No campaign is complete without a Big Bad, in my opinion. Ok, you can do one without a big villian. But I like to have one!
My favorite is in the campaign I'm currently running. He (currently she, actually) is a hivemind shapeshifter that is following the party. He has the power to absorb people into himself, their mind and/or body. In doing so he adds their mind into his, both personality and memories. He is currently hunting the party to try and absorb the half-god child they are protecting. At this point he is in the guise of an NPC traveling with the party. I've given hints but none of them seem to realize it for some reason, except for the player he already killed and who's mind he absorbed.
He's pretty fun to have around, I think, and gives me more options for a more subtle bad guy rather than the average Enemy Leader.
So I am curious, what is the favorite enemy you DM's have created? I'm always on the lookout for new evil to throw at my players that they don't expect.
mine is a member of a race i made for this game. the entire race is trying to decide which of them should be in charge so they decided whoever can remove the most trash (aka people races) from the land will become their leader. their rank goes up based on the number and quality of those that they kill. this one even enslaves others of its race to work for it after proving itself to them as being better than them in every way. this one is more of a tactician and uses tricks poisons and traps along with monsters and beasts that it trains and raises to kill instead of fighting directly, but once he was required to actually fight he was always a bit mentally unstable and looses it becoming a primal beast who has a powerful regenaration and physical prowess. he always hated the fact that he when not aided with some herbal medicine to become more stable (which didn't always help) he became a beast who would only destroy and kill with his bare hands and always wanted to prove himself better then the violent other members of his race.
My favorite in recent years was a Pan Lung (Chineese(?)) water dragon.
It was a 3x game. There was a quite extended arc of play where the PCs discovered ones presence (by stumbling into its area & its' plans). They then decided to thwart & ultimately slay this horrible beast, freeing the "oppressed" bullywugs.
Not a single player had any idea what a Pan Lung was. They didn't even ask. The good allingned party just took the evil frogmen at their word. And so off they went to sow destruction throughout the Pan Lungs "lair".
Many fun sessions later they came face to face with the fact, & irrifuitable proof!, that the dragon was NOT the BBEG. Not at all. One of the players decryed this a trick & insisted upon charging the thing. The rest of the party? They made no effort to restrain him. Because of this the party as a whole lost out on a fantastic ally, & great new base of operations, and was banished from the Pans territory on pain of death. The offender who actually attacked? He was killed.
To be fair, my party was largly responcible for creating this Big Bad, and that is why I love it so much. A while bad they were in a vault they found abandoned in a drow outpost, and discovered a magic item. I was improvising at the time so I flipped open the magnifisant emporium to find an item and though 'that looks cool... you find a helm, the helm of seven deaths." Anyways one of the party members thought a helm that uses the souls of those that die near it as fuel for its dark power was to evil to keep, and was out to destroy it, while another wanted to give it to a magical item trading house they owed a debt to. They unloaded their dailies on eachother, and the others steped in to stop the fight.... they knocked eachother out, and the helm was hidden in the artificers bag to be delt with later.... when it was next seen it was being put on to sway the balance of a tough fight, and the ranger in the party who thought it had been left behind to rot, launched a daily on the helm and its holder, resulting in out first party member death. it was lost in a crowd, and not seen again..... for 150 years..... in the past. They ended up in the past after a botched portal, and found the helm in the ruins of the Rune Lords, now known as the Lords of Ruin. It was Wraths helm that he used to keep the souls of the other ords when he turned on them.... the Helm has now taken us to its place of creation, in Gloomwroght, where they will try to end it. Its all very exciting for me as a DM because it is something the party decided was evil, and they made it what it is today... Im like a proud dad seeing my party grow up and get their first job.
In the Nentir Vale, all injured creatures are required to wear a name tag!
While the villain of my most recently completed campaign holds a special place (as that campaign was probably my most successful one), I still have a paticular soft spot in my heart for my first big villain all the way back from 3.0, Glib the Goblin Barbarian. Nothing like seeing the players faces when a Goblin is wielding an axe larger than his whole body talking like Mushmouth from Fat Albert XD
I didn't make this one, rather one of my PCs did. Also this will possibly contain spoilers from the Book of Vile Darkness adventure, so read on at your own risk.
