largely on older existing material, if you can get past the initial bias.

I was given Monte's Beyond Countless Doorways for Christmas last year (I succumbed to the ads' allusions to Moorcock's planar works). How's that compare to DG and to PS in general?

Back on topic: I'll almost certainly be adding some more demon princes to my Excerpts from the Demonomicon of Iggwilv series soon, since I just wrapped up a large GH project on my site. Obox-ob and some of the others that are relatively unique to my campaign will be appearing first, I think

 

[Shemeska]

Yeah, given the setting's popularity, I figured it couldn't be as abysmal as the introductory articles in Dragon made it look. I do own Dead Gods (it has GH stuff in it), but I haven't read it cover-to-cover yet. Is that a good, representative PS product in general, in terms of the scope of the setting, it's flavor, etc.?

Yes, DG is a damn good module and it does hit on many of the elements of the setting, though it doesn't get into Sigil much.

If you want to get a fuller scope of the setting, I'd suggest looked at 'Faces of Evil: The Fiends', 'Hellbound: The Blood War', 'Uncaged: Faces of Sigil', and 'Factols Manifesto'. Those books hit the setting themes of the Blood War, Sigil, and the abstract philosophies of the factions.

The notion that cant was somehow oppressive and omnipresent is a bit overused, and generally held by folks who haven't had a really good exposure to the setting. There's really only one or two books where it honestly might be overdone, and then it's just a question of style and if you like it or not. It's easy to ignore if you don't.

But as a whole, the 2e Planescape stuff took the 1e planar material and expanded it in a massive, truly massive way. It fleshed out concepts, people and places like you wouldn't believe; putting depth and complexity to things that were previously precious little more than names, stats and some brief descriptions. The planes are places that ooze history, mystique, and a sense of scope and scale to do justice to the infinite planes. And this is just my opinion, but trying to run a game in the planes of DnD and not using the full extent of PS resources and the 3e material which is pretty much wholly derived from the 2e PS stuff, would be like running a Forgotten Realms campaign without anything written by or derived from material first created by Ed Greenwood. The expansion of material on the planes from 1e in Planescape is really that massive.

Keep in mind I didn't play till 3e and I rather adore the PS material for what I perceive as the level of creatively and inspiration in the writing, and the atmosphere of the setting, so perhaps I'm biased in this.

I was given Monte's Beyond Countless Doorways for Christmas last year (I succumbed to the ads' allusions to Moorcock's planar works). How's that compare to DG and to PS in general?

It's a good book, one the better ones of the past year or two, but it doesn't quite compare to the PS stuff in the atmosphere that you get out of it.

 

[The Serge]

I do own Dead Gods (it has GH stuff in it), but I haven't read it cover-to-cover yet. Is that a good, representative PS product in general, in terms of the scope of the setting, it's flavor, etc.?

It's a good representation of PS material and, to most, one of the best. It has a very broad scope and the flavor's all there. For some, however, the material is a bit much and the use of Orcus and Tenebrous and so forth left me a little... raw.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

Yep, I never got into PS: the cant in the Dragon previews was enough to turn me off (and I never played 2e, which didn't help my liking for PS, since I never liked the logic for renmaing to bateezu and tanari, and the Blood War always seemed lame to me, etc., etc.).

I added liberally to the Gord stuff from my own imaginings, since there really wasn't a lot of 1e Abyss canon to work with; most of the planar descriptions are generic, and I decided on layers and rulers based on the limited info available in 1e, Gord, and DM fiat. You may want to check out the material the I wrote up around my demonic geneaology and -mythology articles on Canonfiire! (see my Exceprts from the Demonomicon of Iggwilv series at http://www.canonfire.com/cfhtml/modules.php?name=Your_Account&op=userinfo&username=grodog).
I also decided that the River Styx and others flowed throughout all of the underworld planes, with Styx being the most commonly found (therefore I treat it as a plane of it's own, in essence).

I agree with you on the PS stuff, the cant was a huge turn off for me reading the material. Ditto on the renaming stuff and the blood war.