Let's Read: The Dungeons and Dragons 5e Monster Manual!

[arrowed]

I actually like the idea of an aesthete chain devil wanting chains made out of various rare metals. Or a devil treating its chains like pets: "that's Garshunk. She's made of adamantine coated with a thin blued steel."

YES. And they should talk to them too for maximum creepiness. "No, dear we cannot flay these ones... not yet, my dear..."

[Shining Wrath]

I hereby adopt the idea of chain devils giving their chains names and talking to them as though they are living creatures. That's excellent. slow clap. They are solid monsters, very creepy, but another in the continuing series of melee specialist devils. They do score a solid 10 on the "dear gods keep that thing away from me" scale.

Taking Regitnui's idea and running with it, an upgraded chain devil could have its chains be permanently animated, intelligent weapons. Each chain has its own Perception skill, can attack independently, and communicates with the entire group of [chain devil + attached chains] telepathically. Turns the chain devil into something akin to a Protoss Carrier from Starcraft; there's this whirling swarm of death attacking you, which you must ignore while you attack the central entity. And charming / blinding the devil per se doesn't shut down the chains.

If you want to really upgrade one, give it enough levels in Monk that it can use its chains to catch missiles and throw them back. Pew pew pew oh manure.

[RazDelacroix]

Oh hells... Swarms of chains... Swarms of intelligent, barbed, hooked, and bladed chains...


And they want to play yahtzee.



With your bones.

[Shining Wrath]

Oh hells... Swarms of chains... Swarms of intelligent, barbed, hooked, and bladed chains...


And they want to play yahtzee.



With your bones.

Knick-knack paddywhack
Give the chain a bone;
This old devil came rolling home!

[GorinichSerpant]

Previously I thought that Chaine Devils were odd due to being just some dude wrapped up in chains, but now I realise how truly evocative these devils are. The humanoid shape is there simply not to distract from the chains.

Which give me an idea for an encounter, a cult could be ritualistically dress themselves up in chains for some nefarious purpose and there is a chain devil hidden among them. It's like finding a needle in a haystack but the hay and and the needle are flaying you with highly pointy metal bits! But that would require the party to have an incentive to find the devil as opposed to just aoeing the problem away. So either the cultists are actually innocents that are mind controlled or the devil has something that the party needs and also on a time limit. Like a portal to gate in stronger devils is honing in on the chain devil and if the party doesn't deal with him in several rounds the hellgate would open.

[Regitnui]

That's officially two ideas this thread has adopted; my link between beholders and Cyclopes and the chain devil who treats his chains like a snake owner does their snakes.

The cult idea can work really well in Eberron; the cult of the Mockery is known to have flaying as a religious observance. What about a Neutral chain devil leading a Mockery cult, leading them all to enlightenment through stripping away the skin as representative for stripping the falsehoods of life? I'd personally make this a friendly (to a point) NPC, maybe even quest giver.

[ZenBear]

I love the concept of the chain wrapped warrior. There's a book called Master of Chains that features a chained wrapped protagonist, and Thresh's song perfectly suits the Chained Devil.

I envisioned a character that would look like the Daru Cavalier:


Wood Elf Shadow Monk that uses a kusarigama:

Opening scene follows a little girl running through a dungeon, seeking escape from the quiet clinking chains that chase her through the darkness. She hides, and when she thinks the pursuer is passed she makes for a barred window. She reaches a hand out pleadingly to shining Selune before a chain whistles into the light...

Might just make it a Chain Devil instead.

[Shining Wrath]

Erinyes
The good-looking devils, Erinyes come in male and female forms and may be fallen angels. They are willing to be mistaken for angels if it advances their mission. The name dates back to the ancient Greeks; the Erinyes were the furies who punished oath-breakers. In D&D they started life back in first edition as lesser devils, and have been around ever since in more or less this (comely) form.

Art
We get the female form - surprise! She's striking a non-combat pose playing with her variant Rope of Entanglement. Pro tip: if you want to be mistaken as an angel, wear white armor, at least in 21st century American culture. I am disappointed in this particular piece.

