Yeah, okay, then. Have fun, we "less creative" "fools" will get back to playing non-evil guys.
Don't forget to leave people alone when they display the ability to do more. That part is important.
He's boring only in the hands of bad writers. He's a phonomenal character when he's handled right as in JLA: New Frontiers. How many other comic book heroes are still going as strong after the better part of a century?
And like it's said before Flawed, tragic heroes were more interesting...until you ran into one on every corner. And if Wolverine were Evil or Neutral with Bad, he'd be Sabertooth. He's a hero because unlike Sabertooth, at the end of the day he's fighting for the RIGHT reasons and there are lines that he doesn't cross.
My issue with Superman is that he's rarely portrayed as having a real personality. There have been exceptions, I liked it when he shoved Darkseid into that space wall. I liked the running Superman & Batman series. It's just so rare to see it.
I'd say Wolverine is solidly neutral, with impulses towards Evil and a conscious desire to be Good. Which is probably why he's one of the most popular characters in history, he's something for everyone. (Sabertooth isn't exactly unpopular either, y'know. And his best moments have been when he had more motivation than just being a monster. Like when it's shown that his background with Wolverine is actually love/hate.)
Regarding the OP, I think that evil characters are strong in different ways.
It's been noted that they can heal undead same as a good cleric can heal other PCs. So barring a partially or entirely undead party (fun!) there's also the fact that they can control a bunch of undead easily. So you almost get a free leadership feat to make up for your negative energy having a save; and at least you've still got access to heal spells in your list.
Maybe not a perfect trade-off, but not terrible.
Don't forget to leave people alone when they display the ability to do more. That part is important.
Don´t worry, arrogant twerps usually end up playing alone with themselves.
Don´t worry, arrogant twerps usually end up playing alone with themselves.
Provided they're not just wishy-washy, kinda arrogant twerps, but real dyed-in-the-wool *****? Nah, I'm sure they just find a group that thinks like they do.
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Here's a solution for Evil-wannabe's...
Required Reading (Select One): Machiavelli's The Prince, Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead, and possibly Dumas The Count of Monte Cristo. The list can be expanded, but these provide interesting concepts of personal integrity and social obligation.
One of the funnest campaigns I've ever run was an Arcana Evolved game (where there is no alignment), and all of the characters and NPCs had their own motivation systems. Vexlareq (a criminal mastermind) runs a rather brutal and seemingly greedy smuggler's operation, but is not "evil"; he actually has a very good reason for doing those things, but in a game with no alignments, things can become wonderfully complex.
The next time a player says, "Tamora is an evil cleric." (or whatever), look them dead in the eye and ask, "Why?" If they can come up with something better than, "because it would be fun to play" (although that's a relatively good reason, if shallow) - then you, as a DM, have some information about the character's motivations, which is very useful information to have. It can be incorporated into the campaign and make things significantly more interesting for everyone!
Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead
Mmmmmmm. Reading anything by that woman is enough to make you want to crush a baby. Preferably by traveling back in time and finding HER crib.
DM Blake -
You asked earlier for examples of evil/good parties staying together. I would suggest the Gerald Tarrant/Damien Vryce trilogy by C.S. Friedman - Black Sun Rising, When True Night Falls, and Crown of Fire. Yes, it's only 3 books, not the "hundreds of hours" but it is a much better example than Caramon/Raistlin. I would tend to agree that while it might be possible for the two characters to work together for a limited time, eventually, either their alignment shifts, or they end up as foes.
Personally, if you've got an evil cleric, you may be served to have the Tomb Tainted Soul feat from Libris Mortis. But then everyone needs to spend a feat. Of course, the cleric can hurt your enemies while healing you in that instance, which is pretty handy.
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but in a game with no alignments, things can become wonderfully complex.
