I don't know what it says about me as a person, but I love playing evil characters. While the good guys fight over how to maintain their humanity on their adventures, agonizing over whether or not what has to be done is the right thing to do, evil characters tend to know exactly what they want and will act on that without remorse or second thought. On top of that, they give a lot more room to explore why a certain character is their alignment; if you ask a good character "why are you good?" they'll give you a look and say "because I am?" Ask an evil character the same question, and their response will probably be more interesting and less existentially dreadful.
I suddenly have the urge to have one of my characters ask another "why are you good" in a future game. I want to see the player's face when they try to process that. How dreadfully exciting.
You know who doesn't seem to like evil player characters? DMs. Do I blame them? Not really. However, the reason most DMs (especially newer ones) might give you a weird look for proposing an evil protagonist to hang out with a bunch of not evil protagonists is this: most people forget that there's a difference between "evil" and "potentially antagonistic." For anyone who ever wanted to know what it's like to be the bad good guy, I'd like to introduce you to three of my characters: Delo, Heracle, and Avery. Two of these characters are evil, one is good. Two of these characters are potentially antagonistic, and it's not the two you think.
Let's start with Delo, a lawful evil cleric. He's exactly what you and your DM think an evil character is: potentially antagonistic (spoiler alert: he was, in fact, antagonistic), uninterested in the party's needs and goals, and an overall bad person. He believed that adventurers were a fundamental plague on society and deserved extermination. The biggest thing that stood in his way was Quilad, a second soul that inhabited his body (when one died, the other naturally resurrected). Quilad believed adventurers were worthy of love and protection, something she worked hard to show the world when she was the active soul. Delo teamed up with an existing party, got close to them, then held their bard and other cleric hostage to get his hands on a crucial piece of information for his plans.
How did Delo wind up in this party? If you guessed Quilad, you get a cookie. Quilad joined the group, died, and came back as Delo, who pretended to be Quilad until his chance came to get what he wanted before leaving them to die (which was especially rough on the bard in the party, who just so happened to be Quilad's boyfriend). The "leaving them" part is probably the most important part. Playing a character like this will more often than not be temporary. This was great for me, someone who had to temporarily leave the table, but not so good long-term. Once a character reveals themself to be an antagonistic force, they'll either have to leave or be killed; their "friends" probably won't keep them around. You might give your DM a good villain to bring back later, but most of your time playing this kind of character will involve pretending to be good while waiting to strike.
Heracle, on the other hand, is not potentially antagonistic. This chaotic evil and barbaric druid worshipper of Baphomet is happily friends with a group of adventurers hellbent on eliminating the corrupt government tormenting their realm. The rest of the party wants this to free the people, but Heracle wants this because she believes that civilization should fall and the world should be wild and natural once more, as does Baphomet. While this disagreement has caused a few issues, Heracle and her fellow adventurers are all genuine friends who share a common goal. No one cares that she's evil, as she's also an ally.
This is my recommended approach to playing an evil character. It's not always easy, but it's extremely fun. Your evil character doesn't have to be as friendly with their peers as Heracle is to work, though. The entire party can be paranoid about where you truly stand with them, but as long as this doesn't result in a massive battle or your character getting ousted, who cares? The reason for being friendly can also be just about anything: shared goals, convenience, contractual obligation, and more. Just make sure none of the other characters in the party are so self-righteous that they would feel the need to change or kill you.
Speaking of self-righteous, let's talk about Avery. Avery is a lawful good order cleric.
And she's potentially antagonistic.
Avery differs from Delo by the fact that she doesn't have to pretend to be a good person. Avery believes that true world peace is entirely possible, and that everyone is capable of seeing the world the way she does, even if their past isn't perfect. However, her morals are relatively strict, and they come with a caveat: those who have already sinned and refuse to even try walking her path are a disease that will sicken her peaceful future. This disease is the one thing Avery believes will justify taking a life. Avery's party sees her as naive but inspirational. What they don't know yet is that, if one of them breaks one of her tenants and refuses to see it as a problem, they're dead where they stand.
I'm incredibly fortunate that my DM for Avery let me play her, because she, a potentially antagonistic character, may cause some problems down the line, and she might not go away as easily as Delo did. Fighting Avery will wind up with at least one person dead, likely including Avery herself.
These three characters are examples of an evil and potentially villainous character, an evil ally, and a good but potentially villainous character. Most of the time, these characters will involve a friend becoming an enemy followed by figuring out what to do about that. As mentioned earlier, the two most common options are banishment and death, but they are not the only options. Your evil and/or antagonistic character can be redeemed, used as a double agent, and just about anything else the party would otherwise do to an evil and/or antagonistic NPC. The only difference is that the voice behind that character is exclusively behind them.
Unless both you and your DM are really confident, I'd stay away from potentially antagonistic characters. They can cause a lot of infighting, which might be hard to say what anger is directed at a character versus at a player. Additionally, they might only be able to stick around temporarily. Evil characters, however, are both fun and freeing. I recommend having a good bit of charisma or similar stats at your disposal though, and probably not much else in terms of mental stats. Deception skills will be your friend regardless of what path you take, and if you yourself are clever enough, no one in the party will think to check if you're lying to them.
Just don't scare your table too much.
By guest contributor Bex Saper, President of RPI DND Club
