TAV’SGUIDETOFIENDS VeryImportant This book is very unfinished and just about everything inside is subject to change.
Contents Tav’s guide to fiends 1
Using this book From the fiery depths of the Nine hells, the near endleess abyss, allthe way to the fiendish being that call these places home, detaling there lore and discussing plans to defeat them. This book is not for the faint of heart, for within these pages resides information that may even plunge even the bravest of adventurers into an uncurable madness. But if you dare face the evil ahead then read on but you have been warned… Important This book is simply a collection of other lore already built up throuout the several books of Dungeons & Dragons. All rules and lore contained within this book has already appeared somewhere else in the official books. I hope this can be a helpful collection of information to any DMs who dont want to scramble to find the exact piece of lore/enemy necessary for the upcoming moment. Whats inside this book? Chapter One: The blood war Chapter two: Lore surrounding demons Chapter three: A deep dive into the many layers of the abyss Chapter Four: Exploring the srict higharchy of the devils Chapter Five: Explaining the levels of the nine hells Chapter Six: The interesting middleground of the Yugoloth Chapter Seven: A fiendish bestiary
The blood war Throughout history, hordes of the Abyss and legions of the Nine Hells have battled for control of the cosmos. Mortals who know of this conflict refer to it as “The Blood War”.Ths war takes place primarily in the Lower Planes, in the first layer of the Nine hells, or very rarely in the material plane. From time to time, demons spill out of the Abyss to invade Avernus, the uppermost layer of the Nine Hells. While the devils defend their home turf, they also make strategic attacks against locations in the Abyss. Although the intensity of the conflict will ocaisionally wax and wane, and the front lines of the war can shift,but always remember a moment never goes by when demons and devils aren’t battling each other somewhere in the multiverse. The Great Dance The battle lines in the Blood War shift back and forth. Each time one side gains an advantage, its lines weaken somewhere else.Demons usually enter the Nine Hells by following the River Styx from the Abyss into Avernus. By hiring fleets of merrenoloth pilots, a demon lord can transport an army of enormous size.. But devils can also employ such tactics and occaisionally plot attacks against the abyss of Mimicking a complex dance, the two sides shift their attacks and trade positions with each passing day. Many scholars have begun reffering to this as the great dance. rarely, demons attempt to reach the furthest end of the Styx and attemt to gainn access portals leading deeper into the Hells.If they are succesful in there endeavors, the legions of the Nine Hells will boil up from below to repel the invaders out of These deeper layers, back to Avernus the top layer of The Nine Hells. This drive by the devils attracts the attention of more demons from the Abyss, which pushes the front line back into Avernus. The process repeats itself time and time again. To the good fortune of the rest of the multiverse, almost every battle in the Blood War take place in the Abyss or the Nine Hells. Whether by chance or the design of some unknown power, the dark waters of the Styx provide passage between the two planes, but pathways to other realms are at best fleeting and unreliable. Despite the difficulty of escaping the Lower Planes, combatants on both sides find their way to the Material Plane and other realms from time to time. Although the conflicts on these other planes are little more than skirmishes in the Blood War, even a small number of demons and devils can wreak havoc and bring destruction wherever they see fit to do battle. Mortals & Minions Devils and demons are far from the only combatants in the Blood War. Both sides exploit the Material Plane’s most abundant resource-mortal creatures, whose bod- ies and souls are both useful to the cause. Devils constantly strive to recruit mortals into their ranks by offering them rewards in return for their ser- vice. While they live, these cultists carry out the wishes of their archdevil masters, whether raiding an enemy outpost or gathering more members for the cult. When a cultist dies, its soul emerges in the Nine Hells and becomes another of the Blood War’s 1 PART 1 | The Blood War
immortal soldiers. Most of the evil souls consigned to an afterlife in the Nine Hells become lemures, which make up the vast majority of the hellish forces, but some mortal recruits who willingly accept a contract offer from a powerful devil can arrive as a lesser devil. Demons generally have no regard for mortal souls and do not solicit them, but living creatures do have their uses. Groups of corrupted cultists dedicated to one of the demon lords exist all across the realms of the material world. For as long as these mortals do the bidding of their lord, they are allowed to live. From a demon’s perspective, all other living creatures are nothing more than sheep ripe for slaughter, and demonic cultists share this view. These fanatics don’t hesitate to slay other mortals if given the chance-and if their victims happen to be in league with devils, so much the better. A casual observer might suppose that two forces of evil bent on exterminating each other would be an advantageous situation for the forces of good, but the com- batants in the Blood War have no regard for collateral damage and on the Material Plane, they can cause a lot of it. If agents of Asmodeus discover a thriving demon cult in a city, they might deal with the threat by starting a fire that not only destroys the cult