| Evil Overlord Survival Guide |
| 100 Things To Do If You Become An Evil Overlord |
1. My Legions of Terror will have helmets with clear Plexiglas visors, not face concealing
ones.
2. My ventilation ducts will be too small to crawl through.
3. My noble half-brother whose throne I usurped will be killed, not kept anonymously
imprisoned in a forgotten cell in my dungeon.
4. Shooting is not too good for my enemies.
5. The artifact that is the source of my power will not be kept on the Mountain of Despair
beyond the River of Fire guarded by the Dragon of Eternity. It will be in my
safe-deposit box. The same applies to the object that is my one weakness.
6. I will not gloat over my enemies predicament before killing them.
7. When I've captured my adversary and he says, "Look, before you kill me, will you at
least tell me what this is all about?" I'll say, "No." and shoot him. No, on second
thought, I'll shoot him and then say "No."
8. After I kidnap the beautiful princess, we will be married immediately in a quiet civil
ceremony, not a lavish spectacle in three weeks' time during which the final phase of
my plan will be carried out.
9. I will not include a self-destruct mechanism unless absolutely necessary. If it is
necessary, it will not be a large red button labelled, "Danger: Do Not Push". The big
red button marked "Do Not Push" will instead trigger a spray of bullets on anyone
stupid enough to disregard it. Similarly, the ON/OFF switch will clearly not be labelled
as such.
10. I will not interrogate my enemies in the inner sanctum - a small hotel room well
outside my border will work just as well.
11. I will be secure in my superiority. Therefore, I will feel no need to prove it by leaving
clues in the form of riddles or leaving my weaker enemies alive to show they pose no
threat.
12. One of my advisors will be an average five-year-old child. Any flaws in my plan that he
is able to spot will be corrected before implementation.
13. All slain enemies will be cremated, or at least several round of ammunition emptied into
them, not left for dead at the bottom of the cliff. The announcement of their deaths, as
well as any accompanying celebration, will be deferred until after the aforementioned
disposal.
14. The hero is not entitled to a last kiss, a last cigarette, or any other form of last
request.
15. I will never employ any device with a digital count-down. If I find that such a device is
absolutely unavoidable. I will set it to activate when the counter reaches 117 and the
hero is just putting his plan into operation.
16. I will never utter the sentence "But before I kill you, there's just one thing I want to
know."
17. When I employ people as advisors, I will occasionally listen to their advice.
18. I will not have a son. Although his laughably under-planned attempt to usurp power
would easily fail, it would prove a fatal distraction at a crucial point in time.
19. I will not have a daughter. She would be as beautiful as she was evil, but one look at
the hero's rugged countenance and she'd betray her own father.
20. Despite its proven stress-relieving effect, I will not indulge in maniacal laughter. When
so occupied, it's too easy to miss unexpected developments that a more attentive
individual could adjust to accordingly.
21. I will hire a fashion designer to create original uniforms for my Legion of Terror, as
opposed to some cheap knock-offs that make them look like Nazi stormtroopers,
Roman foot soldiers, or savage Mongol hordes. All were eventually defeated and I
want my troops to have a more positive mind-set.
22. No matter how tempted I am with the prospect of unlimited power, I will not consume
any energy field bigger than my head.
23. I will keep a special cache of low-tech weapons and train my troops in their use. That
way -- even if the heroes manage to neutralize my power generator and/or render the
standard-issue energy weapons useless -- my troops will not be overrun by a handful
of savages armed with spears and rocks.
24. I will maintain a realistic assessment of my strength and weaknesses. Even though
this takes some fun out of the job, at least I will never utter the line "No, this cannot
be! I AM INVINCIBLE!!!" (After that, death is usually instantaneous.)
25. No matter how well it would perform, I will never construct any sort of machinery
which is completely indestructible except for one small and virtually inaccessible spot.
26. No matter how attractive certain members of the rebellion are, there is probably
someone just as attractive which is not desperate to kill me. Therefore, I will think
twice before ordering a prisoner sent to my bed chamber.
27. I will never build only one of anything important. All important systems will have
redundant control panels and power supplies. For the same reason I will always carry
at least two fully loaded weapons at all times.
28. My pet monster will be kept in a secure cage from which it cannot escape and into
which I could not accidentally stumble.
