Infernal Ideas
July 19th, 2010
Greetings. To those of you who are wondering why Joshua’s picture in the corner there doesn’t look a whole lot like him, the reason is that after much scheming, plotting, conniving, cajoling, wheedling, and, eventually, begging, I was able to convince him to let me take over his Grave Plots article for Devil Week. Of course, now I owe him, so I’ll probably have to let him do a Dark Designs or two in the future, or Asmodeus knows what…but that’s not important. What is important is that here and now I get to talk to you about devils. Specifically, about plots involving devils.
The most important thing to remember about devils is that they’re sneaky. You can never trust them, and when it looks like everything’s iron-clad and the devil must really be on the up-and-up because, well, it’s just a good deal for everyone all ‘round, well: that’s when the devil’s got you. Devils play smart, not hard, and they outwit or corrupt their opponents, whenever possible, rather than beating them into submission (the beating—along with other tortures—comes later).
The other important thing to remember about devils is that they’re always on the lookout to get ahead. There are multiple things a devil might be looking out for, specifically (for example, gold, land, political power, etc.), but the number one thing a devil is always interested in is generally souls. Souls serve as a sort of currency amongst devils, and while the reasons for this will vary with the cosmology (my preferred answer is the Planescape one, where the souls are conscripted into the Blood War), the bottom line is that a devil that collects a lot of souls gets promoted, and that’s a good thing. Still, though, there are a lot of different ways for a devil to get ahead, and the most effective devils will be those who are able to recognize the opportunity in any given situation.
Within the archetype of sneaky bastards that are always looking for a chance to get ahead and make a little profit, there’re a lot of things you can do with devils, and one of the reasons why they’re amongst my favorite races of outsider is that your party is likely to interact with them in dozens of different ways. Sure, they could just fight them in a wordless brawl at the end of a dungeon crawl through a cult’s hideout. There’s nothing wrong with that, but one could also serve as a really sophisticated and long-term nemesis with great and complex schemes that weave around the PCs like nooses, or as constant foils (think the guy who kept stealing all of Indiana Jones’ discoveries in Raiders of the Lost Ark), or even as informants and/or merchants and other service providers. The point is, devils can prove to be real workhorses in your arsenal of NPCs: a sort of Swiss-army-outsider. Here are some examples.
Sxzylthot the Imp
Sxzylthot the Imp begins play as a lovable nuisance (or, if you’re the sort who doesn’t like lovable nuisances, probably a bloody-annoying nuisance). As his name implies, he’s an imp. Like all lovable imps, he has a very high opinion of himself, and takes every opportunity to share it. He might also regularly pester the PCs to sell him their soul, offering all kinds of petty things in exchange. How exactly the PCs come to meet Sxzylthot could vary: they might encounter him in the depths of a dungeon, and only refrain from killing him as he cries out, “No, wait, let’s do business!” Alternatively, he might run a small shop in town, serve as a low-level informant the PCs bully for information about shady dealings, or he might even be a PC’s familiar.
He doesn’t have to be friendly, though, if that’s your cup of tea: he might constantly spy on the PCs, giving vital information to their enemies and showing up while they’re imprisoned (or what have you) to mock them. He could steal their loot from under their noses while they sleep. The details aren’t that important: what’s important is that the PCs see him fairly regularly, and that he comes off as pathetic, and not a real threat (even if he’s an enemy, they should always feel that they could kill him easily if they just got a good chance).
Then, once you’re confident that Sxzylthot has been properly emblazoned into your players’ memories, he suddenly stops showing up. If he’s been adversarial towards them up until this point, he might make a few vague threats about his “new master” or his “grand schemes,” but these should be only the latest of many, and the PCs should put no stock by them. If he’s been traveling with the party, you should just kill him off. Don’t worry: he’ll be back.
You see, a while later, after the PCs have gone a few levels without Sxzylthot and some time has passed, they hear from him one last time: except now, he’s not Sxzylthot the Imp anymore. Now he’s Szxylthot the Two-CRs-Higher-Than-The-Party Devil. He’s been promoted (probably quite a bit, depending on the party’s level, at this point), and he thinks it’s time for some revenge for the way the party treated him in the past (if he used to be friendly, this could be because the party “let him die,” or it could be because they “never really appreciated him” or anything else. Devils hold long grudges).
