Fiendish Codex I: Hordes of the Abyss

[Aaron L]

Paragon template is in the Epic Level Handbook. And let me add that I think its a great idea too.

 

[Shade]

I don't think that is necessarily a fair statement.

I'm not a magaplaya hater, but I personally find the game more enjoyable at moderate levels of play, and I treat these demon prince types as more of Lovecraftian "forces" (defeat the demons by defeating their plans and cults) than opponents with spells and hit points.

But can't they still be treated that way at moderate levels, since they are far beyond the character's CR at those levels?

I'll still buy the book with stat blocks (and I'm not buying very many books right now), but I'll think of it as a 140-page book instead of a 160-pager.

I feel your pain. I felt that way about Planar Handbook and Sandstorm with all the wasted space (IMO) on touchstone sites. Same goes for the endless wasted pages (again, IMO) on sample character for prestige classes, how to adapt the prestige classes to your campaign, and so on.

To have a prince show up, I would use the Dragon articles as a base and write up the power level to fit my own campaign. It is my understanding that epic level action is hard to balance just out of the book and requires more care out of the GM anyway.

As someone who has been running an epic campaign for over a year now, I can say that I haven't run into any balance issues with monsters. The CRs for most of the epic creatures have been quite on target so far. Some of the non-epic monsters from the MMII that have CRs over 20 are vastly overrated (hellfire wyrm, mountain giant, linnorms, etc).

 

[Pants]

I don't think that is necessarily a fair statement.

I'm not a magaplaya hater, but I personally find the game more enjoyable at moderate levels of play, and I treat these demon prince types as more of Lovecraftian "forces" (defeat the demons by defeating their plans and cults) than opponents with spells and hit points. I'll still buy the book with stat blocks (and I'm not buying very many books right now), but I'll think of it as a 140-page book instead of a 160-pager.

I'm probably making generalizations here, but usually the most vocal members of the anti-stat camp make generic assumptions that statting out these powerful beings turns them into 'just another monster' or 'it destroys the mystery surrounding them.' You know, it's fine if you don't want stats. Nothing wrong with that. However, it's irritating how big of a deal its made out to be when it really isn't one at all. It's even worse when the comments made can be generally insulting to other playstyles.

'Just another monster' and 'it destroys the mystery surrounding them' probably aren't meant to be insulting, but it kind of demeans the play style wherein the goal of a campaign is to eventually confront these creatures and (hopefully) defeat them or delay their plans. In such a campaign, they are hardly 'just another monster' and they can still be 'mysterious,' yet stats could still be very handy.

That's irritating. You (general you, not you specifically ) don't like stats, fine, great go have fun, just don't piss all over someone else's play style because you don't agree with it.

 

[ruleslawyer]

Word.

FYI, James and others, I don't think that "avatar" is quite the word you're looking for WRT the 1e stats for archfiends. Those were written to be THE stats for the archfiends (in the same way that EGG wrote up the stats for the gods of Greyhawk as actual deific stats and not avatar stats, and James Ward did for the real-world pantheons in DDG). The archfiends' stats on their home planes were not given a considerable boost until the release of the 1e Manual of the Planes, which gave them the full privileges of Lesser Powers (a huge packet of SLAs, double hp on their home plane, limited invulnerability, etc.).

 

[Grover Cleaveland]

I'm probably making generalizations here

Yes, you are. It's not a "just another monster" issue, it's a matter of internal logic. If the lords of the underworld are only CR 30 or so, how the heck do they avoid being conquered by deities? When Kurtulmak can finish Asmodeus off in a few rounds and teleport away, something is very wrong with the cosmology. Why hasn't Demogorgon been slaughtered by rival gods of the aquatic races? How did Pazuzu manage to curse the entire race of kenku, as described in the recent Dragon ecology? How did the Lords of the Nine banish the orcish and goblin pantheons from the Nine Hells?

In 1st edition, fiendish rulers were all lesser gods, and most of them were of a similar or greater amount of power in 2nd edition. That made a certain amount of sense - even Bane would hesitate before taking on a plane ruled by nine lesser deities. In 3rd edition, all semblance of sense is lost - the rulers of nine infinite domains are vermin, less than that. Vhaeraun can march into the Gray Waste and give orders to the Oinoloth, as he did in a recent drow-themed novel.

Evil deities are not the types to make peace treaties if they don't have to, nor are they the normally the types to cower in fear of what the other deities might say - it's inevitable in the cosmology implied by the current rules that someone stronger than the rest is going to take control, and the eons of self-rule the demons, devils, and other fiends has enjoyed is gone forever.

And that's fine, if that's what you want - a multiverse where Bane or Hextor rule the Nine Hells and Cyric and Talos or Erythnul and Raxivort are the mightiest of the lords of the Abyss. But, I mean, if Raxivort and Iuz are both mightier than Graz'zt, why is Graz'zt still alive and not serving them drinks in a French maid's uniform?

The common retort I hear is something along the lines of "the other deities would all turn against anyone that threatened the status quo in the lower planes," but a campaign where evil deities don't threaten the status quo (especially on the chaotic planes) sounds like one where evil deities aren't doing their jobs. And who really loves Graz'zt so much that they'd object to his son or former servant taking his place?

I think it's completely fair to criticize a cosmology that's poorly thought out. James Jacobs' fix of making the stat blocks into avatars is fine - but it's still weird to see the default assumption be the least reasonable one.

 

[Zaukrie]

In my case you are wrong. I have no problem with statting out anything, monster, demon....whatever. But, in a 160 page book, if 10 demon princes are statted out, that's 20 pages of stats that I'd rather see on demons and how they shape a campaign and how to use them, and how planes interact and .... I'd rather get stats in a web enhancement, or, preferrably make the book 240 pages...

 

[Grover Cleaveland]

In my case you are wrong. I have no problem with statting out anything, monster, demon....whatever. But, in a 160 page book, if 10 demon princes are statted out, that's 20 pages of stats that I'd rather see on demons and how they shape a campaign and how to use them, and how planes interact and .... I'd rather get stats in a web enhancement, or, preferrably make the book 240 pages...

There's that, too.

And that's the most important point.

 

[Shade]

Trying to apply internal logic to D&D fails 99 out of 100 times.

Along the same lines as "why doesn't Kurtulmak just take out Asmodeus"...well, why doesn't he just take out all deities of a lower divine rank (or a smaller worshiper base, etc. if you don't like stats)? Why doesn't he kill any gnome heroes that show any sign of promise? Why don't balors just eliminate all future rivals?

Real-world cosmologies/mythologies weren't real well thought out either, for that matter.

 

[BOZ]

i will agree that the demon lords' stats need some fixin (perhaps the book under which the thread we are all posting in will go some way towards that), and that they are way more vulernable than gods with such a relatively weaker status.

i don't, however, beleive in throwing out the baby with the bathwater by eliminating their stats completely. it can be fixed by James and/or Erik by adding some rules in FC1. archfiends can be made into Lesser gods while in their realm, or the stat blocks can be officially ruled as manifestations of an archfiend's greater will.

would that help, if they were to do either? i, for one, think it would, and would like to see *something* to give them an advantage against the gods as so dramatically pointed out by Rip.

 

[BOZ]

Real-world cosmologies/mythologies weren't real well thought out either, for that matter.

silly ancient humans. they needed to hire some professional designers!