That's why I said, or at least meant to say and perhaps forgot, that although he'd probably be much better at resisting corruption than a human, it's still a possibility, and one that would be better off not chanced. That would be the logicality behind such a story mechanism.
Oh man. Now we're back a thte corruption-argument.
Suffice to say, I agree with you that it was probably a writing-solution in reality.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
Maybe Hadriel was just a projection and he wasn't reallly there?
That's a possibility. I have a hard time imagining demons running around doing the same in Heaven, but then again who knows how that works?
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I think the reason Tyrael did not take the burden upon himself is because he didn't want to become corrupted, not even chance it. Like in the Lord of the Rings, when Gandalf refuses the Ring from Frodo- he knew he would be a more powerful host/puppet (although this was only part of his reason). In the same way, imagine an angel of the Angiris Council, the most powerful members of the High Heavens, being corrupted and instilled with the baleful spirit of a Prime Evil?
No, it doesn't say it anywhere, but it does make sense.
Hmm, I find it hard to believe that Tyrael would be so weak as to succumb to Diablo's power simply by being exposed to him for such a short amount of time. Once again, thy?ve been at each other for close to eternity, you'd think they know the ins-and-outs of each other by now.
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It's a prison first and foremost. The Prime Evils could dwell on Sanctuary without any problems at all before they were imprisoned. When the soulstones were smashed, their spirits were freed.
It seems like they wanted to be imprisoned in the first place, however, and we have no idea why. So there might be more to how the soulstones work. Anyway, they're not an anchor, and I don't know where you got that idea.
I don't think we'll agree on this, because I don't agree that there's any "real" Diablo body. He doesn't even appear to have a real body in the books, so I'm thinking there is no, and the thing we see in the D3 trailer is jsut another one in the line of many.
Wait, what is the original argument?
Quote from "Ivaron" »
Huh? No we didn't. We killed the Warrior's body, which Diablo's spirit had corrupted and morphed after his own image. Would you say we also killed Diablo's body in D1? Obviously not, so we can't have killed his real body in D2 either. It's the Warrior that dies, not Diablo. Diablo returns to the soulstone, as you can clearly see in the cinematic. Diablo's body was never there. I don't know how much more clearly I can this..
Yes, the soul returns to the soulstone instead of dying. Therefore, the soulstone has to be smashed, as it is anchoring the soul and keeping it from being sent to the Abyss.
Banishing and killing Diablo are two different things. just because the Lesser Evils banished him doesn't mean they killed him. Thus he could well exist as a spirit, since he hadn't died.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
I'll be going with the simplest conclusion until there is evidence to suggest otherwise: the Chaos Sanctuary is not Diablo's domain because the name doesn't fit.
Similarly, we had to go to Tristram in Act 1 yet the Rogue Encampment isn't close enough and they couldn't make Act 1 humongous. So they used a portal. I would expect the same thing for going to the Hellforge, if they are indeed meant to be further apart.
That's a good point. However, I still think it seems like a game design issue.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
Well I know he can't interfere and all that, but don't you think he could have bothered to take the stairs down? It's not like he was very far off from Hell. Besides, if we use that logic, why didn't Hadriel smash the stone? He's. Right. There.
But he didn't have the Soulstone. Look, I wasn't saying that Tyrael should have smashed it. I'm saying Tyrael could have smashed it. Although, we do not know if he had some special help with the Worldstone. Because he could obviously destroy that, yet he couldn't smash the stones in Hell while he was at the pandemonium Fortress. So someone must have helped him when the Worldstone was destroyed.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
Well, the fact is that the soulstones are already split and a part of at least their essence has been divided. So regardless of whether or not this makes them immortal, they have actually lost a bit of their powers. Probably not a lot, but a bit. So your reasoning doesn't work, because we already know they took that risk. What I'm asking is why they did it. Unless you're saying you don't think some of their essence remained in the soulstones? In that case my question is what caused the Zakarum to transform, then? Keep in mind, their transformation is awfully similar to the transformations of the Wanderer, Prince Albrecht, Tal Rasha and I-forgot-his-name-the-one-Mephisto-took-possession-of?
No it doesn't mean their essence is divided, and there's no indication of that.
The Zakarum have apparently been retconned, as there's no longer any mention of soulstones into their hands on Arreat Summit, but instead they were just corrupted and given powers.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
"I helped the Prime Evils mastermind their own exile into your world" - Izual.
