Demodand

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Dungeons & Dragons creature
Demodand
Alignment NE/CE
Type Outsider
Source books
First appearance

Demodands (gehreleths in 2nd Edition D&D) are a race of fiends native to the Tarterian Depths of Carceri in the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game.[1][2] The gehreleths worship or honor a patron deity called Apomps the Three-sided One, a renegade baernaloth who was exiled to Carceri for the act of creating them. Each of the races has certain peculiarities. The farastu and the kelubar can undergo a lengthy and painful process of self-liquefaction into the secretion they most frequently exude. These pools of tar and slime can be bottled and stored for centuries as a kind of 'instant army'.

Contents

[edit] Creative origins

The name demodand is derived from deodand, an evil creature in the Dying Earth series by Jack Vance.[3]

[edit] Types

Farastu: Also known as tarry demodands, are the most common type of demodand.

Kelubar: Also known as slime demodands, are the bureaucrats of demodand society.

Shator: Also known as shaggy demodands, are the obese and disgusting leaders of demodand society.

[edit] Related Creatures

Shrieking Terror: Vargouille/hydra crossbreeds created for war and destruction, sometimes used as advance troops by demondands.

Tarterian Creature: Via ancient magical rituals, a creature may gain some of a demodand's power in exchange for surrendering its soul to Carceri upon death. The demodand is destroyed in the process, but gains freedom from the eternal prison plane.

[edit] Notable Appearances of Demodands

Demodands feature prominently in the Shackled City Adventure Path, including Dyr’ryd, a massive and deformed shator who founded the Cagewrights.

The shator Drigor is trapped within the demiplane of Ravenloft, and the shator Xideous is lurking in the criminally and irreversably insane ward of the Gatehouse in Sigil, working on a revision to the Book of Keeping. The latter one has a price on his head by the yugoloths.

Wulfgar encounters a farastu in The Halfling's Gem.

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ Gygax, Gary (1983). Monster Manual II. Lake Geneva, Wisconsin: TSR, Inc., pp. 27-49. 
  2. ^ Larme, John (November 3, 2000). Dangerous Games? Censorship and "Child Protection" [1] (PDF). 
  3. ^ DeVarque, Aardy. Literary Sources of D&D. Retrieved on 2007-02-23.