Grade-a-Villain: Dalani Brightsword

[Leliel]

Well, been a long time, hasn't it?

Well, I was replanning my all-lycanthrope game last night, and I realized that the far more monstrous of my two BBEGs, Inquisitor Caelum, needed a second-in-command even more vile than he was. Sure, Caelum is a fanatical, hypocritical, and cruel anti-lycan (a completely unfounded accusation in the campaign-they're more akin to Werewolf: The Forsaken's half-spirits, with morality varying as much as any person), he gets some automatic sympathy (however little) for believing he is completely in the right.

So, to prove by proxy what he is willing to do to eradicate all lycans, I created-with some inspiration-a vice command who happens to be a scary monster without having virally-transfered shapeshifting abilities. I present to you, living proof that no, elves aren't better:

Dr. Dalani Brightsword, aka the Spirit Surgeon

Quotes: "Now now now, we musn't struggle, it will only cut your wrists on the silver...Good girl. Now, let's see what's inside that half-wolf body of yours..."

"Anesthetic? Do I look like a peddler of herbs to you? No, I am a scientist. True scientists work without factors that may corrupt the data."

"My my, how do you carry a pregnancy to term with a uterus that changes species on a regular basis? Perhaps I can squeeze in one more experiement in our time together...?"

Motivations: Desire to Know, Sadism, Pride

Evoked Emotions: Terror, Hatred.


Shivering with tension, you search for exits through sight, smell, and sound, but you don't see anything in the cold, damp cell, the meager light merely showcasing the iron grid of bars, almost taunting you. Here, you are an animal, they say. Here, you are less than human. As it is, your fear is making their pronouncement come true. Most of your higher reasoning has been shut off by creeping panic, your Inner Beast's howls of raw terror shutting off any thought other than I need to get out, I need to get out, I need to get out...

Suddenly, you hear it-the sound of iron-soled boots. Your animal side subsides and hides in panic, as you make for the corner farthest away from the cell door, curling up into a tense ball of fur and fear. Hoping against hope that the guards will not see you, that the Surgeon will forget your "appointment" with him...but they do, and he didn't.

You are strapped to the infamous "Silver Seat", any hope of somehow making yourself comfortable shattered by the combination of rowan and the accursed metal bane brushing against you. Then, the door opens.

In walks a dark-haired, pale-skinned moon elf, his silver eyes flashing with dark glee, his delicate hands clasped together. He looks at you with a strange combination of greed and curiosity, sizing you up. Oh, he speaks in a mockery of small talk, but you don't hear it. At least, not before the scapel cuts into your abdomen.

Regernation does nothing to quell the pain, and in fact, your torturerer deibrately cuts slowly so you can feel the flesh trying to heal around the blade. He parses the wound open so he can observe your innards, and prod them should he find someting intresting-and he always finds something intresting. That's not the worst part. The worst part is that rod he carries with him, the one that makes you do the most degrading acts so he can observe your body's physical abilities, and, you suspect, get a rise from that void he calls his emotions.

Finally, after what seems like weeks, he grows tired of his games, and sends you back to your cell. Nursing the closed but still-hurting wounds, your panic you felt at knowing you were next on his list fades, and the reality of your situation sets in: That you have a snowball's chance in the Hells of ever escaping, that you will never see your family, your pack, or your friends again. You pray for death, but know it won't come for another few months at least-the demonic doctor is very good at his job.

So you curl up, weeping, in the straw-covered space he calls a bed, and try to forget. For once, you have a happy dream, a dream of freedom from this Abyss on Earth. But then you wake up, and you remember that you are now the prisoner and experiment of the depraved Dalani Brightsword, and will be for the rest of you (hopefully short) life.

Rest will come later-until then, how did you like my fiction?

[Debihuman]

Are you trying to evoke terror or pity? He's a surgeon and he's scary, but everything you wrote was about the girl and that evokes pity. If you wrote this from the perspective of the Doctor, it would be more effective--especially if written from a first person perspective rather than second person.

