Howdy folks.
A friend of mine has been itching to play some DnD and I drew the short straw to run it. I don’t think we have time for more than a one shot so I come for ideas.
Normally I’m good with coming up with stuff but she wants to do something where they get to play as evil instead of your typical heroes. My problem is everything I come up with just feels like typical hero quest but called evil. Like “kidnap the princess” just feels like a re-skin of “rescue the princess”. Hoping y’all have something more to get me thinking.
I am aware of the Critical Role Mordor one shot that I’ll take some inspiration from.
Thanks in advance y’all
The king doesn’t give a fig what’s going on in the kingdom as long as he’s got his ale and whores. He does not like when politics interfere with his revels and he can be rather brutal when it happens. The prince, an adult, has a pretty free hand but wants to avoid pissing off his overbearing father. The party is a small group of the princes drinking companions that the prince sometimes pays to solve his problems that threaten to rise to the level of annoying the king.
The prince has lately been cavorting in some of the villages and claiming the right of prima nocta in his father’s name. A group of villagers has decided to put an end to it. They’ve started ambushing patrols and maybe even made an attempt to capture the prince himself. The party needs to find and eliminate these trouble makers before his father finds out.
This would be suitable for a low level party. If the players are higher level, switch it to the villagers having pooled their money and hired some adventurers of a suitable to take out the prince.
Here’s a podcast where they ran a one shot where they were evil characters who were all sentenced to death, but if they survived the dungeon, they would be spared. Plot Points: Evil PCs Play Basic D&D
What kind of evil?
Power fantasy of abuse and subjugation?
Have them play vampires or demons. Awaken from their slumber in a small town and go about setting up a cult and securing their safety. Make thralls out of people. Add some sort of mechanic like “eating someone’s soul gives you a stat boost” so mechanically they’re rewarded for cruelty. Have NPCs beg for their life. Have some sell out their neighbors and loved ones for favor. Let the players kill them anyway.
Maybe some heroes show up to fight them and free the people. Maybe it’s just two hours of crushing limited resistance and making their temple.
How about a “Suicide Squad” like run. The players can create all kinds of evil prisoners that get send to kill a thing that all the heros already failed to defeat. Now they can try do to what they are told to in exchange for their freedom or whatever or try to run away and and not risk their own life’s on the way.
A lot of chances to play evil or even reconsider when the little orphan begs for help.