Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Koudanshi 09-24-07, 06:59 AM	I'm thinking of working on a new campaign in a setting similar in style to Forgotten Realms. Now, what I find to be more important than anything else to start off with is the story, and the villain behind it. The scheming creature behind the woes that will befall our heroes, leading them cleverly against his enemies. A villain whose motivations and goals are so utterly dark that they stop of nothing short of oblivion for all of creation itself. What, though, would make a creature desire the end of everything, including itself, without making it look like really dramatic suicide and/or pathetic, or giving pretensions of 'doing it to ease the suffering of all'?
Orchomenos 09-24-07, 12:57 PM	Survival. The villain is an aberration from another plane (Far Realm?), and breathing oxygen burns his organism. He only survives by feeding on some weird ooze covering the ground, and which are burned by the sun. The villain's people do not speak nor hear. Rather, they communicate by electrical currents, which if sent on a living creature, deals 1d8 non-lethal electricity damage. Thus, it's a natural conclusion for the villain that there is no intelligent life on Faerun, so they can freely colonize the area by removing the air and hidding the sun to allow their ooze to cover whole countries.
Karsil_Draken 09-24-07, 06:28 PM	Thats actually a pretty good idea... a grand scope! But different and full of atmosphere... also, check out Rich Burlew's Villains workshop from his Giant in the Palyground site: http://www.giantitp.com/Gaming.html ...Karsil
Koudanshi 09-25-07, 06:06 AM	Well, Orchomenos, that doesn't quite work since the ultimate goal is supposed to be the destruction of everything, including himself. This is an important part of his character, the fatalism and utter nihilism he believes in.
Karsil_Draken 09-25-07, 08:11 AM	Oh, I read it wrong too... Hmm, well first of, you need to the emotions like in that Villain workshop... There needs to be something that makes him self think that nothing deserves to live - and maybe make him a player race. He wants to SO much that there is not even himself deserves to live. Look at that linked article, I think it would help you lots... ...Karsil
Koudanshi 09-25-07, 12:29 PM	Ah, yes, allow me to elaborate. Race, personality and feelings have already been determined. He -was- human, but in order to be closer to death he underwent the excruciating ritual to become a Necropolitan. Not the standard way, mind, but he found a way to fix himself up with some nice undead traits on his own. He is a powerful Necromancer (Dread Necromancer Class) who revels in the notion of total oblivion and works for Shar. It'll depend on how optimized my players are going to be within the restrictions I'm giving them (knowing them, very) so he's likely going to be a Chosen of Shar as well. He was dead for a long time after he was killed, but Shar restores him -- her most devoted subject -- back to unlife in order to complete his ultimate goal, the eternal return of creation to nothingness, which is the premise for the story the heroes are going to be involved in. His strongest emotions, since you've been recommending the workshop thing, are a irrepressable desire for oblivion and suppressed rage. He is a cunning but proud creature, putting pragmatism before any other way of dealing with things and not above temporarily following goals other than his main one if it furthers his own ends or increases his power.
Morka 09-25-07, 02:08 PM	I just happen to watch House MD yesterday evening. Gregory House looks like your BBEG, but 200 years before. A man, incredibly intelligent, and a bit cynical toward the rest of the population, generally less intelligent than himself. He has a deep admiration for himself, deeply analytical, but in the same time he is unable to laugh innocently on some stupid joke, he's above that. As a really intelligent man, he became Medic (in D&D, he could be a cleric of oghma?). But as he progress, he become disgusted on how the people keep on lying to each other for trivial reasons, wasting their whole life on stupid things. Until he looses all faith in humankind. People seeking the knowledges of Oghma were always doing this for the wrong reason, so he decided to hide all these knowledges, and he turned to Shar. But even Shar asked too much for him - even the gods are not worth. Nothing is worth, and everything should perish! If you like that idea, I suggest you to start your campaign with 2-3 random, not-related adventures; perhaps a minor campaign with a minor BBEG in the end. Your true BBEG will still be a Cleric of Oghma, some cynical sage humilating everyone not as intelligent as himself (in practical, everyone). Your PCs should be visiting him regularly for all kinds of information, they will find cool to play with House MD in their game! Until one day they learn his library has been burned. They are sent to investigate, and can only begin to suspect what's really hanging over their head...
