No, Klingons are barbaric and certainly ascribe to powerful individual senses of honor. Worf clings to the more societal forms of honor...his honor is the honor of all klingons, whereas most Klingons emphasize the part of the code that refers to themselves.
The problem with the Gold dragon hatchlings is, as soon as they gain an age level, they gain a LOT of hit dice, become higher base animal companions, lose a lot of the bonuses, and decide to leave. Hah!
CE is by definition anti-societal and homicidal, totally unpredictable and completely uncaring of the needs and desires of others. MR. CE might help the old lady out of her house on a whim...so he can torture her to reveal the location of said item. Otherwise, he's just as likely to kill her as talk to her.
You can be VERY devoted to a chaotic mindset. It's all about personal honor, as opposed to societal honor. Fighting against The Man, rebelling against anyone who thinks they have power over you, living by your own laws and not those that others impose on you, are all examples of chaotic mindsets that people adhere to. They had some good examples of what Chaotics are like in some old Dragon articles...the biggest thing is that everything is judged on an individual basis, and not a 'group' basis. If the Chaotic person thinks something needs to be done, they do it...they don't go asking the opinions of others, they only acknowledge laws to the extent such will get in the way or backfire on them. They just DO things.
Good thru Evil then determine to what extent they are willing to harm others while doing such things.
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Good have morals. Hard work IS a moral.
Evil people by definition are the laziest around. Getting OTHER people to do the hard work is part and parcel of Evil. Taking the easiest way to do something, regardless of how sinister such is, is another trait of Evil.
Good people, because they can't do the easy thing, tend to be MUCH more inherently dangerous then Evil once they take the step to violence. It's that dad-gum work ethic, making 'em so damn good at what they do, and adherence to a cause and willing to sacrifice themselves in pursuit of doing The Right Thing.
Evil people tend to sacrifice OTHERS. Sacrificing themselves just isn't very productive to their goals. Such a thing might be done out of a sense of flawed honor, or more likely out of spite, but it's one of the psychological things that hold Evil back.
People like to think Evil is tough because Evil immediately is willing to use death and violence as an option, and Good generally is not. But when Good strikes that match and lifts that sword, Evil tends to piss in it's boots. Good has to win without being lazy or cheating, and that makes Good very, very dangerous.
==Aelryinth
Now you see why evil will always win - because good is dumb.
>_> <_< Sorry, I had to throw that out there, lol.
Actually, antipaladins are better because they're chaotic. Order will always lose in the end. Chaos was there before everything and will still be there once everything is gone. This order thing is merely a temporary infestation.
But I don't think paladins are the counterbalance to evil. If there is such a thing, it's the angels - because there is no overarching race of fiends to cancel them out! So archons oppose demons, agathions fight daemons, azatas fight devils - and angels help archons, agathions and azatas. Add to that the fact that angels are extremely powerful and you see why paladins can afford to take a week off without the world being destroyed.
I think 1/month wish pretty much beats out anything the Paladin gets from his mount, barring 3.5 Halfling Paladin/Ranger/Beastmaster/Halfling Outrider builds that run around with hatchling Gold Dragon special mount/animal companion hybrids that can take control of every gold dragon in the world and recreate Dragonlance. (yes, that's an entirely legal build)Or if you want to compare mounts to mounts, a level 20 paladin's horse has a BAB of +12 and a Str of 28 (at best), and maybe 120 hp, whereas an anti-paladin can cruise around on a bebelith with +12 BAB, 32 Str and 174 hp starting at level 13.So you end up with a 16HD Celestial Horse vs a Glabrezu? Sure, ok...
3. An antipaladin’s servant does not increase in HD and so on like a paladin’s does (like a druid animal companion).
APG:
The second type of bond allows an antipaladin to gain the service of a fiendish servant. This functions as summon monster III, except the duration is permanent.From the summon monster spell:
A summoned monster cannot summon or otherwise conjure another creature, nor can it use any teleportation or planar travel abilities. Creatures cannot be summoned into an environment that cannot support them. Creatures summoned using this spell cannot use spells or spell-like abilities that duplicate spells with expensive material components (such as wish).
They can't cast wish, but I would still rather have the demon than the mount. :)
Now you see why evil will always win - because good is dumb.
>_> <_< Sorry, I had to throw that out there, lol.
Actually, antipaladins are better because they're chaotic. Order will always lose in the end. Chaos was there before everything and will still be there once everything is gone. This order thing is merely a temporary infestation.
But I don't think paladins are the counterbalance to evil. If there is such a thing, it's the angels - because there is no overarching race of fiends to cancel them out! So archons oppose demons, agathions fight daemons, azatas fight devils - and angels help archons, agathions and azatas. Add to that the fact that angels are extremely powerful and you see why paladins can afford to take a week off without the world being destroyed.
