Planar Renovation Project: Gehenna

Yeah, that's waaay too much change. I (and most people here) prefer to stick to the canon. That applies to most of your other topics about your campaign setting as well, quite honestly.

I disagree with you about Gehenna being too like Baator. First of all, some of its Baator-like features are the result of completely different reasons. On Baator, it's the result of using laws, rules, and regulations to evil ends, and to trick and deceive.
On Gehenna it's the result of "oh? what's in it for me?".
I did not mention it, but this is essentially a plane for sadists, thieves, and greed. (THIEVES as opposed to thugs/muggers that is, the latter of which is a feature of Carceri) There's no "tyrranical law/hedging out of individuality" like there is on Baator. In fact, the book states that the natives are opportunistic, dog-eat-dog, and individualistic, but somehow they're "kept in line" and society is able to exist.

The yugoloths' tower on this plane houses all their records on the flesh of live mortal victims. The yugoloths torture them as a diversion, not out of sadism, the book states, but out of some sort of philosophy (I don't recall the exact wording).
This differs from Baator and Abyss, BTW. On the Abyss, victims (esp. petitioners) are tortured out of wrath (and to a lesser extent, for a purpose), while on Baator petitioners are tortured purely for practical reasons (e.g. interrogations, speeding up the whole petitioner 'ripening' process, punishing disobedient fiends, etc.)

""On Gehenna, it's every berk for himself.
--More of an Abyss attitude than Baator, but still doesn’t make it stand out to me""

Unlike the abyss however, the Gehennan natives aren't out to kill people just for the fun of it (well, they sortof are, but not as directly). Remember the "what's in it for me?" thing mentioned earlier? Well, this attitude goes both ways.

""they identify with the group and rationalize their evil as being “needed” for the benefit and security of the group.""

They do try to rationalize their evil, yes. Planes of Conflict's Gehenna section gives a few pages on the nature of the Yugoloths-- mainly they're all about the bluff and intrigue. They're obviously way more secretive than the other fiendish races, as evidenced by the fact that nobody knows the General of Gehenna's name, and he's as powerful if not moreso than the Oinoloth.

""have a “wolf pack” mentality where they join into packs/gangs/tribes (a slightly lawful tendency) to exert their evil.""
They only do that to fulfill their individual goals.

Let me look up and post some of the stuff about the 'loths.

So it goes like this:

Baator: Torture for a purpose
Abyss: Torture out of emotion/passion/enjoyment
Gehenna: Torture without purpose or enjoyment
Carceri: torture really isn't a big thing here, though it's sometimes done for enjoyment. (the plane's more about betrayal and committing savagery over meager resources)
Gray Waste: Torture isn't intentionally done here. Even if it was, the victims wouldn't give a damn, so it'd be pointless in the first place.

Bytopia is cooperation (or even symbiosis), where beings of different but complimentary natures combine their efforts for mutual benefit. If you sell something in Bytopia, both parties benefit from the exchange. More even than Elysium, law and chaos are able to develop mutually beneficial relationships in Bytopia, despite the plane's lawful bent (in Elysium they're more likely to avoid the extremes of both law and chaos; in Bytopia, they embrace them and make use of them, each side bringing their strengths to the mix). Capitalism works perfectly here. Communism works perfectly here as well.

The Outlands are competition. It's not as positive as Bytopia. In any exchange, someone makes more of a profit than the other. There are winners and losers. That doesn't mean the other party doesn't benefit at all, but there's a Darwinian struggle going on, and it's at least possible for people to be cheated or be run out of business, where that's difficult to manage in Bytopia.

