The problem with evil RPG characters...

[Doclector]

Yes, another thread kinda sorta related to skyrim. But only kinda sorta...

Recently, with the dawnguard DLC, I started a pure evil character to go as a vampire lord, A Dunmer by the name of Helsmarsh Tal. It's fun to be evil every once in a while, as most of my characters will barely even so much as steal a few arrows or potions that they need, but inevitably, I come to a point where I have to be good. I've learnt that fus ro dah is a really useful thing to have, especially at early levels, so playing through the main quest to at least "diplomatic immunity" is a must, and I usually do it first with little to no other quests at the start of every character. It annoys me, because for a little while, my Dunmer who would pickpocket a traveller for the sport, then kill them anyway because he felt like it, has to play goody-two-shoes for the greybeards.

It got me thinking about how often, in RPGs, you can be evil, but not completely so. You'll be forced to do heroic acts as part of the main quest, with any evil options being limited to just being a bit of a dick. It seems silly, complaining about having to be a good guy for a few missions, but for someone such as myself who can really get immersed in role playing a certain character, it's really distracting to have a complete bastard of a character suddenly do something good. Even Overlord falls prey to this, your evil plans being carried out via some rather heroic things.

So, what do you think? Does it annoy you when you have to play the good guy, even when you're a bad guy?

 

[Vegosiux]

My problem is that you rarely even get to play a genuinely bad guy. There are villains and there are simple assholes.

 

[DoPo]

So, what do you think? Does it annoy you when you have to play the good guy, even when you're a bad guy?

Sort of. I mean, I don't mind my evil characters doing good deeds, in fact, I'd want them to appear good to other people - self serving interest there. But I still don't like being given the option to be evil under the mask. D&D inspired games are very bad in that regard - they do give you the option to act evil or good but also tie these to the actual Evil and Good, so evil characters have to act like pricks all the time (which is pretty stupid).

As for the ES series, at least Morrowind had it OK - there is a prophesy and you're just following it. But you could also decide not to and go murder everyone connected to it - nobody is forcing you to be good. Well, joining the sixth house would have been better, but we can make do with that. Oblivion just made you be the hero. Well, either that, or you could just leave the MQ alone and not come back. Bad, but not as bad as Skyrim - you should do the MQ to get some cool powers. And you're very limited in how you do it, too...

 

[Fappy]

Its unfortunate that you have to be Dragon Born in order to do Dawnguard, but Dawnguard and the Civil War are exceptions I suppose. Almost no other quest in the game requires you to go to Bleak Falls Barrow and become the hero of the Nords. You don't have to be the avatar of Talos if you don't want to, you can just be some evil douche who likes murdering people. Usually when you do the mainquest of a TES game you are inhabiting the shoes of a champion who's ultimate goal is to fix the world and reinforce the status quo at the behest of the gods. Then again it is perfectly reasonable to be an "evil" dragon born who fulfills his role in Talos' plans because he wants to preserve the world to do with it what he desires once Alduin is taken care of.

 

[lRookiel]

You actually raise a good point there, most of the evil crap you do means nothing since you have to save the day anyway, that's quite a big middle finger towards logic there....

 

[Fappy]

So, what do you think? Does it annoy you when you have to play the good guy, even when you're a bad guy?

Sort of. I mean, I don't mind my evil characters doing good deeds, in fact, I'd want them to appear good to other people - self serving interest there. But I still don't like being given the option to be evil under the mask. D&D inspired games are very bad in that regard - they do give you the option to act evil or good but also tie these to the actual Evil and Good, so evil characters have to act like pricks all the time (which is pretty stupid).

As for the ES series, at least Morrowind had it OK - there is a prophesy and you're just following it. But you could also decide not to and go murder everyone connected to it - nobody is forcing you to be good. Well, joining the sixth house would have been better, but we can make do with that. Oblivion just made you be the hero. Well, either that, or you could just leave the MQ alone and not come back. Bad, but not as bad as Skyrim - you should do the MQ to get some cool powers. And you're very limited in how you do it, too...

I loved the "backdoor" method to completing the mainquest in Morrowind. Its so hardcore.

 

[Doclector]

Its unfortunate that you have to be Dragon Born in order to do Dawnguard, but Dawnguard and the Civil War are exceptions I suppose. Almost no other quest in the game requires you to go to Bleak Falls Barrow and become the hero of the Nords. You don't have to be the avatar of Talos if you don't want to, you can just be some evil douche who likes murdering people. Usually when you do the mainquest of a TES game you are inhabiting the shoes of a champion who's ultimate goal is to fix the world and reinforce the status quo at the behest of the gods. Then again it is perfectly reasonable to be an "evil" dragon born who fulfills his role in Talos' plans because he wants to preserve the world to do with it what he desires once Alduin is taken care of.

