My group did OK with it, but we lost interest after a while and went back to playing semi-good guys.Surely a mature group could play a party of evil characters without resorting to the common pitfalls of a party of backstabbers and psychopaths.
I'm sure you'd be up to the challenge, Mairkurion.
I can't imagine playing in a game like that for the long term. Overall, I like being able to play a character who saves the princess/prince, town, country, world.
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Surely a mature group could play a party of evil characters without resorting to the common pitfalls of a party of backstabbers and psychopaths.
It seems to me that the crux of the argument is that evil PCs can work as a cohesive party so long as they continually appeal to a higher morality and their more noble virtues.
Put me down as a customer who would cancel my subscriptions right before paying for an 'evil' AP or module. I have no interest in either, no matter how talented the writers.
All my buddies in the evil thread? I never expected to see that...well, except for the drow and the jacks, maybe.
This is what makes me wary...or more than wary: every time I've encountered a group made of players where most of them wanted to be evil characters most of the time, they were 1. terrible role-players and 2. utter douche bags. I'd rather spend my time with better people and better players, as gaming is supposed to be a good time. Maybe someday I will want the challenge of playing an evil pc, but it will have to be carefully worked out thing, and it would only be because I was getting to play SO much (what wonderful circumstances would that take!) that I wanted to do something really different. Otherwise, I enjoy playing heroes, and could never enjoy the same kind of deep identification with role-playing villains or anti-heroes.
Surely a mature group could play a party of evil characters without resorting to the common pitfalls of a party of backstabbers and psychopaths.
I'm sure you'd be up to the challenge, Mairkurion.
I agree it would be a challenge. But I think of an evil character as not simply having weaknesses of character so that they occasionally do evils things, but a character that actually wills evil ends, going forward. Alright, if I were suddenly offered the role of MacB-- er, the Thane of Isildur, sure, I'd take it, just as I'd play Hamlet's uncle. I guess I feel that there's something more limited there: I'd be expressing already created roles. But creating a character whole cloth for role-playing seems a deeper, more singular identification. I love creating memorable villains as GM, but I think of it more like playing the Scottish usurper or King Claudius: expressing a role. I guess it would still be talking in abstraction until I had more detail about what the evil party would be like and what they would be doing.
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Both Jack and Christian play good villians, who else can we thin kof that does evil well on the big screen?Frank Langella
Sir Anthony Hopkins
Christopher Lee
Ian McKellenJust to name a few....
Anthony Hopkins is awesome. And Ian McKellen can play pretty much anything.
I wouldn't mind seeing Sean Connery take on a good bad guy role, and I don't mean like he did in The Avengers.
Surely a mature group could play a party of evil characters without resorting to the common pitfalls of a party of backstabbers and psychopaths.It seems to me that the crux of the argument is that evil PCs can work as a cohesive party so long as they continually appeal to a higher morality and their more noble virtues.
Put me down as a customer who would cancel my subscriptions right before paying for an 'evil' AP or module. I have no interest in either, no matter how talented the writers.
I agree that the market would be very small for such a module--just going by my general impressions, you'd cut out over half the customers--and an AP would be right out, so I can't imagine Paizo publishing anything like this.
With the right GM and party, though, it would be a fun "one night stand" kind of game. It's the sort of thing I could see Logue or Pett doing very well.
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Anybody see Goodfella's? I can break this all down I think pretty well, but it relies on the movie Goodfella's.
I saw it a gazillion times.Yup. But here's what I tell folks who ask why they can't play evil PCs in my game. "Because you're a doushe, that's why."
Now break it down for us Wolfie. ;)
Allright.
There's two halves to this movie, all crystallizing around the "dungeon delve."The first half, introduce the characters, who they are, why they are where they are, doing what they are doing.
The "delve" is the Lufthansa job.
At this point, the "adventure" in question is usually done. Everybody goes, levels up, buys a suit of +1 plate mail, some silencers, and a fur coat and pink cadillac for their goomah.
Not Goodfella's. The "adventure" is just beginning.
