In the Beginning...[Lore question]

[X_TheLostOne_X]

Hello everyone, so this is a rather complex question.
so the very essence of what im trying to figure out is what a certain Demon is that a DM threw at us, he calls it "the first demon" however that term leaves many questions, and while yes i am 100% certain he made it up and is not taking from books or specific lore, it would be interesting to quantify what this demon actually is.
So! to do that we need to know what he is, how hes made, and what makes him special from other demons.

I've done some research myself but 2 heads are better then 1, and the more the merrier or something like that.
So here's what i got so far.

Devils: Firstly lets make sure nobody confuses Devils with demons, Devils are Angels that used Forbidden Demon magic and in returned turned into Devils, they still hate demons.

What: we know its a Demon, and by it being "the first" we know its special, however we can only assume what makes it special, however to do so we must know the origin of Demons.

Origin: Now this is both easy and tough, Demons are manifestations of Chaos and Evil, They come into being in the Abyss, there's rumers that beings who're evil or chaotic in nature turns into a demon in there next life, but this is unconfirmed, regardless we can confirm that the origin of Demons is the Abyss, however that raised a side question, Who or What made the abyss? and what about the other planes?

The Abyss Origin: now this is by far the single most difficult question i've found so far, unlike the Material realm and various others the outer Realms are shrouded in mysteries and i have found nothing that connects this Plane to the Overgod Ao or any other god, during the creation story.
For all we know, the Abyss could be older then all of creation, like a Machine that went to Slumber in the absence of Souls,Creation and likewise.
Relic's from Past "Cycles" so to speak, creations so old that no single trace of there origin remains.

SO! with all this, i think the most logical conclusion is that this "First Demon" is a forgotten Chaotic god that died, and that god's soul then reincarnated as "The First Demon"
it's a stretch, but plausible.

with this said, im very interested in what others say, i've spoken about this subject with friends and on various channels, but much of this stuff is very hard to find, and trying to put face on something that a DM made up on hes own...well its still very interesting :P but it can be hard at times :D

[Dalmosh]

Maybe check out afroakuma's planar questions thread.

"Devils are Angels that used Forbidden Demon magic and in returned turned into Devils, they still hate demons."
That might be homebrew in your DM's campaign, but it's not the way things generally work in D&D.
The powerful elites of Baator today did indeed originally exist as angels. As far as we know they were slowly corrupted over millennia by the atrocities they were forced to commit in the War of Law and Chaos. Most Baatezu are not fallen angels, but recruited and promoted souls of damned Lawful Evil mortals.
They were not the first devils though, as Baator has an older breed of inhabitant called the Ancient Baatorians, who seemingly were spontaneously shaped out of the basic matter of the Plane by widespread multiversal belief in Lawful Evil as a concept.

"Who or What made the abyss?"
Based on canon, a popular idea is that it spontaneously arose out of corrupted planar matter around the Draeden Ulgurshek, when he went into torpor. It would then have been given more form and definition by widespread multiversal belief in Chaotic Evil as a concept.

"what about the other planes?"
As I understand it...
The Far Realm lies outside rational time and logic, and the Multiverse itself so was never created.
The Deep Ethereal is the basic firmament of the Multiverse, arising spontaneously at its beginning.
The Prime was created by the first Gods. The Inner Planes probably were as well, but they may be more of an unintended consequence of creating the Prime.
The Astral was created spontaneously by sentient life.
The Outer Planes were created spontaneously through the beliefs of this life. Its implied that Limbo and Mechanus might be the most ancient of these concepts, though that is very speculative.

"i think the most logical conclusion is that this "First Demon" is a forgotten Chaotic god that died, and that god's soul then reincarnated as "The First Demon"
Depends how you define demon and god. These "gods" were independent of mortal belief. In canon, there is very little set down about this kind of stuff.
Ulgurshek would really push the definition "demon". The Great Mother would just about slip in though.
I'd expect the first demons to be sentient layers of the Abyss itself, which the Great Mother doesn't seem far off being herself.

[ngilop]

I just cannot help but be completely perplexed about why the OP came here to ask a cannon lore answer to a question about a 100% DM fiat created entity.

what exactly are you trying to gain here X_TheLostOne_X?

[The Viscount]

Most demons in the game are Tanar'ri, which are, as I understand, the souls of mortals who have gone to the Abyss.