but burns through several neighborhoods and kills hundreds of innocents. A demon might unleash a plague to kill every person in a town, just for the sake of claiming from its library an old book containing a map to a lost artifact. The fiends on both sides of the Blood War take the path of least resistance to their The Great Dance Both sides in the Blood War employ spies and soldiers drawn from the ranks of other evil creatures of the planes. The devils are generally more successful at this tactic because of the discipline they can bring to bear on these ostensible allies. Even so, powerful, intelligent demon lords such as Graz’zt can also force their agents to do their bidding under threat of annihilation, As creatures that don’t favor either cause, because they care nothing for the philosophical concerns of law and chaos. Other fiends including incubi, succubi, and night hags work for whichever side offers the best compensation. Demons use them as insurrectionists in the Nine Hells, inciting rebellion and defiance. The devils employ such creatures as scouts, who use their magic and other abilities to navigate the Abyss and gain intelligence about the demons’ activities. Adventurers hired by an agent of the Nine Hells to make a foray into the Abyss are customarily guided by such a mercenary. SAILING THE STYX The River Styx frustrates every attempt to map it or predict its course. Although anyone can try to navigate it, only merrenoloths, the yugoloth ferrymen of the Styx, can faultlessly negotiate the Styx’s treacherous waters. For a price, merrenoloths will carry anyone safely and swiftly across planar boundaries. The greater the distance and the more perilous the passengers to be ferried, the higher the price. Getting lost while sailing the Styx isn’t the only danger the river presents. Merely tasting or touching its waters causes most creatures to become stupefied, and drinking fully or being immersed for too long can render that condition permanent, robbing a creature of all its memories. Fiends don’t fear being momentarily exposed to the Styx, but-with the notable exception of hydroloths, merrenoloths, and amnizus even they can’t retain their memories if they drink from the River Styx or swim for too long in its waters. 2 PART 1 | The Blood War
demons The true embodiement of chaos demons are fiends spawned from the unfathomability of the abyss itself rising from its ground like a worm escaping the clutches of the earth. Demons are truly evil fiends, ever-evolving engines of destruction spawned from the infinite depths to act as living instruments of oblivion. Beings of utterly wickedness, demons are cruel and savage, without compassion or empathy and completely unfamiliar with concepts like fear or mercy. Every thought that crossed their minds was tainted by hate and malice,each believing that only its own desires are important. They love benevolence and seek to tear down order, because first and foremost, demons exist to spread chaos and evil, thus all other activities serve this ultimate goal of sowing strife and disorder. Categorisation There are four primary categories of demons but for the purposes of this book i will also be using the extra categories written in the denominicon of Iggwilv Primary Categories Know living species Obyrith 2 Tanar’ri 22 Luomara 1 Demon lords 8 Iggwilv’s categories Known living species Beasts 3 The Created 2 Servitors 1 Other 1 Obyrith The oldest of the demonic races, obyriths were ancient creatures of chaos and insanity said to have come from an entirely different reality. They ruled the Abyss for eons and were responsible for creating the tanar’ri, before an ill-fated war broke their armies and a subsequent slave revolt drove most of them into hiding or to extinction. Only two species of obyrith are known to this day, The Sibriex, and the Wastrilith. Tanar’ri The most numerous of the demonic races and the rulers of the Abyss. The tanar’ri are born spontaneously from the Abyss, although some bear signs of being altered by sibriexes or other creatures. Tanar’ri occurred when evil mortal souls enter the Abyss; the first tanar’ri was Demogorgon. for a long time they where ruled over by the Obyrith, but when the obyrith society collapsed the tanar’ri took over the abyss and founded the modern day abyss. Luomara Loumara demons are the youngest demonic race, consisting of immaterial beings that possess people, creatures, or objects to spread evil. They are theorized to be born from the dreams of dead gods killed by the cruelty and abominations of the Abyss. 3 PART 2 | Demons
Demon Lords The eight demon lords of the abyss are the most powerful demons in all of the abyss they have rose the hiegharchy of power and truly become the most powerful and dominant of the demons. The eight demon lords of the abyss are as follows: Baphomet Prince of beasts Demogorgon prince of demons Fraz-urb’luu Prince of Deception graz’zt Prince of lust juiblex The faceless lord Orcus Master of undeath Yeenoghu lord of the gnoll Zuggtmoy queen of fungus Other Demons Even with the six categories described by Iggwilv, many demons defied categorization, either due to lack of sufficient knowledge or the sheer chaos of the Abyss itself. Beasts Some creatures produced by the Abyss acted like what would, in saner places, be called wildlife. They were generally unintelligent. Created Demonic creatures created by some powerful entity, such as a demon lord or, more rarely, some other powerful entity like a night hag or very powerful mortal spellcaster. Servitors Similar to the Created, servitor demons were the least populous group. They were created by deities as servants, proxies, and agents. Some servitor races were abandoned to the Abyss when their creator moved on or died.