Good point, I do try to tell myself my character's only doing this so he can fus ro dah old ladies and eventually kill alduin because hey, if anyone's going to plunge skyrim into an age of terror, it had damn well be me, but at the end of the day, it's just not quite the same.

 

[Saladfork]

Well, *my* problem with evil in video games is that I don't believe in objective evil and that generally 'evil' options mostly boil down to being either rude or psycotic for no reason.

One reason why I like Dragon Age is that it doesn't objectively judge you for your actions; the characters do, but it makes sense that they would.

I'd like an RPG that gave you an incentive not to be a saint, which many fail to do. Given the bilateral choice between helping somebody out or being a dick, if there isn't any incentive to be a dick, that is to say, the rewards are about even, you'd probably help them, if for no other reason than to have their gratitude and have them owe you. After all, having people like you is generally quite helpful, isn't it?

 

[Vegosiux]

Good point, I do try to tell myself my character's only doing this so he can fus ro dah old ladies and eventually kill alduin because hey, if anyone's going to plunge skyrim into an age of terror, it had damn well be me, but at the end of the day, it's just not quite the same.

Well technically, even if I'm a bad guy, it's in my interest to save the world if some wacko threatens to blow it up/eat it/deconstruct it atom by atom, because, hey, where am I going to keep my stuff (especially my ill-gotten gains) if I let that happen?

Villanous pragmatism, a thing so rarely heard of in modern fiction...

 

[Jerkules]

The problem with the good=evil dichotomy in a lot of fantasy and RPG settings is that in real life, no one thinks of themselves as evil. People can be motivated to do horrible things by greed, lust, a desire for power, anger, spite, etc - but nobody commits an act for the sake of being "evil".

If there must be a dichotomy of character, I think "altruistic" and "self-interested" would make for a better one than "good vs. evil".

IMO, rpgs should do away with "good" and "evil" choices. They often amount to:
1. Response pledging to help however you can, regardless of context or personal cost. ("Good")
2. Bland, noncommittal response, or version of good response that asks for money. ("Neutral")
3. Response that is pointlessly rude, needlessly sadistic, or aggressive to the point of being psychotic. ("Evil")

Instead, rpgs should offer choices, both situation and in dialogue, that reflect different motivations. Rather than good and evil characters, let's have characters that are motivated by personal gain, or self-preservation, or a desire to punish an antagonist, or a vague sense of moral obligation that falters when the going gets tough.

I'd like to play a small-time criminal who's reluctantly thrust into the role of hero and only agrees to it because the end of the world would be bad for business. Or an avenging anti-hero who's interested in killing the villain, but doesn't particularly care about saving the villain's victims.

 

[RedEyesBlackGamer]

I've played Fallout 3 and it really gave you the option to be evil in the quests. "Yes Moira it works fine! <hasn't tested it, lies>"" . I was shocked when I discovered that Skyrim completely lacked this. I was not 'my character', I was one of the millions who played Skyrim and had to play the Dovahthingy's quest.

FO3 was a bad offender at it. What if my character doesn't care about providing water to everyone? What if my character thinks his dad is a dick? At least in Skyrim, the world is going to be destroyed. That is reason enough for characters good or evil, unless you are playing a nihilist.

 

[Berenzen]

Video games can't do evil well. Because there is a story being told, eventually the character is going to get railroaded into doing the story, if they want to access more parts of the game. And because for the most part, people like playing the hero- making an evil campaign can be a turn off for a lot of people.

That being said, there are a few games that have done evil, or morally ambiguous somewhat well- a lot of them Obsidian games- Neverwinter Nights 2, Fallout: New Vegas, KotoR 2.

In the end, it comes down to cost- It's fucking expensive to write more dialogue trees- you have to pay the writer to make them, the actor to act them, the programmers to write them it, animators to animate the faces for it. For every permutation that exists, cost substantially increases.

If you really want to do an evil campaign, I suggest going to your FLGS, find a group of people that want to do an evil campaign, and do one in Pathfinder/D&D.

 

[Fappy]

Video games can't do evil well. Because there is a story being told, eventually the character is going to get railroaded into doing the story, if they want to access more parts of the game. And because for the most part, people like playing the hero- making an evil campaign can be a turn off for a lot of people.

That being said, there are a few games that have done evil, or morally ambiguous somewhat well- a lot of them Obsidian games- Neverwinter Nights 2, Fallout: New Vegas, KotoR 2.

