Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Chimerasame Aug 03, 2014 9:19:48	I've been thinking about re-adapting some old Planescape stuff for 5th ed. One aspect of this, which could be relevant to a lot of general campaigns, is fleshing out the devils a little more than they are. Also known as Baatezu, devils are the Lawful Evil denizens of Baator, aka the Nine Hells. They have a long-standing cosmic Blood War against demons, aka Tanar'ri. And, any smart Planeswalker knows, making a deal with a Baatezu is probably just about the worst thing you could do.   Here's the situation, though: I want to make it plausible. I want to introduce an NPC, a very low-level Baatezu. I'm thinking a Spinagon (Spined Devil). And it has something the PCs need. (What, I haven't decided yet.) It offers up a contract, which I would like to actually write up to allow the PCs to look over. The spinagon is trying to sneak in the usual Baatezu legal trickery that will induce the PCs to ... meet some dastardly end, become beholden to it permanently, give it their souls, etc, etc.   However, it's not anywhere near as good at doing this as a typical higher-level Baatezu. Its trickery is clever, but fairly transparent. I want to allow the group to look over the contract, and whatever shenanigans they can actually spot, it will begrudgingly edit to make the contract more fair.   Ideally, on a 'success', the PCs will end up not selling their souls to the Spinagon, or becoming its permanent slaves, or anything so dire -- but they will be restricted from killing it, and it may have even snuck in a turn of phrase such that the PCs are obligated to defend/assist it in certain circumstances or else be visited by a greater doom. (This would give me an excuse to introduce it as a recurring villian-slash-questgiver!)   So here's the big question: What are some examples of devil-contract shenanigans that would be writeable and implementable?   Couple ideas I've come up with:   - The devil misspells its own name in certain contexts. (E.g. something like, if the Spinagon's name is "Meridian," the contract could say "Standard recompense for this service is assumed to be that in one year's time, the contractee is to become the permanent slave of the contractor, i.e. Meridian. However, in this instance, the contractee will not become the slave of the Baatezu Spinagon Maridien.")   - The devil lays out a references to another law in Baatezu precedent, that is not available to view. E.g. "This relationship shall proceed as defined in the Seventh Code of Dis, chapter XIV, sections 22.1.4 alpha and gamma." If asked, the spinagon will lie about what's actually written in sections 22.1.4 alpha and gamma (easy insight to see through this lie), but will take out the entire reference if pressed.
#2 mrsrockguru Aug 03, 2014 14:23:49	- If suggestion for Diabolic contracts are required, suggest that you contact the legal departments of Microsoft, Apple, or Google as Belial recently informed me that he was subcontracting all his contract work to the above companies.......
#3 Emanuele_Galletto Aug 03, 2014 14:53:48	- All of the familiars, minions, henchmen, servants and by extent all creatures bound to the service of anyone participating in this contract at the time of the signing are considered to be subjected to the contract itself as hereby presented; as such, they are expected to behave collaboratively as stated in the forms included and participate in the defense of [insert Spinugon's name]'s interest, as per the appropriate articles of this document. (this allows the spinugon, were the PCs to rebel to his authority, to actually turn their followers, if any, against them).   - As for any form of distrain or the likes, the signer(s) of the present contract agree to retain a form of the ownership of their possessions, specifically in a non-exclusive nature. (this one is blatant! The clause states PCs retain a "form" of ownership, but this "form" is non-exclusive, which means they actually lose any rights on their possessions).