As promised, after having covered the Overlord trope in all (well at least some of) its RPG glory, I now want to tackle another of my favorite character tropes:
The Magnificent Bastard (I’m making no reference whatever to any good friend of mine, honest!)
Love him or hate him, there’s a certain type of character that defies being hero or villain, good or evil, friend or enemy. He doesn’t play that game, because he’s too busy making us play his. And at the end of the day when, more often than not, his character succeeds, there’s only one thing we can call him… a Magnificent Bastard.
Sometimes the Magnificent Bastard is consciously and actively pursuing The Game; he is to Machiavelli what the Nietzsche Wannabe is to Nietzsche. At other times, it is merely an expression of his gloriously labyrinthine nature. Either way, he doesn’t just dance to the beat of a different drummer, he bribes our drummer to play all his favourites. Then he has more fun sitting down and watching us stumble over the unfamiliar steps. And deep down in a dark little corner of our hearts, we can’t help but admire that he not only pulled it off, he did it with style.
The ultimate embodiment of selfishness and egocentricity this character type exists in all genres of fiction.
Here’s a few examples from TV and Movies.
- Gaius Baltar & Darth Sidious (Sci-Fi)
- Nathan Petrelli & Mr. (Noah) Bennet (Modern/Super Heroes)
- Jareth (From Labyrinth) & Captain Jack Sparrow (Fantasy/Historical)
We love to hate them while at the same time we are awed at how he/she always manages to get away with such style.
But herein lies the challenges of mining this juicy trope to create cool NPCs. Players don’t usually care enough about a given NPC to appreciate his deviousness and showmanship. Plus they don’t want to share the spotlight, which is quite understandable.
So let’s explore how to tackle this, RPG style!
The Magnificent Ally
While Genre Savvy players expect almost all allied NPCs to turn traitor, this type of NPC was made to do it….and survive! As an effective NPC, it needs to embody the trope without threatening or irritating the players to the point of sparking a spontaneous homicide.
The Magnificent Bastard revolves around being a larger than life jerk that manages to get the girl, the money and the praise, while the true hero does the job and takes consolation that at least the world is a bit safer, if a bit more unfair.
(Hmmm, seen like that, most if not all PCs of kill and loot RPGs would qualify as Magnificent Bastards…)
Here are an example for an allied NPC:
A bard wants to write an epic poem about the PCs that will make her a lyrical legend. While her work greatly increases the PCs’ reputation, whenever they go, she’s already there, be it:
- at the city’s swankiest inn, sleeping in a luxury suite with the innkeepers son (for free and with the innkeeper’s blessing)
- in the barbarian village where she shares the thatch palace of the Chief, being real friendly.
- in the dungeon, discussing the finer points of Troll-Finger race strategies with the troll guards .
The trick here is to give the NPC one key weakness that will prevent it from becoming a Marty Stu. Maybe she is a horrible combatant (as all bards, amiright?) and the PCs need to save her bacon countless times. Maybe she’s the daughter of a truly scary Overlord and she openly opposes him and provides critical tidbits of info to help the PCs spoil his plans.
(Of course in that last case, she’s actually using the PCs in a Xanatos Gambit to depose her father and take his place).
To make this character really over the top, make her mention from the start that a true Epic needs a grand Villain and have her say, many times, she’d be perfect for the job if she wasn’t so busy writing the damn story.
If you can fit in these comments right after she looks the most incompetent, chances are they won’t take her seriously… you’ll leave your players in the dust when she actually pulls it off.
The Magnificent enemy.
As an openly declared antagonist a Magnificent Bastard can be more fun to play than an Overlord.
Always civil, always polite. He’ll make a point of capturing the PCs and then entertain them to a classy evening where he’ll try to make them see that he’s not such a bad guy after all. Of course all this is done in order to work the PCs in a frenzy of hate for him so that they find a way to destroy that Orb he jealously guards at the bottom of his dungeon of Death. Said orb that only Heroes with pure intentions can open.
Then when the trapped Demon gets out and nearly slaughters the PCs, the Bastard arrives shortly after the Demon fled and announces an Heel Face turn. He confesses to his evil manipulative schemes and gives the PCs all the tools needed to destroy the escaped Evil. While they are on the hunt, he gathers up all terrorized kingdoms and creates a ruthless Empire that starts marching on the rest of the world.
