Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

The secret to being evil

If three evil PCs, one of which is a citizen of Baldur's Gate makes a report about vigilante "heroes" to the Flaming Fist, will they not become outlaws?

Keep in mind with anywhere, to include Soubar.

Ran by evil or not.... Evil does not like competition. And it won't just sigh and let things slide either.

Hiya Abox!

Firstly, welcome to the daring and dastardly side of evil! You will quickly find, as I already knew from having played on the server so many years, that evil RP is some of the most challenging to pull off well without looking like Skeletor tormenting He-Man with a new plot to foil each week.

I've been participating in full-time evil RP since I made my current main, 'Mae yr Machshikhah' (not her real name! ), and I guess I could go over some of the things I did to help myself engage in all-round RP with a large cross section of good-neutral-evil PCs and enjoy the journey.

1. Prepare (several!) False Identities

• This includes doing the work to prepare a false biography or three. In my opinion, deception RP is as much IC as OOC. There comes a point where you simply must keep your true cards close to your chest and only let other characters, and their players, perceive only what you want them to see. Again, this is as much OOC as IC, because even mentioning that you're Banite here in this thread will unfortunately sour some players to hopelessly metagame that information and give you a hard time ICly because of it (sad, but it happens).
  
  I went my first 3-4 months under the guise of a Helmite Cleric, infiltrated no less than 3 organisations and stole plenty of their valued information. And of course when it came time for the 'big reveal', it was wholly orchestrated by me and the PCs still only know what I want them to (again, metagamers notwithstanding). Only give away your secrets to highly-trusted friends you know won't go blabbing on Discord about who you really are or serve.
  
  Remember to always log out with the biography description/disguise name you want your fellow players to read when you next arrive in the server Nexus!

2. Prepare two Separate Spell Books

• You mentioned not using half your spells because you don't want to get caught using them, and I agree! Therefore, I recommend you memorise two wholly opposite spell configurations using the /mspells command with the Client Extension (if you don't know what I'm talking about, click here).
  
  When operating with my public persona, I favoured neutral summons (dire creatures, elementals) with a buff & bash strategy very fitting for your cleric to use. When I went incognito, then I brought out the big guns (desecrate, animate dead, harm, destruction, etc) because it didn't matter if people saw that; they could not link it back to identity 1 without metagaming.
  
  If you need some ideas on cleric spells to prepare for each 'identity', simply shoot me a PM

3. Tactical use of Spells/Abilities

• Try to avoid using perceivable evil abilities (eg. Baneguard in your case) while trying to maintain your public persona. Remember: If a player can possibly metagame something from you, they will. So do absolutely everything in your power to prevent any possibility of your affiliations being metagamed unless you want that to be publicly known. Hide your scry when you're in 'evil' mode. Disguise your name. Use your special class abilities (hopefully!) away from prying eyes.
  
  Makes for a pretty frustrating existence at times, but I got a good 3 months out of doing this before I deliberately laid my cards out. And now I don't have to worry about Public Persona 1 anymore. I can focus on Evil Persona 2, and Public Personas 3 & 4

4. Get some Friends to Join!

• There are plenty of us evil RPers that are happy to foster (if not nurture & prosper!) your evil tendencies, let you join our Upperdark undead swarmfests and release all that pent up anger against all that is good and holy in the world. I am one of them. Shoot me a tell if you see me in game and I'd love to show you around!
  
  I would also highly recommend getting in touch with the guild leader/s of The Zhentarim. They have the most wonderful base with direct access to Upperdark grinding areas (lvl 3-20); you will love it!

Hey Tsid,
Did you ever consider that the reason you could “infiltrate” those orgs was because other Players, of those orgs, saw it was You as a Player, and thus showed open arms?

I went my first 3-4 months under the guise of a Helmite Cleric, infiltrated no less than 3 organisations and stole plenty of their valued information.

MrPsion wrote:The Coven seems to be another good choice for an evil guild.

