Evil Campaign

[Ariel Hapzid]

My friend wants help with building a world where everyone is evil.

An Overdeity named Bhalla decided to take all the evil creatures of the world and put them into their own society. Just to see what would happen.

So far, the playable races are

Doppelganger
Drow
Minotaur
Orc
Gnoll
Human
Tiefling
possibly Undead
We have a few ideas, like a society of demon worshipers, who's demon lives in their city. Anarchists. Masters of Industry, burning entire forests to feed their furnaces. And a society where the living serves as the cattle for the undead.

We're thinking of a Might makes Right kind of world. Like the War of the Spider Queen novels.

The players may all be evil, but ultimately, they want to work together. For now.

[Superfluous Crow]

As an experimental setting, it could be quite interesting. What kind of help?

[Kindling]

Where EVERYONE is evil... I'm guessing you mean small-e evil, not capital-E Evil...

EDIT: And how are Anarchists inherently evil? Or did you not mean to imply that?

[Pair o' Dice Lost]

EDIT: And how are Anarchists inherently evil? Or did you not mean to imply that?

Well, masters of industry aren't inherently evil, but when they kill entire forests for the heck of it as he mentioned, they could be considered evil.  I'm guessing he doesn't mean "anti-government" anarchists, but "Chaotic Stupid player with a staff of meteor swarm and homicidal tendencies" anarchists.

[Ariel Hapzid]

exactly on the last note about Anarchists. I guess I just wanted a better name for them then Barbarians. And this is Capital E Evil. We want the players to be able to really go at it. It'd probably be a mature style game. Mainly we want to know, if you were playing, what would you like to see? when it comes to cities, NPCs, the level of evil-ness (1 being ooh you can't trust anyone 10 being Book of Vile Darkness evil)

[Kindling]

Well, I think that for it to maintain any sense of realism, the majority of the population would have to be at the lower end of the scale. If every tom, dick and harry was Vile Darknessing it up 24/7 it would seem totally overblown.

I think the way to do it is have the general populace be quite unpleasant, paranoid and xenophobic people, but not over-the-toply evil. They just wont be nice to the PCs at all. But then, the people in power, your average aristocrats, priests, viziers, warlords, chieftains, et cetera should all be nearing the upper end, of the scale.

Sort of a pyramid of evil, with those at the higher end of the social strata being more and more vile - Because, they're the ones with the power and influence to do the truly unspeakable.

[Pellanor]

I think that the Anarchist Society is one in which there are no rules, and everybody is more than willing to kill you if they think they won't lose anything from doing so. However I can't imagine an entirely anarchistic society, especially n a fantasy setting where single characters can become powerful enough to destroy nations. In this case we would end up with the toughest characters rising to the top and making their own laws. Which could get interesting if one decrees that he'll kill anybody wearing white, and the other declares he'll kill anybody not wearing white.

I put together an evil society once that I thought was quite interesting. This nation put a huge emphasis on war, and was continually fighting its neighbours. It had the military might to crush them, but instead stayed mostly on the defencive in order to prolong the war and keep its people focused on the foe from without. They would take captives from the war, and use them for forced labour. In addition the punishment for breaking most laws was a forced labour sentence. They had enough of a slave work force to provide the basic necessities for the rest of the nation, so the citizen were free to spend their time however those chose, though those enlisted in the army or who became master artisans (armour smiths, civil engineers, etc...) were further rewarded. All none citizens were looked down on.
I had a lot of fun putting together a list of crimes and punishments for these guys :)

[Ariel Hapzid]

I like both those last posts. The Pyramid of evil is very smart. For most of the societies thats what we want, dirty rotten people. That should be the bulk of the country. At the top are the really powerful, really evil people. Might Makes Right kind of thing.

Your society of the nation focusing on war is an awesome idea. What I would like to do with it is make it a little into 1984. Everyone is focused on the war between three countries. And sometimes two countries will gang up on the other, only to have the other gang up with the other on the other. So caught in an eternal stalemate. Like Sparta with all the goodness squeezed out of them. Maybe we'd have three major Human societies.

The first is our strongly military country. Everyone serves, one way or the other. Like the Imperial Guardsmen from Warhammer 40k but in a fantasy setting.

