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I also think that any type of villain can be good if (s)he is well written enough.

As for specifics, I'd like to see a doppelganger of the main lord (like Doopliss from Paper Mario TTYD). She would be a mage who can change her own looks at will. In a mid-game chapter, you fight this doppelganger (who has the same stats etc. as your lord archetype), and it's a fairly generic chapter...

But, afterwards, it cuts to a few months later. Surprise! You fought the real lord archetype. At this point, you realise that your army has been terrorising the land and let the real villain gain insane power in the background. Through the next chapters, you train a new army (AKA lots of useless Est archetypes) to form a resistance.

After a few chapters of training, you eventually have to fight your own previous army! If you lost any units in earlier chapters, they won't appear. Any of your old allies who die here are dead for good, even on casual mode (as they aren't blue units). They will even have their death quotes.

After reaching and dealing damage to your "self", the doppelganger's disguise falls. This means all your remaining former allies will realise that you're the real deal, and are re-recruited. The doppelganger is then brutally slaughtered in the most satisfying manner possible.

After this, the main story continues, but with the main villain much more powerful a foe after several months of free time.

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On 7/6/2017 at 5:26 PM, Sunwoo said:

Hmm, reading some of the posts here got me thinking ... maybe a villain whose motivations are a mixture of FE6 Zephiel, FE10 Sephiran, and Lysandre from Pokemon XY would make for an interesting final villain. Someone who either was (or had every potential to be) good and to care for people. But human stupidity and selfishness ultimately broke them because they weren't strong enough to continue being optimistic.

Maybe a noblewoman who entered the clergy (because more main female villains would be interesting) because she wanted nothing more than to help people. But she found that being a simple cleric wasn't enough to protect the people -- the true root of the issue was that the people in power were not doing enough to assist the poor, take care of bandits, etc. So she decided to take up a part in politics, believing that if the people in power knew what the common people were suffering, they would help. Because that's the job of people in power -- to help those below them. She finds that politicians are extremely corrupt, they knowingly trample on the poor to get even the slightest bit of wealth and power, and they use their pretty words to deny all accusations. The people whom she wanted to protect turn on her because she cannot got anything done.

And, when confronted with the corruption and selfishness and stupidity of the people around her, politicians and nobles and commoners alike, she finally snaps and decides that humanity is doomed and should just be purged.

I dunno, just an idea. It's always interesting to think that a villain could've been the hero of another story, if only they had more tolerance for humanity or if they were able to stay optimistic. And it's also interesting to think that maybe some of our heroes could've become villains had they snapped.

I'm down with that.

8 hours ago, The_antithesis said:

I also think that any type of villain can be good if (s)he is well written enough.

As for specifics, I'd like to see a doppelganger of the main lord (like Doopliss from Paper Mario TTYD). She would be a mage who can change her own looks at will. In a mid-game chapter, you fight this doppelganger (who has the same stats etc. as your lord archetype), and it's a fairly generic chapter...

But, afterwards, it cuts to a few months later. Surprise! You fought the real lord archetype. At this point, you realise that your army has been terrorising the land and let the real villain gain insane power in the background. Through the next chapters, you train a new army (AKA lots of useless Est archetypes) to form a resistance.

After a few chapters of training, you eventually have to fight your own previous army! If you lost any units in earlier chapters, they won't appear. Any of your old allies who die here are dead for good, even on casual mode (as they aren't blue units). They will even have their death quotes.

After reaching and dealing damage to your "self", the doppelganger's disguise falls. This means all your remaining former allies will realise that you're the real deal, and are re-recruited. The doppelganger is then brutally slaughtered in the most satisfying manner possible.

After this, the main story continues, but with the main villain much more powerful a foe after several months of free time.

Omg this is slightly confusing but I think I got the hang of it. 

How about we combine these two ideas? WARNING: This could be really bad, but I'm feeling inspired.

