Your Next Villain's Voice

What kind of accent does your lich have? Does he talk like Chigurh from No Country For Old Men?  What do the street urchins in your cities talk like?  Maybe some of them sound like Al Pacino in Scarface?  Do all of your NPCs have cockney accents?

Voices and accents are one of the easiest ways to distinguish NPCs, especially villains.  I encourage everyone to indulge in epiglottal impersonations.  And anyway, DnD is more fun with ridiculous voices.

One tip: pay attention to the pauses and the timing.  It's easy to overlook, but it adds a lot.



Chigurh from No Country For Old Men
He's a rambling, unrepentant murderer.  He's my new favorite.
In case you want a psychotic bad guy without a recognizable precedent.

Tom Waits
Inspiration for Heath Ledger's Joker
In case you want a bad guy who's on a lot of drugs.

Emperor Zombie in The Incredible Screw-On Head
Invented by Mike Mignola, the Hellboy Guy
In case you want a clever, playful bad guy.  [skip to about 8:04]

Tony in Scarface
Ambiguously Cuban.
In case you want an intense little thug as a bad guy.

Tetsuo in Akira
I hope you've seen Akira.  There's a lot of visual, music, and ideas you can cull.
In case you want a sweaty, persecution-complex kid as a bad guy.

Charles Manson
Gotta get some non-fiction in here.
In case you want an insane egomaniac for your next bad guy. Or a hobo.
Holy shit, Manson would be a great evil hobo-wizard.  With crazy groupies.
[skip to about 2:25 if you want to see him wig the fuck out]

Hannibal Lector
Obligatory evil mastermind voice.
In case you want a debonair, psychological bad guy.

The Gravemind in Halo 2
Obligatory basso monster voice.  There's actually a lot of good examples of stereotyped voices in this video.
In case you want a rumbly, labored monster voice.  Pretend you're a talking dump truck.  Or a sewer.