Pathfinder 2E Succubus on the offensive

[Lackofname]

Because:

Once PCs willingly take the deal, they are more vulnerable to her. They could have penalties to out-of-comb at skill checks/saves against her, or (behind the screen) they simply auto-fail--she can cast mental deception spells on them without save or them noticing, they believe her lies and sense motive is always rosey, etc.

Once the succubus starts layering in the mind controls, you're going to be her puppet. The lies she tells the character are going to be believed, hook line and sinker. "That performer is whispering against you. Your girlfriend is seeing someone else. The crowds are bigger at your show but you're not being compensated. Why don't you do something about it?" All that stuff you outline she was doing to hurt other people? Now the PC is going to be pushed to do that. "I need you to start this rumor" "I need you to steal that and put it in someone's stuff..."

Hell, with proper mind control/suggestion, the PC could have done something and then simply had the memory wiped. "You did this" "No I didn't" "You did, you just don't remember it".

Don't want to do those things? "Sure baby, I'll just take those benefits away." And here comes the reverse.

"I get a +1d6 to damage but people around me are hurting" can be rationed away as "Well, it's not me hurting them. I'M not responsible..." But when the character themselves are the ones hurting those around them, that's a different story.

 

[CapnZapp]

Sure. I just chose to not give the characters themselves penalties, be that "-1 to attacks" or "be magically compelled to do stuff".

Why? Because any penalty to the character is much more easy to number-crunch and analyze. I wanted to studiously avoid giving the players any excuse in the form of "the numbers suggest I should end the deal". I wanted the penalties to be entirely off-character, and entirely unquantifiable. Subjective, not objective. Not being in control of your own character is objectively a fairly heavy nerf (comparable to being hit with, say, a Confusion spell), and few power-ups can justify tolerating that. Thus, getting your PC controlled makes the decision to end the deal easier.

And I didn't want to do anything that made the decision easy. Only by keeping bonuses and penalites as incomparable as possible would I get to the bottom of it: how far is the player willing to go in order to keep his character's demonic power-ups?

I'm fully on-board with you not having this specific aim. Just hoping I've explained my decisions here.

 

[Lackofname]

Oh sure, your way is fine, and it turned out great (love the boo'd to death). Like you said though, this thread isn't just for you, as it might inspire someone else along the way.