During the investigation of recent hollers in the Complete Monster thread, it's become apparent to the staff that an insular, unfriendly culture has evolved in the Complete Monster and Magnificent Bastard threads that is causing problems.
Specific issues include:
- Overzealous hollers on tropers who come into the threads without being familiar with all the rules and traditions of the tropes. And when they are familiar with said rules and traditions, they get accused (with little evidence) of being ban evaders.
- A few tropers in the thread habitually engage in snotty, impolite mini-modding. There are also regular complaints about excessive, offtopic "socializing" posts.
- Many many thread regulars barely post/edit anywhere else, making the threads look like they are divorced from the rest of TV Tropes.
- Following that, there are often complaints about the threads and their regulars violating wiki rules, such as on indexing, crosswicking, example context and example categorization. Some folks are working on resolving the issues, but...
- Often moderator action against thread regulars leads to a lot of participants suddenly showing up in the moderation threads to protest and speak on their behalf, like a clique.
It is not a super high level problem, but it has been going on for years and we cannot ignore it any longer. There will be a thread in Wiki Talk
to discuss the problem; in the meantime there is a moratorium on further Complete Monster and Magnificent Bastard example discussion until we have gotten this sorted out.
Update: The new threads have been made and can be found here:
for the earliest date a work can be discussed, (usually two weeks from the US release), as well as who's reserved discussion.
- Why do a cleanup?: This trope definitely exists and has a well documented history of use. That being said, it frequently gets misused to a character who meets one of the components, namely that they are smart, charming while not necessarily even being a villain, or create good plans. While these are components, there is also a certain personality required, not to mention that all of the above are required to be present for a character to be a true Magnificent Bastard. As the trope attracts interest, it unfortunately brings in a lot of misuse and I thought the best way to rectify this would be a Perpetual Cleanup Thread, as is being done and has seen success with Complete Monster.
- What makes a Magnificent Bastard: Below is a list of the individual components to make this character. Note that they must all be present, not just some, which has lead to frequent misuse:
- Must be intelligent: Goes without saying, to be a Magnificent Bastard, the character has to be smart in the first place and use their brain to work towards whatever their end goal may be;
- Must be a Bastard: While going overboard in how vile the character is can be detrimental, a key aspect is the Bastard part of the trope, whether the character is an out-and-out antagonist in the work, some manner of Villain Protagonist, or something in between, they at least have some unscrupulous qualities to qualify for this trope;
- Must not be too detestable: Again, there is a ceiling on how bad the character can be before they just become too nefarious, blocking out the Magnificent part of the trope. A genocidal racist or child-raping Sadist aren't going to make the cut;
- Think on their feet: In addition to being a Chessmaster, a Magnificent Bastard, if the character deals with situations in which their initial plan is ruined, has to be able to pull a Xanatos Speed Chess and at least come up with a competent strategy to make up for lost time, otherwise they fail for being unable to think in tough spots;
- Have charm: Even if they don't necessarily make every character they meet fall in love with them and can even be detested by others, the audience has to find an amicable social relation to the character, or they are failing to make the impact required for this trope.
- What to do if a character is listed on a page but has not been approved?: They need to be removed, all candidates need to come through the cleanup thread first. The character could well count but they need to be analyzed properly and voted on first.
- Do we list Playing With this trope?: No; as a YMMV trope, this cannot be Played With, so we only want examples that are Played Straight.
- What do I do if I want a character to be listed as a Magnificent Bastard?: The greatest success Complete Monster saw for its cleanup effort was from the invention of the effort post format, so, borrowing from that, a troper wishing to propose a Magnificent Bastard will create such a post in the following format:
- Begin by describing The work, this will help establish the setting the character is in and for the reader to understand what kind of a scenario they are in;
- Summarize The character's actions, this will provide a listing for readers to understand what they do and how it applies to this trope because charm and lack of smugness are so crucial, this is a good time to be incorporating exactly the flavor of how they operate to explain this;
- List circumstances in which the character must Think on their feet, these are times where a wrench might be thrown in their initial plan and they have to adapt on the spot or even come up with a new scheme all together, this is also a good time to explain how the villain reacts to defeat when they have to face it, a true Magnificent Bastard won't break down into tears at the thought of death, they should have known such a possibility could occur and be able to handle it with more dignity;
- The competition, similar to the Heinous Standard dealt with for a Complete Monster, this section is to deal with how successful the character is in carrying out their plans compared to other characters. While, as a villain, they probably are going to lose in the end, it is good to explain how other characters handle the same situation. There is no exceptionalism case to be made for this trope but explaining the variety helps the reader have a better understanding of the proposal.
