Vox Felicitas X — The Fine Art of Writing Evil
On last week’s episode of Vox Felicitas, I decided to wade into the ongoing social upheaval caused by the killing of George Floyd in Minnesota, USA, by overzealous police officers over a counterfeit dollar bill — and the global outrage it set off, sparking the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement. I discussed how this latest sad chapter in a longwinded history of abuse has the potential to spark terrible carnage in the future, if America fails to address and resolve the evil that is racial prejudice.
Today, I return from my sojourn into the political. My trousers are sodden and I’m definitely going to need to change my socks, but in the tenth episode of VF, we return to creative writing topics I cover — though the badness will remain, albeit in a slightly less toxic form. Today, I want to discuss how I cover topics considered ‘evil’ in my stories, and how I handle villainous characters and actions therein. Grab your devilish popcorn and pour your vile champagne, because this will be a most diabolical piece…
I’m going to begin with Dungeons & Dragons, probably because I’m in a very good mood regarding it at the moment. To help our usual Dungeon Master settle down and recover from the burden of coronavirus-induced loneliness, we’ve decided to create alternating campaigns, swapping DMing seats on a weekly basis. The campaign I’m running, entitled The Draconomachy, is set within Theros, a plane originating from fantasy series Magic: The Gathering which got its own source book for D&D quite recently. I’m well-versed in Hellenic mythology and the guys are MTG nuts, so I thought — why not treat them to a Theros campaign?
(By the way, guys — if you’re reading this, you’ll want to skip these next paragraphs down to the next section if you don’t want to be spoiled.)
There are two primary villains in my campaign, which the heroes have yet to be introduced to (but will in due time) — the Serpent Witch, and Pyros. Pyros is an ancient, massive red dragon who has made an alliance with the Serpent Witch, who plans to claim the powers of Tiamat, the fallen Titan who is the queen of all chromatic dragons, through a blood sacrifice. What Pyros hopes to gain from such an alliance is the opportunity to seize command of dragonkind by having her anoint him as the Dragon King, believing Tiamat to be too weak to be worthy of worship and proclaiming himself ruler instead.
Pyros (whose name is inspired by a dragon in the Dragonlance saga) is the epitome of one kind of villain — the classical moustache-twirling type. In D&D lore, red dragons are exceptionally egotistical creatures who believe that they have been appointed directly by Tiamat herself to rule over all of dragonkind. But Pyros’ arrogance is astonishing even by red dragon standards, believing himself superior to Tiamat; he’s almost asking to be put in his place by the dragon goddess.
Where the differences between Pyros and other villains of his type are marked is through his exceptional traits and physique. Such a massive claim, which is bound to invite the fury of many a red dragon, is not one that Pyros makes lightly, so how does he differ from other dragons who would dare to challenge their own god (and promptly get whaled on by said god’s adherents)? Pyros has had the Serpent Witch alter his heart with powerful magic, creating a dimensional rift drawing energy straight from the Elemental Plane of Fire. When the players get to fight him, his battle will have two different phases, with the first phase being roughly the same as with a regular ancient red dragon. But once he drops to zero hit points for the first time? That’s when the fun begins…
The final strike brings the mighty Pyros low, and he bows his head with a pained growl. But as his charred scales begin to slough off like shed snakeskin, clattering to the floor like hundreds of metal coins, he unleashes peals of guttural laughter as he stands proud once again. Flares of sun-yellow fire begin to erupt from within his superheated body, and everything they touch bursts into flame!
(I had a lot of fun devising that bit of flavour text.)
As a standard red dragon Pyros is scary enough. But read the Mythic Actions he has in his custom stat block, and you can see that once his Blaze of Glory is activated, his fiery breath burns so hot it can vaporise other red dragons and creatures that would normally be impervious to fire. Also, melee attacking him is a good way to get yourself burned. And to cap off what is likely to be an intense fight, he explodes when he dies.
So as you can see, Pyros is an absolute terror of a dragon to fight at the end of the Draconomachy. But I’m going to draw attention to his prescribed alignment at the top — chaotic evil — for the sake of my next section.
D&D categorises creature and character alignments on two spectra: Law-Chaos, and Good-Evil. The precise definition of each alignment is up to interpretation, but to allow for diverse characterbuilding, I define each alignment as follows:
- Lawful = prefers hierarchy.
- Chaotic = opposes hierarchy.
- Good = happy to risk oneself for the benefit of others.
- Evil = happy to risk others for one’s own benefit.
- Neutral = ultimate pragmatist.
I adopt these definitions because they’re broad enough to allow for the massive array of people who express the equally myriad number of views and beliefs there are in the world.