They are preceded by the Obyriths, who were formed out of the chaos of the Abyss. Some of the Demon lords in Fiendish Codex are in fact Obyriths. Obox-ob and Pazuzu are both very old, but if I had to guess as to the first I would go with Pale Night.

[X_TheLostOne_X]

Great answers! knew i could count on this forum for answers :D, and yea i know its odd to look for lore when its confirmed to be 100% custom made monster, but we all in our group enjoy Lore and origin, it just takes time to find these things.

[Pleh]

What I see here is, "Devils are angels who were cast down for dabbling in Demon powers."

The monster in question is, "the first Demon." The word "first" implies there was a definitive origin to this being.

This suggests to me that in some way, this creature was the first to discover and/or create Demonic powers to begin with. There's a possible Chicken or the Egg scenario here. The Abyss would be a plane more or else constructed and/or subsisting of Demonic powers, so the question becomes if this "first demon" is drawing power from the Abyss or if they somehow created the Abyss through their use of the powers they discovered/created.

In essence, it determines if separating this "first demon" from the Abyss would render it unable to use its demonic powers or if doing so could cause the power of the Abyss to collapse as it was no longer being held together by this cosmic entity.

Does the Demon make the Abyss, or does the Abyss make the Demon?

Then there's a possibility that whatever the means of both origins of these entities, they are no longer codependent, having become totally self-sustaining since the time of whatever causal relationship they once possessed.

The next question being, "what exactly are demons generally?" If they are corrupted souls of mortals who fell into the temptation of demonic powers and principles, then it stands to reason that this, "first demon" might likewise have fallen for some seductive idea or temptation that caused their own transformation.

[lbuttitta]

"Devils are Angels that used Forbidden Demon magic and in returned turned into Devils, they still hate demons."
That might be homebrew in your DM's campaign, but it's not the way things generally work in D&D.
The powerful elites of Baator today did indeed originally exist as angels. As far as we know they were slowly corrupted over millennia by the atrocities they were forced to commit in the War of Law and Chaos. Most Baatezu are not fallen angels, but recruited and promoted souls of damned Lawful Evil mortals.
They were not the first devils though, as Baator has an older breed of inhabitant called the Ancient Baatorians, who seemingly were spontaneously shaped out of the basic matter of the Plane by widespread multiversal belief in Lawful Evil as a concept.
I'm fairly confident that Asmodeus and his angels actually were the first devils.

As to the question of the origin of the Abyss, I have here this quote from Fiendish Codex II (emphasis mine):

In the beginning—and even before—chaos was all that existed.
From this, I conclude that the Abyss was the void before the universe was created, since only after the Abyss (if the word "after" can be used, as there was no time) did the gods appear:

A state of raw chaos was intolerable to the universe, so a force arose to combat it—the power of law. From this principle of abstract order, a number of beings coalesced to combat the demons.

[Dalmosh]

Yup, depends what you consider canon and how you define the terms I guess. A lot of 3.5 draws heavily on content from 2nd ed Planescape, but also tends to contradict it a great deal.

The Ancient Baatorians are never specifically called "devils" in 3.5 to my knowledge, but they are implied to be a sister race to the Obyriths, which are definitely considered demons.


"In the beginning—and even before—chaos was all that existed."
Which in D&D canon would be Limbo, as the Abyss is Chaotic Evil. In the Yeenoghu chapter, Bechard the Obyrith Lord reveals that the Obyriths immigrated to the Abyss from elsewhere. In 2nd ed. the Rod of Seven Parts, which is where the Queen of Chaos is predominantly described, she specifically arose first in Limbo.

"From this, I conclude that the Abyss was the void before the universe was created, since only after the Abyss (if the word "after" can be used, as there was no time) did the gods appear:"
The Outer Planes are products of conceptual belief; before the Prime was Created, "chaos" was something more physical.

We also have the LeShay from the Epic Level handbook, that suggests a previous universe and creation cycle, from which the current one has arisen. All this seems to have taken place bounded by the ever present Far Realm, which as raw random entropy inimicable to all physical rationality and life is in essence a kind of meta chaos.

Draedens are similarly poorly defined godlike beings of entropy in 3.5 which definitely did not arise from the Abyss, they seem to be related to the entropy of the previous universe.

[Crake]

I'm fairly confident that Asmodeus and his angels actually were the first devils.

