In the world of tabletop gaming, few titles have become as culturally significant as Dungeons and Dragons. In recent years, DnD’s popularity has skyrocketed, blasting beyond the niche gaming circle and out into general pop culture.
At its core, Dungeons and Dragons is a collaborative storytelling game. Players create characters who embark on adventures, guided by a Dungeon Master who narrates the unfolding story, creating experiences and managing challenges. It’s not a game in the same way Monopoly is a game-rather it can be better thought of as a medium for a story. What makes DnD unique among other games or storytelling mediums is its collaborative nature. People gather to progressively unfold a story using themselves as the actors in that narrative.
Many concerns about Dungeons and Dragons stem from its fantastical elements, like magic, monsters, and deities borrowed from pagan folklore. DnD is a flexible medium, and you do not need to play within the basic world setting.
This article delves into the demonic symbols within D&D, exploring the meanings and characteristics associated with devils and demons in the game.
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Devils in D&D
Devils are vicious creatures who were capable of attacking and killing others for essentially no reason. However, they hated being the target of misery themselves. This led to another trait of devils, their extreme vindictiveness combined with a lack of ability to accept their mistakes.
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Devils had an instinct to look for others to blame when they suffered setbacks and had the drive to exact vengeance against whomever they held responsible, even when they were demoted to a weaker station. Devils often delegated their work to others. This did not mean that they were lazy, however, as the primary personality trait for any devil was ambition. They constantly looked for ways for promotion.
The goal behind this behavior was the fulfillment of the devil's own desires. They tried to rise up the hierarchy to modify rules in ways that suited them. Devils often had magical abilities. A large number of devils had an aura of fear, which they used to split enemy groups apart. Most devils had some kind of illusion abilities, which were used to sow confusion among their foes. A common use of these powers was to create illusory support for themselves.
Devils were at a stark numerical disadvantage in the Blood War, where they fought demons. The devils, though, had many advantages against the chaotic demons, such as better equipment, morale, and the ability to employ tactics.
Being at a severe numerical disadvantage against the demons, they developed a number of strategies to fight against them, which were also used against others. First, devils never fought on Baator when they could help it. The reason for this was that they would actually perish if they died on Baator. Secondly, a lot of devils had the ability to use greater teleport. They made frequent use of hit-and-run-tactics using this ability.
When devils fought in a more long term way against their enemies, they attacked in ways that curtailed their enemies' combat abilities in a lasting manner. When fighting anything alive, the devils' combat philosophy was to securely kill their enemies.
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For example, when they knocked another being unconscious, they did not believe that their job was done. First, a devil killed the unconscious enemy and then took on the next enemy. When they fought on the Prime, they knew that dying would not kill them, but they also knew that dying there might cost them a lot including their rank. Therefore, they had no problem fleeing when a battle did not go their way.
A devil did not need a lot of time to find out whether the battle was in its favor or not, because a devil always went all out in a fight. For example, they tried to use their summoning powers as early as possible to summon allies into strategically beneficial positions. They fought in a noisy manner; for example, by constantly screaming. This allowed their allies to notice them, and would thus potentially aid them in battle. When devils had the chance, they tried to deplete their enemies' resources by sending their underlings to engage the enemies.
Devils were immune to fire. One common tactic that was developed against demons was heavy use of fire, so much that the battlefield was filled with it. Thus, devils could pass through the majority of the terrain without being hurt.
When fighting angels or archons, devils with the ability to fly took the lead. An often used tactic was to use special tanglefoot bags on the good creatures to make them drop to the ground where earth-bound devils ganged up on them.
Devils, no matter the rank, were record-keepers. They wrote records to show their high-ups how good their qualities and results were. They did this even while being on the Prime. This meant that an outlining of whatever plan they were concocting on the Prime was on the Prime. Devils took some pains to protect this information from falling into the hands of opposing factions.
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Material wealth was, compared to souls, of no meaning to devils if it did not further their goals. Therefore, devils were willing to give up on material wealth, even wealth they owned, when it allowed them to evade trouble. However, there was one exception to this rule, devils beholden to Mammon.
When devils fought, they fought to efficiently reach their objective, for example to kill their enemies, and did divert attention to other matters. Their lairs reflected this stance towards fighting. Namely, it was arranged in ways that maximized their strengths while minimizing their opponents' strengths. The outline of a lair could be different from species to species.