Spoiler

In a kingdom similar to the Lycia Alliance in structure, politicians bicker and take from the people of this empire. The Counsel does nothing of real productivity. The political climate is reflected on society, as people are prone to care about themselves. Since the government is weak and the people don't have much, many mafia/gang organizations have arisen. Law and order is really dictated by the many different gangs, not the government. The people face everyday in fear due to the variable nature of these organizations. MC and family are from a noble house, and live in a Versailles-esque manor among the other blue bloods. The giant manor is truly ignorant of the outside world. MC's older sister has studied as a cleric, and truly wishes for the world to improve. She chooses to go into politics, and proposes for more unification among the alliance and more government presence, but is labeled a populist and is shunned. While attending the church she studied at, it is attacked by the area's main mafia group. She tries to defend the church, but the priest warps her away, fearing for her safety. She then learns that the church has burnt down, many were killed, and all of the church's money is stolen. She is embittered, and angry at humanity. (Maybe the ruins of the church can be the final battle place, or an encounter place? IDK) She hates the politicians because they do nothing, the mafias because they inflict terror, and the populace for not practicing neighboring love and also showing cowardice instead of bravery at the times where they need to stand up the most. . MC has been trained in the art of battle and being the upstart they are, agree to help their sister in her goal to eliminate the crime organizations. However, as change is recognizable, the power of change goes to her head, and her ambition becomes overwhelming. The bitterness and rage she felt mixed in with the power corrupts her and she starts to target the government, and isn't opposed to cutting down "cowardly" civilians to get her way. MC begins to question their sister's sanity, and after the two argue, MC walks to get a breath of fresh air by themselves, and our knocked out cold by a vengeful child of a mob boss you previously killed. The vengeful child is like Xane and becomes a doppelganger to the MC and takes on their appearance to get close to the sister. Maybe they thought they killed MC after stabbing them and throwing them in the river, but is revived by some wayward cleric from a small hamlet, a hamlet that proves that humanity can be saved, as the corrupt politics and the greed doesn't reflect on this "Heaven on a Hill" town. Then the second half of the game where you basically start anew begins.

Sorry if it's too wordy.

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I'll echo two sentiments:

1. Something well written. I want clear motivations, character traits and development, and a believable amount of actually evil traits and actions. If they're going to be over the top evil, have them also be subtle about how they gain and use their power(IE not Garon, who is cartoonishly evil from the get-go, and not Validar, who makes many poorly veiled threats in the middle of what's supposed to be a cooperative negotiation). 

2. If they're going to be blatantly over the top evil, then make them like Luca Blight. A complete and total force of nature that just revels in evil and violence that takes a ton of effort to put down. Somebody who you could actually believe ruling and taking over through sheer force. 

Actually, I'll echo 3 sentiments:

3. I want a Thracia 776 remake. And if 2 is on the table by that point, make Raydrik like Luca Blight. 

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Seconding the wishes for a well-written villain. Someone who isn't cartoonishly evil for the sake of it, possessed, acting out of fanatical loyalty or gone insane. And I doubt IntSys is letting the "Dragon + magic-using second in command" archetype go any time soon, but if they're sticking with it I'd like the human to be the final boss for once.

A villain who has history with the hero again could be interesting. Awakening didn't do much with the reveal that Robin had killed Chrom (at least it didn't affect their relationship) since it happened so late in the game; I'd like to see a hero who know from the beginning or learns it early in the story, and have this add a personal dimension to the conflict. (I know Sacred Stones did something like that, but there was possession involved.)

And as others have said, a female villain. Preferably an adult, so she can have a more complex motivation than Veronica's "I'm lonely and I hear voices" which felt a bit weak to me. You don't invade worlds out of loneliness, didn't anyone teach this kid basic manners or what.

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On ‎7‎/‎07‎/‎2017 at 10:26 AM, Sunwoo said:

Hmm, reading some of the posts here got me thinking ... maybe a villain whose motivations are a mixture of FE6 Zephiel, FE10 Sephiran, and Lysandre from Pokemon XY would make for an interesting final villain. Someone who either was (or had every potential to be) good and to care for people. But human stupidity and selfishness ultimately broke them because they weren't strong enough to continue being optimistic.

[omitted]

+1 vote from me too.

Another scenario I would like to see is this. You start out with a standard FE story - an enemy nation invades your kingdom, and you try to stop that. The PC manage to repel the invasion, create an alliance with others, and eventually, the allies are in the offensive now. However, over time, the PC finds out that some of the supporters are not as savoury as first thought.

