How do you like your villains?

[ebarde]

I feel that the best villain duos are usually the ones where one is more traditionally evil while the other at least has some sort of reasoning or backstory to justify the bad stuff they do. Mostly cause you get the benefits of a strong unredeemably evil villain that the heroes have no choice but fighting head on, and one that is a tad more complicated and can serve as a wildcard in the story.

[Necris Omega]

Entertaining.

Sympathy can run out, menace has to be undone, and justified (or "justified") generally isn't all that satisfying in the end. "Relatable" has hard limits, and so does competent.

But a villain like Xykon? I don't see Xykon ever failing to satisfy in whatever role he's in. Watching him win, watching him ham it up, watching him lose...? He does it all, and does it well to an extent that really does the captain of Team Evil credit. He has the humor, the punch, the fun, and... well, he doesn't have the heart, though he may well have a collection of those stashed somewhere. In short, he's incredibly effective, fits the comic perfectly, and is, by my reckoning, the best villain in the story.

[Reathin]

While it's by no means an absolute requirement, I tend to prefer my villains to be

1) Absurdly powerful but still in the same general scale of the heroes (ie. (s)he might be the most powerful wizard in the world by a huge margin, but they aren't flat out deities, for instance)

and

2) Polite. Genuinely polite.

You don't have to have both to be a villain that I am interested in, but that combination is usually a surefire thing for me. I like my antagonists with a bit of class to go with the schooling they can dish out.

For OOTS specifically, I don't have a direct favorite more like "tiers".

Like:
Xykon: Exchange "polite" for "funny, but still menacing". Xykon's always a treat on screen.

Redcloak: "Evil for a good cause" may be semi cliche at this point, but I really like how well the Giant plays up his Sunk Cost Fallacy, and the fact that he's done some genuinely awful thing (not just minor evil) in pursuit of his goals. I kinda hope that while he pays for his crimes, his ultimate goal of goblin equality gains some real traction. Maybe in spite of him, rather than because of him, just to drive home the idea that he wasn't justified.

The IFCC: Villains actually getting along as an effective unit is great, and I can't wait to see how their carefully contructed house of cards comes down. They also facilitated Darth V, which is one of my favorite segments in the comic.

Thog: The Giant was right. He IS hard to hate, even as brutal as he is.

Tarquin: Genre savvy, intelligent but not quite as much as he thinks he is, good planning, style for days, Tarquin was great to watch (and, earlier on when he was in control, hit my two points very effectively). His King or Deity speech was one of my favorites (beaten only by Zykon's "There is only power and style, and in a pinch, style can slide" speech in the backstory).

Neutral:
Ancient Black Dragon: Excellent motivation. Doesn't even close to justify her actions.

Durkon*/Durkoff: The vampire spirit was well written, and his plans very smooth. I love/hate his "you are who you are on your worst day" speech, because it's not fully true (even beyond Durkon's epic rebuttal), but it mixes just enough truth in with the Kafka Trap that people often self-impose of "if you deny a painful thing, it must actually be true and you're in denial". That's a bit of sore spot for me.

Hate

Nale: All of my hatred, annoyance, disdain and rage at him, both as a person and as a character, exceed the sum of every other one in the comic combined. I HATED Nale and it was way too personal, really. Like, I considered every moment he was on screen a waste of good ink, from his obnoxious intervention at all the wrong times to his stupid theme. His death at the hands of a more competent villain, when it was such a clear consequence of his own stupidity? I was grinning, ear to ear, for like half an hour, laughing frequently. The ONE moment I actually liked him was his "how's the family" line to Mallik (spelling, sorry). That was a REALLY good line. But thinking of him being disintegrated and blasted away STILL makes me happy.

Hel: In this case, it's purely personal dislike. She's a great character. I just find the "bratty teenager" attitude annoying. Well suited, though. And solid plan.

There's more, but I'm out of time for now, and my keyboard is literally starting to break a bit, so that's enough for now!

