Hordes of the Abyss: Q&A

[Razz]

Fiendish Aspects III is up, as well as a compiled zip of all the fiendish aspects.

I was hoping for an aspect of Graz'zt, but alas, I figured he'd get screwed.

I assume that's the last of the aspect WE? Why aren't we getting a IV? It's just a couple more aspects...

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

My hat of PS know no limit.

Really it just wasn't my cup of tea. Campaign setting crossovers are cheesy IMO. I always considered my campaign worlds to be seperate entities with no connection to each other.

 

[Nightfall]

Until you see that horde of Titanspawn come crashing through the dimensional barriers...

 

[BOZ]

Fiendish Codex I: The Lost Annals is up, including laghathti obyriths, Woeful Escarand, and other planar layers!

This is the web enhancement I've been waiting for, and it delivers.

yay! i just finally finished reading up on all the descriptive text in the book, for the descriptions of the layers and the text on the demon lords (took me long enough given how little free time i tend to have), including the web enhancement.

that's the part i was waiting for, and indeed it delivers!


it did get me to thinking though...

Erik has suggested before, that he would like to see article queries for Dragon on interesting planar locations (can you see where i'm going with this?) and i was thinking that a few articles on Abyssal layers to expand FC1 would be a lot of fun. for a hint, the ones that were included in the web enhancement add up to a wordcount of 3327 (Woeful Escarand = 1047, additional layers = 2280), so you could pack quite a bit into an article with a wordcount, of say 5000.

 

[BOZ]

noticed the references to Saint Kargoth the Betrayer, and Raxivort the other day. good stuff!

I would humbly suggest a new name for arrow demons: sagittezu.

given that i was born on the 12th day of the 12th month, your reference is not lost on me.

and i support this!

The Forgotten Land works very well with Colin McComb's email to BOZ, but also with Zzyczesiya's original reference - apparently Xanxost forgot to mention Zzyczesiya again because Zzyczesiya, Lord of Ignorance, made it so. Which was probably Colin McComb's intention, though I thought he was just joking about how it was a lord we had no information on. I also like the description of the layer a lot - it's quite an expansion on something that we previously had basically only one line of information on!

indeed - as i have commented before, it looks like Erik really dug Colin's suggestions. i forget if it was you or someone else, but i remember seeing someone defining Zzy as the "Patron of Innocence". planar scholars might attribute "Innocence" as a mistranslation for "Ignorance" - pretty amusing.

and actually, Colin told me that Z was actually Ray Vallese's "creation", which Ray later confirmed.

I agree with him, DL should NOT be in the Great Wheel, as it never was originally.

So, as far as I am concered, there are NO DL gods in the Great Wheel.

hmm, i'm starting to think that the authors wanted to create controversy on purpose, since controversy sells.

Haagenti will probably not appear in a Demonomicon. At least, not any time soon.

although, you know, if someone gets to use the article idea i suggested above, we could have at least some description of the lesser demon lords pop up so that they don't have to compete with Orcus, Demogorgon, and Graz'zt for screen time.

Dagon is Cthulhu for the D&D game.

actually, Dagon is Dagon for the D&D game. Cthulhu isn't the only Old One in Lovecraft's books, you know.

Here's a question asked on IRC:

"Quick question for you all. Hordes of the Abyss mentions Archosian Brightflame of Celene. Is that Melf by any other name? Or another Brightflame?"

i was wondering that myself, especially since Melf didn't have an actual first name that i'm aware of (unless Melf really was his first name)...

 

[Mouseferatu]

Erik has suggested before, that he would like to see article queries for Dragon on interesting planar locations (can you see where i'm going with this?) and i was thinking that a few articles on Abyssal layers to expand FC1 would be a lot of fun.

I hope Erik and Jason agree, since I've just proposed that exact thing.

(And I'm quite certain you and I aren't the only ones to think of it.)

 

[Nightfall]

Would be nice to see stuff like Alzrius's layer maybe or the other layer Pazuzu runs.

 

[frankthedm]

actually, Dagon is Dagon for the D&D game. Cthulhu isn't the only Old One in Lovecraft's books, you know.

The Critter from Dagon, which honestly never did get its own depiction, presumably was one of the things depicted in the stone carvings found by the unfortunate hero, unless one assumes H.P.L. intentionally misnamed the story. A better representative for Dagon would be a Kuo-Toa Leviathan of maximum advancement, from the FR:Underdark book. But as you say, there is more than one Great Old One and as long as the D&D game has The Great Obyrith Ones, it is all good.

… damnably human in general outline despite webbed hands and feet, shockingly wide and flabby lips, glassy, bulging eyes, and other features less pleasant to recall. Curiously enough, they seemed to have been chiselled badly out of proportion with their scenic background; for one of the creatures was shown in the act of killing a whale represented as but little larger than himself.

 

[Razz]

You I've wondered something for awhile lately and--WHAT'S THE DEAL WITH DEMONS!?

j/k

But seriously, I noticed the hype about demons demons demons and though I am on the same boat as everyone, I just wonder what is it about demons that likes to steal the spotlight and shine from the devils (which are just as awesome in their own light) and yugoloths (my absolute favorite of the 3 fiendish evils).

Not that I would want to see a loss of Demonomicon articles, but I wouldn't want to see a complete lack of, say, articles on the Lords of the Nine, new devils, and even articles on never-before-seen archdevils (beyond Geryon, there're other unique archdevils besides the ones that rule the layers). At least I believe it's been stated many times there are, the Nine Hells is one big vile, political landscape with its "nobles" and "ranks" to create just about any new archdevil.

As for the 'loths, one can go miles with them, and unlike demons, I don't mean just coming up with infinite new demon lords and new demon creatures either. Sure be nice to, maybe, see an article on the updated yugoloths not converted from 2E yet and yugoloth lords. Of course, yugoloths demand their own Fiendish Codex, number III on the list I, along with many others, are hoping for?

 

[EricNoah]

I dunno, I think devils should be more like "beautiful evil", demons like "ugly evil," and yugoloths like "sneaky evil." I haven't yet really seen what I envision devils to be like. Maybe FC2 will have a new "race" of devils (not the baatezu) that are "beautiful evil."