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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(Psi)SeveredHead" data-source="post: 1988899" data-attributes="member: 1165">This is a question that's bothered me for a while - how do you run a powerful social BBEG?Virtually every BBEG I see in a game is a spellcaster or high-level fighter who kicks butt. They're different from other spellcasters because they're researching some new, world-destroying spell and/or have some social skills, too.I want to use a real-life person as a character example. His name was Cao Cao, and he lived in AD ~200 China. In DnD terms he would probably be a Aristrocrat/Marshall with a few levels of fighter (he didn't fight unless he had to) and a good Int and Cha with no magic items. (This means no rods of beguiling, magically enslaved bodyguards or what not, please.) In D20 Modern terms he's probably Smart/Charismatic/Soldier.At that time, the central government was falling apart, and some of the peasants were revolting. Too weak to stop the revolt, the government had to call upon it's nobles (let's start calling them warlords, shall we?) to stop it. These warlords ended up more popular than the government, since they proved they could actually get things done.Many minor warlords, such as Cao Cao, participated. He gathered some of his former retainers and family members, plus charmed a really rich guy into hiring mercenaries, to help him out. He also participated in a revolt against a Prime Minister, but the revolt failed due to ... well ... stupidity.Cao Cao became a provincial "inspector" (basically a governor) through diplomacy. Another governor had gotten killed fighting more angry peasants, and some of Cao Cao's friends lived in that province. They convinced the remaining provincial leaders to make Cao Cao their leader so he could fight the peasants. What a feat! There's no way of modelling something like that in-game, but I suppose making a really good Diplomacy check (with aid another from your friends, who buttered the council up ahead of time) followed by a favor could do it.As provincial leader, Cao Cao now had a staff. He started choosing some of the most competent members as his minions. (The Leadership feat is not appropriate for covering these minions.) Many of these minions actually came to him because he was smarter than their previous leaders. (He lost his first battle against the peasants due to a colossal mistake. Oops. Not a good time to fail to impress your new allies.)As Cao Cao gained in power, he gathered around himself a large number of advisors and warriors. Some of his advisors were civil, some military, and a couple were both. As for his warriors, a couple acted as bodyguards (they were there for their ability to kick butt only, not for their ability to lead armies) and only led armies when Cao Cao was desperate, or wanted to win a battle of champions. Some were reasonably competent leaders. Five of them were his Tiger Generals, high-level characters who certainly weren't using his Leadership feat minions. In order to be a Tiger General, you had to be a pretty good fighter, a very good military leader and you had to be smart enough to independently lead an army. (They varied in terms of skill, however, with some being really good at fighting and some being just mediocre at it.) Independence was very important since Cao Cao could not be everywhere at once and could easily have to face five angry armies simultaneously.Cao Cao gained these minions through conquest, bribery, diplomacy, and the stupidity of his enemies.I call him a BBEG, not because of his greatly overblown actions in Romance of the Three Kingdoms, but because he was willing to destroy two cities in Xu Zhou plus massacre it's inhabitants just to break the morale of the weak army he was facing.Has anyone run a DnD campaign where the BBEG was a bit like this?Suppose you were running a D20 Modern campaign, and instead of a warlord, the BBEG was an evil businessman or a gangster. How do you determine minion levels compared to the BBEG level? Is the BBEG always the highest level character there? What if the BBEG needs an accountant, but he can't find one who is competent enough and loyal? Do you just say they're loyal (like it's a movie) or make one disloyal but too weak to stop working for the BBEG (like... in a movie, I guess)?</blockquote>

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