Duryodhana
Son of Gandhari and Dhritarashta. His resentment toward the Pandavas eventually leads to the Kurkshetra war.
- Achilles' Heel: He's invulnerable except for his "thighs", IE Groin Attack.
- Always Second Best: It's not enough that he be beloved as a great king, he must be the greatest in the land to ensure that his cousins never overshadow him again.
- Anti Anti Christ: His birth was ominous, but the love of his parents caused him to try to be a good man so he wouldn't let them down. While he nevertheless did a lot of evil, his good ended up netting him a cushy spot in heaven.
- Anti-Villain: A just king, a good son, a loyal friend, and a terrible, terrible, terrible enemy to have.
- Berserk Button: Making fun of his parents. One of the reasons why he molested Draupadi was because when he slipped into the Pandava's palace pool, she laughed at him by saying that he's a blind son of a blind king.
- Big Bad: The main antagonist for most of the story.
- Bullying a Dragon: Had Bhima poisoned because he relentlessly bullied and beat up him and his 99 brothers all day every day for sport, and thrown in the Ganges. Due to the King of the Nagas resuscitating the drowning Bhima and giving him the nectar of the gods for sustenance, he grew even stronger than he already was, but kept his violent tendencies towards the Kauravas in check. Until the Kurukshetra War, where this trope gets reversed onto Duryodhana as Bhima becomes Revenge Before Reason incarnate and murders him and all of his brothers and many of his close allies in a display of violence even Bhima's allies found distasteful.
- Carry a Big Stick: Preferred the mace just like Bhima, and one of the few men who could match Bhima in it's use.
- "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: He's horrified when learning that Karna was the rightful heir to the throne, and the man never told him. Duryodhana said that if he had known, he would have let Karna rule.
- Driven by Envy: Duryodhana's hatred of the Pandavas stems from his jealousy over the fact that they were more talented and popular with their subjects than him (as well as the fact that Bhima bullied him as a child). This hatred causes him to humiliate and exile the Pandavas, and eventually leads to a terrible war. It's averted when he learns that Karna was the true heir and a Pandava; he says he would have let Karna rule.
- Droit du Seigneur: He molests Draupadi and practically forces a Gandharva chieftain’s daughter to come and “satisfy” him, because he believes that his title of Crown Prince entitles him to such.
- Equal-Opportunity Evil: Remember that Duryodhana was unaware of Karna's Divine Parentage; he took him in believing Karna was a mere charioteer's son. He also has a genuine friendship with Ashwatthama outside of professionalism with Drona despite being a poor Brahmin.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones:
- He adores his parents to the point he wanted to be a good man to not disappoint them and will fly on a rage if they're insulted.
- His friendship with Karna is literally the stuff of legends.
- Face Death with Dignity: Bhima cheats against him in their final duel to win, and as he lays dying he verbally destroys the Pandavas so fiercely that they end up tearing up before passing on.
- Jerkass: Extremely petulant and always wants things his own way. Tricks the Pandavas out of their kingdom because he doesn't like them, leading to a devastating war.
- Karma Houdini: ...Sort of? He's without question the antagonist of the story and gets his comeuppance in life, but due to his prosporous rule, piety and many benevolent actions, he ends up in the highest rungs of heaven with Karna, but doesn't achieve Moksha like the Pandavas.
- Manly Tears: Never cries for any of his fallen brothers, uncles, cousins and so on, but he is reduced to a bawling wreck upon hearing of Karna's death, to the extent that he was said to be soaked from head to toe in his own tears screaming into the night.
- Noble Demon: Depends on the version of course, but he's pious, a strong and fair ruler in the Pandavas' absence and his hatred of Bhima in particular is pretty well-deserved when you consider what Bhima put him and his 99 brothers through. His worst traits are believed to come from Shakuni both literally and figuratively poisoning his mind.
- People Jars: He and his siblings were "born" as an unformed mass and split up into a hundred and one jars of butter, where they grew into full-fledged babies.
- Pet the Dog: While everyone was mocking and shaming Karna for daring to think himself gifted in spite of his low birth, Duryodhana immediately acknowledged his fighting prowess and gave him a kingdom to rule, so that no one could slight him.
