Trope:The Empire


 * "To plunder, to slaughter, to usurp, they give the lying name of empire; and where they make a desert, they call it peace."

—Calgacus, Caledonian warlordnote

The Evil Counterpart to The Republic. The Foil to The Kingdom. TheShadow Archetype to Hegemonic Empire. The Rival to The Federation. The Logical Extreme of the Rising Empire.

The Empire's defining Grand Ambitionis World (Or Interstellar/Galactic/Universal) Domination. Amassing The Evil Army, it sets out to conquer all of its neighbours and be the sole superpower by force of arms. Taking cues from history, it often resembles the historic Roman, German, Russian/Soviet, or Chinese empires in some way. Led by The Emperor, who is usually also an Evil Overlord, Emperor Scientist or God Emperor or by some kind of theocratic cabal. A theocracy of a Religion of Evil will almost certainly be the Empire.

If the Empire is not Obviously Evil, it may represent itself as the Lightbearer of Civilization, Defender of Faith, Domain of Law and Order, The Co-Prosperity Sphere, Central State of Humankind or Legitimate Regent of Humanity. People's Republic of Tyranny may overlap with these titles. The Empire may be genuinely highly civilized, wealthy, organized, and/or vital, or corrupt, bureaucratic, sybarite and/or ossified. It may be militaristic and imperialistic, or pacifistic and turned inwards.

Of course, there's going to be some kind of Resistancemovement within its borders, and small autonomous nations without who may need encouragement by the heroes to become The Alliance. They may also be helped by Les Collaborateurs. There may also be one or more powers that oppose it, often kingdoms or republics, which may or may not band together into The Alliance. The Empire is usually too strong to defeat militarily (unless the story is set in a war strategy video game), but taking down the leaders while they're instigating their sinister plan is usually enough. Or La Résistance may well turn out to be nothing but a treasonous clique to overthrow the government or dynasty and replace it with something even more cruel and brutal, or a nationalist or racist separation movement.

If the Empire and The Federation exist in the same universe, the two are usually at war, just recovering from a war, or dangerously close to getting into one (the latter two often coincide). If The Republic is a separate entity alongside The Federation, you'll usually find them taking shots at one another prior to forming a pact against the Empire; they could've been longstanding rivals, they might view the other as the Empire, or they might've been pinned against each other by the Empire. If The Kingdom is in the same universe, expect the Empire to assault it (at best) or occupy it (at worst); The Kingdom could've been neutral ground, the original head/proposer of The Alliance, or a simple victim of the Empire's bid for dominance. If the Empire is part of The Alliance, you can make a good bet for it being the Token Evil Teammate.

Note that just being called an Empire is not sufficient to qualify a nation for this trope. Especially in a Heroic Fantasy setting, other types of empires abound, often based on the Holy Roman or British Empires (and occasionally a more sympathetic take on the actual Roman or the Chinese Empire). These types of empires may be better described as an expansionist kingdom, a militaristic federation, a nationalistrepublic, or a more centrally controlled alliance.

Weakened or weakening versions of the Empire often becomeVestigial Empires. If the Empire has been overthrown or mostly overthrown but what's left of it is fighting to get back into power, it's The Remnant. The Empire tends to have itsStandard Evil Empire Hierarchy.

For works named Empire, see this disambiguation page.

Real Life examples would be redundant and unnecessary, there are already too many in history to count.

Examples

 * While The Directian Empire would certainly be called this often it fighting this role depends on one viewing it as morally corrupt. On the other hand supporting that argument is the fact that Directus exterminated millions of civilians during the Osean Continental War, has been aggressively expanding its borders ever since, and generally uses its might and influence to get its way all the time. On the other hand the fact that most of Osea is allied to the Empire, that it also generally plays the role of enforcer of the Federation, rather than its opponent, that it founded said Federation, and that it has yet to actually instigate a war may disqualify it from this trope.
 * Likewise the Soleilian Empire might be called The Empire, but it is generally well remembered. On the other hand in its time most of its people were slaves, there was a massive income gap with the rich being disgustingly rich and the poor being dirt poor, and it likewise conquered its way past Osea, leaving the continent a bloodbath for half its history. Despite all of these it wouldn't generally be called The Empire in modern times... because of the past is great? or something.
 * The Yuktobanian Empire certainly counts. It conquered almost all of Osea, waged wars on and off with all the independent nations, generally for no other reason than War for Fun and Profit, and generally made everyone, including those who lived within it, have shity lives. And unlike Soleil people don't misremember it.