When PCs become villains.

[Kunimatyu]

In my current homebrew, one of the PCs, a warlock cursed with lichdom, has just become a major villain. He attempted to sacrifice himself to stop a planar catastrophe(severing Sharn's link to Syrania, causing the towers to fall), but his sacrifice ended up creating a direct connection to the plane of the dead, replacing the Syrania connection. He was quickly possessed by a paeliryon devil(Fiend Folio) and was forced to watch from inside his own body while the devil raised the inhabitants of the city as undead. The event was so unexpected that the PC(now an NPC, obviously) ended up becoming a greater threat to Eberron than the original villain that caused the catastrophe.

In another(sadly defunct) nautical game, I played a Neutral Evil warmage who recently acquired a Cloak of the Manta Ray.(his nickname was "Devilfish") Had the game continued for a few more sessions, he would have swiped the most valuable treasure from the brig, set a fireball to the ship's power room, and escaped using the cloak, thus giving the rest of the party a villain and a reason to keep playing.

I'm curious to hear any other stories of players who(intentionally or otherwise) have become NPC villains.

 

[William Ronald]

In a game I was in several years ago, various players had gained control of different countries. (This was a very intense diplomatic and political game, where the PCs often had to solve major problems -- and go adventuring to stop horrible threats.) One player decided that her character would start a war and try to conquer her former allies. The DM warned her against it. I was not there the night of the inital battle, but her armies were defeated by other PCs. As this group split, the former PC became an NPC villain. (Perhaps the DM enjoyed portraying his ex-girlfriend as such.) Fortunately, I was able to strike back at our former ally and some associated NPCs. Perhaps it was satisfying to get even with the PC of a disruptive player and her NPC allies.

Moral: It is one thing to be a party of outlaws. It is quite another to be an outlaw from your party.

 

[Evilhalfling]

I ran RttoEE where the party included a tiefling sorcerer related to the line of the Demon Lord of Hunger - he started out neutral, but was offered power in a vision, which he accepted.
He started sneaking off an eating fresh corpses left in the parties wake, the heart of an elf here a few bites of human guards there. He actually lost control after chasing down and finishing off a dragon by himself. mmm fresh dragon meat. The demon lord opposed the ToEE and so staying in the party was no problem. The mission ended in a TPK.

Several game years later a new party found a dretch with a tail who said he knew them, but kept useing the wrong names, and asked if they had anyone that needed to be eaten.

 

[Hand of Evil]

Once had a player that got pissed at some actions the party did, not listining to him, with the result of the party loosing hit points, a lot of equipment, henchmen (secondary characters), and animals. The player came to me with a plan, he wanted to kill the other players and he became "the hood" and outlined his plan. First was to turn the dungeon they just cleaned out into his base and a death trap, second hire some thugs. These thugs on his orders would go out and cause trouble and create the buzz of the hood and raise cash. The player continued with the party on adventures using the punder to fund his empire, he also took the savings of the party for his use. When the buzz became loud enough the party was hired to find and bring "the hood" to justice, the party found themselves back at the dungeon where it all started, the players weak and in trouble (diluted healing potions, faulty equipment), facing "the hood" or so they thought. This is when the player turned on them, telling them he was the hood and that the dungeon was a death trap for them, even harder to escape than to get into, he told them all he had done, wiping out their bank accounts, putting poision in their drinking water, diluting their healing potions. He then attacked the party.

No one came out of that dungeon.

 

[Jupp]

My old character, a lawful-evil Necromancer in a Midgard game, did turn into the main villain for the rest of the group at the end of our last campaign. He was a follower of Methraton (a character of a comic from Francois Froideval) that happend to meet the other party members just when they tried to figure out that Methatrons biggest enemey, Arioch, tried to get access to Toril. At first my character just played along to help giving Arioch a nice defeat but over time it turned out that with the banning of Arioch there would be a chance to give Methraton access to Toril instead. At one point the DM took me aside and asked me to choose sides. Either I help Mehtraton or I try to betray him, ban Arioch and switch over to the good side. My decision was to help my master. That also meant that should I succeed to betray the rest of the party my character would either be killed in the fight or he would become an NPC under the DMs control. So I played along for another 1.5 years, acting like I would help the party but instead tried to stear them to the point where I would succeed to free Methraton. I managed to hide my true identity as a necromance throughout that time (dont ask me how I did it...I never would have thought it would work out) and in the final confrontation when Arioch tried to access Toril I was able to manipulate our Dwarven fighter to help me banning Arioch and freeing Methraton, though he only saw his mistake when it was too late My luck was that in the previous fight two of the players already where either unconscious or not able to move due to very low hitpoints. That left me with 2 remaining players, the priestess of Auril and the dwarven fighter. With unbelievable luck ( I rolled three crits in that fight) I was able to beat them and finished the ritual to free my master. At that moment I gave the character sheet to our DM and sat back to enjoy the scenery.

