Homebrew campaign taking place in hell. The idea is, my players start their adventure in an idyllic town named Lebanon. It is a peaceful place, ideal living accommodations, friendly community, but the entire thing is an illusion. The town is actually in the first level of hell, and their lives are being drained from them until they become lemures to make the 1st level of hell stronger in their fight against the other levels of hell.
Here's the problem. One player wants to be a paladin (they of course don't know about them being in hell). How would you accommodate divine sense and not spoil the entire thing? They're constantly uncomfortable? The food they taste is actually bitter while everyone else's is flavorful? Ideas welcome.
How long are you planning on keeping up the charade? Divine sense only triggers on activation, it's not just passively on in the background. You could just keep your fingers crossed they don't use it. If you don't give them a reason to, it's quite likely they won't. And if they do, that can be how you break the illusion.
The presence of strong evil registers on your senses like a noxious odor, and powerful good rings like heavenly music in your ears. As an action, you can open your awareness to detect such forces. Until the end of your next turn, you know the location of any celestial, fiend, or undead within 60 feet of you that is not behind total cover. You know the type (celestial, fiend, or undead) of any being whose presence you sense, but not its identity (the vampire Count Strahd von Zarovich, for instance). Within the same radius, you also detect the presence of any place or object that has been consecrated or desecrated, as with the hallow spell.”
I think it’s reasonable to assume Hell counts as desecrated place, but that’s not all the relevant information. So the Paladin would know the town is on unholy ground, and probably get suspicious as to why everyone seems to be doing so well regardless, but might still think it’s just a spot on the material plane that needs to be purified.
Homebrew campaign taking place in hell. The idea is, my players start their adventure in an idyllic town named Lebanon. It is a peaceful place, ideal living accommodations, friendly community, but the entire thing is an illusion. The town is actually in the first level of hell, and their lives are being drained from them until they become lemures to make the 1st level of hell stronger in their fight against the other levels of hell.
Here's the problem. One player wants to be a paladin (they of course don't know about them being in hell). How would you accommodate divine sense and not spoil the entire thing? They're constantly uncomfortable? The food they taste is actually bitter while everyone else's is flavorful? Ideas welcome.
How long are you planning on keeping up the charade? Divine sense only triggers on activation, it's not just passively on in the background. You could just keep your fingers crossed they don't use it. If you don't give them a reason to, it's quite likely they won't. And if they do, that can be how you break the illusion.
The text of the ability in question:
“Divine Sense
The presence of strong evil registers on your senses like a noxious odor, and powerful good rings like heavenly music in your ears. As an action, you can open your awareness to detect such forces. Until the end of your next turn, you know the location of any celestial, fiend, or undead within 60 feet of you that is not behind total cover. You know the type (celestial, fiend, or undead) of any being whose presence you sense, but not its identity (the vampire Count Strahd von Zarovich, for instance). Within the same radius, you also detect the presence of any place or object that has been consecrated or desecrated, as with the hallow spell.”
I think it’s reasonable to assume Hell counts as desecrated place, but that’s not all the relevant information. So the Paladin would know the town is on unholy ground, and probably get suspicious as to why everyone seems to be doing so well regardless, but might still think it’s just a spot on the material plane that needs to be purified.