D&D General The Role and Purpose of Evil Gods

[Faolyn]

But let’s talk about that disagreement, because that would actually be a productive conversation. What story can you tell with an Evil God that you cannot tell with an Archfiend? I haven’t been able to determine any, so what do you think I’m missing? That seems like a far better use of our time than this constant parade of accusations.

Sure, OK, let's focus on this.

For starters, gods generally don't show up on the prime (except during the Time of Troubles, when they were banished there). They send servitors. Archfiends can show up in person. This means you can literally has Orcus (or an aspect of Orcus) in your game without having the players plane shift. (Also, archfiends have stats, so they can be killed.) Sure, killing an archfiend on the Prime doesn't destroy it, but it prevents that fiend from reappearing on the Prime for a good long while, and that's just as sweet a victory. Demons and I believe devils both have soul-amulets, so if your high-level PCs felt really ambitious you could have adventures involving finding and destroying an archfiend's amulet and thus actually killing the archfiend.

Gods have temples are are more widely accepted. Fiendish cults are usually kept hidden. Thus, stories involving gods will usually take place out in the open, while cults are going to be sneaky and understated. If the High Council are all worshipers of Iuz, they're all going to have his holy symbol around their neck and they are going to be openly evil, or at least fine with evil. If the High Council are all worshipers of Titivalus, they're going to keep that a secret. Finding out this secret and revealing it--and ensuring those you reveal it to aren't also worshipers of Titvalus--will be an adventure in and of itself.

If you have a city where worship of a particular evil god is outlawed (in Waterdeep, it's illegal to build temples to Talona), you can have a more political story where priests of that god are trying to get the religion accepted. The story can be, Waterdeep has suddenly reversed that decision and a temple to Talona is being built. Everyone wants to know why. It's up to you plucky adventurers to find out. It could be something as simple as bribes or something darker like mind control or even murder-and-replacement. But it's really hard to imagine this plot going on with worshipers of Geryon or Zuggtmoy.

With archfiends, you get into things such as soul contracts, which you don't have with gods. You can also make deals with archfiends for power, including various fiendish boons. Sure, by RAW, a PC can suddenly decide to take a level of cleric or warlock, but many DMs are going to require that the PCs justify that multiclassing in some way.

Now, one adventure type both gods and archfiends will create is when the PC has to go on a quest for their power. The main difference is that with a god, the PC will be asked or commanded by the priest (or through a dream), while the archfiend may send an actual minion to do the "asking," if it doesn't show up in person.

Archfiends often try to pervert other religions (good, neutral, and evil ones alike), either making a mockery of the faith's beliefs or introducing fiendish influences. This means you can have adventures where you find out that a local religion is starting to turn to the dark side. Evil gods generally don't try to get their worshipers to pervert other religions in this way--they're more into forced conversions or outright killing the nonbelievers.

You can also introduce fun moral dilemmas such as, worshipers of Yeenoghu are corrupting a temple to Malar. Malar's priests are evil and chaotic, but also have something akin to a social structure and rules (they won't kill the young or pregnant), whereas Yeenoghu's worshipers will murder everyone and may also spread Yeenoghu's insanity (that's not RAW, but it's fairly reasonable to homebrew that idea, especially when MTF had a sidenote of a person mind-reading a gnoll and because of that, slowly going mad and becoming a cultist of Yeenoghu). Do you help the Malar worshipers, fight them both, or let them duke it out on their own and hope that their fight doesn't harm innocents?

Gods are sort of part of the world. Even the evil ones are kind of necessary for the world to keep turning, in some way, because what they represent is already an aspect of the world. Sure, some of them are awful, but they're kind of awful in the way that things like parasites or forest fires are awful, but also useful in a way, even if it's not a way that most mortals can easily see.

But archfiends are more like cancer, doing horrible things to a world that they're not part of. Hyenas would just be animals if Yeenoghu hadn't turned them into nearly mindless and monstrously bloodthirsty gnolls. Fungi are needed to recycle dead things so that the living can continue to exist. Zuggtmoy's fungi are corruptions of this, turning a much-needed organism into monsters that do no good. Undead would likely be limited to what were created by mortal wizards or to ghosts of those who can't pass on if Orcus hasn't decided to start turning them into creatures that prey on the living.

