You shouldn't need to explain their past, their actions should speak for themselves. If your main antagonist's reasoning comes out as just "lmao evil" then you're just a shit writer.
By gitting gud. You don't have to straight-up tell them exactly why is the BBEG doing everything, just describe WHAT are they doing and let players infer the logical motivations behind those actions.
If the dark lord sieges the dwarven mountainhome and slays the wizard that discovered the potion of immortality, it stands to reason he >has a grudge against the dwarves >wants the potion of immortality
And so on and so forth. As the party continues to thwart his schemes and see what he does, they should be able to keep inferring why he does this.
I don't even know who the final boss of the campaign IS yet. It's been narrowed down to three, admittedly, but that's still a lot of variance to have after thirty-four sessions.
As a change of pace I decided that the next campaign I'm running is going to feature a fundamentally evil entity that's known to the players from session 1 and spends 99% of the campaign dormant doing nothing. Just trying to figure out how to execute this.
The final BBEG boss is the leader of maximally charismatic warlocks who made deals with demons who're maximally charismatic immortals in order to prepare for a war against the destroyer of the world.
Most times I leave my villains pretty mysterious, but I for sure figure out their backstory for myself. If the players want to learn more then I’m gonna have that information for them.
Final bosses from my campaigns: >Aged elf friend of one of the heroes who sought to travel back in time to change history as their heroics from half a century prior left the world in a worse state in the long run. Lost his mind after hundreds of attempts failed because his methods of time travel never sent him back far enough >Legendary pirate trapped in an ancient city that was sealed away due to being infested with eldritch beings, managed to merge with one and sought to take over the world and rule as an immortal king, felt owed after a century of silence and darkness at the bottom of the sea >Tragic knight who was manipulated by an angel into wielding a sword that would destroy the fabric of magic, by severing the celestial realm from the material and ending the obligations of the heavens to care for mortal souls. Now an undead left to roam, he falls back under his angel's thrall when the sword housing part of his soul is reforged
The big bad of my setting is named Lord Death, and he killed all the old gods and remade the world to be more in line with his dream of a world ruled by monsters with only the strongest mortals rising to the top before he got bored and sat back and let it all play out for a few thousand years.
He's a real jerk who's just pure evil for the sake of it, the best kind of villain in my opinion.
All of his lieutenants and underlings think there's some kind of grand plan at play and they're always fighting for his favor while he doesn't give a frick about anything except making bigger and nastier monsters to unleash upon the world.
All the major antagonists I've ever created have been major antagonists because the PCs were acting against them or vice versa. I do not make 'evil' characters, unless it's just in the sense that petty malice exists, which it does, usually as israelite/gnomish characters, but who are not principal villains because they don't have the status or power in my game settings to fill that role.
Of fricking course they need a story dipshit, nothing happens without cause and effect. Even the most stereotypical of dark lords need a reason for evil, even if it was something as simple as "The primordial god of Bad Things willed him into being purely to scorn the land"
>Do you create a story to explain their past or are they just evil?
The "final boss" of my last campaign was a large, non-sapient, carnivorous plant.
Its' tragic backstory™ was that it was now big, hungie, and inconveniencing everyone within the province.
>Inb4 Anons insisting on my Little Shop of Horrors references.
It was a 1st to 3rd level campaign and I was deliberately going for an Ultraman Juran, Day of the Triffids, kind of situation.
I play with two groups.
One where the DM likes making a series of one shots connected by an overarching plot, usually making it a shorter campaign, and one where the DM has been running the same campaign for the last 15 or so years.
The first usually has a clear BBEG with some relevant backstory.
The later is a sabdbox in a premade campaign where everything ends up interconnected in some pretty onteresting ways, oftentimes relating to a party member by proxy, since qe are the ones to go after the challenges most of the time, so the villain backstories end up ranging from unkown to connected to the setting in some fundamental way to personally connected to one of the 7 PCs.
Depends on the campaign. Last time around was a wounded and slowly dying demigoddess, her pain and fear manifesting into the world as a corruptive mist filled with monsters. Current campaign is a fallen angel, still angry at the gods' creation and determined to destroy the concept of love and marriage in the mortal realm. I have two ideas for my next campaign, one being invasion by a magitech civilization from an alternate timeline that goy destroyed and now go from reality to reality harvesting all the magic so they can punvh their way to the next plane and keep on going; or a more grounded campaign in a major, Arabian themed trade city with an obviously evil merchant prince antagonizing the party but he's in a position of power and the party are all foreigners or lower class locals.
I don't create pre-planned final boss, I leave it up to the players who is the most powerful individual they manage to antagonize.
Utterly moronic
You shouldn't need to explain their past, their actions should speak for themselves. If your main antagonist's reasoning comes out as just "lmao evil" then you're just a shit writer.
But if all his actions harm the players and I don't explain them, how can I make it so that it doesn't look like "lmao evil"?
By gitting gud. You don't have to straight-up tell them exactly why is the BBEG doing everything, just describe WHAT are they doing and let players infer the logical motivations behind those actions.
If the dark lord sieges the dwarven mountainhome and slays the wizard that discovered the potion of immortality, it stands to reason he
>has a grudge against the dwarves
>wants the potion of immortality
And so on and so forth. As the party continues to thwart his schemes and see what he does, they should be able to keep inferring why he does this.
the world is the story, and antagonists live in that world yes.