- How do you know when the character's arc is done so they can be proposed? When their tenure as a villain or antagonist finishes. This could happen in a single Story Arc in an entire work, a single work of a franchise, or the whole series in general. We'll show lenience to Long-Runners with constantly recurring candidates or series with outstanding continuities (ex. comic books), and it's entirely possible to count in a work or two but not in general for a reason like Depending on the Writer.
- What about candidates evil because of external sources? Those Made of Evil can qualify if they show enough individuality and tactical acumen — in other words, they have the personality to fulfill the magnificence requirement. Conversely, those brainwashed, especially if they're a better person without it, may fail the individuality aspect and cannot count.
- What if they are under orders from a higher-up? Depends. If the boss created the plans down to the letter and the candidate is just following them, sounds like we should discuss the boss instead. However, if the candidate takes creative liberties with the orders, adds their own charm and flair to them, fills in holes in the orders, and/or actively deals with obstacles their boss did not talk about, the candidate shows enough individual thinking to qualify.
- What about Character Development? An MB is something a character can develop into... a nice person who plots well might become more morally gray as the work goes on and hits the "Bastard" criteria, thus making them viable. Likewise, a Smug Snake might shed their ego, become more understanding of the threat others pose and gain the personality or "Magnificent" criteria, likewise making them viable. Conversely, a character who looks like this trope might suffer from a Sanity Slippage or just get outed as not being as smart as they thought they were and become incompatible with MB.
- Can an MB be a good guy? Not in the conventional sense... it is required they have at least some dubious traits lest they fail the "Bastard" criteria. That being said, a character who pulls a Heel–Face Turn or eventually stops taking villainous actions is still fair game: as there was a point in time where they were both "Magnificent" and a "Bastard" at the same time and they've merely adapted as time goes on. Now... if such a character begins showing other issues (i.e.: becomes prone to freak outs or starts getting outwitted) then they're compromising their Magnificence and will probably be deemed a cut. What's important is stylishly operating while at least for some time being willing to take at best underhanded methods to see a job done. A Heel–Face Turn in itself isn't a disqualifier but they do have to have been "Magnificent" and a "Bastard" at the same time and afterwards can't start slipping on the former front.
- What about characters whose stories can take different routes?: When proposing a character in a form of media that has them in multiple story routes. Said character must be consistent with their characteristics in all routes. (ex.: Can't have an example who shows promise on one route yet fails in another.) The only exception is if a later installment of the series confirms the character's actions which made them worth proposing are the canon route.
- Is there a timeframe rule like with Complete Monster?: Yes, please wait two weeks until after the work has concluded before proposing a character (again, usually using the North American air date). As is the case with CM, we want to give a reasonable time frame so that everyone interested in seeing the work has done so and can participate in the discussion without having anything spoiled.
- What about groups like with Complete Monster?: This is a point of divergence between the two tropes. While CM does not allow for a single entry encompassing more than three characters lest their heinousness for crimes becomes too watered down, with MB as long as they are treated as one "unit" it is acceptable to lump all characters provided they share acts of charm and intelligence.
- Can I propose my own work's character as a Magnificent Bastard?: No, this is a YMMV subject and the creator of a content is way too biased to be able to evaluate the criteria we're looking for without a second opinion taking over. That being said, you are more than welcome to encourage someone to consume your creation and if they feel a character counts, are more than welcome to suggest them.
- My example/edit has been approved, but the example subpage is locked! How do I get it added?: The moderators do not add examples to locked example subpages in the MagnificentBastard/ namespace directly. Rather, you need to do the edit to a sandbox page that follows the format Sandbox.MagnificentBastard<Name of the example subpage> (e.g for MagnificentBastard.Fullmetal Alchemist it's Sandbox.Magnificent Bastard Fullmetal Alchemist) and on a Friday, ask in the locked pages edit requests thread for the content to be swapped in.
Thread rules
When voting a troper must specify the effort post they're voting on and cannot merely vote on "Everything I missed" as in the past it has indicated the poster didn't read the effort post and is guessing instead of analyzing.
Resolved items
In general, a character listed on this trope is considered "settled". This means they should not be challenged unless information used to list them was incorrect or information was missed in the initial discussion.
However, when re-litigating a candidate, the same rules apply for when they were originally proposed. If they do not have five or more upvotes than downvotes for approval upon a re-litigation, including votes from the initial discussion if they do not change, then they are a cut.
This especially applies to the characters listed below, who have been discussed excessively and repeated attempts to get them listed/cut may result in punitive action for bogging down the thread.