One of the biggest draws of GURPS and Vampire games for me is being able to play someone who doesn't have an 'alignment,' but is, like a real person, able to choose to follow any (or no) code of morality, ethics or conduct they please. Want to play a Toreador art maven who is a complete pacifist and relies on her supernatural Presence to avoid conflict? Go for it. Want to play a high humanity Gangrel animal rights activist who runs an animal shelter? It's all good. No pesky 'always CE' need apply. Want to play a callous manipulative jerk who sends retainers and followers in to die like expendable pawns in a game of chess of his design, while he sits back and acts like he's a humanitarian and accepts accolades for his philanthropy, while skimming from his charitable foundation to fund his behind-the-scenes gun-running business? Welcome to Clan Ventrue, and you're still no more or less 'evil' than people we read about in the paper every day.
Moral complexity is fun, with experienced players and / or friends.
The next time a player says, "Tamora is an evil cleric." (or whatever), look them dead in the eye and ask, "Why?"
And, if your group is seasoned, you can do the same thing if they say, "Tamora is a good cleric."
Any character, regardless of alignment, could benefit from fleshing out exactly what the player wants to explore with this character, and any DM can benefit from knowing those motivations, so that they can tailor the play experience to not utterly disappoint. If the player designs their character anticipating a magical crime procedural with detective work and mysteries and tons of social interaction with all levels of society, and the DM is planning on running World's Largest Dungeon, someone's not gonna be happy...
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Gerald Tarrant/Damien Vryce trilogy by C.S. Friedman - Black Sun Rising, When True Night Falls, and Crown of Fire.
Heh, that first book was awesome.
[In a seedy tavern in a brutish land]
Neutral Sorceress - "There's blood on the menu!"
Battle-harded good Priest - "Eh. It's a rough place."
Sorceress - "No. You don't understand. There is blood *listed* on the menu!"
Priest - "What? Human or animal?"
Sorceress - "Umm, there appears to be a selection..."
Vampire travelling with the party - "Tastes vary."
As with most evil/good/neutral parties, they are united against a threat far greater than the 'bad-guy' travelling with them. Look at almost any Adventure Path, and it's just as easy to see why a group of evil characters would be willing to work alongside good characters to prevent, say, the Age of Worms, or the Savage Tide, neither of which promises to be any fun for the Hextorian Blackguard from Aerdry or the Scarlet Brotherhood Monk or the Necromancer-Priest of Wee Jass or the Orc Barbarian battle-sargeant from the Land of Iuz. Their own gods / nations / etc. would be just as motivated to stop the ascension of Kyuss or the ultimate victory of Demogorgon as a Cleric of Pelor or a Paladin of Heironeous, and, indeed, an unlikely party that has both a Paladin of Heironeous *and* a Blackguard of Hextor could have some awesome competition between the holy champions of the divine brothers, each seeking to prove how their god's chosen are the best suited to protect the world from the latest threat! The neutral representative from the Circle of Eight could roll her eyes at their posturing and displays of testosterone, and try to keep both of them on task, stopping the Tide/Worms/whatever, so that the 'champions' of good and evil can return to their regularly scheduled pointless bickering *after* the world is saved.
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Granted, I can see this happening. Most of my complaints against are specifically in regards to either the entire party is Evil, or an individual that expects the other players/characters to allow them to do whatever they want and deal with it.
I do have one question, though. How will you handle spells that affect alignments? Like Holy Word. Do they just affect everyone? I don't see this as being too powerful, but it is a little boost. Do they not work any more? If so, that is a huge power lose for Divine casters. Is it up to the DM, (Worst possible solution). To say that they only affect certain members of a group, like worshipers of a certain faith is terribly limiting. So what do you suggest for this type of thing?
DM Blake -
You asked earlier for examples of evil/good parties staying together. I would suggest the Gerald Tarrant/Damien Vryce trilogy by C.S. Friedman - Black Sun Rising, When True Night Falls, and Crown of Fire. Yes, it's only 3 books, not the "hundreds of hours" but it is a much better example than Caramon/Raistlin. I would tend to agree that while it might be possible for the two characters to work together for a limited time, eventually, either their alignment shifts, or they end up as foes.