29. I will dress in bright and cheery colors, and so throw my enemies into confusion.
30. All bumbling conjurers, clumsy squires, no-talent bards, and cowardly thieves in the
land will be preemptively put to death. My foes will surely give up and abandon their
quest if they have no source of comic relief.
31. All naive, busty tavern wenches in my realm will be replaced with surly, world-weary
waitresses who will provide no unexpected reinforcements and/or romantic sub-plot
for the hero or his side-kick.
32. I will not fly into a rage and kill a messenger who brings me bad news just to illustrate
how evil I really am. Good messengers are hard to come by.
33. I won't require high-ranking female members of my organization to wear a
stainless-steel bustier. Morale is better with a more casual dress-code. Similarly,
outfits made entirely from black leather will be reserved for formal occasions.
34. I will not turn into a snake. It never helps.
35. I will not grow a goatee. In the old days they made you look diabolic. Now they just
make you look like a disaffected member of Generation X.
36. I will not imprison members of the same party in the same cell block, let alone the same
cell. If they are important prisoners, I will keep the only key to the cell door on my person
instead of handing copies to every bottom-rung guard in the prison.
37. If my trusted lieutenant tell me my Legion of Terror is losing a battle, I will believe him..
After all, he's my trusted lieutenant.
38. If an enemy I have just killed has a younger sibling or offspring anywhere, I will find them
and have them killed immediately, instead of waiting for them to grow up harboring
feelings of vengeance towards me in my old age.
39. If I absolutely must ride into battle, I will certainly not ride at the forefront of my Legions
of Terror, nor will I seek out my opposite number among his army.
40. I will be neither chivalrous nor sporting. If I have an unstoppable super-weapon, I will
use it early and as often as possible instead of keeping it in reserve.
41. Once my power is secure, I will destroy all of those pesky time travel devices.
42. When I capture the hero, I will make sure I also get his dog, monkey, ferret, or whatever
sickeningly cute little animal capable of untying ropes and filching keys that happens to
follow him around.
43. I will maintain a healthy amount of skepticism when I capture the beautiful rebel and she
claims she is attracted to my power and good looks and will gladly betray her
companions if I just let her in on my plans.
44. I will only employ bounty hunters who work for money. Those who work for the pleasure
of the hunt tend to do dumb things like even the odds to give the other guy a sporting
chance.
45. I will make sure I have a clear understanding of who is responsible for what in my
organization. For example, if my general screws up I will not draw my weapon, point it at
him and say "And here is the price for failure." then suddenly turn and kill some random
underling.
46. If an advisor says to me "My liege, he is but one man. What can one man possibly do?", I
will reply "This." and kill the advisor.
47. If I learn that a callow youth has begun a quest to destroy me, I will slay him while he is
still a callow youth instead of waiting for him to mature.
48. I will treat any beast which I control through magic or technology with respect and
kindness. Thus if the control is ever broken, it will not immediately come after me for
revenge.
49. If I learn the whereabouts of the one artifact which can destroy me, I will not send all of
my troops out to seize it. Instead I will send them out to seize something else and quietly
put a Want-Ad in the local paper.
50. My main computers will have their own special operating system that will be completely
incompatible with standard IBM and Macintosh powerbooks.
51. If one of my dungeon guards begins expressing concern over the conditions of the
beautiful princess' cell, I will immediately transfer him to a less people oriented position.
52. I will hire a team of board-certified architects and surveyors to examine my castle and
inform me of any secret passages and abandoned tunnels that I might not know about.
53. If the beautiful princess that I capture says "I'll never marry you! Never, do you hear me,
NEVER!!!", I will say "Oh well" and kill her.
54. I will not strike a bargain with a demonic being then attempt to double-cross it simply
because I feel like being contrary.
55. The deformed mutants and odd-ball psychotics will have their place in my Legion of
Terror. However before I send them out on important covert missions that require tact
and subtlety, I will first see if there is anyone else equally qualified who would attract
less attention.
56. My Legion of Terror will be trained in basic marksmanship. Any who cannot learn to hit a
man-sized target at 10 meters will be used for target practice.
57. Before employing any captured artifacts or machinery, I will carefully read the owners
manual.
