Demons are chaotic evil, so remember that they shouldn't have large organised groups. If the world is overrun by chaotic evil creatures, remember to make things very evil and very chaotic.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Homebrew, homebrew, homebrew. I DM homebrew. I homebrew homebrew. My homebrew brews homebrew. I brewed by home. My home brews homebrewed homebrew, homebrewing homebrew that homebrews homebrewing homebrew.
To expand on what GoodKraken said, keep in mind that Demons have no desire to kill at all. What they are after is Misery and Suffering. Souls should not be reaped until they are fully corrupted. The demons will gladly protect and help people out so they can prolong the pain. People will have to gather in groups, the larger the better, to survive, and that makes them easy prey for the demons. The demons will be delighted to help.
No one dare travel. The moment they go, their stuff will be gone, not a single stone standing on another. Anything the demons cannot take will be destroyed and nothing will remain but dust, ashes, and memories. The vast majority of demons have Telepathy, so they may be able to destroy the memories too.
The people who remain will have to suffer in place, never moving out of clear view of each-other, to survive. All the work must be done by the demons, who really end up as slaves in this case, and I guess they will be more than happy to give up their lives to keep the people in their misery. After all, demons come back when they "die".
That must have been SOME apocalypse. The very gods themselves would have to be gone for there to be nothing left but demons.
To expand on what GoodKraken said, keep in mind that Demons have no desire to kill at all. What they are after is Misery and Suffering. Souls should not be reaped until they are fully corrupted. The demons will gladly protect and help people out so they can prolong the pain. People will have to gather in groups, the larger the better, to survive, and that makes them easy prey for the demons. The demons will be delighted to help.
No one dare travel. The moment they go, their stuff will be gone, not a single stone standing on another. Anything the demons cannot take will be destroyed and nothing will remain but dust, ashes, and memories. The vast majority of demons have Telepathy, so they may be able to destroy the memories too.
The people who remain will have to suffer in place, never moving out of clear view of each-other, to survive. All the work must be done by the demons, who really end up as slaves in this case, and I guess they will be more than happy to give up their lives to keep the people in their misery. After all, demons come back when they "die".
That must have been SOME apocalypse. The very gods themselves would have to be gone for there to be nothing left but demons.
This feels more "devil" than demon to me. Demons don't play the Faustian game of corrupting souls and bargaining, demons are the chaotic side of chaotic evil to the devils' lawful evil.
Demons are about wanton destruction, the mindlessly consuming souls, with really only the higher echelon of demon lord really displaying any kind of sofisticated intelligence. The demon lords might occasionally play politics with mortals, but they'd only bestow power or protection to their own cult followers, and only if they promise to bring souls and power in return.
You may be right. Demons cannot be relied upon in any way.
Devils are so very similar in many ways and yet so different in others. Still no killing. They are just as much about pain and misery as demons. They go about it differently, by forcing the behavior they want to see. The devils organize everything, and they are telepaths too, so they are the Thought Police and you will do as you are told. It they have their way resistance is unthinkable.
People will be gathered into large groups, just the same as with demons, but this time it is imposed on them. They are forced to obey, put into camps, and treated just as harshly as possible. There is no question who is the slave and who is the master this time. The devils rule, on Earth is it is in Heaven. The cities will be silent, the streets empty and scented with terror. Communication if forbidden by law, except when required with notices in advance. For the people, death becomes a blessing to be sought after, and with telepathic devils all around and watching every second, it's not happening without authorization.
Devils do love to bargain, and they are very good at it. Imagine if your lawyer could read your mind and didn't like you. Better read the fine print. Demons just want you to burn.
Presuming the advice you're looking for is advice that's in line with established D&D lore, so that's the perspective I'm giving. If you can access it, you should read "The Blood War" chapter in Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes. It lays out the key differences in what Devils are and what Demons are and how they operate in service of very different end goals. The second half of the chapter focuses on the demons. Out of the Abyss is an adventure that's based around multiple demon lords making incursions into the Forgotten Realms' Underdark, and if you get that a look over it could give you some ideas as to "how it all started" in your Demon apocalypse.
Demons come from the Abyss, and generally a unchecked Demonic incursion into the prime material plane, whatever the goal of its leaders or accomplices may be, results in the given world becoming part of the Abyss. Infestation and infection metaphors abound in descriptions of a Demonic takeover of a mortal world. Lower level demons left to their own devices generally want to ravage are wreck. More powerful demons generally have a desire to shape a subjugated world to some vision, usually through violent contortions of that world.