- When his wife Bhanumati and Karna got tangled in a compromising position from a practical joke, Duryodhana doesn't fly into rage out of jealousy because he knows both are loyal to him. He simply gathers his wife's pearl necklace that snapped because of their game.
- Threatening Suicide: In the BR Chopra TV adaptation, Duryodhan threatens suicide multiple times to bend his father Dhritharashtra to his whim.
- Toxic Friend Influence: To Karna, who aids him in his schemes and acts as The Juggernaut on the battlefield for him, but Karna is also his only Morality Pet who can speak to him as equals and Duryodhana will happily listen to his advice. An incredibly tragic case comes of this in that upon being told of Karna's real heritage (making them cousins, and Karna the rightful heir to the throne), he is horrified to learn that the destructive war and both sides' lives becoming Revenge Before Reason incarnate could have been avoided if his friend hadn't been so loyal to him and just told him.
Karna
Son of Kunti and the sun god Surya; Duryodhana's best friend and closest ally.
- The Ace: He has more or less all the traits the Pandavas got from their divine fathers. He's as just and level-headed as Yuddhisthira, stronger and faster than Bhima, an archer equal to Arjuna and as handsome as Sahadeva and Nakula. He's the only man alive who actually fits the ideal husband Draupadi wishes for in a previous life, but she rejects him because of his (adoptive) caste.
- Anti-Villain: Fights on the side of the Kauravas, but is just as virtuous as the Pandavas.
- Always Second Best: Karna would be the best archer in the world... if it wasn't for Arjuna. Karna repeatedly either loses archery contest very narrowly to Arjuna, or wins outright, but is disqualified due to a technicality.
- Badass Boast: Is fond of those and is often noted to be sharp tongued. His teeth are compared to swords, and his tongue a spear, making him one of the Trope Codifiers of this.
- Because You Were Nice to Me: Karna's motivation for fighting for the Kauravas. Duryodhana was always nice to him, while the Pandavas rejected him because of his low birth.
- Curb-Stomp Battle: Once he's allowed to join the Kurukshetra War properly after Bhishma's passing, he hands these out left and right. Only Abhimanyu and Arjuna backed by Krishna are in his league on the Pandavas' side.
- Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?:
- His arrows are so strong that they're the only thing that can push back Arjuna's chariot, which is under Krishna and Hanuman's direct protection. To repeat, they're capable of moving a weight equal to the entire universe and then some.
- He stops Ghatotkacha's rampage that might well have destroyed the entire Kaurava force by using the javelin Vasavi Shakti that he was allowed to borrow for one throw after Indra felt awful for invoking Loophole Abuse on Karna's oaths. This turns out to be a Xanatos Gambit from Krishna, however, who enlarges the dying Ghatotkacha so that his mountain-sized corpse can crush most of Karna's battalion flat and is now assured that Karna doesn't have a weapon that can One-Hit Kill Arjuna.
- Divine Parentage: The son of Surya, the sun god.
- The Dragon: Duryodhana's second-in-command and closest ally. He's also the last important Kaurava general to be defeated before the Pandavas's eventual Pyrrhic Victory.
- The Giant: Described as being more than ten feet tall and looking "more akin in body to a lion than a man".
- Good Parents: His lower class parents were incredibly loving and encouraging, and part of his hatred towards the Pandavas comes from when his father came to defend Karna's honor in a tournament only to be ridiculed in turn. Karna in turn went on to be a loving father to his own children, which becomes incredibly tragic when Arjuna starts using eight of his sons for target practice before he took on Karna.
- Happily Married: Adaptations vary on who his wife is, as she goes unnamed in the epic, but they never vary on the fact that Karna and his wife are a very loving couple. Despite being a regent of the city state of Anga under Duryodhana who could take as many wives as he wanted, Karna only ever married her who chosen for him by his lower-caste father, bearing all of his nine sons.
- Heroic Bastard: Zig-zagged. Born to an unmarried teenager, then raised by a man who was not his father. Even though his origin is the same as the Pandavas, who are considered legitimate sons of Pandu despite being descended from gods, Karna is consistently treated as second-best due to his parentage.