They can't blow the loot; they have to lie low.
The paranoia builds.
Everybody gets whacked.
Ray Liotta gets busted, turns over on De Niro, goes into the witness protection program, starts writing his autobiography or whatever...
Totally different structure than what we're used to seeing.
I'd go so far as to say the second half of the movie would be extremely challenging for the dungeonmaster to run, and damn near impossible for a canned adventure product to script.
It's extremely character-driven; the best they could hope for is a few interesting settings within which for the characters to backstab eachother until they're all dead, and one guy walks away with all the loot. The only group dynamic left is a chaotic scramble to survive, and I don't know if it's the nature of the beast re: "the game" or our own "assumptions" that we bring to the game, but it's a bear to script, if not impossible.
So....you have a dungeon, a McGuffin, and a group of people whacking eachother; I think you can take any dungeon product out there, get a group of evil guys together, figure out a reason why the "powers that be" want to get heavy on them for HAVING the McGuffin they stole out of the dungeon, and let them have at it.
ZERO SUM GAME.
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Have you ever seen Ian McKellen in Apt Pupil? Talk about a badass movie.
Anthony Hopkins is awesome. And Ian McKellen can play pretty much anything.I wouldn't mind seeing Sean Connery take on a good bad guy role, and I don't mean like he did in The Avengers.
Hell yes! I am trying to find it on DVD so the wife can see it. :D
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I'm not even making market assumptions here. "If you build it they will come...."
I'm saying that it's damn near impossible to create a canned module like this in the first place due to the nature of the game. The story ultimately relies more heavily on personal choices than what we're used to seeing.
I'm saying that such a product wouldn't deliver the goods. It would get 2 or 3 stars.
This type of a game relies more on personal choices than a scripted mission to be fulfilling.
OP request aside, when I read the title of this thread, with the experience of the gamers referred to in my head...
GAMERS: GM, why can't we just be EVIL?
ME: Don't worry, you already are.
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Contributor, RPG Superstar 2012
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You're not the target market for something like that. Heck, neither am I really. I do think it would require someone with a lot of skill to write an adventure module specifically for evil characters. I would definitely have to trust the author to create something that's not "Lulz, lets kick puppies and take candy from babies."
Now that I think of it, Paizo did this with Savage Tide somewhat, where you could side with the evil Vanderboren (I'm going from faulty memory here).
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I'm not even making market assumptions here. "If you build it they will come...."
I'm saying that it's damn near impossible to create a canned module like this in the first place due to the nature of the game. The story ultimately relies more heavily on personal choices than what we're used to seeing.
I'm saying that such a product wouldn't deliver the goods. It would get 2 or 3 stars.
This type of a game relies more on personal choices than a scripted mission to be fulfilling.
Exactly. It would probably the least enjoyable product ever.
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Two other good onscreen villains are Alan Rickman and Gary OldmanI'm having a brain misfire, I'm drawing a blank on Alan Rickman. :/
Die Hard villain. Chewed the screen in Robin Hood. Plays as Snape in the Harry Potter movie. He can do noble as well (was a secondary love interest in Sense and Sensibility) but he tends to get typecast a bit in the villainous role. EDIT: I almost forgot. He was also the main villain in Quigley Down Under.
Another one that can do non-villains but its a bit jarring when I see it is Robert Patrick who I first saw as the T-1000 in Terminator 2.
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You're not the target market for something like that. Heck, neither am I really. I do think it would require someone with a lot of skill to write an adventure module specifically for evil characters. I would definitely have to trust the author to create something that's not "Lulz, lets kick puppies and take candy from babies."
Now that I think of it, Paizo did this with Savage Tide somewhat, where you could side with the evil Vanderboren (I'm going from faulty memory here).