Definitely an MB
- Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers: Any sadism Darkrai displays is limited in effect thanks to the game's nature and any cowardice which can be inferred about him is Alternative Character Interpretation about his tactical retreats.
- Avatar: The Last Airbender: Azula's Villainous Breakdown is undone in the sequel comic Smoke & Shadow where she regains her composure and ends up stable and in control enough to count.
Definitely not an MB
- South Park: The show's frequent use of vulgar comedy and mean-spirited humor leaves any potential candidates devoid of the dignity or charm to qualify.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Aug 31st 2023 at 4:15:22 AM
I don't mind at all Emerald. I await the EP on the Dread King. As for Number two I say go for it man. Austin Powers is built on Rule of Funny, I don't really consider that a big deal.
You can only write so much in your forum signature. It's not fair that I want to write a piece of writing yet it will cut me off in the mid
Lies and Violence!
A Practical Guide to Evil is a web serial set on the continent of Calernia. I've explained this a few times, but to reiterate, this is a world where standard fantasy tropes and stories can be manipulated by Genre Savvy individuals (so a villain who says "Nothing can stop me now!" is basically committing suicide). This entire world was created as a wager between the Gods, to see whether Good or Evil would prevail over the other—however, they've had other wagers before, so when Armageddon inevitably rolls around they intend to reset reality for a different game.
Their main agent in enforcing the rules of this wager is an immortal abomination called the Wandering Bard, equipped with an omniscient mastery over tropes. However, she manages to acquire a few persistent enemies in her mission...
Who is Neshamah Be-Iakim, the Dead King?
Successfully conquering Hell and raising an undead army, Neshamah began plotting against the Bard—even though he outsmarted her in his rise to godhood, the Gods won't let her rest until he's struck down for his dreams. As such, he began crafting himself a story with periodic raids into the living world.
- Any prisoners taken alive are brought to his Hell, the "Serenity," where Neshamah dotes on them and their descendants as an all-loving god. Eliminating all strife and disease while sharing his vast treasure-troves of magic and military knowledge, his subjects are raised to be both exceedingly competent and undyingly loyal, with many offering themselves up to be harvested as elite undead generals in his armies.
- The attacks are brutal enough to garner him widespread fear but simultaneously small-scale enough to not attract too much attention from heroes seeking to kill him—if he went overboard with trying to kill potential pawns of the Bard and threw all his might against the living nations, he'd just get killed by the Near-Villain Victory trope. It's a balancing act of not being unstoppable while nonetheless methodically securing every avenue to victory. Within a few centuries, Neshamah has engraved himself into the legend of Calernia as its "Hidden Horror," too integral to the overarching story to be slain without serious narrative weight against him. The Bard manipulates the living nations into forming several continent-wide crusades with the sole purpose of killing him, and while each is more successful than the last they all end up butchered.
- Neshamah himself never leaves the Serenity unless invited out for alliance with other villains. The Big Bad doesn't have good life expectancy, but a recurring antagonist acting as the lesser member of a Big Bad Duumvirate is more likely to escape to fight another day.
In the present, Neshamah is contacted by the Dread Empress Malicia for an alliance. To create a bidding war for more favorable concessions in exchange for his help, he also invites Catherine to negotiate a team-up—though really he's curious as to how she achieved godhood by accident, and wants to personally invite her to the Immortal Club. One of Cat's friends, Masego, steals some of Neshamah's memories during their visit, allowing him to later possess Masego when he's grieving his slain parents and manipulate him into creating a ritual that will allow them to be brought back. The ritual begins phasing the faerie realm with the real world, which would allow Neshamah to slaughter his enemies before raising them to march on the living nations... at least, that's what everyone assumes he wants.
The true purpose of the ritual behind this smokescreen is to allow him to discern the Bard's true motives. Long story short, the only way for her to finally die after millennia of service to the Gods is for everyone else to die. The Bard can subtly influence the actions of both heroes, villains, and angels themselves, so she wants to manipulate the leader of the current crusade into using an angel corpse as a nuclear warhead against Neshamah, the blast radius of which she can then amplify to kill everyone. Neshamah's disappointed by the pettiness, but with this info he allows a piece of his soul to be destroyed to trick the Bard into thinking he failed, then tricks Cat into falling into the trap of the villain Kairos Theodosian, who cripples the angelic Choir that would power the corpse. With that taken off the table, he reveals the Bard's plans before the nations of the world to finally discredit her and declares war on all life, taking a risky gamble to remove her pawns while her influence is weakened.
