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crazywolf
2010-06-22, 07:21 PM
I'm a new DM and i have decited to run a campaig with a few friends but i didnt expect them to make evil charecters and i am not sure if my adventure idea will work because they're already unpredictable without being evil :smalleek:. well what i'm trying to ask is has this happend to you? and if so how did you deal with it and how did you keep the players from murdering and pilageing everything? i have had ideas for an evil campaign like mabye they could fight bounty hunters instead of evil bandits? but what are your sugestions?

gallagher
2010-06-22, 07:23 PM
I'm a new DM and i have decited to run a campaig with a few friends but i didnt expect them to make evil charecters and i am not sure if my adventure idea will work because they're already unpredictable without being evil :smalleek:. well what i'm trying to ask is has this happend to you? and if so how did you deal with it and how did you keep the players from murdering and pilageing everything? i have had ideas for an evil campaign like mabye they could fight bounty hunters instead of evil bandits? but what are your sugestions?

well, first of all, make sure they have a real reason to stick together. as evil characters, they are prone to doing things that arent good for a team.

secondly, make the police force powerful, it should keep them in check (relatively)

make it adverse to their goals to go all willy-nilly and burning and looting also

Snake-Aes
2010-06-22, 07:29 PM
Over anything else, make sure they pay for what they do if they aren't careful in any settlement. Sure, they will get away with removing the lycanthrope threat on the faraway village by "killing everyone", but they can't be violent in a city without attracting very unwanted attention.

If your plot just doesn't fit evil people...well, rewrite it or get them to change their alignments. Evil doesn't have to be dumb and it's perfectly possible for evil people to be integrated in society, they just can't be open about it.

crazywolf
2010-06-22, 07:31 PM
well, first of all, make sure they have a real reason to stick together. as evil characters, they are prone to doing things that arent good for a team.

secondly, make the police force powerful, it should keep them in check (relatively)

make it adverse to their goals to go all willy-nilly and burning and looting also

huh i see were your geting at thats, a good idea keep them controlled but it still lets them loot and kill stuff i have had an idea for a town (more like a hideout) for thieves, criminals, and such which is run by the thieves guild and the party works for them instead of a king or something what do you think?

Thajocoth
2010-06-22, 07:32 PM
What I would do with an evil party is have them work for a powerful evil force that's much higher in level, and has a lot of other lackeys. Maybe a dragon or something.

On top of that though... An evil party is a bit more flexible, as evil can fight evil just as easily as good. Bandits stole from the town? Maybe they kill the bandits, and then keep the stolen loot. Have occasional bounty hunters, or even a party of good adventurers come after them. There are a couple such party's in the Monster Builder. They're level 3... One of them's Unaligned, the other is all Good & Lawful Good.

crazywolf
2010-06-22, 07:39 PM
thank you, you guys have been VERY helpful and i will think about the "no killing in the city" rule and how to inforce it....i could just tell them to be nice or else they'll be writing up new charecters :smallwink:

crazywolf
2010-06-22, 07:41 PM
What I would do with an evil party is have them work for a powerful evil force that's much higher in level, and has a lot of other lackeys. Maybe a dragon or something.

On top of that though... An evil party is a bit more flexible, as evil can fight evil just as easily as good. Bandits stole from the town? Maybe they kill the bandits, and then keep the stolen loot. Have occasional bounty hunters, or even a party of good adventurers come after them. There are a couple such party's in the Monster Builder. They're level 3... One of them's Unaligned, the other is all Good & Lawful Good.

huh never thought they would be more flexible but now that i think about it, thats true thank you

jumpet
2010-06-22, 07:48 PM
You need to clearly state OOC expectations. Evil campaigns can quickly degrade into silliness. Senseless acts of violence and destruction that will lead to the destruction of the game. The higher the level, the more seductive the call of silly evil. ie plane shifting/gating powerful outsiders into a quaint little village because ... because they can.

If it gets to this stage there is little that can be done to save the game.

There is no reason evil PCs can't be heroic and out to save the world. Afterall performing good dead yields many rewards, be it money, women or fame. All more than enough motivation for self serving evil PC types.

Also experience has shown that evil PCs can really struggle to survive. Even simple things like healing need to be considered, and also access to holy weapons for fighting demons, devils etc. The problem with evil is you also tend to fight your own.

