The Campaign Builder's Guild

Hey, i've been rewriting my demons into a more generally pleasing format (or so i hope), and i thought i'd like to try to post it again, something that will hopefully result in some comments.

Though the material world is not without its own mysteries, the world beyond is a mystery in and of itself. The Dreamscape is the most incomprehensible of these, a realm of pure chaos and thought, it is everything that could have been or has been; or maybe even is. Of course, with this world being the negative opposite of the 'ordered' existence of the material world, no interaction is possible between the two. A world that isn't governed by any rules can't be perceived in our world as none of it 'exists' in the way we understand existence. But even though it's impossible to build a bridge between these two distant locations, nobody says you can't explore the chasm between them. This border-world is the World Beyond, a world of thought given form. It is the origin of our souls, and it is the place the souls will seep back to after they shed the mortal coil. Here they will be broken apart and take part in the Oversoul, a composite maelstrom of thought.

In this maelstrom, res cogitans, the basic mental 'matter' that makes up souls, coalesces into new souls or, when powerful emotions, memories or thoughts coalesce, into unnatural spirits of the mind known as demons. These demons are sentient, and consume the natural energy of the plane thus turning themselves into semi-material beings of energy, mind, and shadow. In our world they take on the shapes of stolen bodies, using their unnatural heritage and their only partial connection to the reality of the material world to unleash devastating demonic powers. Their thoughts are alien and passionate, and they are fickle creatures, consumed by one emotion in one instant and another in the next. They aren't necessarily evil though, as many myths state, but are rather embodiments of emotion and thought, both good and bad.
Demons are per definition completely unnatural otherworldly beings, but at the same time there is a certain familiarity to them, caused by the fact that they are actually the spawn of our own dreams and nightmares. Before men were given souls, and the res cogitans was still untainted by memory, the coalesced nodes of thought in the maelstrom never grew big or dense enough to give birth to a demon, but as the human race experienced more and more, demons began forming. When still on their home-plane demons are barely self-sentient and are but a small part of what constitutes the Oversoul. But if they are drawn away from the Oversoul by the sound of an evocation ritual, they can be lured into our world, where they rid themselves of the connection to the Oversoul. But being creatures but of mind and energy, they lack flesh, they lack a Vessel; something that is completely unthinkable in this world. And this becomes a craving for flesh that they must fulfill.  

POSSESSION
They have one tool to fulfill the Craving, and that is the power of possession, where their spirit form forces its way down a person's throat or directly through his flesh to usurp his essence and crush his soul. Even though most demons possess an arsenal of destructive powers, this is usually the one that strikes the most fear into a person since it represents not the loss of your life, but the loss of your freedom. The entering of a dark spirit through your flesh feels like your skin pores suddenly open to the touch of a cold, greasy breeze, followed by a prickling sensation. This is then usually immediately followed by immense pain as the creature infects your very life force. Formerly possessed people have described the pain as feeling like every inch of their skin is being boiled until it melts. This also leads to violent muscle spasms that continue for up to 5 seconds. After this first ordeal, people often describe how they feel a sudden alienation to the rest of their body, just before they feel a pain reminiscent of someone ramming their brain, creating a weird dissonance and the sounds of something utterly alien, pushing at an imperceptible membrane. At this point some people give in to the force, and let the soul of the demon take over. Others force the demon out through the use of sheer willpower, making it violently retrieve its essence, a painful sensation that feels like tearing your skin apart (luckily, no physical damage actually happens unless the demon is very powerful and enraged).
Possessed humans usually merely have their minds subjugated, although powerful demons can crush souls completely, and even weaker demons can crush a soul that was already weakened when they took control of the body. Possessed humans are called hosts, and they are often inactive for a short while after the possession as they go through the Metamorphosis, a process where the human body adjusts to the mental image the demon has of its physical form (the thoughtform), composed of memories, dreams and nightmares from the constituent souls. Some thoughtforms are grotesque and monstrous, while others are human and inconspicuous; demons are often divided into types depending on their thoughtform. It should be noted that demons can also possess inanimate objects.

DEMONIC SUBTYPES

MNEMONS:
Mnemons are the most ordinary and hard to discover demons, since they physically resemble humans. Most have slight inhuman alterations, but not many of them are immediately obvious, and so they are able to integrate themselves quite well into human civilization. Mnemons are driven by a great variety of ambitions and dreams, and possess a host of different abilities, making all of them more or less unique.