Don't just call him demonic, show him doing demonic things (and obviously he wouldn't think that they are demonic). Does he revel in the blood on his hands or is he just a casual observer? Also, why is getting bored? Does he only have one victim for his cruel experiments and is itching to get more or is he merely impatient to get to the results?

If this were a scenario to rescue the girl it would be effective, but you should showcase the villain and make him the total focus of this intro piece.

What game system is this for and what level?

Debby

[Zom B]

Hmm, I take it Grade-a-Villain is a recurring feature that has fallen into disuse? I might have to make one. Do they normally include combat tactics and stats? I see you have "more to come" and I'm wondering if that is what is to come. Or are these more of villain concepts?

[Leliel]

Are you trying to evoke terror or pity? He's a surgeon and he's scary, but everything you wrote was about the girl and that evokes pity. If you wrote this from the perspective of the Doctor, it would be more effective--especially if written from a first person perspective rather than second person.

Terror. I'm trying to show what his victims go through.

Don't just call him demonic, show him doing demonic things (and obviously he wouldn't think that they are demonic). Does he revel in the blood on his hands or is he just a casual observer?

Er...Didn't you see the part where he cuts slowly to make his current experiments feel the flesh heal around the surgical tools, and he doesn't use anesthetic?

Also, why is getting bored? Does he only have one victim for his cruel experiments and is itching to get more or is he merely impatient to get to the results?

None of the above. He, as noted, has multible "guests", and is eager to get as wide a group of results as possible. Plus, he knows that if he pushes too hard, his victim will die, and that just isn't fun.

If this were a scenario to rescue the girl it would be effective, but you should showcase the villain and make him the total focus of this intro piece.

He is the focus. I call it Slasher Movie Lens.

What game system is this for and what level?

Debby

4E, don't go to work on stats until I have fluff down.

[Miyako]

If you can imagine what else he does, definitely terror.

With humility, you will feel terror; with ignorance you will feel pity.

Your villain isn't very frightening, though, because he's easy to understand. If you really want to make someone sick, treat him like a sex slave breaker.

Kindness and cruelty together, actions that toy with emotions. Or random experiments that just make his conclusions 'interesting'. Have him keep scientific diaries and detailed reports on the most trivial things.

The dimensions of the body, the state of their clothes, the layout of their cell, heart beats per minute, the location of optimum burst for a specialized alchemical flask of silver-flake fire. After infection, how long it takes for suffering to occur. How loudly they complained. What they dream about. How they eat their gruel. How they respond to 'treatment', how they respond to 'kindness'. What their dreams and hopes are. How they received their reward for an animal trick. Whether they are rude or polite.

Play head games, too. 'Just a little longer, and you can go free'.
Pretend to feel remorse, pretend to be a friend, and involve them in the experiments. Teach them things. Watch them constantly sometimes, and then give them privacy. Degrade them, and make them like being degraded by making it pleasurable. Walk them around on a rope with a choker. Smack them if they do something naughty. Yell at them for doing dirty things in the cell (Even though I gather it isn't very hygenic).
Search the cells... periodically, even though there is no risk. Have inmates clean their cells regularly.

And you cannot forget the 'control'. A carefully orchestrated fabrication of life 'outside', within a contained and controlled environment.

Edit
That is the whole point. Do not think of it as 'her', but 'me'. This is the introduction of a player character.

Subject them to a horrible torture, and ask some dumb question like:

'What stupid thing did you do?'

Then write down how they answer. Have the villain insist that they answer.

Given how traumatic this will be, it might be best to have the villain do this to someone the players really like. A family member, a contact, an old employer.

I'm sure you'll figure it out. Evil is horrible, and it will make the Superior Evil seem even more sickening for allowing it to act by proxy; especially when they get to keep their good name while their minion goes unseen.

