D&D 5E Archsuccubi

[Shemeska]

The Brachina was introduced in 3.5 in the Tyrants of Hell suppliment. The Brachinais an evovled more powerful, but also more focused on seduction verison of the 3.5 Eryine. The Brachkna were called Pleasure Devils.

Even though Brachina had no connection to Succubi originally, when the Eyrines were transformed into Monsterous infernal vengeful woman of arse kicking in 4e who when they get demoted turn into super hot succubi, so in 4e terms Brachina are now related in that stream.

A correction here. 4e did not originate those 'arse kicking' changes to erinyes, 3.5 did.

The 1e/2e/3e erinyes were more overtly returned to their 'furies' mythological roots in 3.5, and the 3.5 created brachina were developed as a subtype of erinyes less focused on ass kicking than on manipulation, corruption of mortals, puppet-string pulling, etc. Prior to 3.5 the erinyes were sort of straddling two concepts - both the original greek myth furies, and lawful manipulators who were more or less hell's succubi (but about control, -not- wild debasement, lust, destruction and chaos), and 3.5 tried to remedy that divide.

Given that effort, it still strikes me as bizarre (and highly confusing the issue) that 4e radically changed the succubi because it's a pretty harsh disjunction to all the editions previous.

 

[gyor]

They do, 4e Eryine's are far from pretty and 4e has Warden devils, which while pretty protecg higher level devils.

The there are passion devil that don't really have the patience for seduction, and instead exist purely as an expression of Feirna's vanity.

As for Lilitu, Lilitu were succubi who underwent a rite of immolation, that cost them thier proper wings, and made them more monsterious, but also more powerful. Still seducers though, that specialized in the religious folks of good deities.

Still Lilitu and Brachina were unrelated until 4e where the family tree got intermixed.

 

[Yora]

Someone correct me if I am wrong, but the Brachina are essentially what we used to call Erinyes - they are the devil-equivalent of Succubi. Since the devil/demon split is entirely a D&D construction, the two come from the same Lilith mythology.

If they want to really update their mythology, how about having female evil that isn't linked to pleasure and/or sex?

In the history of D&D, mariliths have been severely underplayed. They rank right below balors and pit fiends and are the generals of the abyss. In those cases they appeared, it usually wasn't in that form.

Erinyes are actually quite different from succubi, though. Apart from being winged women from hell, they don't have much in common.

 

[DMZ2112]

Given that effort, it still strikes me as bizarre (and highly confusing the issue) that 4e radically changed the succubi because it's a pretty harsh disjunction to all the editions previous.

Well, frankly, it was idiocy. Sometimes that happens, through no fault of the participants. I'm prepared to forgive and forget.

The clear mythological and canonical differences between succubi and erinyes aside, however, succubi as chaotic evil outsiders have never sat well with me -- if we're going to see them move into a neutral evil or lawful evil role I would applaud that as a smart revision. They make more sense to me as free agents in the same vein as the yugoloths, but mythologically they probably do belong in the pseudo-Christian devil hierarchy (where, somewhat conveniently, the erinyes have never made much sense).

For what it's worth I wish the developers were not worrying about nonsense like this right now. What's the projected release date on a D&D5 Manual of the Planes? Late 2015? Early 2016?

 

[gyor]

I admit 3.5 was the beginning of the shift, Eryines were still hot looking, they still looked like Succubi with black feathered wings and better armed. They didn't turn ugly big arsed fighters with giant swords, and wingless until 4e.

 

[HardcoreDandDGirl]

In the history of D&D, mariliths have been severely underplayed. They rank right below balors and pit fiends and are the generals of the abyss. In those cases they appeared, it usually wasn't in that form.

Erinyes are actually quite different from succubi, though. Apart from being winged women from hell, they don't have much in common.

I try not to put a "Woman are treated lesser" spin on most things, and even don't mind the amount of cheesecake in the books, but I have to admit I can't see another reason for this.

Mariliths (aka type 5 demons) are strategist and warrior, and they have 6+ weapons (tail slap). I mean they should be top tear in everyway, I would love a named one or two to be "leaders of hells army" type...

 

[gyor]

Morag: A non-evil marilith who was bound to serve Lolth, she now travels with the Justicar and his friends.[21]

Stentka Taran: Beshaba's general.[

Shaktari-Queen of Poison, Queen of Mariliths.