As to the question of the origin of the Abyss, I have here this quote from Fiendish Codex II (emphasis mine):

From this, I conclude that the Abyss was the void before the universe was created, since only after the Abyss (if the word "after" can be used, as there was no time) did the gods appear:

I take that state of raw chaos to not be the abyss, but the far realm. Now that in mind, many of the obryths have some semblance to farspawn, but..


Most demons in the game are Tanar'ri, which are, as I understand, the souls of mortals who have gone to the Abyss.

They are preceded by the Obyriths, who were formed out of the chaos of the Abyss. Some of the Demon lords in Fiendish Codex are in fact Obyriths. Obox-ob and Pazuzu are both very old, but if I had to guess as to the first I would go with Pale Night.

By far the closest to being to match farspawn would be dagon, not pale night by a mile if you ask me. But, if you look into the lore, there's actually a being referred to as simply the queen of chaos, who may even predate these obryth demon lords.

Of course, the most likely scenario is that the very literal "first" demon died a long time ago in a power struggle, because first doesn't mean strongest. However, first may also refer to "oldest" which would make more sense.

[Eldan]

This sounds considerably like a cosmology your DM invented, and as such, any official answers we can give you won't matter much. Case in point: officially, it's very much confirmed that most demons are made from mortal souls. Asmodeus and his buddies were also probably archons, not angels, though different editions argue that differently.

Anyway. There's a few beings around that might some claim are the first demon. Mostly, the Obyrith. Look up the Queen of Chaos, Obox-Ob, Pale Night.

The Queen of Chaos is generally named as the oldest Obyrith and their leader. She also created Demogorgon, the first Tanar'ri, though Pale Night makes similar claims.

Obox-Ob first had the title Prince of Demons, before he was killed (sort of, he's still around) and the title given first to Miska the Wolf Spider and then to Demogorgon.

Pale Night takes her title from Paradise Lost, which automatically makes her cool. She's also claimed to be the creator of the entire Tanar'ri race and specifically as Graz'zt's mother.

There's a few more Obyrith hanging around, like Pazuzu. Many are still quite powerful.

If we're talking oldest Tanar'ri, not oldest abyssal creature, we're probably talking about Miska or Demogorgon.

But once again, that's official cosmology, not your DM's.

[Crake]

This sounds considerably like a cosmology your DM invented, and as such, any official answers we can give you won't matter much. Case in point: officially, it's very much confirmed that most demons are made from mortal souls. Asmodeus and his buddies were also probably archons, not angels, though different editions argue that differently.

Anyway. There's a few beings around that might some claim are the first demon. Mostly, the Obyrith. Look up the Queen of Chaos, Obox-Ob, Pale Night.

The Queen of Chaos is generally named as the oldest Obyrith and their leader. She also created Demogorgon, the first Tanar'ri, though Pale Night makes similar claims.

Obox-Ob first had the title Prince of Demons, before he was killed (sort of, he's still around) and the title given first to Miska the Wolf Spider and then to Demogorgon.

Pale Night takes her title from Paradise Lost, which automatically makes her cool. She's also claimed to be the creator of the entire Tanar'ri race and specifically as Graz'zt's mother.

There's a few more Obyrith hanging around, like Pazuzu. Many are still quite powerful.

If we're talking oldest Tanar'ri, not oldest abyssal creature, we're probably talking about Miska or Demogorgon.

But once again, that's official cosmology, not your DM's.

Why do you all keep omitting Dagon?

[Dalmosh]

Dwiergus is specifically stated to be older than Pale Night, who is generally considered one of the oldest demons.
Dagon is specifically stated to be feared by the Tanar'ri Lords for they feel he may be as old as the Abyss itself.
Cabiri is similarly ancient.
Ugudenk is probably pretty ancient too, and is basically an Abyssal Layer in his own right.

Since the lore on Cabiri confirms Bechard's story of obyrith origins in FC1, perhaps Dwiergus predates this event since he is not specifically defined as being an Obyrith.

Dwiergus as presented is an Advanced Chaos Beast, with some overlapping traits in common with Obyrith Lords, which gives further weight to the idea that he preceded them and was originally more associated with pure conceptual Chaos (Limbo), rather than the contemporary Abyss as we know it.

And how could we forget Dalmosh? (Not strictly defined as a demon, but as a CE outsider that is the will/embodiment of his Layers he is as good as. Dalmosh is similarly described as being as old as the Abyss itself)


Edit. The Great Mother is Lawful, so doesn't count.