You've got your Gray Maidens in full-face helmets? That's literally the first entry on
Copyright 1996-1997 by Peter Anspach. If you enjoy it, feel free to pass it along or post it anywhere, provided that (1) it is not altered in any way, and (2) this copyright notice is attached.
Being an Evil Overlord seems to be a good career choice. It pays well, there are all sorts of perks and you can set your own hours. However every Evil Overlord I've read about in books or seen in movies invariably gets overthrown and destroyed in the end. I've noticed that no matter whether they are barbarian lords, deranged wizards, mad scientists or alien invaders, they always seem to make the same basic mistakes every single time. With that in mind, allow me to present...
The Top 100 Things I'd Do
If I Ever Became An Evil Overlord1. My Legions of Terror will have helmets with clear plexiglass visors, not face-concealing ones.
It's not below the fold.
I've read any number of books with Evil Overlords in them, and they a) aren't usually overthrown and destroyed in the end, what the Abyss, how do people from your planet make it through the weekend without ugly crying, unless it's that none of you read? and b) when they are overthrown it's not because the have their soldiers wearing helmets.
That's a pretty cool justification in-universe for why you're going to make mistakes that anyone familiar with Earth literature wouldn't.
Picture it:
Most of the heroes are trapped in a cell, when the door opens and a guard wearing a face-concealing helmet enters.
They prepare for a fight. The guard takes off his/her helmet — and reveals that it's one of their allies.
From "TV Tropes: Dressing As The Enemy."
Also, the audience - that's me, and the other three - are, despite themselves, more sympathetic towards people with distinguishing characteristics.
Weird but true.
Equipping every Maiden with a permanently Invisible Helm would nearly double the cost of their armor.
Is it better than making their full plate +1? Because she wouldn't - couldn't - shouldn't - pay for everyone to have +1 armor.
Just ditch the helmets entirely - it's not like wearing one changes your AC.
...But if it ever had we wouldn't be having this conversation.
I don't feel equipped to argue against anthropic arguments, but I'm telling you, you don't want all-concealing uniforms.
Inadvisable yet irreplaceable visors do discretely hide Ileosa's fumbling handicraft, though.
She doesn't mutilate faces to hear every John, Jane, and Art Critic voice their asinine opinion.
Although, faces aren't the only uniquely identifying part of a man or woman.
Caaaaaaaaaaaaaarl, you could cool it with the face-carving thing.
I do take your advice seriously, you know.
I'll... think on the helmets.
What comes second on the Evil Overlord List?
3. My noble half-brother whose throne I usurped will be killed, not kept anonymously imprisoned in a forgotten cell of my dungeon.
Hah!
It seems that Earth's books aren't so different, after all. Don't worry, Ileosa's not going to make that mistake.
Number four?
You've got me between a rock and a hard place, because on the one hand, I'm realizing that I should feed you false information, and on the other, I'm sworn not to alter the list...
Aww, don't be like that, Choryon.
I wouldn't feed you false information.
You would and you have.
(At least, within the context of this omake-continuity where we've been playing Curse of the Crimson Throne. If you have in the main continuity, I don't know - but then, I wouldn't.)
Okay, but within the context of this omake-continuity you're probably, like, charmed and suggested and maybe dominated and/or geased unless I'm not a high enough level for that yet.
I wasn't imagining that you were a high enough level for that yet.
I'm always imagining that I'm a high enough level for that yet.
It wouldn't jibe with how we implied earlier that you only recently founded the Gray Maidens.
Why can't we live in this world where I have fifth-circle spells, just for a little while. Don't you think I deserve it?
No, I don't think that you deserve the power to rule minds nonconsensually.
I don't think you've done anything to deserve what it would do to you.
I get enough of this from Glorio in the main continuity.
What's number four?
One-Armed Man: I've been looking for you for eight months. Whenever I should have had a gun in my right hand, I thought of you. Now I find you in exactly the position that suits me. I had lots of time to learn to shoot with my left.
[Tuco kills him with the gun he has hidden in the foam of his bubble bath]
Tuco: When you have to shoot, shoot. Don't talk.Villains frequently find themselves in conundrums that could easily be solved by finding the right person and putting a bullet in the offender's head. But for whatever reason, some villains continue to refrain from taking the pragmatic approach and won't put said bullet in said offender's head.
There may or may not be some Watsonian/in-story justification for this failure to take the direct approach. However, the Doylist/real-life explanation can always boil down to "because if he did just shoot him, the story would be much shorter and the bad guys would win."
From "TV Tropes: Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?"
This doesn't change that sometimes a clean death is too good for someone.
Hey, 'Leosa, remember what happened when you tried to publicly execute Trinia Sabor?
Oh, and I've read that they changed what happened with Marcus Endrin in the remaster, I don't know the particulars but I'm guessing that since Paizo loves to see you succeed any changes they made are sure to go your way.
Suppose that she takes Item Number Four under (grudging) advisement.
What's number five?
5. The artifact which is the source of my power will not be kept on the Mountain of Despair beyond the River of Fire guarded by the Dragons of Eternity. It will be in my safe-deposit box. The same applies to the object which is my one weakness.
In that case it might be unavoidable.
What about the item which is your one weakness?
Within the grim fastness of haunted Scarwall, where the lifeless legions of the ancient warlord Kazavon guard the same accursed halls they've stalked for more than 700 years. To find it you'd have to cross forsaken Belkzen to reach to reach the citadel's dreaded gates, explore the foul castle's haunted halls, contend with otherworldly terrors, and purge the taint of Kazavon's final days before having any hope of finally breaking the Curse of the Crimson Throne. Skeletons of Scarwall is an adventure for 12th-level characters and alright, fine, you win, she'll go fetch the stupid fucking sword and stash it with the Bank of Abadar.
Happy?
What's number six.
6. I will not gloat over my enemies' predicament before killing them.
In Chellish literature gloating over your enemies' predicament before you kill them is, like, half of the book. And it usually goes fine.
I think you should assume that, meta-narratively, Chellish literature exists to sabotage you.
7. When I've captured my adversary and he says, "Look, before you kill me, will you at least tell me what this is all about?" I'll say, "No." and shoot him. No, on second thought I'll shoot him then say "No."
What's even the point of being an evil overlord if you can't cut faces, can't dole out fates worse than death, can't gloat, and can't even explain your genius.
At that point what's left?
Is the next thing on this list "I'll keep taxes low and avoid foreign entanglements"? Was the "evil overlord" who wrote this made an empowered priest of Abadar while the ink was still wet?
8. After I kidnap the beautiful princess, we will be married immediately in a quiet civil ceremony, not a lavish spectacle in three weeks' time during which the final phase of my plan will be carried out.
...
...
She hates this, but she can see the reason in it.
Nine?
9. I will not include a self-destruct mechanism unless absolutely necessary. If it is necessary, it will not be a large red button labelled "Danger: Do Not Push". The big red button marked "Do Not Push" will instead trigger a spray of bullets on anyone stupid enough to disregard it. Similarly, the ON/OFF switch will not clearly be labelled as such.
Nah, in our genre when everything starts exploding or caving in it's usually because a magic item was removed from its place of power rather than out of any deliberate choice anyone made.
Going forward, you should feel free to skip the ones which aren't applicable.
10. I will not interrogate my enemies in the inner sanctum -- a small hotel well outside my borders will work just as well.
It wouldn't work just as well... but it makes sense if your threat model is that people will escape after you've already caught them.
You don't want them to know what you were doing in your inner sanctum, or to break out any prisoners.
Actually, that's the puzzle piece which everything locks to - the person who wrote this list was paranoid about people escaping after they've already been captured. They're giving up the chance to seduce heroes to evil or make them scream or use them against their allies and all of the fun things that overlords do in Chellish fiction after they've captured someone, because they're so worried about chance of an escape.
Just like how in Chellish fiction it's agents of evil who are prone to daring escapes. It's because Earth fiction follows the good guys, escapes are exciting, and they give authors a chance to ratchet up the stakes without permanently killing characters.
This is so dumb.
And Choryon is saying that Ileosa's a character in an Earth book.
11. I will be secure in my superiority. Therefore, I will feel no need to prove it by leaving clues in the form of riddles or leaving my weaker enemies alive to show they pose no threat.
This is the analogous trope to how in Chellish novels the good guys let their weaker enemies off out of "mercy," but then the hero of the story gets stronger or smarter and fights them again and wins.
That's so weird.
Twelve?
12. One of my advisors will be an average five-year-old child. Any flaws in my plan that he is able to spot will be corrected before implementation.
Okay, villains from books are usually idiots. But she doesn't need to follow this rule, right? Since she isn't?
Fine.
I guess five year old children aren't exactly hard to source.
Thirteen?
13. All slain enemies will be cremated, or at least have several rounds of ammunition emptied into them, not left for dead at the bottom of the cliff. The announcement of their deaths, as well as any accompanying celebration, will be deferred until after the aforementioned disposal.
And petrified or soul-trapped if it's really important, since in this version of Golarion you can't bind and stab petitioners.
...You can't petrify or soul-trap everyone, though, and by narrative convention whoever you decide aren't important will be the ones who overthrow you...
She'll think on it. Fourteen?
14. The hero is not entitled to a last kiss, a last cigarette, or any other form of last request.
This precludes the possibility of some of her favorite romance tropes.
An unapplicable sci-fi trope:
15. I will never employ any device with a digital countdown. If I find that such a device is absolutely unavoidable, I will set it to activate when the counter reaches 117 and the hero is just putting his plan into operation.
The one after it goes:
16. I will never utter the sentence "But before I kill you, there's just one thing I want to know."
These are a lot of words across many separate bullet points to say, "I won't do anything fun if it in any way involves someone who dislikes me."
Seventeen?
17. When I employ people as advisors, I will occasionally listen to their advice.
I am listening, though.
I'm pissing and moaning about it, but I am also listening.
18. I will not have a son. Although his laughably under-planned attempt to usurp power would easily fail, it would provide a fatal distraction at a crucial point in time.
...Is the next entry on the list "I will attain eternal youth," or "I will have a daughter, who in Earth fiction for mysterious reasons will never attempt to usurp power," or "I will anoint a successor and be the last of my line," in reverse order of how bittersweet the best victory you can get through denying Earth's tropes is?
It's not your second-pick, alas.
19. I will not have a daughter. She would be as beautiful as she was evil, but one look at the hero's rugged countenance and she'd betray her own father.
Ileosa is assuming that she'd betray her own mother equally readily?
Ap-parent-ly she dodged a bullet that Eodred died without managing to knock her up first.
...If eventually having children is non-negotiable, what are the safest ways to do it? It doesn't have to be immediately, Ileosa's current plan was already to get her eternal youth and character levels and unchallenged despotism all sorted before taking on that kind of distraction.
Ileosa's first thought is that she could leave a hundred unacknowledged bastards to be raised by their mothers far away from Korvosa, and never tell them about their heritage. It's not what she really wants - she'd like to be a better parent than her own father, to apply what she learned from watching him and make him proud/show the old man up - but it'd be better than nothing.