58. If it becomes necessary to escape, I will never stop to pose dramatically and toss off a
one-liner.
59. I will never build a sentient computer smarter than I am.
60. My five-year-old child advisor will also be asked to decipher any code I am thinking of
using. If he breaks the code in under 30 seconds, it will not be used. Note: This also
applies to passwords.
61. If my advisors ask "Why are you risking everything on such a mad scheme?" I will not
proceed until I have a response that satisfies them.
62. I will design fortress hallways with no alcoves or protruding structural supports which
intruders could use for cover in a firefight.
63. Bulk trash will be disposed of in incinerators, not compactors. And they will be kept hot,
with none of this nonsense about flames going through accessible tunnels at
predictable intervals.
64. I will see a compentant psychiatrist and get cured of all extremely unusual phobias and
bizarre compulsive habits which could prove to be disadvantageous.
65. If I must have a computer system with publicly available terminals, the maps they display
will have a room clearly marked as the Main Control Room. That room will be the
Execution Chamber. The actual main control room will be marked as Sewage Overflow
Containment.
66. My security keypad will actually be a fingerprint scanner. Anyone who watches someone
press a sequence of buttons or dusts the pad for fingerprints and then subsequently
tries to enter by repeating that sequence will trigger the alarm system.
67. No matter how many shorts we have in the system, my guards will be instructed to treat
every surveillance camera malfunction as a full-scale emergency.
68. I will spare someone who saved my life sometime in the past. This is only reasonable as
it encourages others to do so. However, the offer is good one time only. If they want me
to spare them again, they'd better save my life again.
69. All midwives will be banned from the realm. All babies will be delivered at state-approved
hospitals. Orphans will be placed in foster homes, not abandoned in the woods to be
raised by creatures of the wild.
70. When my guards split up to search for intruders, they will always travel in groups of at
least two. They will be trained so that if one of them disappears mysteriously while on
patrol, the other will immediately initiate an alert and call for backup, instead of
quizzically peering around a corner.
71. If I decide to test a lieutenant's loyalty and see if he/she should be made a trusted
lieutenant, I will have a crack squad of marksmen standing by in case the answer is no.
72. If all the heroes are standing together around a strange device and begin to taunt me, I
will pull out a conventional weapon, instead of using my unstoppable super weapon on
them.
73. I will not agree to let the heroes go free if they win a rigged contest, even though my
advisors assure me it is impossible for them to win.
74. When I create a multimedia presentation of my plan designed so that my five-year-old
advisor can easily understand the details, I will not label the disk "Project Overlord" and
leave it lying on top of my desk.
75. I will instruct my Legion of Terror to attack the heroes en masse, instead of standing
around waiting while members break off and attack one or two at a time.
76. If the hero runs up to my roof, I will not run up after him and struggle with him in an
attempt to push him over the edge. I will also not engage him at the edge of a cliff. (In
the middle of a rope-bridge over a river of molten lava is not even worth considering.)
77. If I have a fit of temporary insanity and decide to give the hero the chance to reject a job
as my trusted lieutenant, I will retain enough sanity to wait until my current trusted
lieutenant is out of earshot before making the offer.
78. I will not tell my Legion of Terror "And he must be taken alive-" the command will be
"And try to take him alive if it is reasonable practical."
79. If my doomsday device happens to come with a reverse switch, as soon as it has been
employed it will be melted down and made into limited edition commemorative coins.
80. If my weakest troops fail to eliminate a hero, I will send out my best troops instead of
wasting time with progressively stronger ones as he gets closer and closer to my
fortress.
81. If I am fighting with the hero atop a moving platform, have disarmed him, and am about
to finish him off and he glances behind me and drops flat, I too will drop flat instead of
quizzically turning around to find out what he saw.
82. I will not shoot at any of my enemies if they are standing in front of the crucial support
beam to a heavy, dangerously unbalanced structure.
83. If I'm eating dinner with the hero, put poison in his goblet, then have to leave the table
for any reason, I will order new drinks for both of us instead of trying to decide whether
or not to switch with him.