What this means is that you can have plenty of adventures involving an archfiend's evilness affecting an area, and the PCs have to deal with it. While by RAW these are regional effects around the archfiend's lair, you can also use them as the after effects of their cults (a bit of the archfiend's power is imbued in the cult's altar, perhaps), especially if its a powerful one. 3x had the "Corrupted Creature" monster template for just such a event. But outside of the hallow spell, few people assume that anything unusual happens around a temple to a currently-worshiped god, even if the temple has artifacts in it or bits of dead saint or whatever. It's holy (or unholy) ground, but other than that, not too much happens beyond a few more or less undead.

And then, of course, there's the "the archfiend's cult is trying to turn their patron into a full god; you have to stop it."

Stepping off the Prime, there's the Blood War, which allows any number of war-based adventures: fighting in it, trying to prevent an arm of the War from affecting a particular place, aiding or hindering one side, and so forth. There's also fiendish coups, where you can prevent (or help) one archfiend from taking over another one's.

Petitioners in a god's domain want to be there, because the ultimate goal for a petitioner is to merge with the god's domain and therefore the god. The souls that an archfiend has almost certainly don't; in fact, they probably have souls that don't deserve to be in Hell or the Abyss. Adventurers can try rescue those souls. Archfiends also have more use for living beings than gods have (as minions, servitors, or slaves, mostly), who primarily use the living as proxies (as per Planescape). Thus, you can rescue living beings who are being held by or are working for archfiends.

In addition to the Blood War, archfiends fight amongst each other for other reasons. These battles might spill out to other planes, including the Prime, and do so far more often than with god vs. god battles. The PCs can fight one or both fiends (and their cults) at the same time.

So, that enough possible plots?

 

[Chaosmancer]

So the only thing they are missing is the actual cleric. Because seriously, class abilities are what make up a class.

No. It doesn't work that way. A class is a class. It doesn't get to be two entirely different things just because one side plays by different rules.

So, unless they are built exactly like a cleric, they can't be a cleric? So, a Warpriest, an NPC who specifically has clerical spells, and casts with wisdom, and worships gods isn't a cleric, because they don't have every single PC class ability.

You are clutching at straws, especially since your only route seems to be to keep making up new "classes" because of how WoTC decided NPCs don't have to follow the same rules.

This is wrong. Every single creature with innate spellcasting or regular spellcasting that casts a spell from the cleric list casts it in an identical manner. That doesn't make them all clerics.

Nope, there are celestials that cast from the cleric spell list using Charisma. Innate casting (something the cultist doesn't have) doesn't require components. There are clear differences.

:sigh: You miss the point yet again. I never claimed that they did count as a cleric.

Actually, you literally did.

They could still be considered to be clerics for the same purposes, though. That's the point. People who are not clerics, but who have some holiness(however they get it), can be considered clerics in a few areas without being actual clerics.

Those purposes being

1) Changing out their spell list
2) Attuning to items that require attunement by a cleric.

To the second point, no, a Divine Soul Sorcerer cannot attune to an item that requires a cleric to attune to it. A Cult Fanatic can. Even though they are both pulling from the same spell list.

 

[Maxperson]

So, unless they are built exactly like a cleric, they can't be a cleric?

Correct. Cleric = a very specific set of abilities. Class and subclass.

So, a Warpriest, an NPC who specifically has clerical spells, and casts with wisdom, and worships gods isn't a cleric, because they don't have every single PC class ability.

A Warpriest is a Warpriest, not a cleric.

Nope, there are celestials that cast from the cleric spell list using Charisma. Innate casting (something the cultist doesn't have) doesn't require components. There are clear differences.

Psionics don't require components. There is no such exemption for standard innate spellcasting, which is the same as what a sorcerer does. Sorcerers need components.

"INNATE SPELLCASTING

A monster with the innate ability to cast spells has the Innate Spellcasting special trait. Unless noted otherwise, an innate spell of 1st level or higher is always cast at its lowest possible level and can't be cast at a higher level. If a monster has a cantrip where its level matters and no level is given, use the monster's challenge rating. An innate spell can have special rules or restrictions. For example, a drow mage can innately cast the levitate spell, but the spell has a "self only" restriction, which means that the spell affects only the drow mage. A monster's innate spells can't be swapped out with other spells. If a monster's innate spells don't require attack rolls, no attack bonus is given for them."

Note how there is nothing there saying no components are needed.

Actually, you literally did.

