McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft

Can't come up with a decent villain

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kingaling:
So, here's the thing. I'm just starting to get into the crux of my short story, and I'm fairly certain that once it's done I'm going to take my main character and start a novel (maybe even a series).

But what the main character is capable of, leaves me without an idea for a villain.

My character has the ability to control demons (particularly the 72 goetic demons of the lesser keys of solomon). He can do this with no strings attached, no moral ramifications and no temptations or his soul going to hell for doing so. He has been gifted/earned the rings of Solomon, and his seat of power is The Solomon, not just because of his adept power, but his mental prowess in understanding things.

But, he's already dealing with dark entities (I'm not looking to turn this into a heaven versus hell situation, I have a completely different series I have planned for that), so what could make a good villain for someone who already deals with (and bitchslaps) evil creatures everyday? Any thoughts would be great.

drza:
My first thought is a woman, a temptation.  If your story is building to a series, you could have him face off with a bad girl that he has enough tension with that she could become a recurring gray villain/anti-hero in your main series.  Think Catwoman and Batman.  Your hero sounds too powerful to be troubled by a lesser villain, and it sounds like you plan for your big villains to come in later, but a well-written femme fatale could be introduced and bring up some nice drama in a short setting.

KevinEvans:
Make his villain himself, or a reflection of himself. Add in the law of unintended results, and a wierd reflection of the motivation.

Regards,
Kevin

the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
I see three angles I would take, if it were mine.

Firstly, an equal opposite. Someone with 72 angels to counter his 72 demons, or 72 other demons. 

Secondly, he sounds like a pretty understanding/knowledge/structure-based sort of guy, so chaos opposed to his order. 

Thirdly, an Outside Context Problem.  He clearly has a very good handle on a large body of knowledge about how a particular chunk of metaphysics works; what if that's a much smaller part of the rules of the universe as a whole than he thinks ?  What if there's a larger context, in which what he knows is only one small, local, limited set of knowledge (like Newtonian physics in a post-Einstein world) and he's completely unprepared to be blindsided by something that.. is not so much Not Following the Rules, as operating form a different volume of the rulebook that he does not even know exists ?

svb1972:
Does the Villain have to be,.. Villainous?

What about a Templar like order.

Knights who are adept at slaying Demons.  They view him someone who consorts with demons.

Also, why is this guy so cool?  How come he gets to get Demons to do what ever he wants with no risk to his soul?
Really?  That seems.. too good to be true.  Perhaps it is.

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