Seeking Yuan-Ti PC Motivation / Backstory Ideas

[NecessaryWeevil]

Hi,

Considering a Yuan-Ti (Monsters of the Multiverse) Redemption Paladin for an upcoming game. It's AL and there's a good chance I will only play a couple of sessions, but I'd still like to have an idea of who he is, why he would swear an Oath of Redemption, and why he would get along with other PCs. Ideally something a little more original than "he got out in the world and realized how much his home society sucked."
Any ideas?
Thanks!

[Spo]

My Yuan-Ti PC is a drakewarden ranger (snake charmer) who left her region after a group of adventurers wrecked her tribe's temple. The group of adventurers is actually my group from a previous campaign - always wondered what impact my PC's have on the world. In this particular case it provided a origin story for another PC.

[da newt]

YuanTi are often VERY caste driven and purebloods are the lowest of the low (except brood guards, but they aren't born YuanTi) - this can be a good reason why a pureblood decided the YuanTi way of life wasn't for them as there is just about no way for them to improve their position - they are locked in by their form.

They usually preach that emotions are a weakness and only hold back individuals from achieving. Evolutionary progress is away from human/mammalian and toward reptilian - simple, logical, cold, etc. Any YuanTi with a lick of compassion would be ridiculed for their weakness.

[Unoriginal]

Hi,

Considering a Yuan-Ti (Monsters of the Multiverse) Redemption Paladin for an upcoming game. It's AL and there's a good chance I will only play a couple of sessions, but I'd still like to have an idea of who he is, why he would swear an Oath of Redemption, and why he would get along with other PCs. Ideally something a little more original than "he got out in the world and realized how much his home society sucked."
Any ideas?
Thanks!

How about something like that:

Your PC was greatly skilled at fighting, and loyal to the Yuan-ti cause before any personal ambition, so he got noticed by the higher-ups and rose through the ranks at a very fast pace, until he was appointed as the warden of the city's prison.

There, and to his escalating horror, he discovered that he was one of the few Yuan-ti with empathy. Empathy for *non-Yuan-ti*, at that.

Still, it was not because he was... feeling bad about the torture and the screaming and all that blood to wash and the fear on their faces and... that there wasn't a duty to perform. So he soldiered on, and did his duty, and got angry at the prisoners for making him feel sorry for them, and coped by focusing on the glory and greatness of the Yuan-ti society, where one can ascend from mere pureblood to full godhood.

And then one day he just couldn't do it. Maybe it was something particularly repugnant. Maybe it was just a particularly large group being coraled to their sinister fate. Maybe one of the prisoners looked at him not with fear or hate, but disappointment.

Maybe it was just an ordinary work day.

But he couldn't do it anymore, so he didn't. He fled, maybe freeing prisoners in the process, and kept fleeing until he was somewhere no one would ever ask he'd break a bone to record how fast it heals or check the family ties between two teammates to check if they were appropriate sacrifices.

And it was when he was at his lowest, most self-loathing that he swore to be better.


YuanTi are often VERY caste driven and purebloods are the lowest of the low (except brood guards, but they aren't born YuanTi) - this can be a good reason why a pureblood decided the YuanTi way of life wasn't for them as there is just about no way for them to improve their position - they are locked in by their form.

Not really, purebloods can go through a ritual that let them become an higher caste, and then another, and so on and so on.

Yuan-ti Anathemas are one ritual away from godhood, and Abominations are one ritual away from Anathema-hood.

It could be interesting if OP's PC left when he was well on his way to get rewarded by becoming the next step up from Pureblood, which I think is Malisson?

[NecessaryWeevil]

Thank you all, these are great ideas and have me thinking as well.
Maybe he is ashamed at his empathy. A real Yuan-Ti would not have this weakness, but he is flawed.
So he flees his society before it's discovered, and runs far enough, as Unoriginal said, until he reaches somewhere
that the inhabitants are foolish enough to view his shameful failings as *admirable.*
Much like other Paladins might "fall" to Oathbreaker, he swears the Oath of Redemption because it's all a failure like him can do so he might as well embrace it.
So he's rather angry for a Redemption Paladin. Bandits, murderers, even sadistic guardsmen infuriate him. If a Yuan-Ti like him has this failing, this empathy, then how dare these hairless apes, who are supposed to be *born with* empathy, dare to lack it? He knows they can do better. Though if they finally convince him that he's wrong about them...he'll give them a swift death.

[Sigreid]

I had a devotion paladin kobold that his egg was captured in a raid on a kobold lair and he was raised in a paladin order dedicated to Bahamut. Raised in an environment where he was valued and cared for, he decided his purpose was to break into the kobold god prison and slay him to save his species.

[JackPhoenix]

Eberron has Shulassakar (https://web.archive.org/web/20161101150107/http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ebds/20040920a), Silver Flame-worshipping, rainbow-feathered Yuan-ti based on Couatls. Though setting-specific, sounds pretty much like what you're looking for.

[da newt]

Sorry - I left out the bit about how they can undergo a ritual to 'progress' to the next body type. The rituals are prohibitively expensive (money, time, expertise, captives, magic components, etc) and reserved for the most extraordinary YaunTi. It's more likely a pureblood will be eaten by an Abomination than it will ascend to Malison via a ritual / sacrifice.

Bottom line - feelings and morality are probably the two most likely reasons to reject your kin's way of life.