He's such a pretty man.

It's been a while since I seen that arc but I was assuming from Grog's background of 'left for dead for defending a harmless old man' seemed to be about toxic masculinity. *shrug* People read different meanings in the same things. I think that's kind of cool.

It's been a while since I seen that arc but I was assuming from Grog's background of 'left for dead for defending a harmless old man' seemed to be about toxic masculinity. *shrug* People read different meanings in the same things. I think that's kind of cool.

Hey, there are some decidedly un-classy red wines out there. My favorite is sangria.

Sangria (when fresh) should count as vitamins

WHAT IS A MAN!? *throws glass of red wine*

He was an Anti Villain, more than a real villain. The bag guy was Ozai.

He was definitely a villain, he just changed to become an antivillain, and lastly a hero.

I'd say most of his story is one of redemption. He started out trying to, in his eyes, restore his father's faith in him. However, he then realized that this would never be possible. And so, he decided to redeem himself to himself. It became clear to him in Book 2 that he had done some unsavory things due to his tunnel vision of capturing the Avatar just to appease his father. Thus, he felt bad and needed to right those wrongs.

By far one of the best written children's TV characters. I think his story is one that is very sad, because he was (in a metaphorical way) born a monster, son of an evil emperor; and I think at first he embraced this evil side of himself but you did later see massive ways in which he was still human. One episode where you can really see this (I don't know which season or episode) is after he cuts off his pony tail and his hair grows more normally and he meets a girl in the earth kingdom. How you see him going out of his way to be good and loving toward her (such as when they visited her favourite spot to find none of the candles were lit, and he then asked her to cover her eyes whilst he lit them all with his fire-bending abilities), and you really see an early glimpse of him asa character who has genuine good and empathy in him. Of coarse when the woman finds out who he really is she leaves him, and we then start to see him going back towards the fire nation like attitude (perhaps representing the fact he was the way he was, due to sorrow, fear and anger, rather than out of compasion and love for his home).

First of all... this has nothing to do with the comment you replied to... I'm sure you meant to reply to another comment. Second, while this is mostly true, wtf does it have to do with Critical Role or Matthew Mercer? I watch these to get AWAY form all the bullshit of society, I think we can all afford to draw a line when it comes to fantasy and that's what Matt did. And no, he doesn't view "that" as the case, his choice to make sexism not exist in his world was very deliberate. He can't however control how the players act. As for Vex vs Vax in regard to how each other dealt with the Raven Queen, you're looking much to deep into it. Vax offered his own life because he had nothing else to offer. Vex however is manipulative and by then knew much more about the Raven Queen than Vax did when Vex had died, so she used that knowledge to make a deal. It's that simple. While sexism may still be very present in society, it's actually not omnipresent.

That's a good start! Some tidbits to think about might be: How are they any different from PCs that are always looking to "power up"? What in the villain's past made them believe that power for its own sake is necessary? Was the disillusion with morality a gradual decline, or was there a defining moment that completely broke them? Either way, having the players have two bad choices that must be made to solve a terrible evil could lead to your BBEG losing their faith in morality.

I've been thinking about introducing a confused male Drow, who followed the calling of Eilistraee and escaped with some of his friends from the cruelty of their class based society as former slaves. However when they get to the surface world, some Wood Elves from the High Forest mistook them for Drow raiders and slaughter them. He survived by crawling under the body of his friend and pretending to be dead. As you can imagine, he's pretty pissed at Wood Elves and has turned away from Eilistraee and towards a dark, forgotten Drow god for the power he seeks. I've also got a young human warlock, who turned to an Archfey out of fear that he would be rejected by his love because his love's farther had a grudge against him. So he asked the Fey for the magic he could use to charm the farther into putting the quarrel to rest. He was able to and they we're all happy and stuff and bam, the chick is pregnant. While his love is with child, he starts to worry about their future and all kinds of imagined disasters. The Archfey reaches out to him and tells him that his patron can take away his fears, if only the human could "Spend a little bit of his youth" opening portals for the Archfey's "friends". Each portal that he opens literally spends years of his life. Crestfallen that he'd never be able to return to his new family again, he agrees to keep working for the Archfey (getting older and older in the process) and even lets the Archfey possess him from time to time, provided the Archfey protects his lost family and makes sure none of his fears for their safety come true. The Archfey's "friends" are swarms of Meenlocks that are infesting the area. When the party defeat him in possessed form, he'll explain all that has happened and how he was only 23 a few months ago, although by that point he'll be beyond 80. He'll also still be afraid for the safety of the family, especially now he has "failed" the patron, so he'll beg them to visit Waterdeep and check up on them ever now and then. I'm hoping my players take the time to understand these "villains" and can see how fear and misunderstanding has lead them on their paths. I guess all that is missing now is a puppet master kind of villain who has been pushing them away from the people who would of wanted to help them, towards striking deals with patrons and generally corrupting them.