Actually, Law was before everything. A state of nothingness, perfect Entropy, is in effect perfect Law.
Then Chaos came along and messed everything up. Boom!
The universe is currently working this chaos crap out of its system. In a few hundred billion years, everything will be back to inert perfection.
=-=========
Paladins are the mortal answer to evil...they adhere to a ridiculously stringent code of conduct unbecoming a human, just to show us there is a better way, and to lead us towards it. The psychological impact of having people out there who will do the Right Thing, Guaranteed, probably does more to fight the influence of Lower Planar Evil then smiting stuff. Paladins are true Heroes...and people like Heroes and want to support them.
Angels are overarching coordinators of the fight against Evil. They could be seen as manifestations of what Good really means...uniting Law, Neutrality and Chaos into a common cause, which Evil just can't do. In doing so, they prevent conflict among the upper planes and promote harmony and understanding among different viewpoints.
And beat the &^%# out of fiends in their spare time, too.
==Aelryinth
That's what I love about this sort of game. Its richness, complexity and variability are unmatched. No one would say, "I don't think there should be knights in chess - their movement pattern is absurd!"Have you *seen* that movement pattern? I mean really, I can get rooks and their 'up and down is my domain biotch!' attitude and the bishop's 'just get diagonal of me and I'm ROFLstomp you' but knights? Man they be all up in this like 'I'll go here, and then here, and ooh look I made an L! teehee' man, what?!
... I think I love you a little bit for that.
** spoiler omitted **
Historically, Law is placed as 'Good' because it means civlization, advancement, order, respect for authority...and keeping those currently in power and their successors in power. In effect, it's considered 'good' because we've been brainwashed into seeing it that way. You don't have scientific advancement without Law.
You have to step away from that viewpoint. That's not 'good'...that's Lawful. Everything above can be twisted to serve Evil.
Chaotic is about individual freedom to follow your own path; no restrictions on what individuals can ascend to; judged on your own merits instead of inheriting respect; consideration for the person and not the group; personal good at least as important as the greater good, and usually moreso.
The Chaotic person refuses to be shackled down by laws, traditions, and the words of others saying he 'must' do this. He attains what he can, because he can, and because he is able, and doesn't let anyone stop him with their piffling 'laws'. In short, he is a free spirit, and only direct force or threat thereof is going to hold him from doing what he wants.
You don't have art, philosophical or cultural advancement without Chaos. The old must be swept away to make way for the new.
All this can be turned to Evil also, of course...and to Good. Too often has Chaos been associated with Destruction, because that is the most violent form of change (Warhammer is like this...there is no 'good' Chaos).
==Aelryinth
I have to say I don't find the Anti-Paladin to better than the Paladin. The key thing is generally if you are an Anti-Paladin you probably won't be fighting good creatures as much as the Paladin fights evil creatures. As an NPC fighting the players the Anti-Paladin my find the players to be Good and smite good comes into play but even with that due the wealth for NPC the player Paladin will be better. If you plan to play a evil campaign and Anti-Paladin then there just are way more monster that not good than there are monster that are good. So you will be limited in your use of smite good more so than the Paladin.
Actually, Law was before everything. A state of nothingness, perfect Entropy, is in effect perfect Law.
Entropy is, by definition, disorder, not order.
Entropy is, by definition, disorder, not order.
Actually, Law was before everything. A state of nothingness, perfect Entropy, is in effect perfect Law.
This definition disagrees with you:
3.(in cosmology) a hypothetical tendency for the universe to attain a state of maximum homogeneity in which all matter is at a uniform temperature (heat death).
Maximum homogeneity is pretty much the definition of perfect Law.
Entropy is, by definition, disorder, not order.
Actually, Law was before everything. A state of nothingness, perfect Entropy, is in effect perfect Law.This definition disagrees with you:
3.(in cosmology) a hypothetical tendency for the universe to attain a state of maximum homogeneity in which all matter is at a uniform temperature (heat death).Maximum homogeneity is pretty much the definition of perfect Law.
Case in point. I don't like D&D's alignment system anymore. I have no problem with objective morality and ethics; that happens to be my orientation in reality. However, D&D is far too inconsistent in its approach, because different "authorities" will print different ideas and definitions at different times, which often conflict with each other. That, and the game promotes a form of sand-box creativity, where each person and table is encouraged to run wild with their imaginations and the question "What if...?" That's great, but it is not conducive to also establishing a community-wide consensus on objective definitions of supposedly objective concepts.
Wow, that's an awful big rant for something that has so little to do with my post.