The Second is strongly Magical, this would be the Human and Tiefling society, brought on from centuries of consorting with Demons and Devils.

The Third is our Theocracy. The worst aspects of organized religion (Hunting for heretics, inquisitors, human sacrifices, necromancy, intolerance) are all represented here.  

Now, I know this will be sort of a caricature rather than truly realistic, but I can accept that.  

[Pair o' Dice Lost]

The first is our strongly military country. Everyone serves, one way or the other. Like the Imperial Guardsmen from Warhammer 40k but in a fantasy setting.

The Second is strongly Magical, this would be the Human and Tiefling society, brought on from centuries of consorting with Demons and Devils.

The Third is our Theocracy. The worst aspects of organized religion (Hunting for heretics, inquisitors, human sacrifices, necromancy, intolerance) are all represented here.

Idea: mix and match them.  Why limit them to "the martial country," "the arcane country," and "the divine country" when you can have martial + arcane, arcane + divine, and divine + martial?

1) Arcane + Martial nation.  Everyone has some degree of magical power, all blasty magic, and everyone's really violent.  Think the Sith--someone ticks you off, choke them to death or blow their head off with a lightning bolt.

2) Divine + Martial nation.  Paladins and inquisitors galore.  Take the usual "detect -> smite" paladin and reverse it--UA paladins of slaughter and tyranny, plus some blackguards, are all over the place and will torture citizens for hours at the slightest perceived goodness ("You helped a little old lady cross the street!  Torture the heretic!").  Mystic theurges will play inquisitor for a few hours, kill the victim, and play necromancer with the corpse.

3) Arcane + Divine nation.  Consorting with demons and devils and Cthulhu-esque aberrations...sometimes literally.  Leaders spend the night with succubi and incubi (sometimes both), summon imps to harass beggars and children, open portals to the Abyss to let demons destroy the landscape, etc.

Less of a caricature, but the same kind of "unremitting evil" result.

[Ariel Hapzid]

That's exactly what I was thinking! HERETIC!!! HE READS MINDS!!!

[Nomadic]

Perhaps they are all at war because they consider the other heretics for using arcane+divine/arcane+martial/divine+martial...

Ensures unending war, and also adds beautiful irony in that they all are not all that different from each other.

[Ariel Hapzid]

That's perfect! Nomadic you psychic, you stole the thought from my brain just as I began to type it. Adara, our Divine+Martial country worship Camnod, the Lord of Blood, Slaughter, Total War, and destruction. They are the ones with Inquisitors and paladins who hunt down Magic Users. Camnod hates all Wizards, Warlocks, and Clerics who do not owe fealty to him and they are hunted down and purged.

[Ariel Hapzid]

The three Human societies are:

-Kiva, a nation of Wizards and Warlocks. They spend all their time creating new and mysterious magics to throw at their enemies. They are usually accepting of other races as long as it benefits them "Knowledge is power, protect it at all costs!"

-Adara, a nation of Warriors and Zealots. They worship Camnod, an unforgiving deity who requires only total domination and subjugation of all. Adara is well known for its slave trade. They zealously hunt and murder races seen as alien to them (anyone not human). Do not ask "Why we want Kiva and Korriban dead?" Rather ask "Why not?"

-Korriban, a nation of Clerics and Warlocks. These foul and disturbing people delve deeply into the lore of the Abyss and Hell. They sell their souls to eternal damnation for power. Korriban has a large population of Tieflings.  War is cruelty. There is no use trying to reform it. The crueler it is the sooner it is over."  

[Ninja D!]

You say Adara want Adara dead in italics.

[Ariel Hapzid]

-The Severed Hand, is the loose organization (not so much a country) of orcs. Every Orc swears an oath of fealty to Uglakh, a demon prince trapped on the material realm. He is powerful and drives the orcs to destroy and consume everything in sight. Orcs are one of the few reasons the human realms ever stop trying to destroy one another.  "Za shum ushatar Uglakh." -All should fear Uglakh.

As a side note, these Orcs are based upon the Orcs from Warhammer and Warhammer 40k with a fusion of Tolkien Orcs. The goal is to allow players to be the insane destruction driven monsters they've dreamed of being.