What follows is two years of war, with Neshamah pulling out every stop: underwater barges ferrying weapons across lakes, shapeshifting ghouls that eat and replace people, giant skeleton dragons as flying troop transports, undetectable plagues, undead rats rising from sewers to eat injured soldiers in their sleep, enormous moving "Crab" city-fortress-weapon forges immune to angel attacks, teleporting entire lakes on top of armies, etc.
In the climactic battle for the city of Hainaut in Book 6, Neshamah constructs a bridge to efficiently carry his troops across a lake without wear and tear on their weapons. The threat posed by this brings Cat's armies out to Hainaut to stop him, but in one of his usual Xanatos Gambits, his main goal was to lure her forces out and gradually bleed them. In the battle, he tricks the drow goddess Sve Noc into flying into a blind rage, allowing for her to get captured by a ritual he uses to usurp control over the drow's magic "Night". They have to cripple the Night's power to stop him, but the damage allows his hordes to overwhelm them and the hero known as the Grey Pilgrim has to call down a star from the Heavens to wipe out the hordes.
...So you know that thing where Rita Repulsa makes her monster grow, giving the Power Rangers free rein to bring out the Megazord and immediately kick its ass? The Pilgrim calling down the Heavens first gives Neshamah the perfect narrative weight to respond with his own masterstroke without retaliation, summoning three more Hell portals. They're delayed from opening for about a year by some giants sacrificing themselves, but Neshamah amplifies the excess magic generated to destroy as much cropland as possible. Cat goes to invade the Dread Empire of Praes and recruit diabolists who could deal with these portals permanently, and in the process pulls one over on the Bard... who, in a fit of sheer petty rage, mutes all the Evil stories. You know, like the Near-Villain Victory trope that prevents Neshamah from going all out.
He immediately notices, unleashing plagues and demons on even more cropland and cities before moving to secure control over the one thing that could bring the Evil tropes back, the aforementioned Night, by giving the warlord Kurosiv the ritual he used to ascend to godhood and destroy Sephirah. While Neshamah distracts Sve Noc's loyal generals, Kurosiv can sacrifice the rest of its race to steal their Night, giving it to Neshamah once the modified ritual kills Kurosiv. This plan fails since Kurosiv is an idiot, but Neshamah isn't too ruffled. Cat's armies are on the brink of starvation, and once they get around to teleporting to Keter he magically smashes their teleportation system, stranding them without a supply train. He just needs to hold out long enough for them to collapse.
In his opening move of the siege, Neshamah allows Cat's armies to enter the capital before beginning a massive ritual underground. The waste magic generated by the ritual is used to power magical artifacts buried around the city, creating "entropy zones" that age soldiers to death. The ritual itself turns Keter into, as one comment calls it, a "Beyblade Rubik's Cube Jigsaw Puzzle Gyroscopic City of Death"—a constantly shifting battleground that kills basically everyone before the last Titan, Kreios, arrives to rewind time by two hours... two hours Neshamah spends throwing every monstrosity he has to kill a disturbing number of important characters.
In addition, he releases three old monsters he's had stored away: two undead Titans, lesser gods who used to rule Calernia, and a half-dead drakon, an ancient dragon god that is hunger personified. The Titans fight Kreios, but the drakon has a multifunction purpose as an unkillable guard dog, a separate Big Bad to draw attention away from him in the narrative, and an initially unknown third role.
Eventually, thirteen fight their way to Neshamah's throne room (surviving a grueling tower filled with death traps designed to complete their character arcs and subsequently force them to waste the climactic power-ups and special moves they've been saving for the final battle). If you've read The Kane Chronicles, think of Apophis' Duat fight: everyone is split between a billion different pocket dimensions filled with death traps. They individually fight their way through from the throne room's entrance to Neshamah himself... who proceeds to absolutely manhandle them, not putting in any effort while simultaneously having the time of his life. The Mirror Knight manages to behead him with the Severance, a sword specifically designed to destroy his soul... only for the survivors to find themselves teleported back to the entrance. Neshamah, like any good lich, has a phylactery to recoalesce his soul should it be destroyed. Cat realizes too late that the city of Keter itself is that phylactery.
Nine fight their way back to his throne, but Cat remembers a seemingly trivial fact about lichdom from one of her earliest adventurers (complicated to explain, just go with it) and enacts her final plan: using all the narrative power accumulated from reshaping the entire continent to her will throughout the years, Cat sentences Neshamah to death and carves her judgement into fate itself so that the narrative will bend over backwards to see him dead. And so begins the greatest Rasputinian Death ever.