Purpose and tactics
Not too much different than a mid-level fighter except for the flight and the poison. 3 attacks a turn with longsword or longbow; attacks are magical and poisonous. Can use the Rope of Entanglement to restrain a foe so they don't get away at the cost of two attacks. Given that the longbow's poison is worse than the longsword's poison, you might prefer to fight her up close anyway. At this level (CR 12) resistance to non-magical weapons is not so much of an issue. Immunity to fire and poison and Magic Resistance are significant, though. The Parry ability is a nice addition.

The ability to fly while raining longbow death from above gives the erinyes a useful option. The Rope of Entanglement is not that useful for a walking erinyes, but a flying one can entangle a foe, fly straight up, and then release them. Note that the erinyes presumably knows how to tie one end of the rope to their armor so they can make 3 attacks a turn to anyone at the other end until they are ready to drop them.

Hooks
A commanding winged figure in shining armor appear to the party and exhorts them to wipe out a cult of demon worshippers. Later, the same figure gives them other missions that are progressively less clear-cut morally. For how long will the party be willing to obey the "angel"?

The wizard Baalgone has a problem. He struck a bargain with Asmodeus, and in his opinion he outsmarted the Lord of Hell, fulfilled his end of the bargain, and is free. Asmodeus evidently has other opinions, and Baalgone is being plagued by a winged figure firing poisonous arrows, which hurt. If the party can deal with the erinyes Baalgone has plans for escape...

Verdict
A long ways removed from their Greek roots, these devils fall into the "pretty girl that wants to kill you" trope, albeit it can be a pretty boy. The text does nothing with the idea of them being "fierce and disciplined warriors"; do they command brigades of lesser demons? Serve as special forces? We don't know, at least from 5e MM. They are a flying good-looking fighter who uses poisoned weapons; there's a place for that, I suppose. Their ability to pass as non-fiends allows for a lot of uses. A solid, classic fiend.

[Shining Wrath]

Possible variants

• The rope has possibilities; it can be upgraded to do more than merely restrain the foe. A rope that turns into a serpent with a poisonous bite seems appropriate.
• The erinyes has not always been a greater devil, and the idea of the tempter / temptress devil has a lot of precedent, to say the least. A CR 5 or 6 version of the erinyes, with less armor, no poison, but still 18 charisma, could be useful.

[arrowed]

do they command brigades of lesser demons?

Command demons? Never!
What about giving them some Battlemaster Maneuvers if they're leading some grunt demons? Commander's Strike and Rally might work well. How many / what size would be appropriate?

[Shining Wrath]

Command demons? Never!
What about giving them some Battlemaster Maneuvers if they're leading some grunt demons? Commander's Strike and Rally might work well. How many / what size would be appropriate?

For starters, DEVILS.

[arrowed]

Arrgh! Hoisted by my own petard! At least I think so, I'm not sure if that phrase works in this context. But yeah, Erinyes should definitely be leading devils, not demons. Although back in the demons section it said that demons basically obey the strong because they'll beat them to snot if they don't, so just how impossible is the idea of a demon obeying a bullying devil?

[JackPhoenix]

Arrgh! Hoisted by my own petard! At least I think so, I'm not sure if that phrase works in this context. But yeah, Erinyes should definitely be leading devils, not demons. Although back in the demons section it said that demons basically obey the strong because they'll beat them to snot if they don't, so just how impossible is the idea of a demon obeying a bullying devil?

Demons and devils hate each other more than anything. If the devil in question was more powerful than the demon, it wouldn't bully and order it around, it would kill it ASAP. Similarly, the demon would rather flee or commited suicide attack than to obey the devil.

[GorinichSerpant]

Arrgh! Hoisted by my own petard! At least I think so, I'm not sure if that phrase works in this context. But yeah, Erinyes should definitely be leading devils, not demons. Although back in the demons section it said that demons basically obey the strong because they'll beat them to snot if they don't, so just how impossible is the idea of a demon obeying a bullying devil?