Gehenna is exploitation. In any exchange, one side benefits and the other suffers, horribly. It's (nearly) physically impossible to have it both ways on this plane; if you attempt to give someone a fair deal, it means you're likely to be utterly screwed. If it's not them suffering, it's you. Labor here is based on backbreaking suffering or outright slavery. It's a capitalistic (or socialistic) nightmare, with groaning, scarred thralls, people selling their own limbs and bodies and minds to survive a little longer, and absolutely no authority that can check the absolute power of business owners, merchants, gods, and yugoloth and barghest lords. It's thievery with no compassion, food is sold with no safety standards, and workers are ground into dust by their uncaring overlords. It's every evil corporation in books and movies, but a thousand times worse. It's a plane where semi-mechanical horrors kidnap innocents and transform them into pig-thralls with lifespans of mere weeks. Think of the Company in Aliens, or the one in Total Recall. The worst of the Lords of the Planar Trade Consortium have their headquarters here. This plane represents all that's worst about the Fated, just as Ysgard represents what's best in that faction. If you have the Tome of Horrors II from Necromancer Games, there's an outer planar race (the n'gathau) that collects limbs and bodies from living creatures and stitches them together into agonized mockeries - they'd best be placed in Mungoth, I think.

The theme of Gehenna as given in Planes of Conflict is that free will is an illusion. There is only the rule of the strong over the weak. That fits with what I've been saying; you can't choose compassion on Gehenna, not really. You can only be the exploiter, and not the exploited. There's no middle ground. If you're strong, if you have a more powerful will, you find yourself exploiting those who are weaker, willingly or not. If you're weak, you'll be exploited. Good-aligned characters won't want to stay for long.

Gehenna's place as the anti-Bytopia makes it unique in the lower planes. In Baator, plane of wicked politics and law, there are checks and balances on independent corporate exploiters; the villain in Baator is the government, led ultimately by the Dark Lord of Nessus himself. In Gehenna there are many villains without any check upon their activities, no central authority, laissez-faire run rampant, a libertarian dystopia. In the Gray Waste, plane of apathy and soul-crushing despair, suffering is personal and, for the most part, internal, or for the sake of suffering itself rather than for any particular benefit gained by the tormenters (who are affected by the same soul-crushing apathy, which is why the yugoloths mostly moved to Gehenna). In Gehenna, suffering is external, and used to fuel endless agony machines in order to out-compete rivals. As with Bytopia, law and chaos combine in Gehenna, but where in Bytopia they're able to cooperate like nowhere else in the multiverse, in Gehenna they war, endlessly.

Gehenna isn't anarchy like the Abyss; there are rules, but the rules are always subject to negotiation, and they exist purely for the benefit of those in power. Where they produce no benefit, they do not exist. In Baator, rules are much more unchanging and inviolable, and they exist for their own sake. If Baator's laws benefit those in power, this is secondary to the necessity for rules for the sake of rules. Baator is malign law personified. Gehenna is exploitation personified.

Gehenna is also the Beastlands' opposite in many respects, the Beastlands as free, beautiful, and natural as Gehenna is as desolate, polluted, and exploited. It's a mistake to give a plane only one opposite. In fact, most planes have two opposites; its diametric opposite and its mirror opposite. Baator and Celestia are mirror opposites, each the good/evil equivalent of the other on the planes of law. Celestia and the Abyss are diametric opposites, one as chaotic and evil as the other is lawful and good.

I think the unrelenting snow, magma, and ash-covered volcanic slopes of Gehenna are distinctive enough. The only other plane that exists on a permanent slope is Malbolge (before the ascension of Glasya), and that layer isn't volcanic or chill. Think of Gehenna as an evil, tilted Iceland, with the other three layers visible in the void like bloody, triangular moons.

I think the planes of Baator ought to have the layers above them visible from below, too, just as in Celestia the layers above can be seen. Let the unique configuration of the plane be visible to those who visit it.

""I find the terrain of Gehenna painfully (and I mean PAINFULLY) unimaginative; thus my push way past the boundaries.""
Really? I found it pretty imaginative. Four massive volcanoes floating over a vast nothingness (yes, they ARE floating), two made of magma, one made of acidic snow, and one dead and dark. In addition, the 2nd layer features a mimic the size of an entire city, who eventually wishes to become a major trade hub.

""You mention “Gehennan natives aren't out to kill people just for the fun of it... [rather it’s the] "what's in it for me?" thing mentioned earlier”
--OK my problem with this point is if the residents of Gehenna are so opportunistic, when why don’t they ever do anything?""
They do. They're the ones who actually control the entire damn Blood War, and supposedly masterminded the whole thing. They're friggin' manipulating the Baatezu and Tanar'ri, mainly for profit.