The exact nature of the vengeance is largely up to you. This is one case where a straight-up fight might not be a bad idea, but more elaborate and drawn-out vengeances are great, too. In fact, you might even consider bypassing the CR-upgrade entirely and just let Sxzylthot become incredibly politically powerful, usurping a small kingdom and declaring the PCs outlaws, or something like that. Finally, if you’re a more beneficent DM than I, you could twist the whole plot in a couple different ways. First, if Sxzylthot and the PCs were on good terms, he could theoretically come back to help the PCs, though it’s not a very devilish thing to do, unless he’s getting something out of it. You could also reward your players by having a powerful devil who they had fought for a long stretch of the campaign come back demoted instead of promoted, as an imp or other lesser devil.
The Infernal Ball
In this plot, your PCs are unfortunate enough to receive an invitation to a grand ball…set in one of the nine hells. Though they will no doubt be suspicious and reluctant, the message didn’t leave any option to RSVP a “no,” and everyone knows there are some invitations you really can’t turn down without making some very, very serious enemies. Besides, the invitation says that their safety is guaranteed, so nothing could possibly happen to them…right?
Naturally, whoever sent the invitation didn’t do so purely for the PCs’ sparkling personalities (though, depending on the PCs’ actions this far in the campaign, there may be a few devils in attendance who have heard of them: these might be enemies, or, if the PCs’ claim to fame has been fighting demons, they might even be wellwishers, but any immortal devil noble is unlikely to be impressed by the PCs in any case). In fact, they are here as pawns in a grand and complicated political game, as one devil (or group of devils) tries to make his (or her) move against a rival.
The details here might get complicated, and, in any case, are probably best left to your discretion, but they should be very in-depth and byzantine. Grab a blank piece of paper and a pencil, and, in various places throughout the paper, write down a few devil names or factions (or just letters, for now). Then, using arrows, connect each to the other by alliance/enmity/etc (for example: A is trying to claim B’s throne. B is aware of this and wants A out of the way. C works for both parties, and is secretly playing them off of each other. D has a grudge against B, and so is secretly helping A, but can’t admit it openly because B has information about what D did to E…) and so on. Once you know what each party wants, it’s just a matter of putting all the pieces into place, and soon you’ll have the PCs in the middle of a web of intrigue, as various devils try to frame them, assassinate them and frame a foe, hire them to kill someone, appear to be allying with them to force someone else into a premature move, use a doppelganger that looks like a PC to assassinate a rival, etc., etc., etc.
This sounds like a lot of work for a network of plots that the PCs are never likely to fully unveil, and in some respects it is. Bear in mind, though, that these plots don’t really need to make that much sense. They certainly don’t need to be the easiest way to do things. After all, your PCs aren’t likely to see the whole pie, so they won’t be bothering you about little details like that. And it leaves your party with a feeling that devil politics are really, really complicated. If your players like politics, they might even try to get involved, which is good, but can be a little dangerous, because, remember, devils should generally be far superior at politicking than the average (or even pretty good) PC, so if your PCs start “winning” politics, you may need to cheat a little, or else they’ll walk out of hell feeling like devils are a bunch of chumps who don’t live up to the hype. At the end of the day, the adventure should be for the PCs to survive all the schemes and plots around them and be able to go home (and this should require some doing), not for them to walk away as the new lords of the third layer.
This also gives you a good chance to cameo all those exciting devil lords that you read about in Monster Manuals but never actually use, and it can also be kind of fun to set the scene, giving PCs extensive descriptions of the kind of food, drink, and fun activities that can be found at an infernal ball (depending on your taste, these may be exquisite delicacies the likes of which the mortal world has never seen, that are so good they’re practically a sin to look at, or they might be something a little more…garish. Like eyeballs.
That’s it for this week’s Grave Plots. Join…er…Joshua…next time, when he’ll be giving you plots about…something. I’m not sure, really. He doesn’t tell me these things. In the meantime, try thinking one extra step ahead—you might be surprised how many people you outwit that way.