First of all, the title is meant to be satirical, if anyone has played Overlord 2 they will recognise the humour.
Second of all, i have drawn inspiration for old 'Minionistry of information' adds for Overlord 2 off of youtube.
Finally, this book is very rough, any criticism is appreciated i will upload new versions when i can.
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Why not
kill baby seals,
a beginner’s guide
to Overlording
By Ryan Asquith
Firstly, before setting off for a time of destruction and mayhem realize that Overlording is not just for fun, it’s a career! Enjoy a unique job experience while enjoying the benefits of your own personal army, a very decent income and the fact that gals love bad guys.
A personal army?
That’s right! Minions are an impish like fellows attracted to those of a dark nature, they happily bash smash, and destroy for you while returning all treasure, to the overlord. However on his own, he’s a sad little fellow, not much evil going on there. But in an army, no one can stand up to them, or a well-oiled minion machine.
Now, kill a small animal, or a person. What’s that shiny orb? That’s life-force, and for each one of those a minion is born! What was that? Not much variety? Well that’s been solved. See that minion he’s a Brown. They love too smash and fight, and have a tendency to bash first, and jump up and down on it, later. They’re the toughest of all minions, and will pick up useful, and sometimes useless, items as makeshift weapons and armor.
It is getting hot in here?
Why, yes it is! That’s because a Red has arrived! He’s a feisty fellow isn’t he? Rather useless in melee I’m afraid, but he makes up for it by having to the ability to throw fireballs at enemies. Ah… the smell of roast elf makes me glad to be alive.
Moving on…
No way Jose! We have left out to more minions! The Green and the Blue. These two minion types are specialized minions, like the Red. The Greens, also known for poor hygiene and permanent smell of rotting fish heads, are stealth experts. When made to stay in a place for a certain amount of time they go invisible, and will happily leap onto enemies backs, stabbing and hacking with joy.
Now, those clammy Blues, gravitating around watery places, Blues are rather magic heavy, and defend minions from mutating rogue magic. They also have the rather handy ability of resurrecting dead minions, with almost 100% success rate (the 0.1% is a chance of the magic exploding and destroying the World).
THE GREAT THINGS ABOUT OVERLORDING
1. Your own minions.
2. Job security.
3. Riches and fame.
4. You get to travel to the far corners of the world.
5. And conquer them.
6. You meet cute and fluffy animals.
7. And kill them!
8. Girls love bad guys.
9. Having power over life and death.
10. No one remembers the good guys.
TOP 10 BAD OVERLORDING LISTS
10. Drowning
Unfortunately each minions represents an element, blues water, reds fire etc. so they do not enjoy being in another’s elements. Browns are the most stupid as they have had too many blows to the head in melee, so they have a tendency to run straight into water. Although watching them drown is rather hilarious, it doesn’t really inspire confidence in your other minions of your overlording ability.
9. Making enemies, and not finishing them off
During your overlording career you will make many enemies, in fact the degree of an overlord is usually tested by the amount of enemies one makes. Although the idea of the more the merrier is still in fashion it is usually not a good idea to have an enemy at ones back. So when you have an enemy, make sure to finish them off, either by setting them alight with a Red, or by clubbing to death with a Brown, before making another.
8. Being a tight-wallet
As new places are conquered, more populations placed under the boot of oppression, the new overlord will have unwittingly acquired a large amount of riches. These riches are intended to be spent, upgrading and darkening up the dark tower, or evil lair. Like many an age the ladies still love big-spenders and being a tight-wallet will not get an overlord anything in the popularity department, with both the ladies and minions.
7. Not setting fire to it
6. If your bored, wrap your sword
5. Each of the seven deadly sins, a must in the overlord’s moral code
4. being deep
When pressed with the choice of two or more mistresses, and there is no option for all of them, an overlord must make the most simple decision, pick the best looking one, the darker and more evil the better. IF an overlord is even suspected of displaying emotion, or choosing a mistress for anything besides her evil beauty, his leadership will be questioned.
3. Letting oneself go…
When overlording, overlords must participate in the destruction once in a while, and not just leaving to the minions. Watching an overlord participate in destruction sets an example to the suppressed and inspires the minions. Besides if an overlord doesn’t participate in the annihilation of fluffy creatures, he might get in the habit of not doing anything, which is on the bad overlording list because no one fears a fat guy. And more importantly, no gals like a fat guy, even if he is an overlord.