""How does the theme of being opportunistic (evil to gain something) tie in with the theme of sadism. Yes, I get that sadists get pleasure from their acts; but ultimately, it doesn't really accomplish anything. Sadism seems much more of a Abyssian trait.""
It's partly that another theme is mere "evil for evil's sake" among the Yugoloths (and evil for profit), whereas for the Baatezu, it's "evil with a goal", and with the Tanar'ri it's "evil for enjoyment". The Yugoloths are supposed to be even more evil than the Baatezu or Tanar'ri, keep that in mind.

""what is the end game of the resident of Gehenna?""
Nobody knows. That's another theme with the Yugoloths is intrigue. The highest rank of Yugoloth is the Baernaloths, their creators, and unless they're mentioned in the 4E Demonomicon, not a single canonical source lists a single one of them other than Apomps the rebel (who created the Gehreleth of Carceri), but it's well known that the Oinoloth and the General of Gehenna seek their counsel on a regular basis (and only ultroloth princes such as those two are able to contact the Baernaloths) Remember that we don't even know the gender of the General of Gehenna, much less its name! Their nature and goals aren't meant to be fully understood like their Baatorian and Abyssian cousins. However, it's posited that the ultimate goal of the Yugoloths is to trick/manipulate the Baatezu and Tanar'ri into wiping each other out, so that the Yugoloths alone will rule the lower planes.

"But what are the (probably) less cryptic goal of the other residents?"
The other residents are not dominant forces of the plane, so there isn't a whole lot mentioned about them. However, the other INDIGENOUS residents include the Barghests, Phiuhl, Vaporighu, Linquas, and Slasraths.

Slasraths, bonespears, are just animals/beasts/what have you.

Phiuhls obey and cannot be controlled/compelled by anyone, and a Tanar'ri stupid enough to use ESP on it went insane, muttering things that appeared related to the inner planes (e.g. Undead Lords of Brass, Spirits of Long-Dead Wind Dukes, etc.). They'll eat anything, and even the fiends are afraid of them. I think they appear somewhere in 3x as well; this is just their 2E info. They are 'elemental' type creatures made from heat, steam, and toxic vapors.

Linqua work for and are creations of the deity, Sung Chiang. They are extremely prone to drug and energy addictions (in 3x terms, their will score is probably only around 8 at best). They operate as 2nd-level rogues under 2E rules (IIRC Sung Chiang is the Chinese god of thieves)

Vaporighus "don't seem to have any causes or motives; they exist only to cause pain ans suffering to any sod unfotunate enough to cross their path." This thing seems a tad out of place however, because its nature and description fits with something from the Gray Waste (perhaps it, like the Yugoloths, was originally indigenous to there?) with the whole "loves to cause suffering, is festering with disease, etc." theme. "They savagely attack anything short of a greater yugoloth, and sometimes even those."
They also have a fear aura, and also cause fear simply by being so hideous to look at. They're covered in corrosive, diseased slime. Also "only weapons of cold-wrought iron can affect them. Enchanted weapons cannot affect them no matter how powerful (e.g. no matter how many plusses.)"

It also gives a monster writeup for the Baernaloth:
"The essence of the creature is callous detachment, never seeing the suffering and pain that it ceaselessly creates; an unending, insatiable need for misery and affliction; a monster that mechanically, methodically hurts, harms, foils, impairs, and hinders all other creatures. In many ways, the baernaloths are the outcasts among the ranks of the Yugoloths."
They all (save Apomps) represent the Gray Waste version of the Yugoloth, BTW, so they're covered in pus and infectious bodily secretions.
They are the weakest Yugoloth when it comes to sheer might. They know more about fiends of all types, and may not be true Yugoloths at all, but rather some sort of primal ancestor, predating even the Yugoloth, who predate the Baatezu and Tanar'ri.
"More than anything else though, baernaloths see their place in the scheme of things as bringers of misery and pain. They specialize in torture, not as a means of interrogation, but as agony for agony's sake."
This shows another difference between the Yugoloths of Gehenna and Gray Waste:
The ones of Gray Waste are all about disease, pain, and torture. The ones on Gehenna are all about greed, deception, and intrigue (but vestiges of their gray waste nature, such as torture as a diversion, and apathy to anything of no benefit or no harm to them remain)

I honestly don't feel like hunting up the Barghest's 2E writeup or looking at anything from 3x.