84. I will not have captives of one sex guarded by members of the opposite sex.
85. I will not use any plan in which the final step is horribly complicated, e.g. "Align the 12
stones of power on the sacred altar then activate the medallion at the moment of total
eclipse." Instead it will be more alone the lines of "Push the button/"
86. I will make sure that my doomsday device is up to code and properly grounded.
87. My vats of hazardous chemicals will be covered when not in use. Also, I will not
construct walkways above them.
88. If a group of henchmen fail miserably at a task, I will not berate them for incompetence
then send the same group out to do the task again.
89. After I capture the hero's super weapon, I will not disband legions and relax my guard
because I believe whoever holds the weapon is unstoppable. After all, the hero held the
weapon and I took it from him.
90. I will not design my main control room so that every workstation is facing away from the
door.
91. I will not ignore the messenger that stumbles in exhausted and obviously agitated until
my personal grooming or current entertainment is finished. It might actually be
important.
92. If I ever talk to the hero on the phone, I will not taunt him. Instead, I will say that his
dogged perseverance has given me new insight on the futility of my evil ways and that if
he leaves me alone for a few months of quiet contemplation I will likely return to the path
of righteousness. (Heroes are incredibly gullible in this regard.)
93. If I decide to hold a double execution of the hero and the underling who failed or
betrayed me, I will die first.
94. When arresting prisoners, my guards will not allow them to stop and grab a useless
trinket of purely sentimental value.
95. My dungeon will have its own qualified medical staff complete with bodyguards. That
way if a prisoner becomes sick and his cell mate tells the guard it's an emergency, the
guard will fetch a trauma team instead of opening the cell for a look.
96. My door mechanisms will be designed so that blasting the control panel on the outside
seals the door and blasting the control panel on the inside opens the door, not vice
versa.
97. My dungeon cells will not be furnished with objects that contain reflective surfaces or
anything that can be unraveled.
98. If an attractive young couple enters my realm, I will carefully monitor their activities. If I
find they are happy and affectionate, I will ignore them. However, if circumstances have
forced them together against their will and they spend all their time bickering and
criticizing each other except during the intermittent occasions when they are saving
each other' lives at which point there are hints of sexual tension, I will immediately order
their execution.
99. Any data files of crucial importance will be padded to 1.45Mb.
100. Finally, to keep my subjects permanently locked in a mindless trance, I will provide each
of them with free, unlimited internet access.
ones.
2. My ventilation ducts will be too small to crawl through.
3. My noble half-brother whose throne I usurped will be killed, not kept anonymously
imprisoned in a forgotten cell in my dungeon.
4. Shooting is not too good for my enemies.
5. The artifact that is the source of my power will not be kept on the Mountain of Despair
beyond the River of Fire guarded by the Dragon of Eternity. It will be in my
safe-deposit box. The same applies to the object that is my one weakness.
6. I will not gloat over my enemies predicament before killing them.
7. When I've captured my adversary and he says, "Look, before you kill me, will you at
least tell me what this is all about?" I'll say, "No." and shoot him. No, on second
thought, I'll shoot him and then say "No."
8. After I kidnap the beautiful princess, we will be married immediately in a quiet civil
ceremony, not a lavish spectacle in three weeks' time during which the final phase of
my plan will be carried out.
9. I will not include a self-destruct mechanism unless absolutely necessary. If it is
necessary, it will not be a large red button labelled, "Danger: Do Not Push". The big
red button marked "Do Not Push" will instead trigger a spray of bullets on anyone
stupid enough to disregard it. Similarly, the ON/OFF switch will clearly not be labelled
as such.
10. I will not interrogate my enemies in the inner sanctum - a small hotel room well
outside my border will work just as well.
11. I will be secure in my superiority. Therefore, I will feel no need to prove it by leaving
clues in the form of riddles or leaving my weaker enemies alive to show they pose no
threat.
12. One of my advisors will be an average five-year-old child. Any flaws in my plan that he
is able to spot will be corrected before implementation.
13. All slain enemies will be cremated, or at least several round of ammunition emptied into
them, not left for dead at the bottom of the cliff. The announcement of their deaths, as
well as any accompanying celebration, will be deferred until after the aforementioned
disposal.
14. The hero is not entitled to a last kiss, a last cigarette, or any other form of last
request.
15. I will never employ any device with a digital count-down. If I find that such a device is
absolutely unavoidable. I will set it to activate when the counter reaches 117 and the
hero is just putting his plan into operation.
