Dungeons and Dragons Lore: Pit Fiend
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- Опубликовано: 11 сен 2024
- Second only to the Archdukes and Lords of The Nine Hells, the Pit Fiends are mighty in battle, but their true power is their gift for strategy and it is their goal to lead the indomitable legions of Baator to victory against the Hoards of the Abyss, in the eternal conflict between the forces of Law and the forces of Chaos.
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I like to imagine that Pit Fiends and Balor's have an intense rivarly, and that if you summon a Pit Fiend to fight a Balor, it *might* forgive you.
I would suspect that most Pit Fiends would do quite a bit to avoid facing a Balor head on, as being forced into single combat with a determined foe strong enough to stand a good chance of defeating them is the last thing any Devil wants. Balor's would relish a Pit Fiend being summoned to fight them 1 v 1, Pit Fiends would not want to touch them with a ten foot pole until they had devised some means of skewing the battlefield in their favor.
A Pit Fiend also has superiors who would frown on such a risky confrontation, so even if it privately wanted a fair fight against a Balor, it has to keep it's reputation and service record in mind. Unless it's in service to someone like Malancathet, a Balor has no such considerations.
the problem is that if you look at their stats, one balor is much more powerful than one pit fiend.
@@benthomason3307 One balor definitely isn't more powerful than one pit fiend. In terms of fighting ability the pit fiend comes out on top it has more attacks, more health, better crowd control. They even have the same strength and dex modifiers .
@@benthomason3307 no. The pit fiend has a huge advantage being immune to the fire aura and fire damage from the whip of a balor, where the balor despite the +9 wisdom save isn’t immune to the dc 21 fear aura of a pit fiend.
However the balor is immune to both the poisonous bite of a pit fiend and the fire of their weapon, they negate 42 damage from the the pit fiend and the pit fiend negates 20 +10 per successful attack damage from a balor.
Even ignoring the damage that the other is immune to the pit fiend STILL does more damage and has more health and has a form of crowd control that works on balors in fear and hold monster. Although hold monster maybe isn’t that much better than attacking considering how likely it is to not work. But it’s better than dashing to get all the way to melee
Pit fields lore states verbatim that they immediately go straight for the strongest enemy on the battlefield, as a way to show off their strength and to gain prestige, as well as the fact that they're too arrogant to believe they'd lose 99% of the time. So yeah a pit fiend WOULD fight a Balor 1v1. Plenty of devils would run from a challenging fight but pit fiends are literally a different breed
I can just imagine how pissed off a Pit Fiend would be if summoned by some pathetic mortal. I can just see some Pit Fiend delineating orders down to lesser devils in preparation for some tactical assault on a demonic stronghold, only to be cut off in the middle of some grand speech and whisked away to the sudden scene of some dark-robed wizard screaming at it to "incinerate my enemies in hellfire".
Pit Fiend makes a self- control roll on his Willpower/ Wisdom check to keep from howling at the wizard. Then follows with Diplomacy/ Bluff skill check to say ,
" By the power of Baator to be used, to Who's glory and which land/ world/ kingdom is to gain renown. Or Hell will not be able to act of your behalf.?"
Translate " Ok fool who the F**k are you, and after wards where can I find you , you little piss ant.?"
so indirectly zariel and tiamat worked together for her being unleashed during the tyranny of dragons, nice
Well, Tiamat was not exactly aware of how involved Zariel was in all this.
Love pit fiends. The idea of a mortal working their way up from petitioner to Pit Fiend would be an amazing evil campaign.
In my long decades of DM'ing, I've only ever faced my players against a pit fiend once. They were a group of 7 heroes (~16th Lvl), with a pair of clerics and a paladin to boot. It lasted 3 rounds, only because the Wizard was able to miraculously counterspell the fireball on round 1. TPK and my group learned to not randomly summon monsters from ancient infernal scrolls without an unbelievable, inconceivable amount of preparation...or at least a single magic circle. They were angry with me, but one does not rampage like a maniac in my campaigns without repercussion. As an aside, yes, they knew what it would summon. They figured they could handle it. They were wrong.
Important safety tip.
Not gonna lie. On paper, that fight was definitely in their favor. 7 tier 3 characters vs a single pit fiend.
Unless they got really unlucky with their saving throws and attack rolls.
@@supremecaffeine2633 A lot of it came down to where they did the summoning. An open field outside the ruins where they found the scroll. The ranger and Wizard were the only ones who could touch it when it went airborne the first round (It went first in initiative) The Clerics kept trying to use magic, but its saves were decent. Not even great, just decent. Had it gone hand to hand with them, it might have been different. Note, this was in 3.5 as well, so things were a bit extra nasty, as well.
I love that pit fiends see themselves as a kind of war hero, and that they are right!
Nice subtle Conan reference “to see his enemies fleeing before him is what a Pit Fiend considers best in life
Fun Fact: Conan was reffering to a Genghis Kahn quote in his movie
I love the devil series , they are absolutely my favorite of AJ's videos ❤💯
I always loved the artwork that displays the Pit Fiend as basically being 15 feet tall and about 15 feet wide LOL, just a big
Doom Hulk of hatred and death.
I think Balors are supposed to look like that. Pretty sure pit fiends are closer to a normal human shape. (although that's not saying much)
@Ian Robertson the art in the monster manual definitely depicts them as massive. I thought they were smaller in previous editions lol.
And a good morning to you sir. Wonderful, the pit fiend is my single favorite creature that demonstrates why being in hell should be scary (not that there is a shortage of awful things in hell), but this creature when played right captures the fear of hell. Typically prompting someone in the party to say "Its go time!".
Or "it's go home time"
@@AJPickett I mean, your not wrong.
So, basically summoning a pit fiend as a mortal summoner is the equivalent of taking a five-star general to your apartment to make you a sandwich?
More or less, yes
It's like when you need the salt in a diner and you call the owner of the restaurant chain to give you some.
Yes, and making an eternal enemy in the Hells... so a really stupid thing long-term. At least summoning a Balor to do the same job would not be an important thing to the Balor to remember... unless it was summoned to actually just make you a sandwich... that, it would remember as opposed to doing that to summon it to have fun by killing a lot of mortals before it goes back to the blood war.
Currently playing a Tiefling who’s infernal ancestry is Bal, an Arc-Duke level pit-fiend.