""Although I just thought of this follow-up question: what industries can there be on a violently pitched slope with few resources and subject to frequent lava (or other substances) flows?
This isn't impossible, it just makes the setup a little unlikely.""
Actually, some of the towns *esp. those near Sun Chiang's divine realm* are stated in Planes of Conflict to be very good places to find rare and unusual items (which are usually stolen). Unfortunately, they are sold at obscenely inflated prices (IIRC 3x their actual worth).

Yes, mining and smelting would be the primary industries, and the industries associated with the Blood War, including weapons and other provisions. Merchants who bleed desperate troops dry for needed supplies in an inhospitable environment (and remember, not all Blood Warriors are fiends) will be common. Yes, it's a horrible place to live and work - that's the point. Life is nasty and short for the desperate peons of the plane; their overseers burn through them quickly, and send barghests to hunt for more, endlessly more, mostly children. Think of inhosptable mining colonies on Mars. The vaporighu make admirable whipmasters and slave drivers, though I also love the idea of vaporighu gangsters in sleazy cantinas. I recommend The Forever War by John Haldeman for more flavor on wars in inhospitable, unfathomably cold and dark environments. Then imagine that planar merchants have the ability to bring relief, at ruinous prices. For the miners, too: "I owe my soul to the company store," indeed. As long as the Blood War lasts, Gehenna's economy will thrive, for some.

Gehenna is the cruel parent who sacrifices her children. The name comes from Gihinnom, the fiery garbage dump outside Jerusalem where children were burnt in the furnaces of Moloch. Barghests sacrifice their own children, casting them to other planes to survive on their own before returning to the warm comfort of the furnaces that spawned them.

An infinite volcanic slope isn't any more creative or interesting than a finite, but unfathomably large volcanic slope. Unless you're on the edge, watching lava or Styx water rain down into the endless, endlessly hungry void, there's no difference from a visitor's perspective, except you're robbed of some of the most visually arresting sights on the plane: the other three furnaces hovering in the sky, each darker than the last, and the terrifying edge itself, and beyond the edge of the first furnace, the blood-red orb that is the gate to Torch. The Gehennan town nearest this portal, as I said, I've named the Edge, also Void's Edge, Furnace's Edge, the City of Ravens, City on the Edge of Never, Neverland, City of Lost Children, etc., ruled by the hidden cabal of vaporighu elders who have controlled the city since it slid from the Outlands long ago, at the moment the vaporighu race was first created.

I do like the idea of subjective slopes, though that's not incompatible with the idea of finite layers, unless you're on the edge or peak. Volcanoes bigger than worlds are readily distingishable from Ysgard's earthen rivers or Acheron's cubes.

Gehenna is lava and cold and darkness and barren rock because this makes working there more agonizing, and supplies more precious, but also, yes, because this is the antithesis of the beastlands.

Gehenna is also the location of the Flower Infernal, headquarters of the Tacharim, planar marauders created to give Pentar plausible deniability in her war against the modron march.

Don't forget the trade in secrets and lore: Mellifleur, Velsharoon, Math, and the Tower of the Arcanoloths itself.

It was an example of how barghests fit the theme I was trying to convey. But yes, I did mean to suggest an adventure in which immature barghests are kidnapping human children and bringing them back to Gehenna to work in forced labor camps.

There should also be various exiled devils connected to Moloch, the exiled Lord of the Sixth himself, on the plane.

And it fits with other ideas I plan on posting to this thread eventually. The point is to establish a theme to spur further creativity. I think the "exploitation of children" theme has legs.

As for evil sun gods, that particular tangent doesn't seem relevant to this thread, but there are some evil sun gods in D&D, including the Maztican god Tezca (chaotic evil god of heat and sunlight), the Aztec/Olman gods Tezcatlipoca and Tonatiuh, and the Babylonian god Nergal, if you use a more historical version. There's also an evil sun cult in the non-canonical Greyhawk novel The Price of Power.

This essay suggested a conspiracy theory that explains the lack of succubus-equivalents among the 'loths.

