D&D 5E Chains of Asmodeus: Official 286-Page Nine Hells Book & Adventure Released!

For Extra Life, the children's hospital charity, Wizards of the Coast just released Chains of Asmodeus on DMsGuild in PDF format. Written by James Ohlen and Adrian Tchaikovsky, this book includes an adventure for levels 11-20, stat blocks for Asmodeus and the other archdevils, a corruption mechanic, and more.

Arcanum Worlds Presents: Chains of Asmodeus
Chains of Asmodeus is a 286-page source book and adventure for the Nine Hells written by legendary game designer James Ohlen (Baldur's Gate, Baldur's Gate II, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Dragon Age: Origins) and award-winning author Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, The Tiger and the Wolf, The Doors of Eden). This book is beautifully illustrated with haunting art from Sergei Sarichev, Sergey Musin, Julian Calle, Sebastion Kowoll, Paul Adams, Luis Lasahido, and the Aaron Sims Company.

Travel through the Nine Hells to save your soul in this tome that includes:

• 50+ High Challenge Monsters
• Stat Blocks for Asmodeus, Lord of the Nine, and all major Archdevils
• 20+ Infernal Magic Items
• New Item Corruption Mechanic
• Details on all Layers of the Nine Hells, with Beautifully Illustrated Maps created by John Stevenson
• A Fiendish Adventure for Levels 11-20

The book includes full stat blocks for Asmodeus (CR30), Beelzebub, Belial, Dispater, Fierna, Glasya, Levistus, Mammon, Mephistopheles, and more including Bel, Zariel, and a ton of monsters and NPCs.

You can pick it up for $29.99 on DMsGuild.

 

[Reynard]

No, but I would not blink if this feature of the adventure was changed.

Ancient deities no one believes in any more: don't you dare!
Atheism: oh, sure, crap all over it

 

[Scribe]

Ancient deities no one believes in any more: don't you dare!
Atheism: oh, sure, crap all over it

One more step on the same slope.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Ancient deities no one believes in any more: don't you dare!
Atheism: oh, sure, crap all over it

I don't see how any belief system, atheism or otherwise, should be forbidden to be used in a game.

 

[Shardstone]

What is the word rate for a sensitivity reader?

It changes but if I had it my way, they'd get paid very well, especially by big publishers like WotC. I think you're trying to undercut my point by talking about prices here. I'm an indie publisher. I can't afford a sensitivity reader for my work right now. I don't expect other indie publishers who don't have spare budget to do so. But if they do, like in the case of MCDM, Kobold Press, Cubicle 7, En Publishing, then I strongly believe they should hire sensitivity readers so that they can evaluate their work and see if it can be improved.

 

[Shardstone]

Fall of the Faithless 2.0? Funny to see.

In the case one doesnt believe in Gods (a stand in for these beings who are powerful and fueled on literal worship/belief), where does the soul go in FR/D&D 5e? You are not a petitioner, so...where do you go?

Considering of course that the LE/CE sides of the equation take souls, and corrupt them to because the fuel in their eternal war, it would seem to indicate the soul exists and matters, to all sides of the debate.

Clearly they have to go somewhere, and its not the wall anymore since that was stealth errata removed.

Having nowhere to go in pre-existing lore doesn't justify sending athiests to Hell. You could make an up explanation or create a new plane or even have them go to various planes that their personal virtues or failings align with. Regardless, when I run this adventure, I will not be using this idea. In fact, I'll be turning it around, and saying that Asmodeus has been compromising various faiths and all of their petitioners go to Hell, making this an interplanar, interafterlife conspiracy on a grand scale.

 

[Shardstone]

An unjust universe opens up questions and opportunities:

• Why is the universe unjust
• What can be done about it
• Who wants to keep it unjust
• Who wants to make it just
• Can the injustice be undone
• Are there consequences to making things just

This is a theme I wish Planescape as a whole embraced. If a huge number of night hags are trading rare components for Hades larvae (an example from the new Planescape book), are the people who sold the night hags the larvae complicit in any crimes the has commit with them? If so, are these traders not contributing to the unjust universe? In fact, doesn't this mean that Sigil itself is the very ICON of the unjust universe, since the Lady of Pain allows AND encourages such trade to happen here without outside interference?

