I want villains I can respect

Dang, I was hoping to get in before GG had her way with this thread...

As an actor (by trade), I actually enjoy playing the villain. It allows me to indulge in those impulses, thoughts, and desires that every human has and most simply suppress or ignore because they are, indeed, terrible. And I get to do that in a controlled environment so there's no risk of anyone actually getting hurt. Truth be told, I have played the role of some terrible people who do or have done things that I, myself, have never even dreamed of doing. But by doing so in a false setting, there is a disconnect from real life and with that in place I am free to act within those boundaries.

This game offers a similar circumstance. A player can create an evil character, one that is actually despicable, without any impact to his/her real life persona. The player can actually create a false scenario with given guidelines, and is thus free to be as evil as he or she wants because, in the end, it is all pixels and cyberspace.

That having been said, I think the type of player is the variable here. For players like myself, there is a disconnect from the game, even for those of us (again myself included) who like creating a detailed biography and talking in character here and there. For those who are truly integrated in their characters' stories (like Samuel_Tow), creating a despicable villain is probably difficult because they end up disliking their own creation.

Perhaps a better way of summing up my own feelings on the matter is that I want a villain who is logical. I despise the "insane madman" type of villain, I've always seen it as a narrational cop-out, the type of bad guy who does what the plot needs, just because it's the opposite of what good guys do.

The type of villain I want is the one who plans. "This is what I want, this is how I'm going to get it, and this is what I'm going to do to you if you get in my way", kind of thing. I consider the best example of this in game to be old-school Nemesis - by "old school" I mean the old contact missions before the newer writers started trying to use him as wacky automaton comic relief.

I like to imagine many of my villains holding to the tvtropes list of evil virtues.
I like to think that a lot of the Rogue Isles hold to at least four or five of these virtues, otherwise the whole place would truly fall to pieces and not even Lord Recluse would be able to salvage it.

And I must say, as far as characters I play and even some I fight against, I like mostly villains who can be respected.
Villains who are polite, efficient, determined, and honorable (in their own strange way).

But I occasionally do like utter monsters, but only for enemies I fight, and usually such foes would not be human in any sense of the word.

And as a funny note, this thread made me realize that NONE of my villains would ever engage in a world domination plot but one of my heroes WOULD try if he honestly felt the world sucked that much.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow City of Heroes is a game about freedom of expression and variety of experiences far more so than it is about representing any one theme, topic or genre.

I like my villains to have some parts to them that are somewhat easy to identify with, even if you, like me, usually hand out on the good side of the street. The Evil Virtues AzureSkyCiel mentioned is a good way to look at it, but I usually look to motivation to find the hook that makes the villain effective.

To infect this thread even more, I dislike the Generic Doomsday Villain type bad guy. Oh, sure, it's fun to beat down these guys when playing Heroes, nothing like saving the world from an unrepentant scumbag out to destroy it after all. Then you go home, throw a party and eat cake. Yay. But for playing one of these? *yawn* Destroying the world is just so... old. Oh, sure, it'd be fun to make a Saturday Morning Cartoon style villain, but that'd be his hook, then, not that he's out to destroy the world.

A good player villain has a reason to be. Maybe it's revenge, it's a good catch-all since it gives a target, maybe it's professionalism, maybe greed, maybe it's a unique backstory, like a mis-summoned demon who just wants to get back home, no matter who it has to to go through, and so on and so forth. The point is, that the ever-present carrot redside is the promise of nonspecific generic "Power". But power without purpose is useless. Same goes with player villain. A villain without a purpose might as well not exist.

Heroes have it easy here. "To save the day!" covers a lot of basic Hero types, maybe they focus on a specific part of the day to save, but really, coming up ith a Hero motivation is easy. Coming up with a good one for a Villain, though, is hard. But that makes those few great villains that really stick with you all the more special.

I think we are conflating 'evil' 'villainous' and 'bad' here.

To me they are not the same thing.

Bad: You use reprehensible methods. Your goals may be good or evil, but it's not really worth it to let you pursue them. This type of character can be likeable, especially if you agree with the goals. You may even give them a hug before sending them off to the slammer. "Dirty Harry" Callahan is a Bad person, even though he is the hero (a lot of Clint Eastwood goes here). The Punisher is usually here, and Catwoman often ends up here as well, even though those two are almost polar opposites.

Evil: Your goal is sadistic (and not in the consensual whips and leather way) or nihilistic. You want most people to suffer and probably die. This type of character can be quite likeable right up until you realize you are on the list/menu. Magneto (sometimes) and Dexter go here.

Villain: You MUST BE STOPPED because either your method or goal is reprehensible. Or both are.

Unlikeable characters are a different thing entirely.

YMMV, but:

Harvey Bullock's goals and methods are not outside the norm for a cop in Gotham City, but he is slovenly, surly, and hates Batman.

Seargeant Doakes from Dexter is sneering, arrogant and vicious...and yet is a (mostly) honest cop who means well for the innocent public.

Hawkeye from the Avengers is often written as reckless, hotheaded, and resentful of authority...but since reforming from his early stint as a criminal, has remained on the straight and narrow since the 70s.