But really, I have no problem with it. Baatezu and tanar'ri tempt mortals. Yugoloths are fiends that concentrate most of their resources in tempting other fiends. Mortals and mortal souls, in their view, are a contaminant, a pollution that distracts them from the absolute purity of evil. Unlike the tanar'ri and baatezu, they are far older than mortals and do not think they need them (though they don't seem to care enough to wipe them out; mortal existence is beneath their consideration). Their towers act as filters that remove any mortal taint from the plane's energies before creating new mezzoloths, or they can, in a pinch, reproduce sexually, though they seem to find this distasteful. Yugoloths, like obyriths, vaati, elder Baatorians, guardinals, eladrins, and so forth, are part of the older generation of planeborn that precede the use of petitioners in reproduction.

I am getting images of a prohibition-era speakeasy town on the slopes of Gehenna, a den of drunkenness, gambling, backstabbing, and brawling. A place thieves go to strike deals, fiends go looking for slaves, where the booze flows freely, but don't ask what it's made of because you really don't want to know.

You can bet anything you want at the tables. Winners really win, but losers really lose. You can lose the clothes off your back. But even if you're tossed out naked and bereft of dignity, if you get out with your soul intact, you're a lucky sod.

Then again, if you play the game and win, the rewards are well worth it.

And the dark forces running the burg make sure just enough bashers win to keep the other berks coming.

---------------------

On the subject of a race of creatures made from grafted fiend parts...

The two colder layers of Gehenna are popular undead haunts (hah!). They could work. But how about this.

Some time ago, an ambitious arcanaloth got an idea to build a Frakenstein-like creature built from body parts he found across the Blood War battlefields. If successful, this creature and others would make mercenaries he could hire out to warlords on all sides of the War.

It took him a long time to make the perfect creation, but he finally did, using mostly fiend parts. A little tanar'ri, a little baatezu, a little yugoloth, and a pinch of gehreleth.

The arcanaloth wanted his undead creations to be useful, so he imbued them with intelligence. He gave them magic, instilled a fighting instinct within them, and taught them how to adapt. Because they were an amalgamation of different fiends, they were able to adapt more quickly and creatively than any one fiend. Fiends are bound to their natures as chaotic or lawful evil, but these creations didn't have that fetter.

In his hubris, the arcanaloth never thought his creations would outwit him. He used his magic to keep them in line but he became overconfident. He'd given the creatures the ability to adapt. And so his first creations learned how to resist the arcanaloth's magic and they killed him.

It is sometimes said that every creature seeks to reproduce itself. These creations were no different. After they killed the arcanaloth, they retreated to the cold slopes of Mungoth or Krangath. From their hiding place on the cold slopes, they go out into the hotter Gehennan volcanoes and look for other body parts. They've made a modest number of themselves already and plan to make more.

Plus, sometimes they find upgrades among the fallen -- grafts they can use to better themselves.

And someday, they might launch an all-out attack on the 'loths, striking out against their creators.

---------------------

You may wish to take a look at Pathguy's page on Gehenna. He talks about a lot of what's discussed already in this thread but it's worth a look. He takes a very "organized crime" approach to Gehenna. The Godfather is even quoted on the page. Definitely worth a look if you want to see a take on Gehenna's nature.

Also, on the "gangster" theme. Would "throw him into the Void" or "give him some magma shoes" be these gansters' equivalent of tossing someone in the Hudson River?

Possibly, that and giving someone a good shove (they'll go tumbling down the slopes) Just bear in mind however that Yugoloths as well as most Gehenna natives and inhabitants are completely immune to fire damage, so giving someone 'magma shoes' wouldn't have the same effect.

Hohoho! Don't get involved in the barghest mafia! It can only lead to trouble.

I like this and I'm going to have to use it somewhere.

Actually, my comic is going to Gehenna down the road and barghest mafia is just the antagonist I need to make that story arc work.

I think it's enough, honestly. Plus, if you build it, they will come. The adage is true in many respects. On the Great Wheel, it can be even truer. There are more than enough people on the planes to get caught up in barghest mafia politics.

Something the books don't touch on quite enough is that all the planes have a mortal population. The mortals may not be on every single layer, and they may not even be that widespread. But they all have a mortal population. Even Vacuum is mentioned as having a few people that prefer to eke out a life in the void.

