‘Gothic Building At Sunset” courtesy freeimages.com / Beverly Lloyd-Roberts

It’s easy to fall into the trap of having a singular arch-enemy in a campaign. If anything happens to that enemy, it can leave the GM casting around for a direction. What’s more, having one central villain who is responsible for all that ails the world (and his flunkies, of course) is inherently a harder ‘sell’ in terms of credibility, especially if that villain is to be a string-puller behind the scenes – which always makes more sense for that kind of character.

It’s very easy to take the plans of one master villain and diversify the activities attributable to him or her amongst two or more “lesser” masterminds, with no diminution of the impact of the plans or the villain.

If you follow my advice on running a mastermind – which remains one of the most popular articles here at Campaign Mastery – you will find that one of the key pieces of advice is to perpetually ask questions along the lines of “what is the best thing that the villain could have set up to take advantage of (whatever the current situation is)”, then to assume that the villain has in fact done exactly that.

That advice, compounded with a point made a week or two ago – that when a story is about villain development, effects should precede causes in the awareness of the PCs – actually gives you all the tools that you need in order to have your masterminds proliferate.

One becomes two

The technique is simple; determine what the best possible change of circumstance is (in the villain’s favor) at some critical point in the adventure that is about to take place or is currently underway, then have a second mastermind manipulate events to create that circumstance.

This effectively splits what was one mastermind into two – one who is relatively overt and obvious, and one lurking behind the scenes and using the first as a stalking horse.

The Underlying Logic

The second, absolutely critical, step is to determine why. How does it advantage the second mastermind for the villain to benefit? Fortunately, creating villains in this way gives the GM a huge advantage: as of right now, the mastermind has no assigned motivation or objective.

That means that you can work backwards from their actions to assign the traits and characteristics to justify those actions, which is a lot easier than giving an objective and then scanning everything that happens looking for a way for them to benefit. That can be tricky when you have a completely open slate in terms of motivation and objective. The sheer variety of choice can lead to a sort of creeping paralysis and paroxysms of second-guessing. This technique totally bypasses that problem.

And it’s not a problem that you carry into future “appearances” of the mastermind, because the decisions of motivation and primary objective have now been made, reducing the vast field of opportunities to a very straightforward strategic decision.

Another weapon that you have is the relative simplicity of the questions being posed. The mastermind is doing something to advantage the “overt” villain but it’s not out of the goodness of his flabby black heart – it’s because he will benefit in some fashion even more significantly than the “overt” villain will do.

Benefits are relatively simple to characterize. They are either:

1. Direct;
2. Indirect, resulting from something the overt villain is or will do;
3. Indirect, resulting from something the PCs will do in response to the actions of the overt villain; or
4. Indirect, resulting from something that a third party will do in response to the actions of either the overt villain or the PCs.

Furthermore, benefits are either:

1. Gaining access to a resource that was previously unavailable;
2. Gaining information that could not be acquired in any other way;
3. Gaining a change in circumstances that will provide future opportunities for gain that were not previously available;
4. Gaining an alliance that would not be possible otherwise; or
5. Denying one of the above to someone who is functionally in opposition.

The term “resources” is applied very broadly in the above statement, ranging from something material to something quite intangible – it can be anything from a political advantage to an elevation in social position.

There are a lot of possible permutations, but they are relatively quick and easy to assess, and one particular combination usually leaps off the page according to the circumstances in the campaign at the time.

The Modus Operandi Restriction

Of course, there’s always a caveat, a sting in the tail, whenever things are so straightforward. In this case, it’s the fundamental similarity of the modus operandi of the masterminds that result.

That problem brings us to an utterly essential third step: redefining the problem, or in this case, the modus operandi into something that is absolutely unique in the campaign to the mastermind (and preferable unique to all your campaigns).

In order to distinguish this character from the similar ones that will result from the repeated application of these principles, you need a modus operandi that is succinct, distinctive, and that restricts the mastermind from doing anything similar except under extremely restricted circumstances – that just happened to occur during the first occurrence.

What’s more, that modus operandi has to be rooted in the background and characterization of the mastermind, to the point of being the equivalent of a fingerprint – sometimes to the point where that modus operandi can (eventually, when it is sufficiently well-known to the PCs) identify the mastermind’s true identity.

For example, one villain in the Zenith-3 campaign specializes in identifying the weakest link in a process, the point where minimal exertion and exposure will achieve his objective. Through a stationery tracking-and-reordering system, he gained access to the sealed computer systems of the courts, then used that influence to manipulate trial outcomes – for a fee – and always within the bounds of what might have happened by chance. This practice was 15 years old before a piece of truly rotten luck led to his exposure.

This is a villain who is quite capable of meddling to benefit someone else if they benefit even more significantly in the process. But most of the time,, he wouldn’t – he is restricted completely by that modus operandi. His “fingerprint” is not that he manipulates situations from behind the scenes, it’s that he does so in a way that preserves both his anonymity and even the very secret of his existence as his first priority.