Savage tide did include tips on how to run it with the bad guys being your boss. That was one reason I broke down and allowed an evil PC. But I've gone over how that ended. And to be truthful I ended the campaign at the defense of Farshore. Right after the slavegirl Bar/Rog/Dervish got her hands on that PC. :)
I'm having a brain misfire, I'm drawing a blank on Alan Rickman. :/
Hans Gruber, Sheriff of Nottingham, Metatron, Severus Snape
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Two other good onscreen villains are Alan Rickman and Gary OldmanI'm having a brain misfire, I'm drawing a blank on Alan Rickman. :/Die Hard villain. Chewed the screen in Robin Hood. Plays as Snape in the Harry Potter movie. He can do noble as well (was a secondary love interest in Sense and Sensibility) but he tends to get typecast a bit in the villainous role.
Another one that can do non-villains but its a bit jarring when I see it is Robert Patrick who I first saw as the T-1000 in Terminator 2.
Thank you, I love the guys work, but for some reason just couldn't connect the dots in my head.
+1 for Alan Rickman.
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Exactly. It would probably the least enjoyable product ever.I'm not even making market assumptions here. "If you build it they will come...."
I'm saying that it's damn near impossible to create a canned module like this in the first place due to the nature of the game. The story ultimately relies more heavily on personal choices than what we're used to seeing.
I'm saying that such a product wouldn't deliver the goods. It would get 2 or 3 stars.
This type of a game relies more on personal choices than a scripted mission to be fulfilling.
I'd foresee a lot of b+@*$ing/pissing/moaning about what a joke it was.
I'm not even considering the vast difference in individual opinions about "what good and evil" are.
Heathy makes a very good point. A lot of what people seem to want out of an "evil" adventure path is good interpersonal roleplaying between evil characters, which you can't really write into a traditional adventure.
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Heathy makes a very good point. A lot of what people seem to want out of an "evil" adventure path is good interpersonal roleplaying between evil characters, which you can't really write into a traditional adventure.
Yeah, and the rest just want to run around and kill the local kids dogs and duke it out with a Pali.
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In this type of game, you don't "duke it out" with A pali.
25 palis show up at your house, battering ram the door in, and yell "FREEZE, A#&#%~&!!!!" at your wife and kids in the breakfast nook. They rifle your house for McGuffin, throw you in the hoozegow, and make you turn over state's evidence on the party cleric.
It's a total railroad. It's a total godmod event on the part of the dungeonmaster.
You're not the target market for something like that. Heck, neither am I really. I do think it would require someone with a lot of skill to write an adventure module specifically for evil characters. I would definitely have to trust the author to create something that's not "Lulz, lets kick puppies and take candy from babies."
Now that I think of it, Paizo did this with Savage Tide somewhat, where you could side with the evil Vanderboren (I'm going from faulty memory here).
Yeah, here you're pushing back towards the OP and away from my general point -- to an area which I've not really thought through fully, truth be told. Though I'd imagine I'd tend to go along with Heathy's thinking here, I just don't have it reasoned out.
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Heathy makes a very good point. A lot of what people seem to want out of an "evil" adventure path is good interpersonal roleplaying between evil characters, which you can't really write into a traditional adventure.
The exploration of evil is best done through the act of writing - not through roleplaying.
The act of putting pen to paper creates boundaries, a microcosm within which we can look and analyze without personal repercussions.
Roleplaying unlocks boundaries and thus brings us closer to real life interactions. In real life evil is messy and destructive. Evil people, by their very nature, tend to be shortsighted, greedy, powerhungry and selfish. These are not traits which encourage teamwork. My advice to people that want to roleplay evil in order to broaden their perspectives is to take up creative writing - write a novel, short story or script. Don't bring it into the game cause it won't normally end well.
Wicht, this is exactly what I was trying to get at in my posts above.
I'd probably add acting to writing.
Why do we even need this thread or this request?
The PCs are always forced to side with the Devil in the APs, anyway!
I blame Jason Nelson.
I guess I'll compound my post down:
I think that a "p.c.'s are evil" AP, much less a module is damn near impossible to craft convincingly and satisfyingly. If we actually see one in our lifetime, it will be a rare and fleeting thing like a comet in the sky.
