Fiends, Celestials, and Powers Checks

[High Priest Mikhal]

This is a question a player of mine had: do fiends need to make powers checks?

My assumption has always been, "No, not until they have 22+ Corruption Points and lose their reality wrinkle." Partly because fiends, by their very nature, are going to commit evil deeds that would lead to their swift imprisonment otherwise. A reality wrinkle is more than just a portable domain that overrides the control of darklords, it's a metaphysical insulation from the vagaries of the Dark Powers. This dovetails nicely with the idea of power rituals to gain land-based powers and Corruption Points. A fiend can gain more power than they otherwise would have--if they're willing to jeopardize their chances of ever escaping and potentially becoming true prisoners like the darklords.

That in turn begged the question of whether celestials had to make powers checks even if they also possess reality wrinkles? I really didn't have an answer. Partly because celestials committing acts worthy of powers checks would be horribly out of character, partly because there's just one canon celestial in Ravenloft: Isolde of Carnival. Even my main protagonist in The Lost Journals hasn't had to deal with that because, as I said, it would be completely out of character.

There's also the question of how a celestial's reality wrinkle differs metaphysically from a fiend's, the meaning behind a celestial's reality wrinkle disrupting the very reality of Ravenloft, and other fluffy questions I'd prefer to discuss in another thread.

[Alastor]

My personal opinion is that fiends shouldn't have to make Powers Checks, even if their corruption has risen high enough to eliminate their reality wrinkles. The Dark Powers are take an interest in people who succumb to temptation and fall from innocence into evil. A fiend is already as evil as it is possible to be, so there isn't much room to fall further. The only exception if the fiend is part-mortal (as I believe Arijani to be) or for some other reason is less than 100% pure evil before beginning to make Powers Checks. However, it doesn't seem like the canon totally supports this interpretation. Ebonbane especially seems to counter this, and possibly Easan too depending on your interpretation of him.

It might be possible to take actions that are not evil, at least by the standards in D&D outside of Ravenloft, which are still considered worthy of Powers Checks. If the standards of the Dark Powers conflict with those of the Upper Planes, the unfortunate celestial might have to make a check, although it's hard to imagine one could ever actually become a Darklord without truly falling to evil.

According to the 3rd Edition Campaign Setting at least, monks powerful enough to have a reality wrinkle lose part of it each time they fail a Powers Check, just as if they'd performed a power ritual. The same thing would probably happen to a fiend or a celestial. I'm not sure whether the wrinkle would need to be entirely eaten away for the usual curses and powers to be bestowed; it would make sense.

[The Lesser Evil]

I would say no. The description of powers checks mentions that they are incurred when "mortals" commit them, which would seem to exclude these immortal outsiders. With their reality wrinkles, fiends and celestials seem to disrupt the nature of Ravenloft. As has been previously mentioned, the temptation fiends face to bind them to the land is the Power Ritual.

Gods in the Gothic mythos seem get away with an enhanced level of shenanigans just because they are gods. They can curse people, raise the dead, work miracles, and such without feeling negative consequences because they are gods. Presumably, this would extend to their agents as well. I would probably slap a mortal who created an Abomination (as in from the Carnival) with a powers check as this probably constitutes torture, especially if allowed to go on forever as Isolde does.

[High Priest Mikhal]

Good points, both of you.

But I do have an issue with the idea of celestials not having to make powers checks. Firstly because they're not gods. Plus Vecna was a darklord for a brief time, so even divine status is not absolute protection if the god is only a demigod in status. Whether his origins as a mortal before ascension was a factor is also moot to this discussion since the acts that earned him his place in Ravenloft happened after he was already a god IIRC.

Second is that I always felt that the spirit of the wording for powers checks doesn't exclude non-mortals from having to make them so much as it reflected that the majority of PCs in Ravenloft are mortals. The non-"mortal" PC races like aasimar, tieflings, and undead characters aren't really mortals in the traditional sense. Yet they're still subject to powers checks.

Also, consider "ascended" celestials like monks of good alignment. Are they suddenly exempt from powers checks?

[Wolfglide of the Fraternity]

I think that anyone capable of making decisions that slide toward corruption has the ability to draw the attention of the Dark Powers (which is what the checks represent). A celestial would attract such attention more readily, as any slip up is a major departure from the purity of its nature. The Dark Powers are already watching a celestial closely from the moment it enters the Dread Realms, and with the smallest infraction, they are there to invite the celestial to . . . relax further.

Logically, fiends and inhuman monsters are less likely to attract attention for their misdeeds, as such things are not major departures from the norm for them. This is a good argument against powers checks for fiends, but there must be some level of behavior that warrants attention, otherwise Ebonbane, Gwydion, the God-Brain, and other such beings would not become darklords.