2. Not doing it the fun way
If an overlord is trapped in a situation where the solution boring and arduous the dark, creative mind must figure the solution in the most fun, evil and destructive way possible. For example if the new Overlord's boat becomes stuck in ice, there is no need to order the minions to hack it out. Instead melt the polar ice caps, lifting the boat from the ice and flooding the lands causing death and destruction. Fun right?
1. Saving the wildlife
Becoming an overlord
to officially become an evil overlord, one needs a few things. Firstly, the aspiring overlord needs minions. If the evilness in you hasn’t yet attracted Brown minions to you yet, simply commit evil deeds, such as the destruction of other’s property, or the enslavement of locals until Brown minions are drawn to your dark self. If the aspiring overlord doesn’t wish to draw attention to himself, then set of and locate a minion spawning ground. Green’s, Blue’s, and Red’s will be impossible to find without the aid of Browns, so don’t bother looking. Remember Brown’s tend to gravitate towards areas of large land mass, with an absence of water, swamps, forests etc. A wild minion population can usually be detected by large piles of gold, lying on the ground, as Brown’s detest the soft, yellow metal.
Brown’s, not being the most intelligent of minions, are easily coerced to your side, and although they hate gold, they become slobbering maniacs when presented with silver. They will do anything to acquire the shiny, grey metal; in fact a silver sword is usually the price of a minion population’s loyalty, Hive and all.
Before earning the loyalty of Brown minions however, an overlord must find a suitable place for his evil domain. Now, the place differs from overlord to overlord, some prefer a dark castle on a comically precarious mountain, others a dark tower deep within the Netherworld, my preference being a dark castle, situated on a floating island. Once easy access is assured (and if the floating island maing sure it wont float away) an overlord can then use his recently acquired Browns to construct his dark lair. Don’t worry about wages, or a worker union, one of the few things that the Brown’s small brain can handle is construction, and as there element is the earth they are skilled in construction.
Preventing destitution
Because running an evil empire is expensive, along with the maintenance of a ‘big spender’ image and a healthly generosity to one’s future mistress, an overlord must aquire himself a population of humans, or equal humanoids, to exploit the riches of the earth for him. Unfortunately since many people do not generally enjoy being enslaved and overworked, many aren’t fond of letting in shadowy figures, with evil looking minions, into towns and villagers, where enslavement is easy. So, the problems facing the overlord are as follows:
1. Getting into the village/town etc
2. If 1 isnt possible at present, then the gaining of the village/town etc. trust
3. Repeat of 1
4. Enslavement
Generally the things inhabiting this earth are not generally trusting, mainly due to the high number of murders and wonderfully violent crimes that inflict on people’s lives. I personally think its they’re rascist towards people of an evil upbringing. Multicultural my a… um.. anyway, to gain access to a village etc. the townsfolf will usually ask for a solution to one of the many prolems inflicted by an evil entity, and because, if wise, the overlord would have chosen a population of people close to his evil domain the evil entity would most likely have been you, unless bad overlording number 3 is in occurrence, so the solution is simple. Unfortuately because overlords never really think ahead, usually from o many hits to the head, I have provided a variety of examples with possible solutions.
Elves – usually tree-hugging hippy types, the usual request if the saving of a useless population of baby something or others, so order your Brown minions to bring these animals to the village, however Browns usually get hungry while near small fluffy animals so leave strict instructions that they are not to be eaten.
Dwarves – these short stubby walking beer-soaked beards are in love with gold so the price of trust is usually a hefty offering of gold. Don’t worry though, when you get in their dwarven stronghold you’ll get it back.
Dryads – are an interesting group of tree spirits. I. Generally evil in nature these feisty green women are a matriarchal society and do not have any men at all within their ranks, the knock on effect is that they usually abduct men for their eh… attributes, which generally leads to more girl dryads (they eat the male children). So, for the preservation of a wonderfull holiday ‘resort’ a wise overlord will leave these girls with their free will. For access to there home however, an overlord must give a physical demonstration of his ‘overlord-li-ness’.. if you catch my drift.
