The Bestiary of Stupid: The Clich

Last night I was on register, and my coworker was putting away a special order which was something like “The History and Origins of Cliches”. However, the left edge was partially covered by a note, and so my geek-soaked brain parsed it as “The History and Origins of Liches”. It made me think, however, that fantasy gaming needs yet another undead monster: the clich.

Whenever an evil wizard of great power dies at the hands of a young hero whose father and/or village he killed, or by falling from a great height into fire, or by otherwise getting his long-due comeuppance, a clich may be created. The new clich will rapidly set about its nefarious plot of world domination and/or sweet vengeance, cackling madly at every opportunity, killing henchmen who dare to question its harebrained schemes, and capturing heroes in order to reveal its secrets to them. A clich can only be killed permanently if a hero succumbs to temptation and accepts the clich’s offer of vast power in exchange for his submission: the cognitive dissonance will cause the clich to explode.

Originally published on LiveJournal