Why a BBEG...

[NevinPL]

...wouldn't kill (or get rid of in other way) "those meddling" PC's ?
Of course assuming (s)he can.

[Seto]

The big ones are:
1- Laziness. They have perfectly competent (only not) lieutenants to do it for her.
2- Overconfidence. The PCs are beneath her notice.
3- She's too busy dealing with other enemies or rivals, who will take her down if she lets her guard open.
4- The PC's meddling is somehow part of her master plan (does not work for every campaign, but can be a cool twist).

[OldTrees1]

How busy is the BBEG?

How arrogant is the BBEG?

How bored is the BBEG?

How perspective is the BBEG? Are they unaware of the PCs either through the PCs' actions or through the worry of the BBEG's lieutenant?

Is there a prophesy that identifies the PCs as the BBEG's doom? Genre savvy BBEGs will avoid forcing the resolution of the prophesy.

Do the PCs keep escaping almost as if they had insider information?

Is there a curse?

Is there a lone cactus in the middle of a forest?

[Segev]

If he can destroy them, the reasons he wouldn't tend to be one of:

He doesn't know they're a threat/responsible for disrupting his plans.
He can't find them (assuming that's distinct from ability to destroy them if he knew where they were).
They're not yet big enough threats that it's worth his time to address them rather than working on something else.
For example, there might be more powerful foes he's actively working against, or taking time out of his efforts to conquer the kingdom to hunt them down might set back his kingdom-conquering more than they currently are.
Actually, see Wander Over Yonder (a cartoon) for a perpetual example of this.
He's actually very lazy, and there are more fun aspects of being evil to play with right now.
He needs them, for some reason.
They're doing more harm to enemies he considers a bigger threat than they are to him, for now.
The plans they're thwarting are merely plan A; thwarting plan A led to the successful execution of plan B (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/XanatosGambit).

[Geddy2112]

Early on, PC's are probably not even on the radar of a BBEG, and if they are, they are not a threat. The BBEG could squash them like gnats if they wanted to, but they have better things to do then go end the lives of random things.

Even after the PC's are past the stage of rabble, there are other games in town and plenty of opportunities for other things to take them out. If they are trying to mess with the BBEG, the BBEG might send somebody to deal with it, like you would send an underling at work to run an errand.

Eventually they might become somewhat powerful and maybe a threat one day, so the BBEG sends more powerful things, but also might go into hiding, or tear them apart from within, or bargain, or turn others against them.

There also might be the part where at this point they really can't stop them.

Most importantly, if the campaign starts and the PC's are killed after a couple of sessions by a powerful BBEG, the game ends. A game where all powerful omnipotent BBEG kills anything seen as a remote threat ends as soon as the players get a couple of levels under their belt. So the game ends, and at that point why play?

It is part of the metagame that for there to be a story, there have to be protagonists. What if Harry was the boy who died? Or Frodo died and Sauron got the ring first attack from the ring wraiths? Ok, all powerful bad guy won. Cool. Roll new campaign.

[Jay R]

The BBEg always has more going on that just that ridiculous band of lower-level adventurers who keep annoying him.

Sauron didn't crush Frodo because he was focused on the army at the Black Gate.
The Alcalde doesn't crush Zorro because of Zorro's evasion and secret identity.
Joffrey doesn't crush Olenna Tyrell because he doesn't know she's the one who's going to murder him.
Darth Vader doesn't crush Han, Luke, and Leia because he wanted them to lead him to the rebel base.
Xykon doesn't crush Roy because Roy's not important enough even for Xykon to remember his name.

The classic ending is "...and I would have gotten away with it, too, if it wasn't for you meddling kids." The point is that the villain hadn't really worried about the kids. He was too busy trying to fool the adults.

[Nibbens]

Because the PCs are beneath her notice. They ultimately do not matter because the BBEG lich has hidden her phylactery using the secret chest cheese. If they ever meet her face to face, the PCs still won't matter to her plans.

