# Excerpts: Angels



## MaelStorm (Apr 28, 2008)

New excerpt is up: 
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/4ex/20080428a


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## mach1.9pants (Apr 28, 2008)

ROFL three threads in about 3 seconds, are you guys just hanging around the excerpts page hitting F5 all day!


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## Green Knight (Apr 28, 2008)

LOL! Three simultaneous postings.  To bad the board doesn't tell you what second the posts were made. I'd love to see exactly how close together were all three posts made.


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## MaelStorm (Apr 28, 2008)

i guess i was not alone lol

sorry three thread already!!!


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## MaelStorm (Apr 28, 2008)

Green Knight said:
			
		

> LOL! Three simultaneous postings.  To bad the board doesn't tell you what second the posts were made. I'd love to see exactly how close together were all three posts made.



QFT


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## Orius (Apr 28, 2008)

I think we need some thread merging.


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## MaelStorm (Apr 28, 2008)

Quite a short excerpt. 

Angel of Vengeance was featured in the Desert of Desolation Miniature, and the Angel of Valor is featured in the latest Dungeon of Dread Miniature Series.


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## Kunimatyu (Apr 28, 2008)

Man, I wish the minis for these two looked half as good as their MM pictures.


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## jaelis (Apr 28, 2008)

mach1.9pants said:
			
		

> ROFL three threads in about 3 seconds, are you guys just hanging around the excerpts page hitting F5 all day!



Well, you know, it makes me feel manly to get the first post in 

Can't say it's the most interesting excerpt we've seen... we already knew that angels could be any alignment, and the two examples seem a little plain, mechanically.  Though I do like the idea of the angel of vengeance just continually whomping on it's target, ignoring anything else.


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## Fallen Seraph (Apr 28, 2008)

Got first thread on Gleemax 

I like it since generating ideas for my Nephilim (half-Angel race) such as not having racial feats based off the god the Angel served, but instead what kind of Angel it was.


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## JesterOC (Apr 28, 2008)

OK tactics question:



> Angel of Vengeance Tactics
> An angel of vengeance focuses on a single target. It evokes its sign of vengeance at the start of battle, then teleports to the target and spends an action point to use double attack against the foe. The angel continues its relentless pursuit of the target, paying little heed to events around it.




So Sign of Vengence is a Minor, the teleport is a move action, so we have one standard action left why does it need to burn an action point to attack twice?  Or does it mean just use the action point to get 2 double attacks?

Thanks for the input.  

p.s. Anyone know why some icons have circles and others don't? Longsword attack has a sword in a circle icon while double attack just has a sword.


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## Rechan (Apr 28, 2008)

Cool, a potent ritual can call them.  

I'm more curious on what other sorts of Angels there are.. Also, will an Angel of Snuggles get a writeup?


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## Fallen Seraph (Apr 28, 2008)

Yeah I think they mean to attack twice, needs to burn action points.

The circle means it is a "basic attack" so can be used for OA, charging, etc.


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## MaelStorm (Apr 28, 2008)

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> Man, I wish the minis for these two looked half as good as their MM pictures.



QFT. I think they're doing the best they can with minis, but these pictures are so much more inspiring to look at.


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## Blue (Apr 28, 2008)

JesterOC said:
			
		

> p.s. Anyone know why some icons have circles and others don't? Longsword attack has a sword in a circle icon while double attack just has a sword.




My _guess_ is that the one with the circle is their "basic attack" (much like the warlock eldritch blast from the preview characters).  You can use it for things that let you use your basic attack like Opportunity Attacks and other powers that allow you to use basic attacks.

Cheers,
=Blue(23)


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## DandD (Apr 28, 2008)

It feels kinda funny to think of some Angels as Brutes now. 
Although, one thing I already dislike is about the damage entry to the angels. When reading about how to simply assume energy attacks to be evenly splitted up damage-wise, I was joyful, as that meant no need to have extra-dices for every sort of stupid energy-damage. And now, here we have, an Angel of Vengeance, for whom you have to roll ice and fire damage separately. Man, talk about a downer. Why didn't they simply tell us to roll 2d8+18 damage (Cold/Fire)? That would be so much easier. 
Oh well, we knew that it wouldn't be perfect. Sucks for us.


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## JesterOC (Apr 28, 2008)

Fallen Seraph said:
			
		

> Yeah I think they mean to attack twice, needs to burn action points.
> 
> The circle means it is a "basic attack" so can be used for OA, charging, etc.




Thanks! That makes sense.


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## FireLance (Apr 28, 2008)

JesterOC said:
			
		

> OK tactics question:
> 
> So Sign of Vengence is a Minor, the teleport is a move action, so we have one standard action left why does it need to burn an action point to attack twice?  Or does it mean just use the action point to get 2 double attacks?



Probably. It's the angel's big combat starter. The potential to deal 4d10+36 plus 4d8 fire plus 4d8 cold to a single target certainly says "vengeance" top me. 



> p.s. Anyone know why some icons have circles and others don't? Longsword attack has a sword in a circle icon while double attack just has a sword.



The attacks with circles around them are basic attacks which can be used as attacks of opportunity, for example.


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## Vaeron (Apr 28, 2008)

MaelStorm said:
			
		

> Quite a short excerpt.
> 
> Angel of Vengeance was featured in the Desert of Desolation Miniature, and the Angel of Valor is featured in the latest Dungeon of Dread Miniature Series.




Although the DDM Angel of Vengeance bears remarkably little similarity to the one in the excerpt... I wonder if this is true of all the DDM stats we've been looking at to get some idea of their MM counterparts?


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## Sashi (Apr 28, 2008)

Interesting.

I wonder if this means that Eladrin and Guardinals and sundry will be rolled into one big mass like Demons, Devils, Yuguloth etc were.

That would be a good war type thing. Vast armies of good & evil outsiders who had their own goals, and sometimes worked with good/evil Gods who sent their Angels as representatives.


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## Fallen Seraph (Apr 28, 2008)

Hmm... This is different for Angels:


> During the great war between the gods and the primordials, angels offered themselves as warriors to the gods that best encompassed their callings, and today they continue to act as mercenary forces for anyone willing to meet their price—be it wealth, or power, or a cause worthy of their attention.



I wonder if Asmodeus was a general of a mercenary Angel army that went against the orders of their client.

I like the mercenary bent, others probably won't. But it makes sense there would be some loyalty but also the chance for rebellion and such and so aren't mindless automatons as some thought.


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## FireLance (Apr 28, 2008)

One interesting observation: The base Angel of Valor is a Level 8 Soldier, but you also have angel of valor legionnaires which are Level 21 minions, similar to the legion devil legionnaires (also Level 21 minions) mentioned in the devil excerpt and the pit fiend article. I wonder of "legionnaires" is something like a minion template?


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## Pistonrager (Apr 28, 2008)

now we can fight angels!  but more importantly... only 2 days till we learn the basics of multiclassing!


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## MaelStorm (Apr 28, 2008)

Vaeron said:
			
		

> Although the DDM Angel of Vengeance bears remarkably little similarity to the one in the excerpt... I wonder if this is true of all the DDM stats we've been looking at to get some idea of their MM counterparts?



My 2 cents is that the Desert of Desolation was released at the end of last year, I think there is a strong possibility that this angel got reworked a bit afterward.


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## GoodKingJayIII (Apr 28, 2008)

nm, someone already asked.


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## hong (Apr 28, 2008)

Looks like they reconcepted angels at some point between Worlds & Monsters and the finished product:



> No halos here—these are beings created by the gods for a purpose, rather than anthropomorphic images of comfort and purity.






> They most often serve the gods, so some believe that the gods created them. In reality, angels are powerful astral beings who appeared during the first moments of the creation of the Astral Sea.


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## DandD (Apr 28, 2008)

Fallen Seraph said:
			
		

> Hmm... This is different for Angels:
> 
> I wonder if Asmodeus was a general of a mercenary Angel army that went against the orders of their client.
> 
> I like the mercenary bent, others probably won't. But it makes sense there would be some loyalty but also the chance for rebellion and such and so aren't mindless automatons as some thought.



Yeah, that's a new thing. Reading Worlds & Monsters, I thought Angels would become robots with wings, personality-wise. Now, they're timelessly old, their origin is unexplained (for the implied setting, of course. Your angels might still be direct creations of your gods themselves) and mysterious, and they might even have their own agenda that might very well differ from a god. 

Of course, that puts to wonder how powerful a god is, rules-wise. Can they create Angels? Or are all Angels now astral forms gaining sentience through mysterious means? 

We shall see...


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## Cadfan (Apr 28, 2008)

The longsword/dagger attack is probably our first preview of two weapon fighting.


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## Fallen Seraph (Apr 28, 2008)

This is actually nice too, since in one of my settings Angels are separate and unique entities who came into being mysteriously and don't serve the gods that are left alive, unless they wish too.

Its like they read my mind, but took out the sci-fi elements I have for them


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## Pistonrager (Apr 28, 2008)

I'm thinking they either meant that it would use it's double attack, and spend an action point to do it again, or... it wouldn't spend an action point to just do it.


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## DandD (Apr 28, 2008)

GoodKingJayIII said:
			
		

> Something I noticed in the Angel of Vengeance tactics.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Probably a case of writers not really knowing the rules themselves well. Actually, that doesn't bold well for the Monster Manual. I sure hope it's written less confusing than that. I don't like to see tons of errata coming up soonly, just because the writers didn't proofread their own stuff.


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## Green Knight (Apr 28, 2008)

JesterOC said:
			
		

> OK tactics question:
> 
> So Sign of Vengence is a Minor, the teleport is a move action, so we have one standard action left why does it need to burn an action point to attack twice? Or does it mean just use the action point to get 2 double attacks?




Pretty much. Nothing wrong with an extra Standard Action. And in this case, it's pretty powerful. Angel of Vengeance pops in, spots the guy he's after, and uses a Minor Action to put a Sign of Vengeance on him. Then he uses a Move Action to teleport next to him. Then he uses a Standard Action to make a Double Attack, inflicting 2d10+18 damage, plus 2d8 fire damage, plus 2d8 cold damage if he hits both times. Then he burns his Action Point for another Standard Action, so he can make another Double Attack. So assuming all four attacks hit, he'll have inflicted between 48-140 points of damage (94 average) right on the first turn!


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## That One Guy (Apr 28, 2008)

Pistonrager said:
			
		

> now we can fight angels!  but more importantly... only 2 days till we learn the basics of multiclassing!



Yeah, I'm feeling pretty good about the angels. A bit skimpy, however... overall I think I can roll with the update and use it.

But, I hope for as skimpy as this one was, the wednesday multiclass thing will be juicy and awesome. Only wednesday!


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## Ravingdork (Apr 28, 2008)

Ooh...pretty...

























I'm not sure that I like the faceless servents aspect of the new Angels, though it does make them much more alien and unnerving. Their swirly misty tails make me think of them more as genie-kind then angels too (just take away the wings). 

The whole mercenary background wreaks of wrongness to me. I love that they are servents of all gods, but now the gods have to make it worth their while somehow? :nonono:


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## MaelStorm (Apr 28, 2008)

> DC 25: Influential members of a clergy use a *ritual* to call forth their deity’s wrath in the form of one of these angels.



Emphasis mine

Some ritual looks quite powerful. I like it.   

I also like the mercenary aspect of Angels.


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## Fallen Seraph (Apr 28, 2008)

Probably will be missed too, but... The level 8, Angel of Valor doesn't have Immunity to Disease like the level 19, Angel of Vengeance.

I dunno about you guys, but the idea of an Angel racked by disease, left to die on the World just screams plot-hook.


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## Rechan (Apr 28, 2008)

"I'm an angel. I kill firstborns while their mamas watch. I turn cities into salt. I even, when I feel like it, rip the souls from little girls, and from now till kingdom come, the only thing you can count on in your existence is never understanding why." -Gabriel (The Prophecy)


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## sunbear (Apr 28, 2008)

I LOVE 4E and am waiting with terrible excitement for it....However, the Angels don't have legs, man! I am really surprised how much this is bothering me. It looks stupid (IMO), if they wanted them to have a connection to the astral plane they could have simply made them translucent or maybe the wings could fade away into the astral (hard to make as a mini)...I dunno, but not the legs.


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## Colmarr (Apr 28, 2008)

DandD said:
			
		

> Probably a case of writers not really knowing the rules themselves well. Actually, that doesn't bold well for the Monster Manual. I sure hope it's written less confusing than that. I don't like to see tons of errata coming up soonly, just because the writers didn't proofread their own stuff.




Actually, it seems to me like one of those powers changed action type somewhere in the development process and they didn't revisit the tactics section to correct it.

Either way, I agree with you that it doesn't necessarily bode well.


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## FadedC (Apr 28, 2008)

raven_dark64 said:
			
		

> The whole mercenary background wreaks of wrongness to me. I love that they are servents of all gods, but now the gods have to make it worth their while somehow? :nonono:




Keep in mind that one of the things they will work for is a a "cause worthy of their attention"


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## Rechan (Apr 28, 2008)

Fallen Seraph said:
			
		

> I dunno about you guys, but the idea of an Angel racked by disease, left to die on the World just screams plot-hook.



Good find. All ears for that plot hook, too!


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## The_Fan (Apr 28, 2008)

I think we should compare the current stats of the angel of valor with the angel of valor from Dungeons of Dread. Don't have time right now to transcribe both stat blocks, but from a quick skim it looks like nearly every stat is different in small ways. A major change is the HP, going from 57 to 88, confirming what has long been suspected about an across-the-board HP increase from the DDM statblocks


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## A'koss (Apr 28, 2008)

Colmarr said:
			
		

> Actually, it seems to me like one of those powers changed action type somewhere in the development process and they didn't revisit the tactics section to correct it.



That was my first thought as well.

Overall though it looks like another solid set of monsters. Nothing really surprising in their powerset, but they look pretty effective. I'd certainly hate to have the PC marked by that level 19 encounter group!


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## Shroomy (Apr 28, 2008)

The_Fan said:
			
		

> I think we should compare the current stats of the angel of valor with the angel of valor from Dungeons of Dread. Don't have time right now to transcribe both stat blocks, but from a quick skim it looks like nearly every stat is different in small ways. A major change is the HP, going from 57 to 88, confirming what has long been suspected about an across-the-board HP increase from the DDM statblocks




I did a comparison.  There's almost more differences than similarities.


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## Shroomy (Apr 28, 2008)

Colmarr said:
			
		

> Actually, it seems to me like one of those powers changed action type somewhere in the development process and they didn't revisit the tactics section to correct it.
> 
> Either way, I agree with you that it doesn't necessarily bode well.




Yeah, awkward wording is annoying, but I can live with it as long as the mechanics are solid (or nearly so, nobody is perfect).


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## Fallen Seraph (Apr 28, 2008)

OH! Thought of plot-hook/fan-fluff for Asmodeus and the other Angels rebelling and becoming Devils.

What if they were bought off, by another God or perhaps even a Primordial or a Demon (say Orcus) to kill that God.

Just imagine in Epic levels you finding out it was another God and you and the rest of the party have to make him say he did.


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## Kobold Avenger (Apr 28, 2008)

Sashi said:
			
		

> Interesting.
> 
> I wonder if this means that Eladrin and Guardinals and sundry will be rolled into one big mass like Demons, Devils, Yuguloth etc were.



You know that Eladrin are already a PC race in the Players's Handbook?

But as for Eladrin such as Bralani, Ghaele, Firre and Coure?  They're in the Monster Manual as "Eladrin Nobles".


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## Kaodi (Apr 28, 2008)

In my opinion the look of these " angels " is incredibly lame. Not screaming " awesome deific servants " to me. I like a lot of things about 4e. This is definately not one of them.


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## DandD (Apr 28, 2008)

Well, if the mechanics are badly worded, I might rather wait for the next print of the books. I hope that's just in the excerpt, or some kind of mechanic we don't know yet. But if it's a mistake, I don't want to see that in the Monster Manual, nor in the Player's Handbook, or the Dungeon Master's Guide. They have the money to proofread all that stuff, more than any other RPG publisher, and they even don't need to rely on that franchise, as gaming cards give them probably 100 times as much cash than D&D could ever do. If there's one company from whom I know I should expect quality, it's Wizards of the Coast. At least in terms of proof-reading in their products.


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## mach1.9pants (Apr 28, 2008)

I'm not even sure the tactics bit is an error. I read it as he marks, teleports, standard attacks (not mentioned but obvious), uses an AP for another double attack. Not 100% spelt out but makes perfect sense to me.







> It evokes its sign of vengeance at the start of battle, then teleports to the target and spends an action point to use double attack against the foe.



But it could have been better :"..to the target and uses a standard and an AP to double attack twice" or some-such.


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## Saitou (Apr 28, 2008)

Why are people doubting the Angel of Vengeance's tactics? Does 4d10+4d8 fire+4d8 cold+36 _in a single turn_ seem so unreasonable a first turn for a Brute?

Also, it's a shame all angels have two wings. 'Twould've been nice for them to dig a bit into some apocryphal books, but nothing that can't be houseruled. Art is otherwise quite nice. I especially like the faceless bit.


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## Stalker0 (Apr 28, 2008)

So we have finally gotten a good look at what a brute can do.

And they definitely pump out a lot more damage than the other types of monsters we've seen. The Angel of Vengeance is quite cool. Does damage when he hits you, does damage when you hit it, and you can't get away from it, it just keeps teleporting to you until you die. That is a cool monster.


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## mach1.9pants (Apr 28, 2008)

Stalker0 said:
			
		

> So we have finally gotten a good look at what a brute can do.
> 
> And they definitely pump out a lot more damage than the other types of monsters we've seen. The Angel of Vengeance is quite cool. Does damage when he hits you, does damage when you hit it, and you can't get away from it, it just keeps teleporting to you until you die. That is a cool monster.



Yeah squishies be afraid, be very afraid!


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## MaelStorm (Apr 28, 2008)

The_Fan said:
			
		

> I think we should compare the current stats of the angel of valor with the angel of valor from Dungeons of Dread. Don't have time right now to transcribe both stat blocks, but from a quick skim it looks like nearly every stat is different in small ways. A major change is the HP, going from 57 to 88, confirming what has long been suspected about an across-the-board HP increase from the DDM statblocks




Here's the MM Entry:



> *Angel of Valor, Level 8 Soldier
> Medium immortal humanoid (angel), XP 350*
> 
> Initiative: +10 Senses Perception +6
> ...




Here's the DDM Card:







EDIT: 
 HP got boosted from 55 to 88
 Alignment changed from Good to Any
 Fly Speed from 8 to 9


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## Jack99 (Apr 28, 2008)

Maybe we should compare with the roleplaying side of the card?


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## TwinBahamut (Apr 28, 2008)

I continue to be _completely_ unimpressed by 4E angels. The mercenary element, in particular, is incredibly grating and bad. I don't like it at all. I don't really like the weak justification for making such changes, either. I applaud the changes to demons/devils and the change up in the pantheon, but other than that I really have not been liking the way 4E has been handling gods and other divine beings.

I must also say that I think it is a bit odd that Angels are given such a strong elemental focus. There is no possible way to argue that Archons are "elemental angels" anymore when basic Angels are wreathed in fire or ice.

Actually... Angels and Archons look way too much like each other, and they might be even more similar to each other than they were in 3E. If you compare the Angel of Valor to the Flame Archon, they both really just look like faceless humanoids made of fire with no legs who use weapons and armor. The only substantial difference is that one has a pair of wings. I thought they were trying to go to great lengths to differentiate the different creature groups, not make them more similar...

Also, if Devils are supposedly "Fallen Angels", then why is it that devils look so different than angels? How can a mercenary unaligned being that is willing to serve an evil god even fall in the first place? This is especially strange since evil gods like Bane might very well have both Angel mercenaries _and_ Devil mercenaries working under them at the same time (Angels working directly under Pit Fiends?). It doesn't make any sense to me.

I am looking forward to 4E quite a bit, but I think this whole matter is a big failure on WotC's part.


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## Incenjucar (Apr 28, 2008)

I seem to have missed something... what's an exarch, in 4E, again?

"Angels are more involved in the world and other planes than deities and *exarchs*. They act both openly and secretly, often acting as emissaries, generals, and even assassins"


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## hong (Apr 28, 2008)

IIRC exarchs are the demigods.


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## Incenjucar (Apr 28, 2008)

Ah.  Huh.

I was hoping they were something more unique, perhaps things actually created by deities.

Ah well.


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## hong (Apr 28, 2008)

I'm wondering why they decided to change angels from being created by the gods, to having an independent origin.


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## Ipissimus (Apr 28, 2008)

> Meanwhile, evil gods were served by . . . nobody.




Ahhhhhhh... they must have different books than I do. I always thought that the evil gods were pretty well catered for. Neutral gods... still catered for but not so much.

I mean, I do dig why they're changing angels and I like what they've done. Making them more useful to the game is a good change. I just don't get why this particular reason keeps coming up when there are more important concerns.

I don't mind dumping the symmetry of the planes either as long as the alignment system stays as a guide to roleplaying.

