Demons

A demon is an inhabitant of Hell, where Loveless takes place. Demons come in all shapes, forms and sizes; some are living, some are dead, some exist just in your head.

Nature of Being
Demons, due to their broad description, have varying levels of sentience, ranging from deity-like (i.e. biblical human) to plant-life. Some demons control other demons, who control other demons, forming a demonic hierarchy. Demons crave souls as sustenance, completeness, and social status, but due to their limited quantity, demons will tear one another open like piñatas to steal them from one another. Consequently, the smarter demons wind up controlling the dumber demons with contracts called "soulbonds", which reward a demon with souls if they work with the smarter demons in gathering even more souls than if they'd never cooperated, creating a kind of soul-piñata economy where the vast majority of their time is spent building up legions, erecting walls, and playing politics in the pursuit of relieving other demon societies of their built-up wealth (sounds familiar, actually...)

Stats
Every demon has a number of stats which describe how they perform in battle, and how they can improve: In addition to these, there's a number of other non-changing stats a demon will have:
 * Hearts
 * Total HP; one of two health bars a demon has.
 * Willpower
 * Total WP; the other health bar of a demon.
 * Strength
 * Physical attack damage
 * Psionics
 * Psychic attack damage
 * Defense
 * Physical attack damping
 * Resistance
 * Psychic attack damping
 * Sensing
 * HP regeneration and restoration power
 * Intuition
 * WP regeneration and restoration power
 * Intelligence
 * Max level, XP gain rate, mind world depth
 * Agility
 * How many spaces they can move per turn

Elements
Every demon can have up to two elements; these describe what kind of strengths and weaknesses the demon will have against different moves used against them (which also can have 1 - 2 elements associated with them), and helps to describe what kinds of moves the demon will actually learn and use.

Contract
Every demon may have a contract, which describes how much that demon costs while in your service.

Traits
Every demon has between 0 - 4 traits, or passive abilities; these may activate at different points in battle, depending on the particular trait. These are assigned when the demon is born, but may be changed in the demon's mind world.

Status Effects
Every demon can be inflicted with a variety of status effects, which have different benefits or detriments in battle, e.g. extra regeneration, damage every turn, 50/50 chance of missing, and so forth.

Skills
Every demon has a set of skills they might have which can benefit the player outside of battle:
 * Fly
 * Allows the player to fly over obstacles on the world map, and to quickly reach different places in Hell; allows exploration for the Sky world.
 * Swim
 * Allows the player to travel over sea and to explore the Water world.
 * Lift
 * Allows the player to move heavy objects
 * Slice
 * Allows the player to destroy wiry obstacles (like vines, rope, webs or hair)
 * Smash
 * Allows the player to destroy tough obstacles (like walls, rocks, bricks.)
 * Endure
 * Allows the player to survive areas that are otherwise extremely hostile (like volcanoes.)
 * Illuminate
 * Allows the player to see in dark places.
 * Empathy
 * Allows the player to traverse a demon's mind world.
 * Healing
 * Allows the player to replenish his party's health in exchange for souls.
 * Trainer
 * Allows the player to train a demon, resulting in levels, higher potential and the possibility to learn a move
 * Priest/Priestess
 * Allows the player to fuse, sacrifice, and reincarnate demons.
 * Bonder
 * Allows the player to create their own soulbonds.
 * Merchant
 * Allows the player to buy and sell various items and treasures.

Age
Every demon has a finite number of battles they can participate in before they must retire and pass away. The age of a demon imparts different stat bonuses; when a demon is young, they get bonuses to their strength, hearts, and defense; when they are old, they get bonuses to their psionics, willpower, and resistance.

Demon Soul
Every demon may be ritually sacrificed to the Hell prophet Skariel so that their soul may be trapped and used for other purposes, such as reincarnation and possession. A demon soul may also be shattered to produce normal souls, but the demon is lost forever as if it had died in battle.

Reincarnation
Every demon, if their soul has been preserved, can come back from the dead and stored into the body of another demon. This is important because demons get old and die, but through reincarnation, they may live forever, taking with them their previous life experiences into their new flesh vessel; though they are reincarnated at level one, they do get a bonus to their base stats (those which mostly determine growth.) Ideally they will reincarnate into the body of a demon that is young.

Possession
Every demon may be possessed by a demon soul--similarly to equipment in other games--bestowing extra moves, traits and stat bonuses; an alternative to reincarnation.