Talaisan 09-26-07, 10:46 AM	Well, Orchomenos, that doesn't quite work since the ultimate goal is supposed to be the destruction of everything, including himself. This is an important part of his character, the fatalism and utter nihilism he believes in. I'd say 'The Agent of Apocalypse' works pretty well for a title. Throw in some prophecy about some guy fated to end the world, knowing full well what he does, or somesuch, add an impostor or two, make sure the agent is amazingly powerful, and add in some PCs. I used a 100' tall half dragon with class levels and a ridiculous set of stats. Then again, my PCs started at Lvl 30 and went up from there. And they still barely pulled it off. The important thing with apocalyptic villains is to make them scary. Not 'oh, by the way, I'm going to destroy all existence' but 'Make peace with your soul, before you part with it' or something. If it gets as far as a last ditch effort to save the universe, describe the effect the impending apocalypse is having, the ground shattering and sky burning and so forth. Foreshadow from the very beginning. You know you want to do this, eventually, so start laying the groundwork from session 1. Listen to the PCs, too, because often they'll start suspecting wrinkles in your plan that you hadn't thought of, and sometimes you'll want to let them be right. But not all the time. Edit : And since I read the rest of the post, ignore as much of this as you like.
Karsil_Draken 09-26-07, 06:03 PM	Everytime I think of a solution, it get this >>"or giving pretensions of 'doing it to ease the suffering of all'<< you mentioned... Meditate on this, I will... ...Karsil
Deadlypudding 09-27-07, 01:54 PM	Back when I ran a D&D campaign I had a villain that was the unfortunate offspring of a devil that raped a celestial. He was raised on the celestial plane but was shunned, as was his unfortunate mother and foster father. He left the celestial plane to forge a new identity and perhaps create his own followers. What followed was his creation of a plane that was never meant to be. Born of hatred for both good and evil. He sought to destroy from the world all forms of either and thus his plane existed only to assimilate all others. He believed to be himself the superior creation to all others, and that he might have been since his power surpassed even the highest of devils and angels. While he realises he wouldn't be destroying all existence, he might as well since he would turn all beings into mere sheep.
Winged_Edge 09-27-07, 02:15 PM	Shar could be losing worshipers due to some crazy "whatever." Instead of losing out completely and being demoted in God-status; she tries to destroy the world and put all the gods back on an even playing field. In addition, since she's the domain-holder of darkness, the villain could try to destroy the sun along with the planet so everything would be shrouded in darkness. This way, when life re-emerges (your villain might be able to "plant" something) it will inherently be born under Shar. Maybe? I never liked the cliche plots that are "Ease the suffering" - "Things aren't worthy" - etc. They are fun to do, but can be done poorly.
Koudanshi 09-28-07, 08:31 AM	Well, I'm not -terribly- familiar with Forgotten Realms lore, but as I understand it, Shar seeks a return to the nothingness that was before Creation. Hence why I decided on her to be such a strong influence on this villain. Alright, from various suggestions so far: The villain was born to a celestial and a demon, though it wasn't rape. It was by far more insidious, however, as the demon had found a way to fool the celestial's abilities and make it believe that it was one of their own. Any suggestions for an already existing demon (or devil) capable of such a feat that could work are welcome. The outcome was, of course, quite an unusual little child. It not only behaved differently from its peers, it also looked quite strange. The celestial blood kept any strange deformations from occuring so it still looked quite human-like and certainly wasn't ugly, but its strange appearance caused all Celestials to shun him, instinctively sensing that something was wrong about the babe, though none could give any specific reasons as the physical differences didn't look particularly evil. (Note: As a hybrid of two opposites, he'll have a racial, constant 'undetectable alignment' effect) His mother, the Celestial, only treated him with the possible minimum of attention, though she was by no means cruel, as the cunning deception of the demon/devil continued on, pretending to be one of the Celestials while secretely influencing our villain towards feelings of resentment towards his apparent brethren. The plan of the monster was not to succeed, though, through divine intervention. On a journey, our adolescent villain enters a cave (replace with other fitting secluded location) where he has a revelation unlike any other before. Shar appeared before him, and he instantly fell in love with her -- a love so deep that one could describe it as devotion. He instantly felt a deep connection to her, an understanding of sorts. She vanished in a moment, gone without a trace and without speaking a word, but that single moment would forever dominate his thoughts. His life then was devoted to the gathering of power and secret, arcane experiments that would cause his execution should they have been uncovered. Unfortunately, his mother did. Realizing what horror she truly had born, she instantly fell and was murdered only seconds later by her determined son. His father would be his second murder, and the first one he truly enjoyed -- choking the life out of his creator, even as he changed and found to his surprise that his son remained his physical better, smiling with grim satisfaction as he finally understood his true origin. He combined both celestial and demonic, he was spawned of good and evil and was thus beyond such concepts; beholden to none but those he chose to be. And he chose Shar, believing that he could win her love through gaining power for her, but also because he instinctively desired to bring an end to the world. Why? Perhaps an aberration, a dementia caused by genes that should never have been mixed, perhaps the resentment he had built up from his very childhood had evolved into full-blown nihilism, or perhaps it was his innate connection to Shar herself, a goddess who desired the return to the primordial nothingness that he, too, now craved. ---- Hm. Inspiration gone for now ... I'll write up some more about his continued existance later on.