The charismatic, engaging villain makes for good fiction, I will concur. Part of what makes them engaging is that the author can tailor what is known about them and in effect, be their chief PR official.

Ricardo Montalban's Khan is very charismatic and Montalban played him as someone convinced that he was helping the greatest number of people by becoming the undisputed ruler of the world. His vast deeds of evil are mentioned in passing, but there is no visual record of atrocities to horrify.

The Phantom of the Opera has tremendous appeal, wears that cool mask and gets to sing some GREAT songs... so a lot of folks forget that Christine is only SIXTEEN YEARS OLD in the movie and that the Phantom murders, assaults and kidnaps merrily through the film.

There are others, but the authors can control just how much evil peaks through. Whatever appeal Hitler may have brought to the table is buried under the avalanche of documentation of just how much evil he wrought. The fictional villains do not have this problem.

But we are talking about entertainment, and many folks find such villains to be very entertaining... I have certainly been entertained by many... but I do not find them APPEALING. I have no desire to play a villain in-game. Evil deeds remain evil in my book, regardless of how they are spun. But some villains are interesting to watch. Khan may have been evil, but he certainly had his fascinating qualities.

And I also think the attractiveness of engaging villains is held up by very thin wires... I lost all respect for Doctor Doom when a horde of squirrels kicked his armored butt.

Why would you respect a villain? I mean, they're villains; their MO is pretty much to use their power to gain advantage over others.

In fiction, we pretty much "respect" villains for one of two reasons:

1) They have incredible personal charisma and/or intelligence (Lex Luthor, Dr. Doom, etc), which makes them appealing. This isn't really 'respect,' though, it's just a cult of personality.

2) We're conflicted about whether they're actually villains; either their ambitions are noble, they are at least somewhat honorable, or have some other sympathetic quality (Magneto, for example.)

Obviously a lot of the time these overlap.

I actually think Recluse is a really good example of a villain who deserves "respect," it's just that he's gone kind of under-developed lately and the game doesn't do a great job of bringing home the "smart, charismatic, ruthless" part of the character.

The game doesn't really have the kind of third person exposition that's common in other media (since the focus always has to be on the player), so it's tough to really develop NPCs fully.

Cool villains live by the motto: the means justify the ends.

It's wrong to deface other people's property. But if your wall is going to be vandalized, it's more fun to have it vandalized by Banksy than a random fool tagger.

It's wrong to steal. But if you're going to be robbed, it's more fun to be robbed by Danny Ocean than by your average gun-toting punk.

It's wrong to kill. But if you're going to be killed, better a ninja blowdart than an IED.

I actually play a villain who decided that the best use of his fortune was to be the most entertaining and flamboyant criminal mastermind he could. It's fun! And while he is a narcissistic jerk who does a great deal of harm and absolutely should be stopped, battling him makes for some great stories. Not every villain needs to be that much of a showman, but I think every interesting villain needs to be more than purely evil. The single most dangerous, terrifying villain I have ever played is one who is motivated purely by universal, altruistic love.

By the way, the last I checked, "Justify the Ends" was an available character name on Virtue.

(Also, threads like this is why GG genuinely makes me fear my fellow humans.)

I have a solution, and no...no one is going to like it. But it has worked in Pen and Paper games and even NWN...which I played for years because the content that could be created. Which similar to the AE was different in the case that you could create entire worlds for RP/PVP etc. The villains that players make will always (When thought out properly) be more respectable than the villains created or utilize AI. Although it is true that this usually works better with a smaller group.

The remedy for me, to respect or create a respectable villain comes down to a few things, which by nature conflict with themselves. These things would be RP interaction (Which is needed in almost any RPG storyline to create worthy foes etc) and a combination of PVP.

RP/PVP has never worked in any game I have ever played where there have been either factions or servers dedicated towards RP/PVP...where conflict is created based on player interaction rather than "If I can kill it, Ill kill it". However this is hard to achieve because there will be some who will participate in the RP portion and some who will stunt the concept by just being PVPers. There can't really be a balance.

But if Villains and Heroes actually had environments where they could interact as both hero and villain with the threat of PVP based on solcial interactions then respectable "heroes" and "Villains" could be created. Right now there is no threat, no chance of defeat, and nothing that can really sepperate a villain from a hero other than what a player posts in their bio, which may never be read, or seen by a hero.

The issue for me is that the interaction between hero players and villain players is that the only interactions they do have are in shared coop zones, or Pocket D, which allow for communication but usually find people teamed with villains or heroes that they would find repugnant...only to get the cookie in the jar (XP, Merits, incarnate unlocks).

On the flip side there are empty PVP zones in which heroes and villains battle for a goal, but this does not lend it's self to being a threat, or character creation/progression as being a truely evil villain or hero with substance.

So long story short, Villains to respect are no different than heroes to be in awe of, the difference is that we expect this to be written for us, and do not have the ability to actually achieve either, unless we RP...and even then talk is cheap if there is no one to challenge you or issue you any threat.