I think the problem isn't that lesser demons won't follow a devil, it's that no self respecting devil would be caught using them. The If a rival devil catches wind of such things, they would quite quickly drag the first devil down to lower rank or death. The only way a devil could get away with it is if either they leave no evidence of it or they do it with the support of some of the lower downs, which implies some conspiracy to make an event look like result of demons instead of devils. Both of those are excellent hooks.

[arrowed]

Horned Devil
Also called a Malebranche, the Horned Devil is the first of the greater devils, and the description paints it as a lazy, cowardly fiend who nonetheless has the capacity to get mad when you want them to fight your players. So it's big, it's bad, and it's a somewhat vanilla fiend. Their fluff calls them flying infantry, implying these guys come in squads, and are minions rather than masterminds.

Art
Satanic. Tail, horns, pitchfork, feet that are all but cloven hooves. Oh, and wings. It's abdomen looks rather flat for a being described as lazy, but it's pose does a reasonable job of conveying a slothful, thuggish personality. It's fork is glowing like it should be dealing fire damage, which would be cool (well, warm, actually) but isn't reflected in the stat block. Over all, looks fiendish in a classical way, but little else.

Purpose and Tactics
Besides the standard devil armoury, the Horned Devil reads like a versatile brute, with relatively high AC, flight to take on foes in 3D, a tail attack with a nasty rider and at will fire damage at range. It's multi-attack lets it dish out a lot of damage in a turn, and it's only 'weak' save is intelligence at +1. It can take a few hits, it can dole out the damage, it can deal with flying foes... but apart from that, it's almost mundane. It has two options in combat: close and pummel with fork and tail, or fly above and rain fire.
I think the Horned Devil will best work as a bodyguard for a foe with more utility, or a random encounter in Baator. It certainly isn't a boss, even for lower level PCs.

Hooks
Vergalog has lost his fork. He can't be bothered to find it himself, but he says he will reward whoever finds his fork, but how will the PCs find a a fork in hell?

Gerzanan isn't afraid to fight her rivals, because she has called up a champion from hell itself to fight for her. Unfortunately, her champion's demands are growing increasingly difficult to meet...

The local tribe of kobolds has a new 'god', demanding treasure and sacrifice from them as usual. However this winged foe might be a bit beyond the PCs. They might have more luck informing the hells that one of their soldiers is skiving duty on the material plane.

Verdict
A decent side dish of a monster, but one requiring a fair bit of imagination to make an adventure out of. An excellent addition to a devilish encounter for when sheer brutality matters, with little to offer beyond that. I guess it has a place as high level cannon fodder.

[JellyPooga]

Horned Devil

For me, the 3.5 artwork of the Horned Devil is the way I've long imagined them. Big, scaly and intimidatin'.

As elite shock troops of the Infernal Legions, they're consummate warriors and I'd be loathe to limit them to just using a pitchfork. A squadron of these geared for war in plate mail (suitably spiky and black, of course) and a variety of weapons of Infernal origin (dealing additional fire, necrotic or poison damage) would pose a deadly encounter for even high level adventurers.

Be sure, when using them, to inflict as much senseless collateral damage through use of their Hurl Fire ability. They really epitomise Shock-and-Awe tactics when fielded as a group; flying in, destroying and setting fire to as much as possible before moving on while the ground troops mop up. The Infernal Wounds their tails cause reinforce this ideology, allowing them to inflict damage even after they're gone and forcing players to waste actions staunching or healing these deadly wounds instead of dealing with the source of the problem. I also like the idea of giving them Athletics proficiency and utilising grapple to lift and drop their victims from height; the image of a bunch of these grabbing villagers with their tails and dropping them on houses or other people as they pass through, just for kicks, is a powerful one.

As you say, though, I don't think they make a good Solo Boss, except where an ill-advised lower level Mage has bound one to his purpose and lost control somehow; fighting a Mage followed by one of these would make a memorable final fight scene, I think; between their damage immunities/resistances, magic resistance and a heap of HP (though not too many), they can be a tough encounter.

