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View Full Version : Bizarro World, where Evil adventures against Good



Shoes
2010-10-06, 12:49 AM
So, planning on running a high-powered Evil campaign, with no real limit on the material for building characters, except no homebrews. It's 3.5, and I'll be playing a Vampire (Human) Fighter/Ranger Gestalt DMPC. The story is that Good won several centuries ago, and has gone soft(ish) without an enemy to face, and Evil is creeping back into the world. The party is supposed to take over the world. Now, DM-wise, I'll be trying to murder the party at every chance with optimized Hero Parties played like most PC parties. I need some help fleshing this out with ideas for what kind of adventures to throw at the party besides 'take over the world, lol.'

Help please?

Dralnu
2010-10-06, 01:04 AM
I'm running an evil campaign currently, where the adventurers fight against overwhelming forces of good. Here's some hooks:

- goodies are guarding an evil artifact because they don't have a means of destroying it
- evil tribes of giants / ogres / orcs are currently in disarray but can become a formidable force once more if united
- a celestial portal is allowing a steady stream of outsider reinforcements, cutting it off would be crucial towards conquering the world
- starting up evil cults in secret to gain power
- finding ways to summon demons into the world
- set up evil shrines to dark gods by desecrating good temples and unhallowing the ground with the blood of the paladin protector
- using sabotage / misinformation to break truces between good-aligned kingdoms

Hope that helps.

DranWork
2010-10-06, 01:22 AM
Got to remember that Evil doesn't mean stupid, nor does it mean that they can share the same end goal as a good aligned person. They just generally do it for their own gain rather then the selfless act that good might do it for.

With that said you need to get a good understanding of the wants and needs of your players in the campaign. I generally would take the first sesh or 2 to find out more about what type of character the players want to play, why they are "evil"tm, what they want out of it ext ext. Player goals in Evil campaigns help to drive the over all plot of taking over the world and help force them to play nice with each other... to a point.

So to elaborate more on the point. player X might be playing a Fallen Aasmir Death Knight (throwing stuff out here :smalltongue:) Who is LE and wishes to rule his own kingdom and remake it in his image from a warped sense that the kingdom right now lacks Law/Law is to soft in the current kingdom ext ext. However his goals might work hand in hand with player Y that is playing a Vampric Necromancer who wants to have thralls to do his bidding/experimenting on/feeding on. So perhaps setting up an intimidatory NPC character to bring them together by showing them that they both want the same thing. Works even better if the Vamp for example doesn't particularly want to rule said kingdom.

Also you can fairly easily take what is an existing good hero quest and turn it on its head by having the evil players play out the before scenes. Aka if the good quest is to rescue the Queen from some tower, have the evil characters capture and put her in the tower to begin with. Then give them the chance to stop the hero's as well, just make it realistic and don't go over the top with what you send at the evil dudes. Worst thing you can do is make every encounter impossible cause Driz'zt and his merry band of men's heard that there was bad guys around.

Small realistic steps that help the over all plot help a lot as well. So maybe start with a small village, then a small trade town, then a small city ext ext. By the time they get to owning a kingdom in goody goody land they should be high enough lvl that they can happily defend it from any feasible threat.

The Evil group will need a band of "protagonists" as well to bug them. Basically its all about turning a good campaign around. Give the characters a realist reason to work together early and let the fun begin. If your anything like our group I hope you have a strong stomach, some of the things we've done in evil campaigns are vile :smallbiggrin:

endoperez
2010-10-06, 01:37 AM
"Nothing new under the sun"

I suggest you take a look at Villains By Necessity, a fantasy novel written by Eve Forward. Text copied from TvTropes.

Good has not only defeated Evil in the last great war, but continues to hunt down and eradicate all representatives of darkness. While this makes the world a happier, safer place for the common folk, this also puts the protagonist, Sam, out of a job. After all, Sam is an assassin, and with the world in a state of peace, calm and goodness, there isn't much call for his services.

