So I have a question Veeky Forums

So I have a question Veeky Forums

How do you guys pull off recurring villains? Like not overpowered guys who show up, beat up the party, then teleport away. Guys who the party should have a reasonable chance to defeat (and at times may have to) but at the same time he could show up again later?

In a lot of cases it just seems like the guy would die before the recurring part every kicks off. Either by accident (well he was going to surrender at half health but, well, that critical hit really did a number), design (Well he was going to run away but the party made plans to prevent that), or simple ruthlessness/pragmatism (well the party is good-ish but at the same time they realize now that this guy will continue to harass them so they decide to make sure he doesn't leave this castle).

I can't think of many ways to reliably keep one alive that aren't pumping them up to obscene levels or simple asspulls. At the same time when the party DOES figure out a way to kill him I don't want to take that away from them.

Recurring villains usually work for a higher villain down the road, so have that villain see them as too valuable to let the recurring villain die and gives him either trinkets to aid in escaping or fake his death- or revives that person if the party kills him.

If this is a setting where they can't do that or there is no higher villain they serve then Doom bot it.

Either have them act at a distance (though messengers, recordings, etc) or don't tag them as The Big Bad.

If he winds up in the same room as the party, you'll have to be ok with your precious plot going off the rails. If you think about it, it makes sense right? Why would you personally seek out your own assassins unless you wanted to set up a dumb video game cut scene?

You can also just not have a BBEG...
>the enemy is the leadership of a whole church, or a band of several individuals working together
or
>only flesh out an enemy *after* he survives contact with the PCs.
>if he survives a second encounter, level him up and make him a major villain
>if he survives a third time, he becomes essential to whatever overarching badness the players are pursuing

For example, an enemy lieutenant who levels up to be an important lackey of the organization, and then later maneuvers to become the manager of (constructing the doomsday weapon or whatever).

This guy isn't actually a BBEG, and actually yes the enemy IS the leadership of a whole church.

This guy is more of a non-friendly rival to the party, like you said a guy who will go up in ranks as the party becomes a bigger threat.

And again if plans fail and he DOES get killed its not a huge deal, its an organization and this guy can be replaced, its just I kind of want the dynamic of him being a constant thorn.

>I kind of want the dynamic of him being a constant thorn.

Let go of that idea. Let it happen, or not. You're trying to force a linear story thing into an interactive medium.

If the players assassinate the head of a powerful church, whoever takes his place will want them dead.

And remember that the leader of an organization doesn't have to be the most powerful member at any given time (ie, the president of the united states isn't the smartest person in the country, or the most cunning general).

>In a lot of cases it just seems like the guy would die before the recurring part every kicks off.
Yes. This is why you can't PLAN for a villain to be recurring. It has to be something that forms naturally when an enemy manages to escape somehow when things go bad for him.

You can't just say "Ok, this is Jim. He's going to be the recurring antagonist for this game, so he'll show up once every 3 levels for the party to fight him.", because that means that;

A.) You will need to Deus Ex or GM fiat him out of dying at the end of every encounter

B.) Undermine the player's ability to use creativity, cleverness, or just luck of good dice rolls to manage to take him down

C.) Make the players hate you because you intentionally cock-block them when they should have the guy dead-to-rights.

A recurring villain isn't made when you plan for someone to be a fixture in the story. That's shit writing. A recurring villain is made when the players fight their hardest to bring down a bad guy, and through actual gameplay, he escapes FAIRLY. I creates tension and rivalry.

Don't force it. Enemies should generally always TRY and escape when they know they're gonna die. When one of them succeeds, that's when you write them into the rest of the story.

Give him areas to fight in where he can escape really easily
>Fight in a rampaging river so he can just jump into the river if he's near crit or half health that way he can just throw himself in the river.
>Fight in a castle with a ton of chandeliers so he can just cut a rope and let the chandelier drop to boost himself up to the top floor
>Fight in a place with huge drops into darkness that he can just jump into
I mean just give him a bunch of obvious escape routes and let him avoid being surrounded
Or just go the Seifer root and let him do stupid shit

Make the players not want to kill him by making him either funny or interesting in some way.