Read it again. I said you could do it, not that it is done. As in, "You could jump off a cliff." That isn't saying that you jumped off a cliff. It's just stating a possibility. If I wanted to, I could decide to let them attune clerical stuff due to their holiness. DMs can do that and it makes as much sense to let them have it as any of the other various NPC classes with spells on the cleric list.

 

[pemerton]

So, when it suites you, the rule of fiends not being able to cast spells as they are not gods is debunked by the DDG, but when it does not you forget the DDG in a nice closet?

I don't understand what you are saying.

In AD&D - as represented by its MM, PHB and DMG - there is no rule that fiends are not able to cast spells, nor is there any rule that they are not able to grant spells. In the MM we have an example of devil-worshipping spell-casting clerics (Sahuagin); and in the contemperaneous module (D3 - its mezzodaemon and ncyadaemon even appear in the DMG encounter tables) we have a Demon Queen granting spells to her Drow clerics. T1 is published around the same time and has a human cleric of the "Demoness Lolth", Lareth the Beautiful.

Then in 1980 DDG is published, it introduces a new rule about "levels" of godhood, and what spells they can grant, and says that Demon Lords and the like should be treated as lesser gods. It also changes Sahuagin from devil-worshippers to Sekolah worshipper.

In the same year, the WoG Folio is published and it has the Horned Society as devil-worshippers. And in 1984 Ed Greenwood publishes an article in Dragon Magazine 91 that refers to clerics of the archdevils.

As far as I'm aware, the next thing to be published in the AD&D line that bears on any of this is MotP, which changes the treatment of divine abilities for archdevils and the like from the DDG approach, but says nothing about their clerics.

Then early in the life of 2nd ed AD&D we have a major boxed set - City of GH - which has within it a scenario with an Asmodeus-worshipping priest from the Horned Society with 7th level spells.

After that, From the Ashes is published and says that The Horned Society worshipped Hextor and Nerull. That's a retcon. There is some other 2nd ed AD&D stuff that I'm less familiar with (eg A Guide to Hell?) that says that fiends don't have clerics or grant spells.

But then one of the best known of Planescape modules, Dead Gods, has a priest of Orcus who is 12th level but (due to planar separation rules) operating at 9th level and has a full suite of spells up to 5th level. There's a note that the GM may wish to change the planar separation stuff and step up the priest's level, and to me it implies that in that case he would get his 6th level spells too (he has 17 WIS).

That's a potted history of AD&D's approach to archfiends and clerics. It is not selective, except in the trivial sense that I haven't presented any material I'm not aware of.

If you use only the DMG, archdevils are not gods but can serve as conduit for clerics.

This is not correct. The DMG does not say anything about whether or not archdevils are gods able to grant spells. The PHB likewise says very little about gods except that (in the case of druids) they include trees, the sun and the moon. If the sun and the moon can be gods, than why not archdeivls.

Perhaps you missed my earlier post on this point:

In AD&D, the MM (p 20) says that Asmodeus is "the Overlord of all the dukes of Hell [who] rules by both might and wit. . . .
His mighty palace rests upon the floor of the lowest rift in Hell's ninth plane." The PHB (p 120) says that the Nine Hells is one of the "the Outer Planes which are the homes of powerful beings, the source of alignment (religious/ philosophical/ ethical ideals), the deities." Sahuagin are devil-worshippers with clerics, which tends to imply that Asmodeus has clerics and grants spells and is functionally a god; the Sahuagin entry also mentions the possibility that they were created by a lawful-evil god but doesn't identify who that may have been.

The MM has little to say about gods as such. Water elementals are rumoured to have a god-like king on their plane. A "demented godling" may have created catoblepas. Tritons worship the god Triton (does this make the Greek Gods "core"?). The Wand of Orcus kills "any creature, save those of like status (other princes or devils, saints, godlings, etc.) merely by touching their flesh" (p 18). This certainly implies that "archfiends" are on a par with saints and godlings. Neither of those is a defined term.

Saints appear also in the DMG, as possible sources of components for the manufacture of healing potions. They do not appear in the PHB. Most of the PHB's discussion of gods/deities is in relation to clerics, each of whom "is dedicated to a deity, or deities" (p 20). The discussion of how deities grant spells etc doesn't tell us who they are, or whether or not Asmodeus et al are among them: after all, we are also told both that druids "hold trees (particularly oak and ash), the sun, and the moon as deities" (p 221) and that "Clerical spells, including the druidic, are bestowed by the gods" (p 40). So the concept of deity seems pretty capacious!