As Pyros the Red Dragon is chaotic evil, it is quite reasonable to assume that he is beholden to no-one and prioritises his own wellbeing above all others. But even this one alignment can be picked apart and analysed. By making his agreement to help the Serpent Witch, one might say he has beholden himself to her, thus violating his alignment. Pyros gets around this by emphasising that it is an agreement, rather than a pact or even an alliance; both of these confer the mental image of a contract which is signed, to which Pyros has bound himself. But an agreement can be broken off at any time he feels it convenient to do so, and implies that the two are helping one another further each others’ goals. In making such an agreement, Pyros shows his astuteness by recognising that certain goals are impossible to pursue without outside assistance, revealing his potential as a menacing opponent with cunning as well as immense power on his side. His readiness to abandon an agreement showcases he has his own self-interest in mind over all else, and places him squarely on the Evil over Chaos side of chaotic evil.
Contrast Pyros with Rick Sanchez, from Adult Swim TV series Rick & Morty, a rare example of a chaotic evil protagonist. Rick has absolutely zero respect for any authority other than his own and he repeatedly shows that his own wellbeing is placed above that of anyone else — even, on occasion, his own family, and especially his significantly less brilliant son-in-law Jerry. However, Rick does periodically show affection towards his most immediate relations, particularly his daughter and family matriarch Beth. In Season 3, he recognises that he hasn’t been the best father to her and takes time out of his busy schedule to bond with her. When she was a child, he even created an entire world for her to play in named Froopy-Land (just don’t mock the name when he’s around. It’s very inconsiderate). Where Pyros favours evil self-interest over independence, Rick represents the extreme of Chaos over Evil.
But the best villains, however, are those who are the heroes of their own story. I will use this segment to introduce you to Mireen Mantriss, the character I’ve been playing in the other D&D campaign I’m a part of, and also a major character in a fantasy story series I’ve been writing on (more in that in VF episodes to come). On the face of it, Mireen is simply another evil wizard who practices necromancy and aspires to lichdom — an undead state which allows her a form of immortality. Perhaps the only visible difference is her preference for blue over the more commonplace black or red.
However, her pursuit of black magic stands in direct relation to her backstory. Mireen is the last living member of a destroyed noble house, vanquished by the drow during their conquest of her homeland. The last time she saw her beloved father, the deposed ruler of her home city, he was in the middle of being beheaded by the invaders. She survived the invasion, but wishes she hadn’t. She blames herself for the destruction of her family, cursing herself for not being powerful enough to save them. Mireen intends to become the most powerful arcanist to have ever lived, effectively a goddess, and studies magic diligently — but she is savvy enough to have realised that she can’t possibly achieve this goal in one lifetime, and certainly not with her frail human body. So she seeks out the path of the lich as a means of furthering her goal, rather than having it be the end goal. To her, necromancy is just the means to an end.
Mireen’s alignment is neutral evil. She will happily destroy anyone who stands in between her and her goals, and she makes and uses friends and alliances like a carpenter uses a hammer. However, she is smart enough to recognise that cooperating with the other members of her party, as much as she despises do-gooders as weaklings at best and outright liars at worst, is the best way for her to achieve her goal. Mireen tags along not to destroy the MacGuffin as the others do, but to study its magical power and use it for her own ends. As of recently, following her capture and torture by one of the Big Bad’s lieutenants, she has also added ‘unleash a horrible, bloody vengeance’ to her agenda.
All great baddies start out with noble (from their point of view) intentions. Pyros believes Tiamat isn’t worthy of leading the dragons to glory. Mireen wants to make it up to her father for her failure to protect him. Yelena (Frencoverse, lawful evil) fights to end the corruption plaguing her world. Darth Vader (Star Wars, also lawful evil) wanted to save his wife from death. I could go on ad infinitum about what motivates villains classic and obscure, but that would just bore you to death, so I’ll end this already lengthy piece on a high note.
If you want to create an excellent villain, remember that they need to have a believable motivation. They should be an imposing force in the face of the heroes, one who poses a very real threat to the champions of good. The best villains of all combine the above two with sheer brilliance and style. It’s why Heath Ledger’s Joker (The Dark Knight, chaotic evil) is widely regarded as the best out of all the Jokers. He’s a highly charismatic, intelligent and absolutely deadly threat to Batman and all of Gotham City, and he’s motivated by a deep-seated and relatable belief that when the chips are down, society will eat its own children.
Don’t necessarily copy the Joker, but making your villain ferociously powerful, cunning and magnetic in the field is a sure-fire way to draw your audience into the story and root for the heroes in their struggles against this monster.
Thank you for reading, and I will see you all again next week.
~ Harry