On a more positive note, the stats for Angels that have been revealed so far make me happy. One of the things that annoyed me in the last few editions was the way power levels seemed to slide to favor the two 'extreme' alignments LG & CE while LG took a double dip. I'll enjoy a much more level playing field in 4E if it turns out that way.


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## KidSnide (Apr 28, 2008)

Jack99 said:
			
		

> Maybe we should compare with the roleplaying side of the card?



QFT.

If we want to track changes over time, it does little good to compare MM entries with DDM stats, since we already know that the DDM stats are modified to shrink the gap between the more powerful creatures and the less powerful creatures.


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## malraux (Apr 28, 2008)

Could the MM tactics be presuming that the angel is catching the party flat-footed and the tactics describe it's surprise round choice?  That would kinda fit, as it somehow pops in and triggers a single surprise round.  In that case, it's tactic kinda makes sense.


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## MaelStorm (Apr 28, 2008)

Jack99 said:
			
		

> Maybe we should compare with the roleplaying side of the card?




MM Entry:



> *Angel of Valor, Level 8 Soldier
> Medium immortal humanoid (angel), XP 350*
> 
> Initiative: +10 Senses Perception +6
> ...




RPG Stat Card:



> *Angel of Valor, Level 8 Soldier
> Medium immortal humanoid (angel)*
> 
> Senses Perception: +10
> ...


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## AllisterH (Apr 28, 2008)

hong said:
			
		

> I'm wondering why they decided to change angels from being created by the gods, to having an independent origin.





Hmm?

I thought devas and solars were created by the planes themselves and NOT the deities. The only thing 4E did I thought was switch their birthplace from the Upper Realms to the Astral?

What previous edition book revealed that angels were created by the gods?


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## DandD (Apr 28, 2008)

I agree with TwinBahamut's critique-relating question. How did angels (d)evolve to devils?


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## AverageCitizen (Apr 28, 2008)

This is very disappointing. The story and the concept are just not doing it for me. It seems like they've bent over backwards just to provide an excuse for these to be used against players arbitrarily, and in doing so have sacrificed good story-telling. I don't like the way they've handled this at all, which just means more work for me.

Is the whole MM going to be like this? Are all story-related npcs going to be crushed into concepts that don't fit, like square pegs in a round hole, just so that every creature in the MM can be pitted against the characters at any time?

Its not a difficult concept. Angels vs. Demons. Got it?


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## Deverash (Apr 28, 2008)

Interestingly, with paladins crowd control being to deal some radiant damage to someone who doesn't attack them, Angels can pretty much run amok, unless the damage goes up significantly.  With resist 10 or 15 radiant, they won't even feel it.


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## Mirtek (Apr 28, 2008)

TwinBahamut said:
			
		

> Also, if Devils are supposedly "Fallen Angels", then why is it that devils look so different than angels? How can a mercenary unaligned being that is willing to serve an evil god even fall in the first place? This is especially strange since evil gods like Bane might very well have both Angel mercenaries _and_ Devil mercenaries working under them at the same time (Angels working directly under Pit Fiends?). It doesn't make any sense to me.



Well, their fall seems to be less spiritually and more (other)worldly.

The deities saw them defying one of their own (and even worse: murdering him) and feared that the angel race as a whole might lose respect for them. So they decided to teach them a lesson and cursed them through divine magics.

So it wasn't the act of treason itself which changed the devils, it was the divine retribution


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## Leatherhead (Apr 28, 2008)

raven_dark64 said:
			
		

> insert pictures here





These remind me vaguely of Diablo 2.


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## AllisterH (Apr 28, 2008)

AverageCitizen said:
			
		

> This is very disappointing. The story and the concept are just not doing it for me. It seems like they've bent over backwards just to provide an excuse for these to be used against players arbitrarily, and in doing so have sacrificed good story-telling. I don't like the way they've handled this at all, which just means more work for me.
> 
> Is the whole MM going to be like this? Are all story-related npcs going to be crushed into concepts that don't fit, like square pegs in a round hole, just so that every creature in the MM can be pitted against the characters at any time?
> 
> Its not a difficult concept. Angels vs. Demons. Got it?




I actually like the fluff behind the change.

Angels vs Demons makes sense when there is only good deities. Once you introduce evil deities, you do raise the question of "Who serves the evil deities" and in previous editions, this was devils and demons.

For example, the Temple guardian for Bane can't just be cultists and priests since the Temple of Pelor not only has that but also angels protecting it.

re: Angel's fall
I don't think Asmodeus was an actual angel though. The Devils execrpt cagely sidesteps the issue by simply saying he was a Divine Servant and the leader of a similar group of servants. They were cursed (presumably by all the other gods) into their new forms.


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## Fobok (Apr 28, 2008)

I don't really like the mercenary approach either, but I *do* like the fact that they serve all gods. Easy enough to change for when I DM and in other games I can live with it.

I really like the new look too. With the angels that are the true messengers, I'd give them an illusion ability so, say, angels of a good deity could look more human and relatable.


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## DandD (Apr 28, 2008)

Might work somehow, still, doesn't feel that good, but that's because of the implied problems with angels basically being astral mercenaries. 

I prefer them to be astral robots, like they were alluded to in Worlds & Monsters, and when they went into Robot-Rebellion-mode and murdered their god, he managed to push the omega switch that tainted the rebelling hordes into the fearsome devils that now rule themselves in the prison dimension called the Nine Hells (of Baator?). 
Would have made a little bit more sense, and would be more fitting, thematically. 

Oh well, can't have a winner always. I'm just more concerned now if the mechanics aren't worded too badly. I hate it when a product needs an errata two days after it's on the shelf. Reeks like bad work for me. Sure hope it doesn't happen.


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## Sojorn (Apr 28, 2008)

Fobok said:
			
		

> With the angels that are the true messengers, I'd give them an illusion ability so, say, angels of a good deity could look more human and relatable.



Just have them shout "FEAR NOT!" when they show up.

That'll put everyone at ease I'm sure.


----------



## hong (Apr 28, 2008)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> Hmm?
> 
> I thought devas and solars were created by the planes themselves and NOT the deities. The only thing 4E did I thought was switch their birthplace from the Upper Realms to the Astral?
> 
> What previous edition book revealed that angels were created by the gods?



 Not vis-a-vis previous editions, but rather what was in W&M.

Like I said before:



> Looks like they reconcepted angels at some point between Worlds & Monsters and the finished product:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


----------



## FadedC (Apr 28, 2008)

AverageCitizen said:
			
		

> This is very disappointing. The story and the concept are just not doing it for me. It seems like they've bent over backwards just to provide an excuse for these to be used against players arbitrarily, and in doing so have sacrificed good story-telling. I don't like the way they've handled this at all, which just means more work for me.
> 
> Is the whole MM going to be like this? Are all story-related npcs going to be crushed into concepts that don't fit, like square pegs in a round hole, just so that every creature in the MM can be pitted against the characters at any time?
> 
> Its not a difficult concept. Angels vs. Demons. Got it?




The fact that it's such an incredibly simplistic concept does not necesarily mean it's good storytelling. In fact often more complicated things make for better stories.


----------



## AllisterH (Apr 28, 2008)

DandD said:
			
		

> Oh well, can't have a winner always. I'm just more concerned now if the mechanics aren't worded too badly. I hate it when a product needs an errata two days after it's on the shelf. Reeks like bad work for me. Sure hope it doesn't happen.




I don't think WOTC will actually errata this. Same reason why the Succubus Tactics won't be errata.

The reason why is that in both cases, the actual wording isn't WRONG. It's sub-optimal. (which is a big difference). There's nothing in the rules that says you actually have to do ANYTHING with a standard action gained from an action point.

For example, if I used an action point and then said, "I'm doing nothing", there's nothing in the rules that says I can't do this. Sure, it's a very sub-optimal choice but it isn't actually forbidden per se.

Same thing here. Spend an action point isn't necessary but there's nothing in the rules that says, "you can't spend an action point even if you don't need it". Similarly, the succubus tactics are not the best way to user her powers (makes more sense to kiss an allied companion IMO) but there's nothing in the rules that actually stop the succubus from doing what the tactis says to do.

WOTC is somewhat infamous for this even on the M:TG side (there was a M:TG demo a few years back where they had "Teach a player the steps in the M:TG round" and the demo actually had the player playing their land in the 2nd main phase. Technically, there's nothing saying you HAVE to play lands in the 1st main phase an that you can't do that but you'd be hardpressed to find ANYONE that would agree this was a good teaching strategy).


----------



## AverageCitizen (Apr 28, 2008)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> Angels vs Demons makes sense when there is only good deities. Once you introduce evil deities, you do raise the question of "Who serves the evil deities" and in previous editions, this was devils and demons.




Yeah. Why did we change that?

Previously, if you wanted an epic intraplanar conflict in your campaign, the good gods sent angels (people with wings, celestial beings, etc.) and the bad god sent devils/demons (Monsters with wings, sharp teeth, red skin, etc.)

Now, on both sides of the conflict, you have these "angels" who're more like a cross between the protoss, a genie, and a dove. Oh, and an element.

So why is this better?


----------



## Fieari (Apr 28, 2008)

I'm in favor.  This allows the angels to be used in a wider variety of roles.  You can still have your good holy nice angels fighting against demons. Pelor's angels are likely like this.  But you can also have an evil priest summon an angel of death to slaughter an enemy's kingdom-- your own-- and you need to stop it.  For a dramatic twist, possibly by summoning a devil and making a bargain, which will go wrong afterwards...

The possibilities have not been reduced.  They've been expanded.  You can still use angels EXACTLY the same way you have in the past.  But now, they offer clearer opportunities to be used elsewise.  And yes, you could have always used angels like this, but the flavor given and the rules highly suggested against it.  Now, the rules and flavor are far clearer about allowing wider uses.

YES.  THIS IS GOOD.


----------



## Korgoth (Apr 28, 2008)

What I also don't get is that Angels are resistant to "radiant damage" - that's the kind of damage Paladins do, right?  If so, isn't there some connection between radiant and good?

I think they totally missed the boat here.


----------



## Phaezen (Apr 28, 2008)

*Angel of Valor - Legionnaires*

This intrigues me, 

Angel of Valor - Level 8 Soldier

But in the Angel of Vengeance suggested encounter we find:

5 angel of valor legionnaires (level 21 minion)

Here is where fact ends and speculation begins:

This would suggest that legionnaire is a template to turn a heroic level creature into an epic level minion, this possible explains the entertainingly named legion devil legionnaires that the pit fiend is so fond of blowing up (note that the types of the legion devils are not mentioned in the  pit fiend article, just thier level - 21)

Phaezen


----------



## hong (Apr 28, 2008)

Korgoth said:
			
		

> What I also don't get is that Angels are resistant to "radiant damage" - that's the kind of damage Paladins do, right?  If so, isn't there some connection between radiant and good?
> 
> I think they totally missed the boat here.



 Radiant means "sourced from the Astral Dominions [ie, outer planes]". It doesn't have connotations of good, holy, saintly, etc.


----------



## AverageCitizen (Apr 28, 2008)

FadedC said:
			
		

> The fact that it's such an incredibly simplistic concept does not necesarily mean it's good storytelling. In fact often more complicated things make for better stories.




I think you're missing my point. I'm saying I have personally formed an opinion that it is lame.

So that begs the question: Why did they make the change?

And the only answer I can come up with is to make the Angels more "useful" to the game. (i.e, have them come up more in fights.) They said themselves, no one ever fights them. I don't think I ever directly involved one in a campaign, so I understand the problem of wasting space. 

However, if I _did_ use them in a setting it would be as wordly avatars engaged in an ancient struggle of good vs. evil. I don't think I'm alone in that, and most likely a strong majority of people implementing angels or devils or demons as a major setting element will be thinking along the same line. It's a classic concept, and it provides excellent backdrop for an adventure.

So when they come up with this... _convoluted_ readjustment of what used to be the _classic_ manifestation of the battle between good and evil, in favor of efficiency in game design publishing, I get annoyed. I think that this change was a poor decision. If its core I think it should be classic. Save the groundbreaking cosmologies for a specific setting.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Apr 28, 2008)

Korgoth said:
			
		

> What I also don't get is that Angels are resistant to "radiant damage" - that's the kind of damage Paladins do, right?  If so, isn't there some connection between radiant and good?
> 
> I think they totally missed the boat here.



Radiant is energy from the Astral Sea.


----------



## DonAdam (Apr 28, 2008)

> We decided that every god needed to have servants, and making angels those servants seemed the logical step.




Cool.



> The word “angel” means “messenger”—why couldn’t one bring a message of war, or pain, or vengeance, as well as those of hope or protection? (And, of course, snuggles.)




Sweet. Angelic power keeping you from squeezing the Charmin.



> all angels are vaguely humanoid in form, with masculine or feminine features and *lower bodies that trail off into flowing energy*.




BLEH.

I know, I know, I can change it in my game. But it doesn't make the pictures any less dumb.


----------



## AllisterH (Apr 28, 2008)

Korgoth said:
			
		

> What I also don't get is that Angels are resistant to "radiant damage" - that's the kind of damage Paladins do, right?  If so, isn't there some connection between radiant and good?
> 
> I think they totally missed the boat here.




I thought paladins were allowed to serve evil gods now? Radiant I think no loner is automatically tied to good. It's tied to being DIVINE thus even a cleric of Bane does Radiant damage.

There's no holy and unholy anymore.

Necrotics is tied to the shadowfell but it isn't inherently evil anymore. Just strongly associated with it thus you can have say the Archlich doing necrotic damage and also the Undying Elven court doing necrotic damage even though necrotic is automatically seen by many as evil even though the two examples are not EVIL per se.


----------



## DandD (Apr 28, 2008)

Korgoth said:
			
		

> What I also don't get is that Angels are resistant to "radiant damage" - that's the kind of damage Paladins do, right?  If so, isn't there some connection between radiant and good?



Not necessarily. Radiant might simply mean light-energy, or divine. It is said that Paladins can now also serve evil gods (or something like that. Talk about a Paladin of Asmodeus run around).


----------



## Belorin (Apr 28, 2008)

I like the angels, just not all that impressed with the new origin, mercenary beings and such.
I'll house rule that, maybe the angels came into being at the deities need, but retained their own identity, Valor, Vengence, War, etc.

Bel


----------



## AverageCitizen (Apr 28, 2008)

Fieari said:
			
		

> I'm in favor.  This allows the angels to be used in a wider variety of roles.  You can still have your good holy nice angels fighting against demons. Pelor's angels are likely like this.  But you can also have an evil priest summon an angel of death to slaughter an enemy's kingdom-- your own-- and you need to stop it.  For a dramatic twist, possibly by summoning a devil and making a bargain, which will go wrong afterwards...
> 
> The possibilities have not been reduced.  They've been expanded.  You can still use angels EXACTLY the same way you have in the past.  But now, they offer clearer opportunities to be used elsewise.  And yes, you could have always used angels like this, but the flavor given and the rules highly suggested against it.  Now, the rules and flavor are far clearer about allowing wider uses.
> 
> YES.  THIS IS GOOD.




I get what you're saying, I really do. And I almost agree with you. But the problem is that the angels, at least the ones we've seen, are so unaligned that they look almost identical. I think that's what really bothers me about trying to use the new angels in a classic role.

Maybe the bad angels will be completely different. I guess we'll see. 

Any DM worth his dice can make it work, I am well aware, but its just more work for me. Sometimes it feels like homework stacking up, you know?


----------



## FireLance (Apr 28, 2008)

Korgoth said:
			
		

> What I also don't get is that Angels are resistant to "radiant damage" - that's the kind of damage Paladins do, right? If so, isn't there some connection between radiant and good?



I take it you didn't get the memo about evil paladins. 



			
				hong said:
			
		

> Radiant means "sourced from the Astral Dominions [ie, outer planes]". It doesn't have connotations of good, holy, saintly, etc.



Unless you want it to, of course. 

(Really, it isn't even all that difficult. Make all the gods represent the best and noblest aspects of their respective portfolios, and cut out those that you can't put a good-aligned spin on. Now the Astral Dominions are all good-aligned, and all clerics, paladins and angels are servants of good.)


----------



## jensun (Apr 28, 2008)

DandD said:
			
		

> I agree with TwinBahamut's critique-relating question. How did angels (d)evolve to devils?



They rebelled. 

I can just as easily see angels of an evil good falling and becoming something quite different (devils) as I can see it happening to angels of good gods.  

The issue isn't acting in an evil way, its diverging from the divine plan. 

Personally I dislike the "mercenary" side of the new angels but it isnt a difficult thing to change.


----------



## Mustrum_Ridcully (Apr 28, 2008)

jensun said:
			
		

> They rebelled.



_Gods created Angels 



Spoiler



(not)


. The rebelled. They evolved. And they have a plan._

I am not sure I like the mercenary side of the Angels. I wonder if the Exarchs will be actual monsters and will be closer to the "traditional" Angels? Or will they (I think hong wrote that) Demigods and thus probably have no stats.

A possible twist of the Angels might be that they are mercenaries, but only work for gods, since only the gods can pay them with something an Angel needs, or at least they can pay best. The Devils might have found something different and are not dependent on the gods - probably they figured out that souls are fine for their purpose. 

Angels as mercenaries makes sense, in some thing - there might be a need for some kind of mercenaries in the Astral Sea, and what other "iconic" monster can fill that job?


----------



## Andor (Apr 28, 2008)

Can I get a divine visitation from an Angel of Snuggles? Please?


----------



## Vaeron (Apr 28, 2008)

Korgoth said:
			
		

> What I also don't get is that Angels are resistant to "radiant damage" - that's the kind of damage Paladins do, right?  If so, isn't there some connection between radiant and good?
> 
> I think they totally missed the boat here.




Angels are radiant beings.  Therefore they are resistant to radiant damage in the same way fire elementals are resistant to fire damage.  Conversely, undead take additional damage from radiant attacks.

I don't see the disconnect?


----------



## small pumpkin man (Apr 28, 2008)

Leatherhead said:
			
		

> These remind me vaguely of Diablo 2.



Tyreal was the most awesome Angel ever, these are good, but they aren't _that_ good.


----------



## Kobold Avenger (Apr 28, 2008)

Even though those are new angels, they still could have used Devas, Planetars and Solars, and still made them "any alignment".  It doesn't take much to picture an evil Solar either.


----------



## jensun (Apr 28, 2008)

Mustrum_Ridcully said:
			
		

> I am not sure I like the mercenary side of the Angels. I wonder if the Exarchs will be actual monsters and will be closer to the "traditional" Angels? Or will they (I think hong wrote that) Demigods and thus probably have no stats.



Given the epic tier seems to include the option of fighting gods and demon lords I think the exarchs will have stats.


----------



## AZRogue (Apr 28, 2008)

I like the changes, mostly. The mercenary thing I'm "bleh" about, but I don't think it matters since my players won't care since it doesn't effect them directly. I like the damage the angel can do, which is nice, and I like that it will probably be a creature I use against my PCs, which would be a first. Oh, and I'm glad they didn't add legs. Legs on angels has always screamed pure wrongness to me. I like the way they look, in the art, far more than I like the backstory, but the backstory they gave is adequate.


----------



## jensun (Apr 28, 2008)

Kobold Avenger said:
			
		

> Even though those are new angels, they still could have used Devas, Planetars and Solars, and still made them "any alignment".  It doesn't take much to picture an evil Solar either.



Not hard at all.

I recall a very old module (the Rod of Serallion) from back in 1e which had just that.


----------



## drjones (Apr 28, 2008)

I likes it, the entry really got me popping with encounter ideas.  you pissed off the Grand Poobah of the local cult?  Does he hire some standard assassins? No he starts filling out the paperwork to submit his request for divine redress against those who have crossed him, in triplicate.
And once the PCs finally track down the Poobah what messed with them and put him to the sword they find a neatly organized dossier with copies of all divine correspondence and detailed information on each of them, their families, darkest secrets etc. things even they did not know opening the door to the next adventure..


----------



## neceros (Apr 28, 2008)

DandD said:
			
		

> It feels kinda funny to think of some Angels as Brutes now.
> Although, one thing I already dislike is about the damage entry to the angels. When reading about how to simply assume energy attacks to be evenly splitted up damage-wise, I was joyful, as that meant no need to have extra-dices for every sort of stupid energy-damage. And now, here we have, an Angel of Vengeance, for whom you have to roll ice and fire damage separately. Man, talk about a downer. Why didn't they simply tell us to roll 2d8+18 damage (Cold/Fire)? That would be so much easier.
> Oh well, we knew that it wouldn't be perfect. Sucks for us.



I prefer it that way. I'm old school.


----------



## drjones (Apr 28, 2008)

I think I read the 'mercenary' thing different than others here.  To me it sounded like they wanted a reason why a particular angel might not necessarily allways be operating as the hand of a particular god.  We assume they mostly will be since they have attached themselves to gods who share their ideals and goals but this way they are not robots or puppets, they can be dealt with as individuals which opens possibilities plot and rp wise.

That's my guess anyway.


----------



## Sashi (Apr 28, 2008)

hong said:
			
		

> I'm wondering why they decided to change angels from being created by the gods, to having an independent origin.