[ebarde]

I feel that villains like Tarquin that are sorta very entitled and somewhat childish usually work when everyone around them sorta takes them down a peg. I feel that if after Tarquin lost his cool everyone on both sides didn't started acknowledging that he's a raging manchild at that stage, he would have been a bit annoying to read about.

[kingwrynn]

The Black dragon was the best hands down, narratively anyway. Others were entertaining for sure, but for me that was a completely unexpected plot twist, that made the world feel REAL. Of course the dragon would seek revenge (even though we didn't know about it's existence yet). Vaarsuvius taking the devil's powers and attempting to take out Xykon after brought about a moment of growth and humility similar in magnitude to Belkar's inner struggles during the Paladin's Mark.

To chime in on the discussion of Tarquin, I think how effective he was is understated. Sure he is not a villain of the "let's end the world" variety like Xykon or Vampire-Durkon, and he indulges in evil more for the sake of power and control than for the sake of sheer malevolence, but he is effective and entertaining nonetheless. His primary weapons of "collecting and wielding friends, temporary allies who owe favors, and mercenaries," is the evil equivalent of the good guys winning when they are outmatched through the powers of "scrappy resourcefulness and the power of friendship." It is impressive the way he is a few steps ahead of his opponents, including the party (though it is hard to give him credit there, since the party was somewhat forced to treat him as an ally due to Elan's naivety). The charming villain with sinister motives is a trope that I think he did well with, and such villains are rarely all-powerful. He was more of a bond villain than say Thanos from the Avengers.

While I think many seemed to find the Linear Guild bleh, I think they probably rank #2 on the list of best villains in the comic for me. Showing all the internal strife and recruitment within the LG just served to make them seem weak, not good at planning, not good at executing a plan, motivated by silly trifles...really not good villains in any way....so why do i list them as the second best? They set the bar REALLY low for the party. Even as dumb as they were they managed to use the party to infiltrate the dungeon for the amulet, ambush and separate the party at Tarquin's arena, destroy one of the gates, and plenty of other inconveniences. Sure they mostly always escaped from the LG unscathed, but much of the growth we see of the main characters begins with characters like the LG showing us just how BAD the heroes in oots are at even the basic things when they were low level and were not functioning at all as a cohesive team. By showing the heroes falling into the plots and schemes of these B (or maybe even C or D) list villains, it leaves them SO MUCH room to improve throughout the comics. Compare them scouting the area like a trained group of army rangers (ignoring Durkon) in the current strip to scenes like in #24. Which reminds me, they were also at times pretty entertaining comic relief, which at the time i think the comic was much more focused on than all of these narrative threads. My last point on them, they connected the party to a lot of their future struggles such as Tarquin, the IFCC, and the Hilgya/Kudzu situation.

So to answer how I like my villains, I can appreciate all types, but I very much enjoy a villain that can bring out a big plot twist.

[Goosefarble]

I actually really love Gin-Jun in How the Paladin Got His Scar. He feels like a really grounded villain with clear motives despite his short appearance. His line of "Not another 25 years... not another 25 minutes." sends chills down my spine whenever I read it, and the way he butts heads with O-Chul makes HTPGHS my favourite O-Chul appearance.

[Precure]

Well cooked.

[ebarde]

Honestly I wouldn't really rank the Black Dragon all that high, cause while it was a pretty interesting concept, there just wasn't really enough time to get all that familiar with the character I suppose? Plus she came in a book that was sorta very crowded, with the party all split up and dealing with lots of different things. My favorite badguy is probably Redcloak, although Zz'dtri is probably unwarantedly high for me for some reason.

I just think he's pretty entertaining, he kinda gives me a Soundwave vibe as in a henchmen that doesn't talk much but seems to be fairly competent and loyal. I also kinda wondered what was in it for him when it came to joining the guild, I guess to some extent he wanted the salty runback with V, but he never really questioned Nale's authority which makes me think he had some sort of respect for him.

