Fleshing out a pantheon of (former) Devils

In the DND campaign I'm running right now there's a nation of Tieflings (mortals with fiendish blood) governed by seven powerful devils exiled from hell.

The Seven started out as typical Lawful Evil devils but over time have gravitated more and more towards what might be called amoral neutrality.

Now I've done decent writeups for a few of them, but so far it's been on the other side of the continent from where my players are so there hasn't been any pressure to add more details. However, at least one of those players is interested in a trip to that area due to a throwaway comment I made at one point, and if they end up moving there I'll need something beyond Here There Be Devils.

So here I am, asking for ideas. Basically, these need to be kinda shady but not For the Evulz. Puppy-kicking villainy doesn't really work very well at ruling nations. Pragmatic Villainy on the other hand...

All concepts also need to allow for neutral or even good-aligned characters following them to a certain extent.

Here's the ones I've worked up so far (aside from the Vastareth, none are really set in stone at this point).

• Ashurak
  • Key concept: "Ask not whether it is good or evil, ask whether it works." Ashurak's Hat is pragmatism in all things. His followers would probably see the value of Lord Vetinari's policies.
• Vastareth
  • Key concept: "Always repay your debts." Reward loyalty, punish treachery. If somebody harms you, harm them. If somebody aids you, aid them. Leave no debt unpaid. Devotees of Vastareth would probably find a lot of common ground with House Lannister.
• Loromion
  • Key concept: "Follow the worthy. Replace the unworthy." Basically the patron saint of Klingon Promotion, with an attitude that would probably be very familiar to the old-republic era Sith.

Yet-unnamed ideas:

• a patron of Enlightened Self-Interest ("Helping you can help me.")
• a patron of Combat Pragmatism ("Honor is for losers, the goal is to win")

edited 8th Jun '15 5:47:52 AM by MattStriker

You can fold combat pragmatism into Ashuruk's dominion.

Well, I figure I'll need somebody to fit the "god of war" slot.

They do not sound really True Neutral to me. Ashurak borders on Neutral Evil (type 1 — amoral, not immoral), Vastareth is Lawful Neutral, and Loromion is Lawful Evil, I think.

I didn't say they were supposed to be True Neutral. Like I said...they're gravitating towards neutrality, sliding away from literally being embodiments of Lawful Evil to something that works a bit better out in the "real world".

Vastareth is pretty much LN, yeah, and Loromion is LE although mellowed out a bit from the original devilish version of the philosophy he embodies.

D&D Alignments are kind of silly anyway, I mean you can fold batman into every one of them.

But: You could probably make a patron of reciprocation.

Sure you may have to sell yourself into slavery to them, but they'll damn well make sure you're cared for and safe for the rest of your natural existence. You get helped in proportion to what you give up.

Slightly different than enlightened self-interest.

Is it too late (or unoriginal?) to take the seven deadly sins - pride, envy, gluttony, lust, anger, greed, and sloth - and basing them around that?

Not sure about the others, but a reformed god of gluttony would look like a god of plenty, which would include Enlightened Self-Interest in a way that isn't just a rehashed Objectivism. This would include greed, in a way.

A god of death would become a god of rest (sloth) - the whole point of existence is to have time for leisure.

Lust is... done to death. Which is why that god would be all about conserving and saving it up for a single day or something. Same goes with the god of Anger or Wrath - it's about the measured use of an emotion explosion, a la (Exceed) Gills, instead of just mindless berserking.

Envy? That's the god of Spies now, the god of Information and Knowledge. ('My name's Micston, I used to be god of Envy until...')

Pride... pride, pride, pride. The oft-ignored god of self-respect - "Take pride in oneself, and let the world remain ignorant"? Secrecy is their watchword, unlimited self-improvement their goal.

You can have Ash be a war god in addition to a X god. I mean, all the norse gods were war gods in addition to everything else they did.

If you want a dedicated war god you could go the other way and have a god of risking everything on gamble.

I don't know how you'd base a nation on it but a god of risk sounds good, with the basic principle being for greater rewards/success in life you need to be prepared for greater risks.

edited 8th Jun '15 4:18:34 PM by aoide12

Another wrinkle to consider:

Instead of clerics, the religion around the Seven is based on the Warlock class.

This being DND 5, there's different "specs" for the class. Now all of them would have the Archfiend pact, obviously, but there's still the nature of the pact gift to consider.

There's the Pact of the Blade, which produces Magic Knight type Warlocks, the Pact of the Chain (which grants a Familiar and powers related to it) and the Pact of the Tome which gives increased spellcasting abilities.

I'm figuring each of these "gods" will also focus on one particular brand of warlocks for their individual cults. I'd say Loromion would favor the Chain (the Warlock/Familiar dynamic, especially with an intelligent fiend familiar, is similar enough to the sith-style Master/Apprentice one he embodies), Vastareth the Blade and Ashurak the Tome...