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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Psion" data-source="post: 5170260" data-attributes="member: 172">I'm with you 99% percent. But there is one bit that I think Ari is spot on about. PS canon did say that mortals were not all that important to fiends. This stands out clearly in my mind because it was one thing that never sat well with me and that I explicitly changed in my campaign. I'm a little too married to images of devils' grand scheming against mortality a la Paradise Lost.Fortunately, it was a very Planescape centered concept that was easily (and IMO necessarily) discarded when you used the Great Wheel as a backdrop for a wider setting.As for the rest of Ari's discourse, I think Shemmy has the right of it. Ari's view ranges from perspective (yes) that I disagree with (detailed fiends = humanizing them) to not simply not supported by the canon (demons as some sort of unified army... very much not.)On the humanizing fiends thing. In my perspective (and I accept that it is one), pre-PS, fiends were pretty much cardboard-cutout evil standies to be hewn down by PCs. I believe that one can lend them more detail, add nuance to them, without it humanizing them. And I believe Planescape did so.The evil-standies type demon was sufficient for me for many years, but after too long, it had worn a little thin and the rich tapestry of evil that PS laid out was very much welcome.I'll go further and say I think the blood war is a logical outcome of Demons and Devils in D&D. As early as 1e (and probably before), it was stated that there was enmity between demons and devils. But why would such creatures filled with burning hatred stop at mere feelings of animosity?That being said, after having run some stuff from other planar products, I'll say that allowing mixture of fiends where the distinction is less stark permits some interesting play as well. I wouldn't suggest as a campaign construct is the only way to do things, but it is good grist for campaign material that is a bit richer than ye olde "evil standies" model of demons and devils.</blockquote>

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