[Leliel]

OK:

Backstory: Dalani Anassa Brightsword was born to eldarin aristocracy in the capital of the Imperium of Dvannas. From an early age, he showed a precocious intelligence combined with a charm that wooed his tutors and peers. Upon graduating with honors from Dvan City University at age 16, he brought his charisma to the scientific world, and quickly gained a promotion to Sub-Director of the Academy of Alchemistry, and Head of the Biological Department therein. He was, to any outside obsever, an affable, friendly man with a lot of intelligence to back his boyish looks.

If one were to observe his school reports, however, one would paint quite a different picture of the young eldarin. He was often accused of bullying by other students outside of the clique he drew to himself, and small animals kept turning up deceased around him, killed apparently slowly by what appeared to be the tools they used to dissect frogs. Look further, and one would find that the main way he was able to avoid suspicion was, besides his parents' money, charming the headmaster and teachers. If one read one particular journal, one would learn he even resorted to blackmail of a particularly lecherous math tutor, threatening to tell one of his ladyfriends about the others if he told the faculty about forcing the local nerd to write a cheat sheet for him (algebra was always his weakest subject).

And indeed, this photo of a rather frightening child that only grew more so as he aged would be the more accurate, as Dalani is, for lack of a better term, a sociopath. Raised to believe that other people where little more than political tools by his mother and to never accept defeat by his father, Dalani learned very early on that a bright smile and a soothing voice will allow the more atrocious deeds to go unnoticed. Indeed, the knowledge that people trust him, more than anything else, makes him gleeful as any of his "experiments" do.

It was these "experiments" he came to in the latter days of his college years, as he became fascinated by what he calls the "soul problem", the strange way in which the essense of a person's mind and life force is bound to the body. It was small, at first-a little zombie here, a slow exsanguination of a mouse here. By the time he graduated, he had moved on to prostitutes, the homeless-people who wouldn't be missed. Not that he could keep this secret for long, of course-but money and favors, especially when one is dealing with decadence, goes a long way in politics and the covering up of scandals that might reflect poorly. Still, it wasn't a watertight scheme-Dalani was not exactly suprised when then-Cardinal Caelum knocked on his door with two guards flanking him. What did suprise him was the fact that, rather than bonds and a quick jaunt to the local dungeon, pending trial and subsiquent burning at the stake, he was given a job offer.

It seems Caelum's contacts had caught on to Dalani's schemes when he abducted a lycanthrope, intrested in how the "vagrant spirit" or what lycanthropes call the Inner Beast, fit in with his theories of how the bond between body and soul worked. The unfortunate half-beast was found three days later, mutilated, as the good doctor had not perfected his surgical tecniques with shapeshifters yet. Always one to find a possible weapon and ally against the "lycanthropic plauge" when he saw one, Caelum made the mad eldarin an offer-join him in finding effective biological weapons againist lycans, and Dalani would have all the resources he would ever need in his research.

So Dalani joined Caelum's mission, but not for any belief-no, he would find the link between soul and body. And he doesn't care what he has to do to obtain it.

EDIT: I also meant to say that his personality's up next. Until then, grade backstory.

[Velvet Pillow]

Forgive me for saying this but I find the concept of a mad scientist with a genius level IQ and honors in medicine bullying the "local nerd" into copying test answers for him to be... well... absurd... that's jerk jock territory, not depraved genius. All of a sudden an imposing mad doctor has become the boneheaded clique leader my friends in high school always wanted me to beat up.

Not to mention, in the IC blurb, aside from looking at the subject like its an ant and he's a kid with a magnifying glass, and the delibrately painful cutting, this guy doesn't really... well... DO much... There's more to being an evil researcher than just slicing you open slowly and restraining you with your bane. Where are the Lycanthropic Cadaver Golems? Surely he must have at least one Lycanthrope Cadaver Golem... and he no doubt made them himself. And these lycanthropes are all adults. He should have children as control subjects as well.

And you're forgetting that there is more to mad science then just dissection. What would happen if you took a werebear's heart and replaced it with a werewolf's? If you forced a weretiger and a wererat to mate, what would be the result? Can werewolves get ringworms in their transformed state? If so, what happens when they turn back? We should insert a ringworm and see. If they become hungry enough, will Lycanthropes resort to cannibalism? If so, who will they eat first? Will they abandon their obvious charade of civillity and devolve into savage combat for survival? Are their young or elderly fair game? There are so many things you can do here, but you're just overlooking them...