This isn't hard.

Clones, duplicates, or something that let's them fight without being present, like remote controlled robots

Gary

...

Gary?

Honestly, for recurring villains to work your party needs to buy into the theme and the idea of it. Even if it isn't 'realistic' for the bad guy to get away, if you get them on the same page and make sure your intent is clear, if they're not dicks they should go along with it.

Of course, this works better in systems with narrative currencies and such. I recall Mutants and Masterminds having a 'The villain gets away, everyone gains a hero point' thing for a GM to make use of.

Gaaaaaaarrry.

My campaigns reoccurring villian was originally some mook that ending up being the last person standing on the ship the PCs were taking and jumped over board.

Then he tries to gank them in an alley with a few buddies but ended up getting stabbed and almost bleeding to death before stabilizing.

Fast forward 2 years and he's 11th level and still trying to kill them Saturday morning style villian

With reasonable chance to defeat them?

Minions. At the crucial point of the fight, villain's trusted lieutenants decide to valiantly cover for their boss' escape

The place is going down. There's no time to deal with him/the debris, explosion or the cave-in separate all involved in the fight

If my campaign ever makes it to a high enough level, I plan to introduce a lich as a recurring villain. They're basically impossible to kill permanently (a lich wouldn't hide his phylactery somewhere that PCs would ever find it), but most campaigns don't make it to a level where using one would be feasible. I suppose a vampire could also work, as they go into gaseous form and escape after losing in combat.

Don't try to make one guy do everything. You don't need a single character be the final boss *and* the mastermind *and* deliver exposition *and* do his own kneebreaking *and* be in every post-dungeon cutscene *and* come over for steaks on Thursdays *and* cover healing duties when the Cleric is out of town.

Break it down. Turn one guy into a conspiracy:

STR: The best individual combatant in the conspiracy. Takes the party on directly. When one dies replace him with another.

Dex: The director of criminal activities. Hits and runs. Be a thorn in the players side until she's killed/stopped but then do not replace.

Con: The General. Surround with a swarm of foot soldiers/minions. The planned battle. If you replace, make the replacement weaker each time.

Int: The mastermind. Keep offscreen as long as possible. Killing or arresting them is the only thing that ends the conspiracy entriely.

Wis: The institutional corrupter. Secretly working for the Mastermind using their high position in a church/school/police force/military. Revealing them is worth a boon, vulnerable to counter-blackmail

Cha: The gadfly, the king's idiot nephew who can't be openly splatted but can be outmaneuvered and publicly disgraced.

That basic framework goes a long way towards building an engaging opposition without resorting to having to plot armor one guy trying to do all the jobs at once. Change it up as much as you need, drop anything that doesn't work for your group, refocus when needed.

Each time he dies, the big bad resurrects him.

Then the party will want to start taking steps to make him more difficult to resurrect - i.e, they might burn the body.

He is raised again, but this time he's a charred corse of a man who has some kind of fire abilities, rinse and repeat until he's literally just ash or disintegrated

>You don't need a single character be the final boss *and* the mastermind *and* deliver exposition *and* do his own kneebreaking *and* be in every post-dungeon cutscene *and* come over for steaks on Thursdays *and* cover healing duties when the Cleric is out of town.
I do now, that sounds hilarious.

The mention here of a Two-Stage Campaign might be of use. Just downgrade BBEG to a regular thorn and you're set.

In my group, recurring enemies are never intentional. They usually start as a second-in-command or some other product of the BBEG's delegation that the players happen to get into hot water with. Enough scrapes and enough close calls and eventually something's gotta give.

Don't focus on forcing a recurring villain, and don't focus on keeping them around if they start stirring the pot. It's easier to not overthink these things. There can always be another bad guy, and it's really satisfying for players to get to deal with these kinds of villains instead of playing Final Fantasy cutscene goose chases.

Maybe next time I'll even remember the image.