Flawed motivations make the best villains #dnd

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[katori]

Sacrificing innocents in the attempt to harness magical power from the Nine Hells to stop the orcish horde

[royboone]

I once had a necromancer, who after losing their whole village and family to orc's became obsessed with bringing them back to life, decided to reanimate the town with a ritual that would use the orcs as sacrifices.

[Ferrum-vu]

"Always a shame when someone has to die."

[darcyw]

I created a lich that wanted to take over a continent in order to prevent the unnecessary loss of the youth in war. To do this he needed to assassinate the existing kings and take over to create "peace" in the realm. Because he is a lich, he needs souls, so he used dissenters and those that committed capital offenses.

[drakephoenixfeather]

Mourn left the Underdark with his lover over a thousand years ago. They were both tormented, beaten, used as weapons against each other to force the other into submission, they could trust no one but each other throughout their entire lives. When a war came to their House, the pair took their chance for freedom, killing anyone that stood in their way on the hope of a better tomorrow. Both have lived on the surface for a thousand years, kept in their prime by another arcane user, and three were comfortable in their constant watch against the things that haunted them. Until one day, Mourn felt...something. he scryed back into the Underdark and he saw that his House was growing in numbers once more, growing in power and seemingly favoured by Lolth. He saw a young Prince, not much different to himself all those many years ago, and he saw that Prince being beaten and threatened with fire...so Mourn began his work to wipe out the House once and for all and finally ensure the safety of himself and his loved ones. So what if parts of the surface world collapse into the Underdark? Don't tell him about innocents down there either, none of that cruel society are innocent, especially not THEM. It's better for everyone that they're eradicated, and it has to be now

Credit where credit is due, Mourn isn't my OC, he actually belongs to a friend of mine, but I borrowed him to be the BBEG of my last campaign, along with his lover, Rylas, being the lover of my character, Aramil the wizard that extended their lifespans. Rylas is the first boss fight (he's got a couple gnarly curses that were triggered when Mourn went into cold damage control mode) and Aramil is a source of information and useful items IF the party decide to talk to him and IF they decide to ask about these things and IF they put together that the high elf turned Eladrin (Wish spell) is in an open relationship with a Drow whose cursed and in another and doesn't just happen to know who these people are. My last party struggled to process that and never got to asking anyone but lower ranking NPC's about the big named NPC's and they never asked about personal information just combat related information such as "what are Mourn's magical abilities like, is Rylas weak to silver, how scared should we be that Aramil just casually lent level 2 adventurers silvered weapons of their choice like he was handing out lollies, is Mourn connected with powerful evil beings like devils and raksasha", never "how the hell do these people know each other? How on earth do you know so much about the guy blowing up the Underdark? Why won't you help us stop the guy blowing up the Underdark?"

[James_Irish]

I turned a footnote NPC from Dragon of Icespire Peak (Zelene Varnaster) into the BBEG of a campaign that I've homebrewed to spam from DoIP all the way to level 20. The books used her as a wererat gang boss, but I've taken what her character ended up as to something far more sinister, threatening time and reality themselves. All in a spiteful hope that she can get back at the universe that claimed the life of her son before his time was up. If anyone wants to hear about it, let me know!

[foracal]

Mmm home brewed one.. twas a time traveler that was confused and ended up taking out the big bad in their castle .. he was walking around a 3 meter tall basically a furry type lynx wearing modern tank armor as if it was nothing. The bard and ranger failed and then the paladin of the the groups player pondered as the bard was and ranger were dead.. and simply asked in many different languages "what is wrong "

[theomni-]

My main villain is the king but there is an evil that he learned that if he does evil it will repel this evil.

[ambraven]

Here me out how about a villian who is a sociopath and like killing people and drinking thier blood(also not a vampire). He is another one, a person who kills people until he finds someone who is strong enough to kill him.

[CyborGibbon]

Mine is two reasons, one being a reasonable one...the other being what makes them a villain
1: He's reclaiming land for his people that they believe was unjustly stolen from them by foreigners
2: He believes only the strong should live and the strongest should rule, so he's also using the war he started for basically genocide and a hostile takeover

[Onio_Saiyan]

A villain I like is one that THINKS their cause is noble but it’s definitely not. Or they initially had a reason and that reason might be noble, but it’s gone a direction less than favorable. Syndrome from The Incredibles is a perfect example of the latter.

[lyonwhote]

My world is a coma dream of a very sick kid, whose mother sits at his bed side reading him fantasy novels. In the childs world (my D&D campaign) the main villain is the embodiment of his mother's crys for her child's pain to just end after all the years. The embodiment is a much more vile figure of this just wanting the world to end, the world destroying is parts of the childs body failing and every victory of the heros to save the world brings the child closer. Tho big hook almost none of the players outside of out of game conversations know much of any of this. Tho some bread crumbles and special session for the main group know a bit more of the real situations going on in this world.

[yuenasiaide]

My bbeg has sacrificed his whole Kingdom, for the off-chance that the apocalypse is truly about to begin, just to be right and even personally trying to prevent it, sometimes even teaming up with the party on temporary bases, to make them question if all that he did so far is truly as bad as they think.

[liamedwards]

I prefer my villains to lean more towards skelator

[DriskotTheDense]

I should try D&D for more than the 4 short games I've done, seems fun

[dragenfoo]

The only way to stop and prevent evil is with evil... (i normaly have My players choose what they think is the lesser evil, but each time they stop that evil a new one sees a chance to strike. Thus replacing someone evil with someone good only allows growth for new evil. Truely, only the evil can stop other evils. If you kill the largest fish in the sea, another fish is now able to grow without fearing the bygger fish, potentially able to grow lager then the previous BBEG.

[sgtdrake]

How about a villain who's passion is torture and murder?

[klashslash]

I mean... what's better than "i was told by all of my predecessors that overuse of power is the only way to keep it"

[lordofsoup]

Yeah but sometimes you just need an evil bastard for fun kinda villain. Otherwise one of your players WILL make a session one long therapy session w your bbeg

[pwnronetwothree]

I disagree. I feel as though lately it seems like so many "Villains" are these misunderstood people doing bad things with good intentions. Those can be good, Thinking of Emet Selch from FFXIV or Nox from Wakfu. But at the same time, I find Zenos yae Galvus from FFXIV or The Joker from Batman to be far more intriguing, as the act as a mirror to the Main Character and challenge their ethics and morals.