When the players return, powerful enough to topple him in 6 seconds, he crumples to the ground, crying for mercy. He explains that he forged this empire to face the arrival of the Mad World-destroying God through the gate that the demon they released, and killed, was guarding.
While the PCs deal with your latest Lovcraftian creation, the Bastard signs a deal with all the Lords of Hell, becomes immortal in exchange for all the souls of the empire and moves to a Condo next to Asmodeus…
And so on…
The trick here is that whenever the players go “that’s it, let’s kill that f….er!”, you need to offer something that the players need more than what killing the NPC is worth. This can be the whereabouts of a lost sibling (kidnapped by the Magnificent Bastard of course), the possible location of a legendary weapon, etc.
This is the perfect occasion to abuse player backstories to the limit. If they start feeling manipulated by that guy from all angles, you’re doing good.
And if you painted him in a corner and he needs to die… have him fall off a cliff. Never let the players have the satisfaction of seeing such a villain die, unless this becomes a defining moment in your campaign (or the players threaten to blow your four tires on the way out).
An effective Magnificent Bastard NPCs is the stuff of legendary evil DMs.
The Bastard Within
Now I’ve tackled the Trope for NPCs. There are also challenges to having a Magnificent Bastard as a PC. Played lazily, it becomes a case of Chaotic Jerk. Played brilliantly by a good story-teller/Psychodramatist, it could be priceless.
Instead of going on for another few pages, I challenge you to come up with tips to play a good, entertaining Magnificent Bastard as a PC… in the comments or your blog.
Yax? Care to take a stab? 😀
Very interesting writeup. I know exactly the NPC to use. He was originally destined to be an annoying rival but inconsequential, but this will be much more fun.
Thanks Phased Weasel. I must confess that I was apprehensive when I started writing this.
The archetype is hard to conceptualize in an unscripted world where a character can always get his gun and blow the bastard’s head because he smirked too much…
I think a key to a Magnificent Bastard in “an unscripted world where a character can always get his gun and blow the bastard’s head” would be to make him a necessary evil.
The first meeting with the NPC would need to establish that this guy is better kept alive. I’m reminded of the Ultimate Badass in Snowcrash who’s heartbeat was tied to a nuke. Kill him, make a big hole…
Once it’s clear that this guy will have to be tolerated, the plot can reveal that everything seemingly revolves around his gain.
…. and because of the “bomb”, the PCs might even have to rescue him once or twice.
Nail, meet PM’s hammer. Bang!
I agree that this is critical. And the escalation of the value of the NPC’s life can become a nice GMing challenge.
Snowcrash’s Bomb example is a great, relatively easy to handle introduction to the trope’s survival in your campaign.
Just change bomb by an Epic-level sealed Evil in a Can and the possibilities are endless.
Most excellent tropolicious goodness.
One of my favorite examples of the Magnificent Bastard was in a Spacejammer campaign I played in last year. He was a thri-kreen pirate with a French accent and a dwarf ninja follower with a speech impediment. Man I hated that guy.
I am missing one of these in my campaign, which conveniently takes place in a major port on a coastal trade route. Yarr!
A word of warning: Be careful when establishing just how challenging the Magnificent Bastard is. I’ve seen a campaign almost self-destruct before my eyes because the players decided he would win No Matter What and turned suicidally nihilistic.
Agreed. I think the Bastard should always be weaker than the combined party. (Bomb non-withstanding)…
If players abandon and decide tolet the bastard win (or are ready to destroy the campaign to kill him), the trope was pushed too far… which is far easier to say than to prevent I agree…
In that case I suggest turning the bastard into and overlord and letting him/her die…
Eh… If you’re really quick witted, when the players decide to kill the Magnificient Bastard, make him ressurect instantly in a new form. His plan all along was to be slain in manner X. Free of his corporeal self, he can now ascend to another plane and do his dirty business there.
But it’s better not to let it get out of hand like this.
The thing is…. it’s a fine line to walk between an interesting NPC for the players (even one they hate) and an Omniscient/Omnipotent DM stand-in ….
In our superhero gaming, The Face would count as a Magnificent Bastard, I guess.
