Controlling Abyssal Layers [Archive] - Wizards Community

Controlling Abyssal Layers [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Rocketmonkey
06-05-07, 05:54 AM Morning all.

Is there anything from Planescape or earlier editions of D&D that discusses how a demon goes about taking control of an Abyssal layer? I'm assuming it's a bit more mystical than giving your rivals a good kicking and saying "See this? Mine."

Would the process be largely the same for each demon and layer or would it be entirely different every time, as befits their chaotic nature?
Kesuk2k5
06-05-07, 08:30 AM From Planar Handbook (3.0) page 12
"Divinely Morphic: Specific, unique beings (deities or similar great powers) have the ability to alter objects, creatures and the landscape on these planes. Ordinary characters find these planes similar to alterable planes in that they may be affected by spells and physical effort. But the deities may cause these areas to change instantly and dramatically, creating great kingdoms for themselves. Divinely morphic planes are common on the Outer Planes, which is one reason deities live there."

In short, the powers that are able to affect a plane usually do so to create guardians and methods of keeping other similarly powered entities from entering and trying to usurp control. Given the theoretically infinite layers of the Abyss, they've had time to find ones that they could mold to their own liking without interference, and then expand their powerbase from there.

How these creatures attain the power required to change a divinely morphic plane or if they have it already is the DM's discretion and an aspect of the campaign setting.
Gray Richardson
06-06-07, 01:56 AM I imagine it is like wooing a mate. The demon lord first has to defeat all his rivals. He has to show off for the layer. Preening like a bird, except demons preen by means of slaughter and acts of cruelty. It's a seduction, in a way. Different layers may be attracted to different qualities, but if the layer accepts him, it seems like it is something akin to a mating or a wedding.

Not sure if some kind of sacrement is required (or would that be a desecration?) There may be some kind of bonding ritual, something like a wedding or becoming a blood brother or taking an oath.

There would also appear to be some kind of transformation the demon prince undergoes to take on his unique form. I don't know if this happens all at once when he bonds with the layer, or perhaps it happens over time, gradually, the longer he rules the layer. But most demon princes have unique appearances and qualities.

I don't think layers need to stick with the same demon prince. They may dump him if someone better comes along. As in life, some layers are probably more faithful than others. Other layers may take a new demon prince every few decades or so. Other layers may reject suitors, or at least the ones that do not appeal to the layer.
sciborg2
06-06-07, 02:41 AM here's my take on a failed joining between lord and layer from blade o' innocence:

"Go."

When they hesitated she turned a hundred around her into dretches. Some of the victims stood as still as statues in shock. Others began to cry in gutteral wails, fully aware of the genius that had been ripped from them. The Judges of Woe rose up on their tiny wings toward the battlefield. When only Orcus remained on the burning mountains, she felt a delicate probing, as though thin antennae stroked against her thoughts. The layer itself wished to speak to her. Carefully, so carefully, she opened herself to the infinity.

An empty landscape barely lit, mountains in darkness where heartless angelics molded from shadow taught arcane secrets to early necromancers of a forgotten race wandering on the young plane. Then there was light, a flash of unhallowed brillance as the stone caught fire. The shadows were gone, though in time others came to the burnig torches that stretched to the sky.

The demons, warring with each other even as they were birthed from the Misshapen Lands. Then a memory of those first little stars that began appearing upon its majesty, confused and terrified. Souls. Petitioners. Their taste had excited it.

Something older gave way to something new. Obyrith descended into tanar'ri.

When had the begrudged nalefnashee first come to it, seeking a place for themselves as the balors sought to consolidate their mastery over their kind? It had found something kindred in their divine intellects, had enjoyed the flavor of their bitterness. It would be mother to them as they added their own eon spanning plan to the millions of conspiracies that littered the planes. And now Orcus had sent them to true dying.

The question was clear -- what could the Prince of Undead offer to 400th layer of the Abyss?

Even as it watched the nalefnashee struggling to hold against the tide of gnolls that made their way to mountains' base, Orcus shared her dream. Upon the mountains souls screamed as the flames grafted themselves to their forms. Burning wraiths born on the layer, the lingering personalities of the petitioners turned to ash. The layer would taste them forever on its wind.

More. It wanted more.

Orcus promised blood, war, whole prime kingdoms dragged into its territory or marched in as zombies. What did it truly want? The souls coming to the mountains, but then they were sent across the Abyss to suffer varied torments. It was not the petitioners themselves it demanded, it was something about their suffering. The Prince's god mind deciphers the layer's need in a flash of inspiration.

Judgement. Injustice. Loss. That was what it wanted.

Orcus showed the petitioners coming up the mountain, drinking the boiling water of the putrid springs, and remembering. A soul that has forgotten itself understands the comedy of Abyssal courts. But one that remembered the life it had *before*, one that could regret as it fully comprehended all it would never have again, that one was truly a delicacy.