The rest of the party was then able to escape to the Astral plane later on (a portal was opened due to the priestess giving up all of her 3 divine points which grant a priest one extraordinary wish from his god). They then met my new character there, a tiefling rogue that was sent to pick them up and bring them to Sigil.

Later on the other players told me that they had suspicions about me and they secretly tried to get behind my motives. It came out they even had a private session with our DM where they tried to get behind it all, but it didnt work out. But they never thought I would help an evil god to enter Toril and start to conquer it. And our DM gave me a 10% chance to succeed with my plans.

 

[painandgreed]

We had one player, no mater what game he played or what the campaign was, he tried to turn on the party and kill them all. he would even keep fake character sheets with different classes and alignment to try and fool everybody. The only trouble was that he was incredibly inept and it became a fun game to find out what he was planning and foil his character using only in game knowledge.

Once as party leader, I sold out the party to the BBEG. Didn't hurt the party, but while arranging it for the BBEG to win, I made sure the party was always off away from the action. Once, when the BBEG was invading with an army, my character was the general of the defending troops. We planned out the war and eventual defeat of my side. I made sure that my party was in a section of combat we would win and the BBEG made sure that people he didn't like and political opponents were also in spots that we were sure to win. We would clobber unsupported and outmatched units (and get their stuff) while losing the war.

 

[Riggs]

No one came out of that dungeon.

This seems pretty elaborate. I wonder how the other players took this? I expect poorly, but thought I would ask, as it's a different kind of ire when elaborate betrayals are planned rather than a spiteful reactive bar fight, etc.

 

[Thunderfoot]

My youngest daughter played an gnomish rogue - cute, childlike, innocent, gullable.

She stole an artifact and sold it to the local cult of evil in exchange for some cool gear and a lot of money. It wasn't until after she stopped playing with my group that they figured out she was the cause of all their problems - oh, BTW she was 10 at the time.

Morale #1: Innocent doeasn't mean free of guilt.
Morale #2: Never underestimate a women - regardless of her age.

PS - I am soliciting parenting advice to keep her under control.

 

[Hand of Evil]

This seems pretty elaborate. I wonder how the other players took this? I expect poorly, but thought I would ask, as it's a different kind of ire when elaborate betrayals are planned rather than a spiteful reactive bar fight, etc.

They were shocked but the player did a very good job explainnig things, the big bad guy dialog, he also did not stop being a good player in the process (he even became a better player, in his thinking and planning of plot), which made a very big difference. I also think some of the players agreed with him about the 'mad scheme'. There was also work outside of the game with me as he ironed out his plot, it was not easy. I don't like to kill players but if players have fun and a great time while dying they don't seem to mind that much.

 

[Rackhir]

Not my story obviously, but one of my favorites.

http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=102&page=1&pp=40

Wulf's Collected Story Hour -- FINAL UPDATE 12/25

Suddenly there was a piercing cry from the edge of the darkness. Tully had emerged and turned on Alliane, striking her clean through the heart, killing her instantly. Halma had been biding his time, and struck her down with his greatsword, but it was too late for Alliane.

Tully had fallen, but a great deal of the wounds she'd sustained were from Wulf's saps. She was still breathing shallowly. Wulf shouted over to Halma, "Tie her up! Quickly!"

"No!" shouted the halfling. "Kill her! She's a ninja!"

Wulf had been invisibly looting Henwen and Dyson, quickly pulling rings from their fingers and stuffing them in his pockets, but he slowly turned, his mind now at full attention to the halfling.

"How do you know this?" Keldas hovered nearby, also curious.

"She was going to train me."

Halma still wasn't quite sure what was going on. "Rope or sword?"

"Sword!" shouted the halfling. "No wait! Rope... Yeah... Rope! Maybe I can talk my way out of this!"

"Out of what, peck?"

"Well, she passed my name on to her superiors, and said if anything happened to her, they would come looking for me. So you guys may have to fight off some ninja assassins with me."

Once again, Wulf was filled with the urgent need to kill the halfling. He was glad he was invisible, for he was literally shaking with rage. And, perhaps, a bit of anticipation.

But he calmly let the moment pass.

"Well, let's get Tully back to Dyson's tower, right? I'll carry her, just in case she wakes up. Halma, yer can grab Alliane. And somebody should get the head off that demon so we can show the townspeople."

----------------------------

By the time they reached town, Wulf was visible again, and the people fell back trembling from his angry countenance as he marched into town with Tully draped over his shoulder.