SUCCUBUS:
Succubi are demons completely consumed with lust who take on the shape of sexual fantasies. They hunt down and possess the most beautiful bodies they can find (most often women), and then they modify them until they are perfect representations of beauty and human desire. Succubi are crazed with their own desire, and want nothing but sex, which they pursue tirelessly. They aren't rapists though, but seducers; they not only want the sex, but the desire of mankind. Succubi are slightly warmer to the touch than normal, and appear to be hyperventilating a little, but otherwise just resemble extremely beautiful men and women.  Though succubi might sound like a blessing to humankind to many people, they do have a tendency to sometimes suck out the soul of a human after an orgasm, leaving the dead body behind.    

GROTESQUERIES:
Grotesqueries are demons whose form is too horrible to be from a single nightmare only. They are physical representations of the worst the human mind can come up with in terms of fear and horror. Unlike the more focused succubi, grotesqueries come in many different shapes and variants, although   all of them seem to be bent on wanton destruction. But maybe there are exceptions; you never know. Also called gargoyles, the grotesqueries are the most feared demons, since they are the ones most likely to be in possession of claws, horns, tentacles, armored skin, wings, and destructive supernatural powers; things that all demon hunters hate. Grotesqueries are thankfully quite rare: memories and dreams do outweigh nightmares.

SHADOWS
When a soul is ripped away from the mortal world, parts of it sometimes get stuck. This event is what creates shadows. Though not demons in the usual sense, shadows bear some ties to them in that they are both creations of dead human souls. Shadows are, for lack of a better word, psychic imprints made on the physical world. Also called ghosts, shadows appear as flickering images of scenes that have happened in the past (taken from the dead person's memory). Weak ghosts are often nothing but faded pictures being replayed again and again, with the movement of the ghosts being unnatural and flickering, the colors drained and sometimes not even physical integrity is maintained, and the ghosts appear transparent in places. Stronger ghosts have strong emotions keyed to the replayed memory, and this allows them to affect the physical world in certain points of their repeated memory. The strongest of ghosts, the revenants, no longer connect their memory to a specific event, but rather to the experience itself, and seek to copy it in the physical world. Strong shadows are not sentient, but yet still appear to act intelligently in all situations, though they never acknowledge that they aren't human. It's believed that they act as they think the holder of the memory would. Shadows exist until banished or otherwise removed and are contained to the area in which they live.

GHOULS
Ghouls are demons consumed by envy to such a degree, that they long to be others. They are cunning shapeshifters, resembling, thin, short skinless humans with every feature reduced to its smallest human proportions. The demon's mostly grisly physical trait though is its lack of skin; the muscle tissue, and bone is out in the open when the demon is in its natural form. Other parts of the demons physiology have also been changed drastically, though its usually less visible. Every bone is made up of hundreds of smaller bone pieces, connected by muscle tissue, which allows the ghoul to extend and shape his bone structure however he sees fit. Balloon-like organs are scattered across his body, and he can fill them quickly with a fat-like semi-solid to emulate body fat. Small details, like pigmentation and the like, can also be changed, and so can the hair. Skin can be produced by using glands that cover the body, but specific skin designs, such as tattoos or birthmarks, can't be copied. Other than that, the ghoul can modify pretty much all of its body to resemble any living human creature. To take a new shape, the fat-organs are emptied, and the skin is softened and then clawed off, and then the process can start anew. A competent ghoul can change its shape in less than 2 minutes. Though ghouls can emulate people by looking at them, most ghouls prefer eating those they seek to emulate. It is speculated that this gives them a greater knowledge of how to emulate the victim more perfectly, but it could also just be that the demon doesn't want its unwilling doppelganger to ruin its plans.

PRACTICAL DEMONOLOGY
Demonic spirits are sometimes drawn into our world by Evokers in search of power, through the use of occult and ancient rituals. The creatures are then bound to his body inside intricate binding tattoos. Here their spirit is melded to his own spirit; the demonologist essentially giving the demon permission to inhabit part of his body (which gives rise to the ancient concept of selling your soul to the devil). This process is of course kept under control (if the demonologist is competent enough), and with his spirit, soul and body now being partly unnatural, he can call upon various powers of the demon, depending on the way he bound it. These abilities might include the spontaneous creation of energy, enhancing of senses or physical abilities, or the powers to transform parts of his flesh or regenerate. There are risks though; the demon will over time become a more and more fundamental part of the creature, and will start influencing his mental processes as well, and accomplished demonologists who have bound multiple demons are at great risk of losing control. In addition, damage to the binding circle tattoos risk setting the demon loose on the world and, maybe worse for the character, on his mind.

I will add more on practical demonology, if it is something people want to see more on.
The demons presented here are mostly my own work, though i have been greatly inspired by the Bartimaeus Trilogy and the Supernatural TV-series.
Otherwise, ALL kinds of comments/ideas/critique/inspiration are welcome.

