Home
Creators
Search Recent Missing Random
Posts
Search DMs Popular Hash Lookup Tags Random
Importer
Import FAQ
Register Favorites Keys Review DMs Logout
Community
Telegram ThePornDude
Home Creators Posts Import Register Favorites Logout

Golden Monkey Talk Show Topic: Villains (Patreon)

Published:
2024-05-20 16:40:20
Imported:
2026-06

Content

This is a long awaited topic and may span the next two or three episodes! We'll be chatting about villains from all our different campaigns, old and new! How do you make a good villain, what does a villain's arc look like narratively, and the like? Put your questions below about your favorite villains and we'll see you after today's episode of Shroud Over Saltmarsh! If we don't get to your question today, don't fret! I'll be saving the questions about specific villains for the right segments.

Comments

Zansi

I've noticed that I have an issue where a lot of my villains suffer from being not taken seriously, and so can tend to become more sources of comic relief than dramatic tension. Do you have any advice that would encourage players to see them more as the latter rather than the former, without just demanding that your players take you seriously?

Nuclear Bleu

Question for Mikey: could you talk about the process you went through making the Prime arc 3 villains? They are far and away some of my favorite villains and I'd love to know how you made them feel so grand and intimidating

Nuclear Bleu

Is your villain creation process different for each campaign? Or do they go through similar processes?

Casualmonster

Im sure alot of the answer to my question will be to watch prime, but as I've been keeping up with edge of midnight, and shroud over saltmarsh and now getting through curse of strahd im dying to know more about this Demon/Devil Pazuzu! Could you briefly describe what he is and what his deal is?

Nuclear Bleu

What villains had the greatest impact on you as players and why?

AJB

The lawful villains in BDW are so fascinating and unnerving. I’m curious how you keep them in lawful territory? It seems like it would be so easy for them to devolve into evil.

raychobird

What do you find to be the strongest motivations for a believeable and/or frightening villain?

Emily No-more

For the villains you create, what inherently makes them villains? Do you take inspiration from real world events and people, or do you focus more on villains based in media, or mythos and religious aspects?

SorenSilverblade

What’s a good strategy for crafting villains who will be a menace, not only to the party, but to each other, as in the Agwe arc of Prime? We had four villains in that one, counting Asmodeus.

SorenSilverblade

We have had multiple antagonists in the tales of Avantris whom the party have more or less adopted into the team. (Orpheus, Escher, Rex, and so on). Did you expect these antagonists to be embraced by the party (and the fans) the way they were? What are some good steps for creating villains with room for a redemption arc as opposed to those who are destined to end up as Boss Fight creatures the party must defeat?

kenjin capers

Definitely an around the table question for the gms. What is the thought process behind how your villains are built out? Do you start with who the villain is as a person, what they look/sound like in your head, a neat concept, or what you feel the narrative needs (foils to PCs and such) and where do you go from there? What would you say are the footnotes for gms who want to make charming or magnificent bastard style villains?

Adron42

With the depth of the Avantris Character Creation Process, many of your characters are very close to the player's heart. With the very "antagonistic" nature of a villain and all your DMs great roleplaying, has there ever been any amount of "Bleed Through" where a friend stopping you from doing what you want might cause some accidental grumpy feeling towards each other?

SorenSilverblade

Both from a DM perspective and as the player experiencing the villain’s actions.

Bunni

Evil/Villain campaign when? Maybe a oneshot?

Coven pr1ncepunk

(princepunk) Do you consider the antagonistic element to be a villain? So in character vs self, character vs nature, character vs society etc

ArchitectHeather

And the opposite! Like a random named NPC being turned into a villain because the party decided they hated them.

Sblibbo

Considering the style of storytelling LoA likes to do, has there been any intentional/unintentional influence from murder mysteries? All the crumbs left for the party and audience to find and pick up, that on reflection points to a conclusion (correct or otherwise) and providing distinct motives for the villans to drive their actions reminds me of a well told murder mystery, naratively speaking.

Isabelle Lopez

What would it take for one of your characters(from any campaign)to become a villan?

PumpkinSpicedChaos

Do any of you give your villains one thing they wouldn’t/couldn’t do and then work to find out what they can do as a result of that? For example, the 90s animated Batman couldn’t have Joker killing anyone and so the writers had the joker toxin that showed that somethings were worse than death. Not the best example but I hope that gave context.

bulbabum

What points/tips do you all have on antagonists that aren't necessarily villains but still pose as foils or roadblocks to the protagonists? And as a second question how do you plot out an antagonist changing sides? Do you feel like it's more impactful to plan it out throughout the story writing or more spur of the moment and change the antagonist mid-campaign?

DreadQueenCinnamonRoll

Olay so let's talk Futurama villains (because thanks y'all got me to do my very first watch through of it and I'm now OBSESSED)... and while they don't have many villain characters they have quite a few pithy anti-heroes. Would an anti-hero "bbeg" campaign character put a different spin on the "traditional" BBEG campaign purpose and how a campaign plays out differently?

MotherOfMayhem

How do you keep the villians origin fresh? There are so many evil guys out there, I'm afraid of accidentally making a predictable BBEG.

middycat

How do you all feel about the idea that villains are or could be heroes in their own stories?

Plantboy8

What are your worst villain archetypes

_beef2

whats it like mainting a poker face of sort as the characters progress in the story or interact with something that ties in or is the villian? like in eom and the characters interaction with anya?