A module is a place to take such a risk, and perhaps fail without to much fallout. An AP, and I'd not just cancel; I'd cancel, pissed.
I guess I'll compound my post down:
I think that a "p.c.'s are evil" AP, much less a module is damn near impossible to craft convincingly and satisfyingly. If we actually see one in our lifetime, it will be a rare and fleeting thing like a comet in the sky.
Yeah, that was the point I was trying to make. It would take someone of superior craftsmanship to do something like this. Even then, it would be a tough sell.
It's the UNholy grail of modules.
FIFY.
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I guess I'll compound my post down:
I think that a "p.c.'s are evil" AP, much less a module is damn near impossible to craft convincingly and satisfyingly. If we actually see one in our lifetime, it will be a rare and fleeting thing like a comet in the sky.
Yeah, that was the point I was trying to make. It would take someone of superior craftsmanship to do something like this. Even then, it would be a tough sell.
We'll, I'm superior, I should be able to make it.
Only a master of evil, Darth.
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to reiterate:
Every AP so far (and we're starting LoF this weekend, that'll be the 6th one for us) can be done with Evil PC's or Good PC's.
With Evil PC's, it takes a little bit of work to get them bought into the AP Hook, but otherwise I've seen it work just fine.
Our RotRL group (almost all good) worked for Mokmorian halfway through the adventure, requiring a bunch of re-write on the DM's part.
our CotCT group (for which I was DM'ing) went along with the most inane of requests and came back for more. (I'm looking at YOU, A History of Ashes...) They also were among the most cohesive group of PC's I've seen at our table.
Goes to the original question, also: with the proper guidance, getting "Help" from the "Devil" in the AP need not change the whole structure of alignment/PC choice...it's just one opportunity (ok, more than 1) to get some RP Conflict into the writing, without necessarily leading to Combat Encounters (of course, most of those "Meet the Devil" encounters have stat-blocks associated, so if combat breaks out....)
-t
In this type of game, you don't "duke it out" with A pali.
25 palis show up at your house, battering ram the door in, and yell "FREEZE, a~*@&#~!!!!" at your wife and kids in the breakfast nook. They rifle your house for McGuffin, throw you in the hoozegow, and make you turn over state's evidence on the party cleric.
It's a total railroad. It's a total godmod event on the part of the dungeonmaster.
Eh... that why you got your cousins. Benni's an oddball but he can bring the "heat" right back to those tin-star palis with his hands all a burning. And Frank... hades ... Frank knows how to use a pigsticker like the best of them. A couple of 'chemists flames from Benni's stash set your missus up right.
Thats what "the family" is all about!
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In this type of game, you don't "duke it out" with A pali.
25 palis show up at your house, battering ram the door in, and yell "FREEZE, a~*@&#~!!!!" at your wife and kids in the breakfast nook. They rifle your house for McGuffin, throw you in the hoozegow, and make you turn over state's evidence on the party cleric.
It's a total railroad. It's a total godmod event on the part of the dungeonmaster.
Eh... that why you got your cousins. Benni's an oddball but he can bring the "heat" right back to those tin-star palis with his hands all a burning. And Frank... hades ... Frank knows how to use a pigsticker like the best of them. A couple of 'chemists flames from Benni's stash set your missus up right.
Thats what "the family" is all about!
Except Frank has been banging Benni's old lady nigh on a fortnight now.
Benni's gonna set that bed alight, mark my words.Ten cousins, ages 2 to 11, all but one of them screeching and clawing eachothers' eyes out except the 11 year old, who is eating the entire pie the rest are fighting over. Now they're grown up, and the pie is figurative for whatever you got. They've been fighting this thing out all their lives; it's all they know.
You only need one Spartan, O' Mayor of Corinth. House built on sand and whatnot.
Why can't we just be evil...is that so WRONG???
Why do we have to put labels on everything?
Hey, for our next alignment discussion thread, let's all read The Man Who Was Thursday.
Or the git who pushes one directly into ad homimem. (Would that make it, ad gitimem?) OT: Interesting essay on Wilde.