<< PLANESCAPE >> How do you defeat the Lady of Pain?

[reiella]

As far as Planescape material no longer being canon just because of the edition and rule changes, I don't see your point fully. That's the same as throwing away every single greyhawk and FR book and product as never having existed just because some things they contained aren't repeated verbatim in the 3e FR and Greyhawk material. I wouldn't blanket invalidate anything fluffy and storyrelated unless it was fully contradicted, and then I'd be a bit likely to mock the contradiction if it didn't pass muster. But that's just me being picky on the last part.

Hmm interestingly enough, this reminds me of a little Decanonization/Unexplained Change in the world.

In the transition from 2e to 3e, FR Psionics went from being different than magic, to being the same as magic (And that change is part to blame for some editing oddities such as the Magister and Modrons being absolutely immune to magic).

[ Edit / Add ]
Hmm, should the canon discussion move over to a new thread to stop the Derailing of the Lady thread ?

 

[Pants]

Meaning in FR he is still a lesser deity.

I hear that reading is a fundamental part in the ability to learn new information. Perhaps, someday I will learn to do that

 

[Bugbear]

How do you defeat the Lady of Pain? As it has been said before... you can't (or at least that is what is believed). As a DM though I would say that in order to "destroy" the Lady of Pain, you have to convince everyone that she does not truly exist. Since many of the gods believe she exists, that would require a lot of [donkey] kissing to convince them. That would be a neat little story line to base a campaign around. Definetly sounds epic to me.

Another way to defeat the Lady of Pain... create a home-brew campaign without her in it .

This is exactly my line of thought. After all, in the outer planes, belief is reality. If you get enough people to beleve in something, it is so.

The Lady of Pain is undefeatible because the inhabitants of sigil beleve her to be. Her power ultimatly comes from the fear she instills. If, somehow, you can convince millions of sigil's inhabitants that the Lady has no power, or better yet, does not exist, she won't.

I think this is the real reason she is often seen on the streets of the cage and the reason she flays those who get on her bad side. It reenforces her image. IIRC, in the original planescape boxed set, it was said that some people said that the LOP was three squirrels in a suit and that those people were flayed or mazed. The Lady couldn't let something like that go arroud, because people might start beleving it, making her powerless.

I may be way off on this of course, but this may be the only Canon way to destroy the Lady of Pain.

 

[fnork de sporg]

If the Lady's power was somehow linked to the people's beliefe in her power than, perhaps just maybe, if one could become like the lady of pain, look like her, act like her, convince everyone around you that you were her, and turly belive yourself that you were her, then perhaps you might become her. Would you replace her, have to fight her, be absorbed in to her, or just get high on power and then immediately get flayed/maze?

 

[herald]

The novel 'Lord of the Necropolis' for Ravenloft was declared noncanon, though I don't have a link for it to give you.

Die Vecna Die wasn't declared as such officially from on high by TSR/WotC because it wasn't in the PS setting and PS wasn't an active line at that point. It got more than anything else decanonized by being ignored and unused. And then of course Planewalker made parts of it not valid.

Fine get me a letter from WOTC that states that and you'll have your proof. Or some kinda statement from WOTC that disavows this.

It's pretty obvious that when the designers made the game, they understood the road that was laid out before them in 3e. Ignoring that is pretty silly.

 

[herald]

Hmm interestingly enough, this reminds me of a little Decanonization/Unexplained Change in the world.

In the transition from 2e to 3e, FR Psionics went from being different than magic, to being the same as magic (And that change is part to blame for some editing oddities such as the Magister and Modrons being absolutely immune to magic).

[ Edit / Add ]
Hmm, should the canon discussion move over to a new thread to stop the Derailing of the Lady thread ?

You might just have a point.

 

[Orius]

Planewalker also is going to be giving some reasons to reconcile 3e game mechanics and monster stats with the events of Hellbound where the Maeldur et Kavurik was dunked in the Styx thus depriving the fiends of their teleportation abilities. We've discussed this already and come up with a solution that keeps both the story from the box set and the 3e presence of fiends with teleportation valid and kosher with each other.

My way of handling the Maeldur et Kavurik is simple: the fiends don't lose teleporting unless the DM's PCs actually suceed in dumping it in the Styx.