In the end, it comes down to cost- It's fucking expensive to write more dialogue trees- you have to pay the writer to make them, the actor to act them, the programmers to write them it, animators to animate the faces for it. For every permutation that exists, cost substantially increases.

If you really want to do an evil campaign, I suggest going to your FLGS, find a group of people that want to do an evil campaign, and do one in Pathfinder/D&D.

I always hear hilariously disastrous stories about evil campaigns in D&D/Pathfinder. Parties I have been in and ran have had enough trouble getting along simply do to character personality clashes. I can only imagine how bad it would be if most of the party liked the idea of flaying innocent commoners

 

[Berenzen]

I always hear hilariously disastrous stories about evil campaigns in D&D/Pathfinder. Parties I have been in and ran have had enough trouble getting along simply do to character personality clashes. I can only imagine how bad it would be if most of the party liked the idea of flaying innocent commoners

Evil campaigns turn bad if they're done incorrectly (read, someone plays chaotic stupid). However, some of my best Pathfinder stories come from a 2 year evil campaign where we started out as mid-level criminals in a mafia and eventually became god-kings over the world- where we started to invade other planes of existance to start subjugating them. The only reason we didn't continue was because some people were heading out to other parts of the world and getting a reasonable time was difficult.

 

[DoPo]

Evil campaigns turn bad if they're done incorrectly (read, someone plays chaotic stupid).

Yes, I agree D&D is a very good place to go if you want an Evil campaign (I was in one short one. It was loads of fun. We got to blow up a mountain with a cancer bomb) but I'd also like to point out that D&D is the worst place to go for an Evil campaign. As you said, Chaotic Stupid or even Stupid Evil are likely to show up. And They are just too prevalent. Now, if you know the players beforehand, then you should be safe but without prior knowledge and/or planning, it may devolve into madness and not the good kind of one.

I guess the key is to establish some guidelines for the campaign beforehand - that holds true for any RPG you choose. It helps people focus on the actual game. Also, D&D has historically been bad at being evil, so there is that, too.

 

[Scrustle]

The first Fable was like that. You could be a massive bastard and turn on everyone to gain power, but in the end you still save the world from Jack. I would love an RPG where you actually are able to be an evil overlord, not just a poser.

Saying that reminded me of the game Overlord. I guess they did a better job of making you evil in that, even if you were still saving the world. But you were saving the world so you could still control it.

 

[The Scythian]

Think of it as doing things that benefit you. No one else really matters, but do want dragons ruining your day? Eating the world? Even evil characters don't want the world to end. Evil isn't about casual murder and being an ass. It is about putting yourself before anything else.

 

[Sean Hollyman]

You can be as much of an asshole as you want, but at the end of the day you're still the hero of the world.

 

[Iron Criterion]

Yes, another thread kinda sorta related to skyrim. But only kinda sorta...

Recently, with the dawnguard DLC, I started a pure evil character to go as a vampire lord, A Dunmer by the name of Helsmarsh Tal. It's fun to be evil every once in a while, as most of my characters will barely even so much as steal a few arrows or potions that they need, but inevitably, I come to a point where I have to be good. I've learnt that fus ro dah is a really useful thing to have, especially at early levels, so playing through the main quest to at least "diplomatic immunity" is a must, and I usually do it first with little to no other quests at the start of every character. It annoys me, because for a little while, my Dunmer who would pickpocket a traveller for the sport, then kill them anyway because he felt like it, has to play goody-two-shoes for the greybeards.

It got me thinking about how often, in RPGs, you can be evil, but not completely so. You'll be forced to do heroic acts as part of the main quest, with any evil options being limited to just being a bit of a dick. It seems silly, complaining about having to be a good guy for a few missions, but for someone such as myself who can really get immersed in role playing a certain character, it's really distracting to have a complete bastard of a character suddenly do something good. Even Overlord falls prey to this, your evil plans being carried out via some rather heroic things.

So, what do you think? Does it annoy you when you have to play the good guy, even when you're a bad guy?

In Skyrim though you are the Dragon Born through fate, but still the Dragon Born regardless. Only you can perma-kill Alduin and stop the apocalypse. I imagine even the evillest of serial killers still have self preservation instincts, it is in your interest to save the world.

But I get your point, in most games this does ruin immersion and it'd be nice if we could have alternating stories depending on play style and alignment. I think Knights of the Old Republic was the worst for this kind of thing (becoming the baddest of the Sith only to still be forced to continue the defeat Darth Malak saga).