[Deffers]

Xykon's my fave. And oddly, it's because I don't see him as a one-dimensional character. On the contrary, it's not until Tarquin that I realized just how dynamic I found him.

Tarquin is an excellent villain. I love how his toxicity just slowly seeps into everything and you see him as truly loathsome. I hate him so much. His abusive maneuvering is very authentic.

In contradistinction, despite Xykon's viciousness, there's not really anything in him that makes me hate him with that vigor. In a sense, he's too unempathetic with others to sink as low as someone like Tarquin does-- see how he managed to give Lirian and Dorukan a happy afterlife in his attempts at making them suffer forever.

In my mind, Xykon has a lot of good qualities that aren't Good qualities. He relishes a challenge. He's actually intelligent. He's got a sense of humor. He's unpretentious. He's a remarkably deep thinker. I still think of his "power equals power" speech every now and again. Or the way he tears V's motivations apart during their fight. I don't think he truly respects other people, but he seems to respond well to chutzpah-- until he actually starts losing because of it and gets serious. Every now and then I think I see something a little bit more in him than you'd initially expect. Like when Redcloak talks about how killing a paladin got less satisfying than he remembers and Xykon goes "Yeah, that happens when you get older, sometimes." Or the bit where he faces death with resignation when the ghostly paladins were about to cut him down. There's a certain element to Xykon where he displays an authentically high WIS score combined with such a horrid and irredeemable personality that I think makes him interesting by comparison to everyone else.

I always imagine him being voiced by, like, Harlan Ellison but with some grit. Or maybe a dirtbag comedian type along those same lines. Like if George Carlin were just completely voided of all compassion and handed an artillery battery's worth of firepower.

ABD's one of my faves just because her grief was very much... just incredibly understandable and her viciousness so complete. I actually see them as another High INT High WIS evil character. And the way the escalation between her and V went is also just kinda good to me.
I actually hope we see Nale again. It'd feel like a major loose end since Sabine still exists. But at the same time, his character kinda has a terminus in Tarquin. You can't bring Nale back without centering the conversation on how he moves past Tarquin. Which runs contrary to the ending that Tarquin ended on. I'm interested to see where that goes.

[brian 333]

It's really hard to rank them because each has filled a particular role and if not perfect in that role, then pretty close.

I think I like best how The Giant has used, (and subverted,) tropes in his story as an expose or exploration of the tropes themselves while building a solid story. It's as if we are attending a master level course in Literature: English 303, Villains and Archvilains, Professor Burlew, 3 credits.

[ebarde]

Honestly, I don't really get a whole lot on how not showing Tarquin ever again is the only way they can "beat" him. Tarquin wanted to go down swinging sure, but this isn't really a the only winning move is not to play thing. Unless we get some sort of update on his storyline he's still killing lots of innocent people and being a ruthless tyrant. Yeah he probably doesn't feel good about not getting to face off against Elan, but that doesn't really change that he's still making people suffer and be miserable.

Obviously there's also the whole rebel coalition thing, but even then they don't really have any estabilished way of taking him and his legion down except for a plan we know nothing whatsoever about. I don't think it's a particularly satisfying place to leave his story on, cause any personal victory the heroes got is undercut by him still being able to do evil stuff with very little in terms of an actual opposition.

I just feel that the way to beating a bad guy isn't just giving him a "gotcha" but actually stopping him, ya know?

[understatement]

I do fully believe that we'll see Tarquin defeated, but it'll be a single panel befitting of his ego.

I would also like to mildly revise my opinion after re-reading SOD: I want to see Xykon get devoured by the Snarl. The scene where

Spoiler: SOD

Show

he makes Right-Eye burn down his village

was such a kick in the guts. Seriously, Redcloak was so close.

In other words, Xykon is a colossal ****. I like my villains significantly less petty.