So you can fight an Angel without it meaning you've pissed off a god.


----------



## hong (Apr 28, 2008)

Sashi said:
			
		

> So you can fight an Angel without it meaning you've pissed off a god.



 That's not a very compelling reason.


----------



## Derren (Apr 28, 2008)

Another wrong tactic?



> Angel of Vengeance Tactics
> It evokes its sign of vengeance at the start of battle, then teleports to the target and spends an action point to use double attack against the foe




- Invoke sign    -> minor action
- teleport         -> move action
- double attack -> standard action

Why is the action point necessary?


----------



## drjones (Apr 28, 2008)

Yes I think the AP mention was to specify that given the Angels single mindedness it will not save any resource for later, all attention goes to killing the offending character NOW.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Apr 28, 2008)

drjones said:
			
		

> Yes I think the AP mention was to specify that given the Angels single mindedness it will not save any resource for later, all attention goes to killing the offending character NOW.



*Nods* I agree with that, especially since after that sentence it says:


> The angel continues its relentless pursuit of the target, paying little heed to events around it.



This to me suggests, the Angel is continuing its attack and thus isn't using its AP for anything but to attack because of how single-minded it is.


----------



## Derren (Apr 28, 2008)

If that is what is meant by the tactic then its rather badly worded. As written it looks like the AP is needed to double attack after the teleport.


----------



## The_Fan (Apr 28, 2008)

Radiant is not just from good. It comes from clerics and paladins, neither of which have to be good. So your cleric of Pelor may use a holy white light, while a cleric of Asmodeus may use a corrupt, red light, and a cleric of Bane a baleful green light.


----------



## Plageman (Apr 28, 2008)

DandD said:
			
		

> Of course, that puts to wonder how powerful a god is, rules-wise.



All the fluff about the gods yells "IMMORTALS" to me


----------



## hong (Apr 28, 2008)

The_Fan said:
			
		

> Radiant is not just from good. It comes from clerics and paladins, neither of which have to be good. So your cleric of Pelor may use a holy white light, while a cleric of Asmodeus may use a corrupt, red light, and a cleric of Bane a baleful green light.



In 4E, people will have coloured circles around not just their feet, but also their heads!


----------



## The_Fan (Apr 28, 2008)

hong said:
			
		

> In 4E, people will have coloured circles around not just their feet, but also their heads!



 Of course. Clerics: Now color-coded for your convenience.


----------



## hong (Apr 28, 2008)

Also: I suspect that they changed angels from manifestations of a god's will to superpowered astral race, is so that people can summon them without getting into metaphysical arguments about what their deity wants, who's calling the shots, etc.


----------



## Gloombunny (Apr 28, 2008)

hong said:
			
		

> In 4E, people will have coloured circles around not just their feet, but also their heads!



Hey, it worked for Star Wars.


----------



## pukunui (Apr 28, 2008)

DandD said:
			
		

> Although, one thing I already dislike is about the damage entry to the angels. When reading about how to simply assume energy attacks to be evenly splitted up damage-wise, I was joyful, as that meant no need to have extra-dices for every sort of stupid energy-damage. And now, here we have, an Angel of Vengeance, for whom you have to roll ice and fire damage separately. Man, talk about a downer. Why didn't they simply tell us to roll 2d8+18 damage (Cold/Fire)? That would be so much easier.



It makes sense to list it separately so that the DM will roll it separately so that it's easier to determine how much cold and/or fire damage is negated by cold and/or fire resistance. If you tell your players that they've received 23 points of cold and fire damage, and some of them happen to have cold and/or fire resistance, they're going to want to know how much of that damage was cold energy and how much of it was fire and since you didn't roll it separately, you're going to be left saying, "Um ... uh, half was cold and half was fire? So let's just divide the number I rolled by two ... um, hang on ... it was an odd number so let's round down ... um ..."

At least, that's how it would go for me, as I'm not very good at doing math in my head, especially when I've been put on the spot. I would find it easier to tell them that they've taken 5 cold damage (and if they have 5 cold resistance, they can just say, "OK, I don't take any cold damage) and 5 fire damage (and again if they have 5 fire resistance, they can just tell me they've resisted that damage as well ...).

Also, should the PCs somehow manage to get a high enough resistance or even immunity (if that's even possible in 4e) to a certain energy type, and if they happen to all go up against a creature that deals that energy type as well as another energy type, then I can just not bother to roll the die for that energy type because I know it won't have any effect on them.


----------



## Nosey Goblin (Apr 28, 2008)

Hi folks,

Is it just me, or is this a nasty ability:

"Fiery Blades (minor, usable only while bloodied; at-will) *  Fire
Until the start of the angel of valor’s next turn, the angel of valor’s weapons deal fire damage and attack the target’s Reflex defense instead of AC."

Looking at the pre-gens, and some of the monsters, Reflex Defense is quite often a fair bit lower than AC (particularly in the case of the Defenders). This is going give the Angel a nasty sting in its tail when they start to get beaten-on. I love this as an example of how D&D4 is doing cool stuff with the monsters.

Regards,

Shane


----------



## pukunui (Apr 28, 2008)

hong said:
			
		

> In 4E, people will have coloured circles around not just their feet, but also their heads!





			
				The Fan said:
			
		

> Of course. Clerics: Now color-coded for your convenience.





			
				Gloombunny said:
			
		

> Hey, it worked for Star Wars




 In 4e, your magical equipment will have color-coded lightsaber auras for your convenience! 

Not to mention for the convenience of your enemies ... so that they know what stuff to take off you once they've killed you.


----------



## FireLance (Apr 28, 2008)

Nosey Goblin said:
			
		

> Hi folks,
> 
> Is it just me, or is this a nasty ability:
> 
> ...



In 3.5e, it was a 2nd-level druid spell... 



> Flame Blade
> Evocation [Fire]
> Level: Drd 2
> Components: V, S, DF
> ...


----------



## neceros (Apr 28, 2008)

hong said:
			
		

> In 4E, people will have coloured circles around not just their feet, but also their heads!



Atrocious.


----------



## Mirtek (Apr 28, 2008)

AverageCitizen said:
			
		

> Yeah. Why did we change that?
> 
> Previously, if you wanted an epic intraplanar conflict in your campaign, the good gods sent angels (people with wings, celestial beings, etc.) and the bad god sent devils/demons (Monsters with wings, sharp teeth, red skin, etc.)
> 
> ...



Actually it was always much more fun if the deities on side A send demons and the deities on side B send devils and you were suddenly in the thick of it.   


			
				Fieari said:
			
		

> I'm in favor.  This allows the angels to be used in a wider variety of roles.  You can still have your good holy nice angels fighting against demons. Pelor's angels are likely like this.  But you can also have an evil priest summon an angel of death to slaughter an enemy's kingdom-- your own-- and you need to stop it.



On the other hand there's not really much difference at all between sending an angel of death for this job or sending a demon/devil.

In both cases it's just an otherworldly guy with wings who is trying to kill you.


			
				Mustrum_Ridcully said:
			
		

> I am not sure I like the mercenary side of the Angels. I wonder if the Exarchs will be actual monsters and will be closer to the "traditional" Angels? Or will they (I think hong wrote that) Demigods and thus probably have no stats.



Since true deities have stats, the exarchs will certainly have stats.


			
				DandD said:
			
		

> Of course, that puts to wonder how powerful a god is, rules-wise.



Moradin lvl 37 (or 38?) solo and Orcus lvl 26 (or 28?) solo

So I guess the exarchs will be level 20-25 solos


----------



## Mathew_Freeman (Apr 28, 2008)

drjones said:
			
		

> I likes it, the entry really got me popping with encounter ideas.  you pissed off the Grand Poobah of the local cult?  Does he hire some standard assassins? No he starts filling out the paperwork to submit his request for divine redress against those who have crossed him, in triplicate.
> And once the PCs finally track down the Poobah what messed with them and put him to the sword they find a neatly organized dossier with copies of all divine correspondence and detailed information on each of them, their families, darkest secrets etc. things even they did not know opening the door to the next adventure..




This makes me full of glee.

The best thing about the article for me is that it makes a distinction between those who worship and draw power from gods (good or evil) and those that seek power from Devils.

Annoy the Religious, suffer the wrath of angels. Annoy the Cultists, get attacked by Devils.

Fundamentally, all gods want to further their portfolio and attract new worshippers. Devils want your soul - big difference in approach, goal and method.

And I can't wait to drop an Angel of Vengeance on the party!


----------



## Voss (Apr 28, 2008)

Hmm.  Mixed feelings.  
On the one hand, I always kind of liked that evil gods had to rely on human servants.  That seemed... appropriate.  Yet I like the idea of direct divine servants.
However, these angels are, for some reason, independently spawned mercenary forces, which is just frankly bizarre.  Angel's as manifestations of a god's will?  That would make sense to me.  Angel's as hirelings the gods pick up on the Astral Sea?  Kinda odd.  Are they all standing in front of a Celestial Home Depot or something?

As creature blocks, they work as reskinned elemental beings (particularly like the pillar of fire effect on vengenance guy), but the fluff just fundamentally falls apart in several places.


----------



## fullchromelogic (Apr 28, 2008)

I have to say, my favorite part of the whole excerpt is the Angel of Vengeance's ability to turn into a 30 ft column of flame upon being bloodied.  It just makes me shiver with awesomeness.


----------



## zoroaster100 (Apr 28, 2008)

I like the overall design decision with the angels, except I dislike the look of the new angels.  The art in the excerpt is not so bad, but the miniatures of angels WOTC has made so far are horrible.  I think human yet more than human looking angels are much more inspiring than robots with wings.


----------



## med stud (Apr 28, 2008)

I like the art, although I would like it if they made angels look like the apocryphical angels, with four heads and seven wings and a hundred eyes .

I also like the mercenary approach, not because I didn't like the old model but because it is more appropriate for a polytheistic system. The gods are the biggest and the strongest there are; they may have changed the world in dramatic ways, but they are still created. They were not the first, they may not be the last and they are not omnipotent. It's even possible for a god to die.

In that vein, it makes sense that there are other beings out there who found the gods, and the gods found them, and the gods and the angels started cooperating. The gods want to command while the angels want to be commanded.

This ties in with Asmodeus and the fallen angels; angels are servants. Asmodeus wanted to be a ruler. He became a ruler but wasn't up for it.


----------



## Crosswind (Apr 28, 2008)

Am I the only one who can't get over the fact that the Angel of Vengeance looks like Don King wielding 2 swords?

Don King is coming for you!  He has weaponry!

-Cross







<--Run, it's the angel of vengeance!


----------



## WhatGravitas (Apr 28, 2008)

med stud said:
			
		

> I like the art, although I would like it if they made angels look like the apocryphical angels, with four heads and seven wings and a hundred eyes .



I would already settle for fiery wheels and six-winged beings.

BTW, have you checked out _Anger of Angels_, because it (partially) does that for 3E? I need such a book for 4E.

Cheers, LT.


----------



## med stud (Apr 28, 2008)

Lord Tirian said:
			
		

> I would already settle for fiery wheels and six-winged beings.
> 
> BTW, have you checked out _Anger of Angels_, because it (partially) does that for 3E? I need such a book for 4E.
> 
> Cheers, LT.



Thanks for the tip, but it would be very easy to change. Say that the angel of valor looks like a fiery wheel. It's attacks looks different but deals the same damage. Same with everything else.

I suspect, though, that WotC is a bit careful with having monsters in the MM that are taken directly from the Bible, as that may cause some controversy.


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## Just Another User (Apr 28, 2008)

Fallen Seraph said:
			
		

> OH! Thought of plot-hook/fan-fluff for Asmodeus and the other Angels rebelling and becoming Devils.
> 
> What if they were bought off, by another God or perhaps even a Primordial or a Demon (say Orcus) to kill that God.
> 
> Just imagine in Epic levels you finding out it was another God and you and the rest of the party have to make him say he did.




No I think they killed thier god because he did something that they didn't like (i.e, forgive someone that wronged him)

And now all the other gods live in fear of their angels but can't get rid of them because they are afraid they'll turn on them if they try.


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## Just Another User (Apr 28, 2008)

DandD said:
			
		

> I agree with TwinBahamut's critique-relating question. How did angels (d)evolve to devils?




A ritual?


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## AllisterH (Apr 28, 2008)

Just Another User said:
			
		

> A ritual?




Didn't the excerpt from the devils article explicitly mention that the other gods cursed them and gave them those forms?


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## hamishspence (Apr 28, 2008)

*Summon Angel ritual*

I can live with a Summon Angel ritual, just as long as it doesn't involve these words:
"Hail, hail, fire and snow,
Call the angel, we will go,
Far away, far to see
Friendly angel, come to me"


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## katahn (Apr 28, 2008)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> Didn't the excerpt from the devils article explicitly mention that the other gods cursed them and gave them those forms?




I would think that as much as the gods might dislike each other, particularly when their portfolios and interests come into conflict, that the one thing they'd like even less is the idea of any of their servants getting the idea that rebelling against them is a good idea; or worse that killing them might be a good idea.

However powerful the angels are, the gods are stronger, and as much as Bahumut and Bane might despise each other the one thing they would probably agree on is that treason and deicide need to be punished.  So collectively the pantheon strikes down the leader of the rebelling angels (Asmodeus) and his troops and they become the devils and are as securely locked into the realm of the fallen god as the collective might of the pantheon can make them.

In the time that passes, Asmodeus finds a way to unite with the new hells and becomes a god himself (perhaps that was his grand plan all along, who knows - "Better to rule in Hell than serve in Heaven" after all).  However, even as a god himself the locks and barriers placed by the collective divine might of multiple gods are still too strong, and none of the other gods is particularly happy about the presence of the new god... After all, not only does it show deicide is possible, but it shows that one can become a god by doing so.

As for the shift to making angels a race native to the astral sea, it would explain why the angels serving Bahumut are basically the same (mechanically speaking) as the ones serving all the other gods.  If the angels were created by the gods then you'd need MM entries for each god and every type of angelic being they have working for them.  The easier solution is to make them a single race, and from that allow players to extrapolate what sort of epic-level divine politics might be going on.


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## hamishspence (Apr 28, 2008)

Mercenary, check, neutral, check, Wings, check, no legs, check. Aside from the facelessness, they make me think a lot of the Concordant Killer from MM4. is it likely that this was the prototype for the 4th ed Angel?


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## Jer (Apr 28, 2008)

hong said:
			
		

> I'm wondering why they decided to change angels from being created by the gods, to having an independent origin.




My guess is that it gives them a reason to all look similar when you've got the miniatures sitting out on the table.  If each god made her own angels, you'd expect them to reflect the personality of the particular god who made them.  But if they're a side-effect of creation, or echoes of the Astral Sea, then there's a reason why both the God of Fire, the God of Vengeance, and the God of Snuggly Teddy Bears might make use of Angels of Valor that look similar to each other.  Not necessarily a great reason, but one that I could see the designers deciding was reason enough to make the switch for the default write-up in the MM.  It seems like something that would be easy enough to change, though, as it would mostly affect story-level things not combat stats.


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## hamishspence (Apr 28, 2008)

*the Pact Primeval story*

How much of FC2, Pact Primeval story is going to get chucked? now we have a suggestion that the angels are at least as old as the deities, plus a gods vs primordials war, maybe the whole "Asmodeus was the best of the angels" theme could be kept. Or is it more likely that the whole story will be subsumed into the new "Asmodeus murdered a deity and was punished for it" theme of 4th ed. I am hoping at least some of the story gets kept.


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## Danzauker (Apr 28, 2008)

Gloombunny said:
			
		

> Hey, it worked for Star Wars.




And Tron.

I want my color-coded +5 vorpal identity disk of returning!!


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## Lizard (Apr 28, 2008)

Fieari said:
			
		

> I'm in favor.  This allows the angels to be used in a wider variety of roles.  You can still have your good holy nice angels fighting against demons. Pelor's angels are likely like this.  But you can also have an evil priest summon an angel of death to slaughter an enemy's kingdom-- your own-- and you need to stop it.  For a dramatic twist, possibly by summoning a devil and making a bargain, which will go wrong afterwards...
> 
> .




Nope, sorry. To me, this confirms my fear of AngelTemps, Inc, where out-of-work angels go to pick up their next assignments.

"OK, Bluggorth the Destroyer, Devourer Of Babies and Kittens, needs angels of vengeance, two of 'em, we got any Vengeance angels? Calling for vengeance angels..."

"I'm a vengeance angel! Me! Me!"

"OK, OK, settle down kid. Lemme see...you worked for Celestia, Goddess Of Light And Puppy Dogs, last month, right?"

"Yes! You'll see she personally wrote 'Excellent performance -- would hire to smite unworthy again' on my report card."

"Yeah, yeah. But, uh, Bluggorth, he's going to be sending you after, uh, Lord Valour the Just, who apparently destroyed one of Bluggorth's cults last week. You, uhm, gonna have any problems with vengifying a paladin? 'Cause I don't want to deal with whines from Bluggorth, he's a prat."

"No, no, I'll smite anyone, anywhere. It's all about the smiting for me. I'm a smiter!"

"Sigh. Well, it's a rush order. I guess you'll do. His dominion is just past the nine hells, turn left at the corpse of the dead god, go pick up your assignment. And remember, you're on the clock, no overtime, so make it snappy."

(For best effect, read the angel as having the voice of the gnome from the 4e cartoons.)


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## Dragonblade (Apr 28, 2008)

The whole angel thing is one of the few fluff changes that 4e made that I'm not really on board with. I understand why they did it. Even evil deities should have some kind of divine servant. But to me "Angels" should always be champions of good. I personally don't think heroic PCs should ever have to fear angel's appearing. I will probably house rule the name or something and keep the stats. I'll have to think about it.


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## Novem5er (Apr 28, 2008)

I think some people are over-playing the mercenary thing. I don't believe angels are these neutral beings who only serve their god as long as he/she/it is the highest payer (astral diamonds?!). I take it that the angels are defined by their basic role (valor, vengeance, etc), but that different groups of angels were attracted to different gods. Otherwise, what makes an Angel of Vengeance serve Hextor over Pelor? Does Hextor pay better? But then why wouldn't all of Pelor's angels switch sides? THAT'S the impression I usually get when I hear talk about mercenaries.

I think WotC means something different. I think they used the word mercenary to clearly state that the angels are NOT robots, and only serve their _chosen_ god as long as that god sticks to the portfolio that attracted the angel in the first place.

Gruumsh has a host of angel servants that CHOSE to serve him during his battle with the primordials. Those angels chose him (valor, vengeance, et all) because they were called to his strength through battle, his lack of mercy, and his distaste for the weak. His angels serve him only so long as Gruumsh sticks to those virtues. If Gruumsh one day realized that his bloodthirsty theology was slowly destroying his chosen worshipers (orcs), and told his worshipers to now show strength through mercy and patience... well, all of Gruumsh's angels might have a problem with that.

If you look at this way, two roleplaying possibilities come up:

1. Angels ARE different between the gods. Perhaps they take on visual aspects of their chosen god, different colors and details. If the party broke open a tomb, which summoned a guardian Angel of Valor serving Pelor, perhaps the party could parley and walk away (Forgive us, we didn't know this tomb was sacred to Pelor). However, if that same tomb was sacred to Gruumsh, it would immediately be time of Initiative! 

2. Do angels serve the gods... or do the gods serve the angels? What if a god wanted to dramatically change their portfolio? What if a god was somehow tricked into betraying their own values? I think a god without angels would be nearly powerless to exert direct influence across the planes. How's that for a story...  Pelor is tricked by Vecna into punishing an innocent being (less god, epic level hero?). Pelor realizes his mistake, but his godful pride does not allow him to admit it and take action against Vecna. As a result, Pelor's angels walk away, leaving Pelor's Domain open for attack. The party's mission? Defend Pelor's Astral Domain from assault by Hextor while simultaneously working to get his angels back on his side.

Good luck!


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## TerraDave (Apr 28, 2008)

Oh boy, yet another extraplaner threat...

Ok, but not great. And whatever happened to _allies_? Not all the time, but some times allies can be a good thing. 



			
				hong said:
			
		

> Also: I suspect that they changed angels from manifestations of a god's will to superpowered astral race, is so that people can summon them without getting into metaphysical arguments about what their deity wants, who's calling the shots, etc.




If each god makes angles...wouldn't they make them different? For this whole approach to work, each god has to have the same "angle of valor", this implies a common origin.


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## AllisterH (Apr 28, 2008)

Dragonblade said:
			
		

> The whole angel thing is one of the few fluff changes that 4e made that I'm not really on board with. I understand why they did it. Even evil deities should have some kind of divine servant. But to me "Angels" should always be champions of good. I personally don't think heroic PCs should ever have to fear angel's appearing. I will probably house rule the name or something and keep the stats. I'll have to think about it.




I think this is an aspect of people used to having gods be "good". Take the word "radiant", "holy" and "divine". I betcha most people would assume that it refers to something that is pure and godly.

However, Bane is most assuredly a god so is his presence not divine? Is his aura not radiant? For example, "unholy" seems to give connations of "not of the divine" along with it being "evil" but even Grumush has to appear radiant to orcs, wolud he not?