Otodetu
2010-06-22, 08:10 PM
The solution to a evil party? A evil world.

The land that is ruled by the cleric-hood of Nerull and the fiendish lich wizard king and his ghost attendant is going to be able to cope with any amount of evil npc's.

A shop you say? Well the shop-keeper is behind his invisible steel wall, and there is a one-way drawer for moving gold and items in it.

Everyone expects their closest ones to cut their throat if given the chance, therefore no-one trust anyone.

Every settlement is a small fort full of paranoid souls plotting to survive.
Villagers are clad in leather armour and carry whatever weapon they have to defend themselves.

People and adventurers have to be wary for groups of marauding gargoyles looking for mayhem and necromancers with squads of undead on corpse-gathering trips.

And all the time the kingdom is living in fear of the undead legions of the betrayer up in the north, he who instigated the cleansing so long ago, and not to mention the hordes of orcs in the east, the mysterious boat-nation ruled by gnome aristocrats and hextor militants.

Trust me; your players will be fighting to hard to survive in a political minefield of evil to even consider burning down a village, and what if the leader of the trade-guild there is a powerful adept with a pet behir?

elonin
2010-06-22, 08:21 PM
I don't agree with the statement that evil groups break apart while good ones stick together. Just started a new campaign that has some potential to break apart with all good characters due to legal wranglings. Also in a LARP I played in the good people were at each others throats being split into factions and having a lot of in fighting, at the same time as the evil people tended to get along out of necessity. There was some aspect of the "lets bring down a paladin" mentality shared by not only the evil but also a fair number of the evil people.

Snake-Aes
2010-06-22, 08:25 PM
This thread can be resumed as "People really love to bash each other's heads".

Don't worry about how likely a group is to stick together based on alignment. It's more fun if they have reasons to stick together, especially if they play well whatever internal animosity there may be.

Mastikator
2010-06-22, 08:26 PM
Otodetu speaks the truth.

Sc00by
2010-06-22, 08:29 PM
'Chaotic' Evil wants to be avioded amongst your PCs. 'Why did you kill all the farmers?' 'Because!' Shouldn't ever cut it. But Murdering your way to a Throne? Well that's fine ;)

Having them work for, or at least nominally be responsible to, a BBEG that doesn't want a lot of attention is a good way to curb the murderous, etc tendencies. Ripping off the entire town isn't such a good idea when your epic caster level boss finds out you've drawn unnecessary attention to him and his plans...

Edit: that is assuming you don't go for a totally evil world as suggested above.

Snake-Aes
2010-06-22, 08:32 PM
'Chaotic' Evil wants to be avioded amongst your PCs. 'Why did you kill all the farmers?' 'Because!' Shouldn't ever cut it. But Murdering your way to a Throne? Well that's fine ;)

Having them work for, or at least nominally be responsible to, a BBEG that doesn't want a lot of attention is a good way to curb the murderous, etc tendencies. Ripping off the entire town isn't such a good idea when your epic caster level boss finds out you've drawn unnecessary attention to him and his plans...

If they want to play stupid evil, there's little to do there. Aimless destruction is avoided by giving them a goal. Rampant but guided destruction is dealt with by challenging them. Not so happy about killing for fun now that the entire countryside knows that, isn't it?

PersonMan
2010-06-22, 08:35 PM
'Chaotic' Evil wants to be avioded amongst your PCs. 'Why did you kill all the farmers?' 'Because!' Shouldn't ever cut it.

So...just explain Stupid Evil and tell your players that it isn't alright?

In my opinion, as long as the party stays away from Stupid Evil and is willing to put some effort into coming up with reasons for their group to stick together, it should be fine.

WarKitty
2010-06-22, 08:37 PM
I tend to play with more evil characters than good characters. Make them come up with backstories. What you want is to avoid psychotics, not evils. How many of them are chaotic?

Also, find something they want, and make sure they need to work together to get it. Something that would be suicide for any one or two of them to try alone.

NeoVid
2010-06-22, 08:40 PM
Evil doesn't have to be dumb and it's perfectly possible for evil people to be integrated in society, they just can't be open about it.

They could be completely open about it if they're servants of the evil empire, like the PCs in my current evil game.

Mission 1 was "Kill these Good rebels."

Snake-Aes
2010-06-22, 08:46 PM
True, that can also be done. I'm not familliar with the Evil Empire situation as a protagonist =(