Conspiracy hat, the Lady of Pain is the multiverses BBEG, AAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

 

[Oligopsony]

An unjust universe opens up questions and opportunities:

• Why is the universe unjust
• What can be done about it
• Who wants to keep it unjust
• Who wants to make it just
• Can the injustice be undone
• Are there consequences to making things just

Yeah, I don’t see anything wrong (as a fiction element) with an unjust universe; as an atheist myself, my default is that the world wasn’t designed with any good purpose (so an unjust universe is a default, albeit one we can mitigate.) And even really morally awful people don’t deserve to suffer eternally.

That being said: as a setting, Hell is really different depending on whether someone can go there for having the wrong or no religion, vs. one where everyone is a bastard (or maybe a penitent ex-bastard.) I don’t know that one’s a better setting choice, of course, they’re just different.

(In Nomine had a fun take, which is that each person has a bespoke “go to Hell” and “go to Heaven” trigger, which works for scenarios where you’re trying to save or damn some mortal, and left a lot of ambiguity for mostly good people in Hell or mostly good people in Heaven.)

 

[RoughCoronet0]

It was always my understanding that petitioners aren’t just the faithful of the gods, they are all those who’s alignment or life philosophy best aligned with the plane they find themselves in after death. The faithful of the gods typically go directly to the section of that plane that they have dominion over, but no god truly controls every part of a given outer plane, even those that might seem to be the sole rulers.

Also, wasn't the Wall of the Faithless solely a Forgotten Realms thing, since it was Myrkul that created it and Kelemvor that maintained it, and they are exclusively FR gods I thought. So I wouldn't expect it to exist for the greater multiverse.

I also feel like it makes more sense to me that Asmodeus might seek out pure souls, meaning souls who haven't been tainted by the spiritual influences of the outer plane's alignment or philosophies or whatever and therefore have no ties to anything. So babies, the unborn, or newly created souls from wherever souls are created.

Also Asmodeus is Ahriman confirmed?

 

[Distracted DM]

This is a theme I wish Planescape as a whole embraced. If a huge number of night hags are trading rare components for Hades larvae (an example from the new Planescape book), are the people who sold the night hags the larvae complicit in any crimes the has commit with them? If so, are these traders not contributing to the unjust universe? In fact, doesn't this mean that Sigil itself is the very ICON of the unjust universe, since the Lady of Pain allows AND encourages such trade to happen here without outside interference?

Conspiracy hat, the Lady of Pain is the multiverses BBEG, AAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

What I took away from the Planescape novel Pages of Pain by Troy Denning (it's so good, read it)

Spoiler: Very, very early in the book

is that the Lady of Pain is the source, or a significant source, of pain in the universe. Pains are these things that only she can see: hooked, barbed growths that she imparts to people by touching them as they wander through Sigil, and they grow into pods and spread from person to person.

https://books.google.com/books/content?id=FSnLgHqddk0C&pg=PT11&img=1&zoom=3&hl=en&sig=ACfU3U1-lhRchw1mfZ84lmkYn7FbX5npMg&w=1280

https://books.google.com/books/content?id=FSnLgHqddk0C&pg=PT12&img=1&zoom=3&hl=en&sig=ACfU3U1QT3TzCvQoaSyghSt6a9U1h_x42g&w=1280

Of course novels like this aren't hard canon- but man, this was such a good book and so interestingly written. Perspective shifts and changes- I loved it.
edit: Oh, warning, it gets kind of messed up.

 

[Demetrios1453]

Also, wasn't the Wall of the Faithless solely a Forgotten Realms thing, since it was Myrkul that created it and Kelemvor that maintained it, and they are exclusively FR gods I thought. So I wouldn't expect it to exist for the greater multiverse.

As I mentioned previously, the whole "the souls of atheists are claimed by Asmodeus" has nothing to do with the Wall of the Faithless or even the Forgotten Realms, but is something that first was brought forth in the late 2e sourcebook Guide to Hell, which is basically a Planescape book published after the line had been cancelled.