I don't even know who the final boss of the campaign IS yet. It's been narrowed down to three, admittedly, but that's still a lot of variance to have after thirty-four sessions.
All my campaigns end with a monster with no conscience/force of nature, so we don't feel bad about killing it.
>Godzilla
>no conscience
this homie didn't watch the frickin movie
>this homie didn't watch the frickin movie
what movie? Where Godzilla has a conscience or the movies where Godzilla is just a force of nature?
>Where Godzilla has a conscience
Just feeling constant pain is not having consciousness.
As a change of pace I decided that the next campaign I'm running is going to feature a fundamentally evil entity that's known to the players from session 1 and spends 99% of the campaign dormant doing nothing. Just trying to figure out how to execute this.
The final BBEG boss is the leader of maximally charismatic warlocks who made deals with demons who're maximally charismatic immortals in order to prepare for a war against the destroyer of the world.
>final BBEG boss
Jesus fricking christ.
Just don't bother with "BBEG". Only gays say that anyway.
You never take a break, do you?
Well, he's right that "final BBEG boss" is all sorts of redundant.
But what is the final big BBEG enemy guy boss like in your setting please ??
Most times I leave my villains pretty mysterious, but I for sure figure out their backstory for myself. If the players want to learn more then I’m gonna have that information for them.
Final bosses from my campaigns:
>Aged elf friend of one of the heroes who sought to travel back in time to change history as their heroics from half a century prior left the world in a worse state in the long run. Lost his mind after hundreds of attempts failed because his methods of time travel never sent him back far enough
>Legendary pirate trapped in an ancient city that was sealed away due to being infested with eldritch beings, managed to merge with one and sought to take over the world and rule as an immortal king, felt owed after a century of silence and darkness at the bottom of the sea
>Tragic knight who was manipulated by an angel into wielding a sword that would destroy the fabric of magic, by severing the celestial realm from the material and ending the obligations of the heavens to care for mortal souls. Now an undead left to roam, he falls back under his angel's thrall when the sword housing part of his soul is reforged
The big bad of my setting is named Lord Death, and he killed all the old gods and remade the world to be more in line with his dream of a world ruled by monsters with only the strongest mortals rising to the top before he got bored and sat back and let it all play out for a few thousand years.
He's a real jerk who's just pure evil for the sake of it, the best kind of villain in my opinion.
All of his lieutenants and underlings think there's some kind of grand plan at play and they're always fighting for his favor while he doesn't give a frick about anything except making bigger and nastier monsters to unleash upon the world.
Sounds like a man of taste, I shall now become one of his underlings.
All the major antagonists I've ever created have been major antagonists because the PCs were acting against them or vice versa. I do not make 'evil' characters, unless it's just in the sense that petty malice exists, which it does, usually as israelite/gnomish characters, but who are not principal villains because they don't have the status or power in my game settings to fill that role.
>make the antagonist the demiurge
>watch friends have a 45 minute theology debate
Of fricking course they need a story dipshit, nothing happens without cause and effect. Even the most stereotypical of dark lords need a reason for evil, even if it was something as simple as "The primordial god of Bad Things willed him into being purely to scorn the land"
>Do you create a story to explain their past or are they just evil?
The "final boss" of my last campaign was a large, non-sapient, carnivorous plant.
Its' tragic backstory™ was that it was now big, hungie, and inconveniencing everyone within the province.
>Inb4 Anons insisting on my Little Shop of Horrors references.
It was a 1st to 3rd level campaign and I was deliberately going for an Ultraman Juran, Day of the Triffids, kind of situation.
We'll, the big villain of my campaign is Nyarlathotep and he's the one villain whi absolutely needs no backstory to explain why he's evil.
oh they have a story, but they're still very evil. it adds context, not a shot at redemption.
>dO yOu CrEaTe StOrY ??
Well, let's see.
I'm running and playing my own game.
No. No, I don't create story.
I play with two groups.
One where the DM likes making a series of one shots connected by an overarching plot, usually making it a shorter campaign, and one where the DM has been running the same campaign for the last 15 or so years.
The first usually has a clear BBEG with some relevant backstory.
The later is a sabdbox in a premade campaign where everything ends up interconnected in some pretty onteresting ways, oftentimes relating to a party member by proxy, since qe are the ones to go after the challenges most of the time, so the villain backstories end up ranging from unkown to connected to the setting in some fundamental way to personally connected to one of the 7 PCs.
they're just evil
Depends on the campaign. Last time around was a wounded and slowly dying demigoddess, her pain and fear manifesting into the world as a corruptive mist filled with monsters. Current campaign is a fallen angel, still angry at the gods' creation and determined to destroy the concept of love and marriage in the mortal realm. I have two ideas for my next campaign, one being invasion by a magitech civilization from an alternate timeline that goy destroyed and now go from reality to reality harvesting all the magic so they can punvh their way to the next plane and keep on going; or a more grounded campaign in a major, Arabian themed trade city with an obviously evil merchant prince antagonizing the party but he's in a position of power and the party are all foreigners or lower class locals.
>goy destroyed
got destroyed, frick that's a hell of a typo