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 Are the "good" guys winning too much?

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T O P I C    R E V I E W
The Red Walker Posted - 11 Feb 2007 : 03:05:22
I do not think so, but I have heard many who think so. I would be curious to hear your feelings on this and see how you back up your stance.

I think one of the reasons it seems the big winners in the Realms seems to be "the good guys", but I just think that is a mis-perception.

Across the Realms the "bad guys" have been very agressive the past few years and what seems to be huge gains by good are actually just the start of the Realms coming back into balance. I can see a few more "good" things happing that affect large areas of the Realms before we see a big shift in another direction.
30   L A T E S T    R E P L I E S    (Newest First)
Erik Scott de Bie Posted - 04 Apr 2007 : 15:40:24
quote:
Originally posted by ElaineCunningham

In that case, you'll probably love "Order of the Stick," an online cartoon. The party is good/neutral, but the halfling definitely has evil tendencies. Very funny, highly recommended. :)


Yay! OOTS! Good call, Elaine.

Favorite joke (in this particular vein) --

"Hey, why didn't that unholy blight hurt Belkar?"
"Best not to dwell on it."

Cheers
KnightErrantJR Posted - 04 Apr 2007 : 14:03:38
Heh, actually Elaine, I love the Order of the Stick, and the scary thing is, I think I've played in a few campaigns with some "Belkars." Although most of the people that play them don't admit their evil tendancies . . .
ElaineCunningham Posted - 04 Apr 2007 : 13:17:58
quote:
Originally posted by KnightErrantJR

You know what I would think would be more interesting than just an all evil party? A party that was mainly good and neutral with one evil member.


In that case, you'll probably love "Order of the Stick," an online cartoon. The party is good/neutral, but the halfling definitely has evil tendencies. Very funny, highly recommended. :)

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0001.html

ec
KnightErrantJR Posted - 31 Mar 2007 : 23:48:03
quote:
Originally posted by Asgetrion

Knight, you're an evil, cold-hearted bastard... albeit a very clever one! So how much does it cost me to use your copyrighted idea?



Well, after a compliment like that, you can use any of them free of charge . . .
Asgetrion Posted - 31 Mar 2007 : 22:11:21
quote:
Originally posted by KnightErrantJR

quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert

quote:
Originally posted by KnightErrantJR

You know what I would think would be more interesting than just an all evil party? A party that was mainly good and neutral with one evil member.



Wow, I wish I'd thought of that!



Shush . . . don't tell anyone . . . I think I'm going to copyright this idea . . .



Knight, you're an evil, cold-hearted bastard... albeit a very clever one! So how much does it cost me to use your copyrighted idea?
Darius Talynth Posted - 30 Mar 2007 : 20:10:55
This is a very interesting thread and has my attention.

There may be some spoilers here so please be aware if you choose to read further.

I think this really depends. I agree in principle that the "heroes" of the story should prevail in the end and normally this should be good triumphing over evil. However, in the case of a dymanic setting such as the Fortgotten Realms there do need to be events that show that the balance of the world in terms of good and evil does teeter and totter.

I will look at two examples since they are the ones I am familiar with. The first is the Hunter's Blade Trilogy by RA Salvatore and the emergence of Obould onto the stage. Obould was portrayed as a worthy adversary for Drizzt and the Realms in general. I was so excited to see a new high profile villain who wasn't going to just croak and disappear at the end of the series. The portrayal of Obould as a powerful, intelligent, passionate antagonist who was a match for the main characters was a welcome change to the typical formula of writing that seems to restrict many of the authors in the Realms based settings. In this case, the orc horde was defeated in the end but Obould is set to return and the reader knows that he is a character worth following in the future.

On a different line of things, the Return of the Archwizards really let me down despite being well written by an author that I like (Troy Denning). Here was a series focusing on the return of Shade to faerun and also gave attention to the Phaerimm. In this case the bumbling keystone cops showed up representing the Phaerimm and to a similar extent the Shades (except for Telamont). This was a series where the Shades and Phaerimm appear, seem to be powerful meaningful adversaries for the Realms but then the liberal use of the Chosen and the meteoric rise in power of the "heroes" to challenge and beat back the enemies in seemingly easy fashion left me feeling disappointed. I felt this series should have been the Realms shattering event that established a new meaningful evil power in the Realms - where Chosen should have actually perished in the conflict as some of the princes of Shade did and as so many of the Phaerimm did. Sorry, the significant injuries that a couple of the Chosen suffered does not equate. So in this case I found myself cheering for the bad guys in the battles of the Shades against the Chosen just hoping for something new and Realms Shaking to happen. In the end we just have Shade floating around and Evereska back to normal like nothing happened. Sigh. I think in the case of the RotAW trilogy, the author was handcuffed because of the appearance of so many "official" Realms characters (the chosen) that were not the author's own characters.