For example, an erinyes would arrange it lair in a way that allowed it to engage in aerial ranged combat, while a hamatula would arrange its lair so it would become a cramped space to blast as many as possible away with its fireball-ability. Apart from modifications regarding space, devils were fond of looking at what kind of immunities they had and added additional conditions to their lairs or chose places that spread detrimental conditions to all but themselves.
However, there were a series of commonalities, every devil tried to organize, when it was arranging its lair. First, devils were fond of traps and riddled their lairs with them while educating their minions on their whereabouts, so they could be of effective help. Second, they were fond of limiting their enemies' movement.
Part of the common skills of a devil who worked as a military engineer was to know how to construct obstacles in ways that would eventually lead enemies into one specific place where they could be taken out at once. Third, devils that worked in areas that were instilled with Baator's magic tried to duplicate one of Hell's fearsome sights. This was not done out of nostalgia, but because for non-Baator-natives, looking at a Baatorian sight was disturbing in ways that might affect their combat readiness and prowess up to the equivalent of a fear spell.
As mentioned above, devils had no compunctions to run away, when they believed they could not securely win a battle. Therefore, a devil lair most certainly had at least two escape routes built in. First, an obvious one that the devil did not actually intend to use, but where its enemies would pay attention and energy to. Second, a secret heavily trapped escape route that was the actual one, which was dangerous for the devil's enemies to follow inside.
Another construction that devils often used were those that prevented their enemies from running away. Provided a devil did not kill its enemies or was actually defeated, the future of the mortals involved was grim.
A captive enemy of a devil was often handed over to a kyton or excruciarch for torture. These devils' usual specialty was torturing souls, but they often learnt mundane torture skills to obtain additional marketable skills to use them to obtain additional credits. The knowledge to be obtained from the captive was at the very least how much he or she knew about the local devil's plans and who else knew about them. This was a fairly broad field.
For example, hard knowledge like the interior of a fortress, the arsenal, or chain of command was what they wanted. A torture session often had an aftermath in the form of a devil proposing the captive to make a pact with the devil. The kind of pacts were Faustian pacts and the initial offer was to free the captive from continuing torture.
Agreeing to this kind of offer did not offer up the captive's soul to the devil, because the decision to do so was not counted as being made out of one's free will but under duress and could be challenged by the captive's soul in Baator. A prisoner who did not accept the deal was confronted with ever increasing positive incentives to agree.
The usual procedure was that another devil was sent off to meet up with the captives relatives or other people who might care for the captive's well-being to propose a ransom. This ransom was done in the following way, the contacted mortal's soul, or large amounts of material wealth in some rare cases, in exchange for the captive.
Devils put efforts to get the following result, the captive giving up his or her souls for freedom and the contacted mortal giving up his or her soul for the captive's freedom. It was custom for the captive to be turned unable to ever cause troubles to devils.
For all their vindictiveness, when a devil was actually defeated, retaliation did not always follow. Even when the devil in question returned to Baator on being defeated.
Devils had an urge to exact vengeance after every setback, because such setbacks could result in demotion and because they wanted to deter people from sabotaging their plans. When the setback was something inconsequential in the grand scheme of matters, then the devil might choose not to act on its desire for vengeance, but the likelihood to do so increased with increased importance of the plan that was derailed.
As mentioned above, one of the objectives when taking vengeance was to deter other people from acting against devils. Therefore, devils sent their minions against their targets to kill them in open fashion, so other people could see it. This did not mean they saw value in a fair fight.
Killing the targets while they were asleep in some attention-drawing fashion was the usual way to conduct vengeance, because that way the objective of killing the targets was made easier than in a frontal fight. To fulfill the deter-aspect of such attacks, devils indiscriminately killed any bystanders, regardless of age, profession, or health.
Whatever the method, the devil who wanted to take vengeance needed to know the whereabouts of the targets. In places where a devil's mortal minions could act in a more open fashion, these people were the ones who gathered intelligence about the targets. When this was not the case, the devil used more magical means to find the targets, this could lead to the targets becoming hounded by bezekiras.
When the devil was simply unable to find the targets, it tried to get them into the open. The usual method was extortion, either somebody of importance, either to the community and/or to the targets, was kidnapped, or the devil and/or its minions acted like phantom killers until the targets came out into the open.
The vast majority of devils were baatezu. They lived in strict caste society. Devils continuously tried to improve their station in life.