This video makes me happy.
Devils are just spicy Celestials
In 4e that was actually the case. Devils had the celestial tag in addition to the fiend tag.
Isn't that cannon?
When one fights a pit fiend they should not ask how they got here, how they are to win, or why are they fighting the pit fiend, but what have they done to so royally piss off the DM.
I could imagine a pit friend coming back to his place of dwelling just to take his/her armor off and slump in a chair with a nice beverage just absolutely exhausted from all the bullshit they gotta deal with in one day let alone a whole week😂
That is just with other devils, image the bullshit they have to deal with from high level arcane wizard mortals. ?
Uh... " cringe worthy groan,..." Now I have this crazy witch wanting me to be her baby's daddy...
@@krispalermo8133ROTFLMAO!!! 😂🤣😭 "Breed me with your devil seed!?!?" 🎸🖤🧙♀️🔮🤟🌡 "I'm tired... I've had along day... Can't i just sleep in that bed? I'll sire the scion of the appocalypse tommorrow i promise, just let me get some sleep..." 👿😴🛌 "By law you are BOUND!?!?" 🎸🖤🧙♀️📝🌩🌋 "Why do you mortals have to be so kinky, can't you get off like normal people?" 🤦♂️🙄🥱
i wonder if a Pit Fiend (if this is even possible) would provide summoners knowledge/access to go about summoning demons, since it would be more convenient if the summoners are gonna keep summoning away and it's too out-of-the-way to go hunt em down and kill the problematic summoners off... or, maybe even strike a deal with a summoner in this way, and have them summon a particularly powerful/problematic demon during a future battle to temporarily remove said demon during the fighting as a strategic advantage.
They probably would have no problems with that at all. Especially since letting demons into the material plane is why the hell in Baator was created in the first place. Letting a demon into the material plane is a one way ticket to Baator and the pit fiend who tought how to do it would get the credit for for the new soul to get to hell. Though a pit fiend would probably not be bothered with teaching such trivialities to puny mortals and leave that to the imps under his command and still get the credit for the corruption.
demons escape, cause chaos, and try to get the world devoured by the abyss. devils are kinda fighting against it. they might however steer you towards neutral fiends like nighthags and yugoloths, who both love a good deal, if you can offer it.
I would say no, the last thing devils want is demons running around in even more places causing unbriddled wanton chaos, with every footstep. Unless they're succubuses... Hell has an exception for succubuses(succubi)... However that last thing is totally something a pitfiend would do in vengance for summoning it - with this face: "XD" since demons are nigh on impossible to perminantly contain/bind/stop from spreading the abyss. So they'd essentially be spiting the summoners intire pathetic plane for thee audacities thus achieving multi dementional vindication, weakning the moly coddling hippy-sissy(moral objectionist) gods, advancing it's own possition in victory AND geniunely forfilling the summomers desire for unlimited evil power, in "evulz". And besides incapacitating itself with bouts of uncontrollable laughter. The only catch would be the other devils getting torture happy(angry) at it "willfully of it's own volitition deliberately spreading and abetting the abyss". Luckily for it, it will ofcource have that summoning escape goat caught black handed in a sutty mountain temple begging gods jaded by witnessing a whole worlds worth of unholy demon violence for forgiveness. And gods get "angry" too, so it's all kind of divine tropes going on there... "I mean the summoner was wreakless... I made a "commandecisionnn", whom else would they have summoned next? YES A WORLD WAS LOST! Then spoiled... And reanimated... But that was one world in the face of a THOUSAND! and 27 exactly... If someone must be subject to "indefinite intergation and radical restraint" then as an innocent angel doing my part on the behalf of the cosmos, let thee then see this mortal as the forfitation to the wrath of the entire bill that they ALONE hath footed. I object! A mortal soul can indeed be repeared, maintained and sustained for the entire duration! - they will survive to endure all the agony in FULL. I personally would then be responsible for ensuring this process as a mere humble cosmic servant. EVEN THE GODS AGREE!?!?" 😈😈😈🧐🤓📕⚖⚙⛓🌌🏛🧮
No no noo, the devils absolutely do NOT want demons on the prime material plane, any time they go there, they spread demonic energy and further corrupt the prime material plane.
@@AJPickett I thought the #1 prime directive was to fight the Blood War, not win it. I mean, the devils would invade and turn that plan into another front, sure, but winning the war is as profitable as curing the sick - no long term profits
I gotta wonder if the one down vote is from a balor....
Great video, though.
The fact that Asmo just constantly bleeds out these things is nutty to me.
I imagine Asmo takes it upon himself to be the most metal Archdevil as a flex of his power
I'm playing a devil warlock tiefling in the Out of the Abyss campaign. so we have demon lords as the end-bosses. I took True Polymorph as a mystic arcanum on lvl 17. Reached lvl 20. I'm so looking forward to turn into a Pit Fiend for an epic brawl with Demogorgon or Yeenoghu!
Best of luck!
Currently playing decent into avernus campaign. I think this video has convinced me that the devils are correct and that they are all that is keeping the multiverse from being destroyed. Having my character fall into this belief could be interesting, but probably not very fun for the other PCs I would end up betraying.
Understand that devils cannot lie, so on one level on one perspective this is true. However devils have a vested intrest in the bloodwar never ending because it means they have an endless supply of souls. On another level devils really are the only celestial force that is both willing and able to enguage in sustained conflict with thee abyss, as they are incorruptable: = - Because they are already about as evil as you can get. Nessarily evil, but also unexcussably evil at the sametime. Mortals are supposed to put their trust and faith in the gods, even evil gods over devils. No deal should be made with rouge anti paramilitary forces composed of the cosmos's most depraved and corrupted forces. Yet there they are untill you specifically ask them that exact question.