The ghouls are awesome.  Very well thought out, and I particularly like the fact that they can't replicate birthmarks.  I dunno, it's just idiosyncratic.

I really like the merging of demon and undead that seems to be taking place in this. I also agree on the awesomeness of the ghouls. Give us more!

Thank you both for the praise :)
And it's true that i have merged undead and demons somewhat, seeing as my setting doesn't have undead per se.
Also, zombies are corpses possessed by small and weak demons who aren't powerful enough to take over anything but a dying person, and in one of the previous incarnations, vampires were humans who had both their human soul and a demonic soul that surfaced at times. But i haven't really written anything on those two yet.
The next thing i'll write, will probably be more on practical demonology, as i also wrote at the bottom of the post, unless there is something you'd rather see?

Thought i would give this thread a second chance for some comments before i get going on some writing some stuff about practical demonology.

Great work CC. You've sparked a few new ideas for my own work.

Neat explanation for why ghouls are cannibals.

I think formless demons are way scarier than giant fiery monsters.

The traditional definition of revenant is kind of the opposite of a ghost--it is a corpse that remains conscious. The main difference between a zombie and a revenant is that sense of consciousness, perhaps it retains its soul, perhaps just sentience.

Either way, you might prefer the term "wraith" (typically any powerful vengeful spirit) or "specter" (any apparition with dark magic).

You can also find a large number of other names for spirits in the mythological resource pages on the wiki.

Yeah, i think i just liked the word revenant. The way it was defined in my head was as some kind of spirit/corpse that had come back to perform some act of vengeance (revenant sounds kind of like revenge). But i'll probably change it to wraith then.

Revenants typically rise to cause violence, revenge being common. But they are corporeal, actual corpses, as opposed to just spirits.

And, yeah, the word does have a nice ring to it ;)

When you mentioned the whole "it doesn't have skin" thing, I was seriously expecting you to say that the thing wears the skin of it's victims.  (Kind of like the Bug in Men in Black, I suppose) But the whole it changes its body shape seemed to fit with that too, like it would change to to fill out the body.  In any case it's still awesome.

I guess I'm not really sure what you mean about the shadows/ghosts/revenants.  You say that revenants are not sentient, yet go on to say how they will act how they think the holder of the memory would.  If they think, doesn't that mean that they are sentient?  And if they are able to make decisions, to deny that they aren't human, etc., isn't that a sign of sentience as well?

hehe, the ghouls were mostly inspired by the shapeshifters from Supernatural (awesome show by the way).
And i should probably try to clarify the whole ghost thing... I wouldn't call them sentient, as they are but imprints, memories left behind and given incorporeal form.
A serial killers very strong (revenant-strong) memory of how he stalked and killed his victims would contain enough "material" for the revenant (or wraith, when i get around to changing its name) to copy his way of stalking, his way of torture, and so on; in essence his entire skill set of killing + stalking. So even though it can't consider its actions, it can still react to stimuli in the environment (take cover when the victim looks over his/her shoulder).
Did that clarify it in anyway?
If it did, i would be happy if you could give some help clarifying the actual text; i'm not entirely sure how to phrase this.

Incredible amount of detail in the Ghoul section.  Great work that creates some pretty nasty visuals when imagining the transformation taking place.

How do the Demons react to each other when they meet when possessing someone?  If you based some of this on the Bartimaeus books I am guessing there are some Demon politics involved.  Would there be any interaction between demons bound within the same host Evoker?  Two demons in the same body that didn't like each other?  OUCH!
 
I am looking forward to reading more!

A skilled invoker could of course keep multiple demons locked away in different parts of his body, but if two demons actually tried to possess the same body they would probably end up in something of a "spiritual" fight, trying to infect the soon-to-be-host's essence while pushing the other one out. Let us just say that this will be rather horrendous (not to say excruciating) experience for the living creature involved.
While in a host, i think most demons see other demons as rivals. Strong demons might have several lesser allied demons (if he can find them) who will do work for him in turn for protection from stronger ones. But this is probably rather rare seeing there aren't that many manifested demons to begin with.

You want comments?  Well, let's do this again, then.  I'll be typing my reply as I read what you've posted so I can give you my thoughts on this as best as possible.  Hopefully this won't cause any confusion.  Also keep in mind that I may be a little tired while doing this.

Since I seem to be having a lot of thoughts on this, I will break my review up.  The first post will address everything above "POSSESSION".  From there, you respond to me and we can go back and forth until I understand, whether that involves you making changes or not.  If you make any significant changes, I will give my thoughts on them.  After this process is finished, I will move onto the next section.
NOTE: If something I ask is clarified later either simply tell me that and move on or tell me how.

If you want me to edit and decrease my font size so as to not take over your thread, let me know.