Well I don't know how well I made my case, but all I am saying is that at some point the bad guys need to make some lasting gains to keep the "official" Realms dynamic and engaging and also provide real challenging villains that the reader recognizes as being a lasting presence in the Realms. The authors and caretakers of the Realms just need to pick the places where this should happen and understand that from time to time, it does need to happen.

Cheers

The Red Walker Posted - 08 Mar 2007 : 00:25:18
What an interesting discourse!!

Thanks to all who have commented, I have enjoyed everyones thoughts.
Thente Thunderspells Posted - 28 Feb 2007 : 17:54:07
Hi all!

Woo, so I just lost the post I was working on

Anyway, I wanted to chime in on the original topic of this thread. I don't think the "good" guys have been winning too much at all lately. Zhentil Keep had some very solid gains in the Last Mythal(which I really liked) trilogy, the Shadovar utterly wiped Tilverton off the face of Toril when they returned to Faerun, and we can't forget the outright victories of Orc-kind in The Hunter's Blade trilogy (to be continued in this year's Orc King - Transitions bk 1).

On top of all that, there is the upcoming series/trilogy dealing with our favorite nation of evil wizards (Thay if anyone was wondering ) which features the slimeiest of them all, Szass Tam. It'll be interesting to see, but I bet that he isn't defeated (at least totally) in the end.

In the just begun Twilight War trilogy, it's more of a bad(if not outright evil) vs evil. When evil battles, good guys win only in the general sense of less Evil in the world in general, as the innocents destroyed in the battles between evils definitely don't win.

"Good guys" are having a hard time in the realms right now in general. They are forced to fight with underwhelming force (Last Mythal & Hunter's Blade), or against their own country-people (Cormyr). In the case of Last Mythal, the good guys are forced to acquiesce to Zhent take overs in order to focus on the greater of the two evils. Even when we do hear from the powerful "good guys", their victories are Phyrric at best (Blackstaff).

Ok, I'm going to go hit up the evil characters thread now :) Enjoy your realms reading!
Erik Scott de Bie Posted - 27 Feb 2007 : 18:13:49
What a gracious invitation.

Cheers
Delzounblood Posted - 27 Feb 2007 : 15:47:29
quote:
Originally posted by Delzounblood

quote:
Originally posted by Erik Scott de Bie

quote:
Originally posted by Delzounblood

and now to the most corrupt and dangerous char
Tiefling (80% sure) not sure on class yet still in planning stage!

I seem to be moving ever more to Chaotic and Evil!



If I might humbly suggest . . .

Lesser aasimar ex-paladin/blackguard.

The unequivocal fallen angel, who easily bluffs people into thinking he's still a paladin. Wisdom and Charisma bonuses. Add rogue, ranger, or fighter, to suit your own preferences. With "lesser" (that is, planetouched (native) subtype -- see PGtF), you don't even have to worry about the ECL.

Cheers




Your Twisted


I like


Nice one I didn't think of the fallen angel angle, (try saying that 20 times fast on a night out).

hhhmmm the plot thickens


Delz





I'm picking this up in my own thread

Playing and Creating an Utter Evil Character

Join me and comment

Delz
Erik Scott de Bie Posted - 26 Feb 2007 : 00:49:35
On the note of "good party with one evil character":

The game I DMed for was like this:

- Completely self-interested, somewhat psychotic assassin-girl (NE)
- Completely amoral, "I-like-using-people-in-order-to-create-sculptures" dread necromancer (NE)
- Completely self-righteous, "I'm-doing-the-right-thing-even-though-no-god-condones-it" aasimar blackguard (LE)

The third one was the kicker. He still thought he was a good guy -- just a ruthless one, willing to walk the dark path if that was how good was to be done. And all of his foes were people just as evil as he was -- especially the alufiend who tempted him into darkness.

They could easily pass for a neutral sort of party -- except for the whole "horrendous evil" bit.

