Hey there my name is AJ Pickett and I make videos about roleplaying games, and lots of
them, I upload twice a week with a livestream every weekend, I make a lot of content that
is requested by viewers, including todays video on the Devil named Moloch, a classic
figure that most D&D fans will recognise from this often memed image which adorned the AD&D
Players Handbook 1st Edition Original Cover, fun fact, I didn't actually have that book,
our group had the second version of the cover for 1st edition AD&D players handbook.
Moloch is a great, square-bodied creature with red-orange skin.
He has short, thick arms and legs, and huge, square hands and feet.
His feet and head are horned.
His head is huge with slanting eyes and a gaping mouth that looks much more like the
mouth of a shark than a man, his glow yellow and his very dark red horns are jagged and
viciously sharp.
He rarely adorns himself in the opulent wealth he holds, wearing only a simple loin cloth
of some sort of flame proof leather.
He is as strong as a hill giant, and he attacks by grabbing and crushing or piercing a victim
with his huge hands and taloned fingers, followed by the bite of his shark-toothed maw.
Moloch carries, and at times may choose to employ, a six-tailed whip made of an unknown,
pliable metal which carries a constantly crackling and spitting charge of lightning, and so is
greatly feared by less powerful devils who have no resistance to that form of attack.
Moloch, in the same manner as Baalzebul, delights in the act of torture and doesn't spare other
devils from his activities at all.
Visitors to Malbolge to this day may note that a great number of the devils there have
missing fingers, limbs, eyes and great scars from eons of abuse.
The seething hatred that both Moloch and Baalzebul instilled in lesser devils resulted in Malbolge
always being on the very cusp of open rebellion and more than all the other layers of hell,
Malbolge has gone through the most upheavals and changes.
It's current state, as horrifically noxious as it is, has almost reverted back to its
former state, for more information on Malbolge and its current ruler Glasya, you can check
out the Adventurers League sourcebook totled 'Pipyap's Guide to the Nine Hells' which is
designed as an expansion suppliment for the Descent into Avernus campaign book, or, you
can just go watch my video on Glasya on this channel, I'll pop a link on the video here
for you.
Moloch is a former grand duke of hell who has existed for an incredible span of eons.
He was not the leader of the celestial host which liberated nine planes from the abyss,
but he was responsible for driving the last of the demons from what became the nine layers
of hell.
He was promoted from Archdevil to the rulership of the layer of Malbolge, the sixth layer
of hell, which at that time was a smouldering volcanic ruin, the air hot and choking, the
ground setting anything flammable materials on fire if they sat still too long.
Its many caves, massive caverns and lava tubes the site of thousands and thousands of tremendous
battles with demonic swarms where chaotic magic and the mutagenic touch of the far realm
twisted the forms of the celestials as they finally managed to tear the plane free of
Obox-ob's grasp, proving, finally, that it was actually possible to fight the abyss itself,
though the cost was unimaginable.
At the end of this early stage of the blood war, the leaders of the hells were simply
the remaining commanders of whatever forces were left, marshalling and preparing for counter
attacks, restocking their troop numbers any way they could, such as finding ways to convert
whatever native life remained on the liberated layers into what became the named forms and
complex hierarchy of what we now call the devils.
For eons, Moloch ruled his domain, vying against the other archdevils as he sought still greater
power, he remembers well the countless political upheavals and the departure, demotion or death
of so many of the original fallen celestials, including lucifer, and the slow realization
among all the archdevils that Asmodeus was the foremost threat to all of them with his
masterful tactics of pitching their rivalry against each other, thereby controlling them
all.
Asmodeus took full advantage of Molochs evil scheming to keep other archdevils in check,
and at some point even knocked Moloch back to a subserviant position of viceroy by appointing
Baalzebul, lord of flies, the ruler of the layer of Malbolge, redirecting Moloch's rebellious
efforts to usurping the usurper.
