The 'Wonderland'-Inspired Faces of the RAGE OF DEMONS

Take a peek at some of the art from D&D's upcoming Rage of Demons storyline. This art is by Richard Whitters, who is the art director for D&D and used to work as a concept artist for Magic: the Gathering. WotC's Chris Perkins has indicated that one of the influences on Rage of Demons was Alice in Wonderland, and I think the influence is clear when you look at the characters below.

OUGALOP, kuo-toa cave cricket catcher extraordinaire.

YUK YUK and SPIDERBAIT, goblin adrenaline junkies.

THE SOCIETY OF BRILLIANCE, the Mensa of the Underdark.

GLABBAGOOL, awakened gelatinous cube.

RUMPADUMP and STOOL, myconid followers.

PRINCE DERENDIL, a quaggoth who thinks he's elven royalty.

TOPSY and TURVY, svirfneblin wererat siblings.

THE PUDDING KING, svirfneblin devotee (i.e., flunky) of Juiblex the Faceless Lord.

D&D's "Legion of Doom." What a wonderful bunch of malcontents.
​

 

[Mouseferatu]

I've always been a little puzzled by Sauron's motivations. I wouldn't say that he's especially cartoony, but rather a bit under-developed.

Power? Paranoid and eliminating all rivals? I figure he has his reasons, they're just not explained since the character exists primarily behind the scenes.

It's simple, really.

Sauron is a wight-ring extremist.

...

I'll just show myself out.

 

[pemerton]

[MENTION=1288]Mouseferatu[/MENTION], there's no groan button so I had to click laugh instead.

Power? Paranoid and eliminating all rivals?

You're right that he wants power, and wants to eliminate rivals, but what does he want the power for? I don't feel we really get a sense of him using or enjoying the power. And he seems to surround himself with people (wights, orcs, trolls) who don't make for any sort of decent company.

I have the same puzzlement about the endless parade of D&D villians that seek an artifact to take over a region.

Is this an FR thing? When I try to think of D&D villains that I've used in my games, only a handful come to mind:

* Iuz (who is a bit like Sauron, but at least has a material body able to take some pleasure from his exercises of power);

* the Scarlet Brotherhood (power-hungry conspiratorial types);

* Za Jikku, the banished immortal of OA7 Test of the Samurai (who is trying to regain immortality by a combination of meditation and large-scale alchemy);

* Vecna (who in one campaign sought to restore his lost empire, and in my current 4e campaign wants to become god of death);

* and then extraplanar being: the Slaad Lords Ygorl and Ssendam (who have no fully rational motivations, but spread entropy and insanity respectively), and Demon Princes like Orcus, Demogorgon et al (who also have not fully rational motivations, but take great pleasure in spreading suffering and destruction).​

Iuz, and 4e's Vecna, are probably the weakest of these in characterisation/motivation.

I guess what I'm saying is that "fiends are irredeemably evil" is a choice you make in a setting, not a constant truism.

<snip>

The same is true for anything you care to replace "fiends" with. Mind flayers. Wererats. Kuo-toa. Orcs. Whatever. None of those things HAVE to be irredeemably evil, but any of them CAN be, depending on the campaign.

The setting wants you to ask the in-character question, "What MAKES this character evil/good? And even if they truly are, is that really a problem/solution for us right now?"

<snip>

In Planescape, your fiendish informant might very well be a more trusted source of advice than the party member who is a Diviner and also a Doomguard ("For some reason, all her predictions point to our grisly and inevitable demise"). Your fiendish shopkeep who smiles and gives you what you ask for and serves you tea, while odd, might be the best supplier for your expedition to protect some planar trade caravan of lost orphans going to Elysium by the scenic route or whatever. And you could, in-character, think them quite decent chaps for an entire campaign, and not have any stitch of evidence to prove the contrary.

I'm not sure how much weight should be put on the "irredeemably" element of the evil, but if we put that to one side then the game historically has tended to make acquiring the evidence quite easy: detection magic (Detect Evil, Know Alignment, etc).

There is always going to be a deep tension in trying to push the question "What makes this person evil?" while already answering the question "Is this person evil?" via a two-word alignment descriptor.

Mind flayers. Wererats. Kuo-toa. Orcs. Whatever. None of those things HAVE to be irredeemably evil, but any of them CAN be, depending on the campaign.

Which is all just to say that part of what I think I dig about the dark whimsy on display here is that they seem like interesting characters, not just monsters to slay. I was a fan when PS did that to the fiends

I don't think that "irredeemably evil" and "just a monster to slay" have to be equated.

The PCs in my current 4e campaign, are aligned in various degrees with:

* the duergar of the underdark;

* some drow NPCs;

* the god Bane;

* the archdevil Levistus;

* the vampire lord Kas;

* the Raven Queen (who in my campaign has turned out to be not a very nice person).​

These people (except for the Raven Queen) all have "evil" in their stat blocks, and not without some good reason: the duergar and drow keep slaves and are notoriously cruel; the god Bane is a hard-hearted war-leader; Levistus traffics in souls; Kas is a blood-thirsty, vengeful vampire; the Raven Queen is self-serving and power-hungry.