Yeah.
If life follows storybook tropes, it'd make her usurpation at the hands of a claimant even more certain than if she bore and raised them herself.
And for the others, there's alter self or a girdle of opposite gender.
What's number twenty?
20. Despite its proven stress-relieving effect, I will not indulge in maniacal laughter. When so occupied, it's too easy to miss unexpected developments that a more attentive individual could adjust to accordingly.
Huh. Weird.
In Chellish literature, it's the good guys who laugh like maniacs when it looks like they're winning, before the inevitable turnabout.
Twenty-one?
21. I will hire a talented fashion designer to create original uniforms for my Legions of Terror, as opposed to some cheap knock-offs that make them look like Nazi stormtroopers, Roman footsoldiers, or savage Mongol hordes. All were eventually defeated and I want my troops to have a more positive mind-set.
Gods below, "Legions of Terror," that's brilliant!
Later when I'm more established and can get away with that sort of thing, I'm going to roll all of Korvosa's military organizations together under one one umbrella and call them the Legions of Terror.
What's twenty-two?
22. No matter how tempted I am with the prospect of unlimited power, I will not consume any energy field bigger than my head.
Shouldn't it depend more on how much energy is in the energy field? There are first-circle spells with areas of effect measured in ten-foot cubes, and there are ninths with areas of effect smaller than a walnut.
It might be a visual language thing? Since your scenes aren't typically illustrated, I think the thing that really matters is to always keep rule twenty-two in the back of your head when you're tempted by the prospect of unlimited power and thinking about consuming energy fields.
What is it that tends to go wrong when you break rule twenty-two?
You can't handle the power and explode, a kind of ironic punishment for greed or hubris. But now that I'm thinking about it, I don't think you're in much danger of this - in your genre, the convention is that some hero will have to roll initiative and resolve attacks against your AC, and you're unlikely to explode before that happens.
Oh, that's a relief to hear. I didn't like my odds of successfully resisting the temptation of unlimited power.
Twenty-three?
Another sci-fi trope.
23. I will keep a special cache of low-tech weapons and train my troops in their use. That way -- even if the heroes manage to neutralize my power generator and/or render the standard-issue energy weapons useless -- my troops will not be overrun by a handful of savages armed with spears and rocks.
Twenty-four is:
24. I will maintain a realistic assessment of my strengths and weaknesses. Even though this takes some of the fun out of the job, at least I will never utter the line "No, this cannot be! I AM INVINCIBLE!!!" (After that, death is usually instantaneous.)
What if your realistic assessment of your strengths and weaknesses is that you're invincible?
Someone will get past your invincibility and you'll be so surprised by it that your last words are "No, this cannot be! I AM INVINCIBLE!!!"
...What if keeping a realistic assessment of your strengths and weaknesses is scary or depressing...?
Another sci-fi trope:
25. No matter how well it would perform, I will never construct any sort of machinery which is completely indestructible except for one small and virtually inaccessible vulnerable spot.
Isn't it a good thing to have your construct or castle or whatever be as indestructible as you can manage? If the only vulnerable part is virtually inaccessible, that seems like you're doing a pretty good job.
The thing you want to avoid is having one part which, if the heroes can hit it once, will cause the whole thing to shut down or dramatically explode. Because they'll manage to hit that part, no matter how difficult or implausible that is. It's better to have a less indestructible construct across its entire body, if it doesn't have any specific weak points, if that's a tradeoff that you're able to make.
I'll warn Togomor; he's the one who has the feat for crafting constructs.
What's twenty-six?
26. No matter how attractive certain members of the rebellion are, there is probably someone just as attractive who is not desperate to kill me. Therefore, I will think twice before ordering a prisoner sent to my bedchamber.
What if you're attracted to them in part or in whole because they're desperate to kill you, and by definition you can't get that vitamin from someone who isn't?
Well, it's not like I've ever had any difficulty getting people in the mood... okay, but, what if you're attracted to them in part or in whole because they're dangerous and defiant and desperate to kill you and you don't want to just suggest Sabina into the right headspace because a) that'd be play-acting (not that there's anything wrong with play-acting) and b) what if she successfully killed you because you didn't have Sabina on hand to keep the dangerous member of the rebellion from killing you?
No, none of this even gets at my real complaint. My real complaint is that people just aren't fungible goods. If I'm besotted with, take a random example, and this is a wild hypothetical here, you, I don't think "oh, but there's probably someone who's just as attractive." They aren't you. And I want you. If someone else is "equally attractive," that just means I want her too.
When you say that about me it makes me feel all warm inside.
But then I remember everyone else that you're talking about, see, and that doesn't make me happy at all.
Words and air, you don't care all that deeply. And you won't, not unless I do something to make it personal.
That's the role you're playing. And you enjoy it! But it's only a game.
The audience - that's you - is more sympathetic towards people with distinguishing characteristic.
My victims aren't real to you the way that I am, or the way they are to me. They're nameless NPCs.
You only care about them in aggregate, or for the effect that they have on the people who really matter.
This is one of the more meta attempts an NPC has made to seduce me to the side of evil.
But it won't work. I'm Lawful Good. And you're right: I do enjoy it.
I think you'd also enjoy being Evil, though. You could give me advice on tropes and just enjoy it without feeling conflicted, if you redefined success.
And you could be my secret agent and pass on reports about your group. Have you ever gotten to play the undercover evil party member who betrays the others? I'm speaking for the GM here when I say that it's totally cool with me.
Does passing reports on her friends seem in-character for Hasagi Choryon to you?
I think we could find an in-character justification for Choryon, if you thought you'd find it fun!
And you would find it fun.
I'd make sure of that.
I wouldn't want you to grow deficient in the vitamin you only get from fucking people who desperately want you dead. You're sending me mixed signals, Queen. Do you want me a dangerous and defiant member of the rebellion, or do you want me as your evil dragon?
Either?
From the first moment I saw you and saw you looking - looking straight through everyone like you'd just as soon murder as talk to us, I've wanted to see all the ways you could break or all the things you could grow into.
(That 'or' is inclusive.)
I'll grudgingly settle for only living one life with you.
You've got a really unique angle on seducing me to evil and I want to take five minutes and think up an equally unique angle on seducing you to good.
Was that a request that I spend the next five minutes distracting you?
Because I heard it as a request to spend the next five minutes distracting you.
Unconventional methods of seduction aren't my only kind, you know.
Or even the kind that I'm best at.
Nope.
Because my powers counter yours!
If you go any further than you already have, we just fade to black. And when the narrative picks back up I'll have gotten my five minutes of undistracted scheming in!
Bwahahahahahahaha!
It would be a lot of fun to play your double agent. It's not every day that you get to backstab the rest of your party! And now that I'm thinking about it, I'd make such a great boss encounter, with all of my hitpoints and fast healing.
But I'm already getting most of that just out of being under your spell. You're probably going to make me spy on the others whether I want to or not, right, and feed them false information or lure them into a trap? And I'll probably have to fight them anyway when they realize my duplicity and/or notice that I'm under a magic compulsion. I can have my cake and eat it too.
And I'd rather be on their side than yours, in the final showdown. It'd be a cool character arc for me, and the bad guys never do win, in the end.
Earth fiction has some tragedies which were written on purpose, by authors who weren't even rolling dice.
I think this is still anyone's game.
I'll be fine with it, if Choryon dies, as long as her last fight is a memorable one; no one who lives like her lives forever, and there's a room prepared in Heaven.
But if you die, you're toast.
And I'm attached enough to you at this point, that wouldn't feel like a satisfying end to the campaign.
Apparently being honest with someone about your feelings toward them counts as a really unique angle on seducing them to Evil, but I don't think it counts as a unique angle on seducing someone to Good.
My original vague plan has been to keep teaching you the power of friendship, and then after we thoroughly thwart you in the big boss battle – how does it go, one of my professors has it on her wall, “only a crisis produces real change and when the crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around.”
I’ll demand your surrender from a position of strength and you’ll know that you can trust me, and that it might take a while but in the end things will be okay.
How saccharine. But I don’t think it counts as a unique angle either, that’s a very standard plot outside of Cheliax.
I’ve been thinking about it, and I don’t think I can improve on my admittedly vague plans by trying to think of something more unique. The classics are classic for a reason. Maybe I could make them more unique by trying to improve on them, but the plan was vague in the first place for a reason, too: I hate planning. So the story would be more unique, if we do things your way and it goes according to plan, and it’d have a happier ending, if we do things my way and it goes according to plan…
naaahhhhhhhhh, this is already way too much planning things out in advance for a roleplaying game. How about we just both play things by ear?
I too intend to handicap myself in that way, yes, because to do otherwise would be unfair.
Unrelated thing: give me a Sense Motive check?
The last time I used the line Lyvina said “skill issue” and Kroft “I think whoever you’re quoting meant it to be descriptive, not normative.”
Gods, they sound so annoying. I’m sorry you have to put up with them.
Which isn’t to say they’re wrong about this specific thing.
What’s number twenty-seven on the list of
Copyright 1996-1997 by Peter Anspach. If you enjoy it, feel free to pass it along or post it anywhere, provided that (1) it is not altered in any way, and (2) this copyright notice is attached?
27. I will never build only one of anything important. All important systems will have redundant control panels and power supplies. For the same reason I will always carry at least two fully loaded weapons at all times.
I don't feel like this really engages with the reasons why people might only have one of something. Magic items are expensive, and each of them you make or buy is a different one that you can't.
I can follow the advice about carrying backup weapons, but there's a reason why only one of mine has the mega-enchantments on it and it and it's not that I wouldn't love to have another.
Twenty-eight?
28. My pet monster will be kept in a secure cage from which it cannot escape and into which I could not accidentally stumble.
I think that breaks the general spirit of the rule, which is meant to keep you from a karmic death.
No matter how evil the villains are, the good guys can't just kill them: heroes are supposed to be better than that. They need to stay pure and noble (or innocent); role models, exemplars of solving their problems without resorting to bloodshed. If they take another person's life, no matter how justified, they will lose their moral edge, but when the villains are just arrested and hauled away by the police, this isn't satisfying. For one, they have a tendency to escape. For another, the mundane workings of the criminal justice system seem woefully inadequate to hold or to punish a really evil villain. We, the viewers, want to see real justice administered, and we don't trust human hands (or at least not ''heroic'' human hands) to administer it.
So, the writers arrange for the villain to die in a manner that is completely their own fault, or, at least, obviously not the hero's. If they die right in the act of attempting to kill the hero, this gives a particularly nice karmic zing. If they attack after being defeated and then spared by the hero, this is one of the rare circumstances where the hero can dispatch the villain personally and still come across as blameless.