- Neshamah unleashes every curse and Revenant he has, killing three heroes before one sacrifices herself to drag them into her own personal pocket dimension.
- The Mirror Knight goes for another swing, and while the Dead King kills him with a curse, he uses the narrative weight provided by his sacrifice to reflect the curse back at him and throw the Severance to the White Knight.
- Cat has the White Knight use the power he gained from completing his character arc a few chapters ago to resurrect Neshamah from undeath, removing the phylactery from play. Cat negates another killing spell and the White Knight beheads him once more.
- As Neshamah's soul bursts from his body in one last grasp for escape, Masego snatches it out of the air and eats it whole.
As for the drakon, it usurps the undead hordes and sets out to consume everything. The only character with a strong enough narrative to kill it is Kreios, the last living Titan and sworn enemy of their kind, but he's occupied laying his undead siblings to rest—an equally strong personal narrative he can't walk away from. Nothing can stop the Dead King's final revenge.
Kreios' adopted daughter Antigone turns herself into a god and commits murder-suicide on the drakon.
Is he magnificent?
Holy shit is he ever. I streamlined a lot, but I think you can get the gist of his character: Neshamah is a patient, methodical genius who has survived millennia against the smartest heroes to walk Calernia and the Bard's omniscient schemes, regularly employing Xanatos Gambits to even more frequent success. He knows exactly what tropes to play or avoid in a world that runs on them, ensuring victory isn't overwhelmingly inevitable so he isn't immediately skewered by a hero yet nonetheless securing every route to triumph. It takes effectively rewriting reality to finally put him down, and even then it's a brutal fight Cat barely wins after throwing everything they have at him.
It significantly helps he's so Affably Evil. Sure, he'd kill everyone and not lose a wink of sleep, but whenever he gives respect you can tell he genuinely means it. His interactions with Cat are filled but nothing with praise and congratulations towards her successes, which makes him stand out among the other antagonists (classist, sadistic nobles; Holier Than Thou heroes; the Bard being incessantly smug regarding the misery she causes) as a classy and respectable foe, especially with his goal of escaping the all-powerful control of distant, cruel Gods—which, while not excusing his actions, is nonetheless presented in a somewhat sympathetic light.
Too much of a bastard?
I was considering him for a crossover for a reason. He wants to slaughter all life on the continent, swelling his armies with the souls of enemies doomed to serve him for eternity. Might be too bad... in any other scenario. The heinous standard here is enormous, with Praes alone ramping it up to regular mass-sacrifices, multiple characters who plot to plunge entire nations into starvation, and more fates worse than death than a billionaire has money. Neshamah is rightfully viewed as a monster for his crimes, but they're tellingly restrained in everything save for sheer scale when looked at in comparison—nothing is done out of base sadism, and every horrid act that suggests otherwise always has some hidden purpose behind it.
Enslaving the souls of his enemies is also surprisingly not the worst Fate Worse than Death. The undead can't meaningfully grow or change, so whereas in another setting characters may be driven insane by their centuries of imprisonment or being forced to kill their former friends, here they're stuck in their state of mind at the moment of death, meaning most are more depressed and annoyed than mentally broken or anything. The worst it gets is the Knight Errant silently asking to be given a noble death in combat when Neshamah ignobly sacrifices her; the Thief of Stars is lippy whenever she gets the chance, the Spellblade remains a haughty racist, and King Edmund constantly muses about how he'll get the last laugh in the end. It still sucks, but is otherwise kind of chill compared to what you usually get from this fate.
The main issue is whether releasing the drakon to devour everything as posthumous revenge ("If the world is not mine, what need is there to be a world at all?") is too petty, but frankly I think it adds to his magnificence. As noted earlier, it's the final step in a long Xanatos Gambit: the drakon is first a guard dog, than a separate Big Bad to increase his chances of survival, than a final warning to discourage his killers, than a last laugh—one free of charge, seeing how it's so volatile it would have continued to wreak havoc after his death whether he wanted it or not. Not to mention, the reveal comes immediately off the heels of Neshamah happily acknowledging that Cat has truly become his equal, and the "if I can't have the world" thing is less reflective of his own beliefs but rather fondly quoting/paying respects to his old friend, Dread Empress Triumphant. As horrible as it is, it's absurdly clever and the manner in which he unveils it retains his weirdly respectful characterization even in his final moments.
