1. My ventilation ducts will be too small to crawl through.
2. Shooting is never too good for my enemies.
3. My one weakness or 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 Dragons of Eternity. It will be in my safe-deposit box.
4. I will not gloat over my enemies' predicament before killing them.
5. 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. On second thought I'll shoot him then say "No."
6. I will not include a self-destruct mechanism unless absolutely necessary. If it is necessary, it will not be a large red button labeled "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 not clearly be labeled as such.
7. I will not interrogate my enemies in the inner sanctum -- a small hotel well outside my borders will work just as well.
8. 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.
9. 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.
10. All slain enemies will be cremated, or at least have several rounds of ammunition emptied into them, not left for dead at the bottom of the cliff or in a ditch. The announcement of their deaths, as well as any accompanying celebration, will be deferred until after the aforementioned disposal.
11. I will never utter the sentence "But before I kill you, there's just one thing I want you to know."
12. When I employ people as advisors, I will occasionally listen to their advice.
13. 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. Nor will I have a daughter. She would be as beautiful as she was evil, but one look at the hero's rugged expression and she'd betray me.
14. I will hire a talented fashion designer to create original uniforms for my Legion of Terror, not some cheap knock-offs that make them look like Nazi storm troopers, Roman foot soldiers, or savage Mongol hordes. All were eventually defeated, and I want my troops to have a more positive mind-set.
15. 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.
16. No matter how well it may perform, I will not construct any sort of machinery that is completely indestructible except for one small and virtually inaccessible spot.
17. No matter how attractive certain members of the rebellion are, there is probably someone just as attractive who is not desperate to kill me. Therefore, I will think twice before ordering a prisoner sent to my bedchamber.
18. 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.
19. 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.
20. I will never employ the use of a major weapon that takes time to charge up before firing and utterly destroying the rebel base. Instead I will use weapons that can do the same thing with a single push of a button.
21. I will not imprison members of the same party in the same cellblock, let alone the same cell. If they are important prisoners, I will keep the only key to the cell door with me at all times instead of handing out copies to every bottom-rung guard in the prison.
22. If my trusted lieutenant tells me my Legion of Terror is losing a battle, I will believe him. After all, he's my trusted lieutenant.
23. 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.
24. I will be neither chivalrous nor sporting. If I have an unstoppable super-weapon, I will use it as early and as often as possible instead of keeping it in reserve.
25. 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 happens to follow him around.
26. If an advisor says to me "My liege, he is but one man. What can one man possibly do?" I will reply, "This", and shoot the advisor.
27. 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.
28. 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.
29. 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.
30. I will not strike a bargain with a demonic being then attempt to double-cross it simply because I feel like being contrary.
31. 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.
32. If it becomes necessary to escape, I will never stop to pose dramatically and toss off a one-liner.
33. My five-year-old child advisor will also be asked to decipher any code or password I am thinking of using. If he breaks the code in less than 30 seconds, it will be changed.
34. If my advisors asks, "Why are you risking everything on such a mad scheme?", I will not proceed until I have a response that satisfies them.
35. I will design fortress hallways with no alcoves or protruding structural supports that intruders could use for cover in a firefight.
36. If I must have computer systems with publicly available terminals, the maps they display of my complex 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.
37. 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.
38. When my guards split up to search for intruders, they will always travel in groups of two or three. 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.
39. 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.
40. 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 and I will not engage him at the edge of a cliff, and in the middle of a rope-bridge over a river of molten lava is not even worth considering.
41. 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.
42. 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.
43. If I'm eating dinner with the hero, put poison in his goblet, and 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.
44. My vats of hazardous chemicals will be covered when not in use. Also, I will not construct walkways above them.
45. If a group of henchmen fail miserably at a task, I will not berate them for their incompetence then send the same group out to try the task again.
46. I will not ignore the messenger that stumbles in exhausted until my personal grooming or current entertainment is finished. It might actually be important.
47. 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.
48. If I decide to hold a double execution of the hero and an underling who failed or betrayed me, I will see to it that the hero is scheduled to go first and the underling will be killed after.
49. My dungeon will have its own qualified medical staff complete with bodyguards. That way if a prisoner becomes sick and his cellmate tells the guard it's an emergency, the guard will fetch this team instead of opening up the cell for a look.
50. Finally, to keep my subjects permanently locked in a mindless trance, I will provide each of them with free unlimited Internet access.