Why Do You Play Evil Characters?

[DEFCON 1]

I don't play 'good' or 'evil'. I play a character with motivations and desires, and I act on trying to fulfill them. If other people in the game world decide that my motivations and desires are 'good' or 'evil'... that's their call, not mine.

That being said... I am also quite cognizant (out of character) of making sure my character's motivations and desires fit within the motivations and desires of the party as well. If they don't... then I (as player) change them or don't play that character at that time. But if it turns out that my motivations and desires are congruent with the party's (except my actions are considered 'evil' by others, even if the party's are not), then so be it. It's an interesting dramatic situation that we as a group get to roleplay around.

 

[kitsune9]

I want to talk about the motivations for why players play evil characters. Some people on the boards (and that I've met in RL) can't seem to understand why you would want to.

I know when I much younger my friends wanted to play evil characters simply because they wanted to do whatever they wanted with their power. It simply wasn't much fun to them to restrain oneself when you can lob fireballs, backstab a commoner for x3 damage that outright kills him, perform an assassination check, or host of other powerful effects. Why should you put up with backtalk from an uppity guard? Who is this noble think he is when you can cleave him and his guards in half?

The lure of evil for my friends was all about power. That's why they wanted to play evil characters.

For me, I never really got into playing evil characters, but a few years ago, I did have a friend who ran an evil mini campaign, but only got in one adventure. I ran two characters, a fighter who was a larcenous thug, but wanted to pass himself off as a respectable gentleman. He spoke with a Cockney accent and called everyone by their last names or at least address them by "Mr. xxxx" or "Ms. xxxx". He was rather dimwitted and I played him more for laughs than for outright depravity or cruelty. The other character I had was a necromancer who did terrible and unholy experiments upon the dead and was without remorse in looking to perform such horrible experiments in order to achieve undeath. However, he was a socially inept when it came to the living. We had fun with the game. Other characters was a cleric who wanted to promote his evil religion and convert everyone accept that undeath was a "natural" part of life. Of course, his character was preaching to the choir with my necromancer. Another was a noble character who constantly berated and belittled his manservant, ordered him around to do everything, and at times, made the manservant do some fighting for him while he held out a glass for his manservant to fill it with wine. Really funny. There were other characters, but I can't remember what they were or did.

 

[TheYeti1775]

Depends on the Campaign.
I've played Evil PC's that have thrived in a Good-Aligned Campaign.
Long as it ain't stupid evil it can be done.

For me its all concept.

 

[Gryph]

In 30 years of gaming I have played an evil character twice.

The first time, the character turned evil through a series of disastrous events and poor decisions made over the course of the campaign. At that point he was probably more psychotic than consciously evil.

More recently in a 4e campaign I'm playing, the DM started the game in Eberron during the great war. When he informed us prior to character generation that after the first few levels of play he was going to move the campaign into the post-war setting, I decided to make my character a war criminal for the first part of the war and then play through a redemption progression in the post-war portion of the campaign.

I guess I've never really played an all out evil character after all.

 

[Desdichado]

I despise using alignment. I houserule it away in any game of D&D I play, and play many games with nothing like alignment making an appearance in the rules. So, to a certain extent, we're not talking about characters that are labelled evil right there on the character sheet.

If you're asking why characters, who common sense would call evil, or at least bad, would be fun to play, I guess I'm not sure I understand the question. Do you like The Godfather? Do you think Hannibal Lector is an interesting character? How about Dexter? Darth Vader?

Evil characters can be compelling characters. We like to see them in fiction, so why not in games?

 

[Bedrockgames]

If you're asking why characters, who common sense would call evil, or at least bad, would be fun to play, I guess I'm not sure I understand the question. Do you like The Godfather? Do you think Hannibal Lector is an interesting character? How about Dexter? Darth Vader?

Evil characters can be compelling characters. We like to see them in fiction, so why not in games?

Exactly. I like to use Goodfellas as an example of how an evil party might work (Sopranos works too). These are still bad people and there may be some backstabbing when things go bad, but at the end of the day they are on the same team (for the most part

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Perhaps its the callous way I dismiss the begger in the street ...

I callously dismiss beggars in the street. Does that make me evil?

 

[RajKuna]

In fact ,evil is more interesting

 

[Meatboy]

I callously dismiss beggars in the street. Does that make me evil?

Neutral I'd say. Unless your hand has grown callouses from "dismissing" them to hard..

 

[Zelda Themelin]

I just played halloween game with evil characters. Game was set at Scarred Lands, Calastia and we all were (14th lv) priests of Chardun (LE) and trusted agents of church. Queen had went missing and titans' spawns were suspected and we went to get her back. Our combat tactics (it was very combat heavy) were highly ruthless and nasty, but so were our mostly CE opponets.

Very fun game. It was delightful to use equally "evil" combat manouvers than oppents. Though we used mostly phb spells and opponets some nasty spells from relics and rituals (aka book of broken spells 1,2).

Great fun.