Note that this only applies if the villain is clearly human or the setting's equivalent. If they change into some kind of monster, they are no longer protected by this trope: the hero might hesitate to kill another human, but a mutated, horrendous beast is fair game — doubly so when the villain took this form for the sole purpose of murdering the hero. The trope may still apply if the villain's inhuman nature somehow allows him to escape justice at the mortal heroes' hands; in such a case, their doom would come from a completely unexpected quarter, such as previously abused minions finding and shattering the villain's Soul Jar to avenge themselves, without any involvement from the heroes whatsoever (and the minions possibly not even pulling a Heel–Face Turn) and if a Karma Houdini finally becomes the receiving end of this trope, this is Karma Houdini Warranty.
It's more common in Western markets, as a result of heavy censorship and the general reluctance among writers to feature their character (usually in a show with a younger demographic) doing such acts as killing, especially if they're underage. Occasionally known by the older demographic as "getting one's comeuppance." Given that there is a certain charm to Self Disposing Villainy, this trope can show up in works that allow the hero to kill people; it's just that it's much more common for it to show up in situations where the hero has a no-kill policy for one reason or another.
This trope is less common in more cynical works, where the good guys using lethal force is not only more expected but the refusal for a hero to kill comes off as naive at best and irresponsible at worst.
Karmic Death is an example of Death by Irony. Disney Villain Death, The Dog Bites Back and Just Desserts are subtropes. This trope is the opposite of Karmic Jackpot.
Compare Asshole Victim, Hoist by His Own Petard, A Taste of Their Own Medicine and Karmic Butt-Monkey. See also Cruel Mercy. Adaptational Self-Defense usually involves this. The Killer Becomes the Killed is a Crime and Punishment Series variant.
You kill people all the time, so presumably my story isn't from a "Western market"?
It's not in a market at all, really: there are only four readers.
Although also, the censorship TVTropes is talking about is different from the kind in Cheliax. Leastwise in my corner of the West, and... eliding present or potential controversies... there's fairly little that it's illegal to write, it's just that some venues or publishers might ask you to get a rating from the Motion Picture Association of America or ESRB, and parents won't let their kids read you if your rating is too high, which limits your audience.
I'm gathering that your country has very low state capacity. I hope you don't die in the fighting when you're conquered by one of your neighbors.
...Was what I said really that funny?
A little.
The country I'm from has the most powerful conventional military on our planet, but that's hardly relevant to the question, since both of our neighbors have been allies and friends of ours for a hundred years and more. If there was a war it'd be because our head of state went insane and decided to invade one of them.
I do wonder what would happen to you if "Cheryl" died, though. Would she continue directing you from the afterlife? Would that be end of your telepathic connection to the other three?
Is your country so much stronger that there's no chance of your dying in the insane conquest? Well, I guess even if you did, they'd just raise you, you're too strong to be left dead...
My talents may have been exaggerated by the cooperative hand of fate.
I'm not in the military and I wouldn't be asked to march on Canada or Mexico.
But talking about real-world wars is depressing me! Can we get back to the Evil Overlord List?
29. I will dress in bright and cheery colors, and so throw my enemies into confusion.
That's most of why I'm wearing green - the infernal reds and blacks in my wardrobe can wait in there until it's safer to take the mask all the way off.
What's number thirty?
30. All bumbling conjurers, clumsy squires, no-talent bards, and cowardly thieves in the land will be preemptively put to death. My foes will surely give up and abandon their quest if they have no source of comic relief.
...I should preemptively kill every incompetent in the land? That would take a lot of murder... I don't think the public would stand for it.
But I guess the idea is that if you can pull it off, you should, because you only lose your country's incompetents, who are relatively useless unless they have a narrative role to fill, and worse than useless if they do?
I think it's mostly just a joke, and wouldn't help even if you tried. Imagine opening a book that starts with an evil queen deciding to kill all of the talentless but amusing people in the entire land in the fear that one of them would defeat her or contribute to her defeat in some improbable (but amusing) way.
Now flip to the last page. How does that book end?
31. All naive, busty tavern wenches in my realm will be replaced with surly, world-weary waitresses who will provide no unexpected reinforcement and/or romantic subplot for the hero or his sidekick.
That's less wasteful than murdering all the nation's incompetents, since it's more targeted and also I could find other uses for the naive, busty tavern wenches. But I infer that this is another joke like number thirty?
32. I will not fly into a rage and kill a messenger who brings me bad news just to illustrate how evil I really am. Good messengers are hard to come by.
Yeah, I've definitely known people like that.
This is solid advice for those who need to hear it.
You've known people, plural, who fly into a rage and kill messengers? Where do you meet them??
Even though I've been murdering and enslaving people left, right, and center?
I'm not glad about what you've gotten up to since getting out, but I am glad that you got out.
You're ridiculous and I don't know why Pharasma calls you Good.
But I wasn't talking about the general category of people who kill the messenger. I was referring specifically to people who fly into rages and kill messengers just to illustrate how Evil they really are.
There are smarter ways to do it, though, which don't make people nervous about telling you things.
That puts you ahead of most people on Golarion.
What's number thirty-three?
33. I won't require high-ranking female members of my organization to wear a stainless-steel bustier. Morale is better with a more casual dress-code.
MY morale isn't!!!!
Is there no one thinking about MY morale???
Similarly, outfits made entirely from black leather will be reserved for formal occasions.
Unlike a stainless-steel bustier, I am not entirely without flexibility. I don't make casters wear Gray Maiden armor, or, I don't do so unless forcing her to forfeit the use of her arcane or druid powers and fight in melee with a sword and shield was the artistic vision behind inducting her in the first place, which so far is only true of one wizard - I'm still looking for my druid.
And the higher-ranking the officer, or the more they bring to the table, the more willing I am to negotiate when it comes to outfits. It's not aesthetically important for high-ranking officers to look nearly identical with all the other Maidens, unless that's the whole artistic vision behind why I etcetera. I don't make Togomor shapeshift and wear the plate.
But.
I do make Togomor dress with red accents! The high-ranking members of my organization are the ones I spend the most time around! They need to look good as a group!
You're proficient in heavy armor from your fighter dip, and don't lose any important class features from wearing medium armor, right?
If we're just talking combat mechanics, I'd rather keep my full movespeed, but at least I wouldn't lose any magic.
I'm imagining a mithral suit of armor that's inspired by Minkaian o-yoroi but also by Gray Maiden plate - under the armor I'd dress you in red, but I wouldn't wrap the armor itself in anything too chromatic, I'd let the mithral show, except where we need red thread to lace lamellar plates, and maybe a red leather wrap for the upper half of the waidate... no, I think we leave the waidate unwrapped. The armor'd have long skirts like o-yoroi, and all of the plates, even the little lamellar scales, would be etched with intricate designs - I'm thinking animals and vegetation, especially flowers and especially the kind of flower you grow in your hair - which can only be appreciated from up close, but from further away they give a kind of texture that helps set you apart from the rank and file without being too obviously different in kind. You'd wear the red cloak and cape, and a tasteful number of rubies, nowhere where they're stealing the spotlight, just as tasteful accents, but you'd also have some green and earth-tone design elements as a nod to your old color scheme - but I'd want to rewrap your katana, swap out its sheath, and repaint the naginata - there's nodding at an old color scheme, and then there's keeping it. You wouldn't have the red plume on your helmet, though, I'd want you wearing some cool Tian-looking kawari kabuto, maybe with leafy antlers like that one pokemon you showed me, Sawsbuck. Maybe those should be made out of wood, and we could incorporate other pieces of wood in the armor? Or, nah, let's just do it all in mithral. Shiny mithril-silver antlers, mithril leaves, mithril flowers. Maybe designs on the antlers, like scrimshaw? Oh! And some of the etchings on the antlers and armor could be various grass-type pokemon! No one on Golarion would get it but the two of us; to everyone else they're just weird monsters. Most of the etchings should be real plants though, people looking closely at it should think vegetation and strange beasts, not strange beasts and vegetation. The face plate would look like it came from a set of gray maiden armor, but there'd be etchings in it to give that texture.
Under the helmet, things get tricky because of your fast healing. I think I'd go crazy with piercings, maybe with some chains to connect them. Or maybe just one chain, from your nose to your ear, for that asymmetric look? Oh, and I could drill holes in your skull for swappable studs, or just screw in neat-looking things! A ruby or an emerald between your eyebrows? No, let's stick rubies in over your eyebrows, near your temples.
It's giving me so many ideas. I think I'm going try start trying some of them on new initiates - and then after I've done everything that needs cure light wounds, I can do everything that cure light wounds would wreck and leave that to heal naturally.
Aww, but I thought the skull-drilling was going to be a special thing just for me. If you're doing it to everyone, does it really mean anything?
You're just saying that because you don't want me to trepenate anyone who isn't into it.
It's true, though. If I'm the only person with skull implants, I'll feel happier about having them.
You'd be the only person with Minkai-inspired armor.
That's special.
We don't have the shared cultural context that might be necessary to explain why it feels weird for an Avistani to want to dress me up in Minkai-style armor like I'm a rare collector's item.
You are a rare collector's item, though? Like my elf, gnome, nymph, and dhampir.
Abducted from her forest bower, because I had to see for myself if the rumors were true.
Also, I thought she'd lose her spells if I dressed her in the armor, but she didn't, so I'm still looking for a proper druid.
She is satisfyingly miserable about being a jackbooted thug under the effects of geas/quest, though.
Well, maybe Togomor cast it, then, or maybe I don't have a nymph yet.
I don't want to be an example of a category, that you caught to round out your pokedex.
You definitely don't need to worry about that! You're one of a kind to me, irreplaceable.
It's like... if I'd stepped into Viridian Forest and found a shiny pikachu. I'm not going to go looking for another pikachu after that one, but that doesn't mean I only caught it because it was a pikachu.
Honestly, I don't want for there to be people who you think of as examples of categories, and abduct to round out your pokedex.
There are a great many things which you don't want me to be or do.
You already knew I was Evil.
What's number thirty-four?
Because then you're fair game for a non-karmic death, right.
What's number thirty-five?
35. I will not grow a goatee. In the old days they made you look diabolic. Now they just make you look like a disaffected member of Generation X.
Modern depictions of Asmodeus don't usually have Him in a goatee anyway, they give Him whatever style is presently fashionable.
This isn't really applicable to me, though, so, what's thirty-six?
36. I will not imprison members of the same party in the same cell block, let alone the same cell. If they are important prisoners, I will keep the only key to the cell door on my person instead of handing out copies to every bottom-rung guard in the prison.
Can you give the key to someone who runs the day-to-day operations of the prison?
If you're fine with them dying the ignominious death of a quirky miniboss.
Great. Okay, apparently I'm a prison warden now.
...And it's a job with a commute, because I can't imprison them under the castle because that breaks rule ten!
I hope that you appreciate the fact that following all of these rules will require me to re-imagine how prisons work from pretty much the ground up.
What's rule thirty-seven?
37. If my trusted lieutenant tells me my Legions of Terror are losing a battle, I will believe him. After all, he's my trusted lieutenant.
You could ask someone else for their take, or use detect thoughts, or check how the battle's going for yourself.
Aren't those like 12,000 gp? And the DC is 13? And you can already cast the spell?