Other mentions of gods, godlings and deities in the PHB tend to put archfiends on a par. Here are the examples I found:

The Gate spell (p 53) may summon a "demon, devil, demi-god, god, or similar being".

The caster of a Shapechange spell (p 93) "is able to assume the form of any creature short of a demi-god, greater devil, demon prince, singular dragon type, greater demon or the like."

Turning Undead (p 104) can also affect "lesser demons, devils, godlings and paladins".

In astral planar combat (p 120), "Only very powerful creatures (demon princes, arch devils, godlings, gods, etc.) can do more than destroy the astral body".​

The claim that no one using the core AD&D books would imagine that there are clerics of Asmodeus, Orcus etc; or that no one using those books would treat the archfiends as analogous to, or as, evil gods, is completely implausible in my view. If they read the entry on Sahuagin, then they will in fact think the opposite!

And this is driven home further by the fact that it was so common to have clerics of devils and demons (as is seen in T1 Village of Hommlet, for instance). I can't imagine any AD&D player or referee who came across the clerics of Zuggtmoy in T1-4 woud have had their mind blown!

 

[pemerton]

I would not go that far. If you use the 1ed core books, Archdevils and other fiends are not even listed as possible agents for clerical spells... We infer that they are because what else would evil gods would be using in their stead?

She may not be referred as a goddess in her stat block, but all drow cleric worship the godess Lolth. That much is clearly written.

Was it an oversight not to write it in her stat bloc? I do believe so.

This is a sequal to my post just upthread.

The statblock for Lolth in D3 was published in 1979. The DDG was published in 1980. It wasn't an oversighit to not refer to a rules concept that hadn't been invented yet!

And as far as your claim that the 1st ed core books don't list Archdevils as possible agents for clerical spells, you are ignoring both the MM - and its entry for Sahuagin - and the PHB and MM together on devils and the Nine Hells.

As @Voadam says, the rules said nothing explicit on this issue, but were easily read as implying or at least allowing that Asmodeus had clerics. That's how I read them! That's how Ed Greenwood seems to have read them! That's how whoever wrote the To Slay a Hierarch scenario in the City of GH boxed set seems to have read them!

 

[Chaosmancer]

Sure, OK, let's focus on this.

Just to make sure we are on the same page before I begin. These are "stories you can do with gods, but not archfiends"

For starters, gods generally don't show up on the prime (except during the Time of Troubles, when they were banished there). They send servitors. Archfiends can show up in person. This means you can literally has Orcus (or an aspect of Orcus) in your game without having the players plane shift. (Also, archfiends have stats, so they can be killed.) Sure, killing an archfiend on the Prime doesn't destroy it, but it prevents that fiend from reappearing on the Prime for a good long while, and that's just as sweet a victory. Demons and I believe devils both have soul-amulets, so if your high-level PCs felt really ambitious you could have adventures involving finding and destroying an archfiend's amulet and thus actually killing the archfiend.

Coming to the prime and being killed by adventurers is a story you can possibly tell with both evil gods and archfiends. This seems incredibly interchangeable so it doesn't fulfill the point.

Now, I can already feel your accusations, so let me clarify, again. I am not saying this is a bad idea. I'm not saying you are wrong that gods rarely come to the prime. I'm not saying this is a bad story. I'm not saying you must bow down before my "one true way" story. I'm saying, and only saying, that I could use an evil god in the exact same plot of coming to the mortal realms, of players hunting down an artifact needed to truly kill the god, and doing so. I could also tell the story of archfiends being completely unable to form upon this mortal coil. these stories are interchangeable. So they do not support your claim.

Gods have temples are are more widely accepted. Fiendish cults are usually kept hidden. Thus, stories involving gods will usually take place out in the open, while cults are going to be sneaky and understated. If the High Council are all worshipers of Iuz, they're all going to have his holy symbol around their neck and they are going to be openly evil, or at least fine with evil. If the High Council are all worshipers of Titivalus, they're going to keep that a secret. Finding out this secret and revealing it--and ensuring those you reveal it to aren't also worshipers of Titvalus--will be an adventure in and of itself.

If you have a city where worship of a particular evil god is outlawed (in Waterdeep, it's illegal to build temples to Talona), you can have a more political story where priests of that god are trying to get the religion accepted. The story can be, Waterdeep has suddenly reversed that decision and a temple to Talona is being built. Everyone wants to know why. It's up to you plucky adventurers to find out. It could be something as simple as bribes or something darker like mind control or even murder-and-replacement. But it's really hard to imagine this plot going on with worshipers of Geryon or Zuggtmoy.

