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Keinnicht
2010-12-11, 04:06 PM
I'm running a good campaign at the moment (Good as in alignment, it's probably only an average campaign) and my player seems to have a desire to be evil. As such, I figured I'd run an evil campaign after this one ends.

My question is, how do evil campaigns work? What sort of adventures work well? I'm assuming the campaign would be more oriented towards the pursuit of personal wealth and power rather than stopping eBil from spreading throughout the land.

Any advice, tips, suggestions for campaigns/adventures? I figured there'd be some normal dungeon-delving, since I'm guessing evil characters like to kill monsters and get shiny things just as much as good ones do. I was thinking I might have them be members of some kind of evil organization at first, so their goals are more defined while they get a handle on their character.

A specific campaign I was thinking of was members of the Githyanki military, which would be a rather extreme change of pace from our current campaign. Plus I was thinking the decision to be absorbed by the Lich Queen, or to go rogue, or to actually try and kill the Lich Queen, could be a very interesting quandary for the players.

Chilingsworth
2010-12-11, 04:09 PM
You could try having the players be part of a mercenary company. They don't have to be so much dedicated to evil as willing to comit it. Then they work for the highest bidders, which will often be badguys.

hamishspence
2010-12-11, 04:16 PM
There are many different shades of Evil-

from heroes with zero moral restraint about "doing what's necessary" (in their view),

to strongly self-centred characters who will do whatever advances their interests,

to those "out for revenge" whose revenge is of an evil nature- torture, soul-destruction, and the like,

to characters pursuing overall Evil goals, like the furtherance of the interests of Evil deities, or Archdevils, or creatures from the Far Realm wishing to make the universe over.

And more. As long as "evil deeds" are done for some reason or another- the Evil character can do anything.

J.Gellert
2010-12-11, 04:22 PM
Our evil campaign was perhaps our single best campaign yet.

The basic premise was this; there is a Big Bad, he isn't particularly "darker" than us, and he had slighted us all somehow. But he is very very powerful, so the party groups together to take him down.

So it wasn't Grey vs Black (our party was EVIL, though you could make a case for the fighter being just a victim of circumstance) but the Big Bad was a more obvious threat.

Adventures revolved around working with the thieves' guild to gain favors, being harassed by the Big Bad's "allies" (clergy of Tiamat), getting backstabbed a lot, and rushing for a very specific power source before the Big Bad could even learn about it.

Needless to say, it involved a whole lot of backstabbing, especially with the thieve's guild.

The weird thing is, now that I think about, that most of the time we weren't really facing the Big Bad, or even his obvious lackeys (meaning: not counting secret minions and backstabbing). It was a very indirect campaign, even though we had a very specific target ("kill that scumbag"), the scumbag only fought us twice near the end. And one time he was disguised as someone else and we didn't find out until later.

Burner28
2010-12-11, 04:24 PM
the most important of all is to try to give your characters a specific personality, history, motivation, specialisation(in terms of the kind of evil deeds the would want to commit) before giving them a specific alignment on the Law-Chaos axis

Scoot
2010-12-11, 04:40 PM
The only Evil campaign I've ever been in revolved around the party slowly taking over the world, by powers both political and physical.

It was mostly sandbox, and the DM's actions were largely reactionary.

But I'm guessing that's not what you're looking for.

You should ask your players what type of "Evil" they want to be. Whether it's the afformentioned "will to do evil", or a desire to run out and actively commit evil deeds.

Remmirath
2010-12-11, 04:44 PM
My question is, how do evil campaigns work? What sort of adventures work well? ... Any advice, tips, suggestions for campaigns/adventures?

In my experience, pretty much like good campaigns, except the characters are evil. You can certainly have a campaign where the overall goal is to do evil, but usually they're going out on adventures just like the other characters.

Adventures that require somebody to probably be good to want to help somebody won't work, but other than that they're all pretty fair game. Those can work too, if the evil characters in question would do the same thing but for a different motive (helping the villagers because of a large reward and possibly killing them later if they're that sort as opposed to out of the kindness of their hearts).

Having the characters work for an evil organisation does work pretty well, I'd say. You need to make sure that they have some reason to work together, particularly if your players are the kind to think evil = not getting along with anybody.