Does it count as an alignment shift if you go from a largely amoral psychic vampire to a teenager/young adult? I thought they were the same thing... ;)
Yes it is. It has happened in every evil group I've ever seen, as a DM or as a player. Even groups that were working for an evil overlord that expressly forbade them from backstabbing, gave them orders to work together, and promised horrible suffering and torture to anyone who disobeyed, there still was backstabbing.Kuma wrote:
Once again, that "stab in the back" thing is not a foregone conclusion.
Funny, my group's longest running campaign was an evil campaign that started at 1st level and went all the way up to 18th level without anyone turning on each other. We have played many evil campaigns (and even several nonevil ones) that ended with the party turning on each other, though.
I've found that, in my group at least, the DM is usually the most responsible for this happening, usually without realizing it. You tend to allow players to be and do what they want and often put them situations that draw a lot of suspicion from the rest of the group.
In our evil campaing that I mentioned above, the DM did an awesome job of having a relentless assult of good and evil going up against us where we never really even considered back-stabbing each other for fear of weakening our groups effectiveness. We really had no one we could trust besides ourselves. It worked out really well that way.
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Granted, I can see this happening. Most of my complaints against are specifically in regards to either the entire party is Evil, or an individual that expects the other players/characters to allow them to do whatever they want and deal with it.
I do have one question, though. How will you handle spells that affect alignments? Like Holy Word. Do they just affect everyone? I don't see this as being too powerful, but it is a little boost. Do they not work any more? If so, that is a huge power lose for Divine casters. Is it up to the DM, (Worst possible solution). To say that they only affect certain members of a group, like worshipers of a certain faith is terribly limiting. So what do you suggest for this type of thing?
There are ways to get around the alignment spells, like introducing non-alignment based spells that do the same thing, if you are trying to get out of an alignment system.
What I would suggest is changing the spells so that they affect members that are the "enemies" of the cleric's god. Holy Word would become something like Word of Faith, and it would affect everyone who publicly or secretly opposed the power, sovereignty, or importance of the cleric's deity.
For example, deities that grant access to the Sun domain would definitely have evil undead as their enemies. (possibly any undead animated by negative energy).
The question would come up between good and evil though, again, if those domains are left. Here, it would likely come down to religious differences, or those characters (monsters/npcs) that honestly think of themselves as enemies of righteousness. A red dragon, for example, would likely be proud of his evil deeds.
I think I have a document somewhere I wrote called the Complete Book of Good and Evil. I was just writing some interesting stuff for my homemade campaign. I completely threw out generating characters with alignment, and instead created a point system. For performing acts of savagery, cruelty, and malice, a character earned evil points. For performing acts of kindness, forgiveness, etc, a character earned good points. When a character earned enough points, he or she gained the Cruel or Noble feat as a bonus, which affected how certain spells would work for or affect them.
I've also been working on a homebrew game system that throws out the traditional alignment system and replaces it with a scale: Pure, Pious, Noble, Retributive, Mechanical, Beauracratic, Duty-bound, Free-spirited, Liberal, Concerned, Uninvolved, Selfish, Rebellious, Hedonistic, Insane, Corrupt, Tyrannical, Destructive, Cruel, Draconic, Dark. In this system, a seeker (equivalent of cleric) could designate four alignments within 1 rank of each other that their faith-based spells could affect.
So... there are options out there... you just have to be a little creative. Sometimes its good to just throw out the rules that are in place and start over from scratch... even if its just for a little while, a plane jump or whatever. :) Could be fun, you never know until you try.
DM Blake -
You asked earlier for examples of evil/good parties staying together. I would suggest the Gerald Tarrant/Damien Vryce trilogy by C.S. Friedman - Black Sun Rising, When True Night Falls, and Crown of Fire. Yes, it's only 3 books, not the "hundreds of hours" but it is a much better example than Caramon/Raistlin. I would tend to agree that while it might be possible for the two characters to work together for a limited time, eventually, either their alignment shifts, or they end up as foes.
I am all for finding literary examples of evil.
But when we sit at the table, we don't have one single mind controlling every PC. The characters in these novels are all characters of one person - the author.
