Levistus's_Leviathan
5e Freelancer
Okay, I recently had an idea for a cool way to work the Seven Deadly Sins into a D&D 5e setting, which was inspired by my thinking of a way to perfect the D&D cosmology to my liking. I've never really been a fan of the Great Wheel, because I always felt that there were too many planes that shared the same idea. (Acheron and Ysgard as Planes of War, Pandemonium and the Abyss, most of the Upper Planes basically being Heaven, etc.) One of my main thoughts for how to create a "Plane of Evil" that I liked was to combine the ideas of the Devils and Demons, and just have a Plane of Fiends, probably called "Hell" or something like that. And then the idea struck to have the plane have layers, like the Nine Hells and Abyss, but have the layers be unified between one certain idea or "sin". Each layer of the plane would be connected to one of the "Seven Deadly Sins", so the plane is probably going to be called "The Seven Hells". I would also keep some of the typical Archfiends as rulers of these different planes, like Mammon as the ruler of whichever level is connected to Greed and Baphomet as the ruler of whichever level is connected to Wrath.
So, that brought me to create this thread. If you were going to do something like this (create a plane where each layer is based around one of the Seven Deadly Sins), how would you do it? How would you arrange the sins, layer wise (like, how would you order of layers corresponding to the sins)? Here's my current idea for who would rule the layers connected to certain sins (not corresponding to the depth of the layer, though):
For the geography, I'd probably do something similar to how Avernus is mapped in Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus, but make them a bit bigger. I'd probably also include all of the 5 Ancient Greek Rivers of the Underworld; Styx, Lethe, Acheron, Phlegethon, and Cocytus, probably making some ungodly death-spiral on the lowest level of the 7 Hells. (Hmm. Maybe they could be named "The Seven Hells of Tartarus", as all of these do have Greco-Roman roots. I could also do a "Seven Heavens of Elysium" that are connected to the Seven Graces.)
So, any thoughts? I know that the Nine Hells came from the Nine Circle of Hell from Dante's Inferno, which were based off of the Seven Deadly Sins, but that was lost in translation to D&D's Nine Hells of Baator. Any suggestions on any of this?
So, that brought me to create this thread. If you were going to do something like this (create a plane where each layer is based around one of the Seven Deadly Sins), how would you do it? How would you arrange the sins, layer wise (like, how would you order of layers corresponding to the sins)? Here's my current idea for who would rule the layers connected to certain sins (not corresponding to the depth of the layer, though):
- Pride - Maybe Asmodeus? Or Moloch?
- Greed - Easily Mammon.
- Wrath - Probably a demon lord, likely Baphomet.
- Envy - This one is probably going to be a Green Hag (but a really powerful one). "Green with envy" is too obvious to not do.
- Lust - Definitely a Succubus/Incubus of some kind, or the creator of them. Maybe Glasya, even though she's never been explicitly stated to be a succubus. Edit: I can't believe I forgot Graz'zt! He would work perfectly, possibly being paired with a female succubus Archfiend.
- Gluttony - This would probably be Yeenoghu.
- Sloth - Maybe Baalzebul? He does look like a Slug, which are known to be slow, which is connected to laziness. Levistus could also work, as he is stuck in a block of ice all the time.
For the geography, I'd probably do something similar to how Avernus is mapped in Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus, but make them a bit bigger. I'd probably also include all of the 5 Ancient Greek Rivers of the Underworld; Styx, Lethe, Acheron, Phlegethon, and Cocytus, probably making some ungodly death-spiral on the lowest level of the 7 Hells. (Hmm. Maybe they could be named "The Seven Hells of Tartarus", as all of these do have Greco-Roman roots. I could also do a "Seven Heavens of Elysium" that are connected to the Seven Graces.)
So, any thoughts? I know that the Nine Hells came from the Nine Circle of Hell from Dante's Inferno, which were based off of the Seven Deadly Sins, but that was lost in translation to D&D's Nine Hells of Baator. Any suggestions on any of this?
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