In my last campaign that ended, my players were searching for a way to destroy the Book of Vile Darkness. I was running the adventure in the back of the BoVD's DM booklet, so the party had to find the Well of Many Worlds. (I really like the idea for this well) However, before all of this even happened, the Dwarven Warlock in the party, named Cragnor, held the book and was horribly currupted by it. He believed that he held the book in a way that was saving the party from its curruption. Well, some things happened that led to the party not trusting him at all after they found out he was hiding the Book of Vile Darkness from them. After some talking, an inner-party fight broke out, killing poor Cragnor. So the party finds the well and the party Fighter and worshiper of the Raven Queen, a Dragonborn named Rhogar, now held onto the book and was actually managing to keep its curruption at bay. At the well they are beset by followers of Vecna and the fight spills into the well of many world, which is bassically a single portal linking all dimensions and worlds togeter at other wells on other worlds. Well, the party is in the well, floating in time and space, and they land in the Shadowfell reality of Neverwinter. Rhogar has the book and had been currupted by it and fled from the party by flying away. (The game had been at Paragon tier for a while, as the PCs were level 14 to 15.
Old Rhogar flew to a tower in the Shadow fell called the Tower of Evil. This was the Shadowfell version of the Spire of Ice to the North East of Neverwinter in Rhogar's player's own campaign. So naturally he flew there, and contacted Vecna himself. What did Rhogar do? He managed to create FOUR of the best villains I had ever had in any campaign I had ever run. Rhogar Revives a fllen commrade, lures another of his commrades to the Tower, and the best part, Revives Cragnor! Now Rhogar and Cragnor each have a copy of the Book of Vile Darkness, Rhogar carrying the first book, and Cragnor carrying the Shadowfell's copy of the book that was housed in the Tower. Cragnor immeadiately requests the Lich Creation Ritural be cast on himself and he becomes a Lich. An epic fight breaks out at the Shadowfell's well of many worlds, between the four evil turned party members now working under Vecna, and the five remaining good characters now under the Raven Queen. (the five good party members went to Latherna to ask for her aid, as one of the PCs was Her Avenger.)
So yes. Rhogar, the good fighter turned evil; Sora, the other Dragonborn Fighter, and close childhood friend of Rhogar, turned evil; Adrie, Fey Pact Warlock turned Lich, and also evil; and Cragnor, Abyssal Pact Warlock, turned Lich, always evil, and greatest villain I ever had.
Rhogar and Sora Died in the fight against the good party members, while Adrie was killed, but will come back in eight days thanks to Lich's regeneration. Old Cragnor was the only remaining evil PC left after that fight. He managed to, sorta, redeem himself. The good party left the fight through the well of many worlds to tell a temple of Bahamut's Paladins in the Nentir Vale that they knew where to find the Book of Vile Darkness. They knew of the Paladins as this was established in a Heroic Tier adventure they went through. Cragnor met them at the Nentir Vale's well, and stole the book that the good party had got from killing Rhogar, but not before a Paladin got a grapple on him. Cragnor used the well to travel to the top of a volcano where he attempted to dump the Paladin into the lava, but the Paladin, a Paragon Dragonborn, scored a hit on Cragnor, causing him to hit 0 HP, dropping the Book and Cragnor into the heart of the volcano. The Dragonborn Paladin Flew away.
With the good party in possession of one of the two Books after the fight, they were able to destroy at least one copy by flooding it with positive energy and sending it into the heart of the Sun. The remaining members of the good party then established that they would destroy the other remaining Books if they had to, as well as the Liches Cragnor and Adrie. Cragnor and Adrie made it their point that after they regenerated, they would send out new found minions and servants to find the remaining copies and claim them, and take out any resistance they found on the way.
Let an evil or cursed item do its job, and the campagin villains will show themselves.
I didn't make this one, rather one of my PCs did. Also this will possibly contain spoilers from the Book of Vile Darkness adventure, so read on at your own risk.