@YBTrolling Just be careful that your villains and their stories aren't meant to take the fore-front of the campaign. Not necessarily saying that's what you're doing, just a warning because it's a mistake that we all made as young DMs. It's good to make elaborate and compelling backstories for your villains, but you have to keep in mind that the players are meant to be the stars. They need the spotlight, and your villains story needs to be told more subtly. If you come out and tell the background of your villain, that is how you push players away from caring about that villain. They'll feel like you're trying very hard to push a narative on them, and may rebel. I've seen groups that choose to ignore a villain entirely, and opt to go adventuring somewhere else completely just because the villain was too in-their-face and they felt conflicted fighting them. Villains must remain a mystery to the end on some level. The mystery makes them compelling. Try dropping hints of their backstory, rather than feeding it all to your players. choose to very carefully release exposition in measured doses. Your backstories sound very interesting. It was your last paragraph that made me worried a bit that you might be hoping your players spend time on learning the villains as much as you'd like them to. You can't expect that of them, if they fail to it's a failure of how you set up the story. Mystery is key. We all seek the unknown.

Thanks for this. You've hit the nail on the head about them potentially taking up too much of the shared world, at least in the way that I've been reluctantly planning on introducing and explaining them. That is basically info dumps, which I know suck, but the (very appreciated) advice you've given me here has got me thinking more about incorporating it into the world building instead. Like there could be an unofficial plot hook of sorts, the story of a husband gone missing (the human warlock)just before the baby is born being passed around as gossip in a bar, could be introduced before the official plot hook of the open lord of Waterdeep offering a handsome reward for anyone who can bring in the Bloodied Baron of Terror (An explanation for the name: I might have this Archfey transform the elderly appearance to something terrifying whist a possession is taking place, otherwise my party will be fighting an elderly man. They will not treat that as a real fight, instead spending the time between their turn coming up with jokes and such rip). After the fight, the possession ends and the elderly figure of the man return. The explanation for his appearance is an info dump on his deathbed, but hopefully they are invested enough to actually want to hear what he has to say. I'll also try to make it into more of a conversation than a straight info dump. But of course there will be a time limit to this conversation, since the guys is dying while they're talking. Also if they come up with ways of healing him or even somehow restoring his youth, then they totally can.

OK great point Eddie Tokunai

That is fantastic! 10/10

try taking a dive into tv tropes, the recurring themes and examples there of can really help when it comes to creating not just villains but characters in general. here's a good one to start on tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WellIntentionedExtremist

Make sure your players are on board for playing evil characters. It's not everyone's cup of tea. Some players will rebel against it. As a player, myself, I hate being evil. I tend to play the paladin archetype, seeking justice and happiness for as many as I can manage. But I am a DM mostly, and as a DM I love my villains and evil the most. If they're having trouble associating with evil deeds, they might not be interested in them. Would be best to introduce them slowly to corruption, and see how they react. In my current campaign I very slowly introduced a character to more and more evil and powerful artifacts. And he took to them, but over time got more and more weary of their effects because he started to notice that they weren't quite doing 'good' things for him. And recently, just when I was sure he was tempted into the evil path, I offered him power at the side of an evil deity, and he rejected it outright. He fought back, and attacked the deity, calling for help from his former goddess. TL;DR Players will always surprise you when you want them to make a decision. Be careful to be open-minded of their wants.

Edward Hyde ? From "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen", or from the original story ? That Hyde was small and evil, not a super giant.

Darkwintre I've actually made a character quite like that... His name is White Horse, a hero, a champion. Kind and merciful and seeks the good of the world... He's just been misinformed what good is. ;3c

It's been so long since I watched that episode but Matt mentioned Megalomania and that comes pretty close, I think. The wish to become stronger and stronger, to extend your lifespan and subdue and control other creatures is still a very human thing, because we are short-lived and weak by ourselves. Kvarn is pretty much a dictator and tyrant.

Kvarn is more a monster endboss than a villain per say, the villains come later. Clarota is the only villainous character really.

Saundor, probably?

I dunno. I haven't watched that far yet. I was thinking Kevdak, but maybe saundor is a toxic male to a greater degree.

He's a buttface and has no friends. Because he's a butt and nobody likes him.

Spoilers..... Yep, I think Saundor is toxic masculinity. His lover left him, so he poisoned a section of the Feywild with joyless tarlike muck out of spite. He then tried to coerce Vex to commit to him and stay trapped with him forever.