Winged_Edge 09-28-07, 03:34 PM	Eh, I've played my fair share of Sharrans in the past and I don't remember a whole lot about Shar returning to nothing-ness. Now, I could be wrong, it's been a while. Also, it's your campaign so you can make her whatever you want to make her. Also, you could just come up with a demi-god that attempts to work toward the same end. ( I say demi-god because it's difficult to get people to follow you when you only want oblivion) http://www.geocities.com/rtrmdnd/gods.html That might help. Google "Shar Forgotten Realms" and you'll get a million pages.
Koudanshi 09-28-07, 04:20 PM	Well, I'm quoting 'Faith and Pantheons' here: Shar's existence, paradoxically, is tied to the shrouded nothingness that existed prior to Ao's act of creation. Shar reflects the primal dark, the flawless void erased at the beginning of time by a distant, unconcerned overdeity. Her heart longs for a return to the calm of nonexistence, and she schemes from the shadows to tear down establishments, destroy order, and undermine all creation.
Winged_Edge 09-29-07, 12:08 PM	Hmm... can't fight that. Sounds perfect to me, then.
Terjon of the Blue Rose 09-29-07, 11:57 PM	First a kudos to Koudanshi for a nice villian. Next as a counterpoint I have to quote the greatest "destroy the world" villian line I've ever heard. It was in the movie Dogma and went along the lines of "Women, have you ever been to hell. I think not. I'm perfectly willing to accept oblivion to escape that and if the whole rest of existance has to go with me than so be it." Not sure of how exact that is but it gets the point across.
Orchomenos 10-04-07, 02:23 PM	Well, I'm not -terribly- familiar with Forgotten Realms lore, but as I understand it, Shar seeks a return to the nothingness that was before Creation. Hence why I decided on her to be such a strong influence on this villain. Alright, from various suggestions so far: The villain was born to a celestial and a demon, though it wasn't rape. It was by far more insidious, however, as the demon had found a way to fool the celestial's abilities and make it believe that it was one of their own. Any suggestions for an already existing demon (or devil) capable of such a feat that could work are welcome. The outcome was, of course, quite an unusual little child. It not only behaved differently from its peers, it also looked quite strange. The celestial blood kept any strange deformations from occuring so it still looked quite human-like and certainly wasn't ugly, but its strange appearance caused all Celestials to shun him, instinctively sensing that something was wrong about the babe, though none could give any specific reasons as the physical differences didn't look particularly evil. (Note: As a hybrid of two opposites, he'll have a racial, constant 'undetectable alignment' effect) His mother, the Celestial, only treated him with the possible minimum of attention, though she was by no means cruel, as the cunning deception of the demon/devil continued on, pretending to be one of the Celestials while secretely influencing our villain towards feelings of resentment towards his apparent brethren. The plan of the monster was not to succeed, though, through divine intervention. On a journey, our adolescent villain enters a cave (replace with other fitting secluded location) where he has a revelation unlike any other before. Shar appeared before him, and he instantly fell in love with her -- a love so deep that one could describe it as devotion. He instantly felt a deep connection to her, an understanding of sorts. She vanished in a moment, gone without a trace and without speaking a word, but that single moment would forever dominate his thoughts. His life then was devoted to the gathering of power and secret, arcane experiments that would cause his execution should they have been uncovered. Unfortunately, his mother did. Realizing what horror she truly had born, she instantly fell and was murdered only seconds later by her determined son. His father would be his second murder, and the first one he truly enjoyed -- choking the life out of his creator, even as he changed and found to his surprise that his son remained his physical better, smiling with grim satisfaction as he finally understood his true origin. He combined both celestial and demonic, he was spawned of good and evil and was thus beyond such concepts; beholden to none but those he chose to be. And he chose Shar, believing that he could win her love through gaining power for her, but also because he instinctively desired to bring an end to the world. Why? Perhaps an aberration, a dementia caused by genes that should never have been mixed, perhaps the resentment he had built up from his very childhood had evolved into full-blown nihilism, or perhaps it was his innate connection to Shar herself, a goddess who desired the return to the primordial nothingness that he, too, now craved. ---- Hm. Inspiration gone for now ... I'll write up some more about his continued existance later on. ...and the true break point, where your villain really become unstopable, is when he realise his love and devotion to Shar is not mutual...