In my last campaign that ended, my players were searching for a way to destroy the Book of Vile Darkness. I was running the adventure in the back of the BoVD's DM booklet, so the party had to find the Well of Many Worlds. (I really like the idea for this well) However, before all of this even happened, the Dwarven Warlock in the party, named Cragnor, held the book and was horribly currupted by it. He believed that he held the book in a way that was saving the party from its curruption. Well, some things happened that led to the party not trusting him at all after they found out he was hiding the Book of Vile Darkness from them. After some talking, an inner-party fight broke out, killing poor Cragnor. So the party finds the well and the party Fighter and worshiper of the Raven Queen, a Dragonborn named Rhogar, now held onto the book and was actually managing to keep its curruption at bay. At the well they are beset by followers of Vecna and the fight spills into the well of many world, which is bassically a single portal linking all dimensions and worlds togeter at other wells on other worlds. Well, the party is in the well, floating in time and space, and they land in the Shadowfell reality of Neverwinter. Rhogar has the book and had been currupted by it and fled from the party by flying away. (The game had been at Paragon tier for a while, as the PCs were level 14 to 15.
Old Rhogar flew to a tower in the Shadow fell called the Tower of Evil. This was the Shadowfell version of the Spire of Ice to the North East of Neverwinter in Rhogar's player's own campaign. So naturally he flew there, and contacted Vecna himself. What did Rhogar do? He managed to create FOUR of the best villains I had ever had in any campaign I had ever run. Rhogar Revives a fllen commrade, lures another of his commrades to the Tower, and the best part, Revives Cragnor! Now Rhogar and Cragnor each have a copy of the Book of Vile Darkness, Rhogar carrying the first book, and Cragnor carrying the Shadowfell's copy of the book that was housed in the Tower. Cragnor immeadiately requests the Lich Creation Ritural be cast on himself and he becomes a Lich. An epic fight breaks out at the Shadowfell's well of many worlds, between the four evil turned party members now working under Vecna, and the five remaining good characters now under the Raven Queen. (the five good party members went to Latherna to ask for her aid, as one of the PCs was Her Avenger.)
So yes. Rhogar, the good fighter turned evil; Sora, the other Dragonborn Fighter, and close childhood friend of Rhogar, turned evil; Adrie, Fey Pact Warlock turned Lich, and also evil; and Cragnor, Abyssal Pact Warlock, turned Lich, always evil, and greatest villain I ever had.
Rhogar and Sora Died in the fight against the good party members, while Adrie was killed, but will come back in eight days thanks to Lich's regeneration. Old Cragnor was the only remaining evil PC left after that fight. He managed to, sorta, redeem himself. The good party left the fight through the well of many worlds to tell a temple of Bahamut's Paladins in the Nentir Vale that they knew where to find the Book of Vile Darkness. They knew of the Paladins as this was established in a Heroic Tier adventure they went through. Cragnor met them at the Nentir Vale's well, and stole the book that the good party had got from killing Rhogar, but not before a Paladin got a grapple on him. Cragnor used the well to travel to the top of a volcano where he attempted to dump the Paladin into the lava, but the Paladin, a Paragon Dragonborn, scored a hit on Cragnor, causing him to hit 0 HP, dropping the Book and Cragnor into the heart of the volcano. The Dragonborn Paladin Flew away.
With the good party in possession of one of the two Books after the fight, they were able to destroy at least one copy by flooding it with positive energy and sending it into the heart of the Sun. The remaining members of the good party then established that they would destroy the other remaining Books if they had to, as well as the Liches Cragnor and Adrie. Cragnor and Adrie made it their point that after they regenerated, they would send out new found minions and servants to find the remaining copies and claim them, and take out any resistance they found on the way.
Let an evil or cursed item do its job, and the campagin villains will show themselves.
We summoned a devil once. All we used was the D&D books, too. It was pretty kwazy.
God of Arrested Development and Intelligence Resident Left Hand of Stalin and Banana Stand Grandstander Pie-Cooling-On-A-Windowsill of the House of Trolls In the morning HK'll be sober but you'll still be a meatbag. I know I misspell "Danke" in my posts. It's an inside joke. "Ten cents gets you nuts." -George Michael Spoiler:Show
''Being president is like running a cemetery: you've got a lot of people under you and nobody's listening.'' —Bill Clinton
You are not a moral man. There are not enough middle fingers in the world for you.
