Canonfire! - Excerpts from the Demonomicon of Iggwilv: Stygia, The River of Hatred

A description of the meta-plane of Stygia, which wends through and touches upon all of the low planes of the Pandemonium.

Author: grodog

Excerpts from the Demonomicon of Iggwilv:
Stygia, The River of Hatred, Chief Route through the Pandemonium

by grodog (see also http://www.rpg.net/ehp/imrryr/greyhawk.html)

Copyright 2001 by Allan T. Grohe, Jr.

Used with Permission. Do not repost without obtaining prior permission from the author.

The Pandemonium is spanned by the River Styx, more properly known as Stygia. Stygia is a meta-plane that spans all of the lowest seven planes of evil (from Acheron to the plane of Pandemonium). It is the primary river of the underworld, as well as the most common method for travel between the planes of the Pandemonium.

Stygia takes many guises, but its most common manifestation is that of a fogs-shrouded river. The fogs limit visibility, and the far shore cannot ever been seen from the near. Stygia's waters run deep and black. The current runs slowly near the shore, but quickens toward the center of the flow. Islets, reefs, and sandbars occur uncommonly in the Styx, but when they do appear, they often signal imminent conflict. Creatures often wait in ambush on these points of stability, and assail all passing travelers (save those in the company of the Ferryman).

In addition to its more standard foggy river form, Stygia manifests itself as an underground river in a vast cavern, in which stalagmites, stalactites, columns, and other rocky intrusions appear more often. The mage Xaene, upon his first visit to its shores, described Stygia as a storm-wracked, howling tempest, with horizontal rains lashing the shore, while waves crested at over fifteen feet high. At other times, it is a smooth, swift flow, with a sandy shore of crushed white bone; or a waterfall; or a vast, sluggish swamp; or a free-floating river, suspended in space with no shores and no banks. Et cetera.

The waters of Stygia are formed from the souls of the damned, condemned to wander from underworld to underworld, in unending anguish. If a mage is foolish enough to look at Stygia's waters with true seeing, just before his sanity snaps, he will will observe millions of liquid souls, each one's hatred compressed and distilled, each writhing in agony, and screaming their eternal hatred at the viewer. Stygia's waters/souls are sometimes harvested as an ingredient in the manufacture of potions of super-heroism and talismans of ultimate evil, or as a material component for hate-based magics (antipathy, symbol: hatred, etc.).

As a meta-plane which spans the whole of the Pandemonium, any spell or power derived from any lower plane will function normally within Stygia. This includes the ability to summon law-based magics in the Abyss, and chaos-based magics in Hell, etc. In all other respects, however, Stygia is a lower plane: connections to the Astral exist, but not to the inner planes. Therefore elemental-based magics will not function (including water-based spells), Prime planar magical items are reduced in effectiveness by two plusses, clerics who worship non-evil gods cannot regain spells higher than Second Level, etc. In addition, Stygia has the following additional properties:

the waters of Stygia cannot be controlled or animated by anyone other than Charon without a wish
all fire spells cause -1/die of damage, and easier to resist: save at +2 and +10% MR)
all water spells cause +1/die of damage, and are saved at -2 and -10% MR
as the River of Hatred, conflicts occur more easily; all saves vs. hate-based emotion attacks (symbol of discord, scarab of enraging enemies, etc.) are at -4 and -20% MR to resist
anyone who loses a soul (by magic jar, Void draw from a deck of many things, etc.) will find that the empty body inhabited by a spirit who acts as if under the influence of a dire charm spell (see FR4 The Magister, page 26) until controlled, knocked unconscious, or slain

The following verses speak of an experience traveling Stygia's cursed waters. Some have claimed that Xaene wrote them after his apocryphal tempest-tossed trip, while others have attributed the verses to the bard Nightsong.

The Ferryman

Spirits wail
vacating their familiar bodies
and summon me again to the Stygian shores
The River howls its black welcome
I ply its course once more

The hated mists part
Two ghosts shimmer in wait
Copper pennies forgotten
I still grant passage
that they are not condemned
to wander the century's lament

A ragged growl strips away reverie in lurches
as the current's claws drag my skiff through torrents
Faces leer from haunted waves
The damned moan as we sidle shoreward
their din rises
a dirge announcing arrival
Wan witches' moons stalk the dark
chasing shadows from cimmerean ruins
their toppled towers like rotten teeth
silhouetted against the glow
Hades festers before my eyes

I stare into Styx
drawn back to its embrace
It stares back
a myriad of faces
each distortions
of my own

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Hades, lower planes, the Pandemonium, River Styx