The duration isn't long enough. Like, imagine that I've got you tied up and I cast suggestion so you believe I'm really going to kill you this time but charm person so you can't help but love me anyway, and my plan is to tease you until both of the spells wear off.
Obviously I'd want to read your mind while I'm doing this. But charm and suggestion both last for hours, and detect thoughts only lasts a few minutes!
38. If an enemy I have just killed has a younger sibling or offspring anywhere, I will find them and have them killed immediately, instead of waiting for them to grow up harboring feelings of vengeance towards me in my old age.
Seems like solid advice. I wonder whether there's a spell for it...
Thirty-nine?
39. If I absolutely must ride into battle, I will certainly not ride at the forefront of my Legions of Terror, nor will I seek out my opposite number among his army.
40. I will be neither chivalrous nor sporting. If I have an unstoppable superweapon, I will use it as early and as often as possible instead of keeping it in reserve.
41. Once my power is secure, I will destroy all those pesky time-travel devices.
Either Creation is very soon to end, or destroying the time-travel devices is impossible, or someone will eventually succeed at that and therefore already has.
Forty-two?
42. When I capture the hero, I will make sure I also get his dog, monkey, ferret, or whatever sickeningly cute little animal capable of untying ropes and filching keys happens to follow him around.
43. I will maintain a healthy amount of skepticism when I capture the beautiful rebel and she claims she is attracted to my power and good looks and will gladly betray her companions if I just let her in on my plans.
I was thinking this back at number thirty-seven, too, but some of these rules are good advice that I expect is much harder to follow in the moment than they are to pat yourself on the back about when you're just talking or writing about them.
Forty-four?
44. I will only employ bounty hunters who work for money. Those who work for the pleasure of the hunt tend to do dumb things like even the odds to give the other guy a sporting chance.
Mull's the party face, not the party leader.
Also, I do too work for money!
...Why are my minions such horrible infighting backstabbers. What did I do to deserve this.
How much did "that one vampire guy" pay you?
Would you have done it for free?
Were you, possibly, and I'm going way out on a limb here, already in the process of doing it for free when you met someone willing to pay you for it?
I object to your defamatory remarks. This is just bog-standard heroism!
I'm a charitable soul so I do it pro bono.
When I'm not fighting for money, I fight for what's right.
Suppose you were walking through the Cinderlands and randomly encountered a berserk golem.
The golem is about to mindlessly wander through a portal to the Elemental Plane of Fire, which will incinerate it.
If we stop it in time, we can sell the golem's parts for scrap.
Let's stipulate that if you don't fight the golem, Lyvina will kill it with create pit and falling objects.
Let's say that you're out of Bloodrage and fast healing for the day, so if you fought the golem she'd have to spend her spells on mending your wounds.
Lyvina can convert any spells into cures, and so can Mull, and they have healing wands, too, so it's better to spend healing spells here than the create pit.
Your wizard accidentally prepared four of create pit this morning.
Okay, fine, you win, I'd rather fight the golem than watch Lyvina drop rocks on it while it scrabbles helplessly at the walls of a conjured pit.
Happy?
So according to rule forty-four I shouldn't hire you or Altronus for anything.
This isn't fair!
We don't ask for nearly as much money as someone with our track record ought be able to demand!!
You do tend to do dumb things to make fights which should be easy more entertaining, though.
That's clearly against rule forty-four.
Your Red Mantis guys charge a fortune and act professional but I've got like two-dozen of their sawtooth sabers in my Bag of Holding.
I think the thing you should be looking at in a prospective mercenary is how cheap they'll work and whether they've succeeded at similar jobs in the past.
Maybe if you paid me I'd pass along tips about where you could find good fights, and then I could use my earnings to hire more of the people who work for money.
This seems in keeping with the spirit of the rule.
Okay, but if I get to the target first I get to keep whatever I find in their pockets.
45. I will make sure I have a clear understanding of who is responsible for what in my organization. For example, if my general screws up I will not draw my weapon, point it at him, say "And here is the price for failure," then suddenly turn and kill some random underling.
You meet people like this in Cheliax too, I think it's kind of pathetic.
Like, if you could have killed your general there, you would have, right? But you didn't, which means you couldn't. You're angry at the guy you didn't kill, so you're trying to scare him, and you're trying to do it by saying in the clearest possible way that you can't kill him, but totally can and will kill people he likes for as long as you retain power.
How long after that do you expect to retain power?
Well, I don't know, it does show that you're dangerously unhinged, right? You'd want to tread lightly around someone with so few compunctions and so little control over themself.
I think you'd be falling for a ruse.
Sometimes Eodred would throw these tantrums, and after he'd calmed down he'd say that he lost control and didn't know what came over him. When I was a child, I threw tantrums, and attacked people four times my size, or I'd break my own toys. But when Eodred "lost control," he never swung a fist at someone larger than himself, nor broke his own things.
Tons of Chelish people cultivate the virtue of wrath, because they want people to walk on eggshells around them or because it's an easy way to demonstrate Evil, and they want you to think "oh, those guys are wild like animals, they're totally unpredictable, they're stupid and it'll presumably bite them somehow someday but in the meantime I'd better give them everything they want and keep a wide distance." But how many of these allegedly wild people, these allegedly stupid people, how many of them scream profanity at Queen Abrogail Thrune?
Not very many.
Well, Eodred's dead now, which goes to show that there are safer ways to demonstrate Evil than pissing off everyone around you.
My dad always used to say that if you have to choose (and you usually do) it's safer to rely on fear than love (for love is preserved by the link of obligation which, owing to the baseness of men, is broken at every opportunity for their advantage; but fear preserves you by a dread of punishment which never fails), but one should take pains to avoid being hated.
If you're worried that people doubt your Evil, just, like, pave a courtyard in skulls or arrange a gladiator fight between called angels. Now no one can call you soft but also no one in particular feels they've personally been wronged.
Less than I maybe should.
If I'm honest, his advice is probably most of why I've done so well at the common sense portion of your exam.
What's number forty-six?
46. If an advisor says to me "My liege, he is but one man. What can one man possibly do?", I will reply "This." and kill the advisor.
Ask stupid questions, get painful answers. Felandriel Morgethai is but one elf.
Forty-seven?
47. If I learn that a callow youth has begun a quest to destroy me, I will slay him while he is still a callow youth instead of waiting for him to mature.
48. I will treat any beast which I control through magic or technology with respect and kindness. Thus if the control is ever broken, it will not immediately come after me for revenge.
I think controlling a beast through magic or technology is often incompatible with treating them with respect and kindness... no, no, that's the convenient answer. When I enslave a humanoid through magic, I usually put some effort into also building mundane rapport.
I should do that with my pet monster. Figure out how he ticks and how I can make him love me. The only reason I haven't is that it didn't seem intrinsically rewarding.
Dragons live for over a thousand years. You want eternal youth.
Do you honestly think you'll be able to get away with using a mind-controlled one as a weapon against wizards and clerics with dispel magic, for hundreds of years, without it ever going wrong?
I'll see about befriending the dragon.
In case it comes up.
Today's meeting has been pretty productive so far! What's rule forty-nine?
49. If I learn the whereabouts of the one artifact which can destroy me, I will not send all my troops out to seize it. Instead I will send them out to seize something else and quietly put a Want-Ad in the local paper.
I'm assuming for the purpose of the rule that your enemies don't know that this is the one artifact which can destroy you?
In that case, yeah, I can see why you'd want to avoid cluing them in. This exact rule isn't applicable to me, but there's probably some kind of misdirection that I should be doing right now, but it'll be something unique to my own circumstances... oh, and I've thought of one!
I'll pick some random artifact that's been lost to time, like the Axe of the Dwarvish Lords, and make a huge commotion about how I need it found, offer huge rewards, the whole nine yards. Your team will go all "oh, I wonder why she needs it found," "that sounds like a plot hook," and "I guess that's the plot of the next book," and leave town to make sure it doesn't fall into my hands. But it'll be a huge waste of your time, and if you somehow find the thing, it's just a +6 keen throwing goblinoid bane dwarven waraxe, which none of you are even proficient with.
Go right ahead and do! I'm not a goblinoid, and your degenerate Come and Get Me + Petals on the Wind build relies on the reach of your naginata.
I'm not sure even we'd fall for such a transparent ploy. Why would you be weak to the Axe of the Dwarvish Lords? And if it wasn't your one weakness, why would you even want it?
Let me look it up... yeah, if I heard you were after the Ihystear and didn't have any other context, I'd assume something catastrophic would happen if you actually got it, but if the GM isn't coming up with unique mechanics it's pretty much just a +5 brilliant energy dagger.
Now I want an evil scheme which would make the Ihystear make sense as a weapon against me.
Maybe one of these days I'll come up with one.
What's rule fifty?
It's another sci-fi one:
50. My main computers will have their own special operating system that will be completely incompatible with standard IBM and Macintosh powerbooks.
We're halfway to a hundred!
51. If one of my dungeon guards begins expressing concern over the conditions in the beautiful princess' cell, I will immediately transfer him to a less people-oriented position.
Following the spirit of this rule would seriously cut into my quality time with Sabina.
What's the big catastrophe that happens if I break it?
You push her away from you.
Probably she fights you in some climactic battle.
It's pretty much inevitable, if you stay the course.
You should consider just implementing all of her proposed fixes.
Ileosa is quiet for a time, and when she speaks, speaks quietly.
"I didn't think this would be necessary, but I'm going to have to geas my girlfriend."
You'd probably need more Sense Motive than Choryon has to notice Ileosa blinking back sudden tears and turning her face away.
No? Did Ileosa forget to roll Bluff? Well, then this public pathetic display was probably some kind of clever manipulation.
Ileosa seems to have cleverly manipulated Choryon into giving her a hug.
You don't have to geas anyone that you don't want to, you know.
If Sabina betrayed me, that'd hurt worse than just knowing that I had to take away the option.
52. I will hire a team of board-certified architects and surveyors to examine my castle and inform me of any secret passages and abandoned tunnels that I might not know about.
Eodred could have used that advice.
...It's probably wise, if you find yourself saying that someone you killed should have taken some word or other of advice, to take it yourself, lest someone later say it of you. There's no strong reason to think I've already found the important secret passages and abandoned tunnels under Castle Korvosa. I should map it out, and get Togomor to ethereally check everywhere that there could be a secret room.
What's fifty-three?
53. If the beautiful princess that I capture says "I'll never marry you! Never, do you hear me, NEVER!!!", I will say "Oh well" and kill her.
The beautiful princess that you capture is obviously going to say that, so this rule is tantamount to saying "don't capture beautiful princesses." If you captured her anyway you presumably have a plan for bringing her around to your point of view... but I guess that just never works in my genre?
I'm growing to hate this genre.
What's fifty-four?
54. I will not strike a bargain with a demonic being then attempt to double-cross it simply because I feel like being contrary.
That sounds like a great way to trigger a penalty clause.