"Heroes"...I wish I had those. I remember in my first-ever campaign one PC went around shootin all the unconscious baddies in the head to gain Dark Side Points...
Whaaaaaat?!??
Wow...way to waste perfectly good potential slaves.
Er...no wait I mean..uh...something not evil!
(Quotes screwed up on the next one, won't give the poster's name. It's in the Best Lines thread on the D&D forum)
First, an experience from a game I played in a few years back. Our DM didn't like 3.5 as a whole but liked parts of it. So he hands us a big ass rules packet for his modified FR campaign, complete with quotes from important NPC's on the front. I can't remember most of the HRs, just that some how gods like Cyric and Bhaal existed at the same time, despite the obvious problems there. In the end the game became a problem more because of the railroading than the HRs, but it ended with this classic line, after our ranger tried to disarm the strange woman following us WITH HIS BOW: DM: You just killed (insert random noble sounding name here) JP: Was she important? Jack: Dude, she's quoted on the front of the rules packet!
"Why in the wide,wide, world of all things irrational would I help you? -Daniel Jackson "Fun will now commence." -Seven of Nine
Cut the last encounter on your way out after dealing with the Darth. He's the BBEG. Treat him as such. Play up that Darth Revan is THAT much of a badarse. When the shuttle landed, I had no less than 13 JEDI MASTERS step off the shuttle. The PCs were slack-jawed. After the meetup with Bastila (as she's carrying Revan's body), only TWO jedi masters remained with her. Let me tell you, the player whining about not getting to fight Revan himself shut up pretty quickly when he saw that.
1. Cleric cast protection from fire on Tank. 2. Tank goes in and get surrounded by enemies. 3. Wizard cast fireball and blows them up. 4. ??? 5. Profit
I go by the saying," If it ain't friendly fire then it's not working."
As far as my favorite RP big bad, it was a true neutral, bug bear druid. He had a seriously twisted sense of balance that he referred to as decay. To him everything was in a constant state of decay. He fought to bring about the end of existance, quoting "Reality is in a constant state of decay, after this existance is gone, a new one will be born; as even the state of nothingness is in decay.
As far as my favorite combat big bad, it was a half/orc barbarian wrestler, his "weapons" were spiked armor that did uh, i think it was str or con damage. The battle was epic, my tank pc was twitchin a bit. He kept saying, "This guy is my equal, he's functionally removed me from combat!" It was neat watching the other PC's step it up, to handle the adds, and dealing with grappling characters in combat. Kinda reminded me of swimming.
A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men.
My personal favorite ... probably an elf wizard who had lost his daughter to literally random circumstances. So, to seek revenge ... he was going to destroy randomness. Everything would proceed perfectly, like a perfect machine, for the rest of eternity.
The final battle with him (and some creatures he summoned, of course) took place on a small demi-plane of perfect order. No dice were rolled; all results were considered to be dead average. Your d20s were all 10.5 (round down to 10). d6s were 3.5, so 1d6 was 3, 2d6 was 7, and so forth.
My players were flabbergasted; they were basically used to relying on lucky shots to win fights, and now, there was no such thing as luck. They actually had to *gasp* use tactics.
Another day, another three or four entries to my Ignore List.
My personal favorite ... probably an elf wizard who had lost his daughter to literally random circumstances. So, to seek revenge ... he was going to destroy randomness. Everything would proceed perfectly, like a perfect machine, for the rest of eternity.
The final battle with him (and some creatures he summoned, of course) took place on a small demi-plane of perfect order. No dice were rolled; all results were considered to be dead average. Your d20s were all 10.5 (round down to 10). d6s were 3.5, so 1d6 was 3, 2d6 was 7, and so forth.
My players were flabbergasted; they were basically used to relying on lucky shots to win fights, and now, there was no such thing as luck. They actually had to *gasp* use tactics.
Speaking as someone who likes to put twists like this in his campaigns, I have to say that is one of the best things I've ever heard. Well done good sir!