The devils' economy primarily worked on souls that provided their world with energy. In order to change a soul's destination from the Fugue Plane to Baator, they corrupted mortals while they were still alive. Once they died, they were collected and tortured. The devil's economy primarily ran on souls, but money, precious metals, other goods were not ignored and used for trade, but devils saw no intrinsic value in these goods. Their value lay in their use to gain souls.
For example, devils required money to finance their actions on the Material Plane. Starting with financing cults, they needed currency to pay off officials, pay for services like assassinations, simply to pay for goods. Among the goods they bought were the souls of people who sold theirs for money, information, magic, or other goods.
Among the offered goods to the mortals were the devils' service to the mortals. Devils funneled the money they obtained into Baator, so it could be distributed to others or used it for their own projects.
The devils had a number of castes. At the bottom of the hierarchy were the least devils. They were treated badly by all others and the numbers of advancement opportunities were very limited. Above the least were the lesser devils. Generally, they were employed in the soul trade, a field where advancement opportunities were numerous.
Above the lesser were the greater devils headed by the pit fiends. They were the ones who held a high degree of authority in the infernal society. However, they were not the top.
As a general rule, the higher a devil stood, the more chances for further advancement existed. However, the higher a devil stood, the more oversight a devil had to suffer at the hands of its superiors, and the more they were exposed to the prospect of punishment and demotion. As a result, high-ranking devils were fearful of demotion and vented their fears on their subordinates in a violent manner.
When a devil managed to corrupt a mortal, his or her soul landed in Baator on death. Such souls had a unique mark that could be attributed to the devil that was then credited with the corruption of the mortal. Accruing these credits was basis for a devil's promotion. Another form of accruing credits was to provide Baator with material goods.
Promotion, meaning transformation from one devil form to a higher one, was done when a devil's superior thought that it merited promotion, the superior's superior could reverse the decision any time. However, the promotion within least devil-status was very rarely intervened for it was considered too low a station to be concerned with.
Promotion to any of the lesser devil-status required the promoted devil's greater devil superior to agree with it, while promotion to greater devil-status required the archdevil the promoted devil served to agree. When the devil was somehow not sure which archdevil it was serving, Asmodeus was considered the default lord to report to.
Rising to the status of a unique devil required the agreement of an archdevil, to become a normal duke being a pit fiend was enough. The standards a devil needed to meet to be promoted was to show loyalty to its superior and its performance in its duties. The former was valued higher than the latter.
The devils considered someone who was competent enough to do its job but who was at the same time not a danger to its superior's position an ideal subordinate. Due to this reason, high-ranking devils tried to maintain comparatively few subordinates, lest the number would exceed their ability to keep tabs on them to prevent treasonous activities. Combined with the fact that promotion was combined with spending a lot of power harvested from souls, the upper rung of infernal hierarchy was comparatively stable.
Normally, promotion was done when there a position became free. This happened when a devil died or was demoted. Some devils tried to facilitate the former, which was punished with death, and therefore carried a lot of risks. Another valid method for devils was to wait until the latter happened.
Every devil was entitled to demote a devil that was its subordinate. That said, demotions were generally not done out of a whim. They were usually a form of punishment. Demotion to nupperibo-status was the most dreaded one.
However, there was one reason to demote somebody that was not a form of punishment. As mentioned above, promotion required the expenditure of power harvested from souls.
Demons in D&D
The demons of the Abyss cannot be said to be bold. To be bold implies comprehension of what meekness is. They are force. They are chaos. Beings of utterly wanton wickedness, demons were cruel and savage, without compassion or empathy and unfamiliar with concepts like fear or mercy. Every thought that crossed their minds was tainted by hate and malice, each believing that only its own desires were important. They despised benevolence and sought to tear down order, because first and foremost, demons existed to spread chaos and evil, and all other activities served this ultimate goal of sowing strife and disorder.
To demonkind, the Abyss was more than just their world. It was the Abyss that gave them life and within its power to permanently take it away, or to see them reborn anew. At once creator, destroyer, and renewer, the Abyss was the nexus of every demon's existence, and most who planned to be away for long either found or created places that reminded them of home.
Despite this, it would be reductive to simply brush demons off as no more than killers. While demons generally loved death, most found killing on its own boring, their innate desire to destroy coupled with the wish to cause as much pain as possible in the process. For the majority of demons, murder was simply one aspect of destruction, the climax to be prolonged in the hopes of enhancing the suffering caused along the way.