PCs becoming Lemures

[lxion]

A PC dies. The usual thing that happens, is that a new character is made. I am quite certain that there are some DMs that have once worked with an afterlife, homebrewn or in the lore. Very cool stuff. Specific question: has anyone actually sent a party to Baator due to sins or a deal with a devil gone wrong and made them Lemures? How would that work in a campaign?

[Malphegor]

wait do you really mean lemurs as in African squirrel racoon things or lemures as in devil things as this is an important distinction I think

[lxion]

The Devil things. I understand the confusion.

[Willie the Duck]

I was very disappointed with the actual nature of this thread.

[Rerem115]

Mass Polymorph. You are all now Zoboomafoo.

[Telonius]

I haven't run a campaign that way myself, but I think there may have been someone on the forums who ran a Devil-based campaign where the players progressed through the devilish hierarchy. Instead of leveling up, they progressed to different sorts of devils, like they show in Fiendish Codex 2.

Google-Fu is failing me, and maybe I'm inventing the memory. Maybe time to call in an expert?

Red Fel Red Fel Red Fel

Anyway, if you're playing them straight-up, as described, roleplaying Lemures would be a pretty horrible experience. They have no intelligence scores:

A creature with no Intelligence score is mindless, an automaton operating on simple instincts or programmed instructions.

If they're a Lemure, they're basically no longer under the player's control. Unless you have a seriously strange group, this would be No Fun.

If you're looking to change them into a low-level Devil, Imp is probably where you'd want to start.

[lxion]

That would indeed make way more sense. I think that being a Lemure would be something I'd mention in between sessions. "Yeah, your souls have been claimed by Devil X and you have been transformed in Lemures. After being loyally tortured for 17,000 years and killing one hostile demon in de Blood War, you have all been promoted to Imps."

[Reversefigure4]

You'd need to kill the entire party at once, so as not to split the group. Which means you either need to railroad them to inevitable death - or, more likely, start with that as the campaign pitch.

[Mr Beer]

Yeah start as Imps or if they're Lemures, they are intelligent which means they are Destined For Great Things (and could imply a behind the scenes power of some kind, so there's your plot).

[Kaptin Keen]

This is ... barely related, but still:

Verdanos Mir, my half-elf Dark Sun psion once had an unfortunate - and fatal - mental duel with an Arcanaloth. The Arcanaloth took his soul, and left for home.

Verdanos spent 30 years in that place, building his strength, finally breaking free, defeating the Arcanaloth in round 2, and returning home - seconds after his defeat. Turns out, time was a lot faster where Mr. Arcanaloth lived.

Verdanos now has every inch of his body covered in tiny arcane symbols - scars, tattoos, whatever they are, they glow slightly when close to strong magic or psionic energy.

[Yuki Akuma]

Petitioners don't remember their previous lives most of the time, especially if they're transformed into some new creature like a Lemure or Imp. Even if they do remember it, it's more like a biography of some guy they read rather than actual personal memories.

Also yeah Lemures are mindless anyway.

[gkathellar]

The trouble with Lemures in particular is, well ... you don't become one. At least not normally.

When you end up in one of the Outer Planes as a petitioner, you kick around for a bit, maybe get eaten, and then turn into the lowest-ranked form of the local exemplar species. In the Abyss, that'd be a mane. In Celestia, it's a lantern archon. In Baator, it's a ... nupperibo.

See, baatezu are not actually the local exemplar species of the Nine Hells. They're an occupying army. Nupperibos are the lowest-ranking form of the Ancient Baatorians, who the baatezu fear the return of in part because the plane continues to acknowledge their legitimacy and in part because Asmodeus never actually fought them and has no idea what they're capable of (most of them are asleep beneath Cania, except for maybe Belphegor, who Asmo walks on tiptoes around). As a result, nupperibos are sent out to the front lines of the Blood War to either die or accumulate some experience points, and when they've been nicely seasoned with horror and pain but well before they're able to advance to their next form, they're ground up and made into lemures - entirely new beings, with no connection to the mortal from which they were made. In this way, the baatezu subvert Baator's natural ecosystem to feed their own regime.

Compare and contrast the Abyss, where the obyriths (ancient, primordial Chaotic Evil) have been replaced by the tanar'ri (Chaotic Evil shaped by mortal fears and hatreds) as their "legitimate" successors. Baator, unlike the Abyss, remains unconvinced.

It is possible to circumvent the grinder if you work out a deal with the baatezu before dying, in which case they can make sure you go directly to lemure, or maybe even something higher if you're got something really good to offer them for their services. But in general, it's more useful to get a nice, fat nupperibo and make some solid lemures out of it.

[NorthernPhoenix]

The trouble with Lemures in particular is, well ... you don't become one. At least not normally.