Also, he's an ancient lich king older than basically every nation and the inventor of the most powerful branch of magic ever seen, who has successfully fought off an omniscient monstrosity for centuries and conquered Hell. Graceful Loser isn't really a thing in this setting—Catherine's homeland's entire culture revolves around the honor in making one's defeat as difficult and bitter as possible for your enemies—and if anyone's accomplished enough badassery to deserve a final "screw you" to his killers, it's Neshamah.
Verdict?
TL;DR, Neshamah is efficient and awesome for the sheer audacity of his plans, and while he gets up to some evil shit, the heinous standard is so ridiculously high that our protagonist can crucify hundreds of POWs and still be seen as a morally upstanding character. His genuine respect and disinterest in needless sadism consequently do wonders to make him stand out as a classy, refined foe compared to Praes, and his malice is equally matched by his charisma and audacious brilliance, with a massive heinous standard offsetting his worst crimes. Personally? ![[tup]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thumbs_up_emote.png "[thumb up]"){kind=small}
- Neshamah "Trismegistus" Be-Iakim, the Dead King, rose from the lowliest prince of Sephirah to the legendary "Hidden Horror" of Calernia, and one of the greatest monsters of the Age of Wonders alongside the Wandering Bard. Orchestrating his rise to power so thoroughly that even the Bard was unable to prevent it, Neshamah tricked the citizens of Keter into undeath and transformed himself into an immortal lich god, audaciously seeking to survive past Last Dusk to escape the control of the Gods themselves by conquering one of the Hells. From this utopian "Serenity," Neshamah has waged a millennia-long war against the Bard and her living pawns, expertly surviving the stories weaved to slay him while swelling his undead hordes with every crusade and doting on living subjects as an all-loving god to inspire exceptional competence and undying loyalty. With countless innovative war machines, abominations, and schemes within schemes up his sleeves, Neshamah declares war on all life on Calernia after finally exposing the Bard's malevolence, conducting brutal battles against Catherine and using every loss to bleed his enemies to always emerge stronger than before. Philosophical and ever-affable yet unrelenting in his quest to spread death to all who could stand in his way, Neshamah proves himself to be the ultimate pinnacle of villainy and one of Catherine's toughest, most intelligent foes in her quest for peace.
Edited by EmeraldEmperor on Feb 2nd 2024 at 10:10:04 AM
Big yes to the Dead King! Great work and any worries I had got washed away reading about how emphasized his Affably Evil and Villainous Respect aspects are, great work Emerald!
Goku Black
![[tup]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Thumbs_up_emoticon_3268.png "[thumb up]"){kind=small}
Dead King.
Self-Declared King of Everything
to the Dead King.
Goku Black
I'm also taking Call of the Night here too. I actually already have someone in mind. Just waiting for her arc to end.
"That's right mortal. By channeling my divine rage into power, I have forged a new instrument in which to destroy you."
I THOUGHT there might be a point when we went through Austin Powers! Super excited to see what comes out of it!
Woagh
to the Dead King.
Speaking of Practical Guide, I found this:
- Memetic Badass: General Abigail's status as an (admittedly Evil-aligned) Accidental Hero and Magnificent Bastard. All of the victories and strategic cunning that caused her to become Callow's first Callowan General since the Conquest are the result of her self-preservation instincts, desire to get a cushy retirement, and blind luck as her plans always seem to go wrong in just the right ways.
I can't find her on the series MB page, and considering how it's mentioning how her victories depend on luck, gonna guess she doesn't count.
Edited by DoodSlayer136 on Aug 12th 2022 at 2:43:31 AM
NOISE IS CALLING, PICK UP PHONE
Professor Gigachad
Dead King, I guess. I kind of want to restate my concern for Practical Guide though, that is a lot of MB's for a single work, I know that the whole competition angle is not as strict as it is for CM but with this many, it becomes more concerning, especially if all of these factions are directly competing against eachother.
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
I'm sure Emerald Emperors knows what they are doing. There's no limit to how many number of MB a work can have. If anything I'm more surprised that there isn't as many CMs
to the Dead King
![[down]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_down.png "[down]"){kind=icon}
again I'm sure Emerald knows what he doing. There's no need to worry about anything
Edited by G-Editor on Aug 12th 2022 at 6:01:20 AM
Professor Gigachad
No there isn't a limit, but this many MB's in a single work, this isn't like Star Wars where it is a massive multimedia franchise.
CM Sandboxes, MB Sandboxes
Lies and Violence!
x4 Go ahead and cut; while I will say that the "only wins through luck" thing is exaggerated for humor and largely stems from her own lack of self-confidence from pov chapters, she's still nowhere near enough of a bastard to count.