Cheers
Rinonalyrna Fathomlin Posted - 25 Feb 2007 : 22:35:04
quote:
Originally posted by initiate

Regarding the epic level keystone cop depiction of villains, I can't actually think of any examples, but I agree in principle. I dislike beyond words applying game stats to novel situations, but its frustrating to see characters who're supposed to be way smart depicted as morons. We have to keep in mind, though, that there are sometimes mitigating circumstances or considerations. Samaster, for instance, while brilliant, was also delightfully mad. Sarya Dlardrageth it seemed to me had a consistent tendency to become irrationally angry and prone to stupid mistakes when under stress. Also, no villain is omnipotent. They cannot plan for absolutely every eventuality; (it could be argued that some could come close, but even Manshoon and Dread Larloch aren't perfect). The more significant villains are also often being opposed by people who themselves are no push-overs.

I know that this doesn't begin to address the whole of the "keystone cops" issue. Just throwing some thoughts out there.




Regarding this issue: I think the problem many people have with this issue (myself included) is this: if these villains are making so many miscalculations during the story, then how on earth did they become such a threat in the first place? The most glaring example from my mind right now is from the book I just finished reading, Bladesinger. We are told near the beginning of the novel that she managed to get into a position of power and destroy a certain bond that has lasted centuries being being smart and subtle about it, and taking careful "baby steps" towards her goal over many years. However, as the novel progresses, it quickly becomes apparent that this villain is making some incredibly stupid mistakes--the worst one probably being "toying" with the heroes when it is apparently within her power to simply kill them all...and of course, by the time she really WANTS to kill them it's too late: the heroes have already taken advantage of the opportunity she gave them.

My point is, if the heroes only win because the villain made a bunch of stupid mistakes, don't they seem at least a little less heroic for it? Another reason I disliked the villain I mentioned before is because of something you touched on--in the first chapter she seemed like a "moral ambiguous" antagonist who had sound reasons for doing what she did. But by about halfway into the novel, she turned out to be your typical cackling "pulpy" villain who was doing bad things for the sheer pleasure of it and constantly telling the reader about how "foolish" and "pathetic" and "weak" the heroes and everyone else was.
initiate Posted - 25 Feb 2007 : 19:47:51
I realize that this is horribly long, and that I just posted here about something else. Sorry. It seems I've got allot to say on the subject of evil triumphing.

Rinonalyrna Fathomlin Wrote:
In my personal opinion, if I'm cheering on the villain instead of the "good guys", it means the author didn't write the protagonists in a way that makes them appealing to me...

Delzounblood Wrote:
I think that for a balance the bad guys could win a few more and I would like to see it happen in a trilogy. I know this goes against the grain as far as novel-adventures happen, face it you create a hero to win not lose! But it would be nice to see the hero lose and the big baddie win for a change.

I quote both these scribes because this responds to and draws off both of their posts. [Thanks for the welcome, Rinonalyrna.]

I agree with Delzounblood and Bitter Thorn, I just think its really hard to make this work in practice and still come up with something that is satisfying as a story as well as being a good piece of lore. Moral ambiguity in protagonists is fascinating. That's a large part of why characters like Cale, Artemis Entreri, and Twilight are interesting, (to me at least.) I find it much more difficult to remain intrigued by pure evil in the long term, which I think is why Pharaun Mizzrym lost his appeal to me as "The War of the Spider Queen" progressed. Once I realized that there was very little, (not none, but very little), moral complexity to him, that he really was just a jerk, he became less interesting. Since this getting attached to good people impedes giving evil equal attention, (for sentimental people like me, at least), short stories focused on evil seem the best solution. That, or novels entirely focused on evil, with no good intruding itself and acting as a distraction, though even that might not work for some.

Am I biased toward the "side of good"? Certainly. But I do think that these are some genuine obstacles to creating a successful story in which evil comes out ahead at the direct expense of the heroes. Of course, the sages of the Realms are clever. Who knows what they might devise.

I agree that the idea of evil triumphing for a time and then being overthrown in one of those epic come backs might be fun, but I think that such domination would have to be confined to a specific region or two, rather than the whole Realms. Faerun is a big, big place, and the domination of the continent in its entirety by even the likes of Szass Tam would be difficult to realistically imagine. Also, keeping the "bad guys" in power for any really meaningful length of time without messing with the setting time line would be kind of hard, as despite some comments I've heard about the Realms novels careening to quickly forward through time, to my mind the line actually moves at a rather stately pace, (which is good). When the 3 E Realms campaign setting came out in 2000, it was dated Shield Meet 1372. Now, over six years later, the beginning of Richard Lee Byers's new novel "Unclean" is dated 5 Mirtul, 1375, I believe. Slightly less than three years have passed in the Realms since 2000. Since the line tends to move chronologically, with exceptions such as the epilogue to "Final Gate", which I hear takes place in 1380, (interested to see how that works), it would be hard for WotC to sustain interest in a plot that could easily stretch over dozens of years real time to cover even fifty Realms years.