It's a very good point. The best from all I can see here.

Sure. Because Mae's public bio was fake and did its job as I intended. Now had I made a public bio that she were a Banite masquerading as a Helmite from the start, do you really think I had been accepted by ORH, Everwatch & Darius Holding Company as easily as I was by keeping it well hidden OOCly?

And I'll put my hand up first of all to say im guilty of metagaming against evil characters in the past. It's really hard when you -know- OOCly that someone's character is in disguise/evil vs. not having much OOC clue at all. And with Mae I dropped heaps of clues that were intended only to become obvious after the fact.

Nevertheless I do thank the players for letting me RP. Im pretty sure that it wasnt until I dropped the Harper-Drow bombshell that folks finally started to put it all together. It was, of course, too late by then and the whole has generated a large amount of excellent consequential RP, of which I am glad

Unfortunately this is half the truth. At any given time there are only 2, maybe 3 characters rped as evil. The rest are rped as good, chaotic at best. Evil characters for example that make other characters hate their guts but being able do nothing about it. Not because of PvP, or because RPing PG18 scenes, but because of who the character is and how it behaves.

And no, infiltration ahs nothing to do with evil or good rp. Infiltration is like saying that I will rp a character as good ( or evil ) and then say I am evil ( or good ). The time you spend rping as a good character, your character is just that... good.

People dont play evil characters ( or even they dont play them well ) because it is a hard thing to do, a big commitment. There are examples where it has been done right and we all can learn a lot from them. However, most evil character could have their alignment changed to neutral, and no one would be able to tell the difference.

mrm3ntalist wrote:People dont play evil characters ( or even they dont play them well ) because it is a hard thing to do, a big commitment. There are examples where it has been done right and we all can learn a lot from them. However, most evil character could have their alignment changed to neutral, and no one would be able to tell the difference.

Unfortunately, there as is an entire aspect to this as well. A lot of those who're evil in alignment have to very careful how they behave around others, especially in public, simply due to fact there are other characters that most likely will be way more powerful than oneself. This is most likely why most won't be playing overtly evil, not because they don't want to, but simply because the risk is to great, especially when you don't have any sort of network to stand behind you.

Another thing to note about playing evil, there are many, many nuances to playing evil, it doesn't have to be the typical stupid evil kind, or the sadistic cruel kind, or the undead loving one. For instance one could be very manipulative, cunning, selfish and have a very cold personality, generally being one who don't care about others at all. Oh, and just because people don't appear to be playing evil, doesn't mean they'ren't justifying the their more neutral / good acts - it could simply be to uphold the illusion of being good, so when they least expect it you would stab them in their back.

Incarnate wrote:

mrm3ntalist wrote:People dont play evil characters ( or even they dont play them well ) because it is a hard thing to do, a big commitment. There are examples where it has been done right and we all can learn a lot from them. However, most evil character could have their alignment changed to neutral, and no one would be able to tell the difference.

Unfortunately, there as is an entire aspect to this as well. A lot of those who're evil in alignment have to very careful how they behave around others, especially in public, simply due to fact there are other characters that most likely will be way more powerful than oneself. This is most likely why most won't be playing overtly evil, not because they don't want to, but simply because the risk is to great, especially when you don't have any sort of network to stand behind you.

Why? What can they do to the evil character? When was a character that didnt pvp-troll got hunted? Never.

How is that any different for character of any alignment that has a dislike towards a group/race of characters.

Another thing to note about playing evil, there are many, many nuances to playing evil, it doesn't have to be the typical stupid evil kind, or the sadistic cruel kind, or the undead loving one. For instance one could be very manipulative, cunning, selfish and have a very cold personality, generally being one who don't care about others at all.

Yes, that why i said there are just a handful of evil characters.

Oh, and just because people don't appear to be playing evil, doesn't mean they'ren't justifying the their more neutral / good acts - simply to uphold the illusion of being good.

eh? Nobody goes around shouting " I will now rob/kill/manipulate you". That is the one side extreme. The extreme on the other side is rping your evil character most of the time as non evil. Does that qualify for a alignment shift ?

