The Sephet Demon -Xarl this might interest you

Koldar Mondrakken

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The Sephet Demon -Xarl this might interest you

« on: 03 April 2002, 12:27:00 »

Xarl, you might look into this demon kind and consider to find a relationship between them and the Psyrpents. Maybe these demons were the original but as they were too chaotic to control a Chosen created the Psyrpents as lesser(less dangerous) servants? Many features match with the Psyrpents, I guess, but in the end I’m describing a demon kind. Just some thoughts.
If you or anyone has some more suggestions to make them fit/distinguish better just tell me…

SEPHET, MATAR-, LE-

Appearance.
The Sephet is a demon kind that generally grows from 5 to up to 12 peds in length. The body is described as that of a large snake with the upper body of what can be described as a man-like creature. The strong muscled tail makes these creatures stand up to 3 peds in height. The skin are scales colored in a metallic mixture of greens and blues which makes them extremely sturdy against all kinds of physical attacks..
The back has the skin fold like a cobra with a complicate pattern on it and has an array of glands on the inner and outer side that covers their skin with a poisonous fluid.
The head of the Sephets are bald, with snakelike, multicolored eyes and a bony skull structure. The mouth hardly contains two dangerous teeth that make up most of their upper jaw.
There’re several variations of the Sephet demon known which are all different age levels of the same demon kind:

The Matar-Sephet: The fully grown Sephet-demon is the biggest of its kind. The bald head is covered by dozens of moving tentacles and the twin tail has the ends of a rattlesnake. Also the number of arms has increased from two to six.
This kind is the one known to lay eggs in a nest and give birth to dozens of lesser Sephets.
The Matar-Sephet is the largest and oldest of its kind and the most dangerous, physical and in its magical powers, however with growing age it turns rather immobile and slow in movement.

The Le-Sephet: Is the mobile variant of the Matar-Sephet. Already grown up in mind and power, they’re smaller than those and still lack the final pair of arms and the tail might not have split, yet, however the rattles and tentacles are already fully developed. With adulthood the Sephet turns into this version, the back of the head breaks open and tentacles grow from the back of the head, a second pair of arms grew from under the first one and out of the large skin fold and rattles grow out of the tail. The transformation must be painful but obviously the Sephet are able to mutate that way and the old body becomes a second hull that once breaks open.
The Le-Sephet seek out a new place to found their own nest, only seldomly they can stay with their mother and form an even bigger nest.

The Sephet: The smallest version of this demon. Standing it is as high as a man. They seemed mindcontrolled by their mother till they transform into its higher form and care for the nest and the protection of their mother.

Special Abilities.
The grown up Matar-Sephet has great mental powers and can cast terrible magic that can perish easily most opponents right away. Even without the magic the lesser Sephet make formidable enemies protected by their sturdy skin and a terrible contact poison that can weaken any foe that gets into contact with their wet skin.
The many glands on their back are mainly for this purpose. Their claws become deadly through this poison and there are also stories about Sephets bearing rudimentary twin-pikes or other weapons. The picture of the six-armed Matar-Sephet, every arm bearing a scimitar has become a famous legend.
The most dangerous weapon of a Sephet is however the poison of their teeth. The long teeth that replace most of the jawbone contain vast amounts of an even deadlier poison than the skin has for self-defense. With the tips of their teeth that stick out of the flesh and are responsible for the hissing sounds of their language they can spit their poison over a distance of up to 9 sometimes even 15 peds. Often aimed at the eyes of their foes the poison can have a paralyzing sometimes instantaneously lethal effect on their victims.

Territory
Coming from the Netherworlds the Sephet are nevertheless coldblooded and enjoy the warmth of warm wells, caves and volcanoes. They don’t seem to suffer much from heat and moisture however in extreme measure it can be rather harmful to them. A Matar-Sephet coming to Sorren at first looks for a good place to create its nest and then starts breeding. The surroundings are later defended and hunted by her daughters and can infest vast tunnel system with these deadly creatures.

Diet
The Sephet supply from meat, fresh raw meat. If this is the reason why they come to Sorren in the first place for feeding and reproducing, is unknown but a predominating occupation of a nest of Sephets becomes to hunt enough food for the breed. What kind of meat is in this respect highly irrelevant.
As these creatures doesn’t seem to be able to chew they rip their victims into acceptable pieces and swallow them in a whole by dislocating their thin lower jaw. Terrifying is the fact that the Sephet like their meat to be fresh and sometimes keep their meals imprisoned for days –an unbelievable torture for the few that survive this imprisonment.