But wait! There's more: as the forces of Good continue to eradicate Evil, the balance of the world shifts. After Sam and his friend companion often annoying acquaintance Arcie narrowly escape the forces of Good, they stumble across a druid who tells them the ugly truth: if the forces of light continue to overwhelm darkness, the balance will be irreversibly disrupted and the world will be consumed by Good.

As in, cease to exist.

Mostly notable for taking the usual "Evil trying to take over the world" fantasy yarn and turning it on its head.

Lord Vukodlak
2010-10-06, 02:04 AM
A fine example of good and evil sharing the same goal.

The party is trapped in a pocket dimension on an island. Escaping can't be done with simple planar travel magic.

My old lawful evil cleric Christof wants to escape the pocket plane, his wish is to return home to his wife and his children. He is willing to do anything he deems necessary to achieve that goal.

When the party learns the pocket dimension has begun to slowly collapse and if they don't find a way to restore it to the material plane everyone on it would die. This just drives Christof to even more extreme measures especially as their goal draws nearer. He would prefer to save everyone on the island he's not a monster but he'd sacrifice all of them before giving up his own life.

So you see one doesn't even need to flip the adventure around to play evil. You could run a standard campaign with evil PC's they'd just do things differently.

Thajocoth
2010-10-06, 05:44 AM
Evil is actually more flexible. They can fight Good, yes, but they can also fight other Evils. Evil is not a single side... Two different evil groups vying for power will inevitably clash. So pit both against them.

dsmiles
2010-10-06, 05:58 AM
"EVIL IS COOL!"

There. Now that that's out of the way, I can continue. :smalltongue:

Ahem.

Evil vs Good - been there done that.

Evil vs Evil - same.

Honestly, I find evil vs evil to be a little more plausible in a long-term campaign, due the the fact that (in most campaign worlds) good always ends up winning. You can have so many evil vs evil conflicts it's not even funny. My friends and I ran through the entire '3E Adventure Series' (Sunless Citadel, and all of those) with evil characters. It worked because the BBEGs in each (and I'm going to quote my character here) "didn't subscribe to my brand of evil."

Jack Zander
2010-10-06, 08:26 AM
The thread title had me believe that the campaign world was focused around a selfish society, and the "heroic" PCs are adventurers whom deal with all those freaks running around helping others. The local rogue guild just stole all of Scrooge's cash, and you know what happened next? That damn Tiny Tim donated all of his money he had saved up for his condition to Scrooge. We can't have horrifying acts such as this happen in our town. Why don't you guys take out Tiny Tim before he spreads this goodwill cult of his.

I was disappointed.

Myth
2010-10-06, 08:41 AM
Start from the deities. If you are using the 3.5 Deity / planar system, the Evil deities will be all but gone, or reduced to Lesser ones at lest, while the good ones like Pelor/Lathander, Correlon, Tyr etc. will be beasts at maxed or near maxed divine rank.

Since Good has been prominent, deities of arts, crafts, building, agriculture, love, music etc. will be strong as well.

From then on, go on a quest to restore a former Greater deity to power, or massacre the clergy of a good aligned temple in a way the clerics can't be brought back even by Salient Life.

Arcane magic is still the top of the power curve in 3.5, Evil wizards or liches (like Larloch in FR) still exist, but they could be hiding. Get their aid!

Kingdoms are run by kings. Soultrapping them or Imprisoning them or any other means of deposition where they cannot be Ressurrected with ease will sow chaos.

Also, I strongly advise against a DMPC. Unless you have the enemy Radiant Servant splatter him/her in one round soon after the beginning.

Shoes
2010-10-06, 12:30 PM
Well, all this information is helpful. So far, besides my character, one guy wants to run an uber Dread Necro. Or something like that.

Now, how do I start this adventure? Tavern? Prison? Elvish Opium den?