And ofcourse it's more than ideal to be served by thee angels themselves, even just once in the hard, trying and often bitter journey that mortal existence is, here and now. But the price of such a conscentual deal - could in the ultimate never be worth the cost. This being an idylic rapturous eternity at the price of mere devotion in life, exchange for a mere fraction of the former in the later, for unbriddled ruthless shameless wanton "soldierfication". As you are transformed into a litteral "magot", and must routinely perform 5 trillion push ups for each and any minor infraction, and even when you graduate putting the boot in your soul camp. You are deployed to a front in a war that geniunely intends to last aslong as time itself. A war in which you will be killed many times, but never truly die. A war in which obscene unholy super weapons are litterally used for the share sake of it. Because every commander on both sides is someform of evil maniac. And maybe, just maybe you can get a cushy job at a recruiting post, scamming people out of their eternity, but that's no walk in the park either as your centuries of precise political manuvering, beurocratic ballroom engraced legal actions and martial total self perfection have left you with such a distain for the general incompotence of normies, that it is somehow almost as tramatic as that time "when the demons "were" the trees". this baatorian engineered walking nightmare is then your soul... "Forever". 🧐🍷🎻🎠🗝🏰💰🏖💪😈👻📜🤝👌💢✨⌛♻⏳⛓🌋📯👿⚙🤠 What you can handle as a mortal is the luxurous party of innocence and naïveté behind the wall of immortal men with wands you call "life". To do anything other than that is hell. For it is gods and devils that judge the wickness of men, not the other way around. You're player character should pray... Because that's the wise choice(not thinking or relying on their own deduction for anything whatsoever) in the face of lawfull, celestial evil. Rather than get involved in afairs beyond their comprehension and constitution. 🙏🏛🌤
I was reading the 3.5 books of exalted deeds and book of vile darkness yesterday and it gives me so many more ideas of how to use a pit fiend in my 5e campaign
Honestly surprised this video didn’t already exist in the Devil series.
8:10 the giggle of Mr. Pickett (a rare occurance) just shows how epically badass pit fiends are 😎
Beware my giggle of Evile
My tieflings father is a pit fiend, he is a very good father (surprisingly). i wanted to learn more than pit fiends, so i came to this man.
Uberly powerful warrior, general of Baator, number one dad. Yeah I definitely want to explore this idea some time
@@rockethero1177 lol, we cant forget his twin older brothers, who take more from their dad genetically. Lucius more elf then pit fiend. + the twins are protective.
@@pewpewmans7790 What a lovely sounding family, Hellish bloodline disregarded
@@rockethero1177 why thank you
not to be that guy, but shouldnt it be grandfather? fiend + mortal = cambion, no? or did you go tief for balancing with the rest of the party reasons? or is it some crazy story reason like "i was a cambion, but an evil wizard stole my immortality"?
no right or wrong answers, im just curious :D
At long last! They are probably my favorite type of fiend.
Thumbnail: "exists"
Me: "the left one is belakor!"
Well knowing demons by name what dies that say about me?😅
that's really cool dude
It either means you are corrupted, or a demon-hunting True-Namer. Your choice, my dude.
Great video AJ.
I have a funny one for you. Knowing the ecology, you'd get the schtick.
One of my player characters earns a wish from an Efreeti Lord. The players are all gathered before the lord and minions in the City of Brass.
PC: I wish to have the power of a Pit Fiend. (edit: I fixed what the wish was, I was buzzed when I first wrote it)
The Efreeti Lord's subjects begin to snicker.
The party looks around, confused.
Efreeti Lord: Granted. **sing-songs** Oh A-a-a-Asmodeus!
**Firey pit opens below the player character, two giant devil hands come up from it, grab him, and pull him in, snapping shut**
Efreeti Lord (to the remaining party): You will have to go to Asmodeus's realm in a few years, no less than 1001 days, to collect your friend. He might not want to come back though. There are gonna' be a lot of jealous devils.
Now I am imagining the Pit of Flame resort and casino...
@@AJPickett Damn! You are a sage! My memory is wonky. I thought I made that up.
@@That80sGuy1972 So sorry bruh, I was playing efreeti & Baator back in AD&D2e. It got better in 2000 when 3e came out. Seen a lot of DMs do Baator Drops on players who word their Wishes wrong.
You can have a lot of high level campaigns where your characters earn the Favor of Efreeti House or a Devil Lord patronage. In one game my group ran, we had the game shop owner's five year old daughter play a child efreeti for a few games. Her favorite catch phrase became , " ... Granted ... !"
Word of advice, word your statement very carefully, and avoid the word " Wish.."
I don't get it...
@@treacherousjslither6920 I am sorry sir, but which one of these comments or given statement remarks do you not get ?
Hope you have a good Friday and a great weekend.
My most recent character I played was a complete memelord who took almost nothing seriously. To give you an idea of what his character is like as a whole, the party stared down a very much unhappy green dragon, and while everyone else was preparing for a fight, he just walked up to it and booped its snoot.
This idea came out of me and my wife brainstorming on the daily commute. Neither of us have the D&D chops to really say how this should play out in the lore, but here it is.
How would a pit fiend respond if it was confronted with its own holy weapon, which it used as a celestial before the devils became tainted by the blood war? Could such a weapon be an artifact level item, for use by player characters in end game epic level play?
When i think of the corruption of the celestial hosts into the devils, does it make more sense that devils fell due to their own actions, or is it likely that the devils were corrupted by the very contagion they were sent to fight? If so, that original celestial power might be much more effective than that of the devils currently, as the forces of lawful and chaotic evil become more and more like each other.
Maybe this lost weapon of a higher goodly being contains a fragment of the fiend's old celestial personality? Perhaps defeating this fiend with his old blade performs a sort of chaotic detox, returning to his old form and becoming a force of good without the fatalism of the rest of the celestials? Perhaps this leads into an epic questline where this reformed devil forms a new faction to take the fight to the abyss past the corruption of devilkind?
We don't have the ancient lore to determine how this should play out, so we'd love to know what you think of the entire concept.
Nice one Kiwi! Love those Pit Fiends man! Keep up the "good" work mate! 👹
I got a good laugh out of the Balor's hunting down and killing the Summoner's family and making them watch comment. Demon's in a nutshell.
Are they the guys who kick my ass in mosh pits?
Every time.
But they're also charming and friendly outside of it, despite being deepply deeply sadistic once inside.
Hey AJ, great video! The way you did this video. Had a real AD&D feel to it. Thats one thing AD&D did better than any other addition, explaining the how's or why's. Take the goblin, most people will just see that hide & disengage as a benefit of being a goblin. When in reality there Rouges, the ability coming from the class and not from being a goblin.
Thanks AJ & have a great day.