If I ever double-cross a demonic being it'll probably be because that was the plan from the start and definitely be because I thought it through and have also forced a mind-controlled contract devil think it through and I know I can get away with it.
Fifty-five?
55. The deformed mutants and odd-ball psychotics will have their place in my Legions of Terror. However before I send them out on important covert missions that require tact and subtlety, I will first see if there is anyone else equally qualified who would attract less attention.
So, background: the Mr. and Missus Carowyn were a pair of horrid gossips and I thought I'd improve Korvosa's social scene a little bit by having the both of them murdered by an assassin, and a few of their friends.
...Is that why I had to fight like a million dancing zombies in Carowyn manor, and an evil clown?
The Carowyns were gossips?
I don't think it's proportionate to turn people into the backup dancers from Michael Jackson's Thriller just for gossiping about you.
There were not supposed to be dancing zombies!
There was not meant to be an evil clown!
Anyway, I hire this Red Mantis, Reiner Davaulus,
Allegedly! Although he sure didn't get around to very much assassination!!
Anyway, I tell Davaulus to do in the Carowyns, and make it look like it was plague.
So what does he do?
He delegates the murder to the Cult of Urgathoa, who've been doing odd jobs for the Red Mantis, except I guess they're busy because a list of names in my handwriting lands on the desk of a local wizard named Rolth (I never did manage to extract a surname), who has in turn been doing odd jobs for the Cult of Urgathoa.
No he isn't, but his girlfriend is!!!
This four-layer deep stack of delegation works roughly as well as you'd expect. Through some miracle of transmutation which I'm sure an alchemist could properly explain, my request to "make it look like they all died of the plague that's catching, so no one knows that they were even murdered," turned into "dress and paint yourself like a circus clown and kill everyone attending the mask party with crossbow bolts you've dosed with plague or smoke bombs that contain blood from the infected, reanimate the corpses, and stay for days at the scene of the crime drinking and dancing with the zombies!"
You know what.
I'm going to take the genre-relevant entries from your Evil Overlord List, bulk it out with the stuff I know it's missing, and make it required reading for any assassin who wants my money.
There will be a quiz at the end. With word problems.
I'm just shaken that the Red Mantis both have people who can pass as sane to casual inspection, and that those ones are somehow even worse at their jobs.
Well, if you have a substitute crew of contract killers, feel free to recommend them.
What's number fifty-six?
56. My Legions of Terror will be trained in basic marksmanship. Any who cannot learn to hit a man-sized target at 10 meters will be used for target practice.
A man-sized target, within your first range increment, it's AC 3, and if you take a round to line up a shot against an inanimate object you get +5... I don't know if using them as target practice is useful, that probably depends on how secure you are in power, and maybe they have garbage Dex and aren't proficient with the weapon but have other skills to make up for it, but it definitely seems like a problem if your minions can't make that shot, it doesn't take a Menador archer.
Presumably the thing Peter actually cares about is whether his minions can hit a real human, though, which is AC 10 or higher. You can't fault people for missing that sometimes... I'm guessing that Peter has seen a lot of poorly trained soldiers, or soldiers who don't train with ranged weapons? Your soldiers should train with ranged weapons, even if that's not what they expect or hope to be doing most of the time. The Gray Maidens carry bows.
What's number fifty-seven?
57. Before employing any captured artifacts or machinery, I will carefully read the owner's manual.
An owner's manual being... a book that explains how to work the artifact or the machine?
I don't think Golarion really has those.
You're not in this scene!
This thread is just for me and Choryon!
Go away!
58. If it becomes necessary to escape, I will never stop to pose dramatically and toss off a one-liner.
Spoken like someone with zero ranks in Perform (oratory) and who can't maintain their Bardic Performance as a free action.
It's nice when there are rules which clearly don't apply to Ileosa on account of how she's more skilled than most Evil Overlords.
What's rule fifty-nine?
It's one that doesn't apply to you:
59. I will never build a sentient computer smarter than I am.
Number sixty:
60. My five-year-old child advisor will also be asked to decipher any code I am thinking of using. If he breaks the code in under 30 seconds, it will not be used. Note: this also applies to passwords.
Well, if I need a secret code for anything, I'll keep this in mind.
Sixty-one?
61. If my advisors ask "Why are you risking everything on such a mad scheme?", I will not proceed until I have a response that satisfies them.
...Is not telling your advisors about schemes you suspect they'll frown on against the spirit of the rule?
What if I think I'm smarter than anyone that I have advising me?
...What if I think I'm smarter than anyone who I both have advising me and who I trust to have my best interests at heart, or even just in mind?
Ileosa can honestly say she thinks so.
She seems a little proud of this.
Can you teleport back to Westcrown and ask your dad about the risky mad scheme you don't want to talk about?
I ran away from Westcrown because I was sick of Aberian Arvanxi riding herd on me. I wanted to do things myself. And I have!
Look at me! Five years out from under his thumb, and now look at me. I'm a queen... well, if Queen of Korvosa counts as being a queen, I'm a queen, but.
I'm a queen, and I'm a higher character level than he is, higher circle, higher BAB, and I've got a fancier headband, and my staff wizard is way stronger than his, and I'm building a cult of personality and I've gotten pretty good at breaking people to my will, which wasn't something he really did at all. I'm even better at fencing than he is! He should be taking advice from me! I don't need him to bow and scrape or acknowledge me as his better even though he would if we weren't related, but he should see what I've accomplished and - and if we talk, I won't be any of that, I'll just be his daughter Ileosa in over her head and begging for a crumb of his wisdom.
I don't know your family situation well enough to give good advice, yet, so if anything I'm saying is wrongheaded or unworkable, tell me that it's so.
For context, now that you have teleports on tap, though, and ignoring any schemes which you do or don't give the details of or any advice that you do or don't solicit, do you think you'd enjoy visiting Westcrown or inviting your dad to visit Korvosa just to see each other again?
He could have reached out at any point in the last five years.
I bet he's waiting for me to blink first. Because he told me not to go to Korvosa but I did it anyway and I married the king there just like I said I would which puts egg on his face.
I want to get powerful enough that he swallows his pride and tries to curry favor with me.
Do you think you'd enjoy watching him eat crow more or less than you'd enjoy a day trip to Westcrown?
I'm not fishing here for a yes or a no, I'm just curious.
For what it's worth, I think this officially makes you the bigger person.
Kroft deputized all four of my party as something, but only Mull knows the specifics.
Do you trust Mull not to lie about your responsibilities and legal remit?
...I've been trusting him, but now that you've mentioned it maybe I should stop.
I'm not going to talk to Aberian about the risky mad scheme. Just so you know.
Swear an axiomite to secrecy and pay them to improve on what you've got?
...Yeah, I guess I could do that.
Why couldn't you have given me a list of a hundred things I don't have to change at all, that'd be so much more fun to go through.
Well, if you have a burning orphanage to point me towards, I'll be off. Until then, I'll help the person in front of me.
Well, my impression is that sometimes your Evil schemes are more murdery, cruel, or destructive than really serves you in the long run. I think things could be better for everyone, without being worse for anyone.
Suppose that without your advice I'd shortly be deposed, but by following it I secure my precarious position and rule for a thousand years.
Even if those thousand years were less murdery, cruel, and destructive than they'd otherwise be, that's still a thousand more years of my rule than the timeline where Korvosa sneezes me out like a bad cold.
Didn't we already establish upthread that you have me enchanted and that's why I can't feed you bad info?
62. I will design fortress hallways with no alcoves or protruding structural supports which intruders could use for cover in a firefight.
I think that, outside of fiction, this is something which fortress designers are already keeping in mind. What's sixty-three?
Sci-fi trope:
63. Bulk trash will be disposed of in incinerators, not compactors. And they will be kept hot, with none of that nonsense about flames going through accessible tunnels at predictable intervals.
64. I will see a competent psychiatrist and get cured of all extremely unusual phobias and bizarre compulsive habits which could prove to be a disadvantage.
Do you want to talk about why you want me to talk about sixty-four?
Are you looking for weaknesses you can exploit?
So you just want to have a friendly conversation about my "extremely unusual phobias."
What are my "extremely unusual phobias," Choryon? What are my "bizarre compulsive habits?"
Why don't you tell me how extremely unusual and bizarre I am.
You know.
As a friend.
"If I want?" I already said I didn't want to talk about sixty-four! You're the one who kept talking about it!
It doesn't take detect thoughts to think that your queen might not like being called insane??
I think I've been very patient with you so far. This whole thread has just been one thing after another that I'm supposedly doing wrong. But okay, I'm an adult, I can hear out criticism. I'm not the kind of person who doubles down on their mistakes because that's less painful in the moment than feeling powerless and stupid!
But there comes a time when enough is enough!
I didn't get the impression that you were just putting up with hearing the list! I'd have been willing to change topics at any point.
I'm sorry for asking if you wanted to talk about why you didn't want to talk about the sixty-fourth item on a list you've been giving constant commentary on.
Some Chelish people cultivate the virtue of wrath, because they want people to walk on eggshells around them.
Don't leave the castle. Don't be seen. Don't alert your allies.
Don't heal your hand until I give you permission.
You're dismissed.
I'm not ending the thread here at sixty-five?? That's not your call to make!
Even Sword Art Online made it past Floor 70!
The two of you need to get back in here and figure this out.
Let's just pretend this never happened and move on. What's sixty-five?
We never established that I even have geas yet.
Maybe your hand is fine.
You know, it kind of really hurt when you forced me break my own fingers.
I'm sure that seems like an incredible insight when INT is your dumpstat but the idea that broken fingers cause pain isn't exactly news to the rest of us.
I'm an HP tank - getting injured is my day job. The first time I had to save against Death From Massive Damage for losing 50+ points in one hit, I was level 3.
Broken bones, I can bear with.
What hurt, this time, is I was trying to be your friend.
I mean, I wouldn't turn my nose up at one.
I want to talk about what happened, so I know what I did wrong and can make sure not to do it again.
Why don't you just not press me for answers that I don't want to give?
That would have solved everything.
You didn't seem to mind as much on, say, number four. And it seemed like you found it useful? After, you took pains to reassure me that you valued my advice.
Choryon would laugh but doesn't know how Ileosa would take it.
Ileosa has at least +14 on Sense Motive - more, the higher a level she is in this thread - and is perfectly capable of being offended at Choryon's thoughts.
...She isn't, though. Or - or maybe she is! She's sick and ashamed of herself but that doesn't mean that she isn't offended by Choryon's plaintive fucking smug superiority.
If Choryon is angry, but not... hateful and terrified, like you'd expect someone to be, that's an opportunity; there's an obvious play and the only reason for Ileosa not to do it is sheer self-destructive foolishness. Just apologize. Is Ileosa an idiot? 'I've terribly abused our friendship, can you ever forgive me?' Kiss and make up. Done.
But why should Ileosa have to be one who apologizes?
She was willing to let the matter rest. Why can't they just both move on, and both preserve face?
Well, there is a second-best play.
Talk Choryon into thinking she was the party in the wrong.