Cathezar-Half Marilith/ half Chain devil

Kaliva-Born human, turned into a rutterkin by an evil wizard, worked her way to Marilith.

Aushpra- A Marilith Devrish.

These are just some of the important Mariliths I found on wikipedia.

 

[Agamon]

For what it's worth I wish the developers were not worrying about nonsense like this right now. What's the projected release date on a D&D5 Manual of the Planes? Late 2015? Early 2016?

They're not, we are. (note Mearls was answering a question which ended with, "but not sure yet")

But, then, we do indeed worry about a lot of nonsense.

 

[Shemeska]

In the history of D&D, mariliths have been severely underplayed. They rank right below balors and pit fiends and are the generals of the abyss. In those cases they appeared, it usually wasn't in that form.

Erinyes are actually quite different from succubi, though. Apart from being winged women from hell, they don't have much in common.

Though I think it's important to note that balors, pit fiends, and various other fiends aren't male only, not by any means.

In Hell/Baator there have been a number of named female pit fiends, including among the Dark 8. Among devils, it's only erinyes/brachina that are mono-gendered as a caste.

In the Abyss there aren't any exclusively male demon types, and except for some of the genderless fiends, they can all be male, female, both, neither, or for some whatever they feel like at the moment.

I do wish that in the illustrations of fiends outside of the female only maraliths, succubi, erinyes/brachina that we would see more females - a female hamatula, female balor, etc just to avoid the incorrect notion that female fiends are restricted to only a few female-only castes (which has never been the case in the written material at least in 2e and 3.x). This has gotten better over time, and some editions are better than others in the this regard. I know that when I've written planar material for Pathfinder, I've tried to have an even mix of genders for named fiends when it makes sense for them to have a discrete gender in the first place.

 

[Tovec]

Though I think it's important to note that balors, pit fiends, and various other fiends aren't male only, not by any means.

In Hell/Baator there have been a number of named female pit fiends, including among the Dark 8. Among devils, it's only erinyes/brachina that are mono-gendered as a caste.

In the Abyss there aren't any exclusively male demon types, and except for some of the genderless fiends, they can all be male, female, both, neither, or for some whatever they feel like at the moment.

I do wish that in the illustrations of fiends outside of the female only maraliths, succubi, erinyes/brachina that we would see more females - a female hamatula, female balor, etc just to avoid the incorrect notion that female fiends are restricted to only a few female-only castes (which has never been the case in the written material at least in 2e and 3.x). This has gotten better over time, and some editions are better than others in the this regard. I know that when I've written planar material for Pathfinder, I've tried to have an even mix of genders for named fiends when it makes sense for them to have a discrete gender in the first place.

I know that for the longest time (and still default back to it to this day) that I thought Bel was female.

It does make me wonder though, thinking back to the 3.5 image of the Pit Fiend and Balor, how would we know if the picture depicted a male or a female one? Unless a picture has anatomical parts visible or implied I don't see how we can confirm for certain what the gender of a creature that is not humanoid really is. Sometimes it is explicit, but often times - most times I'd dare say - it is NOT clear. If they hadn't given the Dragonborn (or similar) in 4e mammary glands, I would have had a hard time determining the gender of any draconic/reptilian folk.

And if I follow the philosophy of the Abyss correctly, then having girl parts is probably the hardest way to confirm if anything is actually female - since that would be a mostly foreign or at least anthropocentric point of view to assume boobs = girl. We would never say tentacles = male would we (as an example)? Either way... I don't know.

To go back to the original point of this thread; I thought the news that Succubi (at least some of them if not all of them) were going to end up playing both sides (pun sort of intended). Being employed by both Devils and Demons, claiming to belong to both. In order to appease people from 4e and pre-4e bases at the same time. I predicted this would be a bad idea, love or hate the idea at least 4e was firm on where they belonged. But I thought that this was almost exactly where they ended up after the (I want to say 2?) poll(s) on this subject that they conducted during development in the Wandering Monsters articles. This would just be a specific representation of that playing both sides. Maybe we'll see Archfiends for both factions and some neutral ones, to really spread out the Succubi and let DMs use whatever alignment and motive they want. I do have to admit that as appeasement goes that isn't too bad, but we'll have to see what the actual execution ends up looking like.

Also, as far as "a bit too early" why wouldn't Balors and Succubi be in the Monster Manual? That's coming out this year. Granted if they follow my personal advice on such things then they won't include such info in that particular book, but historically I know they might do just that.