No, again, these are easily interchangeable. I can easily imagine an evil god who is not widely worshipped, whose followers are secretive members of a cult and the adventure is about unveiling them. I've even got a DnD example in Vecna from Exandria and Critical Role.

Reversing that again to archfiends being openly and even proudly worshipped... I've actually done that in my campaign already. Do to some inter-party shenanigans, alliances between party members, and some major plot points, a potential future for my homebrew world involved elves openly worshiping the new Lady of the Fifth, The Fallen Huntress Tana. She offered them bloody vengeance against the mindflayers for horrific crimes against the elven people, and was friends with the party member who was basically an elven Arthur, rebuilding the empire and bringing it back to glory... and openly stating that they would allow legal worship of the devils.

So, again, secretive cult worship of an evil being, or open to the public worship of an evil being. I can do that with either Archfiends or Evil gods, so these are not stories that can only be told with one or the other.

With archfiends, you get into things such as soul contracts, which you don't have with gods. You can also make deals with archfiends for power, including various fiendish boons. Sure, by RAW, a PC can suddenly decide to take a level of cleric or warlock, but many DMs are going to require that the PCs justify that multiclassing in some way.

Sorry, I can easily picture an Evil God of contracts, who treats his worshippers in a Pax Romana style of transactional worship. I can only grab part of the article (I heard about this in a video) but to give this context from the Britannica "Yet Roman religion was based not on divine grace but instead on mutual trust (fides) between god and man. The object of Roman religion was to secure the cooperation, benevolence, and “peace” of the gods (pax deorum)."

So, under this style of religion, a contract between man and god is expected.

Now, one adventure type both gods and archfiends will create is when the PC has to go on a quest for their power. The main difference is that with a god, the PC will be asked or commanded by the priest (or through a dream), while the archfiend may send an actual minion to do the "asking," if it doesn't show up in person.

This isn't a difference at all. There is no difference between a preist of a god or a cultist of a demon, and gods have sent angels plenty of times to give quests, so sending a fiend is the exact same.

Archfiends often try to pervert other religions (good, neutral, and evil ones alike), either making a mockery of the faith's beliefs or introducing fiendish influences. This means you can have adventures where you find out that a local religion is starting to turn to the dark side. Evil gods generally don't try to get their worshipers to pervert other religions in this way--they're more into forced conversions or outright killing the nonbelievers.

They don't typically, but is there any reason they can't? I can easily imagine an evil god attempting to spread their influence and weaken their rivals by putting their own influences and iconography into the worship of another god. And mocking other god's beliefs and practices is easily done as well. In a way, we do it all the time.

And, flipping it, I see no reason that Demonic Cultists can't do forced conversions or murder. They are pretty good at both, actually. So, again, I don't see this as a story that is impossible to tell with the opposite type of being. It isn't typical, I will give you that, but an atypical story doesn't mean it can't be done or that it can't be done well.

And, since I've gone through a few of these, I'll go ahead and clarify again. I'm not saying your ideas are bad. I'm not saying these ideas are wrong. I'm not trying to convert you to the "one true way". I'm not trying to "gotcha". I'm honestly looking at each of these examples and asking "is it possible for me to tell this story with the opposite type of being" and each time so far... yes, it is.

You can also introduce fun moral dilemmas such as, worshipers of Yeenoghu are corrupting a temple to Malar. Malar's priests are evil and chaotic, but also have something akin to a social structure and rules (they won't kill the young or pregnant), whereas Yeenoghu's worshipers will murder everyone and may also spread Yeenoghu's insanity (that's not RAW, but it's fairly reasonable to homebrew that idea, especially when MTF had a sidenote of a person mind-reading a gnoll and because of that, slowly going mad and becoming a cultist of Yeenoghu). Do you help the Malar worshipers, fight them both, or let them duke it out on their own and hope that their fight doesn't harm innocents?

Not sure if this is meant to be a seperate example but "lesser of two evils" is also possible to do with both Archfiends and with Gods. You don't need to pit them against each other to pull that off. Internal conflicts between the two can lead to the same story.

Gods are sort of part of the world. Even the evil ones are kind of necessary for the world to keep turning, in some way, because what they represent is already an aspect of the world. Sure, some of them are awful, but they're kind of awful in the way that things like parasites or forest fires are awful, but also useful in a way, even if it's not a way that most mortals can easily see.

