(05-24-2015, 12:17 PM)Emberhair Wrote: In life, there are no truly good people with hearts of purest snow. Furthermore there are no truly evil people with lumps of iron for their heart, sitting in a black ribcage of Dark Lord despair.
But there ARE dicks.Â
Rather than being a noble hero or mr nice guy, i wanted to try and RP a truly unpleasant person. I have been VERY careful about this, and given my RP character a lot of thought. He is arrogant, vain, stubborn but also a coward. However it all comes from a story based place as to why he's like that. He is never a troll or intimidating beyond the realms of RP and he ALWAYS buckles when threatened so the other roleplayer is in the power position in the confrontation. That way, the player behind the character never feels threatened IRL.
Needless to say, my RPs are confrontational when i RP with this particular character. It never EVER spills out into OOC but i find it limits what i can do with RP as obviously, no ones character wants to hang out with mine (and why would they? He's an arse.)Â
LONG STORY SHORT: Has anyone else here ever roleplayed the bad guy, and what issues or successes have you found roleplaying this particular type of character?
I've been on both sides of the conflict, both as a good guy staring down the foe and the villain trying to get the upper hand. I think the confrontations should be considered with give and take. The good guys can't always win, yet neither can the bad. I think it's good that you've been very careful about it. I echo the sentiment. My villain, Melfice, is meant to be very powerful. Yet, because I acknowledge that not everyone may like that kind of confrontation, I generally avoid large crowds with him or keep him away/out of conflict unless the person knows what they're getting into. Even still, I allow people to get the upper hand should they find a way to do so. I'm not against it at all!
It does tend to limit your RP unless you manage to make the character social. Melfice, for example, hates interacting with people but he does so if he feels the need and finds it to be worth his time. He is arrogant and condescending to those he finds intellectually inferior to him, which includes most people. Many don't like to interact with him because of his overall personality, but others do because they find it intriguing.
I try to position my villain as an accessory to other people's plots rather than a main character for my own. With this in mind, I think it helps for me to assist others and provide the machinations for whatever plot or goal they have. Melfice doesn't kill or cause harm because he wants to, but because he has to in order to further his own goals, whatever they may be. Sometimes he helps the heroes/good guys, sometimes he's against them, and sometimes he does things because he's curious and wishes to see what kind of reaction it will garnish from someone or because he believes they stand to learn something from the hardship. It's left for some very entertaining RP and I think people that interact with him tend to enjoy him and never quite know what he'll do, which is all the fun for me!
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