- Honor Before Reason: He finds out that he could end the war by revealing to the Pandavas that he's their older brother. This would also save his own life. Karna refuses because it would mean that Duryodhana would not be able to rule and he made a promise to serve his best friend. Duryodhana even lampshades that Karna ought to have told him.
- Hot-Blooded: It's In the Blood, of course. He seeks heroic skills and exploits, but also can't keep his mouth shut when he has something to say. Karna did not only offended Draupadi in the dice incident, but also apparently annoyed the hell out of Bhishma, extinguishing any trace of respect Bhishma could ever have for his warrior's abilities, which led to Achilles in His Tent situation.
- Kick the Dog: While his insults towards Draupadi was mean-spirited, it was still a deliberate ploy made to make the Pandavas step up for themselves. His participation in the slaughter of Abhimanyu is a more straightforward example that earns him Arjuna's eternal hatred.
- Master Archer: Karna would be the world's greatest archer... if not for Arjuna. They're nearly evenly matched, and Karna has most of the same special abilities as Arjuna, but Arjuna defeated him several times due to technicalities or cheating.
- Morality Pet: Duryodhana is always kind and helpful to him, which gains him Karna's Undying Loyalty.
- Moses in the Bulrushes: Karna was the first divine son of Kunti, but was sent onto the river as a baby because Kunti wanted to hide the pregnancy. He was found and raised by a charioteer.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Was forced to stay silent when Dushasan mistreated Draupadi due to his loyalty to Duryodhana and had to instigate an insult (by calling her unchaste) to finally trigger the Pandavas to stand up to it. Although Draupadi's modesty was saved by divine intervention, this would stain Karna and bite him back.
- Noble Demon: To such a degree that when his real lineage is revealed to the Pandavas, Yudhishthira claims he's a hundred times more distraught by Karna's passing than the death of his own sons.
- The Rival: to Arjuna.
- Semi-Divine: He's the son of Surya, the god of the sun, that Kunti conceived out of wedlock when she wanted to find out whether the mantra she had received from a rather kooky sage even worked.
- Senseless Sacrifice: His decision to hide his true parentage as it would destroy all of Duryodhana's hopes to establish himself as the righful king. After learning Karna had more of a claim on the throne than him, Duryodhana tearfully confessed he would have been happy to crown and faithfully serve his friend.
- Tragic Villain: Despite being as righteous and talented as the Pandavas, Karna turns to the side of the bad guys (the Kauravas) because he is never accepted by his five legitimate brothers and the Pandu lineage, who he is revealed during a talk with Krishna and Kunti to still hold both respect and affection for. His Evil Virtues of loyalty mark tie him to Duryodhana's side, and he dies a tragic death, killed dishonorably by his own brother.
- Undying Loyalty: Karna ought to be the saint of this trope. Even after being told the Pandavas are his brothers, being offered the throne and every other birthright he had been denied, and knowing that much of what Duryodhana does is wrong, Karna still supports him because Duryodhana stood by his side when no one else did. This isn't a one way street either:
- There's a story that Karna was playing a game once with Duryodhana's wife, and she was losing badly. When she saw her husband coming, she stood up to greet him. Thinking she was running away to avoid admitting defeat, he playfully grabbed her and they ended up wrestling into a very... awkward position, with her necklace of pearls snapping and flying everywhere. Instead of thinking the worst or flying into a temper as others would have, he simply asked, "Do you want me to just pick up the pearls, or should I string them together as well?" He trusted both of them to know nothing happened.
- Another example (twofold actually) was after Karna's death. Duryodhana had not shed a single tear upon the deaths of his brothers and sons but broke down completely when he learned Karna had been killed. And he said that had he known that Karna was not just his best friend, but his older brother, he would have happily given the throne to him and served him faithfully, something that he would never have done for Yuddhistra.
- Vindicated by History: In-universe, the Pandavas and the world only honor him after his passing. Arjuna tries to do his best to look after Karna's surviving son as recompense for killing Karna's other sons and becoming his Cool Uncle, leaving him his bow when Arjuna and his brothers attempt to climb the Himalayas in atonement for their many sins.