But archfiends are more like cancer, doing horrible things to a world that they're not part of. Hyenas would just be animals if Yeenoghu hadn't turned them into nearly mindless and monstrously bloodthirsty gnolls. Fungi are needed to recycle dead things so that the living can continue to exist. Zuggtmoy's fungi are corruptions of this, turning a much-needed organism into monsters that do no good. Undead would likely be limited to what were created by mortal wizards or to ghosts of those who can't pass on if Orcus hasn't decided to start turning them into creatures that prey on the living.

What this means is that you can have plenty of adventures involving an archfiend's evilness affecting an area, and the PCs have to deal with it. While by RAW these are regional effects around the archfiend's lair, you can also use them as the after effects of their cults (a bit of the archfiend's power is imbued in the cult's altar, perhaps), especially if its a powerful one. 3x had the "Corrupted Creature" monster template for just such a event. But outside of the hallow spell, few people assume that anything unusual happens around a temple to a currently-worshiped god, even if the temple has artifacts in it or bits of dead saint or whatever. It's holy (or unholy) ground, but other than that, not too much happens beyond a few more or less undead.

So, you can easily tell a story where the gods are not a natural part of the world. Where they come from beyond our realm to play their games with us mortals like chess pieces and an evil god is disruptive and harmful to the very fabric of reality in the same way as your archfiend example. I've actually seen it done, though the name of the work escapes me at the moment.

You can also have it where the fiends ARE part of the natural order. Japanese Yokai embody this entirely. They are evil spirits, but they are a natural part of the world. A part of the world that desires to harm you, that enjoys harming you, but the world isn't a kind place.

In fact, one of your earlier ideas in this thread (I think it was you) inspired a dark gothic world in my head where the fiends are natural and the gods are unnatural, and the natural state of the world is one of darkness, blood and terror, and the unnatural gods are preventing this state of primal darkness.

So, once more, I find this unconvincing. I can do either story with either type of being.

And then, of course, there's the "the archfiend's cult is trying to turn their patron into a full god; you have to stop it."

Which has always been a bizarre story to me. I would have to admit though, the "archfiend is trying to become a god" story is one that can't be swapped like I've been doing...

Except, the larger archetype of the story is "powerful evil being is trying to become more powerful, and we must stop them". I bring this up, because the famous 2e Vecna three-part adventure involves Vecna (a god) tricking Iuz (a demigod/god) to entering his domain, so that he could consume his power and become an even greater and more terrifying god in his bid for the control of all of reality by conquering Sigil.

So, while I fully acknowledge that the specific story of "non-god being trying to become a god" isn't able to work without one side being a god and the other not, the larger trope of "evil power-up ritual we must stop" does still work with either case.

But hey, we got one.

Stepping off the Prime, there's the Blood War, which allows any number of war-based adventures: fighting in it, trying to prevent an arm of the War from affecting a particular place, aiding or hindering one side, and so forth. There's also fiendish coups, where you can prevent (or help) one archfiend from taking over another one's.

All of this can be done with Evil Gods. Endless war between Magbuliyet and Gruumsh is very similar in style to the Blood War. Coups can happen to gods. Happens pretty regularly in various fictions.

Petitioners in a god's domain want to be there, because the ultimate goal for a petitioner is to merge with the god's domain and therefore the god. The souls that an archfiend has almost certainly don't; in fact, they probably have souls that don't deserve to be in Hell or the Abyss. Adventurers can try rescue those souls. Archfiends also have more use for living beings than gods have (as minions, servitors, or slaves, mostly), who primarily use the living as proxies (as per Planescape). Thus, you can rescue living beings who are being held by or are working for archfiends.

Wow, a lot to unpack here.

Petionersin a god's domain want to be there? Okay. But they are an evil god right, so it is still terrible and likely torturous place. And Archfiends can have the same story. I actually had a player recently who was playing a Hell Knight, they wanted to go to the Nine Hells when they died, so they could become an eternal soldier fighting for the cause of proctecting (conquering) the multiverse. Many cultists want to go to the hells or abyss because they think they will come out on top, and they are often proven wrong... but there is no reason that same thing can't be true for an evil god's domain.

Souls that don't belong in the evil realm of the evil god/Archfiend? Yep, that story can and has been told with both types of beings. That is the entire trope behind unwilling human sacrifices after all. And adventurers can go to rescue from either place.