But they are not just monsters to be slain. None of the PCs would think of themselves as evil, and nor would their players. But you can't always predict who you'll end up making friends with.

How does everyone here feel about the ultimate evil presented in the Cthulhu mythos? Is an evil with alien motivations still interesting?

I don't find HPL's stories very horrific. Cthulhu, or a shoggoth, is monstrous, but I'm not sure that these things are ultimate evils.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

Funny that you had Vecna wanting to be the God of Death in your game given that he has never had an interest in that (Orcus is the one who wants to) Vecna is the God of Secrets, his belif that all beings have a secret or something hidden that would allow them to be brought down. Vecna has always been a schemer who's interest was never to take another gods portfolio, but instead to destory all other deities and powers so he would be the sole remaining god with power over all reality.

i think Vecna aiming to replace the God of Death is a much too low of a goal for him. He should be turning her into his puppet with some devastating secret or weakness and have her attack other gods while he waits in the shadows scooping up the losers divine essences. Lets not forget that Vecna managed to get one over on the Lady of Pain and partially rewrote reality before his avatar was destroyed. (Even then he still came up on top as he gained the power of a lesser god out of it when he was a Demigod before his plan.)

 

[SkidAce]

I don't find HPL's stories very horrific. Cthulhu, or a shoggoth, is monstrous, but I'm not sure that these things are ultimate evils.

I always felt the point of HPL's stories wasn't so much evil, as uncaring indifference on the part of the cosmos, and mankind's futile striving like ants under the heels of an oblivious force.

Sure feels like evil to the humans, but the cosmic horror is the soul crushing insignificance and futility of it all.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

If he's NOT Absolute Evil in that story, perhaps he's a victim of circumstance, feels sorry for himself, and strives to be better, but feels like he can't change.

But if he is Absolute Evil in that story, he follows his nature wholeheartedly. He embraces his place in the universe. Poo-poo on his fall from heaven, it was inevitable. He embraces his role as The Devil! Vilest of all, for anybody who believes his sob story, being sympathetic to the devil might actually bar their soul from going to heaven. Thus Lucifer exploits the human desire for empathy in order to possibly claim the mortal's soul for Hell. That would be pure mean evil.

I don't think these two portraits are entirely mutually exclusive. "Strives to be better" isn't compatible with ultimate evil of course, but self-pity and adverse circumstances are. It doesn't even have to be cynical manipulation: someone who (for example) steals money from the homeless urchins he employs only because he really NEEDS a new jetliner to maintain his social status--that person is contemptibly evil, in a tawdry sort of way, no matter what lies he tells you. Same thing goes if you have a Lucifer who is determined to prove that God was wrong to give Man freedom to choose, by getting Man to abuse that freedom in all the worst ways, thus showing that Lucifer was right all along and that Man should have been forced--that's a relatable reason for being evil, in the sense that you can model such a being's behavior with some accuracy using your own human brain as opposed to Cthulhu's. But at the same time it is a totally incomprehensible, utterly filthy motive because almost nobody on Earth would be willing to persuade people to abuse, enslave, mutilate, and degrade other human beings just to win an argument with a third party who isn't even listening to them. Most people have limits to their spite.

TLDR; model evil beings in D&D on real human beings, but take off the psychological brakes. Vendettas that spare no innocents and last hundreds of years; greed that counts no externalities; betrayal without a hint of remorse, only self-justification; power without compassion. And it then stands to reason that evil beings will usually have their biggest grudges against other evil beings, while good ones are usually bystanders in the endless wars of spite and wrath. Not always but usually.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

How does everyone here feel about the ultimate evil presented in the Cthulhu mythos? Is an evil with alien motivations still interesting?

I don't see Cthulhu and the Hounds of Tindalos as evil per se, just scary.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

[MENTION=1288]I'm not sure how much weight should be put on the "irredeemably" element of the evil, but if we put that to one side then the game historically has tended to make acquiring the evidence quite easy: detection magic (Detect Evil, Know Alignment, etc).

From an NPC's perspective, you'd still have to make the case that what those spells are detecting is actually good and evil, as opposed to conformity and naivete, etc. What do you suppose Henry VIII's reaction is to being told he's Neutral Evil? "I guess I am then"? Or "off with the priest's head!" for lese majesty and lying to royalty?

 

[steeldragons]

TLDR; model evil beings in D&D on real human beings, but take off the psychological brakes. Vendettas that spare no innocents and last hundreds of years; greed that counts no externalities; betrayal without a hint of remorse, only self-justification; power without compassion. And it then stands to reason that evil beings will usually have their biggest grudges against other evil beings, while good ones are usually bystanders in the endless wars of spite and wrath. Not always but usually.

