: Re: Evil plans - how do you come up with interesting ones? I just wrote a long way into a first draft for Nanowrimo before realizing my villain’s evil plan kinda wasn’t interesting at best

@Si5022468

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To paraphrase a character from one of my stories:

"Evil is subjective. Nobody thinks of themselves as a villain because nobody likes to think that they are wrong."

The key to writing an interesting villain is to write someone who does not believe they are a villain. They may acknowledge the immorality or illegality of their actions, but they will nonetheless believe that, for some reason or other, they are doing the right thing. They don't have to be correct in that belief either.

This can take any number of forms:

They believe that their actions are "for the greater good", and/or will ultimately benefit society as a whole (Examples: Thanos, N from Pokémon Black/White)
They believe that their actions will ultimately benefit a loved one (Example: Mr. Freeze, Soran from Star Trek: Generations (as mentioned by Amadeus))
They are trying to hold back some even greater evil (Examples: Lordgenome from Gurren Lagann, the villain of Fable 3, Galeem from Super Smash Bros. Ultimate)
They are acting on the orders of some higher power, who has brainwashed or manipulated them into believing they're doing the right thing (Examples: Fate Testarossa from Season 1 of Lyrical Nanoha)
They are retaliating against a (real or perceived) injustice that was done to them or someone they care about (Examples: Carrie, Syndrome from The Incredibles - and the character of mine that said the above quote (and the character they're saying it to))
They do not acknowledge the legitimacy of the laws they are breaking and/or the government that enforces them (Examples: Anarky from Batman, Lelouch Lamperouge from Code Geass)
They have no traditional concept of morality and genuinely cannot comprehend that what they are doing is wrong (Example: Kyubey from Madoka Magica)
They started out committing crimes for one or more of the above reasons, but are either "in too deep" and can no longer back out, forcing them to continue, or have "jumped off the slippery slope" and physically cannot stop themselves from committing crimes (Examples: The Riddler, Walter White, Light Yagami from Death Note)

Once you know what drives them to commit villainous acts, you can start planning out what kinds of villainous acts they might undertake, and why. To use your example:

it basically involved kidnapping and using the descendant of an ancient species to network with an artifact that would only work with people with the right magical DNA. Villain’s plan was to use that to reach their level of magical ability.

So your villain wants magic power - but what do they want it for? Just for the sake of having it? That's not a very compelling motive, and will make your villain feel flat and generic.

Instead, there needs to be some greater end goal for which they need that power. Perhaps it's to carry out a large-scale act of vengeance. Perhaps it's to resurrect a loved one. Perhaps it's so they can do something for the "greater good". Make the plan an elaborate stepping stone to their real goal, and the kidnapped person an "unfortunate sacrifice", and suddenly it's a lot more interesting.

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