16. I will never utter the sentence "But before I kill you, there's just one thing I want to
know."
17. When I employ people as advisors, I will occasionally listen to their advice.
18. I will not have a son. Although his laughably under-planned attempt to usurp power
would easily fail, it would prove a fatal distraction at a crucial point in time.
19. I will not have a daughter. She would be as beautiful as she was evil, but one look at
the hero's rugged countenance and she'd betray her own father.
20. Despite its proven stress-relieving effect, I will not indulge in maniacal laughter. When
so occupied, it's too easy to miss unexpected developments that a more attentive
individual could adjust to accordingly.
21. I will hire a fashion designer to create original uniforms for my Legion of Terror, as
opposed to some cheap knock-offs that make them look like Nazi stormtroopers,
Roman foot soldiers, or savage Mongol hordes. All were eventually defeated and I
want my troops to have a more positive mind-set.
22. No matter how tempted I am with the prospect of unlimited power, I will not consume
any energy field bigger than my head.
23. I will keep a special cache of low-tech weapons and train my troops in their use. That
way -- even if the heroes manage to neutralize my power generator and/or render the
standard-issue energy weapons useless -- my troops will not be overrun by a handful
of savages armed with spears and rocks.
24. I will maintain a realistic assessment of my strength and weaknesses. Even though
this takes some fun out of the job, at least I will never utter the line "No, this cannot
be! I AM INVINCIBLE!!!" (After that, death is usually instantaneous.)
25. No matter how well it would perform, I will never construct any sort of machinery
which is completely indestructible except for one small and virtually inaccessible spot.
26. No matter how attractive certain members of the rebellion are, there is probably
someone just as attractive which is not desperate to kill me. Therefore, I will think
twice before ordering a prisoner sent to my bed chamber.
27. I will never build only one of anything important. All important systems will have
redundant control panels and power supplies. For the same reason I will always carry
at least two fully loaded weapons at all times.
28. My pet monster will be kept in a secure cage from which it cannot escape and into
which I could not accidentally stumble.
29. I will dress in bright and cheery colors, and so throw my enemies into confusion.
30. All bumbling conjurers, clumsy squires, no-talent bards, and cowardly thieves in the
land will be preemptively put to death. My foes will surely give up and abandon their
quest if they have no source of comic relief.
31. All naive, busty tavern wenches in my realm will be replaced with surly, world-weary
waitresses who will provide no unexpected reinforcements and/or romantic sub-plot
for the hero or his side-kick.
32. I will not fly into a rage and kill a messenger who brings me bad news just to illustrate
how evil I really am. Good messengers are hard to come by.
33. I won't require high-ranking female members of my organization to wear a
stainless-steel bustier. Morale is better with a more casual dress-code. Similarly,
outfits made entirely from black leather will be reserved for formal occasions.
34. I will not turn into a snake. It never helps.
35. I will not grow a goatee. In the old days they made you look diabolic. Now they just
make you look like a disaffected member of Generation X.
36. I will not imprison members of the same party in the same cell block, let alone the same
cell. If they are important prisoners, I will keep the only key to the cell door on my person
instead of handing copies to every bottom-rung guard in the prison.
37. If my trusted lieutenant tell me my Legion of Terror is losing a battle, I will believe him..
After all, he's my trusted lieutenant.
38. If an enemy I have just killed has a younger sibling or offspring anywhere, I will find them
and have them killed immediately, instead of waiting for them to grow up harboring
feelings of vengeance towards me in my old age.
39. If I absolutely must ride into battle, I will certainly not ride at the forefront of my Legions
of Terror, nor will I seek out my opposite number among his army.
40. I will be neither chivalrous nor sporting. If I have an unstoppable super-weapon, I will
use it early and as often as possible instead of keeping it in reserve.
41. Once my power is secure, I will destroy all of those pesky time travel devices.
42. When I capture the hero, I will make sure I also get his dog, monkey, ferret, or whatever
sickeningly cute little animal capable of untying ropes and filching keys that happens to
follow him around.
43. I will maintain a healthy amount of skepticism when I capture the beautiful rebel and she
claims she is attracted to my power and good looks and will gladly betray her
companions if I just let her in on my plans.