[Falcon X]

Several thoughts:

1. Many Bad Guys don't actually think of themselves as the bad guys. What they are doing might serve some higher purpose they believe in, albeit a misguided one. Even many serial killers are insane enough to believe that what they are doing is part of the natural order or divine mandate. That being said, many are still "The ends justify the means" type of people and will kill the opposition if necessary.
2. You might be too low on their radar. If they are managing a bunch of different things, they might not notice you destroyed Outpost #3 until someone tries to deliver a message to it.
3. Some villains want to be discovered. Serial Killers are famous for this. The opposition is a game to them and they want the game to continue. I think Sherlock Episode 1 went into this directly. This will fail if they are already a widely known bad guy. Then there are already other people paying attention and they don't need you.
4. You might be serving a hidden purpose for them. Maybe they want certain things of their to fail to shed good light on them, eliminate a destructive leader in their ranks, or they are secretly working for the greater good but have to keep up their cover.

[Deepbluediver]

Subsequent to everything that's already been said, sometimes the PC's group is not the biggest or only threat to the BBEG's plans, and he/she/it has to focus their limited resources elsewhere.

Obviously this doesn't work for everyone, but I tend to prefer game-worlds were the PC are NOT the only ones capable of getting things done. Obviously you don't want to upstage your players, but what I mean is other stuff happens around them that they might be only tangentially related to. The BBEG might be dealing with another group or rival atm, or the PCs are only one of several threats. In order to deal with everything, the BBEG would have to murder a lot more than just the PC-group. And that sort of indiscriminate killing (in addition to being expensive in resources) is going to attract even more unkind attention.

If none of the other suggestions work for you, and the players have managed to attract the notice of someone who both wishes them ill and is significantly more powerful, it's not wrong for the campaign to shift focus. "Taking down the BBEG" might become "surviving long enough to formulate a new plan" for a while, provided that your players can take a hint.

[JeenLeen]

I think realism is best maintained when the BBEG has a reason to want the PCs alive.

I was in one game where there were two BBEGs. One was insane and so powerful that he thought we weren't a risk, and actually I don't think he noticed us until the final fight anyway. We got to him in his base as he was about to destroy reality, and he tried to persuade us why he was doing a good deed (in the 'no suffering' sense), and when we proceeded to attack, he was basically annoyed at having to swat the flies away so he could focus.

The other wanted us alive because there was a prophecy about us recovering a magical artifact to (in simple terms) fix a lot of things. The baddies wanted us to get that artifact so they could steal it and break a lot more things.

(Incidentally, game ended with us killing BBEG #1, then being immediately killed a spy working for BBEG #2 that we had help us with the first fight. It was pretty cool.)

[Bucky]

The BBEG might want to avoid attention from the PCs and/or their patrons, judging that the consequences of direct action against them would be worse than permitting their antics.

The BBEG might be waiting for the PCs to hit a high enough level that she gets significant XP and loot for defeating them.

The BBEG might be hoping to recruit the PCs once they hit a high enough level to be useful. It might not be obvious to him how unlikely this is.

The BBEG might like and/or admire the PCs. At least until they directly try to kill him.

The BBEG might enjoy playing with the PCs more than she likes killing them. This is traditional for Fae BBEGs.

[Alent]

My experience is that the BBEG doesn't kill the party because he's usually the party face. Sometimes the party has to kill an NPC the DM thinks is the BBEG, but usually this happens fairly early on. :smallamused:

[Arutema]

* The BBEG can't use his full power outside his doom fortress, for whatever reason.

* The BBEG can't actually leave his doom fortress, at all, and has to use thralls to go after the PCs until they come to him.

* The BBEG has in fact been dead for several centuries, the organization he "leads" is in fact ruled by rather ordinary conspirators.

* The BBEG is again dead for several centuries, but is still able to possess mortal pawns until his spirit is ritually laid to rest.

[ATHATH]

This looks like a job for...

Red Fel!

Red Fel, Red Fel.

[Red Fel]

This looks like a job for...

Red Fel!

Red Fel, Red Fel.

You keep summoning me to these things, when it's mostly been said already.

Look, there can be any number of reasons why a BBEG won't handle the PCs directly. Maybe he doesn't know about them. Maybe he doesn't want to risk becoming known. Maybe he underestimates them. Maybe he overestimates them. Maybe he doesn't respect them enough to dirty his hands on them. Maybe he respects them too much to bring his full power against them. Could be anything.