[deltamire]

While Xycon is probably the funnest to read out of all the villains, I gotta hand it to Tarquin - it's been a while since an antagonist just stuck with me that much. I think what elevated him for me was the BRITF end-of-book commentary, as it changed him from 'well-written descent into desperation and self-made end' into a genuinely terrifying villain, because Tarquin isn't just a character after that. He's that insidious little voice in the back of your mind that's just so hard to shake off. Almost everyone probably knows, or has met someone like him, which makes him just so compelling and grounded compared to, say, a wisecracking, world-ending lich with more power than patience. However, Xycon is just so matter of fact when it comes to being evil it's almost . . . Admirable? There's no deep tragic motive, there's no complex argument regarding how he's secretly better than the heroes, he's just . . . Having a grand ol' time. It's always a good palette cleanser for a story in which a good portion of the heroes spent the first half of the story being, like, terrible to each other and everyone in a kilometre radius.

I'm looking forward to the next few pages with Redcloak, though. I haven't yet read SOD, but have absorbed enough, protista-style, of his story to understand his motivations. Hopefully his development won't come at a cost of turning Durkon into ground beef.

[ebarde]

I feel like the takeaway here despite of how cheesy it is, is that there's not just one way to be a good villain lol like, I see a bunch of writing advice going "the only good villains are those that believe they are the hero" and ultimately a villain just needs to be whatever the story requires them to be. It's also fairly coherent to our real world that not everyone is super invested in morality and such, and just does bad things cause they don't particularly care enough not to or gain something from it.

[RatElemental]

The only real quality I definitely want in a villain is a reason for them to be a villain. It doesn't need to be a complex tragic backstory, they could just be a greedy jerk who was in the right place at the right time for all their worst qualities to manifest and achieve some high level bad stuff. Luckily, every OotS villain I can think of falls into this category, the ones that don't tend to be in cartoons aimed at children.

[ebarde]

Most of the worst examples of bad guys I've seen are usually on superhero stuff, mostly cause often there isn't a good job of taking fantastical stakes and grounding them with something we can understand. Villains are too often "Destroy the world, for reasons humans can't even comprehend" types, which isn't really fun cause that hardly ever warrants an emotional response. Even in stories about eldritch horrors, I usually find the best ones to be when the antagonist represents something real instead of just vague evilness.

[Angelalex242]

Miko.

They were SO CLOSE to pushing her back to the light, and failed just that little bit in the end. Her story could easily have taken another path.

[Fyraltari]

Miko.

They were SO CLOSE to pushing her back to the light, and failed just that little bit in the end. Her story could easily have taken another path.

The thing is, you can't push people to the light. You can only point the way, they have to lift themselves there. Miko didn't want to do that, she didn't want to even acknowledge she'd stepped out of the light.

[Angelalex242]

She had, what, 24 hours of being out of the light before dying?

There are 5 stages of grief, the first being denial.

She kinda died before she could get through the other 4 stages.

[Peelee]

There are 5 stages of grief, the first being denial.

[citation needed]

Anyway, myths aside, her entire non-prequel life was effectively in denial. It certainly wasn't due to grief. She killed Shojo because she was in denial that she could be wrong. She attacked Hinjo because she was in denial that she could be wrong. She broke out of jail because she was in denial that she was wrong. She destroyed the Gate because she was in denial that she could be wrong. She thought Soon would usher her to the Seven Heavens because she was in denial that she could be wrong.

There was no grief, there was only a massive superiority complex.

[bravelove]

Everyone knows the TRUE best villains are the Demon Cockroaches

[Angelalex242]

[citation needed]

Anyway, myths aside, her entire non-prequel life was effectively in denial. It certainly wasn't due to grief. She killed Shojo because she was in denial that she could be wrong. She attacked Hinjo because she was in denial that she could be wrong. She broke out of jail because she was in denial that she was wrong. She destroyed the Gate because she was in denial that she could be wrong. She thought Soon would usher her to the Seven Heavens because she was in denial that she could be wrong.