It is not that the other nobles, officials or leaders plan to betray the PC - some due to needing their royal family for their own interests, and others because they are genuinely faithful to them. At any rate, they know that that such treason is politically suicidal. However, the officials or other nobles under the PC are horribly racist against others, follow the PC to protect their own interests, and/or resents the enemy too much to give respect for the PC's values in forgiveness and mercy. The fighting becomes even more bitter due to the hero's own nobles/leaders being General Rippers who massacre and/or torture surrendered enemy troops. Others either don't care, don't know, or likewise outright agree to the killing due to the resentment, and consider the PC to be weak-willed. This all comes to a head when other nations, calls out on the PC's nation for it's barbarism that even the PC's allies cannot tolerate.

Should the PC side with the other allies and turn against the PC's own supporters to restore honor and integrity? His/her own nobles and generals would be the bosses for the chapters after this point. The more self-interested would be happy to kill off the PC, while the more idealistic would desperately persuade or plead the PC to return.

Or should the PC stay with her/his own people, preserve the unity of his country, decide that the alliance is a lost cause, and carry out the rest of the invasion on her/his own? The generals and nobles from the PC's former allies would now be the for the chapters beyond, who would desparately stop what they think is the PC's rampage against the former invaders.

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Echoing the whole "more female villains" thing, and no pulling a Maleficent in that the female villain is only evil because of being scorned or misled by a man or something like that. I like Hilda being a power-hungry asshole who only wants to advance her own station just because she's like that, no sad backstory or anything needed.

I don't mind dragons as villains, but the ones we get tend to get cut from the same cloth -- dragons who hate humanity because of mistreatment in the past so they want to exterminate them. Just once, I'd love to see a dragon with a (at least on the surface) good relationship with humanity as the villain. SoV...sort of did this with Duma being a a social Darwinist type guy, but he's not the villain of SoV.

I wrote something up somewhere a while back, but give me an arrogant Divine Dragon with a god complex, who seems benevolent on the surface, but turns out crueler and self-serving underneath it all. The opposite of Naga's whole "Don't call me a god" thing. They "care" about humanity only as far as they can serve them, and when that wears off, it gets ugly. They believe that they have the right to treat humanity and the world anyway they want, simply because they're them. This could be a bias, but I love stories where humanity overcomes what calls itself undefeatable, which is why I do really enjoy SoV's theme of "humans gotta human, gods need to step off" so much.

I loved Sephiran as an antagonist, and I do like the idea of someone who was a decent person at first, maybe even benevolent, but is just so tired of humanity, life, and everything after countless years of being beat down that they just want to end it all and wipe the slate clean so to speak, or that they give in to their darker feelings and impulses. That's what I wish we could have seen out of Garon that would have made him far more interesting as a villain, rather than the Saturday morning cartoon villain we actually got. (No, it doesn't matter how much you tell me he used to be a great guy, if I don't see it in game, it's irrelevant.)

A third thing. Give me a more personal villain. Someone who used to be the hero's best friend, one of the hero's close siblings, or even a former lover of the hero. Someone who adored the hero at first, but became somehow disillusioned with them or their cause and switched sides. Something like that can bring out far more emotion and heartbreak than most anything else. Ashnard as the final villain of PoR kinda fell flat, since he and Ike have nothing to do with each other, and meet for the first time in that final chapter.

So a breakdown:

1. Make our villains human (in the sense of well-rounded and believably written, not necessarily human in species). Even bad people who commit heinous actions have at least a few redeeming qualities, and motivations for what they do. Give our villain good traits, so that while the audience wants to see him/her get taken down, they're not some sort of hate sink. Like, Berkut is an extreme social Darwinist like all of Rigel because he was raised that way, and takes his duty very seriously, and for redeeming qualities, he's got his love for Rinea and his general integrity to his beliefs and country. In general, I love villains that actually have good points and can present the heroes with something of a moral dilemma. Some of the most interesting villains I've come across are villains where you can stop and really think about their worldview and opinions on things. That's why Medeus is so interesting to me -- he's got some good points about how shitty the dragons were treated by the humans, to the point that I'd say he's rightfully angry about it. Does it excuse his actions? No, of course not, but he seems much more like an actual person acting in an extreme way upon a legitimate grievance.