A specific campaign I was thinking of was members of the Githyanki military, which would be a rather extreme change of pace from our current campaign. Plus I was thinking the decision to be absorbed by the Lich Queen, or to go rogue, or to actually try and kill the Lich Queen, could be a very interesting quandary for the players.

I must say, I really like this idea. I don't know about your players, of course, but I would definitely play in that.

Callista
2010-12-11, 06:07 PM
You could try having the players be part of a mercenary company. They don't have to be so much dedicated to evil as willing to comit it. Then they work for the highest bidders, which will often be badguys.This is a good idea--it lets your players fit any kind of evil character into the campaign, from the guy who simply doesn't have a lot of morals to the cultist-of-doom who is in it for pure evil.

You can have them do a lot of the same stuff. Think about why someone might want to hire mercenaries. They'll often be up against other evil people who are simply at cross-purposes to their employers; on the other hand, they could be sent to assassinate or exterminate Good-aligned groups or individuals that have been harassing their Evil-aligned boss.

Other tips:
1. Make some rules about PvP. Do you want to allow any and all PvP? Do you want to require the players to talk out-of-character about PvP that might be happening (so that nobody ends up just slitting throats while people are asleep)? Or do you want to ban PvP, either entirely or until the end-stages of the campaign?

2. Don't go for the gore-and-filth stuff. That gets old fast, and the best you'll get is players trying to gross each other out.

3. Remember that, even if you're playing an evil campaign, players will still have limits about what will be fun for them. Yes, your evil character might commit rape; but if there are players in the game who don't want to see that happen, then you'll have to add it to the ground rules that you either fade-to-black or don't do it in the first place.

4. If you've got non-evil characters in the party, you need to be sure they have a good reason to be there. Do you want to ban Good characters entirely? It's generally a good idea to do so, though it can work if the player can accept that his character will either eventually become corrupted, leave the party, or die. (Much like an evil character in a good party, actually.)

Keinnicht
2010-12-11, 06:38 PM
Other tips:
1. Make some rules about PvP. Do you want to allow any and all PvP? Do you want to require the players to talk out-of-character about PvP that might be happening (so that nobody ends up just slitting throats while people are asleep)? Or do you want to ban PvP, either entirely or until the end-stages of the campaign?


Generally I allow PVP, provided the person can provide a sound explanation for why their character would attack his allies.


2. Don't go for the gore-and-filth stuff. That gets old fast, and the best you'll get is players trying to gross each other out.


I never go into much detail. I really can't be bothered to think of that many ways to describe dripping wounds.




4. If you've got non-evil characters in the party, you need to be sure they have a good reason to be there. Do you want to ban Good characters entirely? It's generally a good idea to do so, though it can work if the player can accept that his character will either eventually become corrupted, leave the party, or die. (Much like an evil character in a good party, actually.)

Yeah, I figured this would be an "evil" campaign. I try to get players to keep in mind other party alignments, so evil alignments are semi-banned in my normal campaigns. They're not banned, it's just people generally decide against after having the difficulty involved explained to them.

dsmiles
2010-12-11, 08:31 PM
Honestly a lot of the same adventures work for "the evil party." The main difference is the plot hook to get them into the adventure, the motives for doing the adventure, and outcome of the adventure.

Example: My friend ran the 3e Adventure Series for us. We decided to be evil. In The Sunless Citadel, we ended up enslaving the kobolds, and taking over the town. This wasn't instead of completing the adventure, this was along with completing the adventure.

You have to be prepared to cater to the evil party. They're usually not satisfied with what's in the adventure, and want to add to it.

Godskook
2010-12-11, 08:41 PM
The number one switch between a "Good" campaign and an "Evil" campaign is DM expectation. In a "Good" one, you expect that, in general, people will behave "as expected"(prefer negotiation to battle, no killing on sight, etc, etc), while in an "Evil" campaign, literally anything goes, and unless the party has strong bonds, they might be asking themselves "why am I adventuring with this dead weight?"

So what you need to do as DM is either ground-rule "party works together", or use the standard AGC tactic of providing a *reason* to work together. A more powerful benefactor would be mad if your team-kill attitude ruined his plot. And then, be prepared for the spells to fly the moment said benefactor steps out of their way.

And then there's the NPCs, whom you should expect to be treated like chaff or kicking-puppies unless they can prove themselves to be worthy opponents.