I kind of look at the editions like the different eras of comic books, so, 2nd edition AD&D was the Golden Age, 3.5 was the Silver Age, 4th was the Rob Liefield and McFarlane era, 5th is yet to be determined, because its still ongoing.
@@AJPickett 2nd Ed nerd here... agreed. Lots of the best after was abandoned and original gamers since 1st Ed that loved 2nd Ed were given the finger. Most of us had homebrew reboots and alternative systems that worked better already.
Cantrips are asinine as 0-level spells. 0-levels spells were always asinine. Mana Point system is godlike. The conversions are good. New edition blow-out scaling is asinine because of the canon. Giving Paladins & Rangers spells without home-brewing them is really stupid. Rangers & Paladins of other ethos are also asinine. I have a LOT of non-good paladins and ranger kits in my campaigns.
Now, let me give two examples.
A ranger of the Manscorpion. He has no spells. He gets weapon specialization, like a fighter. He also gets all forms of two-weapon fighting for free, including not having any kind of two-weapon fighting. He gets all of his attacks with each weapon as if it was his only weapon, attacking like he is two fighters. He also gains the ability to Backstab during his first attack in any combat, not needing surprise nor ambush. He can also Detect Poison by taste or (-4, -20%) by smell.
A paladin of Manscorpion. He is pretty much just like the ranger. He isn't a two-weapon fighter nor an assassin. He is immune to all poisons and can identify any by tasting or smelling them. He can pick any attack as "an attack to kill" while sacrificing 4 pts in his defense for the round and if he rolls a natural 17 or greater and it hits, his attack is considered a natural 20 that does an additional 2d6 points of damage, an additional 1d6 points of damage if the strike also had poison in the strike.
I run a one shot campaign were my big bad, isn't. He's actually a reformed pit fiend that runs a fantasy island and has abandoned the blood war because he sees it as fruitless.
And, now my lvl 6 paladin wants to smite him.
Just found your channel a few months ago , I absolutley love it ! Helps with those long night shifts
Welcome 🧙🏼♂️
They need to put in an option to love not like. Great video
1 Pit feind and an Erynies kicked the crap out of Vox Machina
(Ashley was there too, so a full power Vox Machina)
They are NO joke!!
Well, they’re LAWFUL so they aren’t joking around, they just can’t do it and is horrible at it
Nice Job...bringing the proper focus on a Pit feind
On their slow evolution up the ladder, inferior fiends resent being stepped on by their betters. But once they evolve up the ladder it has no problem doing to its inferiors what was done to it... Woe unto the fool who pulls 1 of the Dark 9 from their focus on the Blood War
" .. Try crossing us again and your Suffering will be Legendary even for Hell..! "
I hope you will please not take this wrong, and it probably says little good about me, but one of the several reasons I always like your content is that, even when it's 5e, it's like you are trying to put the tough back in it. I don't always think that 5e is just an easy-mode player extravaganza, filled with simulated super heroes, but there definitely are times where the streamlining, and oversimplification, make me feel that everything is intended to be a 1 v party encounter, and the players are not only supposed to win, bur to have an easy time of it. I like how your videos remind how ro enhance the monsters, and make them more a part of an encounter, and not the whole encounter, where party action economy just owns them.
On a side note, we often hear how when souls go to the Nine Hells, and I assume the Abyss, too, they forget their past lives, and start over as blank slates; often, they are wretched, and can't even communicate. Has there ever been a Devil, Demon, or whatever who retained, or regained their mortal memories? I know I have mentioned this before, but one of my favorite Fiends is the Arcanaloth, because it is a dedicated caster of no small ability, and I've always wished that the Devils and Demons had their own fiendish archmages. One idea I've had is a Devil who basically becomes something akin to a LE Arcanaloth; he'll look different, but that hardly matters, and part of his ability to use such powerful magic is because he regained his memories of being a wizard when he was human. He got himself back to Toril, and recovered his resources, allowing him to resume, and broaden, his studies, and immortality, of a sort, didn't hurt. Short of me just saying it happened, though, could it? Had it ever? Has a Devil ever been given back their memories?
Orcus was a mortal warlord, a slayer who took death as his literal lover (Ew! Gross). He rose from snivelling mane demon to higher and higher ranks by killing other demons and stealing their power.
Would a Pit Fiend using necromancy raise up devils rather than humane dead? Could a human diabolist learn this type of Necromancy?
A corpse is a corpse, Devils using necromancy in the Nine Hells still raise skeletons and zombies, its just the raw material is different.
I have lately been entertaining the idea of a pit fiend that embraced necromancy in order to gain an edge in the blood war, as well as just more power and favor with the archdevils, becoming known as "the grave fiend". Does this makes sense? What are the devils' stance on necromancy anyway?
Necromancy is used to give flesh life and to manipulate souls. As a devil they LIVE off the power of souls essentially so idk if they would see it as something super special. Maybe more like "why bother when can just command others to do such specific things"
@@larkohiya But imagine if they find a way to reanimate the corpses of devils and demons. Raising any slain fiend in the blood war as an undead that can continue fighting, sounds useful. And what about summoning undead from other planes? Being able to summon nightwalkers for instance would be something.
Necromancy can also do a lot of other stuff besides creating undead as well, and with the resources at the devils' disposal, they could come up with something terrible. I also like this image in my mind of a pit fiend using Shadow of Moil (which would be very handy againts paladins, since it gives resistance to radiant damage).
@@TheHornedKing That's super interesting. Say they find a way to reanimate fiend corpses and teaches it to his followers. He now has a legion of devil's strong in their own right being able to revitalize their fallen subordinates. This causes strife however other devil's see them as no better than the demons their fighting, the gods start getting restless at the idea of devil's being able to spawn infinitely but this has swung the tied of the blood war and he now leads the onslaught into the abyss raising everything that falls underfoot devil and demon alike.
@@TheBones1188 I didn't think it would swing the blood war like that. I would imagine that the demons would come up with something, especially Orcus, who would be very interested in creating undead fiends himself.
As for other devils, I have since learned that quite a lot of devils can actually cast Animate Dead and Create Undead. In 3e/3.5e pit fiends could apparently cast them at will.
Seems like devils don't have anything against undead, and will make us of them. It's just that no one seems to be very dedicated to it.