I would argue there are plenty of the same issues with good characters. Strong RP is strong, weak RP is weak, regardless of good or evil. I've seen plenty of "Good" RP that in the Forgotten Realms setting is pretty silly.

"Don't hurt that imp, he didn't do anything wrong"
"Drow aren't all evil, you can't stereotype them like that...it's wrong"
"But the Orc's just selling cookies, you can't just attack him like that"
"We should resurrect that person we've never met because it's right and just."

You could argue that in every case the player had RP reasons for being the one in a million non-racist person in the realms who has no ingrained fear of drow, orcs, tieflings, etc. And as Hoihe explained in another thread his PC would attempt to raise every single random commoner she came upon.... But in the lore of the realms this is largely not the case. There either needs to be a very good reason, or a very large donation to warrant even a raise dead. Until Drizzt comes along (in our timeline I'm pretty sure he's currently wandering the Underdark alone or maybe living in Blingdenstone) no one has ever met a non-hostile drow, or at least not that was documented in any books that I'm aware of, and Orc's are a monster race, not worthy of parlaying with.

*shrug* I'm sure there are plenty of folks I've RP'd with that considered me a weak RP'er, which is fine as I personally have looked back and seen where I have room to improve. Really not trying to call out anyone here (I use Hoihe cuz anyone that has ever interacted with him likely knows he's a strong Rp'er). I was merely wanting to call out that in general the RP on the server can be pretty hit or miss. Some you'll like, some you wont, regardless if the RP is from a good or evil PC. Still better than the RP you'll get from any other online medium as far as I'm aware (which admittedly my experience in online RP is limited).

mrm3ntalist wrote: Why? What can they do to the evil character? When was a character that didnt pvp-troll got hunted? Never.

Despite the fact that the server is a pvp-consent server, it doesn't change the fact that once you're character is outed as an evil character, it will for the most part stay that way.
Which means at some point there will be some there to go against you, who most likely will be more powerful than you - and if not, then he can still bring all of his/her good aligned buddies.

mrm3ntalist wrote:How is that any different for character of any alignment that has a dislike towards a group/race of characters.

The whole thing good vs. evil, is very different from holding a personal grudge or a dislike towards a group/race of characters.

mrm3ntalist wrote:Yes, that why i said there are just a handful of evil characters.

There might more evil characters about than you realize, but yes there certainly are more good and neutral aligned characters than evil ones.

mrm3ntalist wrote: eh? Nobody goes around shouting " I will now rob/kill/manipulate you". That is the one side extreme. The extreme on the other side is rping your evil character most of the time as non evil. Does that qualify for a alignment shift ?

First of all, if the character's justification for doing the good or neutral action is sound and makes sense for the character, as in for instance I do this now because I have to, otherwise these guys will gut me open if they find out I'm evil - thats called self-preservation. Furthermore, if the justification for doing it the various actions has a good enough explanation and reasoning behind them, then no it wouldn't qualify for an alignment shift. However if the actions got the character to reflect over the actions, as in having doubts about if the justification really was good enough, then yes at some point it could qualify an alignment shift. But you cannot decide just because the character does good actions then it warrants an alignment change. Basically, what would determin it is the moral conviction behind the choices in relation to the specific context.

mrm3ntalist wrote: However, most evil character could have their alignment changed to neutral, and no one would be able to tell the difference.

Some lawful evil character could act like Mr. Roger's, at least until that fateful day you cross them. That's the day good ol Mr. Rogers takes off his tennis shoes and puts on his combat boots....on that day you really wouldnt like to be his neighbor.

My first evil toon on this server was a neutral evil character that was infiltrating a neutral good group. Their goodness wore off on him and eventually he just changed alignments to True Neutral.