There was no grief, there was only a massive superiority complex.

Citation needed? Really? Google it. 5 stages of grief are absolutely a thing.

...but, you are correct, the grief wouldn't have kicked in, if it were a thing, until after she fell. And she was kind of in denial about everything even beforehand.

I suppose it's more accurate to say she was straight up mad. There's a decent chance a good Lawyer would've called her not guilty by reason of insanity. She doesn't ever display a clear grasp of reality.

[Peelee]

Citation needed? Really? Google it. 5 stages of grief are absolutely a thing.

I was hoping that would inspire you to Google it, but if you insist...

The Kübler-Ross model, or the Five Stages of Grief™, postulates a series of emotions experienced by terminally ill patients prior to death, or people who have lost a loved one, wherein the five stages are: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Although commonly referenced in popular media, the existence of these stages has not been empirically demonstrated and the model is not considered helpful in explaining the grieving process. It is considered to be of historical value but outdated in scientific terms and in clinical practice.

[137beth]

I'm doing a reread of Supernormal Step, another fantasy webcomic that ended two years ago. The main villain, Kite, is a powerful magic user who enacts his evil scheme because he's bored. I am struck by the contrast between how Kite and Xykon approach their evil schemes, despite having essentially the same motivations.

Before meeting Redcloak,

Spoiler: SoD

Show

Xykon had no big plans. He just went around killing people at random.

After meeting Redcloak, Xykon still has trouble creating or following any sort of strategy. By contrast, Kite has a very complicated plan which stretches over a span of 130 years, the details of which confuse all of Kite's top minions. Xykon wants to rule the world, and to have everyone know that he rules the world. Kite, in some ways, secretly already does rule the world: he is secretly in control of many powerful large organizations (he has the magical ability to shapeshift and to appear in more than one place at a time, so even the people who work directly for him don't know who he really is).

And quite unlike Xykon, the end goal of Kite's plan is difficult to discern. Even Kite's top minions seem baffled trying to figure out what he wants to accomplish, as different organizations that he secretly controls end up fighting each other.

Spoiler: SNS

Show

Kite's ultimate goal is to destroy the universe, by engineering a scenario in which two extraordinarily powerful magic-users duel each other. Every part of his scheme helps lead two particular magic users down the path to becoming "unbeatable," so that they can eventually fight each other, and the world will end from the contradiction of two "unbeatable" people fighting.

[LadyEowyn]

For my part, I like tragic villains and villains with sympathetic motives. Hence my love for Redcloak (and for V, who isn’t an antagonist but has done horrific things).

For the most part, people are complicated, and conflicts are complicated, and I like villains whose characterization acknowledges that, and stories whose plots acknowledge answers other than “beat up the bad guy”. I also love redemption arcs, and characters having to grapple with what they’ve done wrong. It’s why I’m so happy with where OOTS is going.

If a story’s going to have an out-and-out villain, I like intelligent baddies, the ones who always seem a few steps ahead of the heroes and plots where the heroes have to be clever in their turn in order to win. (I enjoyed the Thrawn Trilogy in old Star Wars EU for that, and even more for the fact that, while the heroes did have to contend with him on a tactical and strategic level, they ultimately beat him by being better people, who treated neutral parties and even their enemies with kindness.) Tarquin’s genre-savvy made him an enjoyable villain in that way, especially with the challenge of how to beat a villain who considers a dramatic defeat to qualify as a victory for him. It was a great plot arc (though the time in the Empire of Blood ran a little long) - very meta.

Redcloak’s smart and intellectual too (and organized); it’s another reason I like him.

I don’t like Xykon very much. He’s neither clever nor thoughtful (despite his claims to the contrary in SOD) - he’s just sadistic, petty, and lazy. He very nearly died against the ghost-martyrs of the Sapphire Guard because he’s ignorant and lazy and attacked them with spells they were resistant to; if he’d used some of his infinite waking hours to do a modicum of research he wouldn’t have had that problem. Still, he can be funny in a crosses-the-line-twice kind of way.

