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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ripzerai" data-source="post: 2710827" data-attributes="member: 38324">No, they're not. The mechanical powers of deities and planar lords are an integral part of any cosmology, and altering them would logically alter the cosmology tremendously."Cosmology" has a much broader meaning than the particular arrangement and nature of the planes of existence. The destiny of souls, the nature of the gods, and the relationship between gods and planar rulers are all parts of it. That is to say, theology is an essential component in cosmology, and part of that broader field. If you change the mechanics so that gods are easier to kill, then that changes the cosmology. He wouldn't need to. No matter what his minions do, the buck stops at Demogorgon's desk.No. "Arbitrary" would be if the yugoloth leaders were far more powerful than the masters of the Hells and the Abyss for no particular reason. Correlating the strength of central authority with the nature of the alignment the various races personify is whatever the opposite of "arbitrary" is. Canonical, certainly, and eminently logical.That's a pretty complex set of mechanics you had to invent out of whole cloth to avoid reading Deities & Demigods literally.  Then they're not "near invincible." Heironeous would only have to ambush Demogorgon the moment he stepped outside Gaping Maw. Yeah, I know - but does the earlier restriction against demons leaving the three planes of chaotic evil without being summoned override this? Some references suggest that this is the case. I can see it being argued both ways.The orcs will be on many different worlds even in your cosmology, since the only limitation is that the worlds know about each other. If an "orcworld" (for example, Borka in Greyspace) is aware of Oerth (as the Borkans are), then both will connect to the same kosmic localized thingy. Or, to give another example, Oerth and Toril are aware of one another.Regardless, the baatezu may not be willing to sacrifice a large number of the troops who would normally be defending their plane. And, of course, by 1st and early 2nd edition rules, they would have to be summoned to enter the Material Plane, which means you need a high-level spellcaster for each devil summoned, more or less (some could summon more than others, and they could continue churning armies into their world for an extended period of time, but you'd think that such a process would be interrupted by other forces eventually). I think fiends could erase deities from existence by targeting their followers on the Material Plane under the following conditions:1. A truce in the Blood War. 2. The devils are targeting single-world deities, not gods who are worshipped on a variety of worlds in the same cosmology, as the orc gods are. Too much of a hassle otherwise.3. You assume fiends can enter the Material Plane without being summoned.Something like this did happen in the Hellbound timeline, where the fiends united to punish certain gods from interfering with the Blood War, but the three conditions were in effect.Hextor lures him out of his throne room first, of course. He's not that stupid. But we've already established that Asmodeus can simply teleport back to whatever ground he chooses, so it's all irrelevant.</blockquote>

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