My next PC was also neutral evil, very selfish, steals from folk on occasion, lied to folk whenever it made her look good. Had a bad attitude about life. Picks fights with folk fairly easily (she gets away with it because shes cute). She is okay about others committing evil or immoral acts around her, like undead or demon summons, at least as long as they benefit her, or at least entertain her.
Learning my lesson from my first PC, this character joined every evil organization she could find to try to build a rep for herself. She was willing to help out any evil cause, for a price. Unfortunately all the evil clubs she joined would usually fizzle out - most of the work she did with these organizations was related to trying to build the organization, or defend it....never really got into an wicked nafarious schemes before they would die out.
So the big gimmick I gave this character was that she liked to rob folk. She raided every cave, dungeon, or hold that she thought would have a treasure chest in it- massacreing every stinkin creature in those places with zero guilt. She found she could rob monsters to her hearts delight and nobody would object, in fact they would pat her on the back. She has the blood of thousands of creatures that were doing no wrong, on her hands. She grew rich slaughtering monsters. In the end she had to wonder, why be evil when she could swim in the blood of all this goodness she was causing.
A NE character will do anything to thrive in the environment they live in.
My first NE evil character decided being evil to get ahead was not necessary.
My current one still looks for the opportunities to exploit a situation.
Now, if I made her try and be evil, tried to plot some nafarious scheme- just for the sake of trying to be more evil, well then that would be more Chaotic Evil then her current alignment.
So I feel she should be careful what she does not to ruin an already good thing she has got going.
This could be why a lot of Evils look loke neutrals in game.

Maybe it is a cop out but the mechanics of this game and server make it harder to be evil and this is for for lots of good and bad reasons. In a nut shell it, its hard to create a balannced simulation of life in a video game.
But one bad reason for why it is difficult to be evil, I have to say is more player related use of various double standards. For example -we will achnowledge that it is hard to RP evil on one had, then we turn around and compare folk to Skeletor when people give evil a try, on the other hand.
BTW -Why are people always giving Skeletor a hard time?
It's not just him that is the problem. Its the He-Man always wins in the end and evil will never prevail world poor ol' Skeletor lives in that makes him look rediculous all the time.

To answer the original posters question. I say when you have a build that uses lots of evil spells, then it is best just to go 'all in' on the evil side and really push being evil. No point always trying to hide it. You do not have to shout out: Im a necromancer to the whole world, but why hide them either, right?
The secret to this is not minding being smited, once in awhile- it is the best way to learn your limits and boundaries. Go ahead and act like Skeletor a bit, and be willing to accept your fate even if team good are RPing like that tool, He-Man and his Masters of the Universe.
RP losing a battle with as much energy as you would winning one.

Its mostly because the server's central factions (its focus) is on the good (or neutral, but they end up serving the good faction's purpose in the end) spectrum. Most of the central events are about good triumphing over evil.

This is just the setting the server has cultivated. Some servers have different spectrum, some have a mix of good and evil focus factions, some have one, or some have the other.

Its likely not going away. Unless we get another Amn/Gate war, or another war involving two central factions that players can join. In which case, we'd get relatively equal representation.

As it is now, you cannot actually implement any plans and expect to get away with it (consequences!). Not to mention, since the central plots seem to revolve around PC factions vs NPCs, there is no real opposition to the central PC factions (who are again, neutral serving good/good, as the NPC factions are evil ones) that drives the plot.

As far as the "grand scheme of things go", its a good vs evil scenario, where good always triumphs (because evil are primarily NPCs). Yes, there are some minor flings with PC factions who try to play evil characters, but they are usually pummeled into the dirt by the superior good/neutral numbers. There are also the ones that are stuck in the eternal "scheming in darkness" phase of life because (surprise surprise) they don't actually do anything (and so, noone can catch them to pummel them). The ones who do pull off actions usually commit small acts of evil that don't really leave any lasting impact or can't be maintained for very long.