The Abyss The Infinite Layers of the Abyss was the birth place of the tanar’ri and loumara demons, a chaotic evil universe unto itself with uncountable layers of infinite variety connected haphazardly. The Abyss’s place in cosmology has shifted over time, but the nature of the plane remained fairly constant: a violent, malevolent place where the strong survived on the backs of the weak, the weak conspired to overthrow the strong, alliances only lasted while convenient,and the landscape itself tortured the mind and body of all who dared to pass. In the Great Wheel cosmology model, the Abyss is an Outer plane on the Great Wheel connected to the Astral plane, Pandemonium, Carceri, and the Outlands.The abyss has 665 layers that we will get indepth with ater in this chapter. Layers The abyss has 665 layers Each layer has its own characteristics, which were as varied as the demons themselves. All types of terrain, atmosphere, weather, gravity, and material composition were represented. While the hundreds of layers of the Abyss might seem to utterly eclipse all other Outer planes put together, this figure was misleading as with the issue of uninhabitable, layers there is just about as much as any other plane. Spells I would recomend for traveling / traversing the abyss Spell name spell level Magic circle 5 Plane shift 10 Protection From Evil and Good 15 These three spells will be your best friends while traversing the abyss. Pazunia The first layer, named Pazunia after (now deceased) demon lord Pazuzu,its is described as a barren, dusty place baking under a red sun, broken only by great iron fortresses, huge holes in the ground, and the river Styx. Some branches of the Styx flow down the holes and some of these holes supplied water to the Styx in reverse waterfalls. The main mark of this layer though is that it has many portals that lead through to other layers of the Abyss. These portals appear as pits, but are rarely marked so finding the right one is often just guess work. Usually, these portals lead to higher layers of the Abyss, though sometimes, they open into lower layers too. Pazunia is a very key location for any wishing to explore the abyss i would not recemend such actions. 5 PART 3 | The Abyss
45th-47th: Azzagrat Azzagrat is made up of 3 Abyssal layers; Rauwend, Shadowsky and Voorz’zt. These 3 layers make up of the realm of the Demon Lord Graz’zt, a place from which obscure magical knowledge can be discovered. (if one survives long enough to find it). 66th: The Demonweb Pits The Demonweb Pits are the home of Lolth, the Spider Queen and goddess of the Drow. The layer is characterised by vast networks of webs which hold buildings and structures in their grasp, suspending them in the air. Portals created within the web network would also draw in random objects from the mortal plane that can be found in this layer. Lolth’s dungeons can be found deep within the web network and even further beneath these lie the bottomless pits where Lolth herself dwells. Lolth also rules over the 65th layer of the Abyss known as the Court of the Spider Queen. 88th: Gaping Maw The Gaping Maw is the realm of Demogorgon, the Prince of Demons himself. It’s a vast continent surrounded by an endless ocean. Within this layer are the Screaming Jungle, inhabited by lizardfolk, yuan-ti, donsaurs and barlguras. The oceans are home to terrifying, aquatic creatures such as aboleths, krakens and ixitxachiti. Demogorgon’s lair can be found on the continent in a palace called Abysm. Abysm has 2 serpentine towers topped with skull minarets that reach deep into the ground, reaching networks of caverns that enter into the Shadowsea, the next layer of the Abyss. 89th: The Shadowsea The layer directly below the Gaping Maw is known as the Shadowsea and is the realm of the obyrith Dagon who is the Prince of the Darkened Depths. Dagon rules this watery realm in the amorphous palace inhabited by giant sea worms. 113th: Thanatos Thanatos is the layer ruled by the Demon Lord Orcus who is not only a competitor for title of Prince of Demons, but is also a master of undeath and magic. Thanatos takes on much of the personality of Orcus with its black forests, desolate ruins and foreboding tombs. It’s also infested with undead legions that form much of Orcus’ army. Orcus rules Thanatos from Everlost Palace, a castle built of obsidian and bone set in a huge wasteland known as Oblivion’s End. For a few centuries, Orcus had been dethroned from Thanatos by the drow goddess, Kiaransalee, but Orcus was able to return and defeat her, sending her fleeing to the Demonweb. 6 PART 3 | The Abyss