If the DM sits alone at the table, controlling the world, the weather, the monsters, the NPCs, and every PC in the party, then such things as these novels would be gloriously possible.
However, IME, the table is filled with authors. They each have their own idea of how their character should be run, how he interacts with the world, and probably how the world must interact with their characters.
And once even one of them defines himself as a "greedy selfish bastard" or a "cocky S.O.B." or a "lone-wolf" or a "baby-eating evil monster" or a, well, any kind of anti-social evil (even neutral, sometimes) character who cares more about himself than he does about the others at the table, then the group will inevitably break down into quibbling, squabbling, in-fighting, back-stabbing, killing, and finally ruin.
Those characters in those novels are together for what amounts to the reader as a few hours. In a trilogy, it might be even 30-40 hours. My D&D group can manage those kind of numbers in a month, yet we must adventure together for a year or more to knock down one solid A.P. (yeah, lots of sideline stuff).
So, by novel standards, we have to be together through a dozen trilogies, and all of that time without the overall total control of an author who has plans for each of us to contribute in a meaningful, plot-advancing, character-defining, interesting and generallyc ollaborative fasion.
I guess my life has just been largely free of selfish players. We often have individual motives that pull us this way and that, but everyone manages to place primary importance on our overall goal. Or at the very least on not disturbing the group dynamic too much.
It sounds like you've had some really terrible experiences with evil PCs, I almost want to give you a hug and ask you, "Show me on this AP chart where the evil party member touched you..."
Well if you're ever in North Carolina and want to test out an evil PC without the constant threat of party squabbles; you're invited to our table.
I've had experience with the selfish (evil) character, the rat bastard backstabber (evil) player, and the "because I'm evil" evil player, which were all rather negative, but mostly for the poor player as the rest of us eventually got tired of his/her shenanigans and usually turned the character over to the law (once we just left 'em nekkid in the wilderness to walk home, but that was a very special case).
On the other hand, one of the fastest, funniest adventures I ever ran was a neutral to evil party that shifted to all evil before the adventure was done. We were running through Gary Gygax's The Land Beyond the Magic Mirror and Dungeonland. Encounters that should have been tricky, though provoking and filled with potential for the players to be backstabbed by the NPCs turned into a bloody romp where the characters just took out anything that looked at 'em funny :) They didn't fully trust each other, but knew they needed all three to make it out alive ... it was truly fun to run and watch the mayhem those boys got into :)
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Those negative channels were NASTY for the party to face, and there was no way to block them, though they could be resisted for half damage.
Is there now a case for the game to include spells/abilities to resist this damage, similar to how Turn Resistance worked? Will Consecrate be re-worded to provide Channelling Damage Resistance?
It didn't exist before, because the option to channel damage vs living creatures didn't exist, but hopefullly, it will be in the new rules.
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In our evil campaing that I mentioned above, the DM did an awesome job of having a relentless assult of good and evil going up against us where we never really even considered back-stabbing each other for fear of weakening our groups effectiveness. We really had no one we could trust besides ourselves. It worked out really well that way.
There may be no blatant back-stabbing in some groups, but there can still be a lot of deaths due to selfish actions. People only buffing/aiding themselves, hogging the healing, looting bodies and not sharing.
This should lead to the death of the remaining PCs, but usually doesn't, because the players are metagaming, counting on the DM to take pity on them, and adjust the remaining encounters, or throw in some healing potions to keep them going. Or they think 'May as well let Jim die, and loot his body, doesn't matter, cause he'll be bringing a new PC, who'll be teleported to our location with a full set of gear....hmmm, hope the new guy's got some good stuff; I can 'accidentally' let him die too....'.
It's not the DM's job to punish such players, as such, but they can stop enabling them. If they aren't going to keep each other alive, why should the DM. Let the dice fall where they may. Give the player of the dead PC a week off, and make them continue without a replacement. Leave the encounters scaled for a full party; if they whinge that they're short of manpower, shrug, and ask 'What's that to do with me?'.