A rain of fire descended on the distant horizon but for the avatar the screams could be heard as sweet music.The avatar of his rival knew it had lost. The layer had decided.

Orcus could feel herself becoming one with the eternally burning ground he stood upon. Was the demon ever a man? A man so filled with evil his soul was a meteor striking the Abyss? Or had he risen from the churning malice? A lowly creature that crawled through the ranks, allying and then bridling Unlife itself. That first moment when she had shared herself with the layer she named Thanatos. The flooding awareness, the rush of having his perception gallop past the ever distant horizon to look at the infinite with new comprehension. Even death could not stop the Prince, who rose from the cold Astral --

A pause. A wary insectile circling of its past. Scurrying metal. Part of my glory, bringing Chaos to Mechanus. She explains. But the layer sees something else within the avatar. A tiny chip of stone made from planetary crust within her being. Looking deeper, that silicate fragment contains etchings layered in gold. Patterns -- not born of fleeting whims but something more certain, more defined. A shame secreted away -- Order brought to the Abyss.

With a thunderous sound that caused the combantants below to turn, the stones cracked. Avalances fell, somehow not breaking the birdlike bones of the avatar. The mountain on which she stood snuffed out, something beneath or within the stone negating the fire. Her eyes of blood popped, bursting in red spatters that evaporated on the ground and ran down the back of now visible skull. Visible only for a moment.

Orcus screamed even as the rocks buried his avatar un-alive.

The animated undead simply fell. The others fled or died or joined the side of the gnoll flood. Far away, in the safety of Thanatos, Orcus held his wand in a nervous grip. Without the dead he was easier prey that Alzirus had been. Then he heard a whisper of the woman he had reserved his deepest hatred for.

'Together we can control them.'
Tevish Szat
06-06-07, 12:42 PM I imagine it as somewhere between the divinley morphic and special wooing answer: an archfiend (one who can control the divinley morphic aspects of the plane to some degree) can control a layer by eliminating all competition and opposing his or her will on it: a layer's current lord has a massive advantage in any battle of wills and must be ousted first, and rivals can result in a torn layer (Like... androylene i believe it was from FCI (pale Night's primary layer), and Jubilex/Zuggtmoy's layer), so it is best to oust any other pretenders for lordship first. a normal fiend becomes a unique archfeind when, through hideous acts like the ones described by Gray Richardson, infernal courting, they gain power over one layer (and, by extension, the POTENTIAL to have power over them all.)

