Question Villanous Motivation

I'm having trouble working out what myu villains are really up to. Ostensibly they are running a logging operation, which leads a gorup of local dryads to take action. But what they are really up to needs to threaten the entire small town the story is set in order to properly motivate the protagonist to take action.

Large Scale Magical Operation by making a large symbol with strategically placed fallen logs?

Who says that they have to be villainous? Why not simply callous? Their logging operation, besides stirring up the Dryads, is causing some damage to the local groundwater or some other deleterious effect on the local region. The loggers were aware of the possibility, but they thought that it wouldn't kick in until well after they'd denuded the region and moved on, so it wasn't their problem. Google Earth First and other Eco-extremist sites; they'll be more than happy to give you details on the dangers of reckless logging. Heck, they'll come up with some.

Yeah. And if this is a small town and a big logging operation, there can also be societal problems independent of the ecological ones. Suddenly you've got a pile of strangers with potentially different values in town, possibly in a number rivaling the population of the town itself. Local businesses could be overwhelmed, and if this is a long-term operation, new businesses might spring up to accommodate the loggers. New businesses run by more new arrivals from Outside. And then those new businesses might draw even more new residents, whether to be employees of the businesses or to partake of them. Next thing you know, your small town isn't so small anymore. And what happens when the loggers finish? Does everybody go out of business, leaving you with a bunch of shifty outsiders looking for a quick buck? Do you have enough of the locals left to recover, or have so many fled to other towns that yours implodes entirely?

Add that to the disruptions the logging might be causing to hunters, fishers, and farmers, and it's time to call the blue guy .

But there are lots of options for overt villainy, too. They could be searching for a magical nexus in the forest that they intend to harness, and the logging is both a means of finding it as well as a means to clear the area around it when they do. Or they might be trying to unearth some lost artifacts from an ancient cult and using the logging operation to excuse the sounds of heavy equipment. There could have been some ancient evil buried beneath the forest, that the (magical) trees are keeping sealed away, and they're trying to free it by harvesting the trees. Or maybe they just need large amounts of wood to fuel their steam-powered death machine (wood being more renewable than coal).

I've had two great ideas form elsewhere that I'm definatly incorporating.

1. The fact that they are logging an area populated by dryads is no accident. They are deliberatly looking for drad populated trees, as they sell for many times more then regular wood on the black market. They can't just selectivly hit the dryads trees due to dryad glamour making it impossible to identify them precisly, so the solution is to clear fell the area and identify the trees afterwards.

2. The escalation is a direct result of the hero's earlier actions. He damages enough equipment that they are behind schedule. So the antagonist starts using his power, along with a devise to speed things up. His power is rock / lava manipulation, and amplified by the devise esentially turns the local substrata into loose powder.

I read a couple weeks ago about a town in the West coast that was notified by the logging company to get their drinking water elsewhere... oh, here it is:

Timber Company Tells California Town, Go Find Your Own Water

And it comes from the N.Y.Times, not from eco-extremists. So there you have it, a real-word example of a logging company behaving like a mustache-twirling villain.

konzill wrote: I've had two great ideas form elsewhere that I'm definatly incorporating.

1. The fact that they are logging an area populated by dryads is no accident. They are deliberatly looking for drad populated trees, as they sell for many times more then regular wood on the black market. They can't just selectivly hit the dryads trees due to dryad glamour making it impossible to identify them precisly, so the solution is to clear fell the area and identify the trees afterwards.

2. The escalation is a direct result of the hero's earlier actions. He damages enough equipment that they are behind schedule. So the antagonist starts using his power, along with a devise to speed things up. His power is rock / lava manipulation, and amplified by the devise esentially turns the local substrata into loose powder.

good idea here, IMO note that the 5 elements of magic come in to play maybe -earth, wood, fire, wind, and water each help one another and wood the elves thought was the king of all or most powerful?

you might be able to add this very easy? Other Fae races when they hear of this attack may come running via some very ancient treaty or promise?

ask for more help if ya want?

I am writing lots of fan fic along these lines and have done the research IMO

lighttech wrote: good idea here, IMO note that the 5 elements of magic come in to play maybe -earth, wood, fire, wind, and water each help one another and wood the elves thought was the king of all or most powerful?

Being unable to attack the loggers directly the Dryads are going to invest the Hero as a Paladin, giving him Elemental power of Wood. Of course Dryads are an exlusivly female race, and the hero is only a low level avatar, so there may be some side effects.

makes sense to me, as magic IMO tends to 'bend' humans to its will and forms in strong usages

lighttech wrote: makes sense to me, as magic IMO tends to 'bend' humans to its will and forms in strong usages

Also canon stories have already established what happens when an avatar gets a spirit that is too powerful for him or her.