Close
Close
Advanced Search

Exemplars of Evil (3.5)Click to magnify
Quick Preview
/gs_flipbook/flip.php?xml=/demo_xml/54310.xml&w=500&h=337
Full‑size Preview
https://watermark.drivethrurpg.com/pdf_previews/54310-sample.pdf

Exemplars of Evil (3.5)

ADD TO WISHLIST >
Villains for Your Campaign
 
Every memorable adventure needs a great villain. You know the type: corrupt, reviled, and rotten to the core. The villains featured in this tome are the best of the worst, sure to test the heroes' mettle. The canny pirate lord, the sinister lich, the tyrannical fire giant queen... your characters won't know what hit them!
 
This supplement shows you how to build memorable villains for your Dungeons & Dragons campaign and presents eight ready-to-play villainous groups of various levels. Each villain comes with complete game statistics, as well as adventure seeds, campaign hooks, statistics for minions, and a fully detailed lair.
 
For use with these Dungeons & Dragons products: Player's Handbook, Dungeon Master's Guide, Monster Manual, and D&D Miniatures.

*****
 
Product History

Exemplars of Evil (2007) is a natural companion to the world-ending devastation of Elder Evils. This book doesn't focus on world-ending threats, however; instead, it teaches DMs how to create and play an incredibly effective Big Bad Guy. That sounds a lot easier than it actually is. Think back over all the years you've played D&D, and consider how many master villains there are whose name, description, and methods you still remember clearly. Exemplars of Evil walks you through the process of forging a villain your players will curse for years to come. It then follows this advice with eight examples of devious, hate-inspiring villains that you can drop into a campaign immediately or alter at your whim.

Constructing Evil. The best villains are the ones players love to hate. Everyone's heroes have killed mediocre villains, bad guys with a funny accent and a powerful magic item who sit around in their crypt and wait for the adventurers to show up. The most interesting foes are much more motivated; they are proactive, motivated, following clear and reasonable objectives to crush their enemies and achieve their most hideous goals.

The first chapter of Exemplars of Evil shows how to put this theory into practice. Whether you're wanting a one-shot boss fight or reoccurring villain, it helps you pick your type of villain and then evolve him as the adventure continues. It gives villainous archetypes - disturbing villain, non-evil villain, rival, sympathetic villain, etc. - and lays out their classic plots and motivations. Developing and portraying the villain is discussed next, with ocupations and personality traits joining suggestions on how to best roleplay a villain. The organizational structure of villainous organizations is explained, complete with lackey rules, and stylish methods are suggested for first introducing your vilain.

New rules information in this chapter includes alternate class features (including feign death for when a bad guy really needs to play possum), villainous feats, villainous spells (from the simple alibi, which makes someone believe they encountered you recently, to a spell that turns enemies into a quivering mass of flesh jelly).

Ice-cold Enemies on Tap. After giving the reader information on how to construct their own villains, the book presents eight fine examples. 
 
  • Zargath Human-Bane, visionary orcish rogue and warmaster, leading his people out of savagery and into their rightful position as rulers
  • The Tolstoffs, a brother and sister who seek to free an ancient archmage and reinvigorate the world-devouring Worm That Walks
  • Captain Gnash, a bloodthirsty bugbear pirate who leads a ship of insane goblinoid reavers in search of a lost city
  • Calais Archwinter, elf priestess of Corellon Larethian, cursed to inhabit a drow body; she has spiraled into evil acts, all in the name of good
  • Emmara Ishandrenn, acclaimed adventurer, driven half-mad by a curse; she perpetrates acts of unspeakable evil to continue to live
  • Valbryn Morlydd, a murderous fire giant queen who uses her arcane might to uncover secrets in the bowels of a dormant volcano
  • Kastya Zurith-Movya, githyanki, former advisor to the lich-queen Vlaakith; he now labors for the great lich Acererak
  • Borak the Thunder Tyrant, an ancient blue dragon who lounges among ruins while minions collect obscure arcana for her
 
Each sample villain comes complete with Appearance and Behavior; Goals; game stats for low, medium, and high-level parties; assistants and minions; headquarters (including a gorgeous full-color map); and sample encounters.

Exemplars of Evil is a non-essential but tremendously useful book, whether you're playing Basic D&D, D&D Next, or anything in between. The game mechanics are for 3.5 D&D, of course, but the advice and ideas are timeless. This is a book that's recommended reading for any DM, from beginner to experienced. More than that, it's just plain fun to read - and that's something to be treasured in any gaming supplement.

About the Creators. Robert J. Schwalb is the Iron Man of game design, an incredibly prolific designer whose work can be found throughout 3rd and 4th edition D&D. His work can also be found in Green Ronin's Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, A Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying Game, and innumerable other products.

About the Product Historian

History and commentary of this product was written by Kevin Kulp, game designer and admin of the independent D&D fansite ENWorld. Please feel free to mail corrections, comments, and additions to kevin.kulp@gmail.com.

We (Wizards) recognize that some of the legacy content available on this website does not reflect the values of the Dungeons & Dragons franchise today. Some older content may reflect ethnic, racial, and gender prejudice that were commonplace in American society at that time. These depictions were wrong then and are wrong today. This content is presented as it was originally created, because to do otherwise would be the same as claiming these prejudices never existed. Dungeons & Dragons teaches that diversity is a strength, and we strive to make our D&D products as welcoming and inclusive as possible. This part of our work will never end.

pixel_trans.gif
pixel_trans.gif
 
 Customers Who Bought this Title also Purchased
pixel_trans.gif
pixel_trans.gif
Reviews (1)
Discussions (1)
Customer avatar
Johnathan D May 14, 2022 12:13 am UTC
POD please
Browse Categories
$ to $
 Follow Your Favorites!
NotificationsSign in to get custom notifications of new products!
 Recent History















Product Information
Electrum seller
Author(s)
Pages
162
ISBN
978-0786943616
Publisher Stock #
109287200
File Size:
51.68 MB
Format
Original electronic Click for more information
Scanned image
These products were created by scanning an original printed edition. Most older books are in scanned image format because original digital layout files never existed or were no longer available from the publisher.

For PDF download editions, each page has been run through Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software to attempt to decipher the printed text. The result of this OCR process is placed invisibly behind the picture of each scanned page, to allow for text searching. However, any text in a given book set on a graphical background or in handwritten fonts would most likely not be picked up by the OCR software, and is therefore not searchable. Also, a few larger books may be resampled to fit into the system, and may not have this searchable text background.

For printed books, we have performed high-resolution scans of an original hardcopy of the book. We essentially digitally re-master the book. Unfortunately, the resulting quality of these books is not as high. It's the problem of making a copy of a copy. The text is fine for reading, but illustration work starts to run dark, pixellating and/or losing shades of grey. Moiré patterns may develop in photos. We mark clearly which print titles come from scanned image books so that you can make an informed purchase decision about the quality of what you will receive.
pixel_trans.gif
Original electronic format
These ebooks were created from the original electronic layout files, and therefore are fully text searchable. Also, their file size tends to be smaller than scanned image books. Most newer books are in the original electronic format. Both download and print editions of such books should be high quality.
File Information
Watermarked PDF Click for more information
Watermarked PDF

These PDF files are digitally watermarked to signify that you are the owner. A small message is added to the bottom of each page of the PDF containing your name and the order number of your purchase.

Warning: If any files bearing your information are found being distributed illegally, then your account will be suspended and legal action may be taken against you.

Here is a sample of a page from a watermarked title:

File Last Updated:
September 17, 2013
This title was added to our catalog on September 17, 2013.