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I think by definition though that Klingon ideals are inherently Chaotic.
[tangent]
Kingon ideals are lawful, full of honor and sacrifice and noble gestures. And they only exist in books and stories, and the heart of some orphaned kid who was raised by humans and got all of his ideas of how to be a Klingon from reading of those lofty ideals, like some 20th century kid who read about Lancelot and decided that feudal times must have been pretty glamorous and egalitarian and romantic.Once Worf met real Klingons, he discovered the ugly truth that *none* of them really live by those ideals, and that poisoning, backstabbing, handing over political enemies to racial enemies (even in time of war), the hiring of assassins, etc. was de rigeur in the Empire.
I wouldn't be surprised if many Klingons had a rosy-eyed view of history and believed that their legends were all true, and that the heroes of their past were better people, and that their society had gone downhill or something, refusing to recognize that just as they lie like crazy about what they are doing, so to did their ancestors, leaving behind fantastic stories with no bearing on reality.
'Oh, everything was so much better back then, when people had honor!'
'Yeah. We just invented treachery and deceit, like, yesterday, right? That's why our thousand year old armor designs have *thicker plating on the back,* because before we even had blasters, a warriors deadliest enemy was the Klingon behind him...'
[/tangent]
(1) Anti-Paladins, while better than "blackguards," still strike me as kinda "meh." I don't know what it is I'm not so excited about. Powerful? Sure looks it. Plausible? Maybe, maybe not...
(2) Anyone caught being one would probably be shunned/killed rather quickly even by most EVIL characters simply because, as is often quoted, "Evil isn't Stupid," meaning nobody but NOBODY wants some dude around who is compelled to be the exemplar of chaos, nevermind evil.
(3)
I don't like D&D's alignment system anymore. ... D&D is far too inconsistent in its approach ...
I agree it's a bit arbitrary and often inconsistent. However, ever since a rant against "Balance" and the Kingpriest of Istar some time ago (a favorite post, and one I still show people), I've been a huge "Searn" fan. Please don't let this lack of alignments in your game stop your commentary on alignments.
I've liked Anti-Paladins since First Edition of a certain other game [Unofficially, of course]. If the Demon vs. Horse seems unbalanced, consider this; any Paladin worth his/her salt should have allies by that level, and could very easily have an Angel of some sort as one of said allies. And that would balance things nicely. It's just a matter of the story being told; not every GM will go for that, of course, but if you explain it well, I don't see why this is impossible.
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That's what I love about this sort of game. Its richness, complexity and variability are unmatched. No one would say, "I don't think there should be knights in chess - their movement pattern is absurd!"Have you *seen* that movement pattern? I mean really, I can get rooks and their 'up and down is my domain biotch!' attitude and the bishop's 'just get diagonal of me and I'm ROFLstomp you' but knights? Man they be all up in this like 'I'll go here, and then here, and ooh look I made an L! teehee' man, what?!... I think I love you a little bit for that.
** spoiler omitted **
I would guess that the law/chaos conflict came from the Elric of Melnibone books. I can't remember the author or the actual titles of the books, only that the major conflict was Law vs. Chaos (good and evil, respectively).
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I'm also guessing the anti-paladin might have been designed to take on a balanced party of 4 heroes.
So what happens when any other class takes on a balanced party of four? If you want a balanced fight, you also put him in a balanced party of four; or you do as you would any other BBEG and give him an extra level or two to make him an appropriate challenge for your group.
Making "NPC classes" inherently more challenging than a core class of equal level, is flawed design from previous editions of the game. Any class can (and usually does) serve as an "NPC class". Anti-paladins should be no different.
I have said on these boards before that the antipaladin needs to be weaker than the paladin in order to make them balanced because of the paladin's code.
An antipaladin can lie, steal, cheat, set an orphanage on fire as a distraction during a fight with a paladin, sign a treaty he doesn't intend to honor, torture innocents to get the paladin to surrender, etc., etc.
The paladin can't do anything like that and it puts the paladin at a huge disadvantage in a fight.
Now the APG adds mechanical advantages to the antipaladin with the cruelties. The antipaladin can afflict the paladin with conditions (stunned, etc.) that don't allow the paladin to take actions-- making the paladin's ability to remove these conditions pretty worthless in a head-to-head fight.
A completely unbalanced character class.
I have said on these boards before that the antipaladin needs to be weaker than the paladin in order to make them balanced because of the paladin's code.
An antipaladin can lie, steal, cheat, set an orphanage on fire as a distraction during a fight with a paladin, sign a treaty he doesn't intend to honor, torture innocents to get the paladin to surrender, etc., etc.