2. Avoid the "evil for the sake of evil" and "asshole just for the sake of being an asshole" characterization, complete with random evil cackling and gushing about how much they want people to suffer. Give them understandable/relatable motivations. Nobody thinks of themselves as a villain, as as far as they're concerned, what they're doing is completely justified (and sometimes, even heroic). This is why someone like Arvis is effective as a villain, since he believed himself to be doing what was right for Grannvale until he realized the mistakes he'd made decades later, while Ashnard was something of a disappointment, seeing as he seemed to be  an interesting and nuanced guy in that he tore down rigid Daein social structures to make a might-makes-right sort of philosophy...but then he fell back into the power-hungry asshole does asshole things just to be an asshole trap.
 

Edited by Extrasolar
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I'd like a villain who we could all relate to on some level. One of my favorite villains in this series is Alvis from Genealogy of the Holy War, specifically the development he gets in the manga. He is not a truly bad person, and he wants to create a world without any sort of discrimination. His goals are good, but the way he goes about it is what's horrible. In a way, he was similar to the hero at the time, Sigurd.

I think that a good villain acts as a foil for the protagonist. One who shares a lot of the same viewpoints, but is far more aggressive with his methods, or lacks an understanding as to why people are against them. I want a villain who could be a good person, that you sorta want to root for even as you cut them down. Male or female, that's the type of villain I would like to see.

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Good god do I have an idea for this.

The villain should be extremely charismatic, but also incredibly evil. I want that to be psychologically quite interesting, however; as if they have a NEED for power, they just want more and more of it, somewhat inspired by Alan Bullock's interpretation of the motivations of Joseph Stalin. As a child, they were merely a Peasent in the Kingdom, before they were contacted by the ghost of the hero who defeated the ancient evil in the backstory. He tells the villain that they can gain more power if they only try to reach their full potential, and invite them to train. Throughout the training, the villain slowly becomes more resentful; the nobility spent their entire life shitting all over him, and now he has to devote his life to saving their world? Hell no. He'll use his power to remake their world.

So, using his charisma, he leads a revolution and becomes the new King of this Kingdom. But, he wants more. He wants to be a god. So, he sets about trying to gain the power of the evil God, which will be possible through the Fire Emblem. Eventually, he gets it, and manages to take this power for himself, after manipulating a priest of this god into helping him(hey, I like reversals, okay, and the priest btw would be motivated by revenge for the genocide of his people by the protagonist's father) he is a god by the climax. Meanwhile, the ghost will have enlisted the protagonist(preferably female, to break cliches) to help him defeat the monster he's created. And thus, we have a very interesting rivalry, that explores the idea of the "chosen one" being a sociopath.

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14 minutes ago, blah the Prussian said:

Good god do I have an idea for this.

The villain should be extremely charismatic, but also incredibly evil. I want that to be psychologically quite interesting, however; as if they have a NEED for power, they just want more and more of it, somewhat inspired by Alan Bullock's interpretation of the motivations of Joseph Stalin. As a child, they were merely a Peasent in the Kingdom, before they were contacted by the ghost of the hero who defeated the ancient evil in the backstory. He tells the villain that they can gain more power if they only try to reach their full potential, and invite them to train. Throughout the training, the villain slowly becomes more resentful; the nobility spent their entire life shitting all over him, and now he has to devote his life to saving their world? Hell no. He'll use his power to remake their world.

So, using his charisma, he leads a revolution and becomes the new King of this Kingdom. But, he wants more. He wants to be a god. So, he sets about trying to gain the power of the evil God, which will be possible through the Fire Emblem. Eventually, he gets it, and manages to take this power for himself, after manipulating a priest of this god into helping him(hey, I like reversals, okay, and the priest btw would be motivated by revenge for the genocide of his people by the protagonist's father) he is a god by the climax. Meanwhile, the ghost will have enlisted the protagonist(preferably female, to break cliches) to help him defeat the monster he's created. And thus, we have a very interesting rivalry, that explores the idea of the "chosen one" being a sociopath.

The idea that you have sounds similar to Griffith from the series Berserk. Where he is trying to create his kingdom, no matter the cost. And depends who you are can see him as a hero or as a villain. Still an excellent idea, there are not enough villains that are willing to create their own kingdom from scratch. 

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5 minutes ago, Jingle Jangle said:

The idea that you have sounds similar to Griffith from the series Berserk. Where he is trying to create his kingdom, no matter the cost. And depends who you are can see him as a hero or as a villain. Still an excellent idea, there are not enough villains that are willing to create their own kingdom from scratch. 