I think Belial and Azmodan aren't in on the plan. That they were tricked into thinking they could beat Diablo and Mephisto. Thus why the exile was "mastermind"ed.
So Andariel and Duriel were?
Quote from "Daemaro" »
Anyway all this happened 3000 years before Diablo 1, so many generations have been created since then. I'll keep reading and let you know the final verdict.
You won't get an answer to that until the very final chapters of the Veiled Prophet, so keep reading
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It was just a logical conclusion I made. Demons get respawned when they die. The Prime Evils' bodies died, so they got respawned and were in Hell. They were however missing their spirits since they were elsewhere. But since only their spirits had been banished, there is no need for this conjecture. I didn't know that, however, having not read the books.
I don't think all too many demons respawn when they die, Hell would quickly get crowded if all those Pain Worms you smash to pieces respawn. Although that does happen in Hell...
Quote from "Ivaron" »
You don't actually kill Diablo, you only destroy the prison that houses his soul. So he isn't banished to the Abyss, rather his soul returns to his body instead.
And I ment of course that he would come and kick your arse when you smashed the stone, not when you killed the Wanderer.
Well I think you do. The Soulstone his necessary anchor in the world; without it or a body, there's no way for him to go.
And besides, you killed his body
However, that would create problems with thembeing as spirits when the Horadrim hunted them. Hmm...
Quote from "Ivaron" »
It's the Chaos Sanctuary, not the Horror Sanctuary. Just a random Sanctuary I would think. Unless one of the books mentions it is specifically Diablo's? I thought he just chose that one because it was close to the Hellforge. It's a rather small Sanctuary anyway, not something I would see fit for the Lord of Terror if it's his actual domain. Although, yes, I assume that could just be game limitations at work.
Like I said: think about it. All that is of importance in the part of Hell we see is the Hellforge. Izual can be explained in that it makes sence he would be near the Hellforge. So rather than thinking the Hellforge happens to be close to Diablo, I would think Diablo specifically chose to visit the part of hell that housed the Hellforge. Perhaps because he wanted to make sure the player would smash the soulstones, or perhaps because he wanted to talk to Izual, or do something at the Hellforge. After all, we still don't know what Diablo was doing in Hell in the first place.
Well there's this little tidbit:
Quote from "Hadriel" »
Proceed, hero, into Terror's lair. Know that Diablo's innermost sanctum is hidden by five seals. Only by opening each of these seals can you clear your way to the final battle.
It may just indicate that it's his lair at the moment, but it could also mean it is his main lair. It's a bit ambiguous.
And again, it might a game issue. You need Diablo in the game, and you need the Hellforge, and you cannot make Act 4 humongous.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
I was thinking only the Hellforge had the power to destroy a soulstone, aside from the Prime Evils themselves, and perhaps the shattering of the Worldstone (which is after all what the soulstones are made from).
Well yes, I was mainly saying that as an explanation why Tyreal didn't destroy them. Had he been in Hell while doing it he might have been successful.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
Did I really explain it so badly? Once again, I know they are immortal in that they respawn when they die. What I meant to say is that would seek a way to become immortal in the way that they can't die in the first place, saving time that would otherwise be spent respawning. This would be valuable in the fight against heaven, in that they would no longer have to fear death at all and could just attack mercilessly. When they die, they return immediately and can cause havok again.
They are evil maniacs! Of course they would. And when they're done destoying Heaven, they can just restore their souls to like they were. They have unlimited time to do this, because they are immortal anyway. So it's a win/win.
I'm saying the tradeoff is probably bigger than the gain WHILE at war. You need to be at full strength when you fight the Angiris, and if you're too weak, it doesn't matter if you don't die, becasue you still can't win.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
And kill the Prime Evils, effectively reverting their banishment? Of course not.
Assuming the Banishment isn't part of the plan. I always imagined, after lsitening to Izual, that the supposed banishing was part of the soulstone plan. If the plan was set in motion "so long ago", it would have to be planned before they were sent to Sanctuary, e.g before they were exiled.
There's been a thread on that already, don't remember when though.
Quote from "Daemaro" »
I don't know where people are getting the idea the worldstone weakened humans, I haven't quite finished the sin war I'm on chapter 13 now of book two, but when you first read about Rathma he explains that humans now aren't really Nephalem, but they're not weaker either. They've become something more than that, Uldyssian has some powers that Rathma doesn't and Rathma has some Uldyssian doesn't. Uldyssian doesn't even call his group Nephalem anymore, he calls them Erydem. I think they said it means, "One Who Has Seen".