Sooo, exactly like the real world, then?

 

[Mouseferatu]

How does everyone here feel about the ultimate evil presented in the Cthulhu mythos? Is an evil with alien motivations still interesting?

So, Cthulhu (and the other Great Old Ones) are a perfect illustration of the two possible interpretations of the alignment system. Specifically, is alignment prescriptive or descriptive?

If alignment is based on intent, belief, motivation, then Cthulhu isn't evil. He's so utterly uncaring and innately destructive that it makes no difference to the world around him, but he's not any more evil than a storm, or a disease, or entropy itself.

If alignment is a description based on results and actions, though, then Cthulhu's evil enough to give the worst demon a run for its money.

As far as alien motivations, I find that a fascinating narrative tool--when it's kept alien. I don't try to describe it, get into it, I just have my players (or characters, when I'm writing) forced to react to it.

So yes, I find them interesting--but then, I'm not sure I define them as villains per se.

 

[pemerton]

Funny that you had Vecna wanting to be the God of Death in your game given that he has never had an interest in that (Orcus is the one who wants to)

From Open Grave, p 212:

Two of Vecna’s chief rivals are the Raven Queen and Orcus. Both claim dominion over death, though each, including Vecna, has a different vision of what the afterlife should be. Vecna believes that creatures should serve him in both life and death.​

And from the RC, p 53:

Vecna is the evil god of undead, necromancy, and secrets. He rules that which is not meant to be known and that which people wish to keep secret. Evil spellcasters and conspirators pay him homage. He commands them to . . . Oppose the followers of all other deities so that Vecna alone can rule the world.​

I'm not a canon junkie by any means, but using the basic descriptions of NPCs, gods etc can make record-keeping easier! In this case, Vecna is said to oppose all other deities, to seek to rule the world (both living and dead) and to rule that which is not meant to be known (which, in 4e, includes the ultimate fate of the dead).

Lets not forget that Vecna managed to get one over on the Lady of Pain and partially rewrote reality before his avatar was destroyed. (Even then he still came up on top as he gained the power of a lesser god out of it when he was a Demigod before his plan.)

This sounds like material from some module that I don't know or use, and that is not part of the core 4e cosmology.

Vecna has always been a schemer who's interest was never to take another gods portfolio, but instead to destory all other deities and powers so he would be the sole remaining god with power over all reality.

The only difference I see between (i) "destroying all other deities", including the Raven Queen, to gain "power over all reality", including death and the dead, and (ii) taking over the Raven Queen's portfolio, is that (ii) is only part of the way to (i).

i think Vecna aiming to replace the God of Death is a much too low of a goal for him.

It seems to me that a necessary condition of ruling both the living and the dead is to rule the dead; and that a necessary condition of ruling the dead is to replace the Raven Queen.

He should be turning her into his puppet with some devastating secret or weakness and have her attack other gods while he waits in the shadows scooping up the losers divine essences.

No one's stopping you using that idea in your campaign!

In my own campaign, he was attempting to learn the Raven Queen's name (which is a secret).

The first scheme, hatched by a priest of his, was a little convoluted, but involved (i) learning the Raven Queen's name, either (a) by prising it from the beings from beyond the stars with whom she had hidden it, or (b) recovering her body and then having that body touched by a strange man who had the power to learn the name of any corpse that he touched, so that (ii) the name could be traded to Orcus in return for access to certain tombs that hid a secret map to Torog's Soul Abattoir, so that (iii) the Soul Abattoir could be diverted to power-up Vecna rather than Torog, so that (iv) once Orcus struck the Raven Queen, using the power of her name, Vecna could then strike Orcus and take control of both death and undeath.

This scheme came unstuck when the PCs themselves took the secret map, killed the cultists who had access tothe beings from beyond the stars, and then killed the priest (and killed him again in lich form).

Once the PCs killed the exarch of the Raven Queen who had done the deal with the creature's from beyond the stars, Vecna sent an angel of secrets to acquire her name directly, but the PCs stopped that too.

Then, when the PCs destroyed Torog's Soul Abattoir, Vecna took advantage of the fact that one of the PCs had the Eye of Vecna implanted in his imp familiar to try and divert the power of those souls to Vecna, but the PC in question thwarted this also. And he subsequently was able to sever the connection between Vecna and his Eye.

Most recently, the same PC communed with Vecna again to learn a secret way into Orcus's palace on Thanatos - using, as the focus, the body of an Aspect of Orcus which had been magically bound, after being defeated, by drawing upon Vecna's power. The PC ended up stealing the secret from Vecna (secretly!) so as to avoid having to do a deal.

Overall, Vecna's star has not been ascendant. Which tends to happen to recurring enemies of the PCs in a long-running campaign. But his methods and motivations (manipulation of secrets; necromancy; the desire for power at the expense of other gods) have been pretty clear and consistent.