The Art of Playing a Good "Bad Guy"

[Wolfsong]

I haven't spawned any broken from the start, but I have spawned a few with intentions to have them be broken, violent and hateful. I just wait for a catalyst - and it doesn't have to be major, since they're already flawed as individuals. Most of the time, other players supply the drama or angst without me having to do anything. I suppose that's a bit of luck. But those characters aren't Hollywood style psychopaths, either - except for maybe one of them? My hateful, mountain-dwelling serial killer might have counted... but again, there was a catalyst. He didn't just spawn murderous and try to start killing everyone in sight. He spawned weak and when there was a catalyst for him going bad, he was fractured beyond saving. Everyone else was either beneath him and barely even human to begin with (newspawns) and therefore no better than wild animals he'd hunt for food, or old and established and therefore a part of the ruling class who were out to get him, to take everything he had "legitimately" earned with his own hands, and to kill him through either inaction or mob justice. Both classes of people were contemptible, and there was no reason then to not kill them.

I play all my characters, though, with the idea that all newspawn are born empty slates - or, at least, empty slates with a predisposition to certain things IF certain conditions are met. If there's a sleeping sociopath on my character list, there needs to be a reason for them to be that way. In an absolutely ideal world, they would stay dormant forever. That hasn't happened yet, so they always end up awakening eventually if that's part of their character - in one year, two years, ten years, forty, etc.

[prometheus]

So you don't believe in Cantrian "genetics", like some characters spawning deaf or mute, or sickly, etc? Depending on how crazy you go, there's an argument to be made for mental illness, no?

[Wolfsong]

Physically there's some room for flexibility given how characters already start weak or strong - physical defects are the manifestations of a faulty spawning. Mental ones, I suppose, could work in the same way, but I try to play those again more as quiet, insidious faults in their character that only manifest if given that little push. In the case of a mental illness, I suppose you could say they're an empty slate, but the slate was made imperfectly. If the slate is never subject to stresses, they'll only ever be what's written there on them by their environment. If the slate is stressed, and breaks, then they're what their environment makes them out to be - but everything is warped by the breaks, too.

[Marian]

I'm really tempted to make a companion thread to this, "The Art of Playing a Good "Good Guy", because they seem in short supply as well, sometimes....

[Axiom]

There are a fair few boring villains in this game, and personally I think someone who's a sociopath just because or kills people for giggles isn't very exciting. No one thinks they're evil, so try to have a higher goal or some sort of overarching reason for your behavior. Also, if you're going to play a villain in a way that actually adds something to the game, you have a few obligations. First, you should be as entertaining as possible for your victims. Second, you should try to create "plotlines" if possible instead of committing random acts of violence, although this can be difficult. Third, you should exhibit sportsmanlike conduct and don't do anything you wouldn't be okay with having done to you. I think that going around murdering people wantonly is mean-spirited. Letting them go after doing something nasty to them is a lot more dangerous, but I think it's also more fun for everyone involved.

[Marian]

All of the above is excellent advice. We need less random sociopaths and more criminals who are actually interesting to interact with.

Second, you should try to create "plotlines" if possible instead of committing random acts of violence, although this can be difficult..

Difficult, but more fun and rewarding for everyone involved.

I don't have any proper villains, but even if I did I'd never target some completely random person. One thing I've discovered is that it's laughably easy to enrage people or make them hold unreasonable grudges just by forgoing the usual saccharine politeness expected in most Cantr towns and being direct. Then, if something unfortunate happens, it's not random at all but a natural development of both characters' mutual dislike.

Actually that's one of the things I'll address in the good "good guy" thread if I ever get around to making it. Beneath all the fake politeness it really seems that something like 40% of the 'good' people in this game are secret psychos, and 40% more are content to just sit around being sweet but useless, right up until they get the chance to be spiteful but useless. Characters that are truly 'good' as well as competent seem as rare as interesting bad guys.

[*Wiro]

Ha those shy girls with their passive aggressive emotes.

[Axiom]

Second, you should try to create "plotlines" if possible instead of committing random acts of violence, although this can be difficult..

Difficult, but more fun and rewarding for everyone involved.

I don't have any proper villains, but even if I did I'd never target some completely random person. One thing I've discovered is that it's laughably easy to enrage people or make them hold unreasonable grudges just by forgoing the usual saccharine politeness expected in most Cantr towns and being direct. Then, if something unfortunate happens, it's not random at all but a natural development of both characters' mutual dislike.