Also, it feels like his ability to stay out of sight seems more like a copout than a boon... Not to mention, if he was truly slippery, why are there records indicating that he's a bad person? If he were truly such a mastermind, such records would've been swiftly purged. He wouldn't be operating alone. He'd have a hand in every watchman or guard's pocket, he'd have eyes all over the city, and the second he hears of someone getting close to finding something they shouldn't... wham, welcome to your new life as a test subject. And establish more on how he maintains this political web. Sure, we have blackmail, but not everyone in the city is going to have skeletons in their closets. What then? Perhaps poison. They don't know what you're giving it to them through, but they know that when they say anything, their steady supply of an antidote is over with. Same goes for if they try to boycott food and drink entirely to make sure you can't poison them. Or have an aforementioned Lycanthropic Cadaver Golem on standby to tear the victims to shreds, making it look like a rabid werewolf attack. The doctor keeps his clean record, and the cardinal gets more fuel for the anti-werewolf propaganda flame. Everyone wins.

Sorry, but I'm just not feeling it. Maybe if I liked werewolves or I was a member of PETA or something, but right now... I'm feeling very underwhelmed by this character.

[Ninmast]

I agree with Velvet. In addition, both of your villains reek of stereotyping. The religiously overzealous and hypocritical high-ranking church figure and the mad scientist. Normally, these can be very good roles, but you are so steeped in the stereotypes that you fail to breathe any life into them, or at least into this "Brightsword." Horrible name for an elven scientist, by the way.

You need to add detail, you need to add depth. I'm sorry, but you are not a horribly nasty genius medical scientist just because you cut slowly and poke at stuff without numbing it first. That's not remotely scientific. Lay off the lame B horror movies and actually look at what scientists do. They operate in the cleanest facilities they can muster (contamination can corrupt data, as he was so fond to tell someone concerning anesthetic), they take notes, they take observations, they study, they theorize, they test, they theorize some more, examining in stages and samples. Your guy isn't a mad medical scientist. He's just a nutter with a sharp knife. The back alleys of Amn are filled to bursting with them.

Also, while Miyako does raise some good points, I would ignore, if I were you, all of his/her sado-masochistic recommendations. Clearly, s/he requires more "personal time," and such tips would only make your character worse, not better.

[Leliel]

I agree with Velvet. In addition, both of your villains reek of stereotyping. The religiously overzealous and hypocritical high-ranking church figure and the mad scientist. Normally, these can be very good roles, but you are so steeped in the stereotypes that you fail to breathe any life into them, or at least into this "Brightsword." Horrible name for an elven scientist, by the way.

Indeed. That's what I was aiming for.

You need to add detail, you need to add depth. I'm sorry, but you are not a horribly nasty genius medical scientist just because you cut slowly and poke at stuff without numbing it first. That's not remotely scientific. Lay off the lame B horror movies and actually look at what scientists do. They operate in the cleanest facilities they can muster (contamination can corrupt data, as he was so fond to tell someone concerning anesthetic), they take notes, they take observations, they study, they theorize, they test, they theorize some more, examining in stages and samples. Your guy isn't a mad medical scientist. He's just a nutter with a sharp knife. The back alleys of Amn are filled to bursting with them.

Aiming for again.

Also, while Miyako does raise some good points, I would ignore, if I were you, all of his/her sado-masochistic recommendations. Clearly, s/he requires more "personal time," and such tips would only make your character worse, not better.

Aiming.

While I don't go over this in the background, the entire point is that for all of his postering, he's not actually a scientist, but really more of a serial killer with pseudo-scientific overtones. Sure, he gets something done-it's why he's still alive and employed after all.