You'll likely first want to figure out which Demon Lords are the masters of this to determine how the Demonic apocalypse. Maybe the whole world was dominated by one, or maybe different Lords carved it up or are pushing back and forth over it. A lot of the canonical Demon Lords have particular flavors. Orcus, for example, is a Lord of the Undead so the Undead would have a considerable presence in something he's overrun. Jubillex, some say all slimes and oozes are its spawn. My favorite Demon Lord Fraz Urb'luu is considered a prince of lies and illusions. I play him a bit differently. Rather than simply a consummate liar, Fraz Urb'luu is deeply invested in the eradication of truth so works to defeat principles, rationality, logic, etc. I role play him as Jesse Ventura's cameo in the X Files (professional wrestlers make good points of reference for demons) and pretty much have committed to memory the best line from that show converted to D&D speak, "Your kind has yet to discover how neural networks create self consciousness, let alone how the mortal brain processes two dimensional retinal images into the three dimensional phenomenon known as perception. Yet YOU somehow brazenly declare ... 'seeing is believing'?" (Fraz has either come to the realization or has deluded himself to believing that he's the smartest entity in the multiverse in his intellectual nihilism). I've cribbed the Blade of Broken Mirrors from EGtW and basically made it an emissary of Fraz, encouraging murder and its illusionist magics as a means to confront the fragile veneer of reality.
Demons and Devils are both fiends by monster type. And there are many other fiends besides Demons and Devils with presences straddling the Hells and the Abyss and the rest of the lower planes. Cambions and Succubi tend to ally with either Demons or Devils depending on the particular Cambion or Sucubi's origin. The Yugoloths are interesting. They're basically mercenaries who have worked for both sides of the Blood War, so basically fiendish military contractors with little scruples or loyalty beyond what they're paid could be an interesting add. Hags, particularly Night Hags can be found in the lower planes. What I'm saying is that there are monstrous options beyond Demons who could find themselves in your world with agenda that may not be completely in line with the Demonic dominion.
What's there to be done in a demonically overrun world? First thing I'd establish is whether the world is truly lost or whether there's still a chance at saving the world. If it's the latter, if the campaign is heroic clearly it'll focus on pushing the demons from their beachheads and back into the Abyss. Out of the Abyss can give you some options there if you can access it. If the world is truly "lost", PCs will largely have to do what they can to survive if their bound to the world. Another option would be extra planar interventions to evacuate souls before they're consumed. "Good" gods and celestials and planar hopping treasure hunters may be aware of artifacts, relics and other magics hidden in the world and the PCs are tasked with recovering then before they fall into Abyssal hands and perverted to demonic ends. To borrow from Hell, Descent into Avernus is largely a quest for a celestial sword before it is swallowed up by Hell's "immune system" (there's literally a giant scab on the battefields of Avernus covering up a sort of vestige/shrine to the ArchDevils angelic past ... it's complicated but cool). As the demons consume the world, PCs could be racing against the clock providing salvation where they can. Or they can go all in and side with the invaders if you want to basically role play being bullies (that's probably be boring). Evil gods may be irked with this subversion of their own plans and may have their followers vie for power in the ruined world.
This all presumes you really meant demons and not devils. As indicated above, devils would be playing a very different game.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Demons can be organized and can have plans, being chaotic evil does not mean being random or disorganized. If you want a sense of how to use demons I suggest you read out of the abyss. Remember the demon lords will act together if there is a common goal but the difference between them and the devils is that they can also descend into anarchy and in fighting where as the devils have law to maintain there cohesion. On the other hand demons don’t have any laws controlling or limiting there behavior and so will go on a rampage killing thousands of innocents with no concerns.
To expand on what GoodKraken said, keep in mind that Demons have no desire to kill at all. What they are after is Misery and Suffering. Souls should not be reaped until they are fully corrupted. The demons will gladly protect and help people out so they can prolong the pain. People will have to gather in groups, the larger the better, to survive, and that makes them easy prey for the demons. The demons will be delighted to help.
No one dare travel. The moment they go, their stuff will be gone, not a single stone standing on another. Anything the demons cannot take will be destroyed and nothing will remain but dust, ashes, and memories. The vast majority of demons have Telepathy, so they may be able to destroy the memories too.
