spitballing

>>51290129
Scrying, Mind control and Mind reading.
Just start your personal Orwellian nightmare.

>>51290383
What if Mind Reading gave priority to the meanest and most unpleasant thoughts? To make the caster more misanthropic.

>>51290440
Of course, this is what you look for, after all. Got to weed out and reeducate all those wrongthink types.

Mindbreaking a criminal is more kind than the death penalty. Such a useless frivolous waste of life...

>>51290440
Aura of Sin
When teaching the spell you make it clear that the effect is different than Divine Sense, it only shows how much evil a being has commited in its lifetime not how much more it would have commited had it been given the chance. So it's imperfect you say, but it's easier, you can use it as many times a day as you like even if you're not a paladin. That's got to be a good trade-off right?
With every sin a being commits it pings stronger on the Aura of Evil spell, however, the spell has no regard for circumstance or severity. An beggar that needs to steal food every day to survive pings way harder than a thug that kills someone every other week.

>>51290129
>>51290383
Mind Control/Manipulation is a good one, particularly if you have it start out as being relatively subtle. Stuff like only being able to nudge somebody's emotions a little, or erasing/faking their memories, stuff like that.

It could start out as a perfectly benevolent usage, like making miserable people feel better, deleting traumatic experiences from their mind, motivating criminals to turn themselves in, etc.
But as the person keeps using it, they'll quite naturally become ever more accustomed to manipulating people as a matter of course. They'll start using it for their own ends, at first in minor ways. Perhaps just making that shop-keeper feel a little more generous and offer them a reward. But the more they use it this way, the more powerful they become, and the further it'll escalate. Next they'll make that one pretty girl in town fall in love with them. Surely she'd have gotten there on her own eventually, just speeding things up a bit. Next perhaps they'll make the mayor resign, because honestly he's a real piece of shit and they can't get at him through the system. And then there's that one crimelord, well, you can't really keep him locked up, so perhaps he should just be made to kill himself. All for the greater good, of course.

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With player characters giving them power that corrupts them is actually really easy. Many fall into murderhobo-ing just with their player levels.
But how do you make it catch up to them in a satisfying way?
When you give someone mind control and he uses it selfishly and too much you've either giving the player a character that's horribly unbalanced or you've got a way for it to bite them in the ass and benefit the demon lord.
Maybe the mind control is an exploit of two spells, one spell to weaken their mental resistance and another spell to invade their mind and impant the suggestion, but the effect of the first spell is permanent and allows the demon lord's minions to posses anybody you've affected with it.

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>>51290129
A book in witch if he/she writes the name of someone that person dies?

>>51291032
Death note is a 'power corrupts' kind of story.
I mean, you can easily give someone a god complex by giving them god powers, but the idea for the thread is more level appropiate warlock spells.

>>51290521
Thank you, someone who has never had their mind broken.

You know what people whose minds are broken are called nowadays?

Someone with PTSD. Because having your mind fucked over is bad.

>>51290440

It wouldn't have to. Just getting someone used to violating peoples' privacy for personal or political advantage is plenty.

The same goes for scrying. Both will gradually be used more and more as routine than as an extraordinary measure. And for what? Eventually they'll use it to generate gossip or blackmail. Or for personal advantage.

Here's another: aura of trust. Sure, you could use it when you're genuinely being honest, but....

Honestly the most corrupting kind of power is any power over other people.

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>>51291312
If the evil demon just grants powers expecting you to go mad with power and abuse them there's usually some sort of fine print where you're working up some kind of debt. (otherwise all you're doing is giving the players a juvinile power fantasy)
It's a whole different case when the spells themselves cause you to become evil, without making you horribly unbalanced.

>>51290129

How about a transfer karma spell? You can bless yourself, but only by taking a proportional amount of good fortune from someone else of your choice; cursing them, in effect. They have to be uninvolved in whatever action you're blessing. The effect is undetectable.

At first they'll use it mildly and sparingly. I succeed in persuading the King to spare the guy falsely accused, and a criminal has a slip of the hands and gets caught in the act. Eventually, the player will want bigger feats: against all odds, he defeats the lich-dagger sent to assassinate him, but the innocent kid who just happened to be the only other person around at the time falls off a balcony and after a few painful days dies badly.

Characters will also start using the power as an attack on their enemies. Then they'll define "enemy" more loosely as people they don't like to disagree with.

>>51291424
What if you're not stealing luck, you're stealing actual favour from a deity?
You're making people's prayers go unfulfilled and damaging the credibility of the good gods.

>>51291394

You're missing the point. Juvenile power fantasies ARE corruption if they're acted upon. And you'd be stunned how fast it happens.

And if you want a way for the demon to control his puppets once they've fallen, simply give him the stipulation that he can suspend the power at any time. Or have the powers' secrecy protected by an amulet that absorbs the knowledge of what the character did. If the amulet is taken away, then he has to be VERY careful to use his powers subtly. If he rebels, the amulet is broken and everyone who'd ever have figured out what he was doing will suddenly know. Look how Anthony Weiner went from a powerful, highly connected, very effective legislator to a powerless laughing stock, virtually overnight. The same thing happened to Larry Craig.

It isn't just politicians. Very brave men who would selflessly give their lives for others, or even for a principle, will often do some very evil shit to protect their name and reputation.

Especially if the threat is kept tacit. A threat someone can feel and dread rather than one spoken out loud.

>>51291455

It could work that way if that's how your setting's magic works. I still would use the karma explanation when the demon describes it to his followers. Why NOT lie?

But what I think is important is that the power be corrupting not because of how it works or who it's from, but because of the character flaws and choices of the people using it. It makes for better storytelling, too.

Also, ONE very flexible power. Not a bouquet of abilities that the player can choose from among. Let him learn to lean on, depend on, and use every permutation of his power. You want someone to become a one trick pony. Addict him.

>>51291602
>Why NOT lie?
Because it's more fun if your victims walk into your trap fully aware of all the details but not connecting the dots.
That's why LE is better than CE.

>>51290129

my boner is purely evil now if you know what i mean

>>51290383
this.