This will admittedly take some doing. There's probably a circumstance penalty for having just made Choryon break her own fingers.
(If that even happened. Maybe it didn't! Ileosa probably doesn't have geas yet. It's Choryon who insists on saying that this actually happened in the thread's continuity. Choryon who doesn't want to just sweep it under the rug. How fucking sanctimonious.)
But talking people into absurd things is Ileosa's mastery.
Ileosa does need to calm down, though. It won't work if she keeps trying to force her version of events down the samurai's throat.
Ileosa will take a breath and: consciously shift her emotional state to wounded sadness, unconsciously slump her shoulders, curl her legs in where she's sitting and hug her knees, and say in a soft and quiet voice, "I do value your advice. It's just that I'm... I'm so afraid. I've lost so much today already, or, I've realized that so much was already lost. I don't want to lose what's left, or... looks to be. There's so very little of it left that I can see."
Oh, Ileosa, I'm sorry. I think I've been taking things too fast, piling too much on you all at once.
It's impressive how well you've taken things so far! I've thought it was impressive, multiple times, and I should have been more vocal about that.
I'm sorry.
Hook, line, and sinker.
"Can things go back to how they were before?"
...
...Probably not?
When you were angry, instead of explaining why, you decided to hurt me and make me feel helpless.
That's not something I can afford to forget, while I'm still in your power.
That response is terrifying for some reason that Ileosa doesn't have time to puzzle out.
Disingenuous oaths on his Law are part of how Aberian Arvanxi maintains his NE. Ileosa really is LE (or at least, was a few months ago, she hasn't actually checked since before she killed Eodred) which is part of why she's better than Aberian ever was, but that just means that she needs to be sincere in saying -
"I've - I've terribly abused our friendship, and, and you would be wise to never forgive me, but if you do anyway, on my Law, I'll make you wise to have forgiven me!"
Pharasma will hold you to what's sworn on your honor.
Self-knowledge is a strength, and one I think you've done much to develop.
Take as long as you need to think it over; I won't think any worse of you if you realize you shouldn't swear this.
Ileosa basically apologized and Choryon is throwing it in her face.
...No, Choryon is too Good to her. Ileosa would have broken that promise.
Why did Ileosa hurt Choryon earlier? That was an unforced error. And now Choryon is wary of her and doesn't like her as much and when she was feeling sad earlier Choryon pulled her into a hug and that was nice but it's not going to happen again unless Ileosa does something and the only way she knows to repair a damaged relationship like this one is with grandiose gestures and high-intensity love-bombing but that usually sours when she runs out of energy for it and then she's trapped in an endless loop of making up for what she did after she flagged in making up for what she did after etcetera.
It was nice when Choryon was pursuing her, even though she wasn't making any particular effort to present her best face; it seemed Choryon liked Ileosa plenty just for being who it came naturally to her to be. It felt like they were both here because they both wanted to be, even though Choryon was under Ileosa's mental control she always spoke and acted like she could walk away at any time and didn't need to manage Ileosa's emotions. Ileosa never realized how important that was to their dynamic until she broke it.
Ileosa is a method actor and while her conscious mind is locked up her subconscious can easily generate some grandiose gesture for her body to execute. Ileosa raises her hands, minutely, despairingly, to signal that she is open to an embrace but imply that she doesn't expect to get one, and she says, "I understand if I'm too loathsome to you, now, for you to want to hold me."
Ileosa hasn't recently done anything to Choryon worse than what she said she was going to to Sabina, and Choryon gave her a hug then, so why wouldn't she do the same here?
Hook, line, etcetera. The one problem with method acting is that it's very agitating to feel sad and self-recriminating.
Being held by Choryon helps.
You can't suavely pat me on the back and say "there, there."
That simply isn't a very suave thing to do.
So I take, what, a -2 circumstance penalty? My bonus to Suave is over nine thousand; I'm pretty sure I still beat the DC.
I haven't explicitly said it yet, so I will: I'm sorry for hurting you. It was cruel and stupid and I shouldn't have.
I was playing some sort of idiot game against myself, earlier, where I wanted to get out of having to apologize, although I don't know why I was doing it and it seems very foolish in retrospect.
I'm not sure how I'll make this up to you, but I know that I'll try... is there a weapon enhancement that you want for your naginata? Togomor has Craft Arms and Armor, and I can pay for the spellsilver.
Is that code for "I'm never going to bring this up in the hope that you forget"?
You're the one who said it, not me.
On another topic entirely, apparently we're not allowed to leave until we've gotten through all hundred of these, so... sixty-five?
...No, let's just pull the splinters all out today at once. Ileosa knows that she's breaking rule sixty-four, and just doesn't want to look squarely at how, but she's an adult, she can handle it.
Remind her exactly how it goes?
64. I will see a competent psychiatrist and get cured of all extremely unusual phobias and bizarre compulsive habits which could prove to be a disadvantage.
Ileosa's "extremely unusual phobias" include but probably aren't limited to: snakes, things which make her think of snakes, things which put her in mind of pit fiends (she'd include "pit fiends," but that wouldn't count as extremely unusual - everyone with sense is afraid of pit fiends), being out-of-doors at night, owning up to failure, and sleeping with men.
Her bizarre compulsive habits include: wanting to make every strong and beautiful women she falls for obey and/or love her, cutting up faces to mark her territory and make them worth less in the eyes of others and take away the places they could run and the people they could be, plotting and betimes enacting disproportionate revenge on people who disrespect her or outshine her or just get uncomfortably close to outshining her, and compulsive one-upmanship.
If Ileosa cares more about winning than she does pandering to her neuroses, probably the ones she needs most to be cured of are ophidiophobia, nyctophobia, androerotophobia, the harem-collecting thing, the mutilation thing, the disproportionate revenge thing, and the compulsive one-upmanship thing.
It's just - gods of the Pit, it seems so joyless and miserable.
I don't think you need to sleep with men if you don't want to.
Why not? Seducing men and boinking them are two of her best skills. She stopped doing it when Eodred died and she gained more hit dice and class features to compensate with, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't have a rightful place somewhere in her toolbox. Ileosa doesn't have any other good way to handle, say... Toff Ornelos. His class features are stronger than hers, she can't really bribe him with the wealth of the state because if she's deposed he stands a good chance of inheriting the entire kingdom, and he's both the more skilled mage than her staff wizard and also has way more wizards in his employ. But would seducing him work? Maybe it would, maybe it wouldn't, but the point is that Ileosa never considered trying. She just thought "oh, yay, Eodred's dead, Venster's dead, that means I'm free, I don't have to have sex with men."
Not wanting to screw dudes isn't a phobia, let alone an extremely uncommon one!
I really don't think you should force yourself to sleep with people you don't want to.
It seems intuitively like I should, since I'm good at it and it's worked for me in the past? Is there a trope-logic reason why I should expect seducing Toff Ornelos to be less likely to work than it looks, or is this just you being Good and not wanting me to suffer through anything no matter how trivial or worth it?
I don't want you to suffer through anything but also I don't - for context, if you could magically get all the benefits of seducing Toff Ornelos without having to do it, but you had to give up, say, the face cutting thing, would you rather do that or get the benefits by seducing him?
It's hard to bring myself to want either, but... I'd rather give up the face cutting?
Definitely a close thing.
I don't want you to suffer through anything but also I don't think this particularly trivial for you, or particularly worth it.
Oh, come off it!
This whole time you've been saying that "even though it takes some fun out of the job," I should quit everything that I do for fun, if it isn't fun for someone else, because that's what makes me more likely to win in the end. Now I bring up something which would take some fun out of the job, and doesn't really hurt anyone else, and now you're up in arms?
What gives?
At the end of the day, even if you do everything on the Overlord List, your odds of winning are better but that doesn't make them good. Like I've said, the heroes tend to win in the end. Some of the Overlord List rules, if you follow them, improve your odds of getting a redemption arc in the epilogue, or, if there's a Greater-Scope Villain or Man Behind the Man I haven't met yet, improve your odds of a survivable Heel-Face Turn in the third act - although others very much don't. I'm least conflicted about the things which it wouldn't hurt you to implement and would make you more effective while also harming others less. I'm more conflicted about the things which hurt you to do, but make you more effective while hurting others less, and the things which don't hurt to do and make you more effective without hurting others less. I'm not conflicted about things which hurt you to do and might make you marginally more effective without doing less harm to others, because those are just terrible. How could I feel happy about you doing something you hate when I don't expect it to help you in any lasting way?
Ah.
Thank you for sharing your view, and thank you for trying to look out for me.
But I'm not planning for failure, here. I'm still trying to win.
Sixty-five?
65. If I must have computer systems with publically available terminals, the maps they display of my complex will have a room clearly marked as the Main Control Room. That room will be the Execution Chamber. The actual main control room will be marked as Sewage Overflow Containment.
It's already the plan to doctor or destroy any public floorplans that there are for Castle Korvosa.
I might set Togomor on hunting down and silencing retired servants from administrations past, although maybe that's an easier excuse for Paizo to give as to why the players can't find this information than it is a strictly optimal optimal use of Togomor's spells and time.
Sixty-six?
Sci-fi trope:
66. My security keypad will actually be a fingerprint scanner. Anyone who watches someone press a sequence of buttons or dusts the pad for fingerprints then subsequently tries to enter by repeating that sequence will trigger the alarm system.
Sixty-seven is cloaked in sci-fi terms but is more broadly applicable than that:
67. No matter how many shorts we have in the system, my guards will be instructed to treat every surveillance camera malfunction as a full-scale emergency.
A full-scale emergency? You'll run out your minute buffs chasing mundane rats.
And if my guards were instructed to treat every delayed check-in or whatnot as an emergency instead of as possibly-an-emergency, a possibility which grows in their minds the more the delay deviates from what they've come to expect, they'd stop doing that and instead start doing the other thing.
Is that why in the sixth and final installment of CotCT an adventuring party is able to take your castle room by room like a dungeon with six floors?
If you switch sides, I'll appoint you seneschal of the castle and you can rework our security.
Has anyone told you that you the sitting monarch doesn't appoint the seneschal of Castle Korvosa?
Oh, people have been bikeshedding about that all year.
What's sixty-eight?
68. I will spare someone who saved my life sometime in the past. This is only reasonable as it encourages others to do so. However, the offer is good one time only. If they want me to spare them again, they'd better save my life again.
If you're being even less honorable than the guy advocating for having less honor than Evil Overlords usually do, that's probably a problem.
What if someone only saved your life because they didn't know who you were and wouldn't have if they did, or they saved your life as a side-effect of saving their own life, or as a side-effect of some other selfish action or act of misdirected altruism, or what if they saved your life because they're literally cooperatebot? You don't want to have a reputation for cooperating with cooperatebot, people might mistake you for one.
I don't know what cooperatebot means either, so it should be fine if you use out of character knowledge and just assume that in-universe we're using less compact terminology... did I say something funny?
I think this is the first time you've broken character during a session!
...?