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Why can't evil clerics cast spontaneous heal spells? I would assume Asmodeus and Zon-Kuthon would want to heal their followers so the can continue to serve them.
The real question is "Why can any cleric be able to spontaneously casting either a cure or inflict wounds spell?" Why would a cleric of travel be able to spontaneously heal and not spontaneously be able to cast a travel spell? Same for a cleric of Trade, they should be able to do something trade related, not healing/harm related. You can do this for almost any domain. Imo this is because clerics are still being viewed as combat/battle clerics with generic powers for good or evil.
The answer is: They shouldn't. Clerics should be able to spontaneously cast any spells from Domains they know.
Agreed; the new channeling rules effectively provide the same safety net that spontaneous curing was intended to be.
This makes spontaneous curing/inflicting unnecessary and redundant, and should ideally change to being spontaneous domain casting (either choice of either at the time of casting, or choose one to focus on at character creation, with a feat to expand the choice to extra domains).This gives someone an actual reason for picking the healing domain; those clerics should be the best, spontaneous healers. Everyone else should reflect their deities' actual portfolio, which some, currently, only do for one spell per spell level per day.
Interesting, your idea of Neutral Evil is quite different from mine.
I've always thought NE characters are the least likely to do good. I see them as the most purely malevolent of the alignments, motivated by jealousy, hatred and a desire to destroy. NE characters are the death-worshipers, serial killers and ruinous nihilists. People who loathe the world and want to tear it down, either to bring "blissful oblivion" or to rebuild a new world that caters to their tastes, or even one to create a "good" world in which they and other evil creatures never existed.
A Lawful Evil creature may empower Good by following the laws of the land or honouring its obligations, a Chaotic Evil creature may do good on a whim (since their actions are more likely to be impulsive, inconsistent or plain random - they are Chaotic, after all), or have a few 'good' friends/associates/enemies they treat with great love, respect and consideration, while being hell-fiends to everyone else.
Well, I can certainly see your interpretation in a couple points; but others don't make sense to me. Neutral Evil being driven to destroy, for example. That's most definitely part of the chaotic purview, I don't know how it could be defined otherwise. Neutrality represents much more of a "meh" attitude than a bloodthirsty lunatic; at least to me.
Honestly, I only suggested that serial killers would be typically CE because they seem the most likely to be unhinged. LE would probably present some chilling opportunities for psychosis.
I think the issue with LE is not the fact that it follows law. In fact, that's pretty tangential to the good/evil spectrum. Law doesn't equate to morality. I think LE people are compelled to twist the law in an evil direction without breaking it.
NE could be a nihilist, sure, but I think they'd be a pretty weak nihilist. Nihilism is a philosophy at its core, and to do more than pay lip service to it you'd need a good deal of personal discipline and belief. You'd need to be lawful.
As for CE, I don't consider them so much impulsive as contemptuous of structure.
In a nutshell, they're all (presumably) the same amount of evil, but they have different takes on how to go about it; right?
So a summary of their attitudes in my mind would be:
CE - You're not the boss of me! +evil
LE - Yes, I am the boss of you. +evil
NE - Meh. +evil
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For the last couple of years I have played a character in the L5R living campaign Heroes of Rokugan who would, in D&D terms, have qualified unequivocally as evil (until a relatively recent set of events that lead to something directly comparable to an alignment shift). Throughout that time, I played the character in groups largely consisting of characters who would translate as good, but there has never been the slightest problem with intraparty conflict, because the evils my character committed (and they were many) were aimed at either helping the party out or pursuing personal goals that were carefully designed not to involve the rest of the group.
The problem is not playing "evil" characters, it's playing characters that are not designed to function well in groups, and that's something you can do just as easily with neutral or even good characters. The poor reputation that evil campaigns have comes from players who think that "evil" is a license to ignore the group-oriented nature of gaming. All-evil groups can work just fine (in fact, in some cases, more effectively and efficiently than good groups do) as long as the players realize that they are still in a group and design their characters appropriately.
alignment
Well, I think chaotic is the most likely to have examples of crazies, but not that the lion's share of NPCs/PCs need to be crazy.