Regarding the epic level keystone cop depiction of villains, I can't actually think of any examples, but I agree in principle. I dislike beyond words applying game stats to novel situations, but its frustrating to see characters who're supposed to be way smart depicted as morons. We have to keep in mind, though, that there are sometimes mitigating circumstances or considerations. Samaster, for instance, while brilliant, was also delightfully mad. Sarya Dlardrageth it seemed to me had a consistent tendency to become irrationally angry and prone to stupid mistakes when under stress. Also, no villain is omnipotent. They cannot plan for absolutely every eventuality; (it could be argued that some could come close, but even Manshoon and Dread Larloch aren't perfect). The more significant villains are also often being opposed by people who themselves are no push-overs.

I know that this doesn't begin to address the whole of the "keystone cops" issue. Just throwing some thoughts out there.

initiate Posted - 25 Feb 2007 : 18:26:33
KnightErrantJR Wrote:
You know what I think would be more interesting than an all evil party? A party that was mainly good and neutral with one evil member.

This is an extremely cool idea. I have, in fact, DMed a campaign, (or rather, part of one; it died), in which the entire party was good or neutral save for one evil character. Its an awesome concept, and when it worked, it worked really well.

I think one of the problems was that, while the evil guy roleplayed quite well as such, he gave the other characters no reason not to despise him; he was to obviously a vile, vile jerk. In addition to being an evil schemer, he was just generally unpleasant on a day to day basis. Also, the other half of KEJR's excellent idea was not present, in that there was no family or even long-term friendship dynamic between the other characters and the evil PC. They just had no reason to care about him.

Ultimately the evil character was able to turn himself undead due to some bad house rules of mine, secretly planted necrotic cysts within all the other party members, and generally high-handed it over all of them in an openly cruel way. It almost came to rolling dice in anger against one another several times before the campaign stopped. The fact that the evil character was vastly statistically superior to everyone else in every possible way, (owing to a power-gaming mind and some miscalculations on my part), probably fueled everybody else's resentment. I agree with Delzounblood and Erik Scott de Bie that to work properly a concept like this would require allot of maturity from the players. I often find it hard roleplaying a "good" or neutral character to my satisfaction, or getting my players to do so; portraying evil would be difficult indeed. I also agree with Rinnonalyrna Fathomlin that I don't think I'd personally find playing a really, genuinely evil character that satisfying.

Cool tale of past gaming, Mace. Paladins have it rough, do they not?

Mace Hammerhand Posted - 23 Feb 2007 : 08:36:18
I once played in a party where every character had his own agenda, with the exception of my paladin. It grew so annoying that I finally decided to double-cross the entire gang and turned to their (our) chief enemy and offered him a deal. Talk about fallen from grace.

We were supposed to hide an artifact piece from him, so when he came to take it, with me on watch bargained a bit, he accepted my offer, took the artifact piece and left.
I, on the other hand, made enough ruckuss in that (locked) room so that it actually sounded like a fight, banged my head severely on the table and passed out. When the rest of the group finally tore down the wall they found me lying unconcious and bleeding on the floor. Of course, they assumed (with me being paladin and all) that I fought valiantly, was defeated and all that. That character became one of the death-god's paladins and "suffered" a severe power-boost. They never saw it coming

Years later, I told one of the players what actually went down, she glared at me and said "You bastard!", I merely smiled and nodded, saying "Yup, and then some."

So, a good guy in a party of selfish rats, stands no chance, unless he turns to the dark side also
Rinonalyrna Fathomlin Posted - 23 Feb 2007 : 00:58:24
I'd like to chime in and agree with WR and KEJR that a good party with one evil character would be a fun idea...although I wouldn't want to be the one to play the evil character. Personally, I don't see how playing such a character would be that satisfying for me (pretending to be seriously evil would bother me too much).
KnightErrantJR Posted - 23 Feb 2007 : 00:31:42
quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert

quote:
Originally posted by KnightErrantJR

You know what I would think would be more interesting than just an all evil party? A party that was mainly good and neutral with one evil member.



