How do we inject villainy into established threads?

A cursory inspection of the high traffic RP threads here leads me to think it's all mostly about the heroes. There is nothing wrong with that of course. Heroes are always more sympathetic, and well, good must always triumph over evil otherwise things just wind up being terribly bleak and depressing! To paraphrase Rick Moranis, good might be dumb but at least it's persistent. Of course said heroes contend with all kinds of plots or conflicts, some generated by villains or not but, since the fizzle of the Chateau Rouge thread, which some here may remember, there seems to be no threads currently running for the villains to chew scenery and engage in melodrama, pathos and bathos.

There are lot of issues around that, which we can hash out here if necessary but, really the main question is if we have some villains some fleshed out villainous plots we want to run, how to we fuse that into an established thread without disrupting things too badly? It's kind of hard to imagine a thread where the heroes and villains bat things back and forth in the same thread. Mostly one or the other group are off camera in other a villain or hero dominated thread.

Or am I just making things too complicated?

You're just making things too complicated.

To answer your first question, though: it depends. Right now, there probably aren't any RP threads active that are appropriate for a full-time camera on villains being villains, so to speak. The Whitmoore is probably the closest to one, but when we gave that idea a shot a while back, things got messy, so we more or less decided to keep the focus on the heroes and have their opponents do most of their stuff off-screen, making token appearances every now and then to foreshadow or convey major plot points.

The only really appropriate way to get a villain into one of the currently running, established RP threads that I can think of off the top of my head is to do it either without a villainous plot attached or making said villain's plot centered around one or more of the heroes (kidnap, assassinate, steal the power of, etc.). Either way, having said villain pretend to be part of the good guys while trying to covertly go about their villainous machinations would pretty much be a requirement, otherwise you'll be writing a lot of monologues that few people are likely to read.

It's a matter of taste really, I mean I for one do not like the story of Watchman.

Oh I fully appricate it as a wonderfully told story and the seriousness of the issues and how a graphic novel can adress them sure. I just don't like the story.

Heroes to me are flawed yes, but they overcome those flaws, they never give up, maybe they don't save everyone but they try thier damn best. And this is why they're heroes, because they can do these things without becoming mosnters, because they don't just stand around gormlessly while the evil villian does his thing. (I'll stop here before I turn this into another Tech vs Omy thread, we just disgaree).

The problem with injecting villiany intoa thread is that we as RPers here have very mixed opinions here, on the oneside you have people like me, who while we have flawed heroes we build them to overcome this and ultimatly save the day. While on the other hand we have people like Tech who belive there's no fundemental difference between heroes and villians and that good is dumb and all that.

You basically need to get a group of players together who can agree on the setting tone of that, trying to inject some villiany into an existign thread is going to run into trouble if what your image of how villians should go doesn't match up to everyone elses.

So yea, I don't think injecting it into an existign thread could ever work, you best bet would be to try and gather together enough plyers who like, or are willing to play in, a thread with a setting and tone you've outlined, or at least, this is my two pence.

The reason there's less villain Open RP than Heroes is twofold.

First is that a lot of Villains don't like to be all that open with others. Secrecy and backstabbing abounds and can quickly derail any thread more complicated than "Break stuff and take their things" Heck it can even derail that as players refuse to share information, mislead others and deliberately sabotage the mission. Heroes rarely get this problem and even if someone is being secretive it's rarely deliberately harmful to the mission.

Second and perhaps more important is Villain's just don't have a uniting cause like Heroes do. For a Hero it's simple, you're there to save people and/or stop the bad guys. But for Villains nearly every one comes in with their own bit of baggage. Some are crazy psychopaths, some are slimy buisness types, some are fences, some are mad scientists intent on ruling the world, some are just down on their luck. It's a common theme in comics that when the Villains group up they usually quickly fall apart again due to lack of a uniting vision. They're all in it for selfish reasons after all, even if they've got Doctor Doom/Lex Luthor/Ozymandius like "I will make the world an Utopian paradise" motive to try justify what they do. It's all Ego, they don't know that they're going to make a Utopia any more than the next person. Heck it's implied in Watchmen that Ozymandius killed all those people for nothing, he didn't really know what the future held as was shown with his final talk with Dr Manhattan and his panicked self doubt and it was likely the truth would out with time.

We had a Cold War in real life and it didn't end with nukes. People seem to forget that, even if the Watchmen universe is different it doesn't change the fact no one with a finger on the button really wanted to blow up the world. The grim dark that followed the Watchmen seems to envision worlds with no good people left in it, which is a real shame as it's just silly. This is really a talk for a different topic though.

So yeah, Open Villain threads don't work because Villains don't play nice with each other. Simple enough really. Honestly even VIllain SG's have problems unless they're united in some way and have a strict code of conduct. Military Units, Corporations or Families seem to last the longest while gangs and "Leagues of Evil" tend to fall to bits quickly.

If you want Villainy to go into current threads, make them closed and set some guidelines. A Secret Six like gang could work great, as could a Suicide Squad. But just a "Bring your ray gun and come help" plot will be.. well.. a giant mess.

may be i should have added ..... Zero battles Fans, so far it has been the most peacfull time in ages.

We havent really started....

I do agree with your post, unless there is a overlord type boss villian , or some glue binding them together villians just turn on each other. After all they are each others biggest rivils.