The more I try to understand what's happening here (currently in Elturel in hell) the more frustrated I become with this module. Everyone in Elturel has already sold their soul, unwillingly, to Zariel by this point. It makes no sense for devils to be attacking the citizens of Elturel, especially if they serve Zariel. Killing the citizens will just make them lemures no matter what. The end goal for Zariel is to dip the entire city into the river, thus killing everyone and turning them into lemures anyway. Why send/command/allow your underlings to kill these people early, allowing them to become cannon fodder in sparse numbers? Wouldn't she want them all to die and turn into devils all at once?
Also! One of the random encounters is a devil making a deal with a citizen. This is impossible as their soul already is forfeit.
I just don't get the game Zariel is playing. She has the city in hell, sends devils to make the citizens into slaves? When that doesn't work, some of her devils go and try to kill those who resist?
Citizens of Elturel swear an oath called the Creed Resolute, which is how Zariel ensnares them. I'd assume that the oath is a few paragraphs with breaks for "I so solemnly swear" every few lines, and contains a line about "the powers who delivered our land from the undead" or something. Anyways, that's how Zariel ensnares citizens, but Elturel is a major metropolis and tourist destination. Not everyone in the city is a citizen. So the imp doing his pitch might have found someone who wasn't ensnared yet. Also, if you read that encounter carefully, the imp is trying to get the souls of the halfling's children as well. The children have most certainly not sworn an oath of citizenship.
How I'm planning to run it is that any person forfeit to Zariel who is prematurely killed by her agents before the city is fully joined to Hell is released from the Creed Resolute, though this protection is nullified if they try to abuse it by initiating a fight or interfering with the chains. This won't be common knowledge among civilians, so devils can still enforce curfew by brandishing weapons. Devils in Zariel's service can tell at a glance who they are permitted to kill.
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Spoilers for Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus.
The more I try to understand what's happening here (currently in Elturel in hell) the more frustrated I become with this module. Everyone in Elturel has already sold their soul, unwillingly, to Zariel by this point. It makes no sense for devils to be attacking the citizens of Elturel, especially if they serve Zariel. Killing the citizens will just make them lemures no matter what. The end goal for Zariel is to dip the entire city into the river, thus killing everyone and turning them into lemures anyway. Why send/command/allow your underlings to kill these people early, allowing them to become cannon fodder in sparse numbers? Wouldn't she want them all to die and turn into devils all at once?
Also! One of the random encounters is a devil making a deal with a citizen. This is impossible as their soul already is forfeit.
I just don't get the game Zariel is playing. She has the city in hell, sends devils to make the citizens into slaves? When that doesn't work, some of her devils go and try to kill those who resist?
Can someone help me make sense of this?
Citizens of Elturel swear an oath called the Creed Resolute, which is how Zariel ensnares them. I'd assume that the oath is a few paragraphs with breaks for "I so solemnly swear" every few lines, and contains a line about "the powers who delivered our land from the undead" or something. Anyways, that's how Zariel ensnares citizens, but Elturel is a major metropolis and tourist destination. Not everyone in the city is a citizen. So the imp doing his pitch might have found someone who wasn't ensnared yet. Also, if you read that encounter carefully, the imp is trying to get the souls of the halfling's children as well. The children have most certainly not sworn an oath of citizenship.
How I'm planning to run it is that any person forfeit to Zariel who is prematurely killed by her agents before the city is fully joined to Hell is released from the Creed Resolute, though this protection is nullified if they try to abuse it by initiating a fight or interfering with the chains. This won't be common knowledge among civilians, so devils can still enforce curfew by brandishing weapons. Devils in Zariel's service can tell at a glance who they are permitted to kill.