I understand the concerns, but the thing here is that almost every faction eventually unites behind Cat for a three-way brawl between her, Neshamah, and the Bard. A lot of characters do end up outplayed by each other, but they also get second chances to make up for their failures as competent allies who use their strengths to cover each other's weaknesses. Take for instance the Grey Pilgrim, who doesn't have what I'd call a fun time in his efforts to outmaneuver Cat in Book 5 but spends Book 6 as an invaluable advisor with an expertise in the stories they're trying to use to win, culminating in an epic heroic sacrifice to save them all when Cat gets conned by the Dead King + some parting words to ensure she follows the story beats to victory. In contrast, characters like Klaus and Rozala face major military defeats early on, and while they remain perfectly capable they never get anything to properly recover or reestablish that they're on equal ground with those who originally beat them.
Edited by EmeraldEmperor on Aug 12th 2022 at 6:09:14 AM
Goku Black
Plus isn't the work massive. Which helps with number of examples.
"That's right mortal. By channeling my divine rage into power, I have forged a new instrument in which to destroy you."
Lies and Violence!
As for questions for CM, like I said in the EP, the heinous standard is ridiculous. It would take a solid minute for a reader to register that forcing a baby to eat another baby—yes, that's a thing that happened—is only slightly worse than the norm for the Dread Emperors. The only three that have made it to CM-worthy evil so far are two who individually rack up or plan to create enough corpses to fill a continent and the most high-profile, lowest resource rapist. I made a list here.
Edited by EmeraldEmperor on Aug 12th 2022 at 6:19:10 AM
Big yes to Dead King, happy to see him here!
Barb / Temporary Kylo
No Offense but we, kinda already talked about there being a lot of candidates from this a while ago? And it had the same answers
to Dead King
Lies and Violence!
While I'm at it, here are some possible quotes:
Could trim it down to the bold if length is an issue.
Not attached to this one.
We were, at most, two hours away from annihilation. And that was if our armies held by some miracle, the finest of outcomes. In practice I expected we had half of that at most. The Dead King had filled his spire with traps and dead and sorceries, but they weren’t truly his line of defense. That was, as it'd been since the start of this, time. It was the simplest thing in the world, so simple we'd overlooked it...
None of it was meant to stop [the heroes] cold, the Dead King knew better than that. They couldn't be, he'd be fighting the story when trying. So instead he was grinding them down into exhaustion, flushing out all their tricks before they made it to his last throne room. The reigning king of attrition was up to his favorite game once more, ending his war the same way he had begun it. There was something almost admirable about that, I thought. There was no lie in Neshamah, no compromise.
The Dead King was true to his nature, horror that it was.
The Dead King, who sounds like an utter *chef's kiss* of this trope to be honest!
Time for my last FE7 guy, one of two playable characters you'll be hearing about - Lighty claimed the other. Say hello to...
Who is Jaffar the Angel of Death? What has he done?
They say that he was found, barely older than an infant, sleeping atop a pile of corpses in the center of his home village, as serene as if he lay in a cushioned cradle. The he himself killed them this early in his life seems unlikely, but the incident set the pattern that would follow the rest of his life: the silent young man known only as Jaffar was disturbingly always more comfortable among the dead than the living. Spirited away from his home by the diabolic sorcerer and power-broker Nergal, Jaffar was raised to know nothing besides life as the evil magician's enforcer. He never had friends, lovers, or close attachments of any kind. He barely ate, drank, or slept. What he did do was kill.
And indeed, he was so good at it, claiming innumerable victims from the shadows and caring nothing for them, that when Nergal's faction pulled its silent coup on the Black Fang, one of the incumbent Four Fangs was demoted to make room for him, and despite being apparently the youngest, he was far and away the best even compared to the other three.
We first meet him in-game at Nergal's island base, where at the wicked Chancellor Ephidel's behest, Jaffar executes the spy Leila, a mole Hector had placed within the Fang, earning the enmity of Hectot himself and her fellow spy and boyfriend, Matthew. He wounds Lord Elbert, and manages to escape before the heroes do, returning to the Fang's base in Bern. Injured on another job later on, he is nursed back to health by Nino, the teenage daughter of Sonia Reed, much to his perplexity - she should have killed him on the spot due to his wounds making him a liability. His coldness toward his own life in turn perplexes her, and an Odd Friendship is born! He is later assigned to accompany her on her first mission as a full member of the Black Fang, the assassination of Prince Zephiel at the behest of his own father, King Desmond. In exchange, Desmond will agree to Nergal's terms to invade Lycia. Sonia sends Nino on here way, but bids Jaffar hang back for an additional order.
