Flavour Shots: Demon Portals
A Flavour Shot is a short description of game artefacts and phenomena for use by Dungeon Masters, Game Masters and Storytellers in their games. Feel free to drag and drop these into your own games, and modify to suit. Let us know if you end up using them. Some will be portals to other realms, some will be magic items, others will be monster encounters. This time, it’s…
Portals to the Nine Hells
More fiery than blood, but you try searching for images of blood portals. Go ahead, try it.
A chain devil as seen in the fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons Monster Manual. [Image courtesy Wizards of the Coast]
They provide a pushing effect directly above them, so if it’s on the ground things levitate gently away from it, if it’s on the ceiling anyone walking beneath it feels pushed more into the ground, etc.
It’s a gentle effect, easy to push past. Touching the blood, it feels warm. Beneath the surface of it, one can feel tendons and muscle. After a few inches, intense heat is felt – enough for exhaustion if you’re in it for a number of minutes equal to your Constitution score.
Success on a DC 15 Wisdom (Nature) check allows you to accurately gauge this. There are teeth on the other side of the portal, so going through does 1d6 piercing damage.
There will often be some form of demon or devil guarding the other side of this portal that will emerge to investigate should the surface of the portal be breached during an Intelligence (Investigation) check or simply curious adventurers touching it. I prefer to use chain devils for this purpose, flanked by some dretches from the demon section. Describing them emerging from the portal, pushing through like the Demogorgon from Stranger Things and covered in blood, emanating the remains of the heat from their realm, is something I treasure in my games.
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