The people who remain will have to suffer in place, never moving out of clear view of each-other, to survive. All the work must be done by the demons, who really end up as slaves in this case, and I guess they will be more than happy to give up their lives to keep the people in their misery. After all, demons come back when they "die".
That must have been SOME apocalypse. The very gods themselves would have to be gone for there to be nothing left but demons.
demons are invaders not corruptors
it is also cannon that a demon will kill litteraly anything that it thinks it can with a very small number of exceptions.
Basically everything you say here about demons is the opposite of what demons are.
and it's pretty normal in dnd for whole planes to be ravaged by demons.
There is only one real D&D word that's been left out of this conversation: Drow.
The absolutely closest thing to a canon civilization that has already been subjected to demon apocalypse from which we can draw canon ideas - is the drow.
What is drow society like? Clannish, like Verona in Shakespeare. Everyone scheming against one another, seduction, poisoning, murder. All to basically torture one another for the amusement of this fickle demon-goddess, who, on several occasions, just wanders off and cuts off the power to her priestesses. To the extent that this demon lord needs mortals at all, the one thing she keeps them around for is entertainment.
So, obviously, set design and overall aesthetics of your post-apocalypse world will vary, but I think the social order would look like a fractal, shrinking pattern that looks like Menzo. In the Center is your big name demon. Your Orcus, your Demogorgon... One layer down are a group of balrogs who don't really like anything about Demogorgon, and aren't really sure he's even aware of them; but they know as long as they keep him happy, he won't eat them and they can use him to get what they want...Everyone of these balrogs has an inner circle of mariliths doing the exact same thing...so on down to the drow...so on down to the slaves of the drow. Whatever level of that scale your PCs start at, whether privileged aristocracy in a culture like the drow or some kind of Mad Max scum conspiring against a local tyrant, the world will look- to the individual - unpredictable and prone to betrayal and life will generally be brief and full of the cruelty that makes one cruel in return. A society that was both chaotic and evil, to coin a phrase.
There is only one real D&D word that's been left out of this conversation: Drow.
The absolutely closest thing to a canon civilization that has already been subjected to demon apocalypse from which we can draw canon ideas - is the drow.
What is drow society like? Clannish, like Verona in Shakespeare. Everyone scheming against one another, seduction, poisoning, murder. All to basically torture one another for the amusement of this fickle demon-goddess, who, on several occasions, just wanders off and cuts off the power to her priestesses. To the extent that this demon lord needs mortals at all, the one thing she keeps them around for is entertainment.
So, obviously, set design and overall aesthetics of your post-apocalypse world will vary, but I think the social order would look like a fractal, shrinking pattern that looks like Menzo. In the Center is your big name demon. Your Orcus, your Demogorgon... One layer down are a group of balrogs who don't really like anything about Demogorgon, and aren't really sure he's even aware of them; but they know as long as they keep him happy, he won't eat them and they can use him to get what they want...Everyone of these balrogs has an inner circle of mariliths doing the exact same thing...so on down to the drow...so on down to the slaves of the drow. Whatever level of that scale your PCs start at, whether privileged aristocracy in a culture like the drow or some kind of Mad Max scum conspiring against a local tyrant, the world will look- to the individual - unpredictable and prone to betrayal and life will generally be brief and full of the cruelty that makes one cruel in return. A society that was both chaotic and evil, to coin a phrase.
worshiping a single demon lord is very different then Welcome to the new abyss.Look over their the tree is made of flesh.Demon pack run (even the weakest demons can 1 shot commoners and they have the numbers and terrain advantage)
An orc can one-shot a commoner and nobody worships a demon lord; they are enslaved by them. The point was that however the OP wants his world to look, the same patterns of behavior are going to take place at every level. War of all against all.
An orc can one-shot a commoner and nobody worships a demon lord; they are enslaved by them. The point was that however the OP wants his world to look, the same patterns of behavior are going to take place at every level. War of all against all.
I'm pretty sure cults devoted to Orcus, for instance, exist in a lot of games. I mean Candlekeep mysteries has a Orcus related magic item that specifically talks about praying to Orcus. Cultists likely consider that devotion a form of worship. Orcus may think of them as dupes or otherwise views them abusively. Wouldn't be the first time in D&D worshippers of an evil power were so deluded.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
An orc can one-shot a commoner and nobody worships a demon lord; they are enslaved by them. The point was that however the OP wants his world to look, the same patterns of behavior are going to take place at every level. War of all against all.
