As has already been mentioned, there's a common theme throughout fiction that gets brought forward into the limelight in certain genres (heist, noir in general, etc.):
Smart criminals don't advertise. Most of the time, you only catch the dumb ones.
Substitute "villains" for "criminals" and you have the fundamental problem with "bad guy RP," which is that the overt ones don't last long and the covert ones don't get noticed. This is further compounded by hero types outnumbering villain types, which only incentivizes more caution and discretion on the villain's part. This is even FURTHER compounded by competing interests in conflict resolution, and that gets more complicated in an open setting compared to a private one.
Sadly, villains in FFXIV RP work best as one-shots or as central figures in a private storyline with a DM a la pen-and-paper gaming. That's not to say that a villain in an open setting doesn't work. It just takes a lot more effort (planning, communication, inevitable drama, and so on). A lot of that is owed to the gravity placed upon criminal or morally reprehensible activities in XIV's RP scene. There's an appreciation for the significance and "weightiness" of murder, for instance, that parallels and is most likely drawn from attitudes on display in FFXIV's Main Story Quests.
Smart criminals don't advertise. Most of the time, you only catch the dumb ones.
Substitute "villains" for "criminals" and you have the fundamental problem with "bad guy RP," which is that the overt ones don't last long and the covert ones don't get noticed. This is further compounded by hero types outnumbering villain types, which only incentivizes more caution and discretion on the villain's part. This is even FURTHER compounded by competing interests in conflict resolution, and that gets more complicated in an open setting compared to a private one.
Sadly, villains in FFXIV RP work best as one-shots or as central figures in a private storyline with a DM a la pen-and-paper gaming. That's not to say that a villain in an open setting doesn't work. It just takes a lot more effort (planning, communication, inevitable drama, and so on). A lot of that is owed to the gravity placed upon criminal or morally reprehensible activities in XIV's RP scene. There's an appreciation for the significance and "weightiness" of murder, for instance, that parallels and is most likely drawn from attitudes on display in FFXIV's Main Story Quests.
![[Image: 1qVSsTp.png]](http://i.imgur.com/1qVSsTp.png)