This is critical because it defines the restrictions under which the mastermind will operate henceforth. It defines – to the GM – his signature, a signature that the PCs will eventually discover.

Two becomes three

The first mastermind should get away with making life hard for the PCs long enough for them to become suspicious that there is someone working against them from the shadows, and to start speculating on who it might be.

It’s quite likely that they will come to the conclusion that the ‘overt villain’ is a subordinate of the mastermind, especially if you’ve done nothing to obstruct that conclusion. Your game has just acquired a fourth layer of plot:

• The superficial layer contains the day-to-day events that the PCs experience;
• The immediate layer contains self-contained adventures that are unrelated to the larger plotline.
• The Overt Villain layer contains the ongoing conflict between the PCs and the Overt Villain.
• The Subterfuge layer contains the shadow-war between the PCs and the mastermind.

Now, that’s quite a tasty recipe, but a fully rounded dish requires more. This is a little too pat, a touch unrealistic. And there is usually a little nagging inhibition against the GM really going to town and doing his worst, because without PCs, he doesn’t have a campaign.

There is a simple solution. Once the existence of the mastermind has been detected and progressed beyond a vague suspicion in the minds of the players, once he or she has become established in the manner described in the opening paragraph of this section, it’s time to complicate the situation.

One mastermind gaining an advantage in this way almost certainly means that he will be interfering in the plans of some other furtive manipulator. On the principle that the enemy of my enemy should be my pawn, the PCs should become enmeshed in the crossfire.

(For a fun variation, don’t reveal this second string-puller as an enemy right away, make that a plot twist for much later in the campaign – have them appear to be someone who is overtly on the PC’s side, a bona-fide ally).

Using this figure as a safety blanket and occasional escape clause for the PCs takes away any pressure to hold back, and lets the other villains revel in their villainy.

Of course, this third mastermind adds still another layer of plot and needs to have his or her own modus operandi that is just as binding, just as identifiable, and just as solidly founded on and justified by his background experiences and personality.

The Lieutenant Distinction

There are still a few i’s to dot and t’s to cross. It’s important to distinguish between things that the masterminds will not do and things that the masterminds are unable to do. Those distinctions are defining in terms of the relationship and attributes that the masterminds will seek in their lieutenants.

A smart mastermind will seek
out a Lieutenant who compliments there own abilities and who can be trusted not to cross any “lines” that the mastermind lays down. (That doesn’t mean that the Lieutenant has to agree with his boss, and won’t get frustrated with those restrictions, and certainly doesn’t mean that the lieutenant won’t cut the occasional corner if he feels it necessary.

It might seem that this relationship isn’t something that the GM needs to pay a lot of attention to, leaving it to evolve naturally. I disagree with any such analysis. First, the relationship will color every instruction that the mastermind gives the Lieutenant, and second, the restrictions placed upon the Lieutenant, and the relationship he has with his superior, will – over time – shine an additional light on the mastermind’s signature.

And that makes this critically important. The Lieutenant is a window onto his boss. There may be other relationships that the GM needs to think about, but few are this important. (A related and equally-vital set of questions: Does the Lieutenant know who the mastermind really is? Do they ever meet, and if so, where and under what circumstances? How does he receive his instructions, and how does he authenticate them? How does he report back to the mastermind?)

The Modus Operandi Integral

It can pay dividends to think of the ‘mastermind-plus-Lieutenant(s)’ combination as a unit. Is the whole greater than the sum of its’ parts? Because it not only should be, that is a great way of enhancing the adventure experience.

To put it bluntly, every combination where that wasn’t the case always seems to fall a little flat in comparison to those in which there is a dynamic that yields this sort of coalition.

It also means that losing that Lieutenant will seriously cramp the mastermind’s plans, which can be a useful plot card to have up your sleeve!

The Flunky Factor

Another point that I want to pay specific attention to is the difference between a Lieutenant and a Flunky. A good mastermind will have two or more of both.

A flunky can be just muscle, or it can be an extension of the mastermind. Flunkies should also never be completely interchangeable parts; there should be a difference between the flunkies favored by the mastermind and those who back up the Lieutenant – not to mention differences between this mastermind and that.

The Organizational Structure

I find it useful, from time to time, to look at these coalitions as a single organization. The mastermind is the CEO and thinker; the Lieutenants are the department heads; and the flunkies are the senior staff.

(As an aside, it can also be useful from time to time to characterize an organization as an individual. Internal culture becomes uncertainty and internal conflict within the mind of that individual, and you can often discern paths ‘forward’ for the organization while looking at how the ‘corporate individual’ would resolve his doubts and uncertainties).

Getting back to the point, identifying a ‘corporate culture’ helps characterize those who work for the mastermind, It can also help the GM understand how the presence of the mastermind influences the rest of society, and what will happen when the mastermind is gone. It might not be the prescription of universal peace that the PCs expect it to be!

And that’s how one Uber-villain becomes three

There are a whole host of benefits from this approach, as readers can see. Richness of plot and characterization, internal consistency, enhanced believability, It may not be the solution to every problem, but it’s definitely deserving of a place in the GM’s toolkit.