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<blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 4801806" data-attributes="member: 2067">One of the cool things about FFZ's &quot;villain design&quot; system is that it reliably creates campaign-ending BBEGs that players will hate for story reasons.Basically, I have the PC's give me a few motives: what do they want? What are they scared of?Then I create an NPC who is everything they are scared of, and who exploits every vulnerability to keep them from getting what they want. For instance, take a party of four: a fighter who wants to be a hero and who is afraid of his own power; a wizard who wants to be powerful because she's afraid of being weak; a thief who wants material wealth because she's afraid of being poor; and a priest who wants to be protected because he's scared of what lies outside.The villain is a creature from outside, who specializes in draining the power from people, making them worthless and weak before its great onslaught as it amasses might and wealth for itself, who is also seen as a savior, someone everyone loves, because of its great power to destroy things that no one could touch. The villain is a propagandist, an entity building a church to itself, where it can fleece the faithful and challenge the established order. The fighter must be a villain, derided for his own power. The wizard must be weak, unable to hurt the creature with raw ability. The thief must be poor as all the wealth goes into the villain's coffers. The priest must be vulnerable to this thing from abroad, as it holds their fate in its hands. That's the mortal villain. The hidden villain can be more esoteric and is probably more like a creature formed of the perverted faith of millions, a massive million-eyed ooze of raw destructive power, hidden behind this false savior. The Power of Archetypes is strong, especially in the villains!</blockquote>

[QUOTE="I'm A Banana, post: 4801806, member: 2067"] One of the cool things about FFZ's "villain design" system is that it reliably creates campaign-ending BBEGs that players will hate for story reasons. Basically, I have the PC's give me a few motives: what do they want? What are they scared of? Then I create an NPC who is everything they are scared of, and who exploits every vulnerability to keep them from getting what they want. For instance, take a party of four: a fighter who wants to be a hero and who is afraid of his own power; a wizard who wants to be powerful because she's afraid of being weak; a thief who wants material wealth because she's afraid of being poor; and a priest who wants to be protected because he's scared of what lies outside. The villain is a creature from outside, who specializes in draining the power from people, making them worthless and weak before its great onslaught as it amasses might and wealth for itself, who is also seen as a savior, someone everyone loves, because of its great power to destroy things that no one could touch. The villain is a propagandist, an entity building a church to itself, where it can fleece the faithful and challenge the established order. The fighter must be a villain, derided for his own power. The wizard must be weak, unable to hurt the creature with raw ability. The thief must be poor as all the wealth goes into the villain's coffers. The priest must be vulnerable to this thing from abroad, as it holds their fate in its hands. That's the mortal villain. The hidden villain can be more esoteric and is probably more like a creature formed of the perverted faith of millions, a massive million-eyed ooze of raw destructive power, hidden behind this false savior. The Power of Archetypes is strong, especially in the villains! [/QUOTE]

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