Also, I don't even agree with your final point. Gods also have a lot of use for living beings and use them as proxies all the time. And living beings can be held captive or in enforced servitude by evil gods or by archfiends. No difference in that story.

In addition to the Blood War, archfiends fight amongst each other for other reasons. These battles might spill out to other planes, including the Prime, and do so far more often than with god vs. god battles. The PCs can fight one or both fiends (and their cults) at the same time.

And "far more often" tells us that these stories can be told with either archfiends or Evil Gods. So, no difference here.

So, that enough possible plots?

These are all excellent plots. But all of them could be switched and told from the other side. So, again, to reiterate, the question asked was "What story can you tell with an Evil God that you cannot tell with an Archfiend?" and the only one you provided is an archfiend trying to become an evil god.

Again, I'm not saying these are bad plots. I'm not saying that they are terrible ideas. I'm not saying you are a bad person for having come up with them, or that there is a "one true way" to tell these stories. I'm saying that I can take every single one of these stories and make it work with the other type of being. Except, specifically, the "Archfiend trying to become an Evil God". Which, technically, I could do "Evil god tries to become an Archfiend" but due to the re-defining that would need to happen, it would likely not work out as well, and I am willing to concede that plot. All the others were interchangeable.

 

[pemerton]

In 4e D&D there are scenarios that involve evil gods that are different from those that would involve demon princes.

Eg (and this is from play experience) you can have a PC who is allied with Bane in part because Bane's iron discipline is what is needed to keep the Abyssal threat at bay.

That scenario changes quite a bit if you swap the god and the demons.

The scenario also depends on building in a cosmological framework that underpins it, which 4e does. And that cosmological framework doesn't establish the same strong contrast between Bane and devils - although there is some contrast there.

My point in this post is that we, or WotC authors, can all come up with ideas for entities and their cosmological significance that establish various contrasts. And we can even link them to various other parts of the game, like which sorts of PCs or antagonists get access to which lists of magical abilities.

But the only edition I know of to do this by default, in its core books, is 4e D&D. And it only did the first bit, not the second. (Deathpriests of Orcus are not clerics in the strict sense because they draw power from a demon rather than a god; but they are functionally indistinguishable.)

 

[Minigiant]

If I were to make a modern pantheon to demonstrate the role and purpose of evil gods, i would do a modified Greco-Egyptian-Norse setting.


Devils come from Uranusand seek to restore him as King.
Demons come from Cronus and seek to restore him as King.
Fire Giants are fiends and anti Odin.
Apep created fiends as well and is anti-Ra.

Ares, Set, and Loki are loyal to the cause of gods and very anti-fiend but not to Zeus, Ra, and Odin.

The 3 pantheons are in mild alliance and mostly stick to their lands. Except for Hades who openly subjugated Anubis and Hel to from a united bulwark against the Abyss and Hells.

No one knows where Asmodeus came from, how he is a god, and no one trusts him.

 

[pemerton]

Ares, Set, and Loki are loyal to the cause of gods and very anti-fiend but not to Zeus, Ra, and Odin.

But another reading of Loki would be that he is a bridge between gods and fiends - eg in his fathering of Fenris and his projected role in the Ragnarok.

I'm not saying that you're wrong. Just that even when we fasten on somewhat concretely detailed mythic/religious traditions, multiple readings are possible.

 

[Minigiant]

But another reading of Loki would be that he is a bridge between gods and fiends - eg in his fathering of Fenris and his projected role in the Ragnarok.

I'm not saying that you're wrong. Just that even when we fasten on somewhat concretely detailed mythic/religious traditions, multiple readings are possible.

It's more of a "current time" thing.

Loki, Set, and Ares don't want the fiends wrecking their plans before they are ready.

Zeus would be already looking for which of his son's would be betraying him so Ares has to look good in public.

The Aesir/Vanir have less of a fiend problem as Surtur is nowhere ready and Loki wouldn't be sure of his fate in Ragnarok nor of his children. Loki's children would be divine beings in this setting.

Fiends in this setting are beings created by or corrupted by fallen gods.

That's why no one trusts Asmodeus. No one knows which deity died or was imprisoned to create him. Any oracle or seer who attempts to look it up gets mental backlash. And some kind of magic contract keeps anyone who does know from spilling the beans. There is just 2 winged gods in the East crusading each other in a cold war Westerners can never understand.