You're talking about Chaotic premises for Law, but I think your terms are a bit off. The constitution and libertarian things aren't chaotic, they're moral. They're issues of right and wrong - good and evil. So they're laws set up to promote what their proponents see as good. Not chaos.
As for individuals with x alignment being disciplined, undisciplined, wishy-washy... There's wiggle room in each alignment. I don't see it as a foregone conclusion that every chaotic person flips a coin to make decisions, or that a lawful person would never double-cross someone. Or that neutral people... (wait, I don't actually see where we've disagreed on neutrality.) I just happen to feel that there's a general trend with the alignments, and an underlying psychology. That's what I was going for with my little alignment descriptions. They're far from exhaustive, but a good rule of thumb when I'm looking at making a certain kind of character.
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I think it might be useful to seperate evil from crazy.
*Lots* of people in the really real-world are selfish, petty, territorial, insecure, protectionist, etc. and would stab a co-worker or family member in the back for a bigger chunk of an inheritance, a promotion, a bigger chunk of the lotto ticket winnings, etc., many of them rationalizing to themselves that they are 'only doing what is fair' because they are 'more deserving' than the other people, who 'would have done the same thing to them, if they had the chance.'
Very few of those people have what it takes to become serial killers, even if they might end up in quality control / product safety, politics, etc. and make decisions that endanger, beggar, ruin the lives of or even kill thousands of people. (See, Madoff, Bernie)
'Psycho-killers' are more likely to be obsessively Lawful than Chaotic, with ritualistic behaviors, specific patterns of movement, preferred victims, etc. But it isn't the alignment that defines their psycho-killer status, it's the fact that they are *nuts.*
I think it might be useful to seperate evil from crazy.
*Lots* of people in the really real-world are selfish, petty, territorial, insecure, protectionist, etc. and would stab a co-worker or family member in the back for a bigger chunk of an inheritance, a promotion, a bigger chunk of the lotto ticket winnings, etc., many of them rationalizing to themselves that they are 'only doing what is fair' because they are 'more deserving' than the other people, who 'would have done the same thing to them, if they had the chance.'
Very few of those people have what it takes to become serial killers, even if they might end up in quality control / product safety, politics, etc. and make decisions that endanger, beggar, ruin the lives of or even kill thousands of people. (See, Madoff, Bernie)
'Psycho-killers' are more likely to be obsessively Lawful than Chaotic, with ritualistic behaviors, specific patterns of movement, preferred victims, etc. But it isn't the alignment that defines their psycho-killer status, it's the fact that they are *nuts.*
*shrug*
I can live with that. Although I'm not willing to say that someone who takes lives for the sake of taking lives isn't evil.
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*shrug*
I can live with that. Although I'm not willing to say that someone who takes lives for the sake of taking lives isn't evil.
Sure, I was just saying that killers aren't necessary *chaotic,* and that the serial killer sorts are in fact quite 'lawful,' in that they are obsessive and trapped within certain types of behavior.
The guys who go in public areas and starts gunning people down = Chaotic =P
Perhaps, for someone to simply snap and go on a rampage it is quite a chaotic act. But some seriel killers (usally ones which are able to kill quite alot) can also be quite cold, calculating and logical thinkers, prone to planning and order rather then spotainious action, which does make them lean more towards lawful (they would have to be after all, if they wern't too smart they'd get caught and wouldn't be able to kill more than once...unless they just went crazy and went on a rampage).
To the main topic: Whether or not Evil clerics are unpowering is entirely up to game play. Alot of people seem to think the cleric's primary role is a healer. If you group agrees with this, then yes, being evil makes the cleric underpowering as it limits his/her healing capabilities. Just like a fighter who cannot fight is considered weak, a healer who cannot heal is going to be thought of in the same way.