...
But the Sin War took place 3000 years before Diablo 1. So people should have no problems with getting powers back, worldstone or not by that time.
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Oh in I think Scales of the Serpent (just read this part the other night) it said that the worldstone doesn't shield it but keep it hidden and the demons have known about it for a long time thanks to Lilith. Or something like that. It's in the first 10 chapters when Mendeln is talking to Rathma and Trag'Oul.
I know. What I meant what, IF it was hidden, how the Hell did they all find it? (no pun intended :P)
Quote from "LordRayken" »
So, I think its safe to say all the monsters running around are because of the Prime Evils on Sanctuary. They didnt just find it by themselves, nor are they freely aligned. They are controlled by the prime and lessers.
I'm starting to think this hiding process isn't actually hiding, but more a shield in the sense that demons cannot find it on their own so long as the Worldstone is there, they have to be summoned.
However, that still leaves the problem of the Lesser Evils banishing the Prime Evils. How could they do taht, if demons have to be summoned and can't get there themselves? If they could accomplish that feat, then all the evils should have been able to muster an army and send it to Sanctuary while the stone was still in place.
Or maybe only Great Evils can get there on their own, but if that's the case, why not go to Sanctuary first, then summon demons? Is it only because of the pact with Mephisto?
Quote from "LordRayken" »
Also, what I meant earlier about killing Diablo... If the Hell in Diablo 2 is the true hell, and you're right, they just didnt want to create more of it for fear of redundancy, then Diablo is effectively banished to the abyss. If you kill a prime evil in its home plane, its banished (dead) forever... Supposedly. Then there are always the rumors that Diablo was not always the ruler of the abyss, and something came before the Prime Evils themselves.
Not necessarily. You need to drop the knowledge you have about other demons and see how Diablo differs
Tyrael specifically says during the last quest in Act 4 quest:
Only by destroying the Soulstone which he carries will his spirit be banished forever.
Banished, not destroyed.
Diablo and Mephisto have been banished back into the Black Abyss that spawned them and the corrupted Soulstones are no more.
Notice spawned them. So apparently that's no the Abyss either.
And how could it be? The Three are like primal forces, everything points to the fact that they cannot be irrevocably destryoed.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
The Prime Evils were on Sanctuary in their bodies, but they were defeated by the Horadrim and their souls were trapped into Soulstones so that they could not return to Hell. Why did they do this? Maybe they couldn't destroy the Prime Evils entirely, and so settled for emprisoning them?
Most likely, that's how I always imagined it. Or, they saw greater profit in imprisoning them, instead of simply sending them back to Hell.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
Regardless, the Prime Evils' bodies were probably sent back to Hell while their souls remained on Sanctuary. After their defeat, I would assume their souls could immediately return to their bodies rather than spending time in the Abyss, as their bodies were still alive. Which would mean Mephisto and Diablo are now in Hell, and Baal is not unaccounted for.
Where are you all getting this whole "body left in Hell" reasoning? There's never been any indication that the bodies of the Three are somehow important for their existence. They were perfectly capable of wreaking havoc without them in Diablo I and II, and could take up physical form anyway. Once again, the body is important in other demon literature, but not necessarily in Diablo because of that.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
This brings up the question, but didn't we defeat Diablo in Hell already? Why didn't he return to his body immediately and kick our arse? Well I think that was only a part of hell, like a bigger variant of the small Hell levels you can find portals to in Act 5. This part of Hell was the part that housed the Hellforge. Think about it. There was basically nothing else of importance there. Izual was there, but that only makes sense because that is where he was captured and corrupted.
Well, Diablo's soul was still in the Soulstone at that point, which can be seen in his death animation, and the sequence, when it flies back into the soulstone after his defeat. Then, it was smashed in the Hellforge, which banished it the the Abyss, which is not the same as Hell.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
Why would Diablo choose to return to that particular part of Hell? Maybe he wanted to talk to Izual, to make him give the player false information or to discuss their plan..
Because his Sanctuary was there.
This is a question you will run into no matter where Blizzard placed him. He had to return somewhere, and it just happened to be there. It's once again a gameplay element: The Hellforge had to be there for story reasons, a River of Flame was cool, and the final dungeon was an impressive dark cathedral in gothic style that went with the game.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
Baal's soulstone could have been destroyed when the Worldstone got destroyed. Remember that in the cinematic the whole crystal explodes, and the parts that break off are blown into smaller and smaller parts until they are finally completely destroyed. Wouldn't the shockwave that did that also destroy Baal's soulstone?