Wow, I wish I'd thought of that!



Shush . . . don't tell anyone . . . I think I'm going to copyright this idea . . .
nbnmare Posted - 23 Feb 2007 : 00:01:39
I never got the impression that Cyric became a devoted champion of evil (EDIT: while still a mortal, of course); to me it just seemed as though he had gone completely and utterly bonkers. He became evil sure, but not because he was devoted to it, rather because he could no longer tell the difference between right and wrong.
Wooly Rupert Posted - 22 Feb 2007 : 23:38:53
quote:
Originally posted by KnightErrantJR

You know what I would think would be more interesting than just an all evil party? A party that was mainly good and neutral with one evil member.



Wow, I wish I'd thought of that!
KnightErrantJR Posted - 22 Feb 2007 : 23:13:01
You know what I would think would be more interesting than just an all evil party? A party that was mainly good and neutral with one evil member. Yeah, I know, this is pretty much what happened with the Heroes of the Lance, and its what the characters in the Avatar trilogy had the potential for, if Cyric hadn't gone from cynical adventurer to devoted champion of evil in the space of a chapter or so.

I DMed an evil/neutral party, and I played in a neutral/evil party as well, and my friends were pretty mature with the party. Yes, everyone was in it for themselves, but there wasn't constant backstabbing or in fighting or screwing each other, just a lot of plotting and scheming and trying to convince each other that a given course of action that was good for you would be somewhat advantageous for them as well to go along with.

But I think that a party where most of the characters are good or neutral, all of them are friends, maybe relatives, and one is evil. The other party members know that the character is evil, but they also know that that person has good points, that they share a history, and they can't give up on them. With the right people this could be a great campaign, but it would definately take someone with the right mindset for this to work.
Delzounblood Posted - 22 Feb 2007 : 22:54:46
quote:
Originally posted by Erik Scott de Bie

quote:
Originally posted by Delzounblood

and now to the most corrupt and dangerous char
Tiefling (80% sure) not sure on class yet still in planning stage!

I seem to be moving ever more to Chaotic and Evil!



If I might humbly suggest . . .

Lesser aasimar ex-paladin/blackguard.

The unequivocal fallen angel, who easily bluffs people into thinking he's still a paladin. Wisdom and Charisma bonuses. Add rogue, ranger, or fighter, to suit your own preferences. With "lesser" (that is, planetouched (native) subtype -- see PGtF), you don't even have to worry about the ECL.

Cheers




Your Twisted


I like


Nice one I didn't think of the fallen angel angle, (try saying that 20 times fast on a night out).

hhhmmm the plot thickens


Delz
Erik Scott de Bie Posted - 22 Feb 2007 : 22:49:27
quote:
Originally posted by Delzounblood

and now to the most corrupt and dangerous char
Tiefling (80% sure) not sure on class yet still in planning stage!

I seem to be moving ever more to Chaotic and Evil!



If I might humbly suggest . . .

Lesser aasimar ex-paladin/blackguard.

The unequivocal fallen angel, who easily bluffs people into thinking he's still a paladin. Wisdom and Charisma bonuses. Add rogue, ranger, or fighter, to suit your own preferences. With "lesser" (that is, planetouched (native) subtype -- see PGtF), you don't even have to worry about the ECL.

Cheers
Wooly Rupert Posted - 22 Feb 2007 : 22:49:18
I want to play an evil character... I'd really like to try playing a NE character who was, for some reason, stuck adventuring with a good-aligned party.
Delzounblood Posted - 22 Feb 2007 : 22:14:58
Depths

Hmmm we shall have to see

as for the maturity and exp level of the Players in my group running a utter Evil game would not be an issue we all have a min on 10 years gaming exp and are all (please dis-regard anything I may have said on this site that contradicts) mature.

My mindset at the mo regarding game play has changed slowly from:

Ranger being caring and thoughtful.
dwarf being money mad
dwarf being violent ( Delzounblood)
and now to the most corrupt and dangerous char
Tiefling (80% sure) not sure on class yet still in planning stage!

I seem to be moving ever more to Chaotic and Evil!



Delz
Erik Scott de Bie Posted - 22 Feb 2007 : 22:05:17
quote:
Originally posted by Delzounblood

Are there any good novels which depict an "Evil doer" winning rarther than the "Heroes" coming through in the end?


Heh. Well . . .

We'll see what you guys think of the ending of Depths.

