Now a couple "rules" regardless of what edition I plan to post the stats in I am starting in the lingua franca of 1st Edition AD&D. That's what the Deities and Demigods is written for and the Monster Manual I am using today.
Level Setting
How powerful are these demons? Well, let's have a look at our high-end examples.
The first edition Monster Manual gives us four of the biggest big bads we STILL talk about today. Orcus, Demogorgon, Asmodeus, and Tiamat. Each one of these can be viewed as a god in their own way; two of which Orcus and Tiamat were gods in their respective mythologies. What the MM does not give us are the HD for these creatures. Orcus has 120 hp, Demogorgon has 200 hp, and Asmodeus has 199. Tiamat has 128 but is also listed as a 16 HD monster. This is nice since this gives us a nice example of a monster with maximum (8 per HD) hp. So dividing the others by 8 we get:
Orcus 15 HD, 120 hpLooking at other editions you can see them climb over the years. Till we get to today.
Demogorgon 25 HD, 200 hp
Asmodeus 25 HD, 199 hp
What this means to me is I am looking for monsters in that 15 to 25 HD range if I want to call them Demon Princes or Archdukes of Hell. Likely none will come up to that level, most will fall short of Prince or Archduke power.
American Indian Mythos
If there is one thing I know it's I am in no way qualified to talk about American Indian mythic traditions. I mean I did grow up in the mid-west and I spent time going to both the Dickson Mounds and the Illinois State Museums. So I feel my background is better than most, but still very much lacking. The American Indian section in the Deities & Demigods in no way represents all the myths and stories of these extremely diverse peoples. Sure there are some commonalities, but there are just as many differences. Maybe more. Since I am limiting myself to the entries in the D&DG this one will be really fast.
There really are not many "demons" in the classical sense in American Indian myths. I mean there are some, but not many and none of them appear in this book. Even the monsters that do appear here are more monsters than demons and the evil gods (both of them) are more destructive forves of nature than anything else. So not really my idea of demons to be honest.
Hastsezini is the fire "god"* of the Navajo. I put god in quotes based on the work of Professor Grant L. Voth, Ph.D. He claims that Amerindian did not worship gods per se but larger spirits that they honored. This god/spirit doesn't really give me a demonic vibe.
Next time I will cover the rich and fertile ground of the Babylonian myths. Might need to spend more than one post there.
Many first nations had a much more spiritual approach to mythology. Instead of anthomaporphaciesed familial figures they took many aspect seen in nature and antromaporphalised them. Wendigo or Shishak are good examples of negative aspects of nature given "life" and personified. Making demons this way is an easy start, look to the MAC show 'The Terror' for an example of this.
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