DEMONS ARE NOT ENSLAVERS
their is only 1-2 demon lords who use this sort of tatics most are like every other god.Just you know evil and with an army of demons.Heck in my campaign their even a single good (or goodish really) demon lord.
Okay. So, in your campaign, what do these non-enslaver demons pay their armies? How much does Baphomet pay? If one of Baphomet's non-slave demons decides to look for another job in the army of Graz'zt, he can just leave any time he wants, right? Because DEMONS ARE NOT ENSLAVERS.
Okay. So, in your campaign, what do these non-enslaver demons pay their armies? How much does Baphomet pay? If one of Baphomet's non-slave demons decides to look for another job in the army of Graz'zt, he can just leave any time he wants, right? Because DEMONS ARE NOT ENSLAVERS.
They don't they get worshipped because their big scary and live next door,They despise working with others and only work with those who actively choose to venerate them thanks to some Bad superiority complexes.The only two demon lords who enslave are the mushroom lady one who loves mind control and Fraz-Urb'luu who loves decieving people to work with them,
I have changed my mind, (who got stuck with the old one, I wonder?) and now agree with all the people who said the Demons just kill everyone they can. Now my problem is that I can't figure out why any people are left. The Demon Lords would find it nearly impossible to keep all those Demons under control, and maintaining strict control over *anything* is not a trait associated with Demons.
The living human cult of Orcus isn't really the main event, though. It's the undead. And I struggle to find a better word for the relationship between Orcus and his undead followers than slavery.
In fact, I'm not sure what the difference is between "worshipping something because it is big and scary and lives next door and will kill you if you don't" and "slavery." I mean, practically speaking, Stuff... and I are each describing the exact same arrangement, but his argument seems to be that we can't define that arrangement as enslavement because "demons don't do that," which seems circular and unproductive. And while there may be philosophical differences between the institution of slavery as practiced by devils and that as practiced by demons, it looks an awful lot the same to the soul in a fiend's thrall.
I don't know, there's a spectrum between delusional toadies and abject slavery and I think cultists general lean toward the toadies. Re: whether any demon would engage in slavery ... I don't know why there's a debate in what a demon absolutely would and would not do. Graz’zt, Orcus, Frau, Jubilex, Yeonoghu, Demogorgon all work very differently. To critique the earlier what a demon apocalypse would look like, there's nigh if no definitely an infinite number of layers of the abyss, with a diversity of ecologies and geologies and whatever metaphysical "gy" one would attach to ecology and geology since we're talking extraplanar stuff. Sure Menzo reflects Llothian geometries. And Orcus heavy area would stink of necropolis, etc. I think Baphomet is big on mazes.... And some layers are actually diverse in orientation because there isn't a dominant figure or said dominant figure gives allowances to another power there too. I forget who but Baphomet I think host such an entity.
So if anguished cries of mortals engaged in some sort of soul burning Sisyphean task, like trying to build a purple pyramid so it touches the one point of light, only to see the pyramid sink after every ten layers are built, if those anguished cries are music to a particular demon with the clout to orchestrate that, why not? If a demon draws the souls of mathematicians into a laboratory where the mathematicians must study symmetrical rectangular obelisks, seemed micro abysses filled with the stuff of stars, until the mathematicians soul is consumed by the obelisk and is in further anguish consumed as the obelisks are scattered about existence as weird harbingers, why not? Demons reject order stemming from anything but their will. Of course lesser demons can be subjugated by more powerful demons, if you want to call them slaves, why not?
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
I have just started a homebrew campaign that is basically set in a post Demonic apocalypse world, any advice on demons is appreciated.
Demons are chaotic evil, so remember that they shouldn't have large organised groups. If the world is overrun by chaotic evil creatures, remember to make things very evil and very chaotic.
Homebrew, homebrew, homebrew. I DM homebrew. I homebrew homebrew. My homebrew brews homebrew. I brewed by home. My home brews homebrewed homebrew, homebrewing homebrew that homebrews homebrewing homebrew.
To expand on what GoodKraken said, keep in mind that Demons have no desire to kill at all. What they are after is Misery and Suffering. Souls should not be reaped until they are fully corrupted. The demons will gladly protect and help people out so they can prolong the pain. People will have to gather in groups, the larger the better, to survive, and that makes them easy prey for the demons. The demons will be delighted to help.