...and that's that Nino needs to die too. See, the prince is extremely popular among the people, and King Desmond fears rebellion if there isn't an obvious and very dead scapegoat to pin his murder on. To the horror of even the supposed ultimate killer, Sonia rants on about how she's finally found a use for her "worthless" child. Jaffar grudgingly sulks off to the palace, but when Nino can't go through with the assassination, he finds he can't go through with killing her. Instead, the pair rebel against the Fang, with Jaffar carving his way through Ursula's men to save the person who has finally given him an actual purpose in life (seriously, he's the one bit of relief you get in that chapter ![[lol]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lol2v12_4863.png "[lol]"){kind=small}
). The heroes recruit both of them, though neither Hector nor Matthew ever forgives him, and he leads them to the Fang's headquarters to make Sonia pay the piper, also discovering that she has murdered Brendan. Utter collapse of the assassin guild follows, but Jaffar and Nino stick with the party for the final stretch of the game to take the fight to Nergal.
Sadly, after all he's been through, Jaffar does not get a happy ending - with the Fang gone, the bereaved of those they've killed pay outrageous sums to bounty hunters to execute survivors, and Jaffar has to slip back into the shadows he knows so well to avoid them. It's even sadder if he marries Nino (his only romantic option, though she can be paired with someone else); as BOTH of them have to go into hiding, leaving their twin sons Lugh and Raigh for all intents and purposes orphaned... but also in exactly the place they need to be to become great heroes themselves.
Intelligent? Charismatic? Thinks on his feet?
I can describe Jaffar, essentially, as a somewhat nicer Darth Maul. Like Maul, he's someone who has been raised for no purpose beyond being the bad guys' blunt instrument, but unfortunately forth, is also smart enough to realize that being a blunt instrument kinda sucks and thus decides to slip the leash. He never says much, preferring to let his daggers do the talking, and he's even willing to turn them on his own comrades if it means saving the life of the one person who makes him feel like an actual human being.
Bastard? Too much?
Well, considering he makes a Heel–Face Turn, he clearly isn't "too much," but even afterwards he's an unashamed cold-blooded killer, just one who can be trusted to point the sharp pointy things at the bad guys this time. If anything, my one concern is that he only starts being magnificent when he's largely done with being a "true" bastard - he's utterly merciless when under Nergal, but also wholly dependent on him. He defects with utter deadly panache, bet after that is pretty clearly one of the good guys.
Verdict
Fairly confident yes, but as usual up to you.
Yes to Jaffar and gonna concur there with HT on the Dead King, the nuance to his demeanour even in the face of his goals and sheer scope of his machinations is something I can really see fitting this trope perfectly and I understand why Emerald was so excited to get to him: the potential 'too bad' aspect feels like a Kimblee situation where the moments of humanity and brilliance are pointedly planted to detract from how awful they could seem. He seems pretty perfect for this trope
As for the worry of too many I'll restate my understanding is tonally it feels antithetical to a work like ASOIAF, where many compete but tons are shown to stand out in the massive war, rather than just being another player hopeless at controlling the scope of events and losing composure or dignity for it (and even ASOIAF has managed a page!)... additionally I'd like to bring up that if it's the series I'm finding here then we're looking at a seven book series with over 10k words... I think we're good.
Professor Gigachad
Jaffar.
Wait for seven installments, the work page make it look like it was only one as it was calling it a single Web Serial Novel. If everyone thinks it's fine that the series has so many MB's I guess that is cool with me, I guess ASOIAF isn't that much different with the only real difference being that ASOIAF is a far more popular series, and also it has a TV adaptation.
CM Sandboxes, MB Sandboxes
Yeah, it's not quite the same but it reminds me of when people kept asking why Haazheel had such a long CM writeup since (especially at the time) tropes had a pretty minimalist page on it which didn't impress upon a viewer that it was actually a comic spanning decades with one of the nastiest baddies put to page as The Heavy.
Self-Declared King of Everything
to Jaffar.
At least this FE MB is one I actually like.
Edited by Critica7 on Aug 12th 2022 at 8:27:13 AM
Check out my current fanfiction project.
Berserk Button: misusing Berserk Button
Dead King.
to Jaffar
Might as well throw Goldmember in there too if we're having a party.
Jokes aside, while Dr Evil obviously has a host of glaring disqualifications, his silliness itself doesn't seem too out of line with the kind of candidates we've passed through before.
Edited by LoreDeluxe on Aug 12th 2022 at 1:37:06 AM
Think you're tough because you made it through Lord of the Rings? Real men survive The Silmarillion.