Also, the DMPC is basically going to be my PC Prodding Stick (patent pending) to keep them moving if necessary. And someone not squishy for combat.

snoopy13a
2010-10-06, 12:42 PM
There's essentially three traditional ways to take over the world:

1) Conventional Conquest involving raising an army and defeating everyone in your path
2) A successful coup of a world-wide empire or a large enough country that would facilate conquest
3) Finding/building a "MacGuffin"

The third is probably the best option for your campaign. Each adventure will have the ultimate goal of trying to obtain the MacGuffin. However, obtaining it will be difficult as the players will have to research, find various parts scattered across the world, locate and interogate those with knowledge of the MacGuffin, and so on and so on.

Of course, the forces of Good will learn about the Evil party's quest and attempt to stop them at various steps in the way.

Basically, this is the overarching plot of many science fiction shows. Of course, here the players will be the "bad guys" instead of the "good guys".

dsmiles
2010-10-06, 04:21 PM
There's essentially three traditional ways to take over the world:

1) Conventional Conquest involving raising an army and defeating everyone in your path
2) A successful coup of a world-wide empire or a large enough country that would facilate conquest
3) Finding/building a "MacGuffin"


4) Amassing such wealth that you can buy it.

Musn't forget buying it.

Endarire
2010-10-06, 06:54 PM
Ur-Priest (Complete Divine) is a fair start. Combine with Sublime Chord (Complete Arcane) or Ruby Knight Vindicator (Tome of Battle) for extra potency.

Randel
2010-10-06, 08:42 PM
He's and idea based on the song Brave New World (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_cBp6gi_G2Y&) from Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds musical.

Basically, the was once a great empire full of the so-called monstrous races who lived in their cities. There was probably violence, poverty, lies and the like... but thats how their Empire was.

Then, the humanoid races came and devistated their empire. Heroes and adventurers came and killed the leaders and slaughtered the civilians. The surviving monsters eventually had to survive by starting a new world undergroun, living in the abandoned sewers, tunnels, mines, or caverns below their cities. They were able to save enough magic items and knowledge to let them survive below ground.

The good aligned races lived up on the surface and forgot all about the monsters, but now they have gathered their power once more.

The good aligned races won by having a few high-powered adventurers strike at the Empire instead of the large numbers of low level monsters that the Empire had. Now the good guys have grown complacant and are made up of lots of low-level guys while the monsters have raised their own select few champions.

The Champions have a mission, to reach the surface and wage war on good aligned race above. To slaughter their leaders and massacre their people to gain the levels needed to fight them off. An entire race is waiting to reclaim its place on the surface.

hamishspence
2010-10-07, 03:58 AM
Sounds a lot like 1st edition- only from the monsters' point of view.

In the Dungeoneer's Survival Guide by Douglas Niles, it mentions the Alignment Wars- where the "good" races warred against the "evil" races and many fled underground into the Underdark to escape the genocidal wars:

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=7566139&postcount=155

So- your description is very consistant with D&D back then.

Adamaro
2010-10-07, 04:17 AM
Problem with evil parties is, there is very little interest in "working for a common goal". In the end, every evil PC wants to be the top dog, and the worst are NE and CE characters.

Evil party is a great foundation for constant re-rolling of new characters.

hamishspence
2010-10-07, 04:51 AM
If the party has other ties beyond simply a common alignment- such as friendship, a common goal, and so on, then the "wants to be top dog" aspect doesn't have to dominate the inter-party interaction.

Not all evil characters are extraordinarily ambitious, either.

FelixG
2010-10-07, 05:14 AM
I am given to wonder, if the players are, you know, smart and stay in the background not presenting themselves as targets, are you going to metagame on them and still land highly optimized heroic parties on their head?

a good mantra for any evil character (ones planning on taking over the world anyway) is this: "If I am fighting this person/creature/thing personally, I have done something very very wrong in one of the earlier steps."

Masterminds should be smart enough to not present themselves as targets when they are taking over the world, they should have minions for such things, preferably working in cells who receive their orders via drop locations delivered by other cells ect.

That way no one knows who they are really working for and the stuff gets done. The mastermind should only step in when things are in keeping with his absolute attention. This gives the opposition very little to work with when taking you down and they may clear out a cell or two but the greater flow of things will go on. It leaves you in an unknown quantity as well, by eliminating any potential witnesses.