@@TheHornedKing Those don't work on demon spawn tho. I was thinking legions of trained devil undead.
when the rules lawyer is elevated to pit fiend
If I'm in a campaign and an evil wizard has a "pet" pitfiend, would it be to my advantage to free it?
yes. freeing it is easier than killing it. though both would result in it returning to hell immediately.
LOL.... absolutely.
Make a deal with it first, and give the pit fiend a good bribe not to tie you up as a lose end after wards.
I thought pit fiends and balor were both ab 12 feet tall. Balor is probably thicker but pit fiend has better stats.
Love it ❤
Knew most of it but the politics and summoning I didn't. Thank you for your effort.
Where exactly does the blood war take place? I thought I heard to say Avernus, now I been reading through descent and not remembering any notable area.
To be more clear if I was to look at the map of Avernus where exactly would the main area of fighting be happening ?
Oh it can kick off pretty much anywhere. There are amazing levels of fortification all along the river Styx as it enters Avernus.
Why are the topics on the hells and the abyss always the most interesting? Always awesome videos. Thanks again, sir. What would a chaotic good celestial being become if it became evil?
An evil eladrin perhaps.
Probably a demonic version of an Erinys. The original Erinys were angels (Lg) who fought the devil forces for too long, becoming devils themselves... while pretty much still looking angelic.
So basically a Bloodthirster of Khorne, but possibly even more metal 🤟
nope. 40k demons are dnd demons. pitfiends would be closer the saints than demons. just a creature focused on killing the chaotic evil demons that are trying to consume everything.
Pitfiends are all big and scary until that lvl 15 (constantly under protection from good and evil) devotion paladin shows up.
At which point the Pit Fiend says "Who ordered breakfast?"
@@AJPickett If he/she was stupid enough to not bring friends and the holy avenger definitely.
i dont think disadvantage to hit is going to stop a pit fiend. even if that paladin is fully decked out in top tier gear they are still dealing with an insanely strong foe that can just win through attrition. an act it wont even need to resort to with the tactical capability of a 22 intelligence creature that likely uses just as top tier gear as said paladin if not more so, has an army that they can summon some of at will and most notably is a large creature with 26 strength and a fly speed. it can literally pick your little paladin up off the ground and toss it around like a doll even assuming your paladin is an 8ft tall obese goliath in full plate that is still within the carry, lift, or drag of a pit fiend who would also have the advantage of greater weight and size allowing for leverage it could kill that paladin without a single weapon attack.
even if the paladin had a holy avenger sword or some other crazy legendary weapon the pit fiend is literally strong enough to just rip that toothpick out of the paladin's hands and hand it off to a minion to toss in its vault while it proceeds to rip off and arm.
@@TechnoCheezit That's like the leader of an elite strike force, the best one, showing up on a battlefield and calling out the general overseeing an army personally commanding a battalion, an armored unit, having air support, intelligence operatives, and a heavily armored mobile command center that makes him track everything on the battlefield down to the flies in the air, fleas on the animals, and crabs on that soldier that visited the wrong whore. If you are facing the Pit Fiend, he knows you would be near before you planned to take him on, you followed the path he put out, and the very worst thing you can do is charge him because that's exactly what he wants you to do.
Excuse but isn't the pit fiend CR near 20!?!
Another quality video, AJ! Enjoyed it quite a bit. May I say, I love how you use different background music for different types of monsters. Obviously heavy metal and industrial is the music of choice for devils and the Nine Hells, or possibly classical, but let's not forget blues! Remember, according to legend Robert Johnson went to a crossroad in Mississippi to sell his soul in return for his musical prowess.
For demons and the Abyss, it should be dubstep or something similar. For undead, goth is the obvious choice, or again, very sombre classical. For aberrations, I would use dissonance (in very small doses, you don't want to put people off the video!). For celestials, you want choirs, strings, and trumpets. For fey, you have very light classical, and possibly reggae! For halflings, I would think bluegrass would make an excellent choice! Can't you picture halflings playing banjos, fiddles, and jugs? For militaristic monsters such as hobgoblins and fire giants, I would think marches would be the music of choice, featuring lots of horns, drums, and percussion.
Anyhoo, just some ideas off the top of my head. Keep up the great work, your videos are always informative and fun to watch!
Quite right.
Well, it was an enjoying time having a first listen through this Hell series.
Now instead of waiting to get my next fix. It is " binge watching " time.
It has been close to 12 years since I had a game group, we/ I mostly played with 3.5e rules.
We always ran Baator in away where the swamps and landscape was more than able to even eat a Pit Fiend that was not careful.
Also we gave " all " self aware creature character class levels.
A " stander " pit fiend with no class levels was a newbie, yet centuries old. It had to burn through all of it's old class levels in becoming a new form. So now it has to collect more souls and magic items to up grade it's self.
After a few of us players that ran characters that used spells to miss lead and redirect others as being
mythical monsters. The DM just started having us ran said monster, which meant we had to redo our characters' skill points/ ranks. Then hand in the " new " character spread advancement sheets to the DM as NPCs. Good news we could still play fiend characters. Bad news the Rulers of Baator demand a steep
Tithe.
Hope everyone will have a great weekend with wonderful weather.
Please remember D&D is a game of " story telling " and having fun. It is the plot of the story that matters not the XP Award.
Spoken like a true roleplayer my friend.
Pit fiend! Fear the demon kings! 😈 🔥 👑
" cough, cough, cough," ..... devil kings....
Devils from the Nine Hells of Baator.
Demons are from the Abyss.
You know how to insult an Italian ?
Remain them that Sicily is the better part of Italy ...
Two pit fiends no treasure
Dark Souls 3 stuff right there
"When a devil dies in the nine hells it dies for good" but what happens to the soul then?
It's gone
@@AJPickett I always thought that they were reborn? Or my DM did and I just went with it. The more we know
@@embodying8moth82 They are reborn if slain off their home plane.
My headcanon is that they believe the soul is destroyed, in actuality it sinks down to Nessus & is absorbed into the consciousness of Asmodeus. Considering there are plenty of other plains where souls are immortal, it didn't make much sense to me that the devils can die at home, unless it was a ploy by Asmodeus all along to become more powerful & intelligent, having his creations perfected over centuries of service, only to die and be absorbed into his vast intellect.
I wonder... can devils or demons be summoned into the ethereal plane?