But if you do have the courage and/or time to endure the frustration of playing the evil villain, good on you. The server needs more people like you. Yes, people will kick and scream and whine to the DMs when RP doesn't go their way or they lose a PvP fight. But at the end of the day, without any villain PCs, they'd all be sitting around their respective campfires, waiting for the next DM event to trudge along.

Without villain PCs and conflict RP, this server would be a second life-esque social server with the occasional DM event.

let me preface by saying being evil and playing good is easy. it is just as easy as being good.. because you are just another good guy.

been playing clearly evil for a while. i bet sometimes i come off as skeletor or whatever to some people, but if you think that then you probably got lost somewhere in your understanding of the forgotten realms setting.

quite often me and my group will walk in on someone all alone in a dungeon/area and they treat it as if they had just been approached by a knightly paladin. "hey big fellas. how's the weather? wanna help kill some (x)s?" i used to just kill these players, but that did not seem to be a player friendly approach and i received a lot of negative feedback. so i took to the approach of just ignoring these players. just dont RP and keep moving. right? cant have good RP with bad RP. right? cant make a tasty cake when the ingredients are all wrong. but that only worked so well. feedback came in that their character is this and just wants that and doesnt want orcs to be any part of this or that. or why are you denying my friendly RP. i was being friendly. so i can understand to an extent that some people do not want the excitement of a confrontation from a hostile sentient creature that will not act in a prescribed manner or has a CR rating attached to it(me and my crew). and i can understand that some people's RP may not recognize the danger of some creatures that roam the planet. maybe they walk up to every mob and ask the weather. i don't know that for sure. but in the end. whatever. who knows?

now this is not to say that every encounter is bad. certainly not. i have had a whole bunch of great encounters with some of the best the server has to offer. i often get feed back that is good and that they appreciate what we are doing and loved the RP. we both go home happy and grew a little from it. and i am not doing anything any different than we do with the bad feedback.

TL/DR: there does not seem to be a right or wrong way to be evil. or at least i havent figured it out. one person's right way will be another persons wrong and vica versa. just do your best and cross your fingers.

man I wish we ran in to each other in game more often. I HATE players that play their grey orcs like innocent little kittens and send me nasty tells when I even RP mistrust, let alone outright hostility...

I mean, my main right now is a tiefling so he would see an Orc as a possible tool, but never as an actual ally.

Keep being you man!

aaron22 wrote:let me preface by saying being evil and playing good is easy. it is just as easy as being good.. because you are just another good guy.

been playing clearly evil for a while. i bet sometimes i come off as skeletor or whatever to some people, but if you think that then you probably got lost somewhere in your understanding of the forgotten realms setting.

quite often me and my group will walk in on someone all alone in a dungeon/area and they treat it as if they had just been approached by a knightly paladin. "hey big fellas. how's the weather? wanna help kill some (x)s?" i used to just kill these players, but that did not seem to be a player friendly approach and i received a lot of negative feedback. so i took to the approach of just ignoring these players. just dont RP and keep moving. right? cant have good RP with bad RP. right? cant make a tasty cake when the ingredients are all wrong. but that only worked so well. feedback came in that their character is this and just wants that and doesnt want orcs to be any part of this or that. or why are you denying my friendly RP. i was being friendly. so i can understand to an extent that some people do not want the excitement of a confrontation from a hostile sentient creature that will not act in a prescribed manner or has a CR rating attached to it(me and my crew). and i can understand that some people's RP may not recognize the danger of some creatures that roam the planet. maybe they walk up to every mob and ask the weather. i don't know that for sure. but in the end. whatever. who knows?

now this is not to say that every encounter is bad. certainly not. i have had a whole bunch of great encounters with some of the best the server has to offer. i often get feed back that is good and that they appreciate what we are doing and loved the RP. we both go home happy and grew a little from it. and i am not doing anything any different than we do with the bad feedback.

TL/DR: there does not seem to be a right or wrong way to be evil. or at least i havent figured it out. one person's right way will be another persons wrong and vica versa. just do your best and cross your fingers.