Pure sources of evil also need to be sympathetic in their own cause. Melkor and Sauron are a great example of that. Their evil is pure, but it's also by design. They are a balance to a system of pure good. The quest of the villain in a Sauron context is to change the perspective of the world from one of good to evil. To Sauron greed, corruption, and evil are a perspective that is justified. He and his master see the 'song' of the world to be an enslaving destiny that they rebel against. There is sympathy to be had, even for Sauron. That being said, that elemental evil where you can see the corrupting force and the horrifying creatures that bubble forth from Mordor. Yeah, that kind of evil is quintessential to D&D. Just don't forget to try and create a reason for it to exist, and a compelling narative will try to subtly imply this reason. In my own world, there's a super-villainy type who is an elemental evil. A vampire lord who looks to wash over the world killing everyone and raising the dead. But for him the world has a destiny to end at a specific time. And this evil villain thinks that his plan is the only way to save the world from destruction. And in a way he's correct. The world was meant to end, and he's keeping it artificially alive. In the end-game campaign set in my world the goal is to wipe out the elemental evil, and destroy this vampire lord. Just before the end the Players become aware that their goal is the end of the world, and the villain is seeking to save it. This leads to a very complicated moral quandry, with elemental evil still existing.

KitZunekaze very well said. Im currently creating a world for a high-level one-shot. I like creating my own lore, and this world will have a pantheon consisting of largely draconic creature. Each color of dragon will have 1 Elder dragon to its name; they are basically the gods of what their draconic ancestry represents (eg, the red elder dragon is the god/aspect of destruction and greed, but also confidence, while the gold elder is the aspect of righteousness and pride) this gives many of the evil aspects a reason to exist as evil counterparts to the good aspects. In the one-shot, the black elder dragon, true to his original role as aspect of fear and intimidation, will have taken to necromancy, and turned himself into the first elder dracolich. It will be up to our heroes to stop him.

Victor Klep interesting, I'm actually currently slowly building up one of my players as a villain, leading to a betrayal and reveal to the rest of the party, then I'm going to run an evil quest of this villian building power and launching an assault on the world, and then I'm going to run another campaign to stop him. It started out like this because my one player was just a naturally evil character and a bit of a power gamer, so I figured I'd knock two birds out with one stone and let him gain power and be an evil presence in my world that I can use in many of my games and have a villain that truly has a presence because the player characters have seen his betrayal, rise, and strength

Victor Klep black is auto associated with death less with fear. You want fear? Get a god damn white dragon. White like black is a non color but the kicker is white is isually hope and possibility. But also when twisted.... it's the most ficked up thing ever. rather than jist taking up necromancu for which there isn't really a reason. Habe a necromancer try to turn the dragon while slumberring. The spell goes aray and he is twisted into a cadaver white hue dragonlich that kills the powerful necromancer and becomes bent on taking out all magic in the realm. All this yoi could put in the journal of the wizard for the players to find through a " adventures guild" and there's the backstory. ^_^

Forgive the many spelling errors. I blame it on the small keyboard on my phone and hyping up the story in my head. =))

i mean, i've made multiple villains who simply think outside of moral decisions (thinking good and evil are irrelevant in the situation they're in) but it's fun to have a villain who's a force of evil.

That is a good point. I think they literally just saw this as business. This is what empires do, we expand. "We owe it to the world to bring it law and order" mentality. Also, make a lot of money.

Rome oftentimes hated war, thats a horrible oversimplification. They had a strong conflict of grieving the losses of war and on the other hand (because of that grieve and the feeling it was necessary) idolizing the warrior. Kind of similar to the common view on ww2. Rome always saw themselfs either beset by enemies or in need to grow to be safe from future threats (including economical ones by inflation), as such their warmongering was driven by collective fear and individual ambition abusing that fear. Not even the Spartans loved war in itself, and they (and Nazis / Imperial Japanese) were about the most militarized people in our species history.

On an individual basis, Romans may have hated war. After all, when out fighting their land was going unworked while rich patricians bought their land when they went into debt. But that doesn't take into account the almost perpetual state of war Rome was in, from its inception as a Republic until the final fall of the empire in 1453. Sure, in its early days Rome was the one being invaded, but by the second Punic War they were always the aggressors. Outside of the Pax Romana - which saw peace only within Roman territory - Rome was under the sway of a war cult, which only became further entrenched after the Marian Reforms made the generals the sole owners of power. The Greeks, similarly, were almost always at war. They really, really liked it on a collective level.

No, they just perpetuated it. We as a society do not particularly like traffic jams, neither individually nor collectivly. Yet we regularly partake, as we accept it as a piece of life. The same is true for romans, greeks and virtually any society before the nation state, world war one or two, depending on your specific point of view. Nearly every tribal society had a raiding / campaigning season. Every Feudal Society had their Feuds and smaller Wars at a fixed time in the year. A major war or two was expected behavior in early nation states. No society ever loved war, war is always something a minority profits from. Something being part of your culture does not mean you love it. You might be missusing the word, or missunderstaning the history. I´d rather expect the former, seeing you not ignorant of what happened.

There are few, if any, villains of history that did things for purely evil motivations. Everyone, including the really big evils had self-justifications. They all believed, however wrong they were, that they were doing the right thing. Rome, for example, believed that the roman way was to bring peace and prosperity to all they conquored. It was evil of them, then in their own eyes, to leave societies barbaric and uncivilized. They commited many atrocities, yes, but they did so in the name of progress and good. However wrong or right their ideas were, they themselves didn't believe they were evil conquorers.