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Message: <blockquote data-quote="kigmatzomat" data-source="post: 9801976" data-attributes="member: 9254">I'm partial to making the "big bad" someone who is not a direct, personal threat.  Like, what if the equivalent of Tallryand or Cato the Elder who spent a non-trivial amount of effort engineering everyone they can get to listen to view the party as a threat, casting their every accomplishment in the worst possible light, and maneuvering for a coalition powerful enough for "the menace to be destroyed."A nearby country has declared them all criminals, a vindictive church (one at odds with the PC cleric/paladin) accuses them of stealing a magical relic, the rogue is blamed for not paying bribes while stealing a magical relic, the wizard reportedly violated some "mage guild code" so no one will so much as sell him spell ink, the druid was supposed to have burned a forest to build luxury housing, etc, etc.    So various groups have been paid and/or incented to attack them PCs.  Pirates, fey assassins, couple of demons, maybe a celestial.  Each attack is then publicized in the way most harmful.  "They consort with demons, make deals with the fey, are in league with pirates and even the Heavens seek to smite them!"Sure, the PCs could squash this person like a bug but in the words of Obi Wan " strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine."So they have to "right" all the wrongs of which they are accused.</blockquote>