[UA] The Villain Archetype (was: various topics)

[Matthew Rowan Norwood]

> I'd use the bad side of the Outsider or Rebel for a 
villain.  They can
> cover an awful lot.

Exactly what I was going to say. Rushdie is seen by some 
Islamic leaders as being a heretic and blasphemer -- 
exactly the qualities of these two archetypes. The 
Marquis de Sade would be another great example of an 
Outsider or Rebel who draws his power from either the 
disgust and hatred he generates in his audience or from 
his blatant disregard for authority and convention. 
People like this tend to be classified by society as 
"villains", and they often revel in the role even though 
they don't necessarily see themselves as "evil" in a 
meaningful way.


> Wouldn't the good side of the Dark Stalker be evident 
in all those shadowy 
> pulp heroes? The Shadow, The Spider (Master of Men!), 
Captain Midnight to a
> 
> lesser extent.

Isn't this explicitly written up in One-Shots? The 
Faceless Man or something? I thought the DS's channels 
were totally usable by a pulp-style mystery man: evading 
roadblocks, popping up mysteriously right behind you, 
travelling more quickly than you thought possible, 
popping back up after being "killed", etc.

> The rule of thumb I use is "If the examples are all 
historical, it's an
> archetype.  If the examples are all fictional, it's a 
stereotype."  Keeps
> me from getting lazy.  ("'The Large Breasted Chick 
With The Guns'?  What
> the heck, it's in every RPG I've seen, and if I write 
it up fast I can hit
> my quota in time for MST3K!")

Um... sorry, but most of the UA archetypes are 
stereotypes. The masterless man, flying woman, two-faced 
man are all characters out of fiction. This doesn't mean 
that there aren't historical figures who haven't been 
mythologized to fit one or more of these roles, but it 
does mean that the Faceless Man fits right in. What 
about Deep Throat? Or the Swamp Fox (the character on 
whom Mel Gibson's character in the Patriot was based, 
but with a different name and his racist and sexually 
predatory characteristics removed)? I think the problem 
may be that once the Faceless Man is unmasked, his 
notoriety fades very quickly, unless he also killed and 
ate people. I'm sure there have been plenty of legendary 
spies/hitmen/commandoes/informants who were a real 
mystery to _someone_ at one time or another.

-Matt Norwood 

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