No one dare travel. The moment they go, their stuff will be gone, not a single stone standing on another. Anything the demons cannot take will be destroyed and nothing will remain but dust, ashes, and memories. The vast majority of demons have Telepathy, so they may be able to destroy the memories too.
The people who remain will have to suffer in place, never moving out of clear view of each-other, to survive. All the work must be done by the demons, who really end up as slaves in this case, and I guess they will be more than happy to give up their lives to keep the people in their misery. After all, demons come back when they "die".
That must have been SOME apocalypse. The very gods themselves would have to be gone for there to be nothing left but demons.
<Insert clever signature here>
This feels more "devil" than demon to me. Demons don't play the Faustian game of corrupting souls and bargaining, demons are the chaotic side of chaotic evil to the devils' lawful evil.
Demons are about wanton destruction, the mindlessly consuming souls, with really only the higher echelon of demon lord really displaying any kind of sofisticated intelligence. The demon lords might occasionally play politics with mortals, but they'd only bestow power or protection to their own cult followers, and only if they promise to bring souls and power in return.
You may be right. Demons cannot be relied upon in any way.
Devils are so very similar in many ways and yet so different in others. Still no killing. They are just as much about pain and misery as demons. They go about it differently, by forcing the behavior they want to see. The devils organize everything, and they are telepaths too, so they are the Thought Police and you will do as you are told. It they have their way resistance is unthinkable.
People will be gathered into large groups, just the same as with demons, but this time it is imposed on them. They are forced to obey, put into camps, and treated just as harshly as possible. There is no question who is the slave and who is the master this time. The devils rule, on Earth is it is in Heaven. The cities will be silent, the streets empty and scented with terror. Communication if forbidden by law, except when required with notices in advance. For the people, death becomes a blessing to be sought after, and with telepathic devils all around and watching every second, it's not happening without authorization.
Devils do love to bargain, and they are very good at it. Imagine if your lawyer could read your mind and didn't like you. Better read the fine print. Demons just want you to burn.
<Insert clever signature here>
Depends. Is it homebrew lore, or Canon lore?
Supreme Cat-lover Of The First Grade
I AM A CAT PERSON. /\_____/\
She/her pronouns please. (=^.^=)
Presuming the advice you're looking for is advice that's in line with established D&D lore, so that's the perspective I'm giving. If you can access it, you should read "The Blood War" chapter in Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes. It lays out the key differences in what Devils are and what Demons are and how they operate in service of very different end goals. The second half of the chapter focuses on the demons. Out of the Abyss is an adventure that's based around multiple demon lords making incursions into the Forgotten Realms' Underdark, and if you get that a look over it could give you some ideas as to "how it all started" in your Demon apocalypse.
Demons come from the Abyss, and generally a unchecked Demonic incursion into the prime material plane, whatever the goal of its leaders or accomplices may be, results in the given world becoming part of the Abyss. Infestation and infection metaphors abound in descriptions of a Demonic takeover of a mortal world. Lower level demons left to their own devices generally want to ravage are wreck. More powerful demons generally have a desire to shape a subjugated world to some vision, usually through violent contortions of that world.
You'll likely first want to figure out which Demon Lords are the masters of this to determine how the Demonic apocalypse. Maybe the whole world was dominated by one, or maybe different Lords carved it up or are pushing back and forth over it. A lot of the canonical Demon Lords have particular flavors. Orcus, for example, is a Lord of the Undead so the Undead would have a considerable presence in something he's overrun. Jubillex, some say all slimes and oozes are its spawn. My favorite Demon Lord Fraz Urb'luu is considered a prince of lies and illusions. I play him a bit differently. Rather than simply a consummate liar, Fraz Urb'luu is deeply invested in the eradication of truth so works to defeat principles, rationality, logic, etc. I role play him as Jesse Ventura's cameo in the X Files (professional wrestlers make good points of reference for demons) and pretty much have committed to memory the best line from that show converted to D&D speak, "Your kind has yet to discover how neural networks create self consciousness, let alone how the mortal brain processes two dimensional retinal images into the three dimensional phenomenon known as perception. Yet YOU somehow brazenly declare ... 'seeing is believing'?" (Fraz has either come to the realization or has deluded himself to believing that he's the smartest entity in the multiverse in his intellectual nihilism). I've cribbed the Blade of Broken Mirrors from EGtW and basically made it an emissary of Fraz, encouraging murder and its illusionist magics as a means to confront the fragile veneer of reality.