Dragon magazine issue 76 published in 1983 has the second part of the first reasonably
detailed overview of the nine hells, and it describes the layer of Malbolge as it was
back when it was ruled by Baalzebul.
Baalzebul at that time was ruler of two different planes and thus found it very difficult to
keep control, so he basically left the running of Malbolge to Moloch, using his herald Neabaz
to relay all his orders to the fuming Moloch who was constantly having to relocate to one
or other of the countless copper roofed fortresses on the layer, where the rain of boulders hurling
from the sky pounded against the metal and down below the adamantine pillars holding
the fortresses secure above the frequent avalances of rock or pyroclastic mayhem, thousands of
cages held the tortured and mutilated prisoners, subjected to punishing bludgeoning from the
rocks flying past all the time.
Even now, most of the notable locations on the layer are located hugging the surface
of cliffs or deep inside sheltered caverns, the rain of rock makes life in the open on
Malbolge damn near impossible.
The rule of Baalzebul came to an end though, when Moloch took the night hag named Malagard
for his advisor, replacing his former herald Tartach, legate of Baalzebul to the court
of Moloch, officially, but a real turncoat and back stabber even by the retched standards
of the nine hells.
Malagard was extremely bad news of course, while Moloch bathed in a putrescent pus pool
contained in one of his domains, relaxing to the ambient sounds of tormented screams,
one of the numberous night hag consorts rubbed thick grease extracted from the fiery tombs
of blasphemers and heretics, into his skin and whispered in his ear.
Moloch was seduced by the ambitious night hag Malagard and she convinced Moloch that
he actually had a chance of usurping Asmodeus, and though the resulting conspiracy nearly
succeeded, it was thwarted.
Moloch was stripped of his station and sentenced to death—and only the timely use of a planar
portal allowed him to escape the nine hells entirely.
Glasya was then installed after a brief reign by Malagard, and that brings us to the modern
era of Malbolge.
I would love to make videos about the giant Hell Lice teeming in the thick forest of hair,
still sprouting from flaking white soil in the shadow of great cliffs and lit by the
crimson light of lava falls, as well as the lightning spitting from pyroclastic clouds.
Or the horrific heaps of glistening flesh on top of three stumpy legs with dozens of
waving tentacles which are the Kalabon devils, these newly formed nightmares covering in
puss oozing sphincters are devils that have budded and spawned from the decaying remains
of Malagard, which are slowly evolving into female humanoid forms with rotten purple flesh
and hair made of white, twitching tendrils that resemble more and more the original nighthag.
Perhaps I will get around to them one day.
Unbeknownst to Moloch, Malagard was playing three sides in her bid for power.
while she whispered in Moloch's ear she was working for his archnemesis Geryon, having
felt the Wild Beast had greater station and that helping him could boost her own status.
Meanwhile, she was also conspiring with Glasya, princess of hell, which was all part of Glasya's
grand scheme to reshape the political landscape of the nine hells in the series of events
now called the Reckoning.
It was Glasya who fed Moloch false information that Mephistopheles was about to move against
him, kicking off the whole disaster that spelt the doom of Moloch and installed a new ruler
in Malbolge.
Whoever is in charge within this layer, Intruders are always brought alive to the horned devils
commander for torment and questioning, as failure from the horned devils to capture
and deliver interlopers generally results in them being subjected to the same sort of
torture, so they are highly motivated.
Few intruders escape, and fewer still are allowed to live for any length of time unless
the ruler of Malbolge says so, much as the other devils would love to vent their seething
hatred and resentment on any other creature they get their hands on.
These days, Moloch is an archdevil in exile, a strange state of affairs indeed.
Mordenkainen the archwizard says that "Moloch obsesses over power he lost rather than power
he could gain elsewhere in the planes.
What a pity he so wastes his potential".
His entry in Mordenkainen's tome of foes talks about what he did after he was exiled from
the nine hells.
And I Quote "Moloch wasted no time in preparing for his
return.