They climbed the stairs to the top of the tower, to Dyson's cramped study. He dumped Tully on the floor.

"Well... here we are. Guess we better wake her up and ask a few questions. I'm not taking any chances though, I'm going to have a potion first." Wulf dug in his pack for a potion.

It was a Ghouls' Touch potion he'd picked up somewhere. He finally found a use for it.

The halfling took the bait. "Got one for me?"

"Sure." Wulf drank his potion and advanced to the halfling with another potion in his other hand. Water Breathing, perhaps, or something equally useless.

As the halfling reached for the potion, Wulf grabbed his wrist. His eyes widened in shock and surprise. "Hey, what are you... Ow...." The ghoul's touch flooded up his arm, threatening to paralyze him.

The halfling fought off the effects and skipped back a step. Wulf advanced. "Wulf, what are you doing?"

"I'm knockin' yer out so we can figure out why yer betrayed us... again."

"What are you talking about?"

"Yer went behind our backs AGAIN, peck, cuttin' deals with the forces of evil."

"I did it for the good of the party! I was trying to make myself useful for you guys!"

"By turning assassin? By studying with evil ninja mercenaries?"

Wulf tried to grapple the halfling, but he wriggled free.

"What, just because Wulf doesn't like me, I'm not allowed to broaden my horizons?"

"I warned yer before." Wulf tried to tackle the halfling again.

"This is silly, I'm just going to fly away."

Wulf laughed. The halfing spoke the command word and his Wings of Flying unfurled to their full twenty-foot wingspan. Or rather, they attempted to: There simply wasn't room for such a large wingspan to fly in the top of Dyson's cramped tower.

"That'll teach yer to buy out o' the bargain bin. Next time invest yer money in a nice pair o' winged boots, jackass."

Wulf opened his hands and his saps unrolled. He started pounding away at the halfling, who tumbled away, trying to defend himself. Halma watched from the top of the stairs. Keldas watched from near the window.

"Fine! I'm not even going to resist, then." The halfling stood still.

Wulf knocked his lights out.

----------------------------

"Think back. How many times has he stood around watchin' us get pounded on? Watching us die? What about Kellick? And now we've lost Alliane. Yer have to ask yerself-- whose side is he on, anyway?"

Keldas and Halma were unsure. "It doesn't seem right..."

"Yer know, the most dangerous evil is the kind that's right there next to yer. The one yer trust. The one yer travel with. But yer can't go soft now. We should kill him."

Halma disagreed. "No! Take all his things, set him free..."

"So he can come back for vengeance later? I don't think so."

"Then give him to Tully-- for justice."

"So they can train him as a ninja and then he can come back for vengeance? Yeah, we need a pissed-off halfling ninja pr*ck dogging our heels. This is ridiculous. Yer had no trouble killin' Dyson, what's the difference? Evil is evil."

"Maybe he's not evil."

"Well, all the priests within a hundred miles of here are now dead. Awfully convenient if yer ask me. Trust yer instincts, boy, and if yer can't trust them, trust me. He's evil."

Halma turned to go downstairs. "I need some air."

Keldas spoke up. "Let's wake Tully, get her side of the story."

She was still tightly bound, so Wulf brought her around.

"What's yer relationship with the peck?"

"He came to Dyson and I last night..."

"Ach! No wonder he wanted his own room! The little weasel..."

"And I offered to take him in and train him."

"An' what was his part of the bargain?"

"He agreed not to interfere with Dyson's plans at all."

This caught Keldas' interest. "And those plans?"

"Dyson has been turning the animals in the area into humans..."

"He WAS..."

"... in order to raise an army so that he could take control over the whole countryside here."

Keldas blanched. "Well..."

Wulf gave him time to work through it.

"It seems pretty clear to me-- notwithstanding his other transgressions-- that if he agreed not to interfere with Dyson's plans, he was directly aiding an evil enterprise... and..."

"All right, yer talked me into it."

Wulf drew his axe and, in one smooth motion, hacked the halfling's head off.

Taranak exploded into flame again, as if taking pleasure in a deed long overdue.

Halma came running into the room at the sound of the flame burst. "What!? What did you do?"

"We decided what had to be done." What are yer worried about? Yer left the room-- clear conscience, boy. Did yer do it on purpose, I wonder?

Keldas pointed to Tully. "What about her?"

Wulf spoke first. "I say we let her go. Send her home, no hard feelin's."

Halma shook his head. "If Tamaloc deserved to die, so does she."

"Right." Wulf lopped Tully's head off.

They all sat quietly for a long time. Halma was the first to speak.

"I don't know if I want to travel with you guys anymore."