The Blood War - Do you like it or not?

[Halaster Blackcloak]

I've been thinking about this recently, while working with some of the monsters for Level 8 (Level 8 has links to various Outer Planes). The Blood War. It didn't exist in 1E, but it became the overall theme of the Outer Planes in 2E.

I don't like it. More and more it seems to me that it reduces the tanar'ri and baatezu to feuding aliens. Even the names tanar'ri and baatezu never sat well with me. The whole thing just feels too "alien" to me, plus it really seems to reduce the two races to nothing more than a planar versions of the Hatfields and McCoys.

I'm really finding myself preferring them as demons and devils, and beign more concerned with seducing mankind (and elven kind, and dwarven kind, etc) into the dark side. They're a lot more fun that way.

Next to dragons, demons (and secondarily devils) are my favorite monster race or category (although they may be tied with drow elves...hard to decide). To me the Blood War really made them less interesting and less fun.

What do the rest of you think?

[Tarrax Ironwolf]

I agree. The eternal battle between the two sects in the 'outer world' seems too 'alien vs predator'. It's just one step away from adding space ships to them.

I felt the same way when I first read Tanar'ri, and to be honest when I read Baatezu, I thought it was a demon not a sect of demons.

But like I said, I agree with you on that. In my book demons and devils are suppose to be last frontier of soul reapers out for their own gain. Each had its own level for it to harvest souls of a particular 'sin' (not just the standard 7). I prefer my demons and devils to be vile, evil, and summoned. A backstory of someone who let loose a foul creature with intents of being feared but instead found out the hard way that the creature don't like being forced to do anything. Especially by a mortal.

But remember, 2nd edition created the Blood War due to so many complaints that D&D had demons and devils in the game and it was not kindly looked upon. Oh hell who am I kidding. There was a serious outcry by parents and religious organizations about those two words. So to placate that crowd, TSR removed demons and devils from the game entirely. That unfortunately made the gaming crowd furious. So to make things right again, TSR released the demons and devils again, but this time by not using 'those two words' they made them sects of outer planes fighting for dominance. Meh.

[Beowulf]

Yeah, I prefer the idea of demons to aliens.

[Mira]

They were always demons and devils in our games, if we didn't like the changes 2E made, we didn't use them, simple as that

I hate the idea of Planescape too, sorry, the Outer Planes aren't there for mortals to live in.

Mira (OK, who stopped payment on my reality check?)

[Tawnos76]

Never liked the Blood Wars. I liked the way 1E had it set up so I usually kept the pantheons and the planes the same in my 2E games.

[Halaster Blackcloak]

Mira wrote:

I hate the idea of Planescape too, sorry, the Outer Planes aren't there for mortals to live in.

Bingo! That was my main gripe with Planescape. It was well written, the art was great, it had lots of cool ideas and spells and monsters. But bottom line, it turned the Outer Planes (and Inner Planes, and Ethereal/Astral Planes, and...) into nothing more than a mix of Deep Space Nine and the cantina scene from Star Wars.

I've always viewed the Inner Planes as extremely hostile environments that host nothing other than tough monsters suited to that environment (ie earth elementals, xorn, etc on the Plane of Earth, efreeti, salamanders, and fire elementals on the Plane of Fire, etc). The Outer Planes were filled with "spiritual" beings like solars, demons, etc.

The planes were never places for human(oid) races to hang out in, colonize, and inhabit. Sorta takes the charm out of it that way.