On the other hand, Tyrael was capable of destroying the Worldstone, but he couldn't destroy Mephisto's soulstone. So perhaps the soulstones were harder to destroy than the Worldstone was.
It's possible it has to be destroyed in Hell in order for them to be banished to the Abyss, otherwise he might just have gone back to Hell. That's speculation, but it sounds reasonable.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
Well anyway. Perhaps the big plan of the Prime Evils was very simply to achieve immortality. They let themselves be captured in soulstones, then they have the soulstones split so that their essence is divided and they can't be banished to the abyss. Then they have the soulstone they occupy destroyed so they return to their bodies in Hell. And voila, immortality is achieved as long as the shards of their soulstones that remain on Sanctuary are not destroyed. Like a Lich.
Doesn't make any sense, they are already immortan in the true sense, in that they cannot be destroyed permanently.
And splitting the soul or some such; even if that were possible in Diablo, there would have to be a tradeoff, one that I am not sure the Prime Evils are willing to pay when it really isn't needed.
Quote from "Ivaron" »
All you are fighting is Diablo's spirit in the Warrior's body. So you defeat his spirit, but you do not defeat his body. His spirit returns to the soulstone. Then it gets freed when you smash the soulstone. His spirit is then probably returned to his body... However, it is unclear where his body is at the moment. It is either on Sanctuary, hidden somewhere by the Horadrim, or the body died when the spirit was captured and Diablo's body has since respawned through the abyss into hell. In that case, his spirit which is now free will likely join with his new body, reviving Diablo in his true form. Which is bad news for Belial and Azmodan...
So, to summarise: Diablo's spirit was in another part of Hell than Diablo's body. The spirit was inside the soulstone, which was in turn inside the Warrior's head. Now that the soulstone has been smashed, the spirit has likely returned to its body.
It has nothing to do with him being in his home place or not.
I ask again, where does the body reasoning come from in relation to the Diablo Universe?
Quote from "LordRayken" »
Close... But not quite. The Prime Evils were never on the mortal realm with their bodies. If I recall, "The Sin War" even states "The lesser evils overthrew the three Prime Evils, and banished their spirit forms to the mortal realm" It does not say anything about their physical forms going to Sanctuary. So, in other words, the Horadrim imprisoned their souls in the soulstones, with nothing else to work with. My guess is, they imprisoned them so they wouldnt ever cause anymore trouble... Perhaps they knew simply killing them wouldnt be permanent, and they'd have to deal with them coming back at some point, and thought the Soulstones would be permanent?
With Tyrael providing them with knowledge of how these things work, this seems to be most plausible. By imprisoning them, they wouldn't be dead, but they wouldn't be able to do anything either. Or so they thought.
Quote from "LordRayken" »
Because the Prime Evils would never want any mortals knowing they were overthrown unwillingly. I don't trust anything Izual says. I think the whole character Izual is a lying character to begin with. Perhpas I'm looking to far into it, but, "Oh, we didnt get thrown out... We had it PLANNED..." sounds like a cover up for getting their asses kicked.
Definately plausible. Izual was defeated, and so knew that shit was gonna come down for Diablo in a moment. The most damage he could do at that point was to lie.
Quote from "LordRayken" »
They got the Worldstone destroyed, so it's easier to find Sanctuary now... On top of that, Baal wasnt the first person to mess with the Worldstone. 10,000 years prior, Lilith, Mephisto's bitch daughter, warped a tiny piece of its internals in order to reactivate the Nephalem (Edyrem) powers in humans so she could use it to her advantage. So, I don't know how powerful the Worldstone is, or what its overall powers really are. My guess is that it controlled just about everything in Sanctuary, including its protection.
I don't think it controlled everything, because then its destruciton would have wreaked much more havoc than it apparently has.
I think it was insanely complex however, and all Lilith could do without screwing up too much was change it in a minor way.
Quote from "LordRayken" »
Not sure I've ever read anything that doesn't say Demons, especially Arch-Demons or Demon Lords, aren't already immortal. They don't have to eat, drink, breathe, sleep, and cannot die by mortal means... Right? I've read that in about 2,000 game manuals dealing with demons, so, I dont think thats it.