1.

Quote from: Crippled CrowThis border-world is the World Beyond, a world of thought given form.

In this maelstrom, res cogitans, the basic mental 'matter' that makes up souls, coalesces into new souls or, when powerful emotions, memories or thoughts coalesce, into unnatural spirits of the mind known as demons.[/quote]When still on their home-plane demons are barely self-sentient and are but a small part of what constitutes the Oversoul. But if they are drawn away from the Oversoul by the sound of an evocation ritual, they can be lured into our world, where they rid themselves of the connection to the Oversoul.[/quote] But being creatures but of mind and energy, they lack flesh, they lack a Vessel; something that is completely unthinkable in this world. And this becomes a craving for flesh that they must fulfill.[/quote]Does this mean they have to claim a body?  Or does this mean they seek only to destroy?  If the latter, why would they not kill whoever summoned them?

Amazingly, i had almost missed this awesome comment. I'll get right down to answering the different questions now.
1 & 2
The dreamscape... how to explain this. It is the place where people's minds go when they dream, but it isn't real as such. In other settings this might be called "the Chaos" or something like that; it is essentially everything you could possibly imagine, every situation that can happen (and therefore maybe will happen). It is a place of dreams, imagination and the unreal. Did that make any sense?
The World Beyond is the place where our world, the real world, meets the Dreamscape, the unreal world, and therefore demons and souls are partly real and partly unreal, although souls are more "real" than demons.
Any idea on how to clarify this? There will probably be some information on the plane when i write up my planar section, though.

3
The Oversoul is partly a hive-mind structure, and it's not a singular sentient entity. It's just a giant mass of incorporeal thought, "talking" to each other, exchanging information, and coalescing into "personalities" in the form of souls and demons. This exchange of information is also the reason why age-old demons can usually speak modern languages as they absorb the knowledge from dead souls.

4
Not necessarily the darker side, though they can be (and a good deal of them are. More something akin to thoughts and emotion given form and life.

5
Essentially, yes, but demons don't influence humans on a general basis as such. They could be likened to the "waste" the dead souls leave behind when they are scraped clean so they can be used again.

6
Rituals gone wrong could easily release small cadres of these creatures, and certain very rare events might cause the spontaneous evocation of a spirit (though i haven't really decided on this). Very weak demons might also be searching for years for a body weak enough for them to take over. The only major event that has lead to demons running free was when an ancient civilization tried to animate their city by binding a mighty demon to it, and failed.

7
Demons aren't naturally inclined to destroy (well, unless they are grotesqueries). The craving for flesh is the craving for a vessel to contain their spirit; a vessel they can acquire through possession.

Thank you for the very detailed comment (and thank you for your comments on the resonance thread as well, again)

1&2.  I think I do understand now.  I'm not really sure how to make it more clear, though.  Sorry about that.  It seems too complex to describe simply.  Maybe when you work out the planar section you will come up with something that makes it a bit more clear.  If you do, I would suggest updating this with that.  If you don't, I would just include a kind of 'designer notes' with this that says basically what you just told me.  Unless you have more to add, I'd call these points of my feedback resolved for now.

3.  So the same demons stay around for a very long time?  What means are there of getting rid of them?  Even when the demons are in the mortal world, do they still keep 'one foot outside'?  (That's what you seem to be suggesting.)  Also, if new souls are made where the old ones join and communicate is there some racial knowledge from birth?  That seems to be what would make sense to me, based on this.

4.  Not always the darker side, just a construct of strong knowledge or emotions?  So, do the souls of great wizard-types and scholar-types often create or help to create a demon?  If so, haven't they discovered this?  If they have, do they do anything about it?  Maybe some people fear caring too much or learning too much as they might be a cause of a demon's formation.

Here's something I thought of:  If demons can be formed from strong emotions of the dead, let's say a man died who loved his wife very much.  Could his soul then form into a demon that, if summoned to the material world, would then be obsessed with that woman?

5.  Does that mean that there is the potential that they could one day overflow from their real or otherwise become some kind of serious threat?

6.  Good, if demons are this kind of thing I feel that there is a need for the possibility of them to be released without being summoned for a certain purposed and to go out of control.  Unless you have more to add here, I'd consider this point resolved as well.

7.  So the demons seek only to possess?  What happens once they have done that.


I would now say that points 1, 2, and 6 are resolved here unless you have more to add.  You're very welcome for this and that.  I will continue on with this one once these questions have been answered.  I enjoy doing this kind of thing with fluff because I enjoy when people do the same with me.  It can make you think about things that you hadn't considered before and clarify the setting in your own mind so you can better put it into words.  If this ever becomes not helpful, just let me know and I will stop.