Demonic Lore

[BOZ]

i would think (without having researched it) that some souls would bypass the default larva stage and progress right on to manes (those who have "earned" it?).

could someone post all the known sources for these transitions?

 

[Alzrius]

According to Faces of Evil, any evil person who does goes to the lower plane that best matches his alignment (presuming he didn't worship a specific deity). He arrives there as a larva. However (from what FoE says), exceptionally Chaotic Evil petitioners make the jump straight to manes (and exceptionally LE ones make it to lemures), never being a larva.

Layer 400, the Mountains of Woe, is where the nalfeshnee judge (as I understood it) all the new souls that come to the Abyss (and my understanding was that they appear on that layer instantly), no matter what their form.

Most likely, the nalfeshnee there are canny enough to understand that those who appear as manes already are probably more hardy than the ones who are just larva. That aside, they still get to choose what happens next to the new petitioners ("You rutterkin; you manes; you dretch; you dinner!").

It's worth reiterating that when higher fiends are looking to promote some larva, they prefer to use NE larva. The article "Pox of the Planes" in the Dragon Annual #2 made it clear why.

 

[BOZ]

Monster Manual (1977): "Those dead which go to the 666 layers of the demonic abyss become manes. The most evil of them are confined in the tiers of flames of Gehenna."

so, not all CE souls become manes, but the souls that go to the Abyss directly should be.

"The larvae are the most selfishly evil of all souls who sink to the lower planes after death. They abide in the gloom of Hades, controlled by the night hags. These creatures are desired by demons and devils alike, as they are used to form quasits (qv) or imps (qv) respectively." etc.

so, originally at least, larvae was not the default form for souls to appear as, but reserved for the most selfishly evil.

 

[Alzrius]

Monster Manual (1977): "Those dead which go to the 666 layers of the demonic abyss become manes. The most evil of them are confined in the tiers of flames of Gehenna."

so, not all CE souls become manes, but the souls that go to the Abyss directly should be.

"The larvae are the most selfishly evil of all souls who sink to the lower planes after death. They abide in the gloom of Hades, controlled by the night hags. These creatures are desired by demons and devils alike, as they are used to form quasits (qv) or imps (qv) respectively." etc.

so, originally at least, larvae was not the default form for souls to appear as, but reserved for the most selfishly evil.

The operative thing to remember is that there are books that expand, revise, and retcon this topic since the 1E MM came out.

 

[Erik Mona]

so, originally at least, larvae was not the default form for souls to appear as, but reserved for the most selfishly evil.

I am considering keeping it this way, and I guess I'm looking for suggestions from the faithful as to why that might not be such a good idea. I should add that I don't have strong opinions on the matter, so my biases are clear.

--Erik

 

[BOZ]

The operative thing to remember is that there are books that expand, revise, and retcon this topic since the 1E MM came out.

though the post that Erik made after yours does not surprise me.

 

[Grover Cleaveland]

Hmmm. This is essentially as far as I got, and it really leaves a bit of a problem in that the 1e MM and subsequent material on manes really do suggest that they are the souls of CE dead folk, and it appears from my reading of the Woeful Escarand material (I don't have it in front of me) that it is _manes_ who are judged (in the main, heh heh) in the court of woe, and not larvae.

Both larvae and manes are the souls of the dead. Manes are just slightly more evolved than larvae are.

And yes, it's manes that are judged, not the worms.

 

[Alzrius]

I am considering keeping it this way, and I guess I'm looking for suggestions from the faithful as to why that might not be such a good idea.

The fact that it'd fly in the face of what Planescape people remember is one reason. Another is that the idea of most evil creatures being larva across the planes made a sense of its own, in regards to how the "soul trade" worked (mostly in regards to night hags et al).

Basically, if all CE souls already appeared as manes, then promoting fiends wouldn't ever need larva from The Gray Waste; why waste their gold to buy larva from there, import it home, and then expend effort to make it into a manes, when there are perfectly good manes right in the Abyss? This then undercuts the entire idea that there need to be "larva herders" (night hags) who then sell the larva to be shaped into higher-powered fiends.

As the "Pox of the Planes" article stated, having larva appear in all the lower planes (as an aside, larva on each plane has that plane's alignment. E.g. larva in the Abyss is CE) creates a need for NE larva. That may sound strange, but the idea here is that CE larva don't hold their forms well - a lot of them are chaotic enough that they devolve back into being larva once promoted (and likewise, LE larva tend to be harder to change, having their own ethos of law). But NE larva accept the imposition of CE or LE better, having no ingrained concepts of the alignments that need changing.

All of that, in turn, makes things more interesting among the Abyssal petitioners. You can then determine who is more likely to become a better demon (they appear as manes); you can have nalfeshnees who, for some reason, decide to send a demon lord they hate the souls of those who're weak (CE larva they promoted to manes, knowing they'll be less useful), etc.

The PS system makes it work for the Lower Planes as a whole, unlike the 1E system.

 

[Alzrius]

And yes, it's manes that are judged, not the worms.

That was true in 1E, but Planescape made some changes (for the better, IMHO).

 

[Grover Cleaveland]

Monster Manual (1977): "Those dead which go to the 666 layers of the demonic abyss become manes. The most evil of them are confined in the tiers of flames of Gehenna."

so, not all CE souls become manes, but the souls that go to the Abyss directly should be.

I read that as saying that all dead who go to the Abyss become manes, but the most evil of manes are confined to Gehenna.

Note that "Gehenna" became "the Pits of Flame beneath the Mountain of Woe" in the layer of Woeful Escarond in 2e. Otherwise, that statement didn't change in Planescape (and manes in Gehenna don't make much sense anyway).