Which doesn't necessarily mean it's true for Diablo, however in this case it does seem to be.
Quote from "LordRayken" »
Nope, his body is most likely in hell locked up by Azmodan and Belial.
Why? Wouldn't it make more sense for Azmodan and Belial to kill his body IN Hell and send it to the Black Abyss if it is so important?
Quote from "LordRayken" »
If he was in true hell, technically, smashing the soulstone would effectively have -killed- Diablo forever. Or, in this case, banished him to the abyss.
Which doesn't necessarily mean he's dead.
Quote from "LordRayken" »
Technically, it does. Because I know I've read that if the Demon is killed on its home pl...
Hmm, wait, that trumps that statement... Technically, you never KILLED Diablo, you only smashed the prison he was in... I'm guessing you have to effectively KILL the -real- Diablo, in his -real- physical form, for him to be banished to the Abyss. I don't think simpyl killing his Warrior form and breaking his Soulstone would banish him to the Abyss... I think you're right, it would simpyly send his spirit back to his -real- body. Hmm... Interesting...
So, perhaps, Diablo 3 is, in a nutshell:
"Hey, we killed his host, we busted his prison, now lets go to the source and stop it for good."
Diablo probably did die at the end of Diablo II. His soulstone was smashed, effectively sending his soul back to the Black Abyss, something which had never happened before in the games.
Quote from "LordRayken" »
* Why did Diablo go to the area in Hell where the Hellforge is? To visit Izual?
This isn't able to be answered. At least, I cannot recall any type of information that would point anything out. It's possible the whole Pandemonium Fortress was demons, and, once again, the heroes were being led to kill Diablo so he could reclaim his original form. However, I dont think the "Hero characters" in Diablo 2 were stupid enough to not realize something isnt right about the pandemonium fortress... however, it does seem odd that Heaven's NEVER interacted in Mortal affairs before, but, for some reason, allows them full and total sanctuary and help to kill Diablo in Hell. Its just a little odd of Angels from what I've read, as Tyrael was like the only angel I've heard of that meddles with Humans.
It's more like a small outpost on the outskirts of Hell. I wouldn't be surprised if Hell had the same thing outside of Heaven, so to speak.
It's a war, you need to keep the bearing of your enemy at all times.
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Why just withdraw the information though? Unless it's important to D3's story or something they have in the works.
Well, what else could they have done? I mean, they can't launch news saying "Look! We changed three lines of text over at this site here under one specific monster."
Quote from "Daemaro" »
Tyrael didn't enter until after the end of the veiled prophet did he when Sanctuary became known to the Council. (haven't finished it yet just seems to be where it's heading)
So maybe that's why Tyrael knew where it was.
No I mean, the Worldstone is still standing during Diablo II, however there are tons of monsters running around everywhere, so apparently entering Sanctuary isn't that hard. Even Lesser Evils are called into the world just to stand on guard duty.
So where does the majro fear of an invasion come from?
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One thing that seemed to be brought up consistently is that there is a soulforge where these stones could be broken. We believed that if this is the place where they could be broken, then that would also be the place where the stones could be reforged. This, then, could be the platform for the series' next installment, via Diablo 3.
AKA the Hellforge? That's at least where they were shattered
Quote from "Nocturne" »
On top of this theory we also believed that since the Worldstone had been corrupted and would thus need to be destroyed we had figured that its protection would wane and allow demons and angels of all sorts in the world of Sanctuary.
Which is perhaps correct, although the Sin War merely said the Worldstone hid Sanctuary.
I don't know that worked exacly though, because obviously Tyrael could find Sanctuary, and tons upon tons of demons that were clearly in Sanctuary long before the Worldstone was destroyed in Diablo II.
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Yes I was responding to your earlier post, which I probably should have quoted come to think of it.
What I meant was that I think they are simply retconning their previous stance on soulstones, rather than covering up. That would explain why they are removing text from Arreat Summit that was previously there. However they would not go so far as to actually draw a new model just because they change the story.
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As to why they removed that lore info check this post here.
I posted that not Genesis!
Sorry Daemaro, mixed that up somehow
And of course the shard is still in their hands, why would they go through the trouble of remaking the model (when the original modelers are gone)? They didn't even do taht when they added Lilith to the game, they just recolored Andariel. And on top of that, they would have to release a patch for the game just to upload a new version of a Council Member.
