Archdevil (3.5e Warlock Patrons)
Archdevil
| “ | If I’m the villain you think I am, then I suppose it’s time you played the hero you think you are, | ” |
| —ProZD | ||
The rulers of the nine hells, especially powerful pit fiends, and other extraordinarily powerful lawful evil outsiders all fall under this category. It's debatable if any other creatures can match an Archdevil for sheer ambition. Unlike demons of the abyss, devil's honor means something, and however twisted it's moral code, a devil does have a code. An archdevil might have many goals in forming a pact with a mortal; knowledge, wealth, souls, power, and more. All are fair game for an ambitious mortal with the right guidance.
Forming a Pact with an Archdevil
Alignment: Lawful Evil or Lawful Neutral
Invocation Required: Beguiling influence, baleful utterance, or devil's sight
Influence: While bound in a pact with an archdevil, your patron expects you to never let yourself be taken advantage of and never to work for free. You must be paid in one way or another for every service you provide. You're technically allowed to do good, but generosity without reward is frowned upon by your patron.
Pact Bound (Ex): Upon forming the pact, your patron grants you a small gift of power. You gain the Disciple of Darkness feat as a bonus feat. Despite the clearly unholy nature of the brand, your patron understands the value of subtlety; you may cast undetectable alignment 1/day with a caster level equal to sum of all your invocation using class levels.
Damage Reduction (Ex): The damage reduction granted by your patron is overcome by silver.
Patron's Resilience (Ex): Your archdevil patron grants you a +2 on saves versus poison and fire resistance 5.
Otherworldly Aura (Su): You gain a Fear Aura out to 5ft. Those entering must succeed a will save (DC = 10 +1/2 CL + Cha) or be shaken for the duration of the encounter. A success indicates the creature is immune to your fear aura for 24 hours. Your aura can be activated or deactivated as a free action.
Gift of the Patron (Sp): You gain the Devil's Whispers invocation.
Pact Ability(Sp):
Deal With the Devil (6th, greater): Just like your archdevil patron, you may make deals with creatures in exchange for some boon you grant to them. You gain a limited version of the scribe scroll feat. With this ability you can create a magical scroll but only for a geas spell. Instead of functioning as a normal geas spell, written on the scroll is a contract that stipulates an exchange of goods and/or services between the pact warlock and one or more other creatures, hereby referred to as "signers". The contract can be worded however the pact warlock chooses but both parties must have intelligence of 5 or higher and sign their real names in blood on the contract. Neither party can be magically forced to do so (other types of coercion still work).
This ability does not allow spell resistance as it is voluntary. Upon signing, both parties are affected by the geas spell. The command to follow is whatever the party agreed upon when signing the contract and it remains in effect until the party's end of the bargain can be considered "completed" (e.g. a merchant might offer to pay a pact warlock to get rid of some competition for gold. The geas effect on the pact warlock ends as soon as the competition is "eliminated" and the merchant remains under the effect of geas until they pay what they owe).
As a servant of an archdevil, a pact warlock would do well to word contracts such that their end of the bargain is as simple as possible to complete while still satisfying the signer(s). When crafting this scroll you must pay the gold and time cost for the 6th level spell as normal, but your patron waives the xp cost so long as you're in good standing. You must craft a new scroll for each contract you make although a contract may have multiple signers so long as they all sign at the same time.
At 15th level your ability to make pacts expands. You may now replicate a soul bind spell with you Deal With the Devil ability at no additional cost. The signer must agree to the terms as normal when the contract is written. There is no time limit on the soul bind, but the pact warlock must be in possession of a black sapphire worth 1,000gp per hit die of the signer. The soul bind affects the signer as soon as they die. When that occurs, their soul is transported to into the black sapphire in the possession of the pact warlock. The pact warlock is notified when this happens and are aware of whose soul they now possess. What the pact warlock does with the soul is up to them. If the pact warlock does not possess sufficient black sapphires to contain the signer's soul, that fortunate signer's soul departs to where it would normally go after death.
Transcendence(Ex): You become an outsider with both lawful and evil sub-types. If you were lawful neutral until this point, your alignment changes to lawful evil. As an outsider you are no longer affected by abilities that target humanoids such as hold person. Additionally, your resilience increases, giving you a +4 on saves versus poison and fire resistance 10. These bonuses override the previous ones granted by Patron's Resilience.
Final Blessing (Sp):
Infernal Delegation (8th, dark): You gain the ability to summon outsiders to do your bidding identical to the greater planar ally spell and its less powerful versions. These summons are always other servants of your patron. These summons can be paid in the standard method, or they can be paid with souls. For the purpose of monetary value, a creature's soul is worth 1000gp per HD. In a transaction of this type, the summon takes the soul, but not the sapphire, leaving an empty sapphire that can be reused by the pact warlock at another time (or the sapphire can be exchanged as part of the trade).
When calling a planar ally, a pact warlock bound to an archdevil may make a diplomacy check to convince the creature to aid him for a reduced payment. If the pact warlock’s diplomacy check adjusts the creature’s attitude to helpful the creature will work for 66% of the standard fee, as long as the task is one that is not against its nature.
As a spell like ability, Infernal Delegation does not incur an XP cost when used.
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