He’s the ammoral leader of the Covert, our version of the MiB organisation which possibly serves the government – though it could be argued that the government serves them 🙂
The Face is so-called because he has none. No eyes, no mouth, no nose, nothing, just a blank expanse of skin which somehow still seems to be staring directly into you. The Face is persuasive, charming and utterly ruthless. Entire towns have vanished on his command if it suited the needs of the Covert, and he always stays one step ahead of the people who stay one step ahead of everyone else.
My players have alternated between hating him completely and had to come crawling to him to clean up their messes 🙂
Good post, CDM. Good post.
I think the best Magnificent Bastards are the ones that are a side plot to the campaign and even, occasionally, help the players out. (Or at least let them get a fair share.)
I have a potential NPC, a goblin merchant that deals in hard-to-sell holy/unholy items. He pays good coin for unholy items and even arranges trades between parties. (Imagine a group of clerics with Demon Armor negotiating for a Holy Avenger from cultists.) He can make the PCs a lot of money, has his fingers on the pulse of the occult underworld, and occasionally pulls off a big con.
He can be the PCs’ enemy, and even betray them a couple times (“just for business, I knew you’d get out just fine”), but he’s also the Man with the Plan (or, at least, the Contacts) for luring out that Elder God cult…
Yay, you moved the anti-spam word above the comment field!
Anyway, I think if a mature party decides they must kill the magnificent bastard, and succeed despite whatever circumstances the NPC has put in place (and choosing to suffer the consequences, etc), then the magnificent bastard has failed, and does not deserve deus ex machina.
…huh?
Phased Weasel – the anti-spam word hasn’t changed places. I haven’t changed any code for it, and I’m pretty sure that ChattyDM doesn’t even know how. 😛
Did you upgrade your browser?
😛 @ Graham…
even if it’s entirely true!
Well, now I’m viewing from home and it appears under the “Submit Comment” instead of above. It must be related to the browser, but both computers are running the newest version of FireFox. Oh well.
Well, it’s your home computer that’s messed up. It should appear above the comment box to everyone at all times.
It’s above for me. Always has been.
Could you check a couple things for me?
1) Exact version of Firefox (latest is 2.0.0.11)
2) Extensions installed
3) If using Greasemonkey, does it look the same with Greasemonkey off?
4) Javascript enabled
I figured it out. I run NoScript to squash ads, annoying flash and possibly exploits. It must killing the script which displays the fields in correct order.
If turning it off fixed it, then there’s your problem.
Good to know, though.
I think the key to the magnificent bastard is to figure out what his motivation is. Somehow he needs to have drastically different – and secret – motives that will lead him to sharing most of the PCs goals.
This should provide a DM with the skewed, twisted vision of the world the bastard has. And yet he should be helpful to, or tolerated by the PCs.
I think you hit a good point Yax in that A well played MB PC needs to have a secret agenda, shared with the DM…
That way the player makes the DM an accomplice to his plans and prevents the ‘I decide, on the spot, to be a Jerk syndrome’
I had a character turn into a magnificent bastard at one point. He was a good-aligned illusionist who discovered the power of shadow magic and attracted the attention of the goddess of shadow. He pretty much knew she was evil, but, if a goddess takes a liking to you, what are you going to do?
He spent more and more time in her realm, saw his values twisted more and more, and eventually worked over the entire party in various ruthless ways. It actually happened such that no one knew the root of their problems was him until the end of the campaign. It was actually pretty entertaining.
Cool story StingRay.
I agree that the Illusionist is a great character class for the MB.
Gankorou, from the Exalted campaign I mentioned earlier, definitely filled the role of “Magnificent Bastard”. Even if their characters loathed him, the players loved him. After their initial confrontation – which was a non-lethal duel made for a bet than a lethal fight – he always appeared friendly and useful and always gave the PCs what they said they wanted, while also making sure that in the process denied them what they truly wanted. Even when they thought they had him under control (and they did, after a fashion), he managed to unnerve them – like causing the Zenith caste to be worshiped as a god, which benefited him mechanically, but disturbed him emotionally as he used to be a Christian missionary…
NPCs who thrive on strong emotions are a lot of fun, and I can only recommend using them.
I’ve been looking your stuff up while you dig your way through my trope archive and I must say I’m impressed at the amount of work you put in your world.
Do sign up on my minion’s page to put a link to your site!