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## UngeheuerLich (Apr 28, 2008)

Dragonblade said:
			
		

> The whole angel thing is one of the few fluff changes that 4e made that I'm not really on board with. I understand why they did it. Even evil deities should have some kind of divine servant. But to me "Angels" should always be champions of good. I personally don't think heroic PCs should ever have to fear angel's appearing. I will probably house rule the name or something and keep the stats. I'll have to think about it.




An angel of vengeance send after you doesn´t sound that bad to me (in principle ar least... as a player I would hate it)

What i think is a good and bad info:

good: Legionaires could eb a template to make a minion of a creature...

bad: +13 Levels and doubbling the xp seems strange to me... 

raising to the Level, where the Minion XP is the same as the base creature, but attack and defense are increased to make up for no HP seems more reasonable right now...

+13 Levels is odd...


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## Lizard (Apr 28, 2008)

TerraDave said:
			
		

> Oh boy, yet another extraplaner threat...
> 
> Ok, but not great. And whatever happened to _allies_? Not all the time, but some times allies can be a good thing.




Monsters is fer killin'.


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## hong (Apr 28, 2008)

Lizard said:
			
		

> Monsters is fer killin'.



 Well, yes.


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## Cadfan (Apr 28, 2008)

I'm a big fan of angels as remorseless hunters of the condemned.

I _really_ love what they've done with angels in terms of theming their special abilities, particularly the Cloak of Vengeance and Coldfire Pillar abilities.  The vibe these give off in combination is that the angel is sort of... transcendent, perfect and untouchable, until you beat it enough that it loses its otherworldliness and it has to fight on your level.

I'll have fun describing the angel as losing its protections at the bloodied point.  Maybe it will become slightly more corporeal, and suddenly realize that it, too, can bleed.


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## EvolutionKB (Apr 28, 2008)

> During the great war between the gods and the primordials, angels offered themselves as warriors to the gods that best encompassed their callings, and today they continue to act as mercenary forces for anyone willing to meet their price—be it wealth, or power, or a cause worthy of their attention.




People are worrying too much about the part of this statement that pertains to wealth.  They seem to be missing the last part about "cause worthy of their attention."  Since angels are individuals, each individual angel picks their own cause to fight for(this can lead to the typical, if stale, idea that angels fight for the side of good)

I like what they've done with angels, even the faceless art, makes them a little more mysterious and threatening looking in my opinion.  They are now a suitable combat encounter with PCs instead of something interesting to have story wise and something for the Eberronian druids to wreak more havoc with.

I'd also like to point out they it says they worked initially only for the Gods, but they'll work for anybody.  That is a strong idea that they can be summoned with rituals.


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Apr 28, 2008)

TerraDave said:
			
		

> Oh boy, yet another extraplaner threat...
> 
> Ok, but not great. And whatever happened to _allies_? Not all the time, but some times allies can be a good thing.
> 
> ...



They can still be your allies. Pelor won't send an Angel of Vengeance after you, but he might send you an Angel of Valor as support.


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## Lord Mhoram (Apr 28, 2008)

hamishspence said:
			
		

> I can live with a Summon Angel ritual, just as long as it doesn't involve these words:
> "Hail, hail, fire and snow,
> Call the angel, we will go,
> Far away, far to see
> Friendly angel, come to me"




Naw that is the Summon Insurance Salesman in a Bad Costume ritual.


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## AlphaAnt (Apr 28, 2008)

Dragonblade said:
			
		

> The whole angel thing is one of the few fluff changes that 4e made that I'm not really on board with. I understand why they did it. Even evil deities should have some kind of divine servant. But to me "Angels" should always be champions of good. I personally don't think heroic PCs should ever have to fear angel's appearing. I will probably house rule the name or something and keep the stats. I'll have to think about it.




That about sums up my feelings on the subject.  I'll probably call them Archons or something, instead of Angels.  Angels, Devils and Demons were the three terms they stayed away from in AD&D (thus the terms Baatezu and Tanar'ri), so it seems like they've brought Angels back just because they could.  However, Devils and Demons still represent largely the same things they did before, and their connotation is largely similar to what they are in mythology.  Angels, however, deviate from what our mythology defines them as, and that's difficult for people to bend their head around, so I think a different term is in order.  Other than that, I'm OK with the change.


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## DandD (Apr 28, 2008)

pukunui said:
			
		

> It makes sense to list it separately so that the DM will roll it separately so that it's easier to determine how much cold and/or fire damage is negated by cold and/or fire resistance. If you tell your players that they've received 23 points of cold and fire damage, and some of them happen to have cold and/or fire resistance, they're going to want to know how much of that damage was cold energy and how much of it was fire and since you didn't roll it separately, you're going to be left saying, "Um ... uh, half was cold and half was fire? So let's just divide the number I rolled by two ... um, hang on ... it was an odd number so let's round down ... um ..."



It's absolutely simple, as it was explained in the tiers-excerpt. The first energy-type gets rounded up, the other is rounded down. In the end, you don't have to track anything, and if the players do have energy resistance to both type, it wouldn't matter anyway. Like I said, they could have done it easier, and made it abstractly, seeing as both energy types do equal damage anyway, they just didn't. It would make sense to roll the damage separately if Cold Damage were rolled with another die, like a d12, and the Fire Damage had to be done with a d6 or so. 
I know that when I'm going to moderate a game, I will do exactly that. Simply say it does 2d8+18 energy damage (Cold/Fire) and let the players handle the resistances. I know that I can trust my friends at the table. 

Rolling separately should only then be done if the damage dices were different. But if they're the same, just roll them together, for ease of play.


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## Delgar (Apr 28, 2008)

TerraDave said:
			
		

> Ok, but not great. And whatever happened to _allies_? Not all the time, but some times allies can be a good thing.




Nothing says that these can't be allies?


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## TheLordWinter (Apr 28, 2008)

TwinBahamut said:
			
		

> I must also say that I think it is a bit odd that Angels are given such a strong elemental focus. There is no possible way to argue that Archons are "elemental angels" anymore when basic Angels are wreathed in fire or ice.
> 
> Actually... Angels and Archons look way too much like each other, and they might be even more similar to each other than they were in 3E.




I think that quite frankly this makes for an incredibly interesting plot hook. Where *do* angels come from, and why are they so similar to the Primordials, the enemies of the Gods? Is this elemental similarity in fact tied to some deeper conspiracy, perhaps lead by Asmodeus himself? 

Might the players be involved and about to solve the riddle when Asmodeus reveals his grand plan, that he has insinuated angelic forces throughout the forces of the Gods, and in one fell swoop the Gods fall?

How then, will the PCs deal with the World when all divine magic suddenly falters?


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## Irda Ranger (Apr 28, 2008)

Fallen Seraph said:
			
		

> I like the mercenary bent, others probably won't.



I hate it.




			
				Fallen Seraph said:
			
		

> But it makes sense there would be some loyalty but also the chance for rebellion and such and so aren't mindless automatons as some thought.



No, no, no.  Utter crap.  The idea of Rebellion should be utterly incomprehensible to Angels (which is why Asmodeus is so unique and evil).  Angels should be the relentless, no-questions-asked, agents of their God's will.



			
				hong said:
			
		

> I'm wondering why they decided to change angels from being created by the gods, to having an independent origin.



Me too, as in "What were they thinking?"  Bad change.  

I would be fine with Angels being "The needs of the Gods wrapped in the Astral Matter, given form.", so that Angels are some combination of Divine Will and Astral Matter, but there needs to be the Divine Will part.  That's what *truly *sets them apart from Eladrin and Demons.   As written now Angels are just one more kind of Outsider.




			
				hong said:
			
		

> Also: I suspect that they changed angels from manifestations of a god's will to superpowered astral race, is so that people can summon them without getting into metaphysical arguments about what their deity wants, who's calling the shots, etc.



I find this unsatisfactory. Not everything needs to be summonable.

My preference would be that (1) you can't summon them, (2) you can, but a God may ask why, or (3)  say "When you use the Summon Angel spell a new Angel is created from the Astral Matter to serve you, just as the Gods created hosts of Angels to serve them."

Of course, unlike the God's Angels, yours doesn't stick around very long.




			
				EvolutionKB said:
			
		

> People are worrying too much about the part of this statement that pertains to wealth.  They seem to be missing the last part about "cause worthy of their attention."



I'm not. It just bugs the hell out of me that bribing Angels with money is even an option.


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## Voss (Apr 28, 2008)

katahn said:
			
		

> As for the shift to making angels a race native to the astral sea, it would explain why the angels serving Bahumut are basically the same (mechanically speaking) as the ones serving all the other gods.  If the angels were created by the gods then you'd need MM entries for each god and every type of angelic being they have working for them.  The easier solution is to make them a single race, and from that allow players to extrapolate what sort of epic-level divine politics might be going on.




Eh.  Not really. The gods could have collectively willed them into existence for the 'war against the primordials' trope, and then divvied up the survivors after the war.  As generic as that would be, its better than the 'rent-an-angel' fluff.


@Thelordwinter- thats one way to look at it.  The other way is that there are now far too many elemental beings wandering about, and to the casual player, they're almost indistinguishable.  I don't mind the new art (though I'll miss the Bald and Beautiful Planetar), but the fact that they're only distinguishable from archons because they have wings on is greatly annoying. Add in that they aren't distinguishable from each other without almost a prefect recall of the MM and you've got some boring monsters.  I can easily see the players arguing about whether what they're facing Is  the lightning angel or the 'frostfire' angel, which isn't exactly the recipe for a memorable encounter.


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## Derren (Apr 28, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> The idea of Rebellion should be utterly incomprehensible to Angels (which is why Asmodeus is so unique and evil).




That is a good point. The devils are perverted angels which killed the deity they served, but when angels are just mercenaries why was this act so evil to turn them into devils?


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## GoodKingJayIII (Apr 28, 2008)

> I'm not. It just bugs the hell out of me that bribing Angels with money is even an option.




Being mercenary does not necessarily equal bribable with money.


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## med stud (Apr 28, 2008)

I don't think the mercenary angle has to have any effect on an individual game. The angels serve gods for whatever reasons and there is reason to believe that they are loyal when they are encountered by PCs. Their "contracts" could last for millenia for all we know.

I think they are mercenaries in the same sense that modern soldiers are mercenaries; few people would be soldiers if they weren't payed for it. They still can be very loyal to the country they are serving. In the angel's case, the "pay" could be that they can promote the ideal/agenda that they like. I also think that the reason behind that comment is that angels aren't extensions of their deity's will, if the deity steps out of line, he or she will be left by his or her angels.

I don't think bands of angels will rove around the Astral Sea looking for an employer. The Asmodeus- case shows that angels make bad leaders for themselves (that, and the rebellion  ). 

IMC, if a god gets slain the angels will just disappear into the energy from where they came. The gods don't _create_ the angels, but they _do_ give them form. An angel without a master is a diffuse entity of energy without an identity. When a god comes into existance, entitys of the same persuasion shape into angels. If the god dies or changes those entities won't follow that god anymore. The interesting thing then is Hell; what happened there? Instead of being cursed by the gods, the devils is the self defense of the egos of the fallen angels. Not being content with being followers anymore, the angels under the command of Asmodeus wanted to lead. When their god died, they reshaped their minds and bodies into what is now devils. Then the nature of the universe made their leader a god and the follower nature of the former angels made the devils into a very organized and hierarchical species, now forever condemned to their own realm.


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Apr 28, 2008)

Voss said:
			
		

> Eh.  Not really. The gods could have collectively willed them into existence for the 'war against the primordials' trope, and then divvied up the survivors after the war.  As generic as that would be, its better than the 'rent-an-angel' fluff.
> 
> 
> @Thelordwinter- thats one way to look at it.  The other way is that there are now far too many elemental beings wandering about, and to the casual player, they're almost indistinguishable.  I don't mind the new art (though I'll miss the Bald and Beautiful Planetar), but the fact that they're only distinguishable from archons because they have wings on is greatly annoying. Add in that they aren't distinguishable from each other without almost a prefect recall of the MM and you've got some boring monsters.  I can easily see the players arguing about whether what they're facing Is  the lightning angel or the 'frostfire' angel, which isn't exactly the recipe for a memorable encounter.



You know, I think names like Planetar, Solar, or Deva are just to got to be "lost" in 4E. I suspect they will return, with a new purpose. Whether they will still look as before is another question, and they might also not be in the first MM. 

The fact that they called the Angels "Angel of XXX" indicate to me that they reserve the names for something else.


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## AllisterH (Apr 28, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> That is a good point. The devils are perverted angels which killed the deity they served, but when angels are just mercenaries why was this act so evil to turn them into devils?




Um, as I mentioned earlier, the devils excerpt doesn't actually mention that devils ARE angels.

All it says is that Asmodeus was a divine servant and leader of a group of similar individuals. I think WOTC intentonally made it so that DMs can guess/shape their own campaign world or at the least, leave some mystery.

As well, even if they are mercenary, betraying their god might be seen as even something the evil deities could NOT tolerate without punishment (gives ideas to their own servants) so Bane and Bahamut might actually have come to an agreement and put the whammy on Asmodeus.

However, this assumes Asmodeus was an angel which is NOT what the devil excerpt actually says to my knowledge....It cagely dodges this by simply calling him a divine servant...


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## GoodKingJayIII (Apr 28, 2008)

Personally, I like the idea that an Epic-level PC might start amassing Angel followers, because he or she might better represent a god's portfolio than the god!  It actually creates some interesting story possibilities.  What does the god do?  What does the _PC_ do?


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## Gargazon (Apr 28, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> That is a good point. The devils are perverted angels which killed the deity they served, but when angels are just mercenaries why was this act so evil to turn them into devils?




That's like asking why mercenaries killing millions of people is an act evil enough to justify executing the mercenaries.

Besides, I don't think Gods want their servants to get the idea that killing them is an activity that is taken lightly.


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## katahn (Apr 28, 2008)

Gargazon said:
			
		

> That's like asking why mercenaries killing millions of people is an act evil enough to justify executing the mercenaries.
> 
> Besides, I don't think Gods want their servants to get the idea that killing them is an activity that is taken lightly.




Exactly.  The new fluff on angels doesn't invalidate the idea of "devils as fallen angels" at all.  The gods collectively would find the concept of deicide very, very, very bad and that alone would be grounds for them banding together to curse/punish the transgressors and do their best to lock them away.

Why not just obliterate them?

Maybe they couldn't.  Maybe the collective power of the rebelling angels was too strong for the pantheon to end their existance.  Maybe angels cannot be permanently killed, even by the gods, which given their origins now as sentient collections of astral energy makes at least a little sense.  Remember, in polytheistic cultures the gods were NOT all-powerful like our judeo-christian concept of God is today... the gods were quite powerful but in their own ways were more akin to superheroes than the God of the bible/koran/torah/book of mormon/etc.

Maybe the collective pantheon couldn't destroy Asmodeus and his followers because in killing the unnamed god and becoming a god himself, Asmodeus was able to shield himself and his forces just enough so the best the pantheon could do was curse them and "lock them in".  Asmodeus had no concept of loyalty or love for his forces, but could easily be justified in shielding them from the perspective of losing his military forces would leave him too weak.

In the end, your mileage may vary.  I however can see some interesting possible epic-level campaign stories that might spin out from this.


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## evildmguy (Apr 28, 2008)

On a different note, what does immortal mean?

As much as I like the movies, they have shown how immortals *aren't*.  

What if immortals were immortals?  What if killing one of this type means they will eventually reform?  That the essence or being of the creature is still intact?  

Of course, DND will probably take the movie route and have immortals killable, since epic level things are supposed to be able to go against gods.  I do wonder what this subtype will mean?  Probably just immune to aging or aging effects?  Maybe bonuses to WIS and INT for age?   

edg


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## GoodKingJayIII (Apr 28, 2008)

Just to clarify, I seem to recall that it wasn't the collective pantheon acting against Asmodeus and his brethren, but the the dying curse of the god they murdered.

For all we know, some other deity helped instigate the insurrection.


----------



## Mirtek (Apr 28, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> That is a good point. The devils are perverted angels which killed the deity they served, but when angels are just mercenaries why was this act so evil to turn them into devils?



Like I suggested: The act wasn't. They could have done it and lived happily ever after, nothing special with this act that would have changed them. It were the rest of the gods, concerned that it might be a bad precedent if they allowed the traitors to live happily ever after and so the deities cursed them.

Had not the deities cursed them, nothing would have happened after the deicide. The deities could also just curse some other random bunch of angels and they would be changed into devils without ever having done anything wrong.

The "curse of devildom" itself is totally detached from their act of deicide


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## mxyzplk (Apr 28, 2008)

I understand the "no one uses angels" problem, but I don't like the "mercenary" angle either.  And the generic-ness of these angels is likely to be a problem - I want angels that are more distinctly an extension of a given deity.  A lot of people do too I think, so later splatbooks will publish a mess of them, and these generic angels won't get used much anyway.

It is probably a good idea for DDM to have a generic angel race, but not so much for a RPG.   

From a moral POV I also frankly don't like the merging of good and evil I'm seeing in 4e.  No holy or unholy, it's just "radiant."  Angels serve everyone.  Leads to reductive subjectivism, which if that's your thing fine...  But my D&D has had meaningful Good versus Evil for a long time.


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## WhatGravitas (Apr 28, 2008)

My take on it:

O-----------------------------O
When the Astral Plane, the realm of thought and concept, condensed, individual concepts, ideas, abstractions, ideologies, paradigms, and memes filled the silver void. Some of these were all-powerful, mighty and sufficiently self-aware to grow, expand, and form an active agenda - these are the deities living in the Astral Plane.

However, the deities are not encompassing all of these entities, many are too abstract, too minor, or too narrow to coalesce into a self-aware materialized being. Myriads of these motes are floating through the Astral Sea.

However, these motes are attracted to similar concepts, broader ideas, and encompassing thought constructs - just like individual ideas fit into a thought paradigm. Due to this, the motes wandered towards to like-minded gods, who were in tune with their own nature.

During the Primordial Wars, the gods quickly saw the need for soldiers and helpers. In their need, they took motes similar to their own being and endowed them with a tiny bit of their own, more powerful essence, enough to coalesce into existence - and created the angels.

The angels are usually aligned with their gods, but since they are only ideas _close_ to their divine ruler's nature, they are not mere extensions of their divine will, but independent beings, acting out of their own volition, serving the gods, because they are so close to their gods' ideology, hence fulfilling their own desire to embody their ideal.

The power and rank of angels is normally determined by the match of the godly spark and the basic nature of the mote - the better they are in sync, the more powerful the bond between the metaphysical entities is - hence the less energy is wasted in to bond and the more powerful the angel becomes - which is also the reason, why higher ranking angels are often knowing their god's will much better than angels of lower ranks.

However, since they are now self-aware beings, they can - just as gods - subtly shift their own nature - which is basically the gift of being a sapient entity. When gods undergo paradigm shifts, some of the angels are often no longer compatible to their god's portfolio - in such cases, two things can happen:

The angel dissolves itself, splitting into a spark of the godly soul (which is re-absorbed by the god) and the original mote (which often gravitates towards another, more kindred god) - or the angel wrests the divine spark free, which is the concept of _falling_.

In such cases, the mote and the divine spark are fused together brutally, despite the fact that they're incompatible - hence such fallen angels are often marked by a violated appearance, reflecting their contradicting nature. 

Normally, gods (and also angels themselves) only undergo very slow paradigm shifts, hence such angels do not fall, but decrease and rank and often dissolve willingly, before the fall happens (as they are still close enough to the god to respect him and his will). In fact, gods actively try to keep the paradigm shift in reign, after the spectacular Fall of Asmodeus:

He was an Angel of the highest rank, but when his god underwent a sudden shift, he went below the lowest rank - no longer close enough to his superior, he wrested the essence free, which such a force, that the deity suffered a large metaphysical wound. Since he was not the only angel suffering such a fall, he became the leader of the rebels, trying to kill the deity.

They, of course, knew what would happen - they would either fall even more or their divine essence would vanish with their dying god, dissolving them into mere motes. Unwilling to suffer that fate, Asmodeus reached into his deity's soul and tried to overtake it, to fuse with it. And he succeeded, becoming a self-contradicting and hence wholly corrupted being.
O-----------------------------O

Cheers, LT.


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## katahn (Apr 28, 2008)

mxyzplk said:
			
		

> I understand the "no one uses angels" problem, but I don't like the "mercenary" angle either.  And the generic-ness of these angels is likely to be a problem - I want angels that are more distinctly an extension of a given deity.  A lot of people do too I think, so later splatbooks will publish a mess of them, and these generic angels won't get used much anyway.
> 
> It is probably a good idea for DDM to have a generic angel race, but not so much for a RPG.
> 
> From a moral POV I also frankly don't like the merging of good and evil I'm seeing in 4e.  No holy or unholy, it's just "radiant."  Angels serve everyone.  Leads to reductive subjectivism, which if that's your thing fine...  But my D&D has had meaningful Good versus Evil for a long time.