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Lore dictates game balance, especially with Blizzard North. If Mephisto was not inherently weaker than Diablo, he would not have been able to be killed earlier in the game. He also wouldnt have been content for lower level characters, but he was. I'm not going to say this as fact, however, I do know Baal was so powerful, they decided to use him in an expansion of his own... Aka, at level 20 or so, you got to kill Duriel... But Baal wasn't there... Its a question of why they chose Baal for the expansion. Almost simply put, because you couldnt of killed Baal at level 20 so they removed him entirely and gave you Duriel.
So you are also saying that Baal is stronger than Diablo, and that one simple Death Lord (Minotaur) can easily smack the shit out of Andariel if he wishes to?
Quote from "LordRayken" »
Because it removes Diablo and Mephisto from Sanctuary, in effect, they have to find it all over again. You were only fighting their Spirit forms, after all. Their physical forms were still in Hell waiting for their spirits to return, at least, I don't know where else their physical forms would be.
We defeated Diablo IN Hell, not in Sanctuary, so how could we have been fighting his spiritual form in Hell if his physical form was in Hell?
Quote from "LordRayken" »
Also, the "hell" in Diablo 2 may not be the actual, real hell, as Azmodan and Belial were nowhere to be found, nor any of their followers.
Or, for obvious reasons, Blizzard North saw no reason to create ALL of Hell, as it would have been reduntant, useless, and way too expensive. Not to mention it would have taken a long time.
All of Sacntuary isn't in the game, yet we know it exists. Amazon Islands for example.
Quote from "LordRayken" »
Also, smashing the soulstones was needed so they would be banished back to Hell again, and no longer be present on Sanctuary. This is simple, because, the prime evils were on Sanctuary without Soulstones to begin with. In other words, they only needed to possess a human being because they were imprisoned. Without the soulstones, they have free reign and are in their "true demonic" forms. They don't need a host without being imprisoned in the soulstone.
Once again, Diablo was in Hell when we beat him.
I don't get what you're saying here. If we kill Diablo in Hell, we banish him back to Hell? That doesn't make any sense.
Quote from "Magistrate" »
Oh, wow, that must have just happened. That is kind of weird. They obviously had to do it on purpose. Of course, the soulstone shard is still jammed in to the GIF's hand, but still. I wonder why they did that.
Yeah. It does go to show however that they do care about what their lore is about, and make sure all sources are up to date.
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Now, all this conjecture about angels and demons FLOODING Sanctuary the moment the Worldstone is destroyed...
Mephisto himself made a pact with the Angiris council 10,000 years ago that they would leave Sanctuary as a Neutral Zone, lest the angels would destroy Sanctuary instantly. All the angels agreed and so did Mephisto that they'd let the humans decide for themselves to join Heaven or Hell, because they both agreed humans could be valuable. So, I don't know whats happened in Diablo 3.
Which obviously isn't meant to last. Those guys have been at each other's throats since time began, no way they're going to keep a pact forever.
Quote from "LordRayken" »
As for the soulstones...
In order for a prime evil to take over a host on the mortal realm WHEN THEY ARE IMRPISONED, aka, the Prime Evils were on Sanctuary a long time before they were actually imprisoned into the Soulstones, the largest shard must be plunged into the head or body somewhere I'm assuming.
This seems to be how it works yes.
Quote from "LordRayken" »
If there is a large shard, and many smaller shards, the smaller shards will only bring forth lesser to moderate demons, whereas the largest shard will bring forth the prime evil, albeit much weaker if his stone was not complete and split into shards. We can see this clearly from Diablo 2, as Mephisto is cake whereas Diablo takes a lot more effort to down, even though Mephisto is the oldest of the brothers.
This however is entirely speculation on your part.
Mephisto was weaker because your character was lower level. It's a game balance issue, it has nothing to do with lore.
Quote from "LordRayken" »
As for shattering the soulstones... All the demons in soulstones return to their original plane of existance, in this sense, true Hell. In hell, Azmodan and Belial are having a lot of fun after the Dark Exile of the three brothers, but, now, for the most part, Diablo and Mephisto -should- be back, and completely fucking up Azmodan and Belial now. I don't know what hapened with Baal, as we never saw his soulstone smashed.
Which is also speculation, because what would be the point of killing Diablo in Hell and then smash his soulstone, just to get him back.
The general consent is that Diablo and Mephisto have both been banished to the Abyss, and smashing the soulstones was necessary to stop them from coming bakc by possessing another being.
