Possible Rise of the Runelords spoilers ahead.
For some perspective: I'm GMing a game of Rise of the Runelords for a group of four friends, who are playing a CN Bloodrager, a LN Unchained Monk, a CG Skald, and a NG Armiger (a third-party class). They're currently in Runeforge, have just cleared out the Halls of Wrath and defeated Highlady Athroxis, and hit level 15.
During the fight with the Highlady, three party members were hit by a Prismatic Spray. Two of them got out fine, but one of them failed their save against the Insanity-causing colour, and nobody in the party had any way of directly curing the effect. The Skald decides to delve into the mind of the now-insane Armiger by using Share Memories (OOC, he had already decided what he wanted to try, but wanted to justify it in-character) to see if she knew any way of fixing this.
Now for a little bit of backstory: about two months back in-game, the Armiger was part of the group who saved Turtleback Ferry by opening the floodgates in the Skull's Crossing dam. They did so by promising the Pit Fiend that they found there freedom in exchange for information on how to operate the dam. They held to their word, and he to his, so the Pit Fiend went free and the town was saved.
Fast forward to today, and the Armiger is the only surviving member of the group that saved Turtleback Ferry. And, sure enough, the Armiger knows one creature who might be able to fix her problem: the Pit Fiend. So, desperate to save his friend, the Skald manages to use Contact Other Plane to ask the Pit Fiend if he'd help (I allowed the spell to work because I thought it'd be fun). Pit Fiend agrees, appears before of the party, and asks what they want. The Skald informs the devil of the Armiger's situation, and asks that the Pit Fiend cure her. The Pit Fiend agrees to do so, on the condition that the Skald sign a contract.
The Skald decides to challenge the Pit Fiend to a fiddle battle instead. If the Skald wins, the devil has to cure the Armiger and leave. If the Devil wins, he'll cure the Armiger, but only once the contract has been signed. Sure enough, the Pit Fiend wins the battle, and the Skald begrudgingly signs the contract. The Pit Fiend, satisfied, leaves.
And that brings us to now. I've got a player who signed a contract with a Pit Fiend, but absolutely no idea what that contract should actually say. So, I turn to this wonderful community: what would a Pit Fiend's contract look like, and what would it contain? How should I go about making this whole thing fun, but without going too far out of the scope of the Adventure Path?
Thanks in advance <3
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Just off the top of my head, that Pit Fiend (if it has decided not to kill the pc's outright to hide its humiliation - motivation straight from the AP) has a real issue with Karzoug. Perhaps the Skald has been Geased to kill Karzoug. The Geas can be broken per the spell description but if that happens, the Armiger's insanity returns instantly. And the Skald earns the devil's enmity. This should lead to a lethal encounter with the devil at the worst possible time.
The Geas is not tolerant of delays. No waiting for days for new magic items or traveling to Magnimar for personal business - All Karzoug all the time. The Geas doesn't care if the Skald's companions are injured or dead or depleted, as long as the Skald is still standing, his inexorable quest to kill Karzoug should not stop. The Geas should compel the Skald to do whatever it takes including committing evil acts to find and kill Karzoug. Indeed merely signing such a contract should move the Skald's alignment toward Evil. Especially as he could just as easily have cast Contact Other Plane to ask someone else for help.
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If you can't think of anything else the "If you lose the Devil gets your souulll~" line should come into play. If he dies he goes to Hell. Do not pass go, do not become a Petitioner, go straight to Hell and become a Pit Fiend's b@@!% for all eternity.
Look to the Damnation Feats for how harsh that should be.
Tl;DR: There are four "steps" of Damnation.
The first step means when you die, any attempt at resurrection takes a CL check of 10+the character's hit dice, or the spell fails.
Step 2, Breath of Life and Raise Dead don't work AT ALL (meaning he now needs a Resurrection or better, and the CL check means the gold of all that is lost if it fails).
Step 3, Resurrection no longer works, so True Res is the only option.
Step 4, nothing short of a Wish or Miracle can end his torment.
And as long as the contract exists, he's still damned to Hell. So if he dies again later (as mortals tend to do), back to hell he goes.
Step 1 can give some interesting RP repercussions. It's relatively easy to bring him back...but he spent all that time in Hell it took you to get him. Takes a toll on a guy's psyche, I imagine.
Edit: Hell, you could even just give him This Feat for free ( or if you wanna be a bit meaner, require that he retrain one of his existing Feats for it).
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Something similar happened with he pit fiend in my game due to the fact that I 'for some reason' allowed a diabolist.
I chose to make him a more of 'long-game' evil. With a few exceptions of players who don't know that he exists they all LIKE him. In his persona as 'ultimate merchant' he has even made several very profitable deals with the party.
In the end it's been very good for the devil.
They GAVE him Chellan as long as he promised to take it far into the depths of the hells (which he did, and gave it to a powerful arch-duke). In return they asked for a new sword for Viorian, which he obtained by teleporting out, killing a former member of the group who was eating his breakfast unawares, and teleporting back in.
They even realized that it was their former party member's sword and simply shrugged.
Other horrifyingly evil acts he has committed against them includes gathering the dead diabolist's soul after his death. Upon Titus Scarnetti's daughter, who was infatuated with same diabolist, begging the devil to raise him from the dead he killed her and put the soul into her body.
Now he has the diabolist in the woman's body working as his familiar.
In the end the long and the short of it is that the devil need not be a horrible foil that the party feels constantly inclined to destroy. He can be a great NPC in his own right. (A very dangerous and manipulative NPC).
Guess it's the 50% bard which makes a skald sign a unknown treaty with a devil. ;)
Building up on Latrecis' proposal: So what is the pitfiend interested in? I'd say:
a) Revenge - he was abused for ages.
b) Souls - because they are fun to play with.
c) Power - to successfully compete with other fiends.
Probably he wants all of it at once - meaning the soul of Karzoug. Once the runelord is killed, the skald has to perform a ritual which makes sure the soul is bound to this specific pitfiend. In some way that's power - owning the soul of such an important mortal means some prestige among fiends.
If you can't think of anything else the "If you lose the Devil gets your souulll~" line should come into play. If he dies he goes to Hell. Do not pass go, do not become a Petitioner, go straight to Hell and become a Pit Fiend's b$$@& for all eternity.
Look to the Damnation Feats for how harsh that should be.
Tl;DR: There are four "steps" of Damnation.
The first step means when you die, any attempt at resurrection takes a CL check of 10+the character's hit dice, or the spell fails.
Step 2, Breath of Life and Raise Dead don't work AT ALL (meaning he now needs a Resurrection or better, and the CL check means the gold of all that is lost if it fails).
Step 3, Resurrection no longer works, so True Res is the only option.
Step 4, nothing short of a Wish or Miracle can end his torment.
And as long as the contract exists, he's still damned to Hell. So if he dies again later (as mortals tend to do), back to hell he goes.
Step 1 can give some interesting RP repercussions. It's relatively easy to bring him back...but he spent all that time in Hell it took you to get him. Takes a toll on a guy's psyche, I imagine.
Edit: Hell, you could even just give him This Feat for free ( or if you wanna be a bit meaner, require that he retrain one of his existing Feats for it).
That feat is a great option! I especially like the twist of forcing the pc to trade out an existing feat for it. I'm just not that sympathetic to a pc that signs an unspecified contract with a Lord of Hell. Caveat Emptor and all that.