When you end up in one of the Outer Planes as a petitioner, you kick around for a bit, maybe get eaten, and then turn into the lowest-ranked form of the local exemplar species. In the Abyss, that'd be a mane. In Celestia, it's a lantern archon. In Baator, it's a ... nupperibo.

See, baatezu are not actually the local exemplar species of the Nine Hells. They're an occupying army. Nupperibos are the lowest-ranking form of the Ancient Baatorians, who the baatezu fear the return of in part because the plane continues to acknowledge their legitimacy and in part because Asmodeus never actually fought them and has no idea what they're capable of (most of them are asleep beneath Cania, except for maybe Belphegor, who Asmo walks on tiptoes around). As a result, nupperibos are sent out to the front lines of the Blood War to either die or accumulate some experience points, and when they've been nicely seasoned with horror and pain but well before they're able to advance to their next form, they're ground up and made into lemures - entirely new beings, with no connection to the mortal from which they were made. In this way, the baatezu subvert Baator's natural ecosystem to feed their own regime.

Compare and contrast the Abyss, where the obyriths (ancient, primordial Chaotic Evil) have been replaced by the tanar'ri (Chaotic Evil shaped by mortal fears and hatreds) as their "legitimate" successors. Baator, unlike the Abyss, remains unconvinced.

It is possible to circumvent the grinder if you work out a deal with the baatezu before dying, in which case they can make sure you go directly to lemure, or maybe even something higher if you're got something really good to offer them for their services. But in general, it's more useful to get a nice, fat nupperibo and make some solid lemures out of it.

That's second edition lore right? In 3rd editions telling of the story, Asmodeus destroys all but one of the baatorians (Zargon) and is the undisputed master of the plane. Here, the nupperibo are a form devils are devolved into for failure.

If you're playing 5th edition, you can use either take.

[Tanarii]

If you're playing 5th edition, you can use either take.

In 5th:

Nupperibos are formed from souls of "the truly worthless- those whose evil acts in life arose from care- lessness and sloth more than anything else". (Mord. Tome of Foes)

Lemures are the most common starting point, although some who contract with strong Devils can start higher.

On the other hand, there are also strong implication in Mordenkainen's that the majority of souls the Devils gain come from contracts & cultists. Not just being Lawful Evil. For example the tale of Asmodeus's trial goes "Mortals who refused a devil's offer were left alone, in accordance with the law. Those who struck deals with his followers and then somehow turned the contracts against the devils were freed from their debts."

[Red Fel]

I haven't run a campaign that way myself, but I think there may have been someone on the forums who ran a Devil-based campaign where the players progressed through the devilish hierarchy. Instead of leveling up, they progressed to different sorts of devils, like they show in Fiendish Codex 2.

Google-Fu is failing me, and maybe I'm inventing the memory. Maybe time to call in an expert?

Red Fel Red Fel Red Fel

Yo!

A PC dies. The usual thing that happens, is that a new character is made. I am quite certain that there are some DMs that have once worked with an afterlife, homebrewn or in the lore. Very cool stuff. Specific question: has anyone actually sent a party to Baator due to sins or a deal with a devil gone wrong and made them Lemures? How would that work in a campaign?

Have I ever done this? No. Usually, in my games, if the party goes to Baator it's because they want to. The irony is delicious.

On the "make them Lemures" front, I agree that's a bad idea, for three reasons. First, as stated, Lemures aren't really playable characters. That's a full stop right there. Second, when the players are accustomed to playing PCs of a certain level of power, having to start over basically from zero is incredibly frustrating. And third, unless this is the campaign for which they signed on, this is not the campaign for which they signed on. An "ascend the ranks in Hell" campaign is very specific, and requires a very specific mindset. If your players aren't on-board for that, they're going to have a very, very bad time.

Which dovetails nicely into the other question you asked: Sending the party to Baator due to sins or a deal gone wrong. I can see the appeal in it, but unless you're playing with an entire party of sinners, it's basically dragging the whole team on an extended sidequest over the conduct of one character. Which isn't a bad thing, if you do it right.

Let's try a hypothetical. Steve Sinner is either as corrupt as they come, or has engaged in a Fiendish Pact. Two possible scenarios.

1. Steve gets dragged to Baator, and the party is pulled along for the ride. Now they have to resolve this mess if they ever want to get home.

2. Steve gets dragged to Baator, and the party chases after to try to save him. Now they have to resolve this mess or Steve will be lost forever.

In one of these scenarios, the party is victimized. Due to one person's conduct, all of their goals are now derailed and there's nothing they can do about it. In the other scenario, the party is the heroes. They are choosing to save an ally, and embarking on a great adventure to do so.

On matters of taste, there is no dispute. But in my personal opinion, a quest where the party chooses to go into Hell to do something heroic is way better than one in which they are simply dropped there.