...Oh, I see now, the joke is that you're reacting to what I'm saying as if this isn't a fourth-wall breaking aside and these are the literal words I'm using in-universe... are you quite alright, did someone cast hideous laughter on you?
I'm not sure what's going on but probably the fastest way to fix it is if I just explain what cooperatebot means so we can move on.
Ileosa actually explains what "cooperatebot" means, which first requires explaining the prisoner's dilemma to her, although I'm not going to force you to sit through the exposition.
(If you know what the prisoner's dilemma is but happen not to know what "cooperatebot" means, it's just a robot as always picks "cooperate" in the dilemma.)
Sorry about that, folks.
We'll get back to your regular program.
It's better to have a reputation for being cooperatebot than for being defectbot, since most people are playing tit-for-tat.
That's not my experience. I think most people are defectbots.
People playing tit-for-tat or grim trigger are a rare and precious resource; life is a game of defectbots scouring Golarion for them and getting that juicy turn-one cooperate/defect.
I think the world only looks that way when you're playing always-defect and nearly everyone can tell.
I don't play always-defect! I only defect in the non-iterated prisoner's dilemma, or on the last turn of an iterated game, or against people who will cooperate next round whether I defect or not.
It sounds lonely to defect more against people the more chances they extend you, until they dry up and you have to move on.
69. All midwives will be banned from the realm. All babies will be delivered at state-approved hospitals. Orphans will be placed in foster-homes, not abandoned in the woods to be raised by creatures of the wild.
I'll get to that the moment I have the state capacity.
Seventy?
70. When my guards split up to search for intruders, they will always travel in groups of at least two. They will be trained so that if one of them disappears mysteriously while on patrol, the other will immediately initiate an alert and call for backup, instead of quizzically peering around a corner.
My guards mostly travel in groups unless they're high-CR solo encounters, but I'm not sure that they keep their eyes on each other constantly enough to distinguish mysterious disappearances from the ordinary sort that responds well to quizzically peering around a corner.
You should not be describing anyone who works for you as a solo encounter unless you are actively steering for an adventuring party to clear your castle one room at a time.
Do you know how much the Seneschal of Castle Korvosa is paid? You could get out ahead of your WBL.
The Queen doesn't appoint the Seneschal, that was a whole plot point in the main continuity.
Take the title or don't take the title, take the salary or don't take the salary, I'm just saying, you seem to know a lot about defending castles and both Togomor and I seem to know very little about it so if you could take over from us that'd mean a lot to me.
If you turned to the side of good I'd have no problem helping with your security, and neither would any of the evil geniuses in my rolodex.
What. WHAT.
Ileosa would never in a million years have guessed this!!
Why, if he's Evil, is "his" "character" Chaotic Good?
(I mean, I'm aware that that's a fake explanation for your extraworldly knowledge even if you aren't, but if we take it at face value.)
...And why doesn't he act like a genius! Why would someone... pretend to believe that their actions are decided by an Evil genius from another world who's pretending to be them, and pretend that the person that person is pretending to be is a vagrant aasimar empowered priest of Cayden Cailean? It seems like a genius could genius up a plan to get a house and not have to sleep in the rain?
What's the in-character justification for the out-of-character behavior (which, in-character, is in-character behavior for the character being played by an Evil genius)?
It's a colloquialism on my planet - Barry's an evil genius in the sense that he designs deadly dungeons, not in the sense that he has the evil alignment.
Oh. I guess it does make sense that both the imaginary character and the real person are architects, like how both you and "Cheryl" are experienced adventurers.
Maybe not in those exact words, but, the stories you've told - like, just taking one example, you died six times fighting "Starscourge Radahn."
Non-adventurers don't fight people with names like "Starscourge," and don't die, let alone six times, in any fights they win.
...It'd be fun to let you believe that, but I don't want to lie by omission.
Radahn was from a game called Elden Ring.
In real life I'm no one important.
Ileosa doesn't believe that for one second. From when Ileosa first met her as a low-level adventurer in the first book of Curse of the Crimson Throne, Choryon's been too good at tactics and lateral thinking and general adventurer skills and everything else she does. Plus, Choryon knows three other people with the same trait, one of whom is an "Evil genius" at designing deadly dungeons.
She's clearly been in the interpersonal violence community for a good while.
I've played a lot of games, and your world is a game, so I look good in it. But in my real life, I sell shoes.
They should at least let you make the shoes, I'm sure that you'd be good at it.
It'd be by the thinnest hair less a waste of your ability.
I appreciate your vote of confidence, but I'm better compensated than the people who make shoes and don't want one of their jobs.
That doesn't make a lot of sense to Ileosa.
Anyone can sell shoes, but not everyone can make them.
I live near a bunch of rich people who don't want to walk too far to get new shoes, and they buy shoes which were made too far away for a convenient walk.
(Well, we buy shoes which were made too far away to conveniently walk; I'm a rich person too.)
This is such an update to my mental picture of you that I don't know where to begin.
You got rich off selling shoes?
That's... correct, but it's not out of any particular skill. I could have gotten rich off of something else instead.
That sounds to me like you have a particular skill for making money.
I live in pretty much the best place in the world for making money, through absolutely no fault of my own - my parents moved here when I was small enough to fit in a microwave oven.
I don't suppose that it's normal on your planet for people to put babies in ovens?
Oh, but it is! For every person born on my planet, there's been at least one baby put in an oven.
...Whack.
While you're on Golarion, I would like you to please refrain from putting any babies in ovens.
Choryon.
Is it normal on your planet to put literal babies in literal ovens?
It is not normal on my planet to put literal babies in literal ovens.
I'm glad to hear it.
Now were you, as a baby, ever put in a literal oven?
If you're nobody important on Earth, and not particularly skilled at selling shoes, why don't you use the skills you have to become someone important?
I don't think my elite gaming skills are in particularly high demand!
You could tell people how to defend their castles. Or, your friend designs deadly dungeons, right, I'm sure you
In games so detailed that you can take any action available to someone from Golarion!
The games you play are just real life with extra steps!
Is Earth such an utter death world, and your competition in it so fierce, that it makes everything from Golarion look like an utter joke?
Well, it doesn't hurt that the encounters on Golarion are usually level-appropriate...
But you're saying that anyone from your world if they sat down at your game table could tear through my nascent Evil Empire like it's all written on paper.
Oh, no way. Pathfinder is crunchy, and Altronus most people emphatically are not.
The game I played in before this one - Skulls & Shackles with a bunch of strangers from the college I go to - we got wizard diff'd in the fifth book and the whole party wiped. My crew might make it look easy, but most tables struggle with the printed APs.
Then how can you say that real life is harder than games are??
Do you just mean that games are easy for you? Choryon, you moron, that's called being skilled.
...I guess?
I'm not that skilled at the char-op minigame or the combat system of Pathfinder.
How many people are there who are better?
Give me a number, I don't trust your qualitative judgement.
Well, you've already met two or three, and my planet has eight billion people on it so the answer is probably "an incomprehensibly vast number of people" because it usually is. But pen and paper RPGs aren't like an online game where you can easily check how you stack up against all of mankind, so I can't give you an exact number.
You're insane.
You're a crazy person.
You need to see a competent psychiatrist and get cured of your bizarre delusions.
You're probably one of the four strongest Pathfinder players in your world.
Why would whatever power intervened to bring you to Golarion and foil my schemes have sent the second best party?
Unless... unless your world and its players are more important than you realize. If the strongest players were busy with something else...
Choryon, do you have any reason to believe that the other "games" you've "played" were any less real than this one that you're playing now?
If every game I've run a character in really happened, I've saved dozens of worlds from the most terrible conceivable fates.
Which I suppose doesn't make it impossible.
...Maybe I should put more thought into my emergency backup redemption arc, in case this BBEG thing doesn't pan out.
Don't you have something better to do? Why are you on my case, why aren't you off saving some world or other?!
It'd get old if the stakes were always maximally high, you know? Emotional burnout.
Saving just one city or just one person is fun and kind of relaxing.
To be clear, I don't think any of this is true, it's just funny to think about.
That isn't any consolation when you don't think my world is real either and regardless of whether the worlds you've saved exist like mine does your honed world-saving skills still obviously transfer fine into my context!
What did I ever do to deserve the four strongest Pathfinder players on a planet of eight billion showing up to thwart me specifically?!
I'm not one of the four strongest Pathfinder players on the planet.
So you've said!
How are you blind to - how is your whole world blind to how amazing you are?
And even if I were one of the four best people at using Pathfinder's character-building and combat systems, that's an almost entirely useless skill!
Pathfinder is a collaborative story-telling game!!
In real life there are stakes for failure and you can't skip the boring parts.
I'm going to apply the hundred lessons of the Evil Overlord List.
Your homework is to conquer some large or valuable part of planet Earth.
Then thwart a villain! Liberate a city! Spend your fortune on masterwork equipment and magic gear and go do something that matters more than selling shoes!
By the Pit, Choryon, how do you want history to remember you??
...We're going to talk about this later.
What's item seventy-one on the Evil Overlord List?
71. If I decide to test a lieutenant's loyalty and see if he/she should be made a trusted lieutenant, I will have a crack squad of marksmen standing by in case the answer is no.
What kind of idiot wouldn't?!
That sounds like something you'd only do to deliberately create an opportunity for drama.
Seventy-two?
72. If all the heroes are standing together around a strange device and begin to taunt me, I will pull out a conventional weapon instead of using my unstoppable superweapon on them.
Rule seventy-two is a special case of rule one hundred and one, which is "keep your Sense Motive ranked."
Seventy-three?
73. I will not agree to let the heroes go free if they win a rigged contest, even though my advisors assure me it is impossible for them to win.
Hm. I can imagine scenarios where I would have agreed to let the heroes go free if they win a rigged contest, if my advisors assured me it was impossible to win, and I hadn't read this rule. Like if they'd promised in turn to do something for me if they lost or something.
I'll keep this one in mind in case it ever comes up.
Seventy-four?
74. When I create a multimedia presentation of my plan designed so that my five-year-old advisor can easily understand the details, I will not label the disk "Project Overlord" and leave it lying on top of my desk.
Oh gods, my desk is a total mess.
I'm definitely in violation of the spirit of this one.
We're talking, and here I quote, "the PCs can use this information to not only prove the depths of [Ileosa's] cruelty, but also to answer any yet-unanswered questions about earlier events in the campaign as you see fit."
Okay, that's pretty bad, but at least when the PCs find it there's only revelatory info about what happened in the past and nothing on your future plans.
No, in addition to my journals and revenge diary and first-drafts of all the letters and memos I've written, I've also left the ancient tome with my immortality ritual in it, replete with all the grisly details of the human sacrifice and where you'd have to travel if you want to stop me from following through.
I'm going to be real with you.
That doesn't sound like the kind of ancient tome you're supposed to leave on your desk when you aren't actively reading it.
Truths of the Sihedron is such a giant fucking book, though. We're talking about a 'lift with your knees, not your back' kind of book here. We're talking about a book penned eight-thousand years ago by a Large-sized outsider with 24 Strength.
