Time it takes for a world to be absorbed into the Abyss

[dededo11]

So I've read Mordenkainen's Tome of foes and saw how a world can be transformed into a layer of the abyss and I would like to make a campaign set around trying to stop that from happening in my campaign world. How long do you think it takes for a world to be absorbed into the Abyss (I want to take the party from level 10-20, do I have time?)?

[Tvtyrant]

So I've read Mordenkainen's Tome of foes and saw how a world can be transformed into a layer of the abyss and I would like to make a campaign set around trying to stop that from happening in my campaign world. How long do you think it takes for a world to be absorbed into the Abyss (I want to take the party from level 10-20, do I have time?)?

Depends on how you do it? If it is "get the majority of the population to chaotic evil" the easiest way would be to kill all the none-chaotic evil people so it would be about saving civilians and stopping alignocide.

[dededo11]

Depends on how you do it? If it is "get the majority of the population to chaotic evil" the easiest way would be to kill all the none-chaotic evil people so it would be about saving civilians and stopping alignocide.

The method I'm using is opening a portal to the Abyss and having demons invading the campaign world through the portal, infesting it with demons and Abyssal energies, so that it essentially becomes another layer of the Abyss under their control.

[jjordan]

The method I'm using is opening a portal to the Abyss and having demons invading the campaign world through the portal, infesting it with demons and Abyssal energies, so that it essentially becomes another layer of the Abyss under their control.Honestly, you've got all the time in the world. You could work out how much time (in game days and sessions) it will take the players to advance to the level you want them to advance to and then set the deadline at around that time frame. Throughout the game have a few checkpoints to assess how the plans are going and move the deadline forward or back based on those checkpoints. People, including me, have done the calculations based on number of encounters per day and characters can advance to 10th level in something like a month of game play with 6-8 encounters per game day. How does that number measure up to your campaign? Do you have fewer encounters? Then it will take longer.

[Eriol]

You're the DM. It takes as long as you say it takes. Calculate how much you need it to take for your players, and have it take that long. Or longer. Or "somebody did a noble sacrifice, the end of the world is pushed back by X days now" if they're going a little slow. Or whatever.

[Unoriginal]

So I've read Mordenkainen's Tome of foes and saw how a world can be transformed into a layer of the abyss and I would like to make a campaign set around trying to stop that from happening in my campaign world. How long do you think it takes for a world to be absorbed into the Abyss (I want to take the party from level 10-20, do I have time?)?

The Abyss and demons are chaotic by nature, there is no set timeline. Also probably depends on where the portals first appear, how much energy the demons are willing to put into that project, how the world is defended, etc.

Last time Demons tried to do it that to the Forgotten Realms, they had weeks without being interrupted and they were still only at the begining. Though tbf they didn't have portals open and vomiting hordes during that time.

[micahaphone]

If it took a predictable amount of time, then it wouldn't be an abyssal plan now would it?

[Witty Username]

I would think in surface area instead of time, make an ink blot on your world map as the starting point and have it expand in world as events happen. Then you can measure time with an expanding danger and factions fighting the spread waxing and waning. Abyss minus 10 days is less impactful than say the forces of King Otmon have been obliterated by a demon horde.

I am personally making a kind of reverse of this idea at the moment, a world that was absorbed by the abyss that is slowly regaining cohesion because the local demon lord was killed.

[Naanomi]

It isn’t a common event by cosmic standards in any case, the one exception being Lolth adding worlds to Her demon-web pits. It can (and has) happened, but seems to be more often the result of a world getting utterly corrupted by demonic stuff because that is just what demons do, rather than any set plan... I suspect that means the process is generally fairly slow

[cutlery]

There are so many ways this might happen, that “at the speed of plot” seems like the only answer.