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Rocketmonkey 06-05-07, 05:54 AM	Morning all. Is there anything from Planescape or earlier editions of D&D that discusses how a demon goes about taking control of an Abyssal layer? I'm assuming it's a bit more mystical than giving your rivals a good kicking and saying "See this? Mine." Would the process be largely the same for each demon and layer or would it be entirely different every time, as befits their chaotic nature?
Kesuk2k5 06-05-07, 08:30 AM	From Planar Handbook (3.0) page 12 "Divinely Morphic: Specific, unique beings (deities or similar great powers) have the ability to alter objects, creatures and the landscape on these planes. Ordinary characters find these planes similar to alterable planes in that they may be affected by spells and physical effort. But the deities may cause these areas to change instantly and dramatically, creating great kingdoms for themselves. Divinely morphic planes are common on the Outer Planes, which is one reason deities live there." In short, the powers that are able to affect a plane usually do so to create guardians and methods of keeping other similarly powered entities from entering and trying to usurp control. Given the theoretically infinite layers of the Abyss, they've had time to find ones that they could mold to their own liking without interference, and then expand their powerbase from there. How these creatures attain the power required to change a divinely morphic plane or if they have it already is the DM's discretion and an aspect of the campaign setting.
Gray Richardson 06-06-07, 01:56 AM	I imagine it is like wooing a mate. The demon lord first has to defeat all his rivals. He has to show off for the layer. Preening like a bird, except demons preen by means of slaughter and acts of cruelty. It's a seduction, in a way. Different layers may be attracted to different qualities, but if the layer accepts him, it seems like it is something akin to a mating or a wedding. Not sure if some kind of sacrement is required (or would that be a desecration?) There may be some kind of bonding ritual, something like a wedding or becoming a blood brother or taking an oath. There would also appear to be some kind of transformation the demon prince undergoes to take on his unique form. I don't know if this happens all at once when he bonds with the layer, or perhaps it happens over time, gradually, the longer he rules the layer. But most demon princes have unique appearances and qualities. I don't think layers need to stick with the same demon prince. They may dump him if someone better comes along. As in life, some layers are probably more faithful than others. Other layers may take a new demon prince every few decades or so. Other layers may reject suitors, or at least the ones that do not appeal to the layer.
sciborg2 06-06-07, 02:41 AM	here's my take on a failed joining between lord and layer from blade o' innocence: "Go." When they hesitated she turned a hundred around her into dretches. Some of the victims stood as still as statues in shock. Others began to cry in gutteral wails, fully aware of the genius that had been ripped from them. The Judges of Woe rose up on their tiny wings toward the battlefield. When only Orcus remained on the burning mountains, she felt a delicate probing, as though thin antennae stroked against her thoughts. The layer itself wished to speak to her. Carefully, so carefully, she opened herself to the infinity. An empty landscape barely lit, mountains in darkness where heartless angelics molded from shadow taught arcane secrets to early necromancers of a forgotten race wandering on the young plane. Then there was light, a flash of unhallowed brillance as the stone caught fire. The shadows were gone, though in time others came to the burnig torches that stretched to the sky. The demons, warring with each other even as they were birthed from the Misshapen Lands. Then a memory of those first little stars that began appearing upon its majesty, confused and terrified. Souls. Petitioners. Their taste had excited it. Something older gave way to something new. Obyrith descended into tanar'ri. When had the begrudged nalefnashee first come to it, seeking a place for themselves as the balors sought to consolidate their mastery over their kind? It had found something kindred in their divine intellects, had enjoyed the flavor of their bitterness. It would be mother to them as they added their own eon spanning plan to the millions of conspiracies that littered the planes. And now Orcus had sent them to true dying. The question was clear -- what could the Prince of Undead offer to 400th layer of the Abyss? Even as it watched the nalefnashee struggling to hold against the tide of gnolls that made their way to mountains' base, Orcus shared her dream. Upon the mountains souls screamed as the flames grafted themselves to their forms. Burning wraiths born on the layer, the lingering personalities of the petitioners turned to ash. The layer would taste them forever on its wind. More. It wanted more. Orcus promised blood, war, whole prime kingdoms dragged into its territory or marched in as zombies. What did it truly want? The souls coming to the mountains, but then they were sent across the Abyss to suffer varied torments. It was not the petitioners themselves it demanded, it was something about their suffering. The Prince's god mind deciphers the layer's need in a flash of inspiration. Judgement. Injustice. Loss. That was what it wanted. Orcus showed the petitioners coming up the mountain, drinking the boiling water of the putrid springs, and remembering. A soul that has forgotten itself understands the comedy of Abyssal courts. But one that remembered the life it had before, one that could regret as it fully comprehended all it would never have again, that one was truly a delicacy. A rain of fire descended on the distant horizon but for the avatar the screams could be heard as sweet music.The avatar of his rival knew it had lost. The layer had decided. Orcus could feel herself becoming one with the eternally burning ground he stood upon. Was the demon ever a man? A man so filled with evil his soul was a meteor striking the Abyss? Or had he risen from the churning malice? A lowly creature that crawled through the ranks, allying and then bridling Unlife itself. That first moment when she had shared herself with the layer she named Thanatos. The flooding awareness, the rush of having his perception gallop past the ever distant horizon to look at the infinite with new comprehension. Even death could not stop the Prince, who rose from the cold Astral -- A pause. A wary insectile circling of its past. Scurrying metal. Part of my glory, bringing Chaos to Mechanus. She explains. But the layer sees something else within the avatar. A tiny chip of stone made from planetary crust within her being. Looking deeper, that silicate fragment contains etchings layered in gold. Patterns -- not born of fleeting whims but something more certain, more defined. A shame secreted away -- Order brought to the Abyss. With a thunderous sound that caused the combantants below to turn, the stones cracked. Avalances fell, somehow not breaking the birdlike bones of the avatar. The mountain on which she stood snuffed out, something beneath or within the stone negating the fire. Her eyes of blood popped, bursting in red spatters that evaporated on the ground and ran down the back of now visible skull. Visible only for a moment. Orcus screamed even as the rocks buried his avatar un-alive. The animated undead simply fell. The others fled or died or joined the side of the gnoll flood. Far away, in the safety of Thanatos, Orcus held his wand in a nervous grip. Without the dead he was easier prey that Alzirus had been. Then he heard a whisper of the woman he had reserved his deepest hatred for. 'Together we can control them.'
Tevish Szat 06-06-07, 12:42 PM	I imagine it as somewhere between the divinley morphic and special wooing answer: an archfiend (one who can control the divinley morphic aspects of the plane to some degree) can control a layer by eliminating all competition and opposing his or her will on it: a layer's current lord has a massive advantage in any battle of wills and must be ousted first, and rivals can result in a torn layer (Like... androylene i believe it was from FCI (pale Night's primary layer), and Jubilex/Zuggtmoy's layer), so it is best to oust any other pretenders for lordship first. a normal fiend becomes a unique archfeind when, through hideous acts like the ones described by Gray Richardson, infernal courting, they gain power over one layer (and, by extension, the POTENTIAL to have power over them all.)