But that's not what he really wants. What he really wants is to puff up his own ego and view of how the world works. He says he has a burning desire to know everything there is to know about the way the soul works, but really, it's a justification for indulging his sick fantasies and power plays.

EDIT: And to Velvet-that's what he does, besides dissection. I just focused on that for the horror angle.

And about the "genius bad at math" part...it happens. A lot. The whole "bullying a nerd" thing just struck me as something a person with no regard for others would do.

[Ninmast]

{Scrubbed}

[Leliel]

No, what I was saying is that, yes, he may be a cliche, but in the grand scheme of things, he's a fairly minor villain.

His personality doesn't drive the plot anywhere. He's mainly a foil for Caelum, to show that yes, he does hate lycanthropes to the point that he employs an inhuman monster who really only cares about his own dominance over others to give himself a small shot at destroying the object of his hate.

And don't think that just because he's a major cliche that he isn't scary.

To put it simply, stop thinking in the third person, and imagine-you know you are being hunted by a man whose experiments are more torture than unethical resarch. He's being supported by one of the most powerful men in a major religion, and let's face it-who is the public going to listen too, a hated minority or a man with an innocent, boyish look to him?

In other words, he's not a high fantasy villain-more like a Gothic one. Not a main villain, mind you, but certainly a good immediate peril.

[Miyako]

Agreed, Leliel-san, we often forget to walk on the ground. Forgive the cruelty that you feel as you read, out of courtesy to us.

We should remember courtesty and its importance. There would have less misery, and perhaps no need to say, 'Sorry, we've been inconsiderate.'

You are welcome, Leliel-san, it was our mutual honour to assist you.

[Ninmast]

{Scrubbed}

[Miyako]

Relax, Ninmast. And tell the cosmos to take it easy. No more Go.

[Ninmast]

{Scrubbed}

[Miyako]

Think about why you're typing. When she reads this, she feels 'Judgement' and 'I am superior' and 'You asked for it!'. How come you're trying to win an argument?

Go is a strategy board game. Do not become mad at the game pieces for wronging you. The supreme bad behavior is the player who places the game pieces on the grid.

To understand, see the world from the tiny perspective of the red or white game piece. Not insignificant or meaningless, just tiny, adorable, and worth protecting.

[Ninmast]

But we are not Go pieces. We are players, and the player submitting this character for review wants to put a big, ugly Go piece on the board in a blind, sloppy attempt to scare off all the other Go pieces.

[Velvet Pillow]

Um... life is not a board game. Life is life. Why are we talking about Go? I think we'd get a lot more places if we talked in a universal language here. In fact, I've got a suggestion. We're on a thread intended mostly for the board game of DnD, so let's talk that. Yeah, that's a good idea, let's talk DnD.

Even if you want this person to be a dumb thug that thinks he's a doctor, there are ways to do that. Think of other serial killers. A prime example would be a certain knife weilding serial killer that may have very well been a doctor, you know, a real one. Jack the Ripper. If you're going to go with a knife sporting serial killer, he's a pretty darn good inspiration piece. And you can still act like a doctor and do more than just dissection. He should have nightmarish medical equipment. Have him carve heads open, all the while holding the subject's head in place with a metal cap with silver needles lined on the inside. Maybe have a "collection" of severed lycanthrope body parts. Look at serial killer characters. The foremost example that comes to me right now is The Butcher from There Will Be Brawl and his trophy room. The Butcher's calling card was leaving his victim's internal organs as the only remaining evidence to their death. (In a particularily grisly example, all of Mewtwo's were packed down into a bloody PokeBall, you can imagine what happened when the police opened it.) Nobody knows what he does with the rest. In the final episode, you see the Trophy Room, in a scene that is pure nightmare fuel, you find every past victim of The Butcher, crudely stitched back together and put on display like trophies of his exploits. Some were even wired up, made to dance about like puppets and spill blood from any open oriface they had, all for The Butcher's amusement. As a certain Triforce-Wielding Bandit King says at this sight, "how can anyone call themself a hero when this sort of evil can roam free?"