He amassed an army of devils and monsters and left them to make final preparations for
invading the Nine Hells, while he ventured to a distant Material Plane in the hope of
finding an artifact that would ensure his success.
While there, he became trapped, leaving his armies at the mercy of his enemies.
In short order they were destroyed.
Now, Moloch has been rendered nearly powerless after his last failure.
He endlessly schemes of ways to return to his former status, but every time he enters
the Nine Hells, he is demoted to an imp and can’t regain his normal powers until he
leaves.
Thus, he lives a split existence, sometimes scheming in Malbolge or other layers of the
Hells and at other times wandering the planes searching for magical might or secrets that
might help him win back his title.
Rumors suggest that he can often be found in Sigil, where he bargains with yugoloths
to build yet another army with which he might invade Malbolge and wrest the throne from
Glasya.
Bereft as he is, he has little to offer in exchange, so he might bargain with mortals
to gain their aid in acquiring coin, jewels, and other riches in return for knowledge about
the Nine Hells and the other planes."
It is possible to find tieflings of Moloch's heritage, they are, as you can imagine, some
very tough, large, brutes, built more like half orcs than humans, most do not have tails
and grow horns like a crown on their head.
They may have a jaw full of shark like teeth, orange red skin, yellow eyes and an intimidating
nature.
They gain +2 to strength and +1 to Charisma and know the Thaumaturgy cantrip.
When they reach third level they can cast the Disguise Self spell once per long rest,
at fifth level they gain the ability to cast Invisibility once per long rest.
Charisma is their spellcasting ability for these spells and they require no study or
material components to cast them.
As for the stats of Moloch, he is represented in full in Mordernakainen's tome of foes.
As you can imagine, he is fairly gnarly in combat and rarely engages foes without first
hurling a lot of other formidable troops in to soften up his enemy.
He prefers to finish off injured foes with great cruelty and pain.
He is a Large fiend, standing over fourteen and a half feet tall and weighing thousands
of pounds with a natural armor class of 19, average of 253 hit points though they could
be as high as 352 if you decide to max out the dice rolls.
He has a speed of 30 ft per round, darkvision to 120 ft, passive perception of 21 and is
a challenge rating 21 legendary foe with legendary resistance three times per day and legendary
actions, which include casting stinking cloud, teleportation and making additional whip attacks
on other creatures turns.
He is very tough, totally immune to fire and poison, resistant taking half damage from
cold, non magical and non silvered physical bludgeoning, slashing and piercing damage,
immune to exhaustion and being charmed or frightened, regenerating 20 hit points at
the start of his turn in the round which only radiant damage can prevent, and he only dies
if he starts the round with zero hit points and with his regeneration not functioning.
He is also resistant to magic, gaining advantage on every saving throw against spells and other
magical effects, unless he decides to use his legendary resistance and just choose to
make the saving throw.
All weapons he picks up and all his hand to hand attacks count as magical, plus he has
innate spellcasting powers, based on his charisma of 23.
Moloch makes three attacks on his turn, either a spell and two other attacks or perhaps a
bite, claw and whip attack.
He still uses that magical metal whip, it has a 30 foot reach, is +15 to hit one target
and inflicts 2d4+8 slashing damage, plus 2d10 lightning damage and if the target is a creature,
it must succeed on a DC 24 Strength saving throw or be pulled up to 30 feet in a straight
line toward Moloch.
His bite and claw attacks are both +15 to hit, the claw has a reach of 10 ft and does
2d8+8 slashing damage, his bite does 4d8+8 piercing damage.
He can choose to teleport instead of his usual movement, taking himself and anything he is
wearing or carrying up to 120 ft to a spot he can see before he gets there.
Also, he has a special attack called Breath of Despair that recharges after use each round
if a 5 or 6 is rolled on a six sided die.
Moloch exhales in a 30-foot cube.