Yeah sure, no problemo.
Excellent video! Bonus points for mentioning Tanetal by name. Just recently re-read the Pool of Radiance/Darkness/Shadow series. Brings back memories
This is such an inspiring video!
It adds fuel to the fire of my current campaign and makes me want to allow the players to eventually understand the importance of devils and their true cause.
Well done!!
Asmo: the elder brain of hell
Yay. I hope there fire whips.
I always liked Demons more than Devil's as villans, but for the longest time I could never put my finger on why exactly. Devil's are far more compelling villans than demons in many respects, and their faustian bargain theme is excellent, so why is it I could never really get behind them?
I think this video kind of gave me the finnal nudge towards realizing. It comes down to the blood war and the devil's role in it, especially the higher ranks of Hell.
The segment on summoning Pit Fiends and why they hate it really put the issue in stark relief for me. At least with the way the Blood War is currently portrayed, to fight against or even impead the Devil's is to indirectly aid the Demons, and by extension to imperil all reality. This is intolerable to me, I can't enjoy fighting an evil force when I know, even if my character doesn't, that I'm just creating more work for the forces of good elsewhere.
This whole idea really kicks my enthusiasm for opposing Devil's in the nuts.
The Blood War is a classic D&D concept, but it explicitly frames Evil as stronger than Good and tells you again and again that the forces of the higher planes are incapable of contending with the forces of the lower planes in the long run, and that existence can only be maintained by having evil fight itself.
Meanwhile there is no grand battlefield where the forces of Celestia do their part and combat the demon hordes in prolonged combat. It makes the heavenly forces ultimately feel weak and ineffectual, or that they are running some kind of con game while the Devil's sacrifice themselves to save us all.
This is the opposite of how it should be, good should be as strong or very slightly stronger than evil, and evil forces gain the upper hand when good is either corupted and joins them, or the forces of good become complacent and begin to fight amongst themselves.
Threats like the far realms and other weirdness can definitely upend this dynamic, but to have a demonic vs divine conflict going on and to have the demons be, not only ultimately stronger, but really the strongest force in all the universe is just backwards.
You can say what you want about themes of order vs entropy, with entropy being the ultimate winner, and that's fine with things like the shafowfell, but with demons vs angels it doesn't work. In a battle of good vs evil, for some reason they decided that evil would have a source of infinite power and reproduction while good doesn't. You can recite all the lore reasons as to why this is that you want, but on the meta level this shouldn't be the case.
Unless you are going for some ultra dark Warhammer 40K setting, you should never craft your universe so that the evil authoritarians are actually in the right and anyone who seriously wants to save the world should be trying to accommodate them. Not only are there weird nock on effects to this idea, but it makes all your victory's against evil ultimately hollow.
my thought is any devil not fighting or earning for the blood war is a villain and deserves death. maybe that approach will work
@@logex621 But all devil's are ultimately earning for the blood war, either directly or indirectly.
@@logex621 Honestly, if I were to ever create my own campaign centered around exploring the blood war I would have it so that a coalition of the Upper Planes, The Devil's, AND Primus all had their own separate front in the blood war, either in Pandemonium or Limbo. (Or I would established it so that the Heavenly and Modron forces got to Gehenna through the outlands.)
The source of the stalemate would be that whenever one side starts winning to hard, the other 3 factions unify against them, equalizing things.
This would be way more interesting and it would obliterate the Devil's moral high ground of being the only force that's protecting the world from the Demons. Fighting against Devil's would then be aiding the Celestials and the Modrons, not just the Demons, something most people would be fine with.
If the players could just see other strategies in action against the demons, then the feinds argument that only their methods of combating chaos is legitimate would be a lot more questionable.
@Ian Robertson You see all the upper and lawful neutral planes having no part in the blood war, a conflict that ultimately decides the fate of the multiverse, as a non issue?
"Take away the Devil's redemption" I don't know what this is or how having other factions fight the blood war would take it away, but if doing so means the angles get to fight demons then sure, I would definitely take it away. I really don't care about Devil's being redeemed, they made their bed.
A system of checks and balances usually means that responsibility is kept distributed amoung multiple party's within a system. What we have now with the Blood war is the opposite of that, there is no system of checks and balances, it's Asmodeus running the whole war like a dictator while the upper Planes do nothing. What I am proposing would be an actual system of checks and balances, with the war effort divided between Hell, Mechanus and Celestia (Along with maybe one of the chaotic good planes). This would be far more intricate than the current myopic never shifting boredom of an endless sea of demons eternally crashing upon the impenetrable fortress of hell.
well in 5e they've retconned it such that the forces of good _would_ be able to hold their own against the forces of evil, it's just that for as long as the blood war rages, they don't have to.
Oh a minimum of 19 AC and a 15 to hit on its Devil chills ability?
So my level 5 party of 5 isn’t quite ready for this?
Correct level tens maybe
@@adamwelch4336 I was being facetious, but agreed I’ll say level 8 minimum! 😂
It'll be fine, don't worry about it
Hmm. So, only a couple reasons at all to summon a Pit Fiend. To fight a demon horde of biblically catastrophic proportions. Or give it extremely needed intelligence for the blood war (such as demons are attempting to wake up Tharizdun..). Thats, about it. Otherwise.... Honestly yeah. They have better shit to do, leave them the fuck alone. More trouble than its worth, not just for the summoner but possibly entire other worlds.
Safer to summon a lesser Baator fiend and have " it " deliver the message.
@@krispalermo8133 most likely. Thats why i used such an extreme example as "someone is attempting to wake up Tharizdun". It would only be necessary if it pertains directly to the purpose of the devils existence to begin with, and ment to be sent directly to Asmodeus himself to, ya know, let him do his job.
Or to end a demon horde that is already present somewhere. Which will end thar region, but if it's infested with a demon heart it's pretty much ended to begin with at that point anyway. So, summon a clean up crew.
These are extremely unlikely, and our mere examples of the extremes you would need to have necessary in order to summon a Pit Friend, and make it worth it.
Otherwise, I absolutely agree with you.
Summon something else... XD
Awsome I'm currently reading Decent to Avernus and while I don't have any plans to run it yet I really wanted to find a better description on how these superdevils operate.
you're the man
I know it's a dumb question but what happens if a demon becomes good. Like under the influence of sanctify the wicked.
idk about demons, since they're pretty pure in being chaotic evil. but a devil, i'd imagine becomes and angel again.