That was a pretty big campaign altering effect (not just in PS, but any material world the DM cares to include), so the PCs should be involved, not offstage. Especially since fiends losing the ability to teleport is an advantage for them. Perhaps that's why it was part of an adventure to begin with?

Of course, this may have long-reaching effects on the campaign, and there's no reason the teleportation loss shouldn't occur in a new campaign that happens after the campaign that suceeded.

 

[Shemeska]

Here's what Planewalker has to reconcile the 3e teleporting fiends with the loss of that power in Hellbound's 'Squaring the Circle'. Keep in mind this was my opinion at the time and it seems to have been accepted by consensus. However since we havn't formally written it up and posted this in one of the releases yet it's obviously subject to change.

"However my take on it is different... The existance of the Maeldur Et Kavurik is clearly something that the Yugoloths had absolutely no intention of leaking to the other fiends or any of the other planar races. By forcing any deals with the Baatezu or the Tanar'ri they tacitly admit its existance, and open themselves up to suspiscions of their larger role in the Blood War than just self serving mercenaries.

They would be admitting many things they had no intention of admitting to if they deal with the fiends to restore their teleportation abilities.

Rather this is what I would see them doing: Take the Maeldur back to Gehenna or the Waste and hide it in the darkest, most secure hole on the plane, metaphorically speaking. Secret it away. Feed to the Maeldur the names of the other fiends as fast as possible, scattering it out among the other fiends at random to make it appear a gradual and natural process. Some quirk of the planes essentially by which it was removed in the first place.

Start spreading stories about how many of their own have lost the same abilities and are only now slowly starting to regain them. Start killing those berks who would say otherwise, and attempt to hunt down and kill any living Baatezu involved in the raid that captured the Maeldur in the first place, as well as all those Baatezu who crewed the Relentless.

Give themselves plausable deniability and in secret restore the other fiends' teleportation abilities.

By dealing with the other fiends, they essentially are forced into playing their hand far far earlier than I could ever see them playing it. It's not something that honestly should have been meant to be used as a tool to control the other fiends until the Yugoloths intended to stop the Blood War. That isn't going to happen till many other of the plans of the Baernaloths come to fruition, or their experiments reach a conclusion. For one, the 3 great Yugoloth towers are not linked yet. The 3rd tower, The Tower of Incarnate Pain in Carceri is nowhere near finished, and likely won't be for another few thousand years. After that who knows what other plans the 'loths as a race have in store towards their promotion of evil across the multiverse.

They likely would eventually desire to exterminate the Gehreleths, and thats not even begun. Likely not till they finished the 3rd 'loth tower. And thats just two long term goals they'd likely need to finish before attempting to end the Blood War and unite the fiends under their own thumb.

Dealing with the fiends to restore their teleportation powers is simply too blatant, too obvious, and too rash for the 'loths to do. They're subtle creatures, and they need to act that way to ensure success. They're not ready yet to admit to what they are entirely, not ready to drop that veil across their nature they wear so well."

 

[Arnwyn]

Die Vecna Die wasn't declared as such officially from on high by TSR/WotC because it wasn't in the PS setting and PS wasn't an active line at that point. It got more than anything else decanonized by being ignored and unused. And then of course Planewalker made parts of it not valid.

Well, I don't ignore it and I use it, so that argument has been shot to hell.

Oh, do you mean the "majority"? Show me clear statistics, and maybe I'll consider it a valid point.

 

[Shemeska]

Well, I don't ignore it and I use it, so that argument has been shot to hell.

Oh, do you mean the "majority"? Show me clear statistics, and maybe I'll consider it a valid point.

Well it's hard to either directly prove my point or your point by anecdotal evidence. However while you in your game may use it and embrace the module happily, it's my experience that not a person on the Planewalker team feels the same way about it. Ranging from selective dislike for a few points to apathy to loathing of certain aspects. I fall on the former end of the scale.

Sure the group I'm picking my so called statistics from is going to have some sampling error and bias as compared to the whole of gamers as well, many of whom in my experience have never heard of DVD in more than passing. However the group is the one advancing the PS storyline, so take that as you will.

And I specifically did not say "majority" because that sort of blanket assumption tends to be flame bait. I avoided it, you brought the term up now. Nor did I use terms such as "shot to hell" and calling a point invalid while pushing the burden of proof on the other side of the issue. I don't care to get into anything more than a friendly argument here.