The paladin can't do anything like that and it puts the paladin at a huge disadvantage in a fight.
Now the APG adds mechanical advantages to the antipaladin with the cruelties. The antipaladin can afflict the paladin with conditions (stunned, etc.) that don't allow the paladin to take actions-- making the paladin's ability to remove these conditions pretty worthless in a head-to-head fight.
A completely unbalanced character class.
A class's power as an NPC is not the same as it is for a PC. The assassin is a decent DM PrC, but it sucks for players. There is a feat that allows you to use one crossbow bolt to shoot through anyone that is lined up, but the chances of the that happening for a player are not good at all.
As far as playing an antipaladin his chaotic nature makes him hard to keep in a group, and almost impossible in a good group since he would most likely be scheming against them.The paladin also has friends. It is not like he will be fighting the BBEG antipaladin alone, and even if the anti-pally is the right hand man he can still be shutdown(stalled at least), the means will depend on the party's level of course.
Entropy is, by definition, disorder, not order.
Actually, Law was before everything. A state of nothingness, perfect Entropy, is in effect perfect Law.This definition disagrees with you:
3.(in cosmology) a hypothetical tendency for the universe to attain a state of maximum homogeneity in which all matter is at a uniform temperature (heat death).Maximum homogeneity is pretty much the definition of perfect Law.
Actually, this homogeneity is absolute disorder - or, rather, used to be, because nowadays order and disorder are left out of the discussion because things get confused.
Entropy is the increase of disorder. Everything spreads out, instead of forming orderly clumps. If this disorderly spread reaches its maximum, making all conversion of energy impossible (preventing things like life or even motion). Heat Death is also a deceptive name, because when Entropy reaches maximum, no heat can exist.
Anyway, equalling entropy with nothingness doesn't work either way. If you have nothing, you don't have entropy, either, because you need something to form the state that is called entropy.
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I would guess that the law/chaos conflict came from the Elric of Melnibone books. I can't remember the author or the actual titles of the books, only that the major conflict was Law vs. Chaos (good and evil, respectively).That's what I love about this sort of game. Its richness, complexity and variability are unmatched. No one would say, "I don't think there should be knights in chess - their movement pattern is absurd!"Have you *seen* that movement pattern? I mean really, I can get rooks and their 'up and down is my domain biotch!' attitude and the bishop's 'just get diagonal of me and I'm ROFLstomp you' but knights? Man they be all up in this like 'I'll go here, and then here, and ooh look I made an L! teehee' man, what?!... I think I love you a little bit for that.
** spoiler omitted **
That author would be Michael Moorcock, and if you haven't read any of his stuff, go do it as soon as possible. All of the Elric stories have been recently released in trade paperback and it was a joy for me to find something that has been around for so long, something that helped inspire the creation of D&D and a lot of modern fantasy as a whole, and something that the original creator is still adding to all the time as he is alive and well and writing something insanely awesome probably as I write this inane blog post.
Actually, this homogeneity is absolute disorder
Homogeneity literally means that everything is exactly the same. I cannot see how that could possibly mean anything but perfect order/law. Chaos/disorder is about randomness, differences, change, and evolution. Maximum homogeneity means there's no capacity for that whatsoever.
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Largest downside to the AntiPaladin:
CHAOTIC EVIL. Which is, in my opinion, just as restrictive if not more so than the Lawful Good alignment that the Paladin is stuck to.
In fact, in a normal campaign, PCs will not be able to play as the Antipaladin. Antipaladins by definition of their code will not work in normal adventuring groups. One of my buddies is currently working on an evil campaign so it may be usable than, but a class that you can't really use is BAD. No matter how good something is, if ya can't use it, it's useless. :P
That being said, the Antipaladin is most useful for GMs. These guys make awesome baddies. ;)
Largest downside to the AntiPaladin:
CHAOTIC EVIL. Which is, in my opinion, just as restrictive if not more so than the Lawful Good alignment that the Paladin is stuck to.
In fact, in a normal campaign, PCs will not be able to play as the Antipaladin. Antipaladins by definition of their code will not work in normal adventuring groups. One of my buddies is currently working on an evil campaign so it may be usable than, but a class that you can't really use is BAD. No matter how good something is, if ya can't use it, it's useless. :P
That being said, the Antipaladin is most useful for GMs. These guys make awesome baddies. ;)
This. Just This.
This. Just This.Largest downside to the AntiPaladin:
CHAOTIC EVIL. Which is, in my opinion, just as restrictive if not more so than the Lawful Good alignment that the Paladin is stuck to.
In fact, in a normal campaign, PCs will not be able to play as the Antipaladin. Antipaladins by definition of their code will not work in normal adventuring