THAT is the kind of image you should be giving if you want your characters to be disgusted at the Cardinal's complacency in his subordinate's actions. Lines of eviscerated werewolves haning from rusty hooks like cows in a slaughterhouse makes a much longer lasting image than a couple of bloody scalpels and a silver restraining chair.

[Miyako]

Ninmast-san, let that be a statement of your innocence. You will be held to it. We will make this a brainstorming and constructive improvement thread.

Rows of bodies lined up?
That's so uncultured. He's a skilled genius, a precise gardener who prunes his flowers to save them. Then he enjoys them. Use all your creativity to understand what that communicates.

This meat hook thing has no love and no courtesy. Your example about the butcher was better. Shouldn't this one be tidy?

Down to the smallest detail. Carefully sewn stitches with only the finest thread. Razor-sharp instruments. An offer to write a death poem. All the blood careully siphoned out. People given neat haircuts... surgical procedures with all the correct lines, counting all the equipment after conclusion. Sealing up the body.

Things that take unnecessary effort.

[Velvet Pillow]

You.... you just totally missed my point...

I was merely giving an example on how to provide a greater emotional impact on the characters. Also note that the villain just likes to pretend he's a doctor, and from the looks of things, the only thing he cares about is his own bemusement. Therefore I highly doubt he'd go to such lengths to be so delicate with filthy half-animal corpses. Failed test subjects are just that. Failures.

[Debihuman]

Er...Didn't you see the part where he cuts slowly to make his current experiments feel the flesh heal around the surgical tools, and he doesn't use anesthetic?

I did. But he's totally uninvolved with his surgery. SHE is the one feeling the pain, but you have nothing about how this affects HIM. Also, nobody uses anesthetic in traditional D&D so it doesn't have the impact you were expecting. I suppose I may be jaded from too many horror films in my youth.


. He, as noted, has multiple "guests", and is eager to get as wide a group of results as possible. Plus, he knows that if he pushes too hard, his victim will die, and that just isn't fun.

Okay, then that's what you should showcase. He should be calculating how much pain his victims can withstand before they lose consciousness and how much blood they can lose before they die. You should show him taking perverse joy in this new-found knowledge. Does he care nothing for his victims or he can revel in their pain? Making the focus on the girl (as the audience is placed in her shoes with the use of "you"), detracts from this.

This is what I mean by changing the focus:



She shivered with tension as she searched for exits that I had carefully hidden from her sight. Even though she could not not see anything in the cold dark cell, I had perfect view of her every move and breath. I could all be hear her heart beat.

The meager light merely showcased the iron grid of bars, almost taunting her. I reveled in her fear while noting how her higher reasoning has been shut off by creeping panic. The sound of her Inner Beast's howls of raw terror was music to my ears. I made careful notes calculating how long it took for her voice to rise.

When finally the sound ceased, I made my presence known. The carefully orchestrated sound of sound of iron-soled boots on concrete. They were my own design, created to add a reverberation in the darkness. She hid in the corner farthest away from the cell door, curling up into a tense ball of fur and fear, hoping against hope that I would not see her, or would forget her appointment, but, of course, I knew better...



Debby

[Miyako]

You totally missed mine, we're even! :smallamused:

Characters take on lives of their own. Things will work out once you put the villain into a game and play it.

All the stuff about taking notes after observation, and being a sick pervert, is implied in what he does. Since she feels, and he doesn't care, he is shown to be horrible.

Edits
Cadaver Golems that use lycanthopic traits like shapeshifting and healing, and they get stronger with the moon.

Exploding flasks of various kinds of silvers, like powders, liquids, or shrapnel.

The Doctor slipping into forbidden depths as the game continues, gradually doing different and more perverse things with his creations. Or his experiments. There are some places you simply do not go, such as manipulating the soul directly.

Developing an infatuation with an especially resistant subject, thinking that she 'understands' him.

Trying to communicate with lycanthropes using barks and howls.

Trying to mate them with common animals like dogs, a breeding program. That would require his hands in drugs, anatomy, physiology...

