D&D 5E Evil Campaign?

[Ralif Redhammer]

A couple of my players tend towards borderline/evil/amoral characters. As long as everyone understands that they have to at least get along internally, you should be fine. Lie, cheat, and steal from any NPC you want, but never each other. Unless everyone is okay with that sort of game, that path leads to ruin.

Motivations will be different for an evil group, rather than a good one. You can't just assume they'll take the hook because it's the right thing to do. Greed and revenge are what I've used for major motivations. Maybe the group was betrayed by an even more evil person, and now they're out for some payback?

For literary inspiration, I'd recommend Glen Cook's Black Company and Mark Lawrence's Broken Empire series.

 

[Kite474]

I only really got to run one Evil Campaign in my life.... But oh-ho-ho it probably had the most memorable character I ever played and ever will play in my life.

All fear the Anti Paladin Erekan: Devourer of Homes , Burner of Families.... And Ravisher of Crops. Those poor pumpkins...
He also had 4 Int... Because he had 4 Int. He also traveled in a wooden box the Wizard put him in.

As for advice theirs two path's to an evil campaign. Slow, Sinister, and subtle evil. Think Strahd or Francis Underwood.

Or McDastrdly mustache twirling, utterly cartoonish evil.

Both can work very well. Though the former NEEDS a really good GM and the later can burn out quickly.

 

[Rhenny]

When I was in high school (a long time ago), I played in an evil campaign. We kept it going for 2 or 3 years and had a great time. Somehow, we all feared each other in the party just enough so that we didn't do anything to disrupt the group too badly. Also, the DM made sure that most of the campaign, we were thrust into situations where we were still trying to survive in a dog-eat-dog world against other even more powerful evils than our own pitiful PCs. We spent a lot of time meeting very powerful evil entities that we would either serve or try to outwit/avoid. We had the opportunity to think differently and try on the neutral, lawful and even some chaotic evil, but for the most part, we never actually turned the campaign into an attempt to battle the forces of good in the world. I think that is a huge key to keeping an evil party going. Really, once the party turns against the forces of good and acts too blatantly against established authority and goodness in a fantasy world, the party has no true safe haven unless they are protected by some higher level/godlike evil entity - but sometimes that feels too much like DM intervention to save the PCs from the consequences they engender.

Unfortunately, toward the end of our campaign, we had worn thin the bond that kept our PCs together, and then we started to plot and fight within the party. The party ended when each party member chose 1 of 2 sides and then we had a showdown. To tell the truth, I can't even remember how it all ended, but once we started to fight faction vs. faction, the game was not as fun. We all think that this happened because we were wrestling with teen angst and interpersonal tension between players/DM.

So, like others have said, try to create really plausible bonds between the PCs and make sure they know that being evil can be really dangerous because if you are openly too evil, you will be fighting both the forces of good and the forces of evil. It is best to play the game of politics and seem more law abiding and conduct most of the evil surreptitiously and selectively. (House of Cards or Thieves' World/Sanctuary style).

 

[Matita]

K I guess

 

[Matita]

When I was in high school (a long time ago), I played in an evil campaign. We kept it going for 2 or 3 years and had a great time. Somehow, we all feared each other in the party just enough so that we didn't do anything to disrupt the group too badly. Also, the DM made sure that most of the campaign, we were thrust into situations where we were still trying to survive in a dog-eat-dog world against other even more powerful evils than our own pitiful PCs. We spent a lot of time meeting very powerful evil entities that we would either serve or try to outwit/avoid. We had the opportunity to think differently and try on the neutral, lawful and even some chaotic evil, but for the most part, we never actually turned the campaign into an attempt to battle the forces of good in the world. I think that is a huge key to keeping an evil party going. Really, once the party turns against the forces of good and acts too blatantly against established authority and goodness in a fantasy world, the party has no true safe haven unless they are protected by some higher level/godlike evil entity - but sometimes that feels too much like DM intervention to save the PCs from the consequences they engender.

Unfortunately, toward the end of our campaign, we had worn thin the bond that kept our PCs together, and then we started to plot and fight within the party. The party ended when each party member chose 1 of 2 sides and then we had a showdown. To tell the truth, I can't even remember how it all ended, but once we started to fight faction vs. faction, the game was not as fun. We all think that this happened because we were wrestling with teen angst and interpersonal tension between players/DM.

So, like others have said, try to create really plausible bonds between the PCs and make sure they know that being evil can be really dangerous because if you are openly too evil, you will be fighting both the forces of good and the forces of evil. It is best to play the game of politics and seem more law abiding and conduct most of the evil surreptitiously and selectively. (House of Cards or Thieves' World/Sanctuary style).