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Thats what I was thinking. All these smaller shards have demonic power left in them.
Demonic perhaps, but not necessarily parts of Mephisto himself.
Quote from "Magistrate" »
I'm not really sure if this helps at all, but I don't think there was ever any doubt that the lesser shards had demonic power in them. They were taken and jammed in to the hands of the Council Members to completely subvert them, physically and mentally, to the will of the corrupted Zakarum, Mephisto.
See that's no all clear anymore. It USED to say that on Arreat Summit, but it doesn't anymore.
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Suffice to say, I agree with you that it was probably a writing-solution in reality.
That's a possibility. I have a hard time imagining demons running around doing the same in Heaven, but then again who knows how that works?
Wait, what is the original argument?
Yes, the soul returns to the soulstone instead of dying. Therefore, the soulstone has to be smashed, as it is anchoring the soul and keeping it from being sent to the Abyss.
Banishing and killing Diablo are two different things. just because the Lesser Evils banished him doesn't mean they killed him. Thus he could well exist as a spirit, since he hadn't died.
That's a good point. However, I still think it seems like a game design issue.
But he didn't have the Soulstone. Look, I wasn't saying that Tyrael should have smashed it. I'm saying Tyrael could have smashed it. Although, we do not know if he had some special help with the Worldstone. Because he could obviously destroy that, yet he couldn't smash the stones in Hell while he was at the pandemonium Fortress. So someone must have helped him when the Worldstone was destroyed.
No it doesn't mean their essence is divided, and there's no indication of that.
The Zakarum have apparently been retconned, as there's no longer any mention of soulstones into their hands on Arreat Summit, but instead they were just corrupted and given powers.
So Andariel and Duriel were?
You won't get an answer to that until the very final chapters of the Veiled Prophet, so keep reading
Well I think you do. The Soulstone his necessary anchor in the world; without it or a body, there's no way for him to go.
And besides, you killed his body
However, that would create problems with thembeing as spirits when the Horadrim hunted them. Hmm...
Well there's this little tidbit:
It may just indicate that it's his lair at the moment, but it could also mean it is his main lair. It's a bit ambiguous.
And again, it might a game issue. You need Diablo in the game, and you need the Hellforge, and you cannot make Act 4 humongous.
Well yes, I was mainly saying that as an explanation why Tyreal didn't destroy them. Had he been in Hell while doing it he might have been successful.
I'm saying the tradeoff is probably bigger than the gain WHILE at war. You need to be at full strength when you fight the Angiris, and if you're too weak, it doesn't matter if you don't die, becasue you still can't win.
Assuming the Banishment isn't part of the plan. I always imagined, after lsitening to Izual, that the supposed banishing was part of the soulstone plan. If the plan was set in motion "so long ago", it would have to be planned before they were sent to Sanctuary, e.g before they were exiled.
There's been a thread on that already, don't remember when though.
Read the rest
I know. What I meant what, IF it was hidden, how the Hell did they all find it? (no pun intended :P)
I'm starting to think this hiding process isn't actually hiding, but more a shield in the sense that demons cannot find it on their own so long as the Worldstone is there, they have to be summoned.
However, that still leaves the problem of the Lesser Evils banishing the Prime Evils. How could they do taht, if demons have to be summoned and can't get there themselves? If they could accomplish that feat, then all the evils should have been able to muster an army and send it to Sanctuary while the stone was still in place.
Or maybe only Great Evils can get there on their own, but if that's the case, why not go to Sanctuary first, then summon demons? Is it only because of the pact with Mephisto?
Not necessarily. You need to drop the knowledge you have about other demons and see how Diablo differs
Tyrael specifically says during the last quest in Act 4 quest:
Banished, not destroyed.
Notice spawned them. So apparently that's no the Abyss either.
And how could it be? The Three are like primal forces, everything points to the fact that they cannot be irrevocably destryoed.
Most likely, that's how I always imagined it. Or, they saw greater profit in imprisoning them, instead of simply sending them back to Hell.
Where are you all getting this whole "body left in Hell" reasoning? There's never been any indication that the bodies of the Three are somehow important for their existence. They were perfectly capable of wreaking havoc without them in Diablo I and II, and could take up physical form anyway. Once again, the body is important in other demon literature, but not necessarily in Diablo because of that.
