History Main / OrcusOnHisThrone

* In the ''Literature/MetamorKeep'' storyverse, Nasoj is quite content to just bide his time instead of making another attempt to destroy the keep and conquer the midlands. However, zig-zagged in that there is one arc dedicated to him assaulting the keep.

** [[spoiler:And somewhat justified with Im, the true head of the World Government. Since his spot and very existence go against ''everything'' the World Government is supposed to stand for, meaning the slightest leak on the matter could easily collapse civilization as a whole, he needs to be kept under a veritable mountain of wraps. As a result, he doesn't get to do much but give orders to the Gorosei, pick out important targets for ''genocide'', ripping up photographs of individuals he doesn't like, and [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking spending the rest of his time tending to his butterfly garden]]. As later arcs reveal, however, he doesn't need to leave his throne room for either he or a weapon of his to ''[[PersonOfMassDestruction completely delete an island from the oceans]].'']]

* ''Series/Daredevil2015'': Wilson Fisk heavily insulates himself from his criminal dealings on the street, his underlings primarily speaking only to James Wesley. To the point that before he makes himself a public figure, it's impossible for Matt to find anything on him, and even harder is finding a witness who took a direct order from Fisk. And the only times Fisk personally dirties his own hands rather than have someone else do it for him are when he's really pissed off. In Season 3, Fisk is technically under FBI house arrest, so he spends the entire season confined to a Midtown penthouse under the guard of FBI agents who are secretly in his pocket. It's those agents, Dex especially, who do the brunt of his dirty work for him.

** While Tywin and his bannermen are out fighting the war in Seasons 2/3 and Tyrion and Cersei are scheming for power in King's Landing, Joffrey does nothing except abuse peasants and engage in emotional abuse of Sansa. Justified because:

** [[TropeNamers Orcus]], of course, through most of his history. {{Justified|Trope}}, in that not only is he in an EvilVersusEvil war with various other Demon Lords, but also with the Fallen Devils as well. Back in First and Second Edition however he was a real terror; first he died, then he came back from the dead, terrorized the planes, killed a bunch of gods [[CListFodder nobody cares about]], and died again. He hasn't been the same since his second resurrection. In 4th Edition, Orcus is fully statted out for combat in the Monster Manual. Clearly he's gotten a bit more active if he needs epic-level heroes to face him. What's more, he's not only the most powerful monster in that book, but he got himself put on the cover.

* In ''Videogame/EvilGenius2'', while the titular Evil Geniuses primarily keeps to their base they've also been given more abilities to actively boost their minions' productivity and are capable of defending themselves (particularly [[HuskyRuskie Red Ivan]]), with their offensive capabilities upgraded once they start building their specific DoomsdayDevice. Still, since their deaths mean that you lose it's best not to keep them in combat.

In the villain's defense, [[DystopiaIsHard maintaining order in one's domain can be a really time-consuming task]], what with all [[YouRebelScum those Rebel Scum]], [[SurroundedByIdiots stupid henchmen]], [[TheStarscream backstabbing lieutenants]], and the other daily tasks an EvilOverlord has to face every day. And any tactician will endorse the benefits of a fortified position surrounded by your most powerful servants. Then again, what kind of EvilOverlord doesn't take the time to smell the roses, pillage a village, and give a hero a good FinalBossPreview every once in a while? They deserve a little "me" time, too!

* ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}'': Salem prefers to work from the shadows and let subordinates act in her stead, as it enables her to turn humanity against itself and leave them pointing fingers at each other instead of her. She directs her forces remotely from the remnants of the Domain of Darkness. [[spoiler:After she learns in Volume 6 that her subordinates failed to obtain the Relic of Knowledge, which is being carried to Atlas by a newly reincarnated Ozpin, Salem decides to personally [[VillainNoLongerIdle take action]], crafting an aerial Grimm army and leading the attack on Atlas. In Volume 8, she is temporarily taken out by a FantasticNuke from Oscar, in a one-shot explosion from Ozpin's cane, just long enough for the kingdom's people to be evacuated to Vacuo.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Amphibia}}'': For the majority of the series, [[spoiler: [[Characters/AmphibiaTheCore The Core]]]] spends its time hidden beneath Newtopia castle, manipulating things from the shadows while Andrias carries out its will. However, this is justified, since it is connected to many cables that are integrated with the inner chambers of the castle. This ends up working in its favor, as nobody outside of the castle even knows it exists.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Amphibia}}'': For the majority of the series, [[spoiler:[[MechanicalAbomination The Core]]]] spends its time hidden beneath Newtopia castle, manipulating things from the shadows while Andrias carries out its will. However, this is justified, since it is connected to many cables that are integrated with the inner chambers of the castle. This ends up working in its favor, as nobody outside of the castle even knows it exists.

* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'' has [[Characters/StevenUniverseYellowDiamond Yellow Diamond]], [[Characters/StevenUniverseBlueDiamond Blue Diamond]], and [[Characters/StevenUniverseYellowDiamond Yellow Diamond]]. Yellow and Blue are [[ExcessiveMourning too caught up mourning]] the assassination of Pink to lead, and White [[{{Hikikomori}} never leaves her throne room/ship]], instead having White Pearl [[MouthOfSauron act as her voice in all matters]].

* ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'': Fire Lord Ozai filled out this trope to a tee for two and a half seasons. "You must defeat the Fire Lord before he takes over the world" was the mantra. In the last season, he makes up for it, however. WordOfGod comments that he was designed this way from the start, saying the first villain they designed for the show was Ozai and that they imagined him "leading from the comfort of his own throne" up until the end.

** Hawk Moth, despite being the BigBad, never confronts the heroes directly and just stays hidden in his secret lair. This is because his Miraculous is the Butterfly Brooch, which is used to grant powers to ''others'' while also making them his brainwashed servants. Therefore he just finds civilians [[MomentOfWeakness who are suffering]] to turn them into supervillains in a deal to get revenge. Since Hawk Moth can keep creating minions over and over again at no cost to himself, there's no real need for him to personally risk himself in the field. Also, he has a SecretIdentity as [[spoiler:rich businessman and fashion designer Gabriel Agreste]] and needs to protect his secret and never do risky moves. Furthermore, one episode implies that he simply lacks the stamina to actually face the heroes in one-on-one combat, though that turns out to be untrue later on. He usually never left home in his civilian identity as well, but changed his mind and went back to appearing in public without his villain costume.
** In the second episode of Season 2, through LoopholeAbuse he uses his power ''on himself'', to give him another set of powers and costume, goes to cause mayhem, and gets defeated by the heroes with no problem. They were close to finding out his secret identity, so he creates a SecondSuperIdentity to hide suspicion by pretending he is another victim of Hawk Moth.
** In the Season 2 finale, Hawk Moth finally leaves his hideout and appears in public, because he managed to boost his own power to make an army of supervillains made from his previous victims, and is an advantage, which was his ultimate plan, even when the whole army is defeated, it's shown that he can fight against the heroes on his own.
** In Season 3, finally he leaves his hideout in the Hawk Moth costume and without a plan because he needed to save his right-hand woman Mayura from getting defeated and captured by the heroes after she recklessly tried to confront them without talking to him. Not only does he genuinely care for her, but if he didn't save her, he would lose a Miraculous, and Mayura being unmasked would risk his own identity since without costumes, she is [[spoiler: his secretary.]]
* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'''s premiere for its third season portrays King Sombra in this way during the flashback to his [[TheDarkTimes oppressive rule]] over the Crystal Empire. This case is more [[JustifiedTrope justified]] than most considering his ZeroPercentApprovalRating; all of his subjects are kept enslaved by him and his BlackMagic, with no army of {{mooks}} to shoulder the grunt work for him.

* Emperor Belos from ''WesternAnimation/TheOwlHouse'' rarely leaves his palace, partially due to [[DarkLordOnLifeSupport suffering from a rare affliction that he's trying to cure]]. [[spoiler:At least until "Hollow Mind" revealed that the actual reason is that he is a WitchHunter with a genocidal hatred for witches, thereby indicating that he stays in his castle to have as little interaction with the witches and demons of the Boiling Isles as possible.]]

** Jack's sword is the only thing that can kill or even hurt Aku, so he mostly hides in his lair and sends minions out to do his dirty work, and he only ever attacks Jack personally if Aku has some advantage he's sure will let him win. By the time of season five, Aku hasn't even been seen outside of his lair in years. He destroyed all the time portals, so there's no reason to confront Jack and risk being killed by his sword (he didn't know that Jack lost the sword during their last confrontation).
** Even before Jack came back on the scene Aku was having minions created to do work for him, minions just as [[WhatMeasureIsAMook mortal]] as he is [[CompleteImmortality not]]. One of them speculates that the work was too slow when he did it on his own. Given the scope of Aku's powers and the total LackOfEmpathy he has for his minions, it's also possible he just gets bored of doing all the killing himself.

** [[EmperorScientist Hordak]], who delegates his minions to go conquer the world for him while he rests on his throne... partly because he's spending most of his time building [[KillerRobot new minions]], but mostly [[spoiler: because he's SecretlyDying, and needs to stay within easy reach of his laboratory if he's to keep himself alive, and also because he’s working on portal technology that will let him return to the side of his master, [[GreaterScopeVillain Horde Prime.]] He’s a busy man. He does strap a BFG to his arm and begin leading from the front in Season 4, some time after his armor gets an upgrade to its life support, but this happens mostly off-screen]].
** In season 5, [[spoiler:Horde Prime is an interesting subversion. While he really does spend the whole season on the throne of his space station, sending clones, robots, and mind-controlled Etherians to do all his dirty work, his ability to perform a VillainOverride on any of his minions allows him to personally menace the heroes anyways. Justified in that he himself seems to have no powers or abilities suitable for combat; he's already in the most useful place he can be]].
* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'' has Yellow, Blue, and White Diamond. Yellow and Blue are [[ExcessiveMourning too caught up mourning]] the assassination of Pink to lead, and White [[{{Hikikomori}} never leaves her throne room/ship]], instead having White Pearl [[MouthOfSauron act as her voice in all matters]].

* Series BigBad Albert Wesker took a powder during the events of ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil4'', sitting back in a dark control room and commanding both Ada Wong and Jack Krauser to do his dirty work. Odd for him as he normally averts this, preferring to get his hands dirty and either lead his goons himself or go on solo missions to get the job done personally.