TBH I was inspired more by George R. R. Martin's villains, specifically Littlefinger and Euron Greyjoy, but I do see the comparison. I also am a huge fan of parallels between the hero and villain; in this case the parallel would be that both of them were offered extreme power, and the villain uses it to hurt and control people while the hero uses it to help people. Of course, the caveat is that the villain was born into a life of extreme destitution and never tasted power in his life, while the hero was born as future Empress of a powerful nation and had one of the most privileged childhoods in the world. In the actual story understanding this aspect of the villain would be one of the principle elements of the hero's character arc.

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For some reason, I enjoy villains who are trying desperately to rebuild something long gone and arguably not worth trying to rebuild:

Spoiler

Ganondorf in Wind Waker, Solas/Fen'Harel in Dragon Age: Inquisition, Zod in Man of Steel, and arguably Jedah in SoV because he's desperately trying to keep Duma alive and strong

Even a few historic figures had this as at least part of their motivation. With this in mind, an FE villain who is trying to restore an empire that once ruled most of the continent before it fell; either crumbling under its own weight or for another reason related to one of the game's central themes. This is a character who refuses to let go of the past and will do whatever it takes to rebuild the empire of old; refusing to realize that the empire he fights for is dead, and even if restored will never be what it was.

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I just want a villain that is less Saturday mourning and more Funny valentine/Arvis. A man with goals more then to be evil for the sake of evil. 599a26ffbaac7_fIREEMBLEM4.thumb.jpg.3f8cfcfcd1360fcd75b47bd78582dee2.jpg

Edited by Emperor
I fucked up the post
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  • 2 weeks later...
17 minutes ago, Fateborn said:

Rather than any of these.

How about we are the villain?

...Not sure if Fire Emblem (or high fantasy in general) is built for postmodern fourth-wall fuckery like that (if by "we" you mean "the player"). Not to say it wouldn't be interesting though, since I think you have something more specific in mind.

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17 minutes ago, Alistair said:

...Not sure if Fire Emblem (or high fantasy in general) is built for postmodern fourth-wall fuckery like that (if by "we" you mean "the player"). Not to say it wouldn't be interesting though, since I think you have something more specific in mind.

More precisely, we play as the villains.

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Just now, Fateborn said:

More precisely, we play as the villains.

Oh. My b, I thought you meant a fourth wall break where the characters would address the audience something to the tune of "why? playing the game only causes people to die here. and all for your entertainment." But yeah, playing as the villains would be cool too! Like, imagine if there's a gaiden chapter where your the villain and have to defend against / run away from your own army... Know Radiant Dawn did something similar to this, but I don't think any of those factions were outright villainous. 

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18 hours ago, Fateborn said:

More precisely, we play as the villains.

From /r/FireEmblem:

"That's an idea that always sounds a lot more fun then it is. Stories with a villain protagonist are rare because it's pretty hard to get the reader invested in the fate of a bad person who is doing bad things. I think a better compromise would be something like The First Law where the main characters are deeply flawed characters who could easily be the villains of another story, but have wound up as the "heroes" of this one. People with a shred of decency in a world that has even less then that."

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An entourage of villains who work directly against the protagonist for base but differing reasons. These villains aren't partners to each other (I.e. Not riding together as one group or part of one faction.), but are manipulated by the main villain who sees something in the protagonist that no one else (not even the protagonist himself) knows about and wants to crush him. The main villain doesn't appear until later on in the story, but does come up in hints in the first. 

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  • 1 month later...

I want to play around with stereotypes. Start out with your usual "good, nice nation that worships a holy dragon vs. the dark, evil nation that worships a dark dragon" plot with the latter invading the former, but then have a lot of Camuses on the bad guy side, a lot of Hans-like warmongers on the "good guy" side who have been waiting for an invasion as an excuse to go shed some blood, and have the final boss be your own nation's holy dragon, who's not content to just kill the dark dragon but also wants to completely salt the earth and wipe out the dark dragon's whole nation because the "holy" dragon is a dickweed who provoked the war in the first place as an excuse to justify genocide.

Though in retrospect, maybe I was subconsciously influenced by Xenoblade Chronicles.

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