Habits/Behavior
The first thing a Le-Sephet or Matar-Sephet would do in Sorren is to build up a nest in a protected location and start to breed. After the first generation of daughters (all Sephet seem to be female) arrive they’re sent out to hunt for more food, care for the eggs and protect the nest. Breeding is considerable fast, it is guessed that a Sephet colony can grew up to one hundred individuals with two years, not much for a demon. Only few of them grow into Le-Sephet to leave the nest.
After a certain zone around the nest is secured and an abundant source of food is found the Sephets can stay in this place for centuries. If the food source depletes the Matar-Sephet starts killing its children to compensate so a certain balance can exist and the Sephets might stay in the place till someone destroys the nest and kills the Matar-Sephet.

Summoning a lesser Sephet is a less dangerous act for a mage as these creature still seem of only minor intelligence and are easily controlled, the Le-Sephet and Matar-Sephet are far more intelligent and capable of dangerous spells and mental powers on their own so dealing with them often is about forming a pact or treaty otherwise the mage can easily end as the first meal.
However the Sephets are easily satisfied when a sufficient source of food is offered which is the main reason why so much research about this particular demon kind was possible. As long as the food lasts the Sephets don’t care much about anything else around them.

Mating
The legend tells that the Sephets mate in the swamps of the Netherworlds but how, when and why is unknown. It is only guessed that Matar-Sephets are capable of returning to these places and there breed their only generations of male Sephets to spread their genes. But all this is only speculation. None observing these creatures from the Netherworlds could ever prove it.

Origin
The Sephets come like all demons from the Netherworlds however their first appearance is reported back in the war of the Chosen as terrible armies of dark mages. The power of the Sephets is terrible and devastating and despite all attempts even a fed Matar-Sephet remains a chaotic creature so slowly these demons were banned to the Netherworlds again till the last nest was destroyed. Not necessarily the last, wether the sporadic appearance of new nests of Sephets in dark cavern or volcanoes are from one of the last remaining nests deep within the Earth or by Sephets that escaped the Netherworlds is unknown

Researchers
Gambarish the Pale: He was one of the first mages after the War of the Chosen who tried to discover more about this mythical demon kind. Well, he should have started with something less than a Matar-Sephet and it took months to get the demon out of his home.

Malik the Sorcerer: Secretly hosted a whole nest of Sephets in the southern Tandalas. Many journals tell detailed about the habits and features of these demons however as before with Gambarish Malik perished when he was not able to supply the growing Sephet community which sooner or later found a way out of its prison…

Ralik the Bald: He was the only one who dealt with these demons only to found out how to kill them. He also tried to find a relationship to the mythical Psyrpents, the snakeman but couldn’t find any proves. His researches ended when the bite of a Sephet nearly killed him –despite all possible defense spells and powerful antivenoms- and he was paralyzed for the rest of his life

Some polishing might be necessary but this is it for today!

Koldar Mondrakken, Knight of the Moonlight
--Santharian Master of Disaster ;)--


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Xarl

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Re: The Sephet Demon -Xarl this might interest you

« Reply #1 on: 03 April 2002, 12:45:00 »

Ahh... I believe we have proof that Churas was a plagiarist. He sees these things, as summoned by someone else. He thinks "hey, I could do that!" He starts work, with the occasional failure sold off as a "research project" for some other mage. That's the true story... but who wants THAT?

The Psyrpents think the Sephets are some of thier ex-brethren who attempted to betray the Insurrection. As a punishment, the Eye sorcerer Magair transformed them into hideous, mindless beasts. And so we have their take.
They also account for some of the terrifying stories about Psyrpents... must continue thinking.

Xarl Bluestride, Archmage of the White Tower of Ximax (c.a. 5 B.S), Master of the Magic Forum, Guide to RPing Sorcery, and generally cool guy. All requests are to be written on the back of a ten-dollar bill (or equivelant thereof) placed on a dead spraypainted ferret, and tossed in the sewer system.
Xarl Bluestride
Owner of the longest pure text sig in Santharia
And it's still growing....


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Koldar Mondrakken

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Re: The Sephet Demon -Xarl this might interest you

« Reply #2 on: 03 April 2002, 12:58:00 »

Well, beasts in their initially state maybe however rather clever lateron hence the magic though the PSyrpents might still think that of course.

I want the Sephets to be summoned first in the War of the Chosen but with very doubtful success so maybe he just looked for a better way?

Still some major finetuning and I'm currently about the general nature of demons anyway (Can they die? Where and how? Can they get to Sorren on their own or only with the help of mages?...etc... I know I should read some entries before posing these questions but I'm still wondering)

Koldar Mondrakken, Knight of the Moonlight
--Santharian Master of Disaster ;)--


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Bard Judith

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Re: The Sephet Demon -Xarl this might interest you

« Reply #3 on: 03 April 2002, 23:32:00 »

Speaking of finetuning - I have a major grievance here.