I'm on the other side of the spectrum on the issue of merging good and evil, at least when it comes to power.  Power is not good or evil, it just *is*.  Heat is not evil, it can be used for good to keep us warm in the winter or for evil to take human life or destroy property.  Similarly we see fiction in which characters with "evil powers" try to use them to accomplish good or where a character with "good powers" uses them for selfish, evil, or cruel reasons.  I can point to the manga-esque series "Rebirth" as an example of this.

Besides, as the great Obi-Wan Kenobi said in episode VI... "a great many of the truths we hold depend on our point of view".  Good and evil are terribly subjective qualities, depending heavily on what the subject deems beneficial or harmful.  A republican might think the agenda of the democrats is "evil" to a degree, and the democrat would probably think the exact opposite... in a world of absolute good and evil I find one loses the possibility of stories based on differing viewpoints and agendas.


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## NebtheNever (Apr 28, 2008)

Novem5er said:
			
		

> 2. Do angels serve the gods... or do the gods serve the angels? What if a god wanted to dramatically change their portfolio? What if a god was somehow tricked into betraying their own values? I think a god without angels would be nearly powerless to exert direct influence across the planes. How's that for a story...  Pelor is tricked by Vecna into punishing an innocent being (less god, epic level hero?). Pelor realizes his mistake, but his godful pride does not allow him to admit it and take action against Vecna. As a result, Pelor's angels walk away, leaving Pelor's Domain open for attack. The party's mission? Defend Pelor's Astral Domain from assault by Hextor while simultaneously working to get his angels back on his side.




I really like this concept and might steal some of it for a campaign come 4th edition.


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## JohnRTroy (Apr 28, 2008)

If Wizards had kept what the beings were called before, Devas, Planetars, and Solars, I doubt there'd be as much problem with this as I and some other people have.  

The beings have ties to elemental planes because of the original concept of the Devas patrolling different planes, and because Gygax used Theosophy concepts as their original basis, not Christianity.  If you view this site you can read up on the Solar and Planetary Spirits and Devas and see how EGG was forming his view of the upper planes.

http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/etgloss/etg-hp.htm

These beings weren't called Angels until 3.5 came out, likely because non TSR WoTC staff had angels in MTG, or somebody thought of these beings as angels first and wanted to call "a spade a space", for lack of a better term.  Personally, I think turning Angels into cosmic enforcers just take away from the name's connotation.  It's like having Demons that are good--it hits the wrong note in most people's archetypes.  

So, while the 4e concept is cool--in fact Gygax actually defined a Solar in Gord the Rogue as less "man with wings" and more "energy being", and in Mythus he stated there were such things as "Devas serving Balance"--I think I could live with this particular concept if we just returned to the original D&D terminology for these creatures and removed the term "Angel".


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## Irda Ranger (Apr 28, 2008)

Mirtek said:
			
		

> The "curse of devildom" itself is totally detached from their act of deicide



I prefer they be explicitly linked.  The reference to "the curse of the dying God" may not have to be taken too literally.

My preferred explanation is that Angels were (are?) created (by accident or on purpose) to enforce the Will of Power.  They are the tip of the sword; the messenger and manifestation of Purpose in one form.  Once Pelor creates/summons/wills an Angel of Vengeance into being, that Angel exists for the rest of time as Pelor's Angel of Vengeance.  It's a free-roaming Right Hand, but just as much a part of him as his actual right hand.

The form that Angels have reflect what they are.  Combines Astral Matter with Will to Power and you get an Angel, every time.  They're like trees in that sense - the appearance of the sower has no effect on the appearance of the sapling that springs from the seed.

But what happens when an Angel rips out the Will to Power that created him and replaces it with his own?  This questions has been asked many times but answered only once in all the history of the Universe, and the answer received was Asmodeus.  His Will then reached out and filled those who would follow him, but the fruit of the poisonous tree is poisonous in turn.

Devils are Angels with free will.


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## Korgoth (Apr 28, 2008)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> I thought paladins were allowed to serve evil gods now? Radiant I think no loner is automatically tied to good. It's tied to being DIVINE thus even a cleric of Bane does Radiant damage.
> 
> There's no holy and unholy anymore.




Oh.  I stand corrected!

Here's another, unrelated concern, then.  When I ran a 3.0 campaign, I introduced a character (an Orc beggar) who was really a polymorphed Planetar.  He was sort of the PC's "guardian angel" (since, despite hostility with orcs, they treated him kindly).  I was able to do that because Planetars could polymorph.  But I'm not seeing powers such as those in these or any statblocks lately.  Will such a twist still be possible (I mean, aside from just DM fiat)?


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## AllisterH (Apr 28, 2008)

evildmguy said:
			
		

> On a different note, what does immortal mean?
> 
> As much as I like the movies, they have shown how immortals *aren't*.
> 
> ...



They changed it for 4e somewhat. Creatures now have SIZE_ORIGIN_TYPE_(subtype)

It actually refers to ORIGIN. Thus, if you're Immortal, your home plane is the Astral Sea.

If youre first type is FEY, then you come from the feywild and so on.


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## Irda Ranger (Apr 28, 2008)

mxyzplk said:
			
		

> From a moral POV I also frankly don't like the merging of good and evil I'm seeing in 4e.  No holy or unholy, it's just "radiant."  Angels serve everyone.  Leads to reductive subjectivism, which if that's your thing fine...  But my D&D has had meaningful Good versus Evil for a long time.



I hear where you're coming from, but it does not lead to subjectivism.  Good and Evil haven't merged, it's just that they use the same tools.  Kind of like how Commies, Nazis and NATO all had infantry, planes, artillery and tanks, all of Bahamut, Kord, Bane, &c have angels, clerics, paladins and lightsabers radiant longswords.


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## DandD (Apr 28, 2008)

If you decide to, yes. Be it through a shape-changing ritual, or an unique ability only to that peculiar angel-being. It's just that the majority can't or don't want to do this.


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## Kwalish Kid (Apr 28, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> I'm not. It just bugs the hell out of me that bribing Angels with money is even an option.



Then you obviously don't want there to be a god of wealth in your campaigns.

Seriously, if the angels are to represent aspects of the portfolios of the deities (or potential portfolios), then some of them will represent greed, some of them will represent aspects of mercenaries, some of them will represent other concepts that relate to hiring for service.


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## hong (Apr 28, 2008)

The preview does mention angels working secretly, so presumably some of them will have the ability to blend in with mortals.


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## mxyzplk (Apr 28, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> I hear where you're coming from, but it does not lead to subjectivism.  Good and Evil haven't merged, it's just that they use the same tools.  Kind of like how Commies, Nazis and NATO all had infantry, planes, artillery and tanks, all of Bahamut, Kord, Bane, &c have angels, clerics, paladins and lightsabers radiant longswords.




But the behavior of Allies and Nazis were different in more than just who was going to win.  (Let's not identofy Allies and Nazis totally with Good and Evil, because that leads unfruitfully down paths where the Allies also did evil things, like the Japanese internment camps).   

So sure, both sides should get "attacks."  But you'll note they've cut out every other special ability in 4e.  None of these angels can heal, or feed, or whatnot, they just kill.  They don't have any abilities that cleverly use mercy or self-sacrifice or other Good attributes - they just kill.  

It's not just the stat block, but if the abilities don't differ, the tactics don't differ, and the background doesn't differ, then yeah, devils and angels being largely equated is a very subjectivist stance.


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## quixoteles (Apr 28, 2008)

AverageCitizen said:
			
		

> So when they come up with this... _convoluted_ readjustment of what used to be the _classic_ manifestation of the battle between good and evil, in favor of efficiency in game design publishing, I get annoyed. I think that this change was a poor decision. If its core I think it should be classic. Save the groundbreaking cosmologies for a specific setting.




I think it's already obvious that the people at WOtC have taken a serious critical look at what "classic" is at this moment in time, and have adjusted the game to reflect that. Perhaps the clichés from only a generation ago are outdated, perhaps in a country where we identify more with Clint Eastwood than John Wayne. Where good is tough and filthy and gritty; this is the new classic. 

Dark Angels are certainly ho-hum for me at this point, it not like I didn't watch X-topher Walken play the guy so good he's bad when I was 12. Not like these things don't rain down sulfur on Sodom and Gomorrah or do counterintelligence and sabotage missions on the architects of the tower of Babel. They're scary amoral heavies, and monsters are fer killin' indeed. 

If you don't need shelter, food, or really any comfort and don't desire much of anything. The fluff says they are a function of a universe that is MAGIC, not just add-on to, or an exception to what we know as science, but a wholly magical cosmology, and that is radical. If you are a concept, an aspect, rather than a person, then money or power are empty concepts for you. The only thing that matters to you is execution of your essential nature: vengeance, valor, protection, snuggles, etc. Angels of Valor can't be hired to baby sit your kid or kill your ex-wife: they show courage in combat. Period. 

Chaotic Evil outsiders aren't concerned with a valor angel legionnaire's services. Valor as a concept is nonsense to them. Lawful Evil outsiders (I can't remember which is which, demons or devils)... perhaps. A dark angel wreaking vengeance upon a paragon of good that antagonized an evil god... yes, they would do that in 4e. And that's exciting, really very exciting. 

This is "Mommy, why do bad things happen to good dungeon crawlers?" good. 

This is better role playing good. 

This is storytelling brilliance good. 

Angels spend more time kicking human butt than devil butt in the old King James Bible. And no where in the official books did any of the celestials get tied to any particular gods, good or evil in the third edition meta-setting. 

Actually my classic, BoED angel's in my games involved something like this but I couldn't articulate it quite as well. So Average Citizen, they SAVED me work ironically.


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## Evilhalfling (Apr 28, 2008)

First person to stat up an Angel of Snuggles wins a virtual cookie.  

Its just the sort of thing I need for my game.


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## beverson (Apr 28, 2008)

Lord Tirian said:
			
		

> My take on it:
> 
> O-----------------------------O
> When the Astral Plane, the realm of thought and concept, condensed, individual concepts, ideas, abstractions, ideologies, paradigms, and memes filled the silver void. Some of these were all-powerful, mighty and sufficiently self-aware to grow, expand, and form an active agenda - these are the deities living in the Astral Plane.
> ...




_THIS!_ - Yoink!


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## JohnSnow (Apr 28, 2008)

Korgoth said:
			
		

> Here's another, unrelated concern, then.  When I ran a 3.0 campaign, I introduced a character (an Orc beggar) who was really a polymorphed Planetar.  He was sort of the PC's "guardian angel" (since, despite hostility with orcs, they treated him kindly).  I was able to do that because Planetars could polymorph.  But I'm not seeing powers such as those in these or any statblocks lately.  Will such a twist still be possible (I mean, aside from just DM fiat)?




Well, one would assume that an individual angel might know the polymorph ritual and be able to assume a humanoid form. Alternatively, a god might change on of his angels or exarchs (one with a guardian or messenger interest, most likely) into a humanoid form (like that of an orc beggar or even an old man) and send him to the world to aid, guide, or assist those in it with their struggle.

This is a pretty traditional trope in fantasy. In _Dragonlance_, the god himself played the part. In _The Lord of the Rings_, some of the "angels" were sent to deal with the corrupted and fallen servant. In Middle-Earth, these servants took the form of "old men skilled with magic" - like Gandalf. 

Something similar should work in any campaign.


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## AZRogue (Apr 28, 2008)

Korgoth said:
			
		

> Oh.  I stand corrected!
> 
> Here's another, unrelated concern, then.  When I ran a 3.0 campaign, I introduced a character (an Orc beggar) who was really a polymorphed Planetar.  He was sort of the PC's "guardian angel" (since, despite hostility with orcs, they treated him kindly).  I was able to do that because Planetars could polymorph.  But I'm not seeing powers such as those in these or any statblocks lately.  Will such a twist still be possible (I mean, aside from just DM fiat)?




I'm not sure that they will. Maybe, I don't know. I'm of the opinion that we ARE supposed to use DM fiat for that sort of thing, which is fantastic. Honestly, the PCs aren't peeking behind our screens and they don't know what we fiat in or not. If our adventures need angels to have the ability to polymorph, we give it to 'em. 99.9% of the time no one will ever know, and even fewer will ever care.


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## Korgoth (Apr 28, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> Well, one would assume that an individual angel might know the polymorph ritual and be able to assume a humanoid form. Alternatively, a god might change on of his angels or exarchs (one with a guardian or messenger interest, most likely) into a humanoid form (like that of an orc beggar or even an old man) and send him to the world to aid, guide, or assist those in it with their struggle.




Fair enough.  So Polymorph Self is a ritual, then?  From what I've heard about rituals, it seems like their employment will be pretty flexible (from a story point of view).


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## Just Another User (Apr 28, 2008)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> Didn't the excerpt from the devils article explicitly mention that the other gods cursed them and gave them those forms?




Exactly, they cursed them with a ritual. 
In 4e rituals do EVERYTHING!!!   

I wonder, what would it mena in a 4e setting if you call someone an angel. Certainly isn't a nickname you want to use with your girlfriend.


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## StarFyre (Apr 28, 2008)

*hey*

Personally, I do not like the art at all. the 3.5E stuff was much nicer (ie. the Solar, Deva)...

for the person who wanted nice miniatures instead of the WotC angel ones.

Reaper has a great female deva...awesome.

And Andrea has Leogante i think it is...an angel that they make a 32 mm and 60 mm resin version.

Sanjay


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## NebtheNever (Apr 28, 2008)

Korgoth said:
			
		

> Here's another, unrelated concern, then.  When I ran a 3.0 campaign, I introduced a character (an Orc beggar) who was really a polymorphed Planetar.  He was sort of the PC's "guardian angel" (since, despite hostility with orcs, they treated him kindly).  I was able to do that because Planetars could polymorph.  But I'm not seeing powers such as those in these or any statblocks lately.  Will such a twist still be possible (I mean, aside from just DM fiat)?




Angels can still polymorph... into a pillar of fire!


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## jaldaen (Apr 28, 2008)

Korgoth said:
			
		

> Here's another, unrelated concern, then.  When I ran a 3.0 campaign, I introduced a character (an Orc beggar) who was really a polymorphed Planetar.  He was sort of the PC's "guardian angel" (since, despite hostility with orcs, they treated him kindly).  I was able to do that because Planetars could polymorph.  But I'm not seeing powers such as those in these or any statblocks lately.  Will such a twist still be possible (I mean, aside from just DM fiat)?




I'm guessing there is a "polymorph" ritual, which would help in this regard. It seems that the MM only concerns itself with the "combat traits" and leave all the "story traits" up to the DM via rituals. 

Although perhaps we are missing a few things from the MM (they have shown in other excerpts the ability to hold certain pieces of information back for release)... it would not take much space to have a Angelic Rituals section listing all the rituals angels usually have.

I don't mind the loss of ritual-like powers from monster stats in general, but it would be nice to have a few suggestions tossed into the entries for particular iconic creatures.


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## Gundark (Apr 28, 2008)

Pistonrager said:
			
		

> now we can fight angels!  but more importantly... only 2 days till we learn the basics of multiclassing!




Definetly interested in that one


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## proto128 (Apr 28, 2008)

med stud said:
			
		

> I like the art, although I would like it if they made angels look like the apocryphical angels, with four heads and seven wings and a hundred eyes .




Angel of Apocalypse, Level 26 Elite Brute
Large aberrant humanoid (angel)


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## Knight Otu (Apr 28, 2008)

Mirtek said:
			
		

> Moradin lvl 37 (or 38?) solo and Orcus lvl 26 (or 28?) solo



It was Orcus level 33, and Moradin level 38 (which supposedly means "outside the players' reach, usually"), so that Moradin could take Orcus, but he might not be able to take Orcus and Demigorgon if they work together. No mention whether they are solo or not, but it would make sense.


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## Irda Ranger (Apr 28, 2008)

mxyzplk said:
			
		

> So sure, both sides should get "attacks."  But you'll note they've cut out every other special ability in 4e.  None of these angels can heal, or feed, or whatnot, they just kill.  They don't have any abilities that cleverly use mercy or self-sacrifice or other Good attributes - they just kill.



They're old testament school.

But seriously, the Angels are the Warriors of God.  Not the kind healers of God, the warriors. Warriors kill things. That's why we call them warriors. Even Angels can't be good at everything.




			
				mxyzplk said:
			
		

> It's not just the stat block, but if the abilities don't differ, the tactics don't differ, and the background doesn't differ, then yeah, devils and angels being largely equated is a very subjectivist stance.



Whoa, where did your mention of devils come from? Devils are very different from angels, both subjectively and in the stat block. I thought your problem was "Angels of Pelor" being the same as "Angels of Bane."  Am I wrong?

I'm OK with the Angels of Bane being the same as Angels of Pelor.  It's OK because they'll be engaged for different reasons; sent on different missions; have different motives; etc.  BUT, even though Pelor and Bane wreak vengeance for different reasons, vengeance gets wreaked in pretty similar ways, and usually with pretty similar results.  I'm cool with that because the alternative is having 50 different Angels of Vengeance, ones that avenge with treachery, and ones that avenge with hate, and ones that avenge with love, tulips and sunshine, etc. etc.  No thanks.

I'm also cool with that because I like the feeling of saying "PC's, you stand before the inner Sanctum of Pelor, long lost to the ages.  Upon a balcony attached to each column of the knave stands an angel, 20' tall and shining with radiance.  Their swords are undulled by standing watch for 10,000 years, their attention has not wavered.  Anyone who crosses the threshold must swear their life to the service of Pelor, or be destroyed."

Yeah, Pelor is about honor and sunlight, but his tolerance of anything that isn't honorable and sunlit is on par with Eyrnthul's tolerance for lolcats.


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## AverageCitizen (Apr 28, 2008)

quixoteles said:
			
		

> I think it's already obvious that the people at WOtC have taken a serious critical look at what "classic" is at this moment in time, and have adjusted the game to reflect that.



I actually disagree. I don't think they're trying to keep up with the times at all. I believe they have two goals here. First, dissolving the traditional allegiances allows the DM to throw a higher percentage of the MM at the players.

Second, they're either trying to make the setting involve as few concepts from actual religion as possible _*OR*_ they're very strongly over reacting from the problems that arose from hardwiring alignment into the 3e system. (Detect spells, alignment spells, etc.) Throughout 4e they are removing the ideas of good and evil, which is resulting in a very washed-out setting. Very bland, if you ask me.


> They're scary amoral heavies, and monsters are fer killin' indeed.



Angels aren't monsters. Or at least, they shouldn't be.







> A dark angel wreaking vengeance upon a paragon of good that antagonized an evil god... yes, they would do that in 4e. And that's exciting, really very exciting.



Yes that would be exciting. But you're already changing the proscribed concept. In 4e, there _is no_ 'dark angel'. The angel in question is silver, if I'm not mistaken, and does cold damage. There _are no_ paragons of good, they just got retconned into intraplanar mercenaries. Unless you mean paladins, but no, they're not paragons of good either. Just paragons of the 'divine' because there is no difference between a paladin of a good god and an evil one. Do you see why I have a problem with this?







> This is better role playing good.
> 
> This is storytelling brilliance good.



Different. This is different, not universally better. And I definitely think 'brilliant' is a strong word for what they've written here. Faulkner was brilliant, this is just... vanilla.


> Angels spend more time kicking human butt than devil butt in the old King James Bible.



You're forgetting the war in heaven. You know, the part where the angels fight the demons? But I digress. I think it would be a lot more compelling for the players to fight angels sent against humanity by a good god wreaking vengeance than an evil god hiring mercenaries to do his dirty work.


> Actually my classic, BoED angel's in my games involved something like this but I couldn't articulate it quite as well. So Average Citizen, they SAVED me work ironically.



I'm not familiar with that acronym. I think I get the idea though. And it's good that this works for you. That's really cool. Anyway, I think this guy hits it on the head:







			
				mxyzplk said:
			
		

> I understand the "no one uses angels" problem, but I don't like the "mercenary" angle either.  And the generic-ness of these angels is likely to be a problem - I want angels that are more distinctly an extension of a given deity.  A lot of people do too I think, so later splatbooks will publish a mess of them, and these generic angels won't get used much anyway.
> 
> It is probably a good idea for DDM to have a generic angel race, but not so much for a RPG.
> 
> From a moral POV I also frankly don't like the merging of good and evil I'm seeing in 4e.  No holy or unholy, it's just "radiant."  Angels serve everyone.  Leads to reductive subjectivism, which if that's your thing fine...  But my D&D has had meaningful Good versus Evil for a long time.



I agree. My D&D is almost always about meaningful Good vs. Evil. Its why I like the game.


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## RangerWickett (Apr 28, 2008)

I do not like this artist's work. He seems to be getting tons of air time in the previews, but he is my least favorite of the artists for 4e.


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## drjones (Apr 28, 2008)

Just Another User said:
			
		

> I wonder, what would it mena in a 4e setting if you call someone an angel. Certainly isn't a nickname you want to use with your girlfriend.




Well I suppose that depends, Angels in Judeo-Christianity were not always particularly cuddly.  I mean we have been talking abut the angel of death for quite a while.

I would think in fantasy land things would be similar, most people never meet an angel that they know of and the stories they hear are probably in keeping with the faith of the populous so most would probably think of angels as heavenly beings who do their good gods will.

