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Grog Logs
2018-07-29, 02:48 PM
When a devil or demon is killed on the Material Plane in D&D, it returns to its home plane of the Nine Hells or the Abyss and reforms. Does a similar thing traditionally occur to other extraplanar beings (such as the Fey from the Feywild, shadow creatures from the Shadow Plane, Angels from Mount Celestia, Yugoloths from their native planes, and Elementals from the Elemental Planes)? Assume that the creature entered the Material Plane through a Planar Gate (or similar method) and was not summoned by a concentration spell.

I am DMing a custom 5e world, so I know that I can make up whatever lore/fluff that I want. But, I am crafting a story that relies on breaking certain conventions. Recently in the campaign, the Party slew and decapitated a Babau (Demon from Volo's). When the body remained on the Material Plane, the NPC that they rescued from the Babau entered a near panic over the fact that the body did not disintegrate into smoke or dissolve into liquid. For what its worth, the Demon did NOT know this would happen, which is why it did not retreat when low on HP (but the Party does not know this). What happened (i.e., the body remaining) is completely unprecedented as far as the Party, NPC, and Demon are concerned.

Darth Ultron
2018-07-29, 03:03 PM
It does depends a bit on the Edition and Setting,


But in a general sense, when an Extraplanar Creature dies, they leave a body behind and are dead forever and don't reform.

Only a few, like Demons in 5E have something set in the rules as to what happens.

Planescape had lots of rules of this type, for 2E. And it goes back to 1E:


Rules as per MMI (1st Edition):

Demons are able to move from their own plane into those of Tarterus, Hades or Pandemonium or roam the astral. However, they cannot enter the material plane without aid (conjuration, gate or by name speaking or similar means)

Than on death it sais:

Demons of type V and above are not actually slain when their material form is killed in combat; their material form being removed from their use, the demon in question is thereby forced back to the plane whence it originally cam, there to remain until a century has passed or until another aids it to go forth again.

Psyren
2018-07-29, 06:19 PM
In Pathfinder it's actually the opposite for Fey. They can reincarnate if they die in the First World (i.e. Feywild.) If they die on the Material however, they enter the standard soul cycle like every other mortal, and come back as humanoids and other stuff instead of as fey. This explains in-universe why Fey are so shy/elusive towards mortals, even Good or nature-friendly ones, because just being on the Material is a huge risk for them - they can potentially lose not just their lives but their very identities as fey.