Thing is, if you're a DM, you can come up with pretty much any reason you want. You play the BBEG. If it works in your head, then it works. It's no stranger than the Drow PC who insists that he received a vision from a Dwarven god urging him to come to the surface and become an NG Druid.

[Honest Tiefling]

You keep summoning me to these things, when it's mostly been said already.

Just tell him that you notice your kouhai.

More on topic, finding a group of six hobos who mostly live in the forest might be hard. PCs are notorious for never wanting to pay for inn rooms, and without substantial druidic magic, combing the forest might not be practical.

You could also throw the group a bone. Perhaps an ally (even one they are not aware of) purposefully or accidentally caused the BBEG to think that the thorn in his side were completely different people. So they went charging off, killing a completely different group of rag-tag heroes from various backgrounds who were learning the meaning of friendship via murder and looting.

[Aegis013]

I had a BBEG leave a group of helpless PCs and just exit the scene, allowing the cause of the helplessness to wear off.

The players know I'm not the type to just spare them for no reason, though they couldn't figure out why this happened until the final encounter in which the BBEG had a semi-monologue and invited the players to ask questions (to distract them as he was charging up his final ability).

The reason he didn't kill them at that time is because he, being undying, had noticed over the course of generations small groups of people that had similar observable traits, and that those people were always extremely prodigious and he had yet to see any of them ever die an unnatural death, even overcoming seemingly impossible odds multiple times. He had concluded that somehow these beings were special and they couldn't be killed and any effort to do so was doomed to fail (he observed plot armor as a phenomenon in-game, and a way to identify those who had it). Thus his final ability, which wasn't ready at that time, was not to designed to kill them, but rather to sever their connection to whatever was granting them protection (to turn them into NPCs, in the meta it would be a fate worse than death as the players would then have no idea what happened next as their characters would cease to be PCs).

That game really went to strange places by the time it was done.

[Eisfalken]

Whenever I make BBEGs in a game, there is always one question that must be resolved at every step along the way:

What's the plan?

Villains never do stuff just because "hurr durr teh evilz!". They want something. They want it more than they give a damn about anything else.

The PCs may alter or interrupt The Plan. But The Plan is the only thing that matters. It's what makes a BBEG so intense: that focus and devotion to the goal.

So why wouldn't he just kill the PCs right off the bat?

First and foremost, how much effort will it take? Sure he may be 10 levels higher with spellcasting. But even a wizard has to measure the risk, and the cost in spells. If you're still building the Tower of Doom, you need all those spells for wall of stone, stone shape, transmute stuff to stuff, etc. If you know you have limited time before a certain thing happens to foil your plans, you can't always afford to juice up for combat plus teleport spells to get to the PCs and back to your Tower of Doom. That's why you send minions and assassins and such.

Second, maybe you need to be stealthy. If you watch the Daredevil TV show on Netflix, notice this is EXACTLY how Wilson Fisk gets away with so much for so long: he stays so far under the radar that it takes a lot of time and effort (and sacrifice) to expose his misdeeds. So what if those meddling kids just killed one of the guys doing something important for the BBEG? Unless they have some proof there's any bigger conspiracy at work, they won't even realize they've stumbled on to something.

Next, the BBEG may realize that he can actually use the PCs. I once talked a DM into letting me play a Lawful Evil tiefling wizard in a Ravenloft game. How? Because I explained exactly what my intentions were: to use the party as a shield against other evil things, because evil knows its own kind, and I had plans of my own to do things and attain power. If you're evil and you need to take out a rival or threat, who better than the people who are fighting for good? If the PCs are evil, same principle applies: you turn one evil upon the other and let them eat each other. If the PCs win, there's still less evil in the world, and you still win. Or maybe the BBEG knows they might be able to seduce one of the PCs to the ol' Dark Side there, give them the whole "we're not so different, you and I" speech.

Lastly, the BBEG may simply need to delay destroying the PCs until the right moment. Perhaps some strange prophecy requires certain events to unfold a certain way before the BBEG can make good on his plans. Or maybe the exact opposite is true: what if destroying the Chosen One (who just happens to be one of the PCs) ushers in other events that work against the BBEG?

Motive is EVERYTHING with the BBEG. Before lifting a single dice to attack the PCs, think rationally about what the potential outcome could be. Did the PC cleric's church send them out to find the BBEG? Killing them is as good as raising a flaming sign in the sky saying, "Yep, I'm right here." Maybe you send a minion after them, something weaker than you but enough to make them think it's the real threat, or at least the one they are looking for.