I didn't want to always be lugging it around.
At least if the book's so big it might be hard for us to figure out which part is important?
"The book contains seven chapters, one for each Runelord, but the chapter on Runelord Sorshen has been heavily glossed in Ileosa's delicate penmanship."
You're telling me you defaced the eight-thousand year-old book.
In my defense, the whole damn thing is written in Infernal! I'm a literate Chel, right, but a gazillion pages of this dense-ass archaic jargon-riddled Infernal in print so small you can't tell what's an alpha-numeric character and what's just grain in the eight-thousand year-old pages or a smooshed bug isn't my idea of light reading.
So I took notes. Taldane notes.
In the book, on the book, on loose-leaf paper that I tucked into the book, on loose-leaf paper that I didn't tuck in the book, in commonplace books, and sometimes in unrelated books that happened to be open on the desk.
Well, this is why we're going through the Overlord List. We can clean all of this up before the PCs ever see it.
Is there anything else I should(n't) know about?
...I also left my copy of an infernal contract detailing the powers I sold my soul for.
Hey, it's okay.
Like I said, this is why we're going through the Overlord List, to find places for improvement.
Right.
I'll move everything important into some hidey hole, and burn the rest.
If you aren't busy with anything, can you possibly help me move the Truths of the Sihedron, and hide it?
It's really heavy.
75. I will instruct my Legions of Terror to attack the hero en masse, instead of standing around waiting while members break off and attack one or two at a time.
76. If the hero runs up to my roof, I will not run up after him and struggle with him in an attempt to push him over the edge. I will also not engage him at the edge of a cliff. (In the middle of a rope-bridge over a river of molten lava is not even worth considering.)
Maybe I'd feel more tempted to do this if I were a full-BAB class and/or invested in Combat Maneuvers, but I'm not and I haven't.
Seventy-seven?
77. If I have a fit of temporary insanity and decide to give the hero the chance to reject a job as my trusted lieutenant, I will retain enough sanity to wait until my current trusted lieutenant is out of earshot before making the offer.
Wait, this seems at odds with rule seventy-one?
And what's supposed to go wrong when you do this? I haven't had any problems with bringing my trusted lieutenants along as security so far.
I think 'trusted lieutenant' here should be read as 'favored lieutenant' or 'second in command.'
Ohhhhhh, I see.
Yeah, if I offer you a specific someone's job, they won't be in the room to hear it happen. Like - although this hardly counts because I don't expect Togomor to care very much - if you decide to take the job as Seneschal of Castle Korvosa, that's when I'll worry about telling the current one.
Why does Togomor work for you? I've never been clear on what his goals are or how the two of you met.
He likes to play that near to the chest. Wizards and their mysteries, right?
I don't think there's an entry on the Overlord List that explicitly says you need to know why the most powerful spellcaster in your organization decided to join it, but it seems like a good idea.
Oh, I'm sure I know what Togomor's whole deal is, by this point in the story. I'm just not telling you.
Seventy-eight?
78. I will not tell my Legions of Terror "And he must be taken alive!" The command will be "And try to take him alive if it is reasonably practical."
Taking people alive is more of a job for a spellcaster than for the Legions of Terror anyway.
Seventy-nine?
79. If my doomsday device happens to come with a reverse switch, as soon as it has been employed it will be melted down and made into limited-edition commemorative coins.
That destroys option-value... but, for better or for worse, I don't think my doomsday device comes with a reverse switch, so this isn't really applicable.
Eighty?
80. If my weakest troops fail to eliminate a hero, I will send out my best troops instead of wasting time with progressively stronger ones as he gets closer and closer to my fortress.
Togomor spends all of his high-level spells every day except for a reserve he needs to defend himself or respond to emergencies, and, especially if we're late enough in the story that I have powerful enchantments, so do I. My weakest troops fail to eliminate heroes all day every day, that's things working as intended or at least as expected - the problem with sending stronger troops is that I don't always immediately know which of the weakest ones' failures need to be escalated how far how fast.
That seems fair to me. Do you think that you're doing as well as you can, here?
Am I making some kind of obvious mistake that you're about to point out?
I'll think on ways to improve how quickly we get sundry heroes' measures...
Eighty-one?
It's a visual media trope:
81. If I am fighting with the hero atop a moving platform, have disarmed him, and am about to finish him off and he glances behind me and drops flat, I too will drop flat instead of quizzically turning around to find out what he saw.
Oh, that's funny.
I want to watch a scene in figment-theater where someone's knocked off a flying carpet by, like, a tree branch or a bridge or a balcony.
Does this really come up often enough in Earth fiction to earn a spot on the Overlord List?
Trains are a kind of mindless construct that can have 40+ Strength and move as fast as pegasi. We task them with hauling heavy loads and ride them from place to place, but only where we've built special train-paths in advance - without train-paths they get lost or trip and fall over; trains aren't very dexterous or smart.
Also, some kinds of trains draw their animating force from the train-paths themselves! So you can't exactly take them off-road.
Woah.
Are trains useful as weapons of war, or - if you encircled your lands with train paths, could they hold that line against infantry like the Quantium Golems in Nex?
It'd be too easy to destroy the train paths, or to evade the trains - they have a real hard time speeding up and slowing down, or turning around. Most of the constructs people use in war are less powerful, but more maneuverable.
Togomor crafts constructs and he's nearly as mighty as a wizard can get - how difficult of a quest would it be to get your hands on the principles behind the construction of train-paths or war constructs, or enough of said principles that Togomor could rederive the rest?
I'm afraid I can't tell a mysterious evil wizard how to craft powerful otherworldly constructs.
My own caster level is very high and/or is growing very quickly, depending on where we are in the plot of Curse of the Crimson Throne, and I canonically pick up Craft Wondrous Item at some point - I could take Craft Arms and Armor too, and then I'd qualify for Craft Construct.
Would you tell me how to craft trains?
Sure!
I'd happily teach any high-level good-aligned bard interested in the welfare of her country how it is that trains work.
...Although it might derail the plot. Is derailing the plot of Curse of the Crimson Throne something that I'm worried about, in this omake-continuity where we're playing the AP?
I'm in favor of you not worrying about anything which, when worried about, gets in the way of your telling me cool train facts.
I have no way to watch videos from your planet, and while I always appreciate your character's verbal descriptions of how they go, I think, alas, that much of the charm is lost in translation.
Are you proposing that as a general rule, or is trying your best being what matters specifically about making train noises?
If I say it's a general rule are you going to tell me to conquer Montana?
That depends on a number of factors! I'd have to know more about Montana.
It has mutual defense pacts with, like, fifty of the most powerful states on its continent.
It happened to be what came to mind? I don't have a deeper reason than that.
I can pursue seducing you to Evil and seducing you to glory separately, if it means that either is more likely to work.
You'd better seduce me quickly - this thread is almost over.
We're on number eighty-two.
Does it come across as entirely psychopathic if I say I've enjoyed my time here with you?
But I don't want this thread to end.
Eh, if anything it makes me less worried that I've been tedious company. I've enjoyed the thread too.
Nineteen rules left... less, really, since some won't be genre relevant... could you read ahead and tell me how many of them aren't?
And is rule one-hundred genre-relevant? Could you read ahead and tell me when the last relevant one is?
I don't want it to come as a surprise, when there's nothing that comes after it.
Mm. It's been said that episodic is the worst kind of plot, and I can see why.
What if all of the interesting rules have gone and passed us by, without the slightest fanfare to mark them?
But there's nothing to do but put one episode after until it's done.
Fourteen rules left. What's eighty-two?
82. I will not shoot at any of my enemies if they are standing in front of the crucial support beam to a heavy, dangerous, unbalanced structure.
I only use mind control and piercing weapons, I don't even know any evocations... although honestly I should.
Do you think anyone would complain if I swapped out irresistible dance for greater shout? I want something that targets Fort and/or hitpoints and isn't completely shut out by protection from evil.
They say Ileosa murdered the high king... with her voice! Shouted him apart!
Unless you've secretly been running this game for Society credit, I don't think anyone from Paizo is going to show up and arrest you for shuffling out some of the BBEG's spells known.
And I'll try and remember to stand in front of the crucial support beam to a heavy unbalanced structure whenever you use it. :P
Now that I know your strategy, I know to build superfluous pillars for you to stand in front of - which aren't load-bearing but are filled with explosive jelly.
And now that I know your strategy, I know to bait your minions into standing near the fake pillars so my party can detonate them at range.
And now that I know that you know, and now that I know what you plan to do in return, I know to... hold my cards close to my chest, instead of just telling you, like an idiot.
Nyah nyah.
That sounds like something someone would say if they didn't have a counter-strategy.
83. If I'm eating dinner with the hero, put poison in his goblet, then have to leave the table for any reason, I will order new drinks for both of us instead of trying to decide whether or not to switch with him.
While I'm swapping spells around, should I swap second-circle out for delay poison? Bards get it and it lasts hours per level.
Delay poison is scroll bait. Do you expect it to come up often enough that it makes sense as a prebuff?
I have relatives who wear it all day and refuse to eat anything without it.
What did I say earlier? 'It's probably wise, if you find yourself saying that someone you killed should have taken some word or other of advice, to take it yourself, lest someone later say it of you.'
What's eighty-four?
84. I will not have captives of one sex guarded by members of the opposite sex.
I guess I'll make a note to hire more male prison guards...
Eighty-five?
85. I will not use any plan in which the final step is horribly complicated, e.g. "Align the 12 Stones of Power on the sacred altar then activate the medallion at the moment of total eclipse." Instead it will be more along the lines of "Push the button."
What if there aren't any buttons you can push to get the thing that you hope to get through the horribly complicated plan? I believe in tying off loose ends and in nailing down everything that shouldn't be moving, in simplifying everything that can be simplified, but at the end of the day I've still got to operate the ancient artifact and complete the rituals and satisfy all the people I need to keep happy and abide by the terms of everything I've signed.
If there was a button to press which would make immortal and almighty, I'd press it, but there isn't.
That's a button that kills you and eats your soul. I only play the lottery if it's rigged in my favor - not just from practicality; it's a moral principle.
Oh, speaking of which! I should host a lottery in Korvosa to raise money for my magic swag.
I'll swear publicly under truth-telling that the prize will go to someone truly random.
86. I will make sure that my doomsday device is up to code and properly grounded.
It's a safety precaution for doomsday devices which run off electricity, but not really relevant to you.
Even if it won't come up, I still want to hear about it; this is fascinating to me.
I'd generally associate electric doomsday devices with the sky, like the Cloud Castle of the Storm King.
Why do you want them on the ground instead?
Similar to how heat wants to move from hotter places to colder places until everything is the same lukewarm temperature, electricity wants to move from places with a lot of electricity to places without much electricity until everything has the same low charge. Especially, electricity wants a path to the ground, because the ground can absorb and disperse a lot of electricity. If there's room for something or someone to get between the electricity and the ground, it might move through them to get there.