Nice touch: Giving his patient in the chair a 'Werewolf treat' for being a good girl/boy. A candy, a piece of meat, a toothbrush.
Something the Doctor is fastidious about.

'You can be as bloody as you like, but you have to Brush your Teeth!'

[Ninmast]

Miyako, it is very poor form, and results in a lesser-quality final product, when you use the excuse, "Oh, I'm sure it'll flesh out when I actually use the character."

Not only does that mean a lack of planning, but if you just go by what feels handy at the time, your character is either going to drift way off from what you needed or you'll find that you suffer from "Allmycharacters Arethesameitis."

As for your edits, which you put up while I was writing this, the werewolf cadaver golems were Velvet's idea, and I doubt she'll like you writing that up like it was your own. Also, you are showing an increasing favor of pr0n and other such things. D&D is not meant for the purpose of fulfilling your lack of a "love" life. If that's what you get off on, you need to get a real life.

[Velvet Pillow]

No, I got it. You think he'd make a greater mad scienctist type villain if he was disturbingly nice and dedicated to his every action. Make him look like he almost sympathizes with his victims and is killing them as a favour to them. And I, respectfully, disagree.

I really think that Deb is making a good point. Even his background is slanted in the favour of the Lycanthropes, protraying them as sympathetic. Often the best way to fear a killer is to get a glimpse into his mind. Using a slasher film lens is all well and good, but I think that painting a scene from his skewed perspective would be much better. I would definitely find the image of the "patient" wrenched up in agonizing pain all the more unsettling if the narration described it in an ecstatic, excited tone, making it sound like it was a wonderful, beautiful thing. Or, a cold, analytical tone. I want to hear every scientific detail. Detatch yourself from the patient completely. Make the lycanthrope in front of the viewer a statistic, not a life.

[Miyako]

Velvet
It seems a little odd to be able to see into someone's thoughts. From the player perspective, it is what he does to others, the things he leaves behind. A better way to do an outlook from inside... a diary?

It makes him worse if he understands what he is doing. He knows they feel, he knows he is hurting a living being. People with a shred of kindness deny the voice inside that says 'life', lessening the blow by calling it 'statistic'.
Have him make no excuses for what he does.

Statistics are Derived From, not Method (material?) For.

If you want to make it perverse enough to scare you, what if the doctor started turning the patient into a masochist?
Evil that drags good closer to its own nature by doing unpleasant things.

Ninmast
Relax, or someone might get uncomfortable with your strong wording.

[Ninmast]

Miyako, I am, in fact, very calm and not at all tense. If I use a word, it is not because I am concerned with whether or not I might step on a toe, but because I believe it to be the correct word to describe what I need to put a word to at the time. You will find that I'll never lie to someone just to make them feel better. It's not in my nature, and even if it were, it wouldn't be the right thing to do.

And the only one who seems to want any of this to be sexual is you, Miyako. The rest of us have not mentioned anything in favor of it the entire conversation, and I've said repeatedly that it has no place here, that the game should not be an outlet through which to relieve your own perverse sexual tension, and that, were Leliel to include it in this character, it would make the quality of it even worse than it already is.

[Velvet Pillow]

A diary or journal or thesis would be very good. However, I was referring to the introductory post describing the villain. I think that, if it chose to convey the atmosphere of the scene through the eyes of the villain, that it'd spark the desired emotions in the audiance better. Really, in the introductory post, you're given much more freedom with what you can use.

[Miyako]

Velvet
I should reread the two posts, and then summarize some ideas.
The biggest problem with the suggestion of internal character dialogue is that it relies on a perception the characters do not have.
They have their own senses, and the only way to determine how villainous Dalani can be is to show them what he is doing or has done.

That can be accomplished using NPC exchanges (impersonal), NPC to Player interaction, or what he left behind. Given the idea he has about himself, what he leaves behind should have style. That style should probably reflect his medical education.

A way to try your idea out is:

Giving players a detect thoughts ability, and then getting hit with a surge of DISGUSTING PERVERT EVIL!
Or by the dream spell, with the player dreaming 'existence, as through the eyes of the villain'.