I've personally always viewed a cleric as a class that should be heavily themed on the god, meaning I don't play them as healers unless their god just happens to be a God of Healing or a God of Life or some such. If I play an evil cleric, it usally means I'll intend to be causing pain rather than healing, so in my case being evil isn't underpowering in the slighest.
Actually, chaotic alignments do mean undisciplined. In the unfocused, non-regemented sense. While being lawful doesn't mean you have to be disciplined, it is an aspect of the alignment. Or a common characteristic.What alignment would you give to a highly disciplined person who thinks that the greatest virtue in life is self-reliance?
Lawful Neutral. He's higly disciplined, keeping himself to a strict set of rules, hence the Lawful. He only helps himself, and no one else, hence the Neutral. Or maybe Evil if he REALLY doesn't care for others.
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What alignment would you give to a highly disciplined person who thinks that the greatest virtue in life is self-reliance?Lawful Neutral. He's higly disciplined, keeping himself to a strict set of rules, hence the Lawful. He only helps himself, and no one else, hence the Neutral. Or maybe Evil if he REALLY doesn't care for others.
My first impression would be Lawful as well, but self-reliance ia actually probably more chaotic in nature. Either could work. So I would have to say, as that is only aportion of their personality and world view, any alignment. The alignment would come from how they act and think, in addition to this. I can see a LG knight that believes in charity and the like, but would not partake in it himself. I can also see a Chaotic Evil thief that wants to stay on the top of their game, so doesn't want help or easy targets.
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Again, that is a goal, but has little to do with alignment. Their alignment might give a clue as to why and how they would go about bringing down these groups, but there are other considerations as well. Like religion, class, the society(s) in question, and the characters background.
Is the character a LG paladin bent on taking down a evil nazi regime, a CG robin hood rogue struggling against a corrupt ruler and their minions, a N druid trying to maintain some balance against a (good?) society that is encroaching out to far (maybe into an area that has threats they are unaware of), a LE cleric that is trying to weaken a society so that when it falls, he can step in to "save" it, or a CE blackguard that just wants to do as much damage and cause as much pain as they can to the homeland that kicked them out.
My two cents.
I have played evil charecters in an all evil party consisting of a cleric of velsharoon(me) a kobald monster of legend and a cleric of tiamat with the earth&fire domains. We worked well together becaus ewe all had totally diffrent goals that didnt overlap. The koblad wanted a home for his race where they would be safe from roaming bands of human murderers, after all their kobalds and are an evil race so nobody cares when their whole village is slaughtered.
Cleric of tiamat wanted to protect and nurture the evil dragons and spread the whorship of tiamat. Incidentally fighting the good dragons was a nice change of pace but boy are they weak. The ancient golds were no match for us and we were only 13th lvl but they do make excellent zombies.
Me I wanted to provide a safe haven for intelligent undead and have them whorship velsharoon as their god. My shining moment was breaking and exalted NPC paladin by having him agree to serve me for 1yr and 1 day in total servitude in exchange for the lives of his companions. He agreed and then after a 10 day coup de graced me in my sleep. I was elevated to half-vampire and returned to life and he was forever a fallen paladin because he broke his word and commited murder.
Evil parties can and do work and are alot of fun to play as well as evil clerics.
As far as the alignment spells, hey thats the benifit of being evil unholy word dosent affect you(as far as the players know you have up a spell or an item) Paladins detect evil only works if your a cleric and have alot of levels.
The book of vile darkness that lets you summon a horde of dretches makes for nice henchmen(they can shape change so they dont attract attention)
Sorry I'm rambling. To conclude.
Evil is fun.
Evil IS more powerful
The argument that evil wasn't meant to be used by players is bunk, if I'm playing I'm going to munchhkin and play the most powerful charecter I can.
Evil can work with good and dosn't have to betray the party or be unloyal or a raving fiend they will simply stop at NOTHING to accomplish their goals no matter what.
like I said that my two cents.
I've found Evil Clerics to be equally powerful but they fill different roles. Evil clerics are all about dishing out damage while good clerics are about healing. The channel energy does that as well the spontaneous casting. Both clerics buff the same and apply conditions the same though.