I'm a bit conflicted about this personally. As a villain, my primary objective is to make everyone's life more interesting whether they like it or not, and committing random acts of assault and theft is a great way to stir things up sometimes. Like, Valeros was essentially a random victim who made some poor life choices that resulted in his getting assaulted, but everything that came of it was pure gold. So I think there's room for that kind of thing too. But violence with buildup and a motive is definitely preferable, yeah.

[Marian]

I'm a bit conflicted about this personally. As a villain, my primary objective is to make everyone's life more interesting whether they like it or not, and committing random acts of assault and theft is a great way to stir things up sometimes. Like, Valeros was essentially a random victim who made some poor life choices that resulted in his getting assaulted, but everything that came of it was pure gold. So I think there's room for that kind of thing too. But violence with buildup and a motive is definitely preferable, yeah.

In that case, taking a crack at a ship floating just off a coast would have been hard to resist for a lot of sailors, not just pirates. Your crew just happened to be a little more equipped to deal with it when he came to investigate than most...

But either way, sailing around and robbing people is just what pirates do. My example was for greyer cases, setting up a good chance to be bad for chars with less of a straightforward job description.

[Axiom]

This is true. I guess when you go around loudly calling yourself a pirate, you set certain expectations for your behavior...

[ObsessedWithCats]

I once played a character who was unquestionably evil, but my trick to make it subtle until she was more independent worked too well (I think people may have also attributed her complete lack of compassion to me being apathetic) and she was never given a motive, so she never committed an evil act XD

I don't suppose many people knew Thomasina-Louise but she was a really poor choice of acting town leader.

[cutecuddlydirewolf]

In my opinion, one of the most fun kinds of evil to play is the sociopath- uncaring, apathetic, and cruelly logical. These are the kinds of characters who will slowly murder you, all while calmly explaining their reasoning behind doing it.

[MonkeyPants4736]

It's possible that someone has been inspired by the "Did you know...[something about bodies fitting into containers]" message.
*blinks innocently*

I'm thrilled about the upcoming changes to burial. Trying to kill a character in secrecy gives me lots of anxiety (headaches and everything). I'm actually excited at the increased anxiety from the risk that someone sees the burial of a character with a screwdriver poking out of their eye.

[Marian]

I'm probably in the minority here, but I don't even really see what death adds to the game. Stories people have put months or years of work and care and love into, abruptly cut off and lost forever without even the guarantee of RP. I honestly think I'd be perfectly happy if NDS was as far as a character could be taken through violence, unless the player themselves opted to die.

So I'd have a hard time playing a truly evil char because I'm just really, really against killing active chars in this game unless the other gives you absolutely no other options. Any kind of villain I tried to play would be hamstrung by my always looking at it from the victim's point of view and going 'would this be fun for them, too?'

Though of course everybody's definition of what counts as fun varies. For me, anything short of being murdered with no other options offered that involves some good RP from both sides, with everyone staying IC, is a good time. But there are just so many players, where if anything even remotely bad happens, even not involving any actual threat to their char, they just take it so personally and become completely unhinged. Ragequitting their character or threatening to, OOC tirades, and so on. The kind of thing that leaves you with the uncomfortable feeling that from then on your character has to watch out for all that person's other characters as well as the characters of all their friends. :/

So that's another reason I'd never be eager to play a 'bad guy' and why I'm hesitant to even get involved with conflicts anymore, regardless of IC motivation. Even if your char managed to get away with doing something to another with no one the wiser, there's potentially 14 others out there that are going to be inexplicably suspicious and unfriendly, or worse, when you unknowingly bump into them again. It's apparently just really, really difficult for a lot of players to keep personal feelings from leaking through to their other chars.

[FiziKx]

Just wanted to say that I like being the bad guy but hate how much people hate me for it OOC if they find out it was me. The stories that are created by evil characters can be some of the most intricate and interesting in the entire game, even if creating them actually takes a toll on me IRL.

I think that there is a place for killing other characters--insofar as that another player's character absolutely gives your bad character no other option. If a character that my evil character has under temporary control/detention/whatever will stand in the way of my character's goals if freed... they won't be going free. If it is made clear that the character has been forced into submission, though, then killing that character would be absolutely the wrong thing to do. Senseless slaughter is ridiculous, of course.