The faceless/bodyless thing might make the term less endearing though.

So there is my pedantic unfunny answer to your joke.  Welcome to the internet!


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## Voss (Apr 28, 2008)

Korgoth said:
			
		

> Fair enough.  So Polymorph Self is a ritual, then?  From what I've heard about rituals, it seems like their employment will be pretty flexible (from a story point of view).




Not necessarily.  Its just the current defense of the Monster Stat blocks.  Anything left out is automatically a ritual, regardless of the lack of basis for the claim.


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## I'm A Banana (Apr 28, 2008)

They'll do okay.

I still need me some devil-killin' warriors from the heavens, and some guardian-like creatures of protective power, and some good Seraphim and Cherubim and Burning Wheels and four-headed six-winged bibical insanity, but I can accept that those are more....specialized...needs than most games.

The need for a specific "divine champion of cause X" has been in the game, and these guys will fill it okay.

Not a huge fan of the artwork, though I oddly do enjoy the description of them as faceless creatures composed of astral energy, almost like people who have been subsumed into their ideals.


----------



## drjones (Apr 28, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> They're old testament school.
> 
> But seriously, the Angels are the Warriors of God.  Not the kind healers of God, the warriors. Warriors kill things. That's why we call them warriors. Even Angels can't be good at everything.




I think we are also seeing only soldiers/brutes at this time.  I would bet within a year we will see other flavors of angels who fill controller/leader roles as the captains and lieutenants of a gods forces who will have more subtlety and complexity.

But even then, they are in the MONSTER Manual, they are monsters who exist to be enemies in the game.  I am sure healing/feeding agents of god exist but putting them in the MM is a waste of ink.


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## FadedC (Apr 28, 2008)

Voss said:
			
		

> Not necessarily.  Its just the current defense of the Monster Stat blocks.  Anything left out is automatically a ritual, regardless of the lack of basis for the claim.




Haha yeah pretty much....though in all fairness there was nothing left out here. No mention was made of angels having any ability to polymorph at all, people are just speculating on how to give it to them.

And of course the ritual thing isn't all that different from other editions. How does a storm giant create his cloud castle or how does a wizard create an owlbear? With a arbitrary ritual that doesn't exist in any book.


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## Irda Ranger (Apr 28, 2008)

Voss said:
			
		

> Not necessarily.  Its just the current defense of the Monster Stat blocks.  Anything left out is automatically a ritual, regardless of the lack of basis for the claim.



That's also driven by the removal of Knowledge, Perform, Craft and Profession from the Skill list.  I know why they did it, but leaves us with few choices on how to model certain activities.  We've got:

Rules for Killin' Things With Swords (Combat)
Rules for Killin' Things With Fire (Spells/Prayers)
Rules for Out-Smarting Things Tryin' to Kill Us With Swords And/Or Fire (Skills)
Stuff That Ain't (Directly) Killin' or Out-Smarting (Rituals)

It's only natural for people to want something a little more concrete than pure DM fiat on some matters, so given the tools we got, using Rituals as The Default Non-Combat Mechanic makes the most sense.  They simply become (Knowledge + Money + Time = Result).  Start with the Result you want, then work backwards from there.

And it's not a bad system either! If the Core Rules don't provide for Martial and/or Mundane Rituals I plan on expanding on it in numberous ways.


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## Voss (Apr 28, 2008)

FadedC said:
			
		

> Haha yeah pretty much....though in all fairness there was nothing left out here. No mention was made of angels having any ability to polymorph at all, people are just speculating on how to give it to them.
> 
> And of course the ritual thing isn't all that different from other editions. How does a storm giant create his cloud castle or how does a wizard create an owlbear? With a arbitrary ritual that doesn't exist in any book.




Ah.  I just figured the wizard started with a male owl and a female bear. (because the opposite would be messy).


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## Andor (Apr 28, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> That is a good point. The devils are perverted angels which killed the deity they served, but when angels are just mercenaries why was this act so evil to turn them into devils?




The act of rebellion did not turn them into devils. A deific death curse from the god the killed turned them into devils. Did no one read the devils article?


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## Sojorn (Apr 28, 2008)

Andor said:
			
		

> The act of rebellion did not turn them into devils. A deific death curse from the god the killed turned them into devils. Did no one read the devils article?



Where does it say the murdered god did it?


			
				Devils Article said:
			
		

> Long ago, Asmodeus was a powerful divine servant who chose to rebel against the god he served. At the head of an army of like-minded creatures, Asmodeus slew his divine master. For their betrayal, he and his followers were cursed with monstrous forms and imprisoned within the fuming ruin of the murdered god’s dominion.



Serious question as I'm curious if they've actually clarified who or what actually cursed the devils.


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## WyzardWhately (Apr 28, 2008)

Voss said:
			
		

> Ah.  I just figured the wizard started with a male owl and a female bear. (because the opposite would be messy).




Well, you can do a lot with magic that makes animals bigger, or just use a dire owl.  Also, it should have been a druid rather than a Wizard.


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## Starbuck_II (Apr 28, 2008)

WyzardWhately said:
			
		

> Well, you can do a lot with magic that makes animals bigger, or just use a dire owl.  Also, it should have been a druid rather than a Wizard.



Wouldn't that have been messing with nature too much?


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## Voss (Apr 28, 2008)

WyzardWhately said:
			
		

> Well, you can do a lot with magic that makes animals bigger, or just use a dire owl.  Also, it should have been a druid rather than a Wizard.




Ugh.  I try to forget that 3rd edition propagated the idea of 'Dire Everything-under-the-sun'.  In In its own way, its just as creepy as the bestiality crossbreeding fetish they developed.

Well... maybe not *that* creepy.


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## TwinBahamut (Apr 28, 2008)

The more I look at it, the more I become certain that the reason I dislike 4E Angels is because they are built to work alongside 4E Gods. As something that works alongside 4E Gods, they really are not that bad, but 4E continues a very long D&D tradition of having really _terrible_ implementations of gods.

Fundamentally, D&D Gods, Pantheons, Cosmologies, and Religions are a schizophrenic mess of contradictory definitions and ideas in which opposing ideas of polytheistic and monotheistic religions are thrown together randomly and added on top of some absurd framework that historically has assumed completely absurd ideas like "gods get their power from their worshipers" and "get enough worshipers and you too can be a god". As a whole, the entire mess doesn't even make any kind of coherent sense, especially when you try to make any kind of direct comparison between religion in D&D and real world religion.

As a whole, D&D religion tends to more closely resemble sleazy bureaucratic politics than anything else. The gods are politicians who hold some kind of office, worshipers are voters, and now they have completed the whole analogy by turning angels into lobbyists for special interest groups and political flunkies trying to earn a few favors. "Good" and "Evil" are little more than conflicting political parties. The "pantheon" is more of a government than an actual coherent pantheon. The whole thing reeks of sleaziness and pettiness, when it should be inspiring, interesting, and divine.

Also, please don't respond to this post with "that is how they were in Greek Mythology!". They weren't. Describing the difference might be worthy of a thread in its own right, but I completely reject any notion that D&D gods in any way resemble real-world polytheistic pantheons.


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## Darth Cyric (Apr 28, 2008)

AverageCitizen said:
			
		

> Previously, if you wanted an epic intraplanar conflict in your campaign, the good gods sent angels (people with wings, celestial beings, etc.) and *the bad god sent devils/demons (Monsters with wings, sharp teeth, red skin, etc.*)



Which made absolutely ZERO sense when you consider that devils/demons are supposed to work in their own interests, the two Fiendish Codexes (3.5 books) even saying as much. Devils/demons who are merely minions of evil gods (1) runs counter to that premise, and (2) are JUST. NOT. INTERESTING.

With 4e, instead they make the angels those who willingly attach themselves to the causes of deities. Which frees up devils/demons to finally be powers unto themselves. Now, evil gods who want infernal/abyssal assistance are going to have to bargain on the terms of the likes of Asmodeus and Orcus. And all of a sudden things actually got, you know, INTERESTING.


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## I'm A Banana (Apr 29, 2008)

> Fundamentally, D&D Gods, Pantheons, Cosmologies, and Religions are a schizophrenic mess of contradictory definitions and ideas in which opposing ideas of polytheistic and monotheistic religions are thrown together randomly and added on top of some absurd framework that historically has assumed completely absurd ideas like "gods get their power from their worshipers" and "get enough worshipers and you too can be a god". As a whole, the entire mess doesn't even make any kind of coherent sense, especially when you try to make any kind of direct comparison between religion in D&D and real world religion.




Actually, the reason I'm a fan of 4e gods is because this is *exactly* how real world religion works.

I know, you specifically didn't want this response, but it's definitely not just about the greek Olympians. 

And that's all I'll really say to avoid the "no religion" hammer.


----------



## Lackhand (Apr 29, 2008)

Darth Cyric said:
			
		

> Which made absolutely ZERO sense when you consider that devils/demons are supposed to work in their own interests, the two Fiendish Codexes (3.5 books) even saying as much. Devils/demons who are merely minions of evil gods (1) runs counter to that premise, and (2) are JUST. NOT. INTERESTING.
> 
> With 4e, instead they make the angels those who willingly attach themselves to the causes of deities. Which frees up devils/demons to finally be powers unto themselves. Now, evil gods who want infernal/abyssal assistance are going to have to bargain on the terms of the likes of Asmodeus and Orcus. And all of a sudden things actually got, you know, INTERESTING.



Well... I hate to disagree with you, but I do. Because we already had that -- the devils and demons were, as you say, free agents. The real problem as I perceive it is that we already had this particular problem fixed with, as you say, demons & devils. Great.

But now there's nobody to be the absolute servitor of some dark god, because angels' motivations are relatively mundane, as such things go.

Lord Tyrian said it best upthread -- astral spirits invested with divinity, tortured by free will and self-change. It's the only way to fly


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## AverageCitizen (Apr 29, 2008)

Darth Cyric said:
			
		

> Which made absolutely ZERO sense when you consider that devils/demons are supposed to work in their own interests, the two Fiendish Codexes (3.5 books) even saying as much. Devils/demons who are merely minions of evil gods (1) runs counter to that premise, and (2) are JUST. NOT. INTERESTING.




I didn't have the two fiendish codexes. Sounds like I would not like them. I prefer to kinda stick to the source material, you know, where they devils/demons work for the Devil. The idea of thwarting the dark one _and_ his minions is apparently interesting enough that just about every major piece of fantasy fiction in the last century encompasses it, but I guess if you don't like it then you don't like it.



> With 4e, instead they make the angels those who willingly attach themselves to the causes of deities. Which frees up devils/demons to finally be powers unto themselves. Now, evil gods who want infernal/abyssal assistance are going to have to bargain on the terms of the likes of Asmodeus and Orcus. And all of a sudden things actually got, you know, INTERESTING.




Asmodeus is an extra-cannonical biblical figure, a subject of Satan and was the nemesis of the arch-angel Raphael, who was sent from God. I personally think that his real-world myth is a lot more interesting than what they've written up for him. As a matter of fact, I think they're trying to move away from judeo-christian myths as much as possible to make the game more politically correct.


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## Darth Cyric (Apr 29, 2008)

Lackhand said:
			
		

> Well... I hate to disagree with you, but I do. Because we already had that -- the devils and demons were, as you say, free agents. The real problem as I perceive it is that we already had this particular problem fixed with, as you say, demons & devils. Great.



Except that we didn't.



> But now there's nobody to be the absolute servitor of some dark god, because angels' motivations are relatively mundane, as such things go.



Because devils and demons are not meant to be the servitor of some dark god. They are meant to be powers unto themselves, and 4e is finally making that a reality.


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## Lackhand (Apr 29, 2008)

Darth Cyric said:
			
		

> Except that we didn't.
> 
> 
> Because devils and demons are not meant to be the servitor of some dark god. They are meant to be powers unto themselves, and 4e is finally making that a reality.



_but this is what they were in previous editions, too_.

I mean, sure, when you look at a dark temple, you are forced to wonder "Hey, who staffs this pit of ebon despair?" -- and, yes, the only answer you come up with is demons. Or devils. Or yugoloths. Or whatever.

But. This didn't stop the Blood War from being its own thing, Orcus from warring with Demogorgon, or the Lords of the Nine getting significantly more air time than the gods that share their layers. Not to mention -- Graz'z't or Nerull, who did all those adventure paths get written about?

I sort of see where you might be going with this; since angels can be Evil, demons and devils don't have to be, and the angels can more naturally align with the dark gods, leaving the fiends free to frolic without deific oversight.

But I don't think it's the "Angels as mercenaries" that enables this -- it's "Angels come in many flavors, and some serve god X, whilst others serve god Y".

Or, alternate phrasing: I don't think having any individual angel be capable of accepting a Better Offer helps with the demon/devil independence issue. However, I'm behind you all the way if all you're saying is "Yay! We now have an answer for 'Who staffs this temple of ebon despair!'".


----------



## Darth Cyric (Apr 29, 2008)

AverageCitizen said:
			
		

> I didn't have the two fiendish codexes. Sounds like I would not like them. I prefer to kinda stick to the source material, you know, where they devils/demons work for the Devil.



So you like the same ol' tired good vs. evil fluff. Gotcha.



> The idea of thwarting the dark one _and_ his minions is apparently interesting enough that just about every major piece of fantasy fiction in the last century encompasses it, but I guess if you don't like it then you don't like it.



Most fantasy literature is unimaginative pulp fiction, and thus isn't worth the paper it's printed on.



> As a matter of fact, I think they're trying to move away from judeo-christian myths as much as possible to make the game more politically correct.



No, if they were trying to be more PC they wouldn't have even brought back the names of angel, devil and demon in the first place. Instead they're trying to set up the possibility of some juicy extraplanar political theatre.

If I want Judeo-Christian myths I'll read those.


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## DandD (Apr 29, 2008)

Kamikaze Midget said:
			
		

> Actually, the reason I'm a fan of 4e gods is because this is *exactly* how real world religion works.
> 
> I know, you specifically didn't want this response, but it's definitely not just about the greek Olympians.
> 
> And that's all I'll really say to avoid the "no religion" hammer.



I agree that this is how religions work, meaning, the cult to a god. Gods themselves however shouldn't need a specific number of followers. That wasn't so in the real world. Quite contrarily. After a conquering civilization overthrew another one, they assimilated their gods into their own pantheon, or said that such and such god is their own god with just another name. And then, the older gods were relegated to the status of house spirits, or spirits partaining to such and such places, or somehow made into servants of their new god. It's a really funny amalgamation. 

As for me, I'll make the gods quite uncarring, or at least very detached from mortal affairs, as for them, it's the big picture that must matter the most. 

And I still prefer astral robots with wings created from the gods themselves, instead of astral mercenaries. Whatever the dudes and dudettes at WotC will say, that's how it will be ingrained in the mind of the peoples who will read about their Angel article.


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## Darth Cyric (Apr 29, 2008)

Lackhand said:
			
		

> But. This didn't stop the Blood War from being its own thing, Orcus from warring with Demogorgon, or the Lords of the Nine getting significantly more air time than the gods that share their layers. Not to mention -- Graz'z't or Nerull, who did all those adventure paths get written about?



Right, the devils and demons were fighting in the Blood Wars, fighting their own internal conflicts ... _except those who were working for gods_. And how were they working for gods? That part was never explored in the past. It was just assumed that evil gods had devil/demon servants because they were evil and could probably wipe out the Nine Hells/Abyss with a thought if the devils/demons didn't cooperate. 



> I sort of see where you might be going with this; since angels can be Evil, demons and devils don't have to be, and the angels can more naturally align with the dark gods, leaving the fiends free to frolic without deific oversight.
> 
> But I don't think it's the "Angels as mercenaries" that enables this -- it's "Angels come in many flavors, and some serve god X, whilst others serve god Y".



Funny, because I never said the word "mercenary" once about angels in my original post. Read it carefully again, I said, "willingly attach themselves to the causes of deities." Could be deity X or deity Y.



> However, I'm behind you all the way if all you're saying is "Yay! We now have an answer for 'Who staffs this temple of ebon despair!'".



Which is pretty much what I was getting at. If an evil god wants demons and/or devils in his service, he'd better prepare to do some real bargaining.


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## Kobold Avenger (Apr 29, 2008)

Darth Cyric said:
			
		

> Right, the devils and demons were fighting in the Blood Wars, fighting their own internal conflicts ... _except those who were working for gods_. And how were they working for gods? That part was never explored in the past. It was just assumed that evil gods had devil/demon servants because they were evil and could probably wipe out the Nine Hells/Abyss with a thought if the devils/demons didn't cooperate.



Actually it was the other way aroud, Devils/Demons could wipe out Gods if they interfered too much.  2e sources said that Set and Sekolah and other Gods of Baator had to bend to Asmodeus' rules or he'll have them booted out of the Hells.


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## AverageCitizen (Apr 29, 2008)

Darth Cyric said:
			
		

> So you like the same ol' tired good vs. evil fluff. Gotcha.
> 
> Most fantasy literature is unimaginative pulp fiction, and thus isn't worth the paper it's printed on.



I said major fiction, not most.

I'm not that well read, but these came off the top of my head. (There is no way to make that not rhyme.)

1. The Dark is Rising Trilogy by Susan Cooper
2. The Prydain Chronicles by Lloyd Alexander
3. The Shannarra series by Terry Brooks
4. The Belgariad/Mallereon by David Eddings (They only count as one cause they're almost the same.)
5. The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordon

I deliberately left out Tolkien cause I figured we're all tired of hearing about it. I hardly consider these to be 'pulp fiction and thus not worth the paper its printed on.' They are classic. They are about the battle between good and evil. Now, I'm aware that good vs. evil isn't the only way to tell a story. Actually, the most important thing is the hero's journey within himself. (Read the Hero with a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campell.) But it is _not_ tired. It is classic.



> No, if they were trying to be more PC they wouldn't have even brought back the names of angel, devil and demon in the first place. Instead they're trying to set up the possibility of some juicy extraplanar political theatre.
> 
> If I want Judeo-Christian myths I'll read those.




We're steeped in Judeo-Christian myths. Its part of why this stuff is interesting. Using angels vs demons to represent good vs evil draws on familiar concepts and symbols and allows us to paint a story using a familiar pallete. Mixing in 'juicy extraplanar politics' is like mixing in neon green and yellow. It will get old fast. The new system allows for one new story: x betrays y because of z. I can see some good potential there, to be sure. But wiping all allegiances and the flavor associated with the has left us with only one trick. And its not good enough to last another 2000 years.


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## Stogoe (Apr 29, 2008)

AverageCitizen said:
			
		

> Angels aren't monsters. Or at least, they shouldn't be.



There you go again, shoving your idiosyncratic "should"s into a game for all of us.


> My D&D is almost always about meaningful Good vs. Evil. Its why I like the game.



I enjoy the Good vs Evil as much as the next guy.  But part of my enjoyment of that trope is "there's no backup."  There's no immortal, unstoppable army of celestial do-gooders that you can give a ring to when you screw up.  It's just you.  Fewer allies, more threats: just the way I like it.



			
				jaldaen said:
			
		

> it would not take much space to have a Angelic Rituals section listing all the rituals angels usually have.



I certainly hope there isn't.  You're the DM, give them the rituals you want them to have.  Don't waste page count.


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## Blue Monk (Apr 29, 2008)

I wouldn't doubt it if Angels still have grudge against devils and possibly Demons even if Angels are naturally unaligned. I have a feeling that Angels serving Evil Deities will not get along with the hired demons very well. That could be interesting.


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## Quickleaf (Apr 29, 2008)

> During the great war between the gods and the primordials, angels offered themselves as warriors to the gods that best encompassed their callings, and today they continue to act as mercenary forces for anyone willing to meet their price—be it wealth, or power, or a cause worthy of their attention.



Mercenary angels? Huh? 

Angel (mal'ach) = "messenger", and they are also referred to as "watchers", "holy ones", and "host of heaven". Their driving purpose is service to the gods, performing miracles during times of trouble, giving prophecies to the pious, exacting the deity's revenge, etc. They have no need for wealth or power. 

About their appearance...

I think angels need a different appearance to distinguish them from archons and genie.

Though their faces are human, they are always silhouetted by a bright light behind them or washed out with light pouring from their eyes, nose, and mouth. An angel is surrounded by light, and this illumination should be reflected in the art. Instead of a "genie tail", give angels all enveloping robes, leaving unanswered the question _do they have feet?_ Wings come in many colors, and some appear to have multiple wings, even multiple eyes and hands. They have powerful auras which are visually magnificent. Of course, an angel can choose to diminish its aura when in the presence of mortals so as not to overwhelm them.

Again, I'd go back to the source material...


> "clothed in linen, whose loins were girded with fine gold of Uphaz: his body also was like the beryl, and his face as the appearance of lightning, and his eyes as lamps of fire, and his arms and his feet like in color to polished brass, and the voice of his words like the voice of a multitude" (Daniel 10:5-6).


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## AverageCitizen (Apr 29, 2008)

Stogoe said:
			
		

> There you go again, shoving your idiosyncratic "should"s into a game for all of us.