I can and do enjoy media with other types of villains, but I enjoy it for qualities other than the villains (characterization of heroes; plot; setting/worldbuilding; themes).

[Peelee]

For my part, I like tragic villains and villains with sympathetic motives. Hence my love for Redcloak (and for V, who isn’t an antagonist but has done horrific things).

For the most part, people are complicated, and conflicts are complicated, and I like villains whose characterization acknowledges that, and stories whose plots acknowledge answers other than “beat up the bad guy”. I also love redemption arcs, and characters having to grapple with what they’ve done wrong. It’s why I’m so happy with where OOTS is going.

If a story’s going to have an out-and-out villain, I like intelligent baddies, the ones who always seem a few steps ahead of the heroes and plots where the heroes have to be clever in their turn in order to win. (I enjoyed the Thrawn Trilogy in old Star Wars EU for that, and even more for the fact that, while the heroes did have to contend with him on a tactical and strategic level, they ultimately beat him by being better people, who treated neutral parties and even their enemies with kindness.) Tarquin’s genre-savvy made him an enjoyable villain in that way, especially with the challenge of how to beat a villain who considers a dramatic defeat to qualify as a victory for him. It was a great plot arc (though the time in the Empire of Blood ran a little long) - very meta.

Redcloak’s smart and intellectual too (and organized); it’s another reason I like him.

I don’t like Xykon very much. He’s neither clever nor thoughtful (despite his claims to the contrary in SOD) - he’s just sadistic, petty, and lazy. He very nearly died against the ghost-martyrs of the Sapphire Guard because he’s ignorant and lazy and attacked them with spells they were resistant to; if he’d used some of his infinite waking hours to do a modicum of research he wouldn’t have had that problem. Still, he can be funny in a crosses-the-line-twice kind of way.

I can and do enjoy media with other types of villains, but I enjoy it for qualities other than the villains (characterization of heroes; plot; setting/worldbuilding; themes).

As a rather noted not-smart-man, I agree with this, and also like when people write about it, like that blog post you threw up (which was awesome and I will totally read any others you do about OotS, btw).

[LadyEowyn]

As a rather noted not-smart-man, I agree with this, and also like when people write about it, like that blog post you threw up (which was awesome and I will totally read any others you do about OotS, btw).

Aww, thank you!

I may do more posts as we see more of where this plotline is heading.

[Worldsong]

I think my perfect story wouldn't have a villain at all, just two (or more) sides with conflicting goals. And I don't mean that one side commits atrocities which then have to be justified: if you studied both sides you'd see that both are just doing their best to achieve their goals while still sticking to whatever moral code they adhere to.

Sure the story would still focus on one side and they'd end up winning, but any conflicting parties would be adversaries rather than forces of evil.

I guess closest to that is a villain who has an understandable motivation, does not enjoy committing acts of evil and tries to approach their problems with intelligence and reason. You know, like an actual person. Someone you could root for (although their evil deeds might still make that difficult).

Which leads me to Redcloak. Xykon is entertaining but a villain needs to be more than entertaining for me to actually like them. Tarquin managed that by combining wit with cunning and an interesting approach to narrative. Redcloak however still wins because I actually want his core goal to be accomplished and for goblinoids to be treated as being on equal footing with PC Races. I want Redcloak to realize that there's a better way and step onto the road of redemption, even if it is long and arduous.

EDIT: although I also like stories in which the definitions of good and evil are put to the test. Pragmatic characters tend to appeal to me because of that, although they have to be actually pragmatic and not just using pragmatism as a facade to cover their horrific behaviour.

[Peelee]

I think my perfect story wouldn't have a villain at all, just two (or more) sides with conflicting goals.

I say this a lot, but you should check out Stranger Than Fiction.

[Fyraltari]

Or the later Foundation books.