I think the best folklore and mythology to research in that theme is Taoist traditions, also I recall there was a relationship in 4th edition between Deva and Racksasha, so perhaps a fully reformed demon could be granted dispensation to reincarnate as a mortal in the prime material plane, memory wiped, but that soul given an equal chance as anyone else.
@@AJPickett Thanks
Well have fun to Doom Slayer get you
I work in academia and the painful bureaucracy of the devils' existence resonates with me on a personal level. It's such a perfect and wryly hilarious yet sad comparison. Especially promotion. I need to find a way to become the baernaloth equivalent, because right now I think I'm somewhere around bone devil...
It's also very sad that I don't bother dreaming of becoming something that doesn't live on a plane of evil and torment, just a different one lol.
That's no fun. I myself may have made Barbazu at best.
Becoming a baernaloth equivalent is by becoming a sadistic psychopath for no other reason than to simply be one and inflict harm and misery on others purely to see how they react, so basically you want to become a marketing consultant to a large company with a secret BDSM dungeon.
What part of Academia?
@@jeremiah1059 medicine
From what I understand from lore there's thousands of pitfiends, but not sure of there equivalent demon balor?supposedly there is a finite number of them?
In earlier editions I mean and as the great sage says..if they didn't retcon this then there's still thousands of them I'd guess under the 8 and arch or lord pitfiends like bell for example
I mean, in order to make an Ioun stone, you need a petrified pit fiend eye, so... they can't be that uncommon.
@@AJPickett really?wow that's a great tidbit of game knowledge.suprised I didn't hear that before.sounds expensive. Lol
@@AJPickettthey can regenate?
A finite number of balors participate in the blood war. The idea of there being a ( relatively) finite number of balors is mortals wanting to sleep better at night.
Okay I'm left wondering about Solars now. What are the Lawful Good positions on the Blood War? Have we ever seen a Lawful alliance between angels and devils to fight chaos on any fronts? I'm left wondering what occupies the celestials while their evil counterparts are completely embroiled in the Blood War.
I think it depends on the deity. Angels serve deities and usually act on the behest of the god or goddess that they work for.
Yet I'm sure Lawful Good entities view the blood war as horrible and would oppose both sides. However, if they did that both the forces of the abyss ad hell would try to destroy any good entity that opposed them.
I'm pretty sure there are deities that are planning ahead and making a safe haven for their followers. Not to mention that a deity of salvation could pop up at any time who would then offer Lawful Good and other good and nuetral aligned deities a deal to secure their believers if a fiend does target their believers.
Think of the Celestials as training for when the final outcome arrives, the devils are fighting a holding action, the Celestials are maintaining the bunkers and the nuclear weapons.
I love the idea of a pit fiend ranting at their summoner... hilarious (and, of course, it's right!) :D
Dude, been checking out your vids for a while now, most excellent quality stuff my dude!
Thanks!
These guys are nothing short of pain concentrate and if a cult contacts one its gonna suck
Pit Fiend sounds like a sick Hardcore band name lol
While unlikely is it possible for a damned soul to become a Pit fiend?
Yes - but it likely takes centuries of working through the ranks of the Baatezu to get there. There are alternatives though. In Descent into Avernus, an agent of Asmodeus is able to cut you a deal where you sell your soul in return for some boom, wealth or item etc., and in return once you reach 17th level you are transformed into a Pit Fiend (presumably you're meant to be an npc by this point mind you).
Ask Orcus...if a damned soul in the abyss can rise to such heights, the same should be possible in the 9 hells
Why did you say a true statement as a question?
Check out Orcus, he could do it so can everyone, just a lot of paperwork when compare to 9 Hell
I'd say the devils in this universe are balancing on the verge of being not even neutral, but maybe even good in some cases.
they are also very good liars.
That's what they want you to think. They got you bro
I’ve been waiting for this one for a loooong time.
Same. :)
1:15 skulls of saints and angels decorating their belts makes some sense in the christian trope of good vs evil, but makes little sense in the law vs chaos of the Blood War and their main enemy of demons
To be fair, I think only 1 Pit Fiend did that since angel is using a spyglass so they HAVE to going out of their way to get some in upper plane, earth if they’re lucky enought about it
I noticed after second ed, the names baatezu, and tanari were replaced by devils and demons
Because when they were initially named D&D was accused of being satanic, so they changed the name...
During the moral panic of 1990s accusations of satanic or just "improper culture" were everywhere. It was flung at the Harry Potter books which were banned by some public schools, DnD, Video Games(See Mortal Kombat), Musicians, TV Shows, and I'm not kidding about this one: Day Care Centers of all things.
DnD second edition had the unfortunate timing of being released in 1989 just as the panic was about to start, and during the phases of its release it had to "self-censor" it's content to prevent being associated with anything the ignorant mass of accusers randomly selected that week.
Basically it was the very beginning of the cancel culture we unfortunately experience today.
I sorta liked them being called baatezu & tanar'ri. Sounds more exotic & otherworldly.
@@rocketraccoon1976 Planars use "baatezu" and "tanar'ri", but primes use "devil" and "demon", imo
Hmm So when a devil dies in the nine hell , it's gone forever? I always thought the souls and energy of it went back to the nine hells , eventually reforming another devil. Well I guess that specific devil is gone though
More often than not when a devil is on any other plane it is a guest. This has the advantage of them being able to flee back to their home plane when things go wrong. By that I mean dying. It often can come with a cost, but their core essence has someplace to retreat to. On their home plane there is no retreat. They are amid the magics that make them what they are. If they haven't prepared a means of surviving the death then the only thing waiting for them if the hungry maw of the plane they call home. Something similar awaits demons too, but in this case we know what exactly happens to the spiritual essence. It returns to a raging maelstrom of other such essence and is likely torn to pieces. Not destroyed but all sense of self is stripped from the demon and it may be an eternity before that core of seldom manages to crawl its way out, lacking all awareness of anything but the constant struggle to simply be. For devil's I would say they too return to a similar sea of souls...but in this case there is an intelligence overseeing it. And it is hungry.