44. I will only employ bounty hunters who work for money. Those who work for the pleasure
of the hunt tend to do dumb things like even the odds to give the other guy a sporting
chance.
45. I will make sure I have a clear understanding of who is responsible for what in my
organization. For example, if my general screws up I will not draw my weapon, point it at
him and say "And here is the price for failure." then suddenly turn and kill some random
underling.
46. If an advisor says to me "My liege, he is but one man. What can one man possibly do?", I
will reply "This." and kill the advisor.
47. If I learn that a callow youth has begun a quest to destroy me, I will slay him while he is
still a callow youth instead of waiting for him to mature.
48. I will treat any beast which I control through magic or technology with respect and
kindness. Thus if the control is ever broken, it will not immediately come after me for
revenge.
49. If I learn the whereabouts of the one artifact which can destroy me, I will not send all of
my troops out to seize it. Instead I will send them out to seize something else and quietly
put a Want-Ad in the local paper.
50. My main computers will have their own special operating system that will be completely
incompatible with standard IBM and Macintosh powerbooks.
51. If one of my dungeon guards begins expressing concern over the conditions of the
beautiful princess' cell, I will immediately transfer him to a less people oriented position.
52. I will hire a team of board-certified architects and surveyors to examine my castle and
inform me of any secret passages and abandoned tunnels that I might not know about.
53. If the beautiful princess that I capture says "I'll never marry you! Never, do you hear me,
NEVER!!!", I will say "Oh well" and kill her.
54. I will not strike a bargain with a demonic being then attempt to double-cross it simply
because I feel like being contrary.
55. The deformed mutants and odd-ball psychotics will have their place in my Legion of
Terror. However before I send them out on important covert missions that require tact
and subtlety, I will first see if there is anyone else equally qualified who would attract
less attention.
56. My Legion of Terror will be trained in basic marksmanship. Any who cannot learn to hit a
man-sized target at 10 meters will be used for target practice.
57. Before employing any captured artifacts or machinery, I will carefully read the owners
manual.
58. If it becomes necessary to escape, I will never stop to pose dramatically and toss off a
one-liner.
59. I will never build a sentient computer smarter than I am.
60. My five-year-old child advisor will also be asked to decipher any code I am thinking of
using. If he breaks the code in under 30 seconds, it will not be used. Note: This also
applies to passwords.
61. If my advisors ask "Why are you risking everything on such a mad scheme?" I will not
proceed until I have a response that satisfies them.
62. I will design fortress hallways with no alcoves or protruding structural supports which
intruders could use for cover in a firefight.
63. Bulk trash will be disposed of in incinerators, not compactors. And they will be kept hot,
with none of this nonsense about flames going through accessible tunnels at
predictable intervals.
64. I will see a compentant psychiatrist and get cured of all extremely unusual phobias and
bizarre compulsive habits which could prove to be disadvantageous.
65. If I must have a computer system with publicly available terminals, the maps they display
will have a room clearly marked as the Main Control Room. That room will be the
Execution Chamber. The actual main control room will be marked as Sewage Overflow
Containment.
66. My security keypad will actually be a fingerprint scanner. Anyone who watches someone
press a sequence of buttons or dusts the pad for fingerprints and then subsequently
tries to enter by repeating that sequence will trigger the alarm system.
67. No matter how many shorts we have in the system, my guards will be instructed to treat
every surveillance camera malfunction as a full-scale emergency.
68. I will spare someone who saved my life sometime in the past. This is only reasonable as
it encourages others to do so. However, the offer is good one time only. If they want me
to spare them again, they'd better save my life again.
69. All midwives will be banned from the realm. All babies will be delivered at state-approved
hospitals. Orphans will be placed in foster homes, not abandoned in the woods to be
raised by creatures of the wild.
70. When my guards split up to search for intruders, they will always travel in groups of at
least two. They will be trained so that if one of them disappears mysteriously while on
patrol, the other will immediately initiate an alert and call for backup, instead of
quizzically peering around a corner.
71. If I decide to test a lieutenant's loyalty and see if he/she should be made a trusted
lieutenant, I will have a crack squad of marksmen standing by in case the answer is no.