Demons and Devils are both fiends by monster type. And there are many other fiends besides Demons and Devils with presences straddling the Hells and the Abyss and the rest of the lower planes. Cambions and Succubi tend to ally with either Demons or Devils depending on the particular Cambion or Sucubi's origin. The Yugoloths are interesting. They're basically mercenaries who have worked for both sides of the Blood War, so basically fiendish military contractors with little scruples or loyalty beyond what they're paid could be an interesting add. Hags, particularly Night Hags can be found in the lower planes. What I'm saying is that there are monstrous options beyond Demons who could find themselves in your world with agenda that may not be completely in line with the Demonic dominion.
What's there to be done in a demonically overrun world? First thing I'd establish is whether the world is truly lost or whether there's still a chance at saving the world. If it's the latter, if the campaign is heroic clearly it'll focus on pushing the demons from their beachheads and back into the Abyss. Out of the Abyss can give you some options there if you can access it. If the world is truly "lost", PCs will largely have to do what they can to survive if their bound to the world. Another option would be extra planar interventions to evacuate souls before they're consumed. "Good" gods and celestials and planar hopping treasure hunters may be aware of artifacts, relics and other magics hidden in the world and the PCs are tasked with recovering then before they fall into Abyssal hands and perverted to demonic ends. To borrow from Hell, Descent into Avernus is largely a quest for a celestial sword before it is swallowed up by Hell's "immune system" (there's literally a giant scab on the battefields of Avernus covering up a sort of vestige/shrine to the ArchDevils angelic past ... it's complicated but cool). As the demons consume the world, PCs could be racing against the clock providing salvation where they can. Or they can go all in and side with the invaders if you want to basically role play being bullies (that's probably be boring). Evil gods may be irked with this subversion of their own plans and may have their followers vie for power in the ruined world.
This all presumes you really meant demons and not devils. As indicated above, devils would be playing a very different game.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Demons can be organized and can have plans, being chaotic evil does not mean being random or disorganized. If you want a sense of how to use demons I suggest you read out of the abyss. Remember the demon lords will act together if there is a common goal but the difference between them and the devils is that they can also descend into anarchy and in fighting where as the devils have law to maintain there cohesion. On the other hand demons don’t have any laws controlling or limiting there behavior and so will go on a rampage killing thousands of innocents with no concerns.
demons are invaders not corruptors
it is also cannon that a demon will kill litteraly anything that it thinks it can with a very small number of exceptions.
Basically everything you say here about demons is the opposite of what demons are.
and it's pretty normal in dnd for whole planes to be ravaged by demons.
Check out my homebrew subclasses spells magic items feats monsters races
i am a sauce priest
help create a world here
There is only one real D&D word that's been left out of this conversation: Drow.
The absolutely closest thing to a canon civilization that has already been subjected to demon apocalypse from which we can draw canon ideas - is the drow.
What is drow society like? Clannish, like Verona in Shakespeare. Everyone scheming against one another, seduction, poisoning, murder. All to basically torture one another for the amusement of this fickle demon-goddess, who, on several occasions, just wanders off and cuts off the power to her priestesses. To the extent that this demon lord needs mortals at all, the one thing she keeps them around for is entertainment.
So, obviously, set design and overall aesthetics of your post-apocalypse world will vary, but I think the social order would look like a fractal, shrinking pattern that looks like Menzo. In the Center is your big name demon. Your Orcus, your Demogorgon... One layer down are a group of balrogs who don't really like anything about Demogorgon, and aren't really sure he's even aware of them; but they know as long as they keep him happy, he won't eat them and they can use him to get what they want...Everyone of these balrogs has an inner circle of mariliths doing the exact same thing...so on down to the drow...so on down to the slaves of the drow. Whatever level of that scale your PCs start at, whether privileged aristocracy in a culture like the drow or some kind of Mad Max scum conspiring against a local tyrant, the world will look- to the individual - unpredictable and prone to betrayal and life will generally be brief and full of the cruelty that makes one cruel in return. A society that was both chaotic and evil, to coin a phrase.
worshiping a single demon lord is very different then Welcome to the new abyss.Look over their the tree is made of flesh.Demon pack run (even the weakest demons can 1 shot commoners and they have the numbers and terrain advantage)
Check out my homebrew subclasses spells magic items feats monsters races
i am a sauce priest
help create a world here
Counterargument: No it isn't.