These are beings that run from '5 to up to 12 peds' large.

They eat raw meat. Large quantities of it.

A colony can be up to a hundred individuals in two years.

LIVING ON WHAT?

Have I misunderstood your description in some way, or is that correct? If so, could we change those details? Sorry to sound so rude, but we already have a lot of large predators, and realistically not enough animals in the food chain below them to support what we do have! Now some large, powerful, intelligent creatures move in and reproduce liberally - that's it, Sorren will become part of the Netherworld in less than a decade.

Could you possibly restrict their reproductive fertility, or better yet, make them infertile, like most demons (who must be summoned from their Netherworld locations individually by mages, as far as I know) ? Or make them smaller, or make them live on some other resource than flesh (yeah, I know, not as scary, but think about running out of water or trees in Santharia....)

Again, Koldar, magic isn't my main specialty but I do try and keep the whole ecosystem of Sorren in mind whenever designing or critiquing something new. Hope you are not offended by these suggestions....


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Koldar Mondrakken

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Re: The Sephet Demon -Xarl this might interest you

« Reply #4 on: 04 April 2002, 00:32:00 »

That is why these creatures are demons not something you encounter around any corner, Judith!

>>After a certain zone around the nest is secured and an abundant source of food is found the Sephets can stay in this place for centuries. If the food source depletes the Matar-Sephet starts killing its children to compensate so a certain balance can exist and the Sephets might stay in the place till someone destroys the nest and kills the Matar-Sephet.<<

Also you can expect the transformation of a normal Sephet into a Le-Sephet taking many centuries and after that another several(many) decades before they start a nest on their own.

Also that is their habit reported when they come to Sorren which is not that often. The egglaying variant is also very immobile so they stay in one particular place then. Also they'll behave like snakes meaning they need one great meal and then keep quiet for quite some time if necessary.

Well the one hundred thingie is definately too much, I'll tune it down to several dozen max...

The main purpose of these demons is that when you summon them they might infest a certain area with their presence making life hard for anything nearby and a tough enemy to remove from there again.
I still need their role in the Netherworlds. And Demons cannot reporduce? That's new to me. More important would be wether they can be killed somewhere. I guess in the Netherworlds they can be but what happens in Sorren?

You can assume that there are no more than two to three of such nests on Sorren at a certain time, and as stated above the deadly impact on life is regional and their life rhythm that slow that only elves would recognize it.

As said there's still some finetuning necessary but I hope your point is taken care of. In fact I guess this demon kind can _only_ reproduce on Sorren though I still need a way how they can get back to the Netehrworlds...

Koldar Mondrakken, Knight of the Moonlight
--Santharian Master of Disaster ;)--


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Drogo

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Re: The Sephet Demon -Xarl this might interest you

« Reply #5 on: 04 April 2002, 05:45:00 »

I think that it should have a weakness. Not just your demon, but rather most demons. This will allow heroes to discover this weakness and overcome immeasurable odds. Perhaps a certain spell ends up working when nothing else does, or a certain natural plant or something. It doesn't have to kill them, but at least weaken them enough for them to be slain.

Drogo Lord of the North


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Koldar Mondrakken

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Re: The Sephet Demon -Xarl this might interest you

« Reply #6 on: 04 April 2002, 09:57:00 »

Demons are supposed to be strong but this is not overly strong. It's weaker than a dragon. It takes most of the demoness out of them when they're weak, Drogo, and the normal form of the Sephet can be easily considered dangerous cannonfodder.

I had in mind that they're rather weak against most elementar magic, mostly heat, cold and water, is this enough great master?

Sorry, currently have the feeling I stepped on someones toes or do I have the feeling that someone is stepping on mine? Don't know...

Koldar Mondrakken, Knight of the Moonlight
--Santharian Master of Disaster ;)--


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Artimidor Federkiel

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Re: The Sephet Demon -Xarl this might interest you

« Reply #7 on: 14 April 2002, 08:24:00 »

What have we got here? Yieeee... It's a twisted alien in demon form... Kitty, kitty, kitty.... ROOOOAAAAAAR! Where's my hand???

Ok, I've adjusted a few mentioned things in the final entry, but I guess it's all workable now. In fact it is a very thorougly elaborated demon, and you in fact won't encounter them every perry (see, Judith? I'm using weights and measures!). So for a very rare beast (reduced to a few dozens) which is surely more or less extinct in this world, it's quite ok methinks

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The Sephet Demon -Xarl this might interest you