[JackPhoenix]

Looks like WotC made some changes there. In 3.5, Horned Devils were called Cornugons. Malebraches came later, at least in 3.5, they existed since 1e, and were also known as War Devils. Both monsters were kinda similar, 3.5 Malebrache is what inspired the 5e version, however, I prefer the spiked-chain wielding Cornugon visually:

Spoiler: 3.5 devils

Show

It is more monstrous, so it doesn't fit the intention of making devils more humanoid, and both devils filled the same role, only at different CR, so it kinda make sense to combine them into one monster.

[arrowed]

Horned Devils would have the same AC with plate armour as without unless it's magical, I think. I do like the idea of giving them a variety of weapons though.

[Shining Wrath]

The Malebranche date back to Dante's Inferno, Canto 21, and their description there is why devilish figures are oft depicted with pitchforks. Out of my affection for Dante, who I will freely confess has a better imagination than I do, I would be loathe to trade in the pitchforks for any other weapon. Their purposes in D&D have drifted far from Dante, of course; there, they punished people who took bribes to corrupt justice. A throw-back to that would be someone who made a deal with a devil for wealth and power and dealt corruptly with the townfolk; let the PCs decide whether to save him from the Malebranche sent to punish him for breaking his bargain by not being sufficiently evil (the devil asked him to go too far in his corruption).

EDIT: there's no reason their pitchforks can't be poisoned, enchanted, or otherwise upgraded.

EDIT #2, which occurred to me while mowing the lawn:
The pitchfork is a sign of status among Malebranche.

• "Enlisted" rank devils get the standard 2-tine pitchfork and have the MM stats.
• "NCO" rank devils get a 2-tine pitchfork but one of the tines does bonus damage: 1d6 from [acid cold electric fire or thunder].
• "Lower Officer" rank devils get a 2-tine pitchfork but both of the tines do different bonus damage: 1d6 from [acid cold electric fire or thunder].
• "Major & Colonel" rank devils get a 3-tine pitchfork; 2 tines do different bonus damage (1d8 from [acid cold electric fire or thunder]); one of them requires a DC 15 saving throw to avoid being one of [Blinded Deafened Frightened or Poisoned].
• "General" rank devils get a 4-tine pitchfork; 2 tines do different bonus damage (1d10 from [acid cold electric fire or thunder]); one of them requires a DC 16 saving throw to avoid being one of [Blinded Deafened Frightened or Poisoned]. One of them requires a DC 16 saving throw to avoid being [Incapacitated Paralyzed Petrified Stunned or Unconscious].

Thus if a general among the Malebranche scores a hit it might inflict (2d8 +6) base damage plus 1d10 cold damage plus 1d10 thunder damage plus require a DC 16 CON save to avoid being Deafened plus require a DC 16 WIS save to avoid being Stunned. Fun for all! Maybe you'd have to bump the challenge rating up a little for that one.

Wielding the weapon requires attunement by someone whose natural shape includes size large, two horns, bat wings, and a sharp tail, and is of Lawful Evil alignment.

[Shining Wrath]

Ice Devil (Gelugon)
Dating back to first edition, ice devils the commanders of the infernal armies of the Nine Hells, but wish they were pit fiends; they take out their resentment at not being the top of the heap on all lesser devils. They are as ambitious as hell.

Art
When grasshoppers go bad, only missing the two middle limbs. Again, nothing lets you know this guy is large. Definitely ugly but not particularly fiendish.

Purpose and tactics
Lacking a ranged attack, but featuring a wall of ice, these fiends close with you, close you in, and hurt you a lot. Immune to cold, fire, and poison, and with magic resistance, they are durable foes. They can't fly, though, and can't keep you from flying, which by level 14 will be pretty common. Put one in a room with a low ceiling, though, and the wall of ice can shut off escape.
The variant ice spear is very close to an at-will Slow spell; OK, it has to hit you, but with +10 to hit and two attacks a turn, that may not be difficult. Despite the fluff as commanders of infernal armies, they don't get any features to help them lead a group.