Plus we have to remember that "mortal" doesn't mean "human." The goblins have a presence on Gehenna (probably doubly so, given their associations with barghests). Tieflings are probably also common mortals. The active layers probably boast some fire genasi denizens and you can bet there are several human communities.

If you reach out a little bit, it's also easy to see fire giants (there is a giant community on Mungoth -- not fire giants but still giants), maybe some rogue modrons, perhaps some orcs, the list of possibilities go on.

Consider, too, that many divine realms exist across Gehenna. These realms are populated by a host of mortals, among other things. While each individual realm may be mostly self-sufficient, contact between the mortals is possible -- especially if there's a go-between group (like barghest mafia families). Unless the divine realms are pretty explicitly off-limits (and it's very possible in Gehenna), canny barghest families might go trading. Even then, some barghests might try to make trouble. It's a dangerous game, but a body'd be surprised what a power allows to happen in his realm -- especially one that's less caring about the fate of his followers.

Plus, there's Sung Chiang's Teardrop Palace, which is a major black market resource.

The Planar Trade Consortium is virtually everywhere, so you can guarantee they've got a presence. Though I doubt Estevan would let his organization just be a front.

If the mafia groups prove successful, you might see Merkhants, several unsavory Taker groups, and maybe even some ambitious Indeps and Sensates heading in to try and stake their claims.

Beyond that, there are plenty of non-mortals. Gehenna's one of the conflict planes and while it doesn't see nearly as much Blood War traffic as the Gray Waste, it still sees some. The yugoloths are a constant presence. The Crawling City makes its rounds on Gehenna and one of the popular theories is that Gehenna, not the Waste, is the actual plane of origin for the 'loths. Some of the barghest families may make big deals with baatezu warlords. Their shared lawfulness would make it easier for barghest crime bosses to deal with baatezu than tanar'ri.

There are lots of undead on the two colder layers, though the barghests probably avoid Krangath (and maybe Mungoth too; barghests seem to prefer the heat). But there's nothing saying there can't be some kind of trade link. Some undead will prefer to isolate themselves, but some are ambitious.

Plus, if we use the cobbled-together undead fiends, they might enjoy arrangements with barghest families.

With the gambling dens, the barghests just need to make sure enough people win that word gets out about great payoffs. After that, it's paying the right chant-brokers to spread the right chant. There are plenty of people on the planes desperate enough, daring enough, or stupid enough (the three are not mutually exclusive) to try their luck on barghest gambling tables regardless of the plane they have to get to.

Bottom line is, I think the commerce is there, just gotta know what to look toward.

Well, I don't mean to imply that there is some kind of prohibition. Certainly, there can be. My use of "prohibition" was more to illustrate the seedy feel these bars would have. It was the first idea that came to mind.

That being said, I think barring the Blood War could work if you want to create a prohibition. The speakeasy towns could be popular R&R spots for the troops. After a brutal campaign, they spend time on Gehenna visiting the barghest-run brothels, dens of drinking and drugs, and vast casinos. I think making the barghest Casablancas more neutral territory could very well work.

Maybe "speakeasy" isn't exactly the right term. I could definitely see several barghest Las Vegas-style casino towns across Gehenna. Can you imagine what a barghest-run resort city would look like? Atlantic City from Hell? Remember, the devil is not always horrific and grotesque. Evil doesn't always come in the violent and brutal forms. The kind of debauchery that a casino city offers lends itself remarkably well to exploitation of the "weak" customer by the "strong" casino owners.

And if the barghests really are the mob bosses of Gehenna, they're the perfect group to be in charge of these hellish Vegases and Atlantic Cities and so forth.

The cities themselves make incredible adventure venues. Some cities might be run entirely by one barghest cartel. Others would have influence from several different cartels. There's room for all sorts of turf wars, inter-clan fighting, and political wrangling to get in control of the city. Back-alley deals are common -- as are back-alley muggings.

The casinos range from grungy, dismal dives for the Blood War grunts to vast, palatial resorts for visiting dignitaries, high-ranked soldiers, and anyone else that can afford their monumentally steep prices. Anyone and everyone is welcome to these vacation "hotspots" (hah!). Just don't cross the ruling mob and you might even get out with your skin intact.