But it can be frightening when you don't really know for certain, too. Someone is carving this people up. How did you carve them up like that? What is the point?

He believes in a link between the soul and the body. So he could show that by trying to control the Undead someone else made, using the soul of the departed. Ideally, a soul from an animated corpse whose soul was sold to devils as currency.

A way to make the Cardinal seem even more horrible would be his tolerating Dalani working with a rival faith.
Dalani uses clerics who get a front-row seat to his experiments. When someone dies, he asks the Clerics questions, and insists that they contact the divine on behalf of his research.
That could explain why Dalani might ask his subjects certain questions, if you want to do it that way.

'What spirit do you believe in?'
'What are the funeral rites when you die?'

Dalani gives something to the Clerics he uses, such as something that is dear to the Cardinal's temple.
That would make the Cardinal like more of a double-dealing cheat with no principles. Just like he is supposed to be, ne?
He still has the option to deny knowing Dalani was dealing with the other Church, and the resources to cover it up. The thought that the Cardianl might have known is enough. The revelation that he was lying to everyone the whole time, that he did know, will reveal that the Cardinal is very big scum.

Does the Cardinal pay lip service, or does he really believe?
How does Dalani feel about religion, and what spirit does direct his prayers at?

Ninmast
Is this about me being naughty, or villain building? What does the thread title say?

The Fiction
Soft for the squeamish, not nearly as scary as it could be. He pokes and he prods, and then releases his subject. He really doesn't do anything especially nasty, it just communicates that he is sadistic. Without being creative for myself, that's it.

He could pause, take some notes, ask questions. From the tone of the thread, everyone seems to think you could do better with it. Scrap the whole thing and start over.

Backstory
Plausible.

Revelation
Hehehe! After reading it from the top, she sees that we all ran away with our own ideas. Only Debihuman and Velvet seemed to stay true to the thread title.

[Scarlet Tropix]

Hello. I got tired of watching you do this to yourselves.

Ninmast, you really need to lay off. Giving constructive criticism is one thing, but insulting and flat out dismissing everyone else who speaks is novice debating trick that's wearing very thin.

Believe it or not, some villains do have horrible sexual qualities such as the ones Miyako described. It is, in fact, part of what makes them villains. You seem to be glossing over the fact that horrible people do horrible things. Jack the Ripper's crimes were in fact often overtly sexual, which is part of what makes him so terrifying. Perhaps these qualities are not appropriate in every work, but to say that they will degrade a work without fail makes you sound foolish.

In addition, I have further things to say about one of your more questionable statements.


Miyako, it is very poor form, and results in a lesser-quality final product, when you use the excuse, "Oh, I'm sure it'll flesh out when I actually use the character."

Not only does that mean a lack of planning, but if you just go by what feels handy at the time, your character is either going to drift way off from what you needed or you'll find that you suffer from "Allmycharacters Arethesameitis."

I dislike the way you say 'needed'. A character is not something to reign in from their natural instincts. A character is a life of their own. Sometimes you need to write them over and over until you're talking in their voice. Sometimes they surprise you, sometimes they make decisions that aren't in their best interests. Sometimes, trying a character out is the only way to make them grow. A story where the characters are bent and repressed into a role that isn't really them anymore isn't a story that someone wants to read.

I have nothing to say about the insults except that they were uncalled for, just as your tone and open rancor is uncalled for.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think that this character is everything it can be. It's very rare that something is. And sometimes, it doesn't need to be. D&D is at heart a game, and this is only as important as the DM makes it. However, and I say this as respectfully as I can, if all you're going to do is snipe and bark about acceptable character frameworks, please don't bother.

Edit:
I should probably actually talk about this villain, huh.
Real personality, regardless of intent, comes through context. How do you intend to introduce this villain? What sorts of quests/situations will he be involved with?

[Ninmast]

{Scrubbed}

[Leliel]

Bumping so I don't forget.