That is the allure of Asmodeus's gift of creating devils. He's at the bottom of the hells, eating souls to reform (or maybe it's reformed or healed already, he's just super-charging now) his broken real body. If a devil dies in the hells, it is fast-tracked to his consumption. I mean, think of all the soul-stealing devices in AD&D... the soul is infinite power on such devices (relatively speaking), so their soul-stealing temporary boosts go where? Asmodeus.
The hells are his realm, his rules, so he can change the rules. So, he amped up the stakes in the blood war he is "trying" to win to get more obliterated beings get consumed by him... not at all against being Lawful nor Evil in that way.
He might be working up to actually take on the gods to enjoy the perks of godhood instead of being a merely broken uber-being than manifested the hells who should have been a creator god.
Also, keep in mind that he can just prick his finger in any of his physical forms and have that drop of blood become a Pit Fiend. All those tormented souls and destroyed devils exist within his being.
Keep in mind that Asmodeus can have a manifestation, one, on any plane... effectively be godlike in putting an avatar there, their physical being. What makes him better than godlike in this one, why do I bring it up? He can do that in as many planes as he wishes, planes with levels he can put one on each plane. They all have their own agency but they are all of his mind. He's not a god but he's an uber-god in this ability. He does this without the need of worshippers to be real, he is the reality of the hells.
What's keeping him in check? The chaos from the demons of the Abyss, the gods of all the other worlds, and all the other powers. His infinite resources are challenged by his ever-changing infinite resistances that only have opposing him in common despite being alien and-or opposing each other.
Meh... I will stop this 50-page report to just sum up. Devils and the forfeit souls all get consumed by Asmodeus, basically, die, but Asmodeus can use their energy (mind/body/soul) to just blood-drip out Pit Fiends from his physical manifestations on any plane they are on... so they die but still live in the hellish eternity of being Asmodeus food until spawned into a purpose-summoned being.
@@jacobfreeman5444 spoilers, dude
Yay!
Yippie skippie
Woot woot!
The one on the left is BelaKor.
Good job😁
Cool as always
So that's why Asmodeus Eats Antitheists...
That's antitheists that commit suicide.
Bad news most people who believe in nothing, don't go adventuring and gain class " energy "
levels to be drain from their souls.
Ran a few games where high level adventures that lost all faith, end their life in one way or another ending up in the ninth layer of Baator. Some were quickly eaten and other eroded over the centuries.
Pit fiends canting within your head, " Give up your hate, to forget your Pain, just let go of your sense of self pride. Your pride and self pity is the cause of your pain. Just let it all go..."
Embrace anger and hate long enough = become a fiend. " embodiment of Hate/ control rage."
Surrender your sense of self = eaten by Asmodeus. " .. despair .."
Do any of the celestials devote themselves to fighting the demons like the devils do?
Yes, certainly.
I believe the Devas and Planater's do.
I would like to point out that, technically speaking, this is exactly what the original devils are, celestials that got so devoted to fighting demons that they fell to evil.
Commenting for support. Another great video AJ!
Hate people being immune to fear for 24 hours...
Not all fear, just that supernatural fear aura... but by all means, don't tell the players that.
Even if they pass the save, roll intimidation and see who runs away anyway.
I once turned a character into one as the result of a poorly-worded wish.
That must have been a pretty damn powerful wish if it did that, merely from being poorly-worded. People in the world of D&D will literally torture and kill babies in front of their parents and then torture and kill the parents for an infinitesimal chance that they might get promoted to be one of these things by one of the nine most spiteful beings in the multiverse.
@@jonathanwells223
The player did not retain control of the character. It wasn’t given the form and powers of a pit fiend, it fundamentally became one. That was the end of that character’s tale.
ah yes love this monster thanks for the vid Aj
I like pit feinds I think one was in the godborn forgotten realms novel I read. What about a homebrew crack fiend from hells crack they pop out of the cracks in the crevices in hell
You just accurately described the Lemure.
@@AJPickett lol cool then
There are real life crack fiends, just they come from Detroit instead of hell
Can a mortal become a pit fiend?, like a warlock or a wizard undertaking a ritual to fully submit themselves to the hells?
5:55 11:32 Snippets on Pit Fiend Ascension. Sounds like a determined mortal could get something going, but id wager it'd be a one trip with no resurrection, and also could be a good trap for other devils to get them into a bad contract by wanting to bypass the standard route.
well in 5e a worshipper of Asmodeus does indeed become a devil when they die, and they do indeed start partway up the fiendish hierarchy, but I imagine you'd have to be something like a 20th level cleric of him to skip all the way to _freaking pit fiend_ .
Descent into Avernus actually explicitly says the put fiend transformation happens at 17th level, so you're very nearly right! This is also the level you gain 9th lvl spells, and true polymorph is another (basically cheating) way to become a Pit Fiend. It's only doable on 20th lvl characters though.
I actually dont think ive ever fought a pit fiend in d&d. None of my characters, ever, and ive played atleast 12 characters
What happen to devil/demon killed on their own plane? Their are simply unmade?
or possibly start over as a weaker fiend
unmade, and their essence merges with the plane, probably. i believe demons just return weaker, and devils probably get consumes by asmodeus (if you roll with the 'asmodeus is an evil quatl from before the creation on the universe, eating souls to heal its wounds' story)
The True Death.
Depends on the DM and the story they are telling.
One wish to reform their body.
One wish to bring them back to life.
I really like pit fiends now
the wise word we learn from and doom Slayer the only thing he'll do just rip and tear that's why he likes killing demons or Devils or are they look demonic you straight up cut them down
You can do lot of story with wishes
ok, these guys are really cool, but I never want to meet one. knowing my DM and the campaign he's running though, I'll probably meet one anyway.
Hey AJ,
I wonder where is the video about horned devils? I can't find it on the basic monster manual playlist 😅
TY for the answer
Whish you the best, lore master 😉
It Fiend :) Thank you. I love this!
So a Pit Fiend is an angry, entitled Veteran? Huh... All I have to do is channel my old SSgt then and turn it up to 15.
More like 150, then yes. Unless your old SSgt was that bad.
Hmm.... Pitfiend vs my old MSgt.... I see the Pitfiend bringing him very warm coffee.
That guy was a beast.....
The thing is.... that pit fiend is actually right
Very Good Video. I'll be listening to this one a few times today. Thank you Sir Pickett😈😈