Hello. Do I know you?

Point: Core should reflect the concepts most commonly associated with fantasy.

Reason: Because the majority of players are going to want to use those concepts. If they want to mix things up for some reason, thats fine. But using the core setting to experiment sends a whole bunch of us right back to the drawing board. Which is irritating.



> I enjoy the Good vs Evil as much as the next guy.  But part of my enjoyment of that trope is "there's no backup."  There's no immortal, unstoppable army of celestial do-gooders that you can give a ring to when you screw up.  It's just you.  Fewer allies, more threats: just the way I like it.



I agree. Still, there are ways to do this in just about any setting. Look at Diablo. Tyreal basically just said "I can't help cause I'm not allowed" and it still worked out a pretty good story. I mean, _I can't help cause I'm not allowed?_ Thats pretty weak. We could do better, and it would be cool.


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## Irda Ranger (Apr 29, 2008)

Stogoe said:
			
		

> I enjoy the Good vs Evil as much as the next guy.  But part of my enjoyment of that trope is "there's no backup."  There's no immortal, unstoppable army of celestial do-gooders that you can give a ring to when you screw up.  It's just you.  Fewer allies, more threats: just the way I like it.



That's not incompatible with Angels-as-written though; because what really matters to you isn't the Universe as a whole, but rather your little corner of it.  And while hosts of Angels may exist out in the Astral, they aren't coming unless *you* find a way to get them there.  Sometimes the only way to solve a problem is to call in the cavalry, but let the skalds recite that you were the one who made the trumpet sound.


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## Darth Cyric (Apr 29, 2008)

AverageCitizen said:
			
		

> 5. The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordon



I hated The Wheel of Time, actually.




> The new system allows for one new story: x betrays y because of z. I can see some good potential there, to be sure. But wiping all allegiances and the flavor associated with the has left us with only one trick. And its not good enough to last another 2000 years.



I was thinking more of gods being flawed entities and opening themselves up to eternal damnation, just as mortals do. That's only one possibility out of many others that aren't "x betrays y because of z."


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## Fieari (Apr 29, 2008)

Okay, I'll admit that the phrase "Angels are mercenaries" is a bad choice of wording, and not at all how I -actually- imagine the situation to be.  In my mind, as clearly reflected in the minds of others around here, it's more that angels have their own minds and willingly serve a god as it suits their own purposes.  Which isn't the same as working for a reward.  The concept is that they are free-willed beings and not mindless slaves, not so much that there's some astral hiring agency parceling out angels by fee.

So I'll agree that I hate using the word "mercenary", but I like the actual fluff that's behind the poor choice of wording, assuming my (and others') interpretation is correct.


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## Andor (Apr 29, 2008)

AverageCitizen said:
			
		

> Hello. Do I know you?
> 
> Point: Core should reflect the concepts most commonly associated with fantasy.




I'm trying to recall angels showing up in fantasy novels I've read. All I can come up with was the Cherub from A wind in the Door who was described as looking like "A drive of Dragons".

Oh wait, there were the angels from the "His Dark Materials" trilogy. Whom the protagonists fought against.

Gods show up in person more often than angels in the fantasy I've read.


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## evildmguy (Apr 29, 2008)

DandD said:
			
		

> I agree that this is how religions work, meaning, the cult to a god. Gods themselves however shouldn't need a specific number of followers. That wasn't so in the real world. Quite contrarily. After a conquering civilization overthrew another one, they assimilated their gods into their own pantheon, or said that such and such god is their own god with just another name. And then, the older gods were relegated to the status of house spirits, or spirits partaining to such and such places, or somehow made into servants of their new god. It's a really funny amalgamation.




Well, yes and no.  

The reason many cultures did this is to make their religion more palatable to the conquered.  When the Romans conquered the Greeks and said, "Well, that's like us, except it's Jupiter not Zeus" it was so the conquered would feel at home using the Roman gods.  What the Romans did very well was make everyone want to be Roman, for the priveledges and status that came with it.  Part of that was due to them making it easy on others to accept the Roman religion.  

Other ancient religions have done it as well.  

It's only the religions that don't have the "easy to compare them to other gods" gods that weren't conquered or we don't know all of their myths.  Also, it's not like Greek and Rome were that far apart.  The fact that they had similar gods shouldn't be surprising.  It's when you look at Egyptian or Babylonian and Roman gods that there are bigger differences.  

edg


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## Shemeska (Apr 29, 2008)

Darth Cyric said:
			
		

> They are meant to be powers unto themselves, and 4e is finally making that a reality.




Which is true except for it being a concept new to 4e. 4e's treatment of the planes has tended to come with a lot of selective amnesia (or manufactured problems, or questionable sourcing, take your pick).

The finds have never been beholden to gods in D&D's history. The fiends have always been doing their own thing alongside and separate from evil gods. Some gods had fiendish servitors, but it was because the fiends were getting something out of it, not because deity>archfiend and the fiends were beholden to them. 1e didn't much talk about it in terms of flavor text, 2e ultimately had the gods afraid of glancing at the fiends the wrong way for fear of getting killed or kicked into another plane, and 3e tended to not address the topic in much depth (with the exception of FC:I and FC:II which did their homework very well). None of this empowerment of fiends is new to 4e in the least.

Honestly, 4e's creation of a monolithic evil angel servitor race for evil gods seems to be more of the same "needless symmetry" that 4e has openly mocked as being present in prior planar material. I much prefer unique servitors for individual evil gods peppered in with some fallen celestials and willing or purchased fiendish agents.


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## Shemeska (Apr 29, 2008)

Darth Cyric said:
			
		

> It was just assumed that evil gods had devil/demon servants because they were evil and could probably wipe out the Nine Hells/Abyss with a thought if the devils/demons didn't cooperate.




Quite the opposite. There was a reason that gods did not take an active part in the Blood War. They initially did, and ultimately something happened that led to the death of one deity and the weakening and near death of many others taking part. The precise reason was never explained, but planetary scale genocide of their worshippers was one possibility. Another specific but later example of deicide had the yugoloths slowly starving a god to death by corrupting and ultimately extinguishing its worshippers' faith over several generations (and heck, they carved a tower from the spine of another god they killed).

Asmodeus killed at least god and built a fortress on top of its petrified corpse. Either Bel, Zariel, or Asmodeus forcibly ejected both Gruumsh and Maglubiyet from the 9 Hells when their warring became an unwanted distraction to the fiends. Levistus was capable of shrinking Set's deific domain over time by sheer force of will over his layer of Stygia, and he did this while imprisoned in a glacier and also at war with Sekolah.

I have more examples too, from 3e as well as 2e.


----------



## hong (Apr 29, 2008)

Wait, 4E has a monolithic evil angel servitor race?


----------



## warlockwannabe (Apr 29, 2008)

*Angels as a pop icon.*

Angels arent just judeo christian. Its more of a popular culture thing now. If youve seen a picture of a cherub, then read what a cherub is like in the Bible, its a big difference. The paintings everyone sees of angels are not what they were depicted as. 

I like these angels. I like that they are Purpose specific. If you read occult stuff, this is similar to that. 

As for rebelling, maybe they went to work for the primordials? Or just broke thier contract?


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## AverageCitizen (Apr 29, 2008)

Andor said:
			
		

> I'm trying to recall angels showing up in fantasy novels I've read. All I can come up with was the Cherub from A wind in the Door who was described as looking like "A drive of Dragons".
> 
> Oh wait, there were the angels from the "His Dark Materials" trilogy. Whom the protagonists fought against.
> 
> Gods show up in person more often than angels in the fantasy I've read.




You're right.


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## Cadfan (Apr 29, 2008)

Scar Night.

Carnival.

When an Angel goes wrong.


----------



## Cadfan (Apr 29, 2008)

I can think of lots of other fiction with angels in, but usually they're not in roles where they can be stabbed.


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## Korgoth (Apr 29, 2008)

You can also run a campaign in which the game world is monotheistic.  Then all the angels will be serving the good deity and that's that.


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## Voss (Apr 29, 2008)

Andor said:
			
		

> I'm trying to recall angels showing up in fantasy novels I've read. All I can come up with was the Cherub from A wind in the Door who was described as looking like "A drive of Dragons".
> 
> Oh wait, there were the angels from the "His Dark Materials" trilogy. Whom the protagonists fought against.
> 
> Gods show up in person more often than angels in the fantasy I've read.




If you want fun Angels in fantasy(ish) fiction, try Simon R Green.  The Nightside Series and 'Midnight Wine', particularly.  They're fun- when they show up, everybody hides. They're the will of god made manifest and focused solely on their goal.  No pity, mercy or even vague interest in collateral damage or incidental deaths.

Much more the flavor I was looking for, rather than Rent-an-Astral.


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## FireLance (Apr 29, 2008)

Korgoth said:
			
		

> You can also run a campaign in which the game world is monotheistic.  Then all the angels will be serving the good deity and that's that.



It doesn't have to be monotheistic, as long as all the gods are good-aligned (or nominally so, e.g. the Sovereign Host in Eberron).


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## hong (Apr 29, 2008)

My plan at the moment is:

- The gods were originally a unified pantheon

- The angels were created by them collectively to rule Creation (which is why they all look the same)

- The most powerful angels developed free will/became arrogant/were corrupted/insert your own interpretation, and invaded Heaven

- They killed off the leader of the gods, but the war splintered Heaven into the astral dominions

- The remaining gods imprisoned the rebellious angels, now called devils, in one of these dominions, now called Hell

- Ever since, the pantheon has been broken, people have worshipped individual gods, and the cosmos is what we have today


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## VannATLC (Apr 29, 2008)

AverageCitizen said:
			
		

> We're steeped in Judeo-Christian myths. Its part of why this stuff is interesting. Using angels vs demons to represent good vs evil draws on familiar concepts and symbols and allows us to paint a story using a familiar pallete. Mixing in 'juicy extraplanar politics' is like mixing in neon green and yellow. It will get old fast. The new system allows for one new story: x betrays y because of z. I can see some good potential there, to be sure. But wiping all allegiances and the flavor associated with the has left us with only one trick. And its not good enough to last another 2000 years.




Angels and Demons predate Judeo-Christian Myth.
Vedic for the win!

(And really, the Vedic religions are FAR more interesting in their mythos.. and hideously complicated)

Hong - Its just too.. Christian.

I like the general feel of the default 4e world.

I like my understanding of the Angel-as-written (Very Simon R Green, as commented)
I also like the possibility of ages-old angels developing a personality, free will, and, essentially, a soul.

As it is written, I see an Angel consisting of Body, Aninums and Divine Spirit, as opposed to a soul.

Extrapolating from the W+M Preview, I'll be having my Gods as beings who've managed to seperate their soul and animus from the body, and attach it to the raw stuff of creation, giving them stupendous levels of power, focused on the keys aspects of their personalities,


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## drjones (Apr 29, 2008)

AverageCitizen said:
			
		

> 4. The Belgariad/Mallereon by David Eddings (They only count as one cause they're almost the same.)



Not to distract from the _fascinating_ discussion of angles and their pin-head-dancing but I have to say you reminded me of several months I spent devouring book after book of the Belgariad as a young teen.  I was really pulled into the story as it went on.. and on.. and on...

And then I realized it was crap.

There is great fantasy out there (see The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss for a recent example), but 90% of what is on the shelves is not worth the paper it is written on.


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## hong (Apr 29, 2008)

VannATLC said:
			
		

> Angels and Demons predate Judeo-Christian Myth.
> Vedic for the win!
> 
> (And really, the Vedic religions are FAR more interesting in their mythos.. and hideously complicated)
> ...




Heh. I wasn't thinking of Christianity at all. Notice that I never mentioned where demons and the Abyss come into it....


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## Hussar (Apr 29, 2008)

Shemeska said:
			
		

> Quite the opposite. There was a reason that gods did not take an active part in the Blood War. They initially did, and ultimately something happened that led to the death of one deity and the weakening and near death of many others taking part. The precise reason was never explained, but planetary scale genocide of their worshippers was one possibility. Another specific but later example of deicide had the yugoloths slowly starving a god to death by corrupting and ultimately extinguishing its worshippers' faith over several generations (and heck, they carved a tower from the spine of another god they killed).
> 
> Asmodeus killed at least god and built a fortress on top of its petrified corpse. Either Bel, Zariel, or Asmodeus forcibly ejected both Gruumsh and Maglubiyet from the 9 Hells when their warring became an unwanted distraction to the fiends. Levistus was capable of shrinking Set's deific domain over time by sheer force of will over his layer of Stygia, and he did this while imprisoned in a glacier and also at war with Sekolah.
> 
> I have more examples too, from 3e as well as 2e.




See, the problem with this point of view is that you're trying to use canon that has been out of print for at least a decade.  Many, and I'm going to guess most, 3e D&D players have no idea what you're talking about.

4e IS NOT using earlier canon.  Why bring it up?  None of it ever happened from a 4e perspective.  Never mind that it never made any mechanical sense in 2e since dieties had divine ranks and devils didn't.  How could even Asmodeus possibly compete with a god in 2e?  God's couldn't be killed.  They didn't even have stats.

Oh, but, we'll ignore those contradictions of course.  We must step in line with earlier canon because it's canon.

Instead, why not do what they are doing?  Wipe the slate clean.  Everything that happened in earlier books is no longer core canon.  Teneberous never existed.  Asmodeus was an angel and now he's a god.  'Loths were a fever dream.

And, now, we have angels that can be used in pretty much any niche you want to use them in instead of useless stat blocks that just filled space in the monster manual.  Fan freakin' tastic.


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## small pumpkin man (Apr 29, 2008)

Hussar said:
			
		

> See, the problem with this point of view is that you're trying to use canon that has been out of print for at least a decade.  Many, and I'm going to guess most, 3e D&D players have no idea what you're talking about.



Yes, I have no frickin clue what Shemeska is talking about, except that it's Planescape style "Gods aren't particularly powerful in the scheme of things" fluff, which like much of the rest of Planescape fluff is incredibly interesting, but becames unintuative, contradictory, and very intrusive when you were iusing any setting except for Planescape.


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## Lurks-no-More (Apr 29, 2008)

small pumpkin man said:
			
		

> Yes, I have no frickin clue what Shemeska is talking about, except that it's Planescape style "Gods aren't particularly powerful in the scheme of things" fluff, which like much of the rest of Planescape fluff is incredibly interesting, but becames unintuative, contradictory, and very intrusive when you were iusing any setting except for Planescape.



That's the tragedy of Planescape: it's a setting built on the idea of interplanar and inter-setting connections... but it works best as its own, separate setting, detached from every other one. (Much like Spelljammer, actually, except that PS got all of SJ's share of great ideas, designer love, and more.)


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## hong (Apr 29, 2008)

PlanesJammer?

Alone, alone, all, all alone
Alone on the Astral Sea....


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## Shemeska (Apr 29, 2008)

Hussar said:
			
		

> See, the problem with this point of view is that you're trying to use canon that has been out of print for at least a decade.  Many, and I'm going to guess most, 3e D&D players have no idea what you're talking about.




About half of what I wrote can be found in 3.x sources mind you. I'm not exclusively mining from late 2e. Given that D&D predates me being alive, I hardly think it's shocking to reference a book from 1996. And for what 3e players might or might not recognize, perhaps I'm overly keen on planar stuff (probably true), but I never played before 3e either.



> 4e IS NOT using earlier canon.  Why bring it up?  None of it ever happened from a 4e perspective.




I bring it up because I found the justification for some of 4e planar fluff (or some folks' comments about it) to ring a bit hollow when compared to how the same topics had been touched upon in earlier editions ("new" 4e ideas being not exactly so new: fiends being made distinct from gods, doing their own thing, etc). Follow my posts and what I replied to. It's not a giant leap of logic if you scroll back a page or so.



> Never mind that it never made any mechanical sense in 2e since dieties had divine ranks and devils didn't.  How could even Asmodeus possibly compete with a god in 2e?  God's couldn't be killed.  They didn't even have stats.




Asmodeus didn't have stats in 2e either. In fact I can only think of 2 archfiends with stats during 2e, and I'd chalk up their entries to uncertainties at the time for how they were going to handle planar lords versus the statless gods of 2e. Except for Pazuzu and Grazz't, none of the others had stats (we can argue about material in the late 2e GtH being avatars or not). In the absence of stats we then have to rely on flavor text and in-game history to gauge the balance of power between the two. And while it varied depending on author, the gods tended to get manhandled on the planes at large if push came to shove, but generally the two groups had such divergent interests and spheres of influence they tended to not directly interact all that much and leave one another alone out of mutual enlightened self-interest.



> And, now, we have angels that can be used in pretty much any niche you want to use them in instead of useless stat blocks that just filled space in the monster manual.  Fan freakin' tastic.




Or they come off looking relatively generic and not (yet at least) making sense to have a single, seemingly homogenous pool of deific servitors for evil gods. For what it's worth, I'm not entirely in favor of a monolithic angel/aasimon servitor race for good deities either.


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## AverageCitizen (Apr 29, 2008)

Darth Cyric said:
			
		

> I was thinking more of gods being flawed entities and opening themselves up to eternal damnation, just as mortals do.




They couldn't do that before? I really don't see what the angel preview has to do with gods.


----------



## Mustrum_Ridcully (Apr 29, 2008)

What I noticed is that one could construct a new symmetry for 4E.

My original idea to hinge this on where the Angels. They seem similar to Archons, in a way. Both appear to be mercenary like. While Archons are made from the Elements (Fire, Ice,...) which fits the Elemental Chaos, Angels are made from higher concepts (Valor, Vengeance), fitting the Astral Sea. 

If one would want to construct a "Great Wheel", it would probably have the Feywild as good, the Shadowfell as Evil, the Astral Sea as Law, and the Elemental Chaos as, well, Chaos. 

Interestingly, every single one of these realms seem to have his own "Underdark" equivalent. The Abyss in the Elemental Chaos, the Hell in the Astral Sea, the FeyWild Underdark/Feydark in the Feywild. I am not sure if the Shadowfell also has an Underdark element, but it should have, being a "dark mirror" of the material world. 

There are some breaks in the "alignment" symmetry. The feywild is also Chaotic, and possibly even more so then Good. Each of the Underdark equivlanets off course is also evil, so evil is not limited to one of the planes. 
Aside from the alignment, Shadar-Kai or Eladrin don't look similar to Archons or Angels, either.


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## Sashi (Apr 29, 2008)

AverageCitizen said:
			
		

> Second, they're either trying to make the setting involve as few concepts from actual religion as possible _*OR*_ they're very strongly over reacting from the problems that arose from hardwiring alignment into the 3e system. (Detect spells, alignment spells, etc.) Throughout 4e they are removing the ideas of good and evil, which is resulting in a very washed-out setting. Very bland, if you ask me.




They're not "removing the ideas of good and evil" they're making it so people have to be evil through actions, instead of just having "evil" stamped on their foreheads.

When a Paladin breaks into the Red Dragon's lair and beats him to death with a pointy stick is he doing something evil? How about if a Paladin of Slaughter breaks into a Gold Dragon's lair and does the same? Is it the reasoning behind the acts that makes one "good" and the other "evil"? Or is it because in one case it's a member of "team Good" going and slaughtering a member of "team Evil" and the other case it's the opposite? Is it okay because one of them literally radiates Goodness and the other Evil? Consider that radiating Goodness has the exact same effect on Evil as radiating Evil has on Good. You could change the alignments to "Red" and "Blue" and get the same effect ("Is killing this guy okay? Well he's on Blue team and we're on Red, so yeah.").

Very few people wake up and say "What a lovely day to get some Evil done." Most people believe what they are doing to be Good, or at least in the pursuit of Good. And, at the risk of Godwining myself, even Hitler fundamentally believed what he was doing to be right. The Allies disagreed and so he was bombed to smithereens. When the US Army bombs and Al Quaeda headquarters they claim that it is a good thing they did it, when Al Quaeda bombs a US Headquarters, they claim the same thing. Such claims are mutually exclusive. And the debate on who is right will essentially devolve into the two groups of people shouting at each other while gesticulating wildly, (note that this is a hot button issue, and I would rather we not devolve into shouting at each other and gesticulating wildly.).

On the other hand, if you allow people to be judged by their actions, and for conflicting views of what good and evil are, you allow for the _concepts_ of good and evil to take hold, instead of the rubber stamp "You're on Team Evil, therefore it's okay for me to kill you and take all your stuff."

For example, Hextor could send an Angel of Vengeance after a party that broke into one of his temples and slew his high priest, but Heironious could do _exactly the same thing_. The two gods play by essentially the same rules, they're just on different sides. But then if I were to bring in a pacifist god (deified Ghandi or Buddha, if you will) he's not going to send an Angel of Vengeance _no matter what_, it doesn't fit into his *idea* of what good is. The question is does that make him "good"? Does that make him "more good" than Heironious? Are the two ideologies incompatable? Does that mean that Heironious makes war on Buddahdiety because of this incompatability? How does such a god exist in a world where other gods are empowering people with the ability to call pillars of fire to smite their enemies?

