>Big Bad takes action >Player Characters take action against

>>50038609
Ocean's 11 springs immediately to mind. Tony Benedict was the antagonist of that, but he wasn't a BBEG by any means. He was doing his own thing, entirely above-the-board as far as we're aware (i.e., his games weren't rigged, he got his competitors out of town simply by having better/more popular casinos rather than by force, he treated his wife well, etc.), and wouldn't have been involved with Danny Ocean or any of the other thieves if not for the fact that they were acting deliberately against him for their own fun and profit.

>>50038609
Give them a goal.
In order to do that, you'll need a tight-knitted party with decent backgrounds, a nice setting, and decent players.
I'd do a session 0 with brainstroming so everybody's on the same page.

Alternatively, mqke them encounter (and kill) the bbeg during the second or third session, so they can use the adventure to decide what to do next ("I really liked that village we saw, I want to become the mayor of it now that evil has ben banished"...)

Let the players be murder hobos. The world will take action in response.

>>50038609
>Big Bad minds his own business
>Player Characters take action
>Big Bad takes action against this action

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>>50038609

Either set the players up with something that has clear goals (restoring a ruined castle + town, or establishing a guild, or founding a colony, or over throwing a monarch, etc) or just give them a breathing world and encourage them to find their own goals (though there needs to be something the whole party is working towards)

It works if the world has it's own priorities and ticks on with or without the PCs. The towns people do their own thing and have arguments and suffer calamities. The neighbouring kingdom is threatening to start a war. The inquisition is rounding up elves and dwarves.

Matt Colville just did a good video on the basics and benefits of having a 'central tension'

>Party forms, has big dreams but featherweight wallets
>"Oh, there was a big underground ruin uncovered not too far from here. Archaeologists were looking to pay big money to some explorers to make sure it's safe for examination."
>Party goes into ruins and fights zombies
>Turns out the lich who raised them to keep the old civilization still alive is pretty pissed about that