Halflings – also referred to as ‘hobbits’ these creatures are extremely fat and lazy, they are also one of the reasons people don’t trust even relatively evil looking people anymore, their mischievousness is only matched for their love of food. These potato sack drop-kicks should be immediately destroyed and toasted, with a side of grilled baby seal meat and sheesh-kebabed gnome.
Gnomes – are extremely irritating, although great tasting, barely lingual pests. They have a tendency to worship anything shiny, so invasion, eviction and re-appropriation of their belongings is a good idea, but as slaves their more than a handful, and due to their small size they can easily escape. However if a large enough population develops that they inhabit a village, a few polished silver coins will earn occupy their rather short attention spans away from your dark appearance.
Humans – relatively useless at anything besides reproduction and, rather quick, destruction of their nearby environment. They make for perfect slaves. Slow, dim-witted, and generally unskilled in combat, humans are a must choice for enslavement. However, humans only fear power so be careful, they will easily rise up against you if your leadership or evilness is in question. Human women also have a reputation of being captured by dragons and other large creatures, so gaining the trust of humans is very self-explanatory.
Fairies – unlike popular views, most fairies aren’t all wishes and magic dust, born with no conscience they have the ability to do great evil, and great good, without damaging their psyche. Anything they do will benefit themselves, and themselves only, so be wary Overlord, in case your destruction will benefit them. As for gaining their trust, it differs from fairy to fairy, but if a task is given to you, do it quickly, as you may have been asked to rescue a stranded baby deer, or some such, only to find that the fairy is question has gone on a human killing-spree, because she liked the clothes they were wearing.
So, this is a list of most of the lingual (although barely, in some cases) races that inhabit this World, but an Overlord must be wise when choosing his servants and slaves as most will not appreciated to be used as gold (and silver) harvesters for an evil entity.
To commit the actual act of enslavement, there are a variety of methods available. If an Overlord is magically talented, magical domination either through fear of your magical abilities, or the actual mind control of your slaves, the latter option is generally safer as uprising’s cannot be conducted if the slaves are drooling constantly. If the Overlord is not interested in magic then the physical enslavement option is open to him. Chaining the slaves, keeping them under guard, and physical, um.. ‘assurance’ that they do as their told is also an option. However if the Overlord consideres these options primitive then the subtly are of diplomacy, or as its commonly known, blackmail, is always an option. Capturing objects precious to the to-be slaves, such as relics or the females of their population (males in the case of the dryads) is way to ensure your material wants are met.
Moving on…
Now the, the basics are in order, the Overlord has a secure, dark domain, an income of riches and Brown minions to work for him, the Overlord has the begginging of the means to expand his evil empire. But even an entity as evil as the Overlord cannot expand with his limited minion-power. To increase the size of his minion horde, the Overlord has to come into possesion of a Brown minion hive, if he hasn’t already. They can be found along with some of the larger wild Brown minion colonies, scattered throughout the world, if the Overlord can either take it by force or bargain for the loyalty of the colony, he has secured a strong income of Brown minions.
Unfortunately, like most magical things in the World, Brown minion hives need fuel to function, the fuel is of course, lifeforce. Found in all living creatures lifeforce differs from creature to creature and is dependent of the habitat of its former owner. Most land-living animals, such as puppies, baby seals (evnen though they live near the sea), cows, sheep, kittens, rabbits even humans, will drop Brown lifeforce. Brown lifeforce enables the creation of Brown minions, via the Brown minion hive. Likewise, Green, Blue and Red lifeforce will power their respective Hives.
Now, there is only one more step before an Overlord can conquer the World. This step is acquiring minions, and minion Hives, of the three other colours. Remember, Blues gravitate towards magical and/or watery places, Greens towards forests, swamps or the sewerage of cities and Reds towards of intense heat, such as active volcanoes or open magma seams. However finding wild populations of the minions is only part of the process, offering the current tributes for the purchase of them and their hive is a nerve wracking decision. Choosing the wrong gift will cause the wild minions to develop a negative attitude towards you, in some sever cases even turning violent.
Greens – besides their colour and stealth ability, Greens are also known for pooor hygeine and distinct smell of rotting fish heads
A Mincyclopedia of the creatures that inhabit this world
Beetles
Dragons
Skulls
Rock Giants
Trolls
Slugs