Well, Diablo's soul was still in the Soulstone at that point, which can be seen in his death animation, and the sequence, when it flies back into the soulstone after his defeat. Then, it was smashed in the Hellforge, which banished it the the Abyss, which is not the same as Hell.
Because his Sanctuary was there.
This is a question you will run into no matter where Blizzard placed him. He had to return somewhere, and it just happened to be there. It's once again a gameplay element: The Hellforge had to be there for story reasons, a River of Flame was cool, and the final dungeon was an impressive dark cathedral in gothic style that went with the game.
It's possible it has to be destroyed in Hell in order for them to be banished to the Abyss, otherwise he might just have gone back to Hell. That's speculation, but it sounds reasonable.
Doesn't make any sense, they are already immortan in the true sense, in that they cannot be destroyed permanently.
And splitting the soul or some such; even if that were possible in Diablo, there would have to be a tradeoff, one that I am not sure the Prime Evils are willing to pay when it really isn't needed.
I ask again, where does the body reasoning come from in relation to the Diablo Universe?
With Tyrael providing them with knowledge of how these things work, this seems to be most plausible. By imprisoning them, they wouldn't be dead, but they wouldn't be able to do anything either. Or so they thought.
Definately plausible. Izual was defeated, and so knew that shit was gonna come down for Diablo in a moment. The most damage he could do at that point was to lie.
I don't think it controlled everything, because then its destruciton would have wreaked much more havoc than it apparently has.
I think it was insanely complex however, and all Lilith could do without screwing up too much was change it in a minor way.
Which doesn't necessarily mean it's true for Diablo, however in this case it does seem to be.
Why? Wouldn't it make more sense for Azmodan and Belial to kill his body IN Hell and send it to the Black Abyss if it is so important?
Which doesn't necessarily mean he's dead.
Diablo probably did die at the end of Diablo II. His soulstone was smashed, effectively sending his soul back to the Black Abyss, something which had never happened before in the games.
It's more like a small outpost on the outskirts of Hell. I wouldn't be surprised if Hell had the same thing outside of Heaven, so to speak.
It's a war, you need to keep the bearing of your enemy at all times.
No I mean, the Worldstone is still standing during Diablo II, however there are tons of monsters running around everywhere, so apparently entering Sanctuary isn't that hard. Even Lesser Evils are called into the world just to stand on guard duty.
So where does the majro fear of an invasion come from?
Which is perhaps correct, although the Sin War merely said the Worldstone hid Sanctuary.
I don't know that worked exacly though, because obviously Tyrael could find Sanctuary, and tons upon tons of demons that were clearly in Sanctuary long before the Worldstone was destroyed in Diablo II.
What I meant was that I think they are simply retconning their previous stance on soulstones, rather than covering up. That would explain why they are removing text from Arreat Summit that was previously there. However they would not go so far as to actually draw a new model just because they change the story.
And of course the shard is still in their hands, why would they go through the trouble of remaking the model (when the original modelers are gone)? They didn't even do taht when they added Lilith to the game, they just recolored Andariel. And on top of that, they would have to release a patch for the game just to upload a new version of a Council Member.
We defeated Diablo IN Hell, not in Sanctuary, so how could we have been fighting his spiritual form in Hell if his physical form was in Hell?
Or, for obvious reasons, Blizzard North saw no reason to create ALL of Hell, as it would have been reduntant, useless, and way too expensive. Not to mention it would have taken a long time.
All of Sacntuary isn't in the game, yet we know it exists. Amazon Islands for example.
Once again, Diablo was in Hell when we beat him.
I don't get what you're saying here. If we kill Diablo in Hell, we banish him back to Hell? That doesn't make any sense.
Yeah. It does go to show however that they do care about what their lore is about, and make sure all sources are up to date.
This seems to be how it works yes.
This however is entirely speculation on your part.
Mephisto was weaker because your character was lower level. It's a game balance issue, it has nothing to do with lore.
Which is also speculation, because what would be the point of killing Diablo in Hell and then smash his soulstone, just to get him back.
The general consent is that Diablo and Mephisto have both been banished to the Abyss, and smashing the soulstones was necessary to stop them from coming bakc by possessing another being.
See that's no all clear anymore. It USED to say that on Arreat Summit, but it doesn't anymore.
http://classic.battle.net/diablo2exp/monsters/act3-councilmember.shtml
I thnk it was Genesis who pulled up a link to a korean version where the hold "jamming soulshards" part was still there, but I can't remember.