Oni Spawn Tiefling


Lost Omens Campaign Setting General Discussion

Silver Crusade

Stupid question, but which starting language makes more sense if your tiefling is oni-spawned: Infernal or Abyssal? I'm thinking Infernal, just because oni and devils are both lawful evil outsiders, but I wanted to check and be sure. This is for PFS, so I want to make sure my PC fits in with Golarion lore.


I think Infernal makes more sense to me as well and that's what i would go with. Hope that helps.


I dunno, Probably depends on the chars alingment really.

Oh and PFS is supposedly going to make it soo you cant play Tiefling or Assimar anymore in the Sky Key adventure thingie they are doing without a boon?


If you have any intelligence bonus, or ranks in linguistics, take Giant as a language. It is the language Oni actually speak in Pathfinder.


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

Where are you getting that Oni are LAWFUL evil outsiders. Oni run the gamut of evil alignments, but...

In pure spirit form, an Oni is nothing but a disembodied evil longing for the sins of the flesh. (From PRD/Bestiary)

screams more aligned with the Abyss than Hell to me. I can see both, but wanton desire generally fits more Neutral to Chaotic to me. In any case, you can base it off the alignment of the Oni you're descended from or decide which your character would likely have more to do with or whatever you want.

As Adam B stated, they are more aligned with giants than devils, daemons, or demons. Especially considering the first released Oni was the Ogre Mage.


It is really silly that of all the things traded out by alternate Tiefling bloodlines, languages are not. Oni are native outsiders too. Too bad it came from a Golarion book, so there is little chance of errata.

Silver Crusade

Well, Blood of Fiends specifically says that oni-spawned tieflings have lawful evil as their "typical" alignment, which is why I was thinking they'd be closer to devils than demons. Obviously, it depends on the character.

In my case, I'm actually playing that up for this PC. He's from Belkzen, the orc nation, which is listed alongside Cheliax as the two places in the Inner Sea region where oni-spawn are most common. So I'm actually taking Orc as an extra language and calling that his native language. But the character doesn't like it there, at least partially because he doesn't fit in with the chaos, even if he does fit in with the tuskiness (I'm going bite attack with this guy). I haven't decided for sure, but I'm leaning towards LN for the character.

Anyway, all tieflings get either Infernal or Abyssal as a starting language, so I just wasn't sure which would be more appropriate. Neither really fits his back story directly, so I'm trying to decide which would be more likely as his ancestral tongue.


Fromper wrote:
Anyway, all tieflings get either Infernal or Abyssal as a starting language, so I just wasn't sure which would be more appropriate. Neither really fits his back story directly, so I'm trying to decide which would be more likely as his ancestral tongue.

This is one of those times where specific rules don't match the flavor source material. Onis are native outsiders and fallen kami nature spirits, Common (Tien in most cases) is their standard language, and giant is the closest to a bonus language depending on their humanoid background (it could even be goblinoid). Not a single standard oni speaks abyssal or infernal.

Even in the Jade Regent adventure path, one of the BBEGs is an oni-spawn tiefling, and his bonus language is giant, just like his oni ancestor that spawned him.

So giant *should* be the standard choice for oni-spawns.

That being said, being a PFS character with strict guidelines, you may not have that flexibility.

Silver Crusade

I'm not really sure which language Oni-Spawn Tieflings get.

I personally chose Infernal for this Oni-Spawn based upon the comment in Blood of Fiends that their "typical alignment" was Lawful Evil, which made me lean of them more towards being devils rather than demons. But then, she's a PFS character, so I had to choose Abyssal or Infernal, so *shrug*

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