Of course, crime runs rampant through these cities. They're popular havens for pickpockets, footpads, con artists, and cutthroats. The barghest mobs are constantly at each other's throats. Miniature Blood Wars do erupt between baatezu and tanar'ri on back streets and alleys. Brawls break out fairly often in the less-classy parts of town. In the upper-class areas, politics and maneuvering become deadly as fiends can't break the habit of trying to outdo each other. The barghests enforce what they can but they also support some of it too. Organizing the crime helps keep everyone in check. If one group of visitors gets a little out of control, arrange some "accidents" to get them back in line. Smaller thieves' guilds constantly try to get up and running but they always get destroyed or absorbed into one of the ruling barghest mobs.

Every once in a while you get some misguided celestial or Harmonium group that comes in trying to clean the place up. They either fall from grace very quickly or they get laughed (and usually killed) out of the cities.

These casinos probably operate several branches across the Outlands and Sigil. They might even have some places in Baator (Dis would be a good place for a casino branch), the Gray Waste, and maybe even other Lower Planes. I could see some kind of setup on Carceri, trying to lure the terribly desperate people that dwell there. Or on Pandemonium, maybe in the Madhouse or Windglum, hoping to get a few barmies to part with things they won't realize are gone. Might even have a presence on several Abyssal layers, like Azzagrat or Malcanthet's layer. These outlying franchises would provide a small taste of what's actually possible on Gehenna proper. If they're specially crafted to cover up how bad things get when you really lose, then they'd be great for snagging a lot more hopefuls seeking to make a quick fortune on the fiery slopes.

I had a similar vision, but then I wondered what exactly would be "prohibited" amongst beings so evil? I think that these speak-easies should have the prohibition that the Blood War doesn't exist within its walls. If you can't agree to that rule, then you are either thrown out or you are not allowed inside in the first place.
In all likelihood any sort of sanctified item that might possibly be able to function on that plane would be banned, and if it's not banned by actual law, it'll be banned functionally-- e.g. you'll find that every single street 'loth and what-have-you is suddenly on your ass.
The same cannot be said of cold-wrought iron (which IIRC the loths are weak to) since the 'loths can actually use it. Whereas items which deal sacred damage/have sacred bonuses/etc. only serve their enemies. Their GOOD aligned enemies. Obviously these things wouldn't be common in the first place, so anyone who brings such things isn't just some clueless green prime. Of course, if he has such a thing, chances are he's fairly powerful, so Gehenna's street gangs are far more likely to stalk the guy and try to ensure he has an unfortunate 'accident' rather than engage him directly.

[Side note: Instead of poker chips, would high stakes games involve tossing larvae on the table?]
Possibly. Or even worse: get demoted to the next lower level of demon/devil/yugoloth. Of course that's only if the gambler bets his rank, and would be the fiendish equivalent to betting one's shirt.
If you can't pay, you'll be sent to the dungeons for a few liquid pain extractions (see Book of Vile Darkness for details on this. As I recall the 'loths in particular are big on liquid pain extraction, though that may have come from somewhere other than the BoVD. In fact, *I could be remembering thsi incorrectly however* if I recall correctly, the Yugoloths use liquid pain as a fuel source for some of their machinery.)

That's an interesting line. The Beastlands as pristine nature, Bytopia as conserved nature, Gehenna the opposite of both as exploited nature, with maximum ecological destruction wrought by the yugoloths and the other planar natives.

The Lower Planes aren't noted for their wealth or bounty, but Liber Malevolentiae says that the waters on Gehenna taste of heavy metals. Perhaps you could say that the volcanos of Gehenna are almost the only source of many valuable minerals in the Lower Planes, particularly obsidian and porphyry, malachite and azurite, and metals like tin, platinum, and perhaps cold iron and silver (the latter two not being well-liked materials on a lot of Lower Planes, what with the natives being vulnerable to it and all!). The locals extract it with frantic effort, selling their finds for the food and drinkable water the plane lacks.