An orc can one-shot a commoner and nobody worships a demon lord; they are enslaved by them. The point was that however the OP wants his world to look, the same patterns of behavior are going to take place at every level. War of all against all.
I'm pretty sure cults devoted to Orcus, for instance, exist in a lot of games. I mean Candlekeep mysteries has a Orcus related magic item that specifically talks about praying to Orcus. Cultists likely consider that devotion a form of worship. Orcus may think of them as dupes or otherwise views them abusively. Wouldn't be the first time in D&D worshippers of an evil power were so deluded.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
DEMONS ARE NOT ENSLAVERS
their is only 1-2 demon lords who use this sort of tatics most are like every other god.Just you know evil and with an army of demons.Heck in my campaign their even a single good (or goodish really) demon lord.
Check out my homebrew subclasses spells magic items feats monsters races
i am a sauce priest
help create a world here
Okay. So, in your campaign, what do these non-enslaver demons pay their armies? How much does Baphomet pay? If one of Baphomet's non-slave demons decides to look for another job in the army of Graz'zt, he can just leave any time he wants, right? Because DEMONS ARE NOT ENSLAVERS.
They don't they get worshipped because their big scary and live next door,They despise working with others and only work with those who actively choose to venerate them thanks to some Bad superiority complexes.The only two demon lords who enslave are the mushroom lady one who loves mind control and Fraz-Urb'luu who loves decieving people to work with them,
Check out my homebrew subclasses spells magic items feats monsters races
i am a sauce priest
help create a world here
I have changed my mind, (who got stuck with the old one, I wonder?) and now agree with all the people who said the Demons just kill everyone they can. Now my problem is that I can't figure out why any people are left. The Demon Lords would find it nearly impossible to keep all those Demons under control, and maintaining strict control over *anything* is not a trait associated with Demons.
<Insert clever signature here>
The living human cult of Orcus isn't really the main event, though. It's the undead. And I struggle to find a better word for the relationship between Orcus and his undead followers than slavery.
In fact, I'm not sure what the difference is between "worshipping something because it is big and scary and lives next door and will kill you if you don't" and "slavery." I mean, practically speaking, Stuff... and I are each describing the exact same arrangement, but his argument seems to be that we can't define that arrangement as enslavement because "demons don't do that," which seems circular and unproductive. And while there may be philosophical differences between the institution of slavery as practiced by devils and that as practiced by demons, it looks an awful lot the same to the soul in a fiend's thrall.
I think you forgot that zombies don't have souls.It's not slavery without any concious though involved.
Check out my homebrew subclasses spells magic items feats monsters races
i am a sauce priest
help create a world here
I don't know, there's a spectrum between delusional toadies and abject slavery and I think cultists general lean toward the toadies. Re: whether any demon would engage in slavery ... I don't know why there's a debate in what a demon absolutely would and would not do. Graz’zt, Orcus, Frau, Jubilex, Yeonoghu, Demogorgon all work very differently. To critique the earlier what a demon apocalypse would look like, there's nigh if no definitely an infinite number of layers of the abyss, with a diversity of ecologies and geologies and whatever metaphysical "gy" one would attach to ecology and geology since we're talking extraplanar stuff. Sure Menzo reflects Llothian geometries. And Orcus heavy area would stink of necropolis, etc. I think Baphomet is big on mazes.... And some layers are actually diverse in orientation because there isn't a dominant figure or said dominant figure gives allowances to another power there too. I forget who but Baphomet I think host such an entity.
So if anguished cries of mortals engaged in some sort of soul burning Sisyphean task, like trying to build a purple pyramid so it touches the one point of light, only to see the pyramid sink after every ten layers are built, if those anguished cries are music to a particular demon with the clout to orchestrate that, why not? If a demon draws the souls of mathematicians into a laboratory where the mathematicians must study symmetrical rectangular obelisks, seemed micro abysses filled with the stuff of stars, until the mathematicians soul is consumed by the obelisk and is in further anguish consumed as the obelisks are scattered about existence as weird harbingers, why not? Demons reject order stemming from anything but their will. Of course lesser demons can be subjugated by more powerful demons, if you want to call them slaves, why not?
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.