Okay, someone recently asked me If I could help start a D&D campaign that he could join. Now I am a horrible DM if I say so myself, but I do like to think I have some interesting ideas; (The Iron Throne being controlled by lowly Mephits. Or my version of the Lords of Heaven, it included an Angel of Death and a former Lord of Hell, both of whom were acually good).
What this has to do with hellish gnomes or dwarfs is this; I did start getting some ideas. I'm thinking of an all stuntie (dwarf, gnome or halfling) campaign in a very dwarf centric culture, particularly with religion. But with the exception of Durzagons I don't see anything resembling dwarfen (or gnome, etc) Damned for lack of a better term. Or for that matter a place where naughty stunties go to when they die.
Can anyone help me out here?
Well, the gnomes have an evil diety served by evil gnomes; think he was called the Crawler Down Below or something like that; forget his proper name, but he lives in the lower planes and sometimes visits the prime material to devour; he kinda looked like a mutated, overly large mole with teeth and claws when I last poked him for fun.
|
Dwarves:
Abbathor, dedicated to treasure hording through theft, and willing to kill, maim and murder to get it. Priests oppose Dumathoin and are evil aligned.
Evil or traitorous dwarves are relegated to Neiflegaddun, located coterminous with the Far Realm.
Gnomes:
Urdlen, dedicated to fostering evil in the hearts of gnomes, his origins are unknown even by the rest of the gnomish pantheon. He is universally feared by all gnomes. His priests are usually rogues and are particularly known for defacing works of art and sculpture, and a drow-like propensity for blood sacrifice.
Wicked or murderous gnomes not specifically chosen by Urdlen to serve him as lichgnomes are condemned to wander the Gemless Wastes for all eternity.
Dwarves of the Underdark have their gods, as well...all very evil, of course. Laduguer, Diirinka, and Diinkarazan.
As far as fiends, or demonic dwarves and gnomes...I don't think I've ever read anything canon (D&D), but there are plenty of Norse, Irish and Hindu tales of dark smallfolk. You could stat up some myths.
|
well, by extracting info from Book of Vile Darkness the mortal races don't become anything when they die. Their souls go to the appropriate plane and are used as coinage and power by evil deities and good deities have the soul worship them. So they don't become fiends and such.
That being said, it is not hard to conceive of dwarven and gnomish, and halfling fiends. Will be something you will have to do youself unfortunately. Identify the niche that needs to be filled and make the fiend. And I would simply do a shorrt background of each one with a description. I wouldn't stat out the entire fiendish pantheon unless I needed a particular one for a combat. A good description read to the PCs is all that is needed until combat begins, then simply use the stats of an existing demon or devil if you want, maybe switch up a couple of abilities so they don't get wise to you.
|
|
Kurtulmak, while not a member of the gnome or dwarf pantheon, is an enemy diety. He's all vengeful and mean because of some sort of incident involving Garl Glittergold and a collapsing mine. It would not be out of line to throw in some koboldy type outsiders. A half fiend kobold hellfire warlock sounds particularly nasty. :)
Okay, I'm set for Dwarfs and Gnomes now, really.
How about Halflings now?
How about Halflings now?
In 2e halflings were unusual in that they had no evil gods. The closest was the gnomish god mentioned before, The Lurker Down Below or something. I would assume that holds true for demons as well. Halfling demons just aren't that frightening.
If you retro to plump Hobbit-like halflings you could do up some sort of halfling glutton demon.
I'm trying to remember the halfling in the Avatar series...can't remember what exactly happened to him, but I do remember he was not a nice little hobbit. You could always stat him up as the god of evil halflings; say that Ao rewarded/punished him by deifying him along with Kelemvor and crew...
There are occasional not-particularly-nice halflings in fiction and in gaming products, usually they fall on sadistic assassin and take-what-you-want rogue types (and combinations, of course). And then there are of course xenophobic cannibals of Dark Sun. I'd say in those concepts there is room for an evil halfling god or demigod at least...