Large mines worked by blasting (magical) and slave gangs would criscross the surface and caves of Gehenna, feeding screaming, smashing conveyors that slice dross off of valuable stone, and belching refineries that smelt the ores, for sale to armies and other operations across the Lower Planes. Any given mine is small and grudging, requiring a huge investment of labor and yielding a tiny amount before another claim has to be found. Worked-out, abandoned mines are everywhere.

Fights over claimjumping are constant, and there is always a need for explorers to survey. The plane's lava flows and earthquakes constantly produce new areas to explore. It's even said that if it weren't for the miners extracting stone and dumping loose waste, that gets blown or washed away into the void in the next Gehennan storm, and shipping off the material they find, that Gehenna would be larger -- that it's only the extraction and exploitation that keep Gehenna from growing into a plane the size of its neighbors.

Another opposition to the animal variety of the Beastlands, yeah. Fossils of every animal species, in vast fossil beds, and the gates to the Gray Waste are found within the forests of bones. The fossil beds seem to be extruded from the unknown depths of the plane, possibly as species go extinct on one Prime Material world or another. This also gives rise to veins of coal, oil, and tar, which are another frantically-exploited resource that leaves Gehenna's surface blackened, ripped, and choked with smoke.

I'm loving the direction this is taking!

Not really relevant to the rest of the thread, but I just wanted to point out how Carceri, being the fourth corner (so to speak), might be considered to be overrun nature. The landscape there is merciless.

Especially given that one layer of Carceri houses those that gave into their bestial urges.

Also especially given that Malar's realm is on Carceri and he represents the savagery of nature on Toril.

I'm kind of surprised Gehenna was slated for renovation. Admittedly it's not as well-populated as the Gray Waste, but that always seemed to be the point to me. Gehenna is *the* barren plane, for me. I could see how it could suffer from complaints that it was a little too similar to Baator, but I think I always imagined the wastelands of Baator and the Abyss as bursting with their own unique brands of life, while Gehenna was just... empty.

Anyway, as I mentioned in the PRJ for the Beastlands, in my campaign, I transplanted the rakshasa from Acheron to Gehenna. Acheron already had its goblin and orc petitioners, not to mention the bladelings. Besides, the rakshasa never really seemed to fit on Acheron. Rakshasa, for me, aren't about oppression and warfare so much as deception and greed. I view their lawful alignment as having to do with the strict laws which govern their conduct amongst themselves, as well as their deep respect for the gods.

These rakshasa will usually make some attempt to obey a direct order from a god, any god, not just their own. Likewise, certain high-ranking celestials, whose orders are apt to come straight from their patron god's own lips, also gain a lot of traction with rakshasa. The rakshasa won't obey orders which contravene the edicts of their creator, ten-headed Ravanna, but they respect divine laws, to a degree in which they certainly don't respect the laws of anyone else.

This selective lawfulness is one way in which I justify their placement in Gehenna, although in my setting, Gehenna was always their home on the Outer Planes. They maintain a mercantile presence on Acheron, as with most of the planes. They reserve a special interest for Thuldanin, but are most famous for having stolen one the cubes of Acheron, a fortress which now serves as one of the great hubs of rakshasa on Gehenna's first layer of Khalas.

Gehenna is a plane of thieves. In my visions of the planes, the four mounts are surrounded by floating debris stolen from worlds past counting. It's a bustling port for planehopping spelljammers, despite being full of wrecked ships, shattered planets, depleted asteroid mining concerns... When the rakshasa wish to put on a show for newcomers, they cloak the place in illusions, though such magic is heavily localized, used solely to impress and entertain guests who are not permitted to stray from the courts of their fiendish hosts.

I'm sure slavery does a brisk business in Gehenna. Spelljamming mind flayers, the tso and their uncouth hillbilly cousins the neogi, khaasta, the Dao... All are welcome!

What little honour there is among thieves contributes to the plane's lawful facade. Perhaps it is a fitting irony that the rakshasa have found their own plane stolen out from under them by the yugoloths. The irony is further heightened if the rumours are true, and the raavasta were once rakshasa who turned stag on their race.

In any event, when it comes to organized crime, to cutthroat politics, to corrupt corporate industry, and the kind of evil that operates under the veil of legitimacy, I'd like to throw the rakshasa's collective hat in the ring. They're the lurking beast behind the sophisticated veneer, tigers camouflaged in pinstripes.