176th: Hollow’s Heart Hollow’s Heart is the realm of the Demon Lord Fraz-Urb’luu who is amaster of deception and illusions. Following FrazUrb’luu’s imprisonment on Oerth for 2 centuries, Hollow’s Heart became destabilised into a flat land of nothingness. It has taken him many centuries to rebuild the portion of the layer that he has already (which is the size of a large continent). This means though, that most of this layer remains featureless. At the centre of the layer though, is the lair of Fraz-Urb’luu; the city of Zoragmelok. It is a walled city of adamantine built in with architecture that would seem impossible. 222nd: Shedaklah Shedaklah is the realm of the Demon Lords Juiblex, the Prince of Slimes, and Zuggtmoy, the Queen of Fungi. Shedaklah is also known as the Slime Pits and is a putrid, swampy realm, covered in a murky, brown sky and prone to torrential rains of filth. Here, poisonous vapors are emitted from fissures in the ground making the land a perfect breeding ground for oozes, molds and slimes of all varieties. 422nd: Death Dells The Death Dells is the domain of Yeenoghu, a savage, jackal-headed demon lord and the creator of gnolls. His realm is a barren place of hills and ravines and few signs of civilisation other than the roving bands of gnolls, ghouls and hyenas that make their home here. This landscape constitutes what is for Yeenoghu and his minions, an endless hunting ground for them to prey on hapless victims. 570th: Shendilavri Shendilavri is home to many succubi and is ruled by Malcanthet, the Queen of the Succubi. The realm was once a mass of living flesh, but has since been shaped into a place of luscious beauty by Malcanthet. It has grassy hills, sandy beaches and is constantly lit by a beautiful sunset. Cities of white buildings have are scattered throughout the land with Rivenheart, the realms capital, also being Malcanthet’s seat of power. Here, it is said, all possible pleasures and desires can be obtained to tempt visitors into relaxing and letting down their guard. Malcanthet is protected here by her own, personal guard, the Radiant Sisters who protect her from potential threats. 600th: Endless Maze The Demon Lord, Baphomet, rules the Endless Maze. It’s an infinite and ever changing labyrinth filled with terrifying creatures including minotaurs, ogres and goristros. Pale night, the Obyrith demon lord also rules a portion of the Endless Maze from her Bone Castle. 665th: The Void The final known layer of the Abyss is known simply as the Void. Those that enter here find themselves falling eternally, either dying, eventually, of dehydration, or from the wicked winds that are powerful enough to flay the very skin from your bones. Much magic is dampened here too meaning that spells that might be useful in such circumstances, are ineffective in the Void; these include spells like levitate and feather fall. Although some portals do lead into the Void, no portals lead out of it. 7 PART 3 | The Abyss
Devils Devils are lawful evil fiends the enemies of the demons. These Fiends are tactical and strategic tricking mortals into deals that will ultimately only help the devils involved. Devils have a strict hierarchical structure. The weakest and least cunning devils are known as the least, above them are lesser devils, greater devils and finally, archdevils. The greatest of all the archdevils, and the defacto ruler of them is Asmodeus. Devils primarily seek to increase in influence and power within this hierarchical structure. This usually involves amassing more souls which are used as a power source within their plane of existence. This is done by influencing mortals towards greater and greater evil deeds. A soul that has performed acts of evil, when it dies, can be diverted towards bephamat and tortured to obtain its energy. Once the soul has had all of its energy tortured away, the empty husk will itself form a new devil. When a devil achieves promotion from a lesser status to a higher one, the stored genetic aspects of the higher devils transforms them into a new type of devil entirely. Most devils will hope to take on the form of a more cunning type of devil. As usually, the only way to be promoted is to occupy an empty position within devil Hierarchy, devils can often be sicophantic beings as loyalty is often rewarded above and beyond competence. Categorisation But not only do they have rankings, 3 primary categories of devils those being, Baatezu, Abishai, and archdevils. categories of devils Primary Categories Know living species Baatezu 17 Abishai 5 Archdevil 9 Other 7 Archedevils Archdevils are a class and a species. Once a devil arrizes to the point of eing an archdevil they are then also classifified differantly. 8 PART 4 | Devils
Baatezu The oldest of the demonic races, obyriths were ancient creatures of chaos and insanity said to have come from an entirely different reality. They ruled the Abyss for eons and were responsible for creating the tanar’ri, before an ill-fated war broke their armies and a subsequent slave revolt drove most of them into hiding or to extinction. Only two species of obyrith are known to this day, The Sibriex, and the Wastrilith. Abishai The most numerous of the demonic races and the rulers of the Abyss. The tanar’ri are born spontaneously from the Abyss, although some bear signs of being altered by sibriexes or other creatures. Tanar’ri occurred when evil mortal souls enter the Abyss; the first tanar’ri was Demogorgon. for a long time they where ruled over by the Obyrith, but when the obyrith society collapsed the tanar’ri took over the abyss and founded the modern day abyss. Other Some creatures produced by the Abyss acted like what would, in saner places, be called wildlife. They were generally unintelligent. Archdevil Loumara demons are the youngest demonic race, consisting of immaterial beings that possess people, creatures, or objects to spread evil. They are theorized to be born from the dreams of dead gods killed by the cruelty and abominations of the Abyss. Important note Everything on this page is placeholder and will be replaced later 9 PART 4 | Devils