72. If all the heroes are standing together around a strange device and begin to taunt me, I
will pull out a conventional weapon, instead of using my unstoppable super weapon on
them.
73. I will not agree to let the heroes go free if they win a rigged contest, even though my
advisors assure me it is impossible for them to win.
74. When I create a multimedia presentation of my plan designed so that my five-year-old
advisor can easily understand the details, I will not label the disk "Project Overlord" and
leave it lying on top of my desk.
75. I will instruct my Legion of Terror to attack the heroes en masse, instead of standing
around waiting while members break off and attack one or two at a time.
76. If the hero runs up to my roof, I will not run up after him and struggle with him in an
attempt to push him over the edge. I will also not engage him at the edge of a cliff. (In
the middle of a rope-bridge over a river of molten lava is not even worth considering.)
77. If I have a fit of temporary insanity and decide to give the hero the chance to reject a job
as my trusted lieutenant, I will retain enough sanity to wait until my current trusted
lieutenant is out of earshot before making the offer.
78. I will not tell my Legion of Terror "And he must be taken alive-" the command will be
"And try to take him alive if it is reasonable practical."
79. If my doomsday device happens to come with a reverse switch, as soon as it has been
employed it will be melted down and made into limited edition commemorative coins.
80. If my weakest troops fail to eliminate a hero, I will send out my best troops instead of
wasting time with progressively stronger ones as he gets closer and closer to my
fortress.
81. If I am fighting with the hero atop a moving platform, have disarmed him, and am about
to finish him off and he glances behind me and drops flat, I too will drop flat instead of
quizzically turning around to find out what he saw.
82. I will not shoot at any of my enemies if they are standing in front of the crucial support
beam to a heavy, dangerously unbalanced structure.
83. If I'm eating dinner with the hero, put poison in his goblet, then have to leave the table
for any reason, I will order new drinks for both of us instead of trying to decide whether
or not to switch with him.
84. I will not have captives of one sex guarded by members of the opposite sex.
85. I will not use any plan in which the final step is horribly complicated, e.g. "Align the 12
stones of power on the sacred altar then activate the medallion at the moment of total
eclipse." Instead it will be more alone the lines of "Push the button/"
86. I will make sure that my doomsday device is up to code and properly grounded.
87. My vats of hazardous chemicals will be covered when not in use. Also, I will not
construct walkways above them.
88. If a group of henchmen fail miserably at a task, I will not berate them for incompetence
then send the same group out to do the task again.
89. After I capture the hero's super weapon, I will not disband legions and relax my guard
because I believe whoever holds the weapon is unstoppable. After all, the hero held the
weapon and I took it from him.
90. I will not design my main control room so that every workstation is facing away from the
door.
91. I will not ignore the messenger that stumbles in exhausted and obviously agitated until
my personal grooming or current entertainment is finished. It might actually be
important.
92. If I ever talk to the hero on the phone, I will not taunt him. Instead, I will say that his
dogged perseverance has given me new insight on the futility of my evil ways and that if
he leaves me alone for a few months of quiet contemplation I will likely return to the path
of righteousness. (Heroes are incredibly gullible in this regard.)
93. If I decide to hold a double execution of the hero and the underling who failed or
betrayed me, I will die first.
94. When arresting prisoners, my guards will not allow them to stop and grab a useless
trinket of purely sentimental value.
95. My dungeon will have its own qualified medical staff complete with bodyguards. That
way if a prisoner becomes sick and his cell mate tells the guard it's an emergency, the
guard will fetch a trauma team instead of opening the cell for a look.
96. My door mechanisms will be designed so that blasting the control panel on the outside
seals the door and blasting the control panel on the inside opens the door, not vice
versa.
97. My dungeon cells will not be furnished with objects that contain reflective surfaces or
anything that can be unraveled.
98. If an attractive young couple enters my realm, I will carefully monitor their activities. If I
find they are happy and affectionate, I will ignore them. However, if circumstances have
forced them together against their will and they spend all their time bickering and
criticizing each other except during the intermittent occasions when they are saving
each other' lives at which point there are hints of sexual tension, I will immediately order
their execution.
99. Any data files of crucial importance will be padded to 1.45Mb.
100. Finally, to keep my subjects permanently locked in a mindless trance, I will provide each
of them with free, unlimited internet access.
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