Each creature in that area must succeed on a DC 21 Wisdom saving throw or take 5d10 psychic
damage, drop whatever it is holding, and becomes frightened for 1 minute.
While frightened in this way, a creature must take the Dash action and move away from Moloch
by the safest available route on each of its turns, unless there is nowhere to move, in
which case it just cowers in place.
If the creature ends its turn in a location where it doesn’t have line of sight to Moloch,
only then can the creature repeat the saving throw, ending the effect on a success.
Molochs innate spells include alter self, animate dead, burning hands equal to a seventh
level spell, confusion, detect magic, fly, geas, major image, stinking cloud, suggestion
and wall of fire, all of which he can cast at will, plus once per long rest he can cast
flame strike and the Stunning version of the Symbol spell.
He prefers to pull opponents in and rip them to shreds with his bare hands, but uses his
stinking cloud and breath of despair to break up groups of foes when he is outnumbered.
Dragon magazine issue 91 tells us that his metal whip is composed of an alloy known as
dajavva, a flexible, light green-grey substance forged from a combination of iron and a metal
exclusive to Hell called arjale.
The lightning charge of the whip is not actually a property of the metal whip, the electricity
is being conducted through the whip from Moloch instead.
Also, Moloch owns more than one metal whip, including another that has four pliable strands
of metals which burst into pale blue flames when swung.
Stripped of his title, robbed of power, and bereft of most possessions, Moloch knows that
if he is killed and forced to reform back in the nine hells, he will incarnate finally
as nothing more than a lowly Imp.
He will only be able to return to his former appearance and power if he manages to leave
Hell again.
It is said that he is trying once again to rebuild an army, this time by recruiting yugoloths
he found in Sigil, but since he was destitute he offered knowledge of the multiverse to
mortals he encountered in exchange for material wealth, something he needs ludicrous quantities
of to deal with hiring a yugoloth army.
Though Moloch once had some base of worshipers, apparently having inspired fanatical loyalty
in at least some of them, it crumbled away after his defeat.
The few fractured cults that remain are small and its members are incapable of casting spells
over 3rd level.
Still, a few glorifying statues of the duke still stand with faint remnants of power lingering
within and around them.
Oh, in case you wondered about Moloch being able to escape death by using a planar portal,
he didn't do this within the nine hells, he was actually plummeting to the ground in a
ball of fire on the prime material plane when he used the portal to escape, so for a while,
everyone thought he was actually destroyed.
His original plan to re-enter hell required the use of an artifact called the Stone of
Corbinet, also known as the Apocalypse stone, the stone of Corbinet anchors the prime plane
to the rest of the multiverse.
If the stone is removed from its proper resting place, the world shifts out of alignment,
losing contact with the rest of the planes.
Without access to the outer planes, the souls of the dead are trapped and without access
to the inner planes, the world suffers ever more severe natural disasters, huricanes,
earthquakes and so on.
I have no idea how Moloch planned to use that artifact to get into the nine hells, but if
he managed to steal it, he would have destroyed a decent chunk of the prime material plane.
We have some more information on Moloch, courtesy of dragon magazine issue 360.
Eventually Moloch managed to work his way back to Baator through several vile acts and
bargains, although he couldn't seem to leave afterwards, and became one of the notable
outcast dukes of Avernus referred to as "the rabble of devilkin".
From there, he led a group of subversive exiles and plotted to build a new army, take vengeance,
and conquer Hell.
However, it seemed his schemes didn't bear fruit since after his latest failure he was
rendered politically, monetarily, and physically powerless.
Still, Moloch continued his mission to reclaim his status, whether it meant getting himself
back into the good graces of Asmodeus or dealing with the other fiendish races to take Malbolge
back by force.
Please hit the like button if you made it this far, subscribe if you like what I do,
check out my Subscribestar or patreon links for all the full scripts for these videos,
buy some Tee Spring merchandise, wear your geek with pride and As always, thanks for
listening and I will be back with more for you, very soon.