Peter's evil overlord list.

The following are from Peter's Evil Overlord List. Peter was watching Deep Space Nine one day and started compiling a list of things he will NEVER DO if his career choice of becoming an Evil Overlord comes about. He came up with 100 plot devices which are overused/stupid/unlikely, all of which resulted in the demise of the Evil Overlord.
Some, like making sure the ventilation ducting is too small to crawl through seem obvious. Others, like the requirement that all Evil plans be gone over by a grade five kid seem to be pure genius.

You can read all of Peter's list here....
http://www.eviloverlord.com/lists/overlord.html

Here are a few to whet your appetite.

1. If one of my dungeon guards begins expressing concern over the conditions in the beautiful princess' cell, I will immediately transfer him to a less people-oriented position.

2. 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.

3. If the beautiful princess that I capture says "I'll never marry you! Never, do you hear me, NEVER!!!", I will say "Oh well" and kill her.

4. I will not strike a bargain with a demonic being then attempt to double-cross it simply because I feel like being contrary.

5. The deformed mutants and odd-ball psychotics will have their place in my Legions of Terror. However before I send them out on important covert missions that require tact and subtlety, I will first see if there is anyone else equally qualified who would attract less attention.

6. My Legions 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.

7. Before employing any captured artifacts or machinery, I will carefully read the owner's manual.

8. If it becomes necessary to escape, I will never stop to pose dramatically and toss off a one-liner.

9. I will never build a sentient computer smarter than I am.

10. My five-year-old child advisor will also be asked to decipher any code I am thinking of using. If he breaks the code in under 30 seconds, it will not be used. Note: this also applies to passwords.