As for other Realms books -- Kemp's Erevis Cale trilogy doesn't end with any kind of all consuming victory for the heroes. If they really are heroes anyway.

quote:
I'm toying with the idea of running a truly evil char in my next game


I DM an Evil Realms Campaign, and it's totally choice. The players have so much fun, and are so interested and fascinated by their characters, that they consider it one of the best RP experiences ever.

That said, use of evil characters requires a certain amount of maturity that not all players have. It's important, before you play an evil character, that you clear it with everyone at the table first.

Cheers
Delzounblood Posted - 22 Feb 2007 : 21:41:43
Hmmm Thanks nbn
nbnmare Posted - 22 Feb 2007 : 14:33:08
quote:
Originally posted by Delzounblood

regarding this topic.

Are there any good novels which depict an "Evil doer" winning rarther than the "Heroes" coming through in the end?


Some of the stories in the various Realms anthologies are like this, and several others have morally ambigious endings (such as Lisa Smedman's story in Realms of the Elves).

quote:
Originally posted by bitter thorn

On the other hand it's hard to take the bad guys seriously when evry major bad guy organization seems all but incapable of gaining and/or consolidating any meaningful goals.


I would rephrase that to "every popular bad guy organization". Groups such as the Night Masks, the Rundeen, and the Hosttower of the Arcane are fairly major powers in their respective geographical locations, but they haven't suffered any setbacks in a while, if only because they haven't actually featured in any recent novels or sourcebooks.

There's also the fact we simply don't know what the goals of several evil organizations actually are, at least those they have for the long term. We still don't know what the the most important plans of the Empire of Shade, the Twisted Rune, the Shield Council, the Dark Moon monks, etc are, so how would we know how well those plans are succeeding? Sure the TR suffered a setback with the Halaster fiasco, but did it really upset their most important schemes all that much? I would say no.
bitter thorn Posted - 22 Feb 2007 : 11:57:54
I just find the depiction of the major bad guys being epic level keystone cops to be a tad frustrating. We all like to see the good guys triumph, and I'm certainly not saying that I'd like to see Cormyr, Waterdeep, or the Silvermarches fall. On the other hand it's hard to take the bad guys seriously when evry major bad guy organization seems all but incapable of gaining and/or consolidating any meaningful goals. I liked the turn in "The Farthest Reach" with the Zhents actually gaining and holding some geography for a change. On the other hand one of my favorite PCs is a Ranger of Daggerdale. I like the current storyline of Daggerdale being liberated from the Zehts, but the Zehts need to se a viable threat to keep them interesting as antagonists. Humanoid hoardes have the same issue. They require depth and menace to be more than massed cannon fodder.

I don't want the Realms to turn into WoD by any means, but I think evil as an institution or setting element needs to be intimidating on an institutional and setting level. I think that the rich history of the Realms reflects this, but I think it's more of a challenge for the novelists. I suppose it makes thier job even more challenging when there is a universal expectation that the good guys invariably carry the day. When all or most of the many fine novels and RSEs in particular represent a win for the good guys the cumilative effect is to make evil seem weak by comparison. I guess that is one of the challenges with a setting as rich and storied as the Realms.
Delzounblood Posted - 22 Feb 2007 : 11:34:41
regarding this topic.

Are there any good novels which depict an "Evil doer" winning rarther than the "Heroes" coming through in the end?

I feel that for a balance the bad guy's could win a few more and I would like to see it happen in a trilogy. I know this goes against the grain as far as novel / adventures happen, face it you create a hero to win not lose! But It would be nice to see the Hero lose and the big baddie win for a change. It will keep the spice in the game rarther than Good will always over come and Evil always turns upon itself!!

Just a thought.

imagine if the Cult of the Dragon or Thay became the Realms Overlords for say 100 years... What a come back the Goodly races could have in the end, Yes I know I have just contradicted myself but you get my gist!

Delz


PS:

I'm toying with the idea of running a truly evil char in my next game

Rinonalyrna Fathomlin Posted - 22 Feb 2007 : 01:57:49
quote:
Originally posted by initiate


This is entirely subjective, but as a reader of stories, I find the prospect of reading about the victory of distasteful, evil characters far less appetizing than the triumph of their "good" counterparts.




I feel the same way...usually. In my personal opinion, if I'm cheering on the villain instead of the "good guys", it means the author didn't write the protagonists in a way that makes them appealing to me (or to be more blunt about it--it means I don't find the protagonists to be well-written, for any number of reasons).

Great post, by the way, and welcome to the forums.

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