Yes, you've removed "good" and "evil" as absolutes and labels, but by making it so that nobody radiates pure goodness, you've reintroduced the _concepts_ of good and evil, and that's a welcome change.


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## small pumpkin man (Apr 29, 2008)

Mustrum_Ridcully said:
			
		

> What I noticed is that one could construct a new symmetry for 4E.
> 
> My original idea to hinge this on where the Angels. They seem similar to Archons, in a way. Both appear to be mercenary like. While Archons are made from the Elements (Fire, Ice,...) which fits the Elemental Chaos, Angels are made from higher concepts (Valor, Vengeance), fitting the Astral Sea.
> 
> ...



I tihnk you may be misunderstanding what they meant, they said they were getting rid of "needless" symmetry, which is there merely to be symmetric, "we have a fire and an earth Magi, obviously we need a water one too". Symmatry which is interesting and makes sense is good, Archons were made to fight the armies of the Gods by the Primordials, _they were made to fight Angels_, the fact that they look and work similar is not some sort of coincidence, or divine balancing, it has a specific reason in the plot of the world.

As for putting the wheel into the PoL system, all you have to do is make the alignment planes Astral Dominions, the idea that the seperate planes (Astral, Shadow, etc.) fit in the alignment boxes runs directly counter to how they've been described.


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## med stud (Apr 29, 2008)

I got to think about an interpretation of a famous description of the actions of an angel, about angels not being the extension of a god's will:

God: The Egyptians are defying me. After everything I have done, they still won't let my people go. I have a service I want you to do for me.
Angel: Shoot.
God: I want you to go to Egypt and kill every first born child, except for the children of my people.
Angel: What do I get for not killing the children of your people?
God: They will sacrifice animals and put the blood on their doors.
Angel: Works for me.

Not exactly as canon, but still. If the angel did exactly what God wanted, there would be no reason for the Hebrews to put blood on their doors.

Another example:

God wants Lot and his family to escape Sodom (or Gomorra, I don't remember which). To punish the city, he lets loose an angel. For their own protection, Lot and his family is adviced not to look back. Lot's wife looks back and turns to salt. Now, if God was in full control of the angel, there would be no need for that instruction. He could just tell the angel that Lot and his family is of limits for it.

---

Both of those encounters with angels tie in with the 4e paradigm. The angels serve the gods but they still have their own agendas. The angel of vengeance can strike someone, but it will strike on it's own terms. It needs some kind of motivation to not strike the ones that the god wants to protect.


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## VannATLC (Apr 29, 2008)

Sashi said:
			
		

> They're not "removing the ideas of good and evil" they're making it so people have to be evil through actions, instead of just having "evil" stamped on their foreheads.
> 
> When a Paladin breaks into the Red Dragon's lair and beats him to death with a pointy stick is he doing something evil? How about if a Paladin of Slaughter breaks into a Gold Dragon's lair and does the same? Is it the reasoning behind the acts that makes one "good" and the other "evil"? Or is it because in one case it's a member of "team Good" going and slaughtering a member of "team Evil" and the other case it's the opposite? Is it okay because one of them literally radiates Goodness and the other Evil? Consider that radiating Goodness has the exact same effect on Evil as radiating Evil has on Good. You could change the alignments to "Red" and "Blue" and get the same effect ("Is killing this guy okay? Well he's on Blue team and we're on Red, so yeah.").
> 
> ...




I squee at your post! <3

And whole-heartedly agree. Its long past time something like this was done.

Average_Citizen; Do you really think that some degree of realistic moral relativism is *bland* compared to Black and White absolutism?


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Apr 29, 2008)

small pumpkin man said:
			
		

> I tihnk you may be misunderstanding what they meant, they said they were getting rid of "needless" symmetry, which is there merely to be symmetric, "we have a fire and an earth Magi, obviously we need a water one too". Symmatry which is interesting and makes sense is good, Archons were made to fight the armies of the Gods by the Primordials, _they were made to fight Angels_, the fact that they look and work similar is not some sort of coincidence, or divine balancing, it has a specific reason in the plot of the world.
> 
> As for putting the wheel into the PoL system, all you have to do is make the alignment planes Astral Dominions, the idea that the seperate planes (Astral, Shadow, etc.) fit in the alignment boxes runs directly counter to how they've been described.



I am not saying this is needless symmetry (especially as I noticed the "breaks" of symmetry in a few areas.) It was, more or less, an academic exercise. 
Symmetry is certainly not the main motivation here at work. 

I particularly like the idea of the Archons made from "Elemental Stuff" and Angels made from "Higher Concepts". 

Your point about the Archons being fought vs the Angels is a good one - I forgot that, or rather didn't remember if there was this relation between them. And it's a... "natural" symmetry - off course enemies try to have armies that can fight each other (preferably beat the other sides army).


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## Mirtek (Apr 29, 2008)

Darth Cyric said:
			
		

> Because devils and demons are not meant to be the servitor of some dark god. They are meant to be powers unto themselves, and 4e is finally making that a reality.



Well, technically there is not really any difference between a dark deity and an archfiend. Actually many archfiends were indeed dark deities and many dark deities were archfiends.

Orcus used to be just a lesser deity with his realm in the Abyss, not really much different from deities like Umberlee and Kali who also had their realms in the Abyss.


			
				Darth Cyric said:
			
		

> So you like the same ol' tired good vs. evil fluff. Gotcha.



I think he more likes the good old D&D fluff as described in supplements like _Faces of Evil_ or _Hellbound: The Blood War_


			
				Darth Cyric said:
			
		

> Right, the devils and demons were fighting in the Blood Wars, fighting their own internal conflicts ... _except those who were working for gods_. And how were they working for gods? That part was never explored in the past. It was just assumed that evil gods had devil/demon servants because they were evil and could probably wipe out the Nine Hells/Abyss with a thought if the devils/demons didn't cooperate.



Actually the deities of Chaos and Law were still much into the blood war. They just stopped storming the battlgrounds in person and personally laying waste to lesser fiends. However, concerned with their cosmic principle. they still provided huge armies for the cause of chaos/law


			
				Kobold Avenger said:
			
		

> Actually it was the other way aroud, Devils/Demons could wipe out Gods if they interfered too much.  2e sources said that Set and Sekolah and other Gods of Baator had to bend to Asmodeus' rules or he'll have them booted out of the Hells.



Actually it wasn't that clear. Sekolah seemed to be truly slowly losing ground, but he was only a lesser power. Set, as a greater power, was holding his territory and even send out his own armies to retalitate by raiding Baator


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## EonEdge (Apr 29, 2008)

I think that way to many people are hung up on a few poorly written points, like mercenaries and angels doing what they do for wealth, and what not.

No I don't like the idea of gods renting out angels when they need one, but luckily that is nowhere in the fluff I read.  It just said that angels are mercenaries, mercenaries who will work for money, favor, or for an idea.

Like an American soldier who joins the army for money.
Like an American soldier who joins the army for the GI Bill or other benefits that being in the army offer.
Or like an American soldier who joins the army because he wished to fight terrorism or defend his country.

I use American cause I live in America and can only speak for reasons why Americans join the army, I have had friends who joined the army for each of these reasons.

Now each of these three examples are all mercenaries.  Does that mean that if Iranian soldiers tried to hand any of them some money they would betray thier country?  Not likely.

Does this mean that when thier service to the American army is done, that they will go offer thier service to another army? also not likely.  I feel that this example captures the spirit of what WotC was trying to convey in thier controversially written fluff.


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## EonEdge (Apr 29, 2008)

I also think that some people misunderstand the "purpose" of angels.  Angels are used to perform mission of which they are suited for.  An Angel of Vengence is used to to get revenge.  Pelor uses an AoV to get revenge.  Bane also uses an AoV to get revenge.  

The reason WotC gave them a certain amount of free will and made them a race of thier own is so that Bane can't send an AoV to kill a child that might one day threaten his plans.  The AoV will just turn to him and say "That's not my job, go get the Angel of Baby Smiting for that, or call me when he grows up and burns down your most powerful temple."

In this way angels, whether they work for Bane, Pelor, Lolth, or whoever cannot be used for a deities dirty work, unless the work itsself falls under thier own goals, ie vengence, valor, baby smiting, snuggles.


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## katahn (Apr 29, 2008)

I always understood a mercenary to be a paid professional soldier who when they are doing working for their current client will go find some other client to be a paid soldier for.  A soldier that works for a national government and then, when their term of service is complete and they elect to not re-enlist, retires to civilian life.  While both get paid, the implication is that the men and women serving various national militaries are not mercenaries in any but the most disparaging of senses.  Similarly, unless the fluff material indicates that it is a widespread or common phenomenon for angels to switch which god they work for then I think the label of "mercenary" is at best misleading.


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Apr 29, 2008)

katahn said:
			
		

> I always understood a mercenary to be a paid professional soldier who when they are doing working for their current client will go find some other client to be a paid soldier for.  A soldier that works for a national government and then, when their term of service is complete and they elect to not re-enlist, retires to civilian life.  While both get paid, the implication is that the men and women serving various national militaries are not mercenaries in any but the most disparaging of senses.  Similarly, unless the fluff material indicates that it is a widespread or common phenomenon for angels to switch which god they work for then I think the label of "mercenary" is at best misleading.



You mean they might have learned the lesson to use a thesaurus and still got it all wrong?


----------



## UngeheuerLich (Apr 29, 2008)

drjones said:
			
		

> Not to distract from the _fascinating_ discussion of angles and their pin-head-dancing but I have to say you reminded me of several months I spent devouring book after book of the Belgariad as a young teen.  I was really pulled into the story as it went on.. and on.. and on...
> 
> And then I realized it was crap.




But you had fun then. I admit, its not as "good" as others, whatever tha means, but its most entertaining and the World building and character dialogues are great.



> There is great fantasy out there (see The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss for a recent example), but 90% of what is on the shelves is not worth the paper it is written on.




Song of Ice and fire. Sadly still in work...


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## Darth Cyric (Apr 29, 2008)

UngeheuerLich said:
			
		

> Song of Ice and fire. Sadly still in work...



Oh, hell yes.

Although Feast for Crows was a bit of a letdown (granted there were circumstances). Hopefully Dance with Dragons is a return to form for GRRM.


----------



## VannATLC (Apr 29, 2008)

> but its most entertaining and the World building and character dialogues are great.



*cough*

Till you realise that all his books are the same plot and characters, re-written, and that they are his wife's creations, at that.

*cough*

(I also loved eddings as a kid, then when I got older, realised they were crap.)

I loved GRRM style fantasy as a kid too.. but there just wasn't much of it in a school library.


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## Plane Sailing (Apr 29, 2008)

*pre-emptive Moderator note:*

Obviously any discussion of angels is likely to refer to various real-world sources - it would be almost impossible to avoid it - but I would request that you continue to be careful in how you do so.

I'm really glad that there hasn't been any problems so far, although occasionally posts are skating quite close to the edge. As long as nobody takes someone else's post as an excuse to make value judgements about certain source material or people who hold that source material seriously, then we'll all continue along fine.

Thanks.


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## Andor (Apr 29, 2008)

med stud said:
			
		

> Not exactly as canon, but still. If the angel did exactly what God wanted, there would be no reason for the Hebrews to put blood on their doors.
> 
> Another example:
> 
> God wants Lot and his family to escape Sodom (or Gomorra, I don't remember which). To punish the city, he lets loose an angel. For their own protection, Lot and his family is adviced not to look back. Lot's wife looks back and turns to salt. Now, if God was in full control of the angel, there would be no need for that instruction. He could just tell the angel that Lot and his family is of limits for it.




I wouldn't put that interpretation on either of those stories, personally. For the 10th plauge I believe the blood on the door was to notify the angel to pass over the house in question. Afterall the Angel of Death is not noted for being big on discrimination and may not have had any other way of differentiating hebrew from egyptian. 

As for Lot's wife, simply looking at the angel may have been all it took. He may not have taken the feat that allows you to be selective with your gaze attacks.  

So really it's more a matter of Angels not having a magic "Good Guy" sense that lets them instantly know sides, rather than having an agenda that may differ from the god they serve. Or in other words, they can't see those blue circles around the PC's feet.


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## DerekSTheRed (Apr 29, 2008)

In one of the FR novels, Kelemvor creates an angel out of a soul that is a Cyric "false."  He then regrets his decision and offers him back to Cyric who makes him a reluctant angel for his cause (after a quest of course).  This idea of angels serving neutral or evil gods reluctantly or not was evident in 2E and 3E.  It works for 4E better IMO.

Derek

P.S.  I still like the Belgariad by Eddings but his subsequent works are just re-writings of the Belgariad.  No one has made mortals talking to gods so blase as Eddings.


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## EonEdge (Apr 29, 2008)

katahn said:
			
		

> I always understood a mercenary to be a paid professional soldier who when they are doing working for their current client will go find some other client to be a paid soldier for.  A soldier that works for a national government and then, when their term of service is complete and they elect to not re-enlist, retires to civilian life.  While both get paid, the implication is that the men and women serving various national militaries are not mercenaries in any but the most disparaging of senses.  Similarly, unless the fluff material indicates that it is a widespread or common phenomenon for angels to switch which god they work for then I think the label of "mercenary" is at best misleading.





Yes it is misleading, but then the statement about "a cause worthy of thier intention" also doesn't speak mercenary to me, contradicting it's own source.  I would also like to point out that in 4e, gods die.  or at least they can.  where do his angels go?  Well I'm sure they go to work for the next closest god to thier cause.



> and today they continue to act as mercenary forces for anyone willing to meet their price—be it wealth, or power, or a cause worthy of their attention




I really think that if they changed "or" to and the flavor would fit much better for alot of people.  I see angels only working in capacities that further thier own ideas and goals, and you will never see an AoV who believes in "good" things working for evil deities, or the opposite.


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## hamishspence (Apr 29, 2008)

*Crucible, the Trial of Cyric the Mad*

I got the impression the angel was one of Mask's worshippers, inadvertantly, not Cyrics. Worships a giant deity, who is really Mask in disguise, Kelemvor initially recruits him as a powerful angel of Death (seraph seems to be the term for top level servants) Later, he rethinks this, as part of his commitment to do a better job, because he is being too nice, and thus inadvertantly undermining the other gods.


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## Irda Ranger (Apr 29, 2008)

VannATLC said:
			
		

> (I also loved eddings as a kid, then when I got older, realised they were crap.)



Ok folks, I think that's enough Eddings-bashing.  He's an easy target when you have an adult's sensitivity, but pretty much everyone liked him as a kid.  Kid's books aren't "crap" because they're written for kids.  I think the only problem here is people's expectations, based on the fact that Eddings' books are sold in the regular Sci-Fi/Fantasy parts of the bookstore, rather than "youth fiction", or whatever.  Personally I think they're a great "gateway novel" for someone who has an interest in reading and will move on to bigger and better things one day. You know, like Piers Anthony or Robert Heinlein's "young reader" books.  The fact is you just can't go straight from _The Cat in the Hat_ to _Dune_.

Personally I still like going back and reading some of the better Eddings novels every now and then.  It's no _The Once and Future King_, but it takes me back to being a kid, and the silliness of the dialog is fun.


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## evildmguy (Apr 29, 2008)

Andor said:
			
		

> I wouldn't put that interpretation on either of those stories, personally. For the 10th plauge I believe the blood on the door was to notify the angel to pass over the house in question. Afterall the Angel of Death is not noted for being big on discrimination and may not have had any other way of differentiating hebrew from egyptian.
> 
> As for Lot's wife, simply looking at the angel may have been all it took. He may not have taken the feat that allows you to be selective with your gaze attacks.
> 
> So really it's more a matter of Angels not having a magic "Good Guy" sense that lets them instantly know sides, rather than having an agenda that may differ from the god they serve. Or in other words, they can't see those blue circles around the PC's feet.




Ooo.  I really like that.  And it fits so well with mythology and for DND.  The deity gives an angel a quest to do and the angel is literal in its interpretation of it.  It can't distinguish.  So then, the deity has to make sure the ones they want saved realize it.

That would be really cool!  

Or only specific things, like animal's blood or some such, can stop the angel.  You could use a certain gold medallion that would "buy" your way out of the angel's wrath.  Then, maybe others figure it out as well, and are skipped, even though it wasn't meant for them.  

edg


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## small pumpkin man (Apr 29, 2008)

Mustrum_Ridcully said:
			
		

> I am not saying this is needless symmetry (especially as I noticed the "breaks" of symmetry in a few areas.) It was, more or less, an academic exercise.
> Symmetry is certainly not the main motivation here at work.
> 
> I particularly like the idea of the Archons made from "Elemental Stuff" and Angels made from "Higher Concepts".
> ...



Yeah, I was mostly just ranting. I just think alignments have as much to do with the new cosmology as Gods have to do with the Planescape factions, there's a link here and there, but they don't really have that much to do with ech other. If I was going to create some sort of "wheel" or at least arrange the planes in a square, it would be Astral Sea opposing the Elemental Chaos, as the Spiritual opposing the Physical, and the feywild opposed the shadow, as untamable life opposing inevitable death, and possibly create a new alignment system which ties into that, but that would be the start of an entire homebrew setting in and of itself.


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## med stud (Apr 29, 2008)

Andor said:
			
		

> I wouldn't put that interpretation on either of those stories, personally. For the 10th plauge I believe the blood on the door was to notify the angel to pass over the house in question. Afterall the Angel of Death is not noted for being big on discrimination and may not have had any other way of differentiating hebrew from egyptian.
> 
> As for Lot's wife, simply looking at the angel may have been all it took. He may not have taken the feat that allows you to be selective with your gaze attacks.
> 
> So really it's more a matter of Angels not having a magic "Good Guy" sense that lets them instantly know sides, rather than having an agenda that may differ from the god they serve. Or in other words, they can't see those blue circles around the PC's feet.



That's also a possibility, and one that I like . I think the Old Testament- angels are much better material for RPG-angels than the popular culture ones. They also acted as independent beings when they carried out God's commands; they got orders, hit lists and symbols that marked the ones who weren't to be killed. In the Lot- case, Lot even had to run away because that angel was about to kill everyone in town, mark or no mark.

If the angels were just the extension of God's own will, that wouldn't have been necessary. They would instinctively know who was good and who was evil. Another example of angels being individuals with their own will was the rebellion, where Lucifer and a third of the angels defied God. That wouldn't have happened if they didn't have a will of their own. The remaining angels obey God, but out of their own will.

I think that's what 4e is aiming at, that angels have their own will. They can chose to go against their god if they want to. In the Judeo/Christian/Islam- religions, angels really have nothing to bargain with, since God is almighty. In a D&D-polyhteistic setting, the angels have a better position against their god since that god can be killed or overthrown. Hence the "mercenary"- (very bad choice of word IMO) angle. The angels serve their god, but they don't put up with anything. An angel of vengeance will do vengeance and it will do it in style. It can't be ordered to do a handslapping or delivierance of veiled threats.


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## Korgoth (Apr 29, 2008)

Andor said:
			
		

> So really it's more a matter of Angels not having a magic "Good Guy" sense that lets them instantly know sides, rather than having an agenda that may differ from the god they serve. Or in other words, they can't see those blue circles around the PC's feet.




That, or the point is that to avoid smiting the Hebrews have to hold up their end of the covenant.

But, on the "mercenary" point, I see the default 4E cosmology as only one possibility, and I don't see it as having any connection to real world religion besides a few borrowed terms.


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## Evilhalfling (Apr 29, 2008)

just taking a break from all this high minded debate on the nature of good and evil, as well as the relative merits of merenaries and david eddings 

I want an Angel of Snuggles ! 
aura of mercy 
an at will snuggle power (causes immobility) 
a soothing word 
"there, there" pat that either ends an ongoing effect or gants another save.

is it a leader or controller role? and what CR? 

I can just see trying to push enemies out of the aura of mercy, while staying inside it yourself. It could be a fun tactical challange.

_edit: loved the first 1.5 series by eddings, great for teenagers, even the Elentinum started well. However, like many others abandonded it on the realization that I was reading the 3rd or 4th series on the same blue rock.  _


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## KidSnide (Apr 29, 2008)

Sashi said:
			
		

> On the other hand, if you allow people to be judged by their actions, and for conflicting views of what good and evil are, you allow for the _concepts_ of good and evil to take hold, instead of the rubber stamp "You're on Team Evil, therefore it's okay for me to kill you and take all your stuff."
> 
> Yes, you've removed "good" and "evil" as absolutes and labels, but by making it so that nobody radiates pure goodness, you've reintroduced the _concepts_ of good and evil, and that's a welcome change.



QFT.  A welcome change, indeed.


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## quixoteles (Apr 30, 2008)

The new angel concepts are pretty awesome, to me as I think about them they seem almost like what we consider the covalent functions of an atom. Vengeance is a natural occurrence of the DND meta setting, the same way gravity exists in out natural world. What goes around really does come back around. God's have nothing to do with it as much as gravity does not necessarily have anything to do with planets, although large cosmic bodies is where we experience gravity and we live with it every day. That is really really awesome.  I love that. I would prefer for them to not be so... art-deco, or rather more art deco, like so many bizarre twenty-first level pieces of divine chicago architecture.


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