Or the BBEG may not do anything at all, and let the PCs waste whole sessions chasing down wild geese and false leads. All the while, the Tower of Doom grows bigger and bigger, and the BBEG gets closer and closer to victory...

[Seto]

Thus his final ability, which wasn't ready at that time, was not to designed to kill them, but rather to sever their connection to whatever was granting them protection (to turn them into NPCs, in the meta it would be a fate worse than death as the players would then have no idea what happened next as their characters would cease to be PCs).

That game really went to strange places by the time it was done.

That sounds fun. Did he succeed?

[Esprit15]

Like others have said, sometimes it isn't worthwhile. Sometimes they like to play with their food before eating it. Sometimes they do take out one person, and then assume part of the problem is done, only for the party to run into another equally powerful individual to help them.

Ex: One villain in a game I ran discovered two PCs rummaging through his war plans. Rather than kill them, he interrogated them about who they worked for. When he found out that it was the people he was already planning to war against, he had them send a message to the enemy king, then blinded one and deafened the other as a warning to never cross him again. Some people want their name to be feared, not just known. That can't happen if everyone you meet dies.

[Jay R]

On the set of the George Reeves Superman show, they often asked why nobody recognized Clark Kent as Superman. The standard answer, lame though it is, is that Clark wears glasses.

In one episode, Superman had been hit with some super-weapon, and he was (as Clark) sick in bed. When Lois, Jimmy, and Perry visited him, he wasn't wearing his glasses. Somebody asked, "OK, now why don't we recognize him as Superman?"

Noel Neill, the actress playing Lois, replied, "Because we want to keep our jobs."

Similarly, why doesn't the BBEG kill the PCs? Because I want to keep running the game.

[NevinPL]

Thank you for replies.
Some are new, some confirm that ideas like "noble evil", aren't just my (wacky) ideas :)

Some clarifications:
By BBEG I meant him\her, and minions, "outsourcing".
I don't really want to kill them, but like it was said - "motive is everything", and not being BBEG, I had trouble coming up with more than a few.
I'm looking for ingame reasons\ideas, not metagame.

[Esprit15]

If the party can't kill what comes at them, then they die. Character death is part of this game.

[Nibbens]

On the set of the George Reeves Superman show, they often asked why nobody recognized Clark Kent as Superman. The standard answer, lame though it is, is that Clark wears glasses.

In one episode, Superman had been hit with some super-weapon, and he was (as Clark) sick in bed. When Lois, Jimmy, and Perry visited him, he wasn't wearing his glasses. Somebody asked, "OK, now why don't we recognize him as Superman?"

Noel Neill, the actress playing Lois, replied, "Because we want to keep our jobs."

Similarly, why doesn't the BBEG kill the PCs? Because I want to keep running the game.

I laughed out loud at this - no truer words have been spoken. Can I sig a portion of this?

[Aegis013]

That sounds fun. Did he succeed?

No, the players murder hobo'd him hard. The power levels of the game were such that non-meta challenges were trifles to the group as it had gone so long they could freely travel several minutes backwards in time (something the BBEG had a defense against which was alluded to earlier in the game, but the group had come up with no counter for that defense). I gave them unlimited time to come up with their plan and they deliberated for probably 14 hours or so over two days before deciding how to act, knowing that failure meant death or worse.

The group was three people, one used blood and life magic to open a portal to the realm of souls, one used her ability to tap into the collective unconscious for info to target the bad guy's soul and the last used balefire (ripped straight from wheel of time) on the dude's soul.

They would have lost limbs, at least, from the guy's defenses but balefire undid it.

The game wasn't actually 3.5/PF so I can't give builds.

[RedMage125]

4- The PC's meddling is somehow part of her master plan (does not work for every campaign, but can be a cool twist).

Ah, the Xanatos Gambit (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/XanatosGambit). My personal favorite.

[Jay R]

I laughed out loud at this - no truer words have been spoken. Can I sig a portion of this?

Of course; thanks for asking. But I figure that I can keep my words private, or I can post them on the Internet. I cannot believe that I could do both.