Villain motivations: Greed
Creating compelling villains for your game can be hard. The more relatable the villain, the more pathos we can generate. Getting the characters to hate a villain is a great way to get the players to love them — or love to hate them. But giving that villain a sound motivation is key. The more solid the foundation, the higher you can build the villain up. In this series of posts, I’ll cover as many types of antagonist motivations as I can think of.
So let’s start with one of the classics: greed. Greed seems like a simple motivation, and you might even overlook it in favor of something more complicated, but let’s take a closer look. Greed may be more nuanced than you might think.
Greed is based in survival. The more food you hoard, the better you eat. If you take your neighbor’s food, then you eat even better. If you greedily claim the best tree or cave or whatever shelter the local clime calls for, the more likely you are to survive. We see it constantly among animals — and ultimately, we’re all animals. And our cat would eat all our food if we let him.
Scaled up and socially evolved, money is that power. It buys safety and comfort, things we all want. So most greed comes out in the form of hoarding money, and everyone understands that at some level, even if the villain has a galactic agenda.
What are some stories where greed was the antagonists’ motivation? There are countless ones to choose from. How about the bandits of Seven Samurai? Obadiah Stane of Iron Man. Hans Gruber in Die Hard. I mean, the guy’s name is practically Money Grubber. Cortez in the Road to Eldorado was horrifyingly greedy — just like the historical conquistadors. These are all great stories, and no one complains about cheap villain motivations there. (Pun intended.)
But while most greed is about money, it doesn’t have to be. It can be hoarding land or any other resource or objects of desire. That’s all greed.
So go ahead and have your villain out for plunder with pirate baddies! Or to strip mine whole planets with corporate antagonists. Or put puppies in blenders to make a street drug for pusher villains. Everyone wants something, and everyone has a price. If the price is high enough and horrible enough, then you have a villain that your whole table will both understand and gleefully hate.
