afroakuma's Planar And Other Oddities Questions Thread VIII

[Tzardok]

The names Baator/Baatezu and Tanar'ri were most likely made up of whole cloth during second edition, when TSR pretty frantically tried to remove anything "demonic-looking" for a while due to religious panic.

That story always cracks me up when I hear it.

Religious fanatics: "Dungeons and Dragons is satanistic! It's full of demons and angels!"

TSR: "Demons and angels? What demons and angels? Those are Tana'ri and Aasimon, honest!"

Religious fanatics: "You are right. That's completly different. Carry on, good citizen."

That might be so, but the word "Abyss" does have a meaning - bottomless chasm, and does make associations with something. The word "Baator", as far as I know, doesn't.

That's exactly what Eldan said, Edreyn. Baator is an invented word, simply for the reason that "Hell" couldn't be used anymore. With "Abyss" one has a degree of seperation to the "hellish" meaning, which grants plausible denieability.

2) There is a now old game Neverwinter Nights 2 and it has a add-on named Mask of the Betrayer. It's pre 4ed and uses standard 3.5 system and cosmology. Yet, the protagonist in this game can consume souls\spirits\whatever there is of powerful creatures and even demigods or dead deities (Myrkul).

If the player will pursue evil storyline and do evil choices the game ending will say that he became a god-killing abomination and continued eternal devouring of everything or everyone and even gods had to flee to the edges of Multiverse.

Pretty much the same actually goes for the Snarl from the comic on which site we write.

Are creatures like this ever mentioned and can exist, at least potentially, in the original vanilla Planescape?
Can a mortal receive such power?

Draeden are like that. Some of the Elder Evils in the eponymous book are described like that, but they are overhyped. Tharizdun has an reputation like that, but... who knows?

3) In the same game, the hero discovers a carcass of Myrkul, floating in the middle of nowhere. Some most devoted worshipers even live on it. And the player can talk and interact with Myrkul. So, the dead deity can't grant spells, but still can talk to those in close vicinity, is it so?
From older threads of this one I also read that in some cases dead deities can return, in special circumstances.

Myrkul is a cheating cheater who cheats. His mind is still alive, imprisoned in the Horn Crown.

But can a deity be eradicated permanently?
What happened to Aoskar? Does his remains float somewhere in Astral and can be potentially "resurrected" (far from Sigil), or he is gone completely?
What happened to previous Mystra, Myrkul, Baal and Bane who were killed while being stripped of godhood? Are they completely gone, float in Astral or got afterlives as petitioners as mortals do?

The Graveyard of the Gods floats in the Astral and is patroled by the Gravekeeper. Aoskar's corpse is there. As far as I know every dead deity has a corpse there.

4) There are two major endless wars in Multiverse: Blood War and a war between Githyanki and Githzerai. Due to the Rule of the Three, there should also be a third one. Is there one?
I thought of endless conflicts of Acheron, but I'd say it isn't exactly one big war with constant stalemate.

I do not see why you consider the skirmishes between the Gith races of equal importance to the Blood War, or even of greater importence than the fighting between the Gith and the illithids, or any of the other "eternal" wars like between Gruumsh and Corellon Larethian, or Gruumsh and Maglubiyet, or Thrym and Thor, or whoever.

5) Some long time ago, I asked if Spire is infinite to the depth as well, and you said that it is. Can there be another city, a twin of Sigil in the depth below the Spire? Has it ever been discussed, in the lore, or in real life?

I don't know, but in my opinion a mirror Sigil (let's call it Rune) shouldn't exist. It infringes on the importance of Sigil as a fulcrum of the multiverse. (I mean, if there is a second Sigil, why did Vecna intruding into Sigil had those grave rammification for the multiverse?) Also, Rune's existence opens up a lot of uncomfortable questions about the Lady.