Hooks
Gerald the Gelid wants to move up. His supervisor, Urgoth the pit fiend, is in the way. Urgoth's latest assignment is to collect souls from chaotic evil Oathbreaker Paladins for some inscrutable purpose of Levistus. If the party can interfere with Urgoth's assignment in a particularly humiliating fashion, Gerald promises to teach them how to imbue their own weapons with the slowing magic of his spear.

Deep within the Nine Hells a minor castle is home to a newly-raised pit fiend named Sinusta. Sinusta is besieged by a force led by the ice devil Frangelia. Unfortunately, the party is hidden within the castle, trying to avoid notice by either Sinusta or the besieging armies. Do the party try to strike a bargain with Sinusta to help raise the siege; with Frangelia to betray the castle from within; try to sneak out unnoticed; or wait?

Verdict
A classic monster but not extremely flavorful. The wall of ice and the spear of ice make it more than just another brawler, but not that much more.

Variants
Very tempting to give these guys either some more innate spell casting or some feature like an orc warlord's Battle Cry. Or both.

[Angel Bob]

Man, we are just flying through these devils, aren't we?

[VoxRationis]

I should hope so. I'm not fond of outsiders (with the exception of formians). Let's get on to the dinosaurs quickly.

[Envyus]

I gave Ice Devils some limited flight.

But yeah Malebranche aka Horned Devils have been around since 1e. In 2e they were changed to Cornugons, then 3.5 reintroduced the Malebranche as War Devils instead of Horned Devils. 5e decided to give the title of Horned Devil back to it's original owner the Malebranche.

[Shining Wrath]

I gave Ice Devils some limited flight.

But yeah Malebranche aka Horned Devils have been around since 1e. In 2e they were changed to Cornugons, then 3.5 reintroduced the Malebranche as War Devils instead of Horned Devils. 5e decided to give the title of Horned Devil back to it's original owner the Malebranche.

I can see them building a ramp of ice a la Iceman (from the Original X-men) and going over obstacles that way.

[MasterMercury]

What if, instead of flight, Ice Devils put those grasshopper legs to good use. I'd say a giant blue grasshopper devil jumping 40-50 feet in the air to stab you in the face with an ice spear would be a rather interesting encounter to that wizard who thought he was safe after casting fly.

[Shining Wrath]

What if, instead of flight, Ice Devils put those grasshopper legs to good use. I'd say a giant blue grasshopper devil jumping 40-50 feet in the air to stab you in the face with an ice spear would be a rather interesting encounter to that wizard who thought he was safe after casting fly.

Or take a page from the Shadeling Fey of 3rd edition and let them manifest weapons out of ice - and throw them. Not necessarily with the Slow effect, but still, a ranged attack against flying wizards.

[MasterMercury]

Or take a page from the Shadeling Fey of 3rd edition and let them manifest weapons out of ice - and throw them. Not necessarily with the Slow effect, but still, a ranged attack against flying wizards.

That would definitely work.
Wizard: hah, you can't reach me!
Ice Devil: EAT ICE YOU IMBECILIC MORTAL!

[RazDelacroix]

I remember a particular 2nd edition Gelugon in the Bloodwar adventure path had wizard spellcasting of the evocation variety and all fire spells substituted for cold variants. Nothing like an Iceball to throw those classic adventurers for a loop!

[Shining Wrath]

I remember a particular 2nd edition Gelugon in the Bloodwar adventure path had wizard spellcasting of the evocation variety and all fire spells substituted for cold variants. Nothing like an Iceball to throw those classic adventurers for a loop!

Shouldn't that be an Ice Cube?

[RazDelacroix]

Shouldn't that be an Ice Cube?

Nope! Although seeing a literal cube of ice in-lieu of just a cold variant of fireball would be pretty neat!



Remember folks, for your games, do not hesitate to create pun-tastic forms of destruction!