Quality
Every demon has a different quality measure, which dictates how many extra stat points they receive per level up; this is assigned at conception, and doesn't change throughout the life of the demon. When entering battle, a demon may flash with a dazzle of lights, indicating just how great it is.
 * Inferior
 * This demon will suffer from poor stat growth relative to other demons of its kind; generally should be avoided, though the chance of encountering one is roughly on the same level as a Rare demon, so it's more a sign of bad luck than anything.
 * Normal
 * This demon is roughly typical of what a demon of this type should be like; most demons you will ever encounter are like this.
 * Superior
 * This demon will have better stat growth than usual.
 * Rare
 * This demon will have very good stat growth, far surpassing other demons of its kind, though it's extremely uncommon to find.
 * Perfect
 * This demon will have incredible stat growth, as good as it can get for a demon of this kind, but the likelihood of finding one is extraordinarily slim.

Death
Every demon can die in battle or from old age; if they die in battle, their soul, and any soul they were possessed by, becomes lost forever; if they die from old age, they are automatically transformed into a demon soul (for convenience sake.)

A demon is considered to be dead in battle once both of their health bars (hearts and willpower) have completely drained.

Loyalty
Every demon has a sense of loyalty to whomever is contracting them; this prevents the demon from betraying their leader, and opens up further opportunities for delegation in your conquest.

Acquiring Loyalty
The closer a demon is to you in your chain of command, the stronger you are compared to them, and the more often you employ them in battle, the more loyalty they will develop over time; likewise, the further from you they are (legions being as low as it gets, aside from citizenry), the weaker you are compared to them, and the less often you employ them in battle, the worse their loyalty becomes. This is improved by giving them contracts that are very favorable to them; likewise, giving them the absolute minimum souls in their contracts will lead to a slower or stagnant loyalty increase. Demons retain their loyalty even through reincarnation, recognizing you as a very familiar face. Consequently, the player is heavily encouraged to select favorites and stick with them through long periods of time.

Effects of Loyalty
A highly loyal demon will fight for you because they believe in you and your cause, not because they're exclusively out for souls; they put their trust in you that you're the best leader they can possibly follow, and due to this, they will not turn on you in battle, and can be trusted to delegate their own party to the best of their ability, ultimately resulting in stability in your chain of command. A loyal demon will not attempt to backstab you, and will not attempt to rally the rest of your party against you.

That said, a disloyal demon will see you unfit for power and will gladly rob you of this, assuming the demon has enough sway with your other disloyal demons, and they feel they can take you and the rest of your chain of command on. This issue becomes exacerbated if these disloyal demons also have their own party members and legions at their command, who will inevitably be more loyal to their leading demon than they will be to you, leading to civil war. So, your very own military can turn on you and kill you if you get weak or you treat them poorly; tragic, given you are the one who made them so strong in the first place.

A valid strategy is to assassinate a demon in your chain of command (e.g. suicide tactics) who is gaining too much power too quickly, as this threatens your own rule; they will inevitably surpass you, so it is better they "have an accident" before they get to the point where they can become a threat.

Delegation
Every demon may be delegated to perform some task on your behalf, whether it is to clear out a dungeon, to ransack a town, or to rule a kingdom as a puppet king on your behalf.

Party
Every demon may have a party of their own, much like the player does, which they will use in battle to further increase their stats and use as a shield, and to use when delegated to perform tasks in the world. The demon may form their own party with the souls you have allotted them, or you may assign to them party members manually. They make up a portion of your hierarchy, and tend to come in go (particularly due to dying.) However, it may be of interest to you to take a look at these demons every once in a while; there may be a chance they managed to snag a very good one.

Legions
Every demon may have legions at their behest, who provide further protection from the opponent's forces, and provide further firepower. These are formed when the demon's demon's demons have enough souls to contract demons, exponentially increasing your military's headcount. They are faceless, gray masses, but strongly believe in your cause nonetheless (assuming the souls continue to flow into their bellies.)

Metamorphosis
Some demons have the capacity to metamorphose when certain conditions are met, such as having consumed enough souls. Generally speaking, they become significantly stronger as a result of this behavior, get a stark change in appearance, and may adopt new elemental types, movesets, and traits.

Mind World
Every demon has a mind world which is plagued with inner demons; through a skill called "Empathy", the player may gain access to this world and destroy these inner demons, thereby unlocking greater potential, skills, moves, and traits in the demon.