That campaign sounds fun and thanks my DM in arms and I have taken a lot from you guys suggestions ideas tips (etc) thank you very much

 

[Libramarian]

I'm not into grimdark evil but I do appreciate some ironic amoralism.

E.g. make a reaction roll for every NPC the PCs meet:

2d6
2: Very Hostile
3-5: Hostile
6-8: Neutral
9-11: Friendly
12: Very Friendly

Very Hostile NPCs want to murder the PCs
Hostiles seem friendly, but will swindle or betray the PCs
Neutrals are brusque and avoidant, or polite but condescending
Friendlies want help with something, but offer nothing but fulsome praise in return
Very Friendlies are rubes who are very tempting to take advantage of

 

[Ancalagon]

but once we started to fight faction vs. faction, the game was not as fun.

This. Just because the party is evil doesn't mean there should be party infighting and betrayal. That tends to ruin the game.

Evil people can be loyal and cooperate.

 

[hawkeyefan]

This. Just because the party is evil doesn't mean there should be party infighting and betrayal. That tends to ruin the game.

Evil people can be loyal and cooperate.

Yeah, exactly. When my group did an evil campaign I wanted to avoid this kind of thing, so I made sure to give them a mutual enemy within the story to focus on.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

This. Just because the party is evil doesn't mean there should be party infighting and betrayal. That tends to ruin the game.

Evil people can be loyal and cooperate.

Yes, even Chaotic Evil people.

Of course, that's the real "secret" to successfully incorporating evil characters into a campaign; actually incorporating them, make them "fit" by making the party and the campaign actually accommodate each other so that there is a unified party of the player characters with enough shared goals to explain long-term cooperation for at least as long as needed to achieve those goals.

If you get the process down, you can actually start including evil characters in parties primarily good-aligned, and vice versa, without so much friction as to destroy the party cohesion or derail the campaign.

One of my current campaigns actually happens to include a Neutral Evil character, while the rest of the party are either Lawful Good or Neutral Good. They have friction, yes, but the players realize that their characters don't actually know each others alignment so they have to view each other as if they weren't sure about what alignment represents.

For example, at the end of a recent encounter one of their enemies feigned surrender to try and create an opportunity to escape with what information and items he had, unknown to any of the party, stolen. The NE character didn't believe the surrender was genuine, while the LG character (and all the others) did. The NE character struck down the foe without hesitation, and the rest of the party, shocked by this because it's not how they expect people to behave, demand explanation why she did that horrible, cruel (evil) thing. She offered "He was lying, trying to steal from us." as her explanation. The LG character pushed further, though the rest of the party accepted that as a good enough explanation, saying "You couldn't have known that was true!" (because she, like everyone else before searching the dead would-be thief, didn't have any evidence of theft or lie)

But, rather than doing what seems typical (from other groups I've had in the past, and what stories I've heard of campaigns involving evil characters) and having the LG character refuse to associate with the NE character any further, or jumping straight to "kill the evil!" over-reaction, the LG player said "If I ever see you murder a man again, whether you have some hunch there's reason or not, I'll be forced to turn you over to the authorities." Which completely resolves the situation because the NE character, being NE, will only do what she thinks she can get away with, and she knows now that she can't get away with killing someone without justification prior to the act. And the characters stick together still, many sessions since that incident, because their goals are aligned and they are more likely to succeed together than apart.

 

[MechaPilot]

I have a preference for the odd, preferring to play monstrous races over "normal" ones, and often preferring to play a villainess over a heroine.

One of my favorite characters is one that I played in an evil campaign. Her name was Cyllinth, and she was a cleric of her own divinity (or, rather, profanity, given that she's evil). She viewed herself as a nascent hellgoddess, and used her travels and cleric powers to perform miracles and gain followers. She kept diaries with the intent of later editing them into the bible for her cult. Some of the reasons why she worked with the other PCs and had no qualms about destroying, or thwarting the plans of, the adventures' villains included:

1) the adventure villains refused to worship her (the look on my DM's face the first time she offered to allow a villain to live if he kissed her feet and professed that she was "the one true goddess, perfect, and with beauty to surpass all others" was priceless).

2) it gave her the ooportunity to find magic items that could help her gather, maintain, and arm a cult of followers.

and 3) she was able to get rid of the villainous competition, and a party helped her do that even when they were stronger than she currently was.

As long as a villainous character has suitable motivations, and is not entirely self-deluded, she can easily work with others and go on the same kinds of adventures that good characters can go on. The only real difference is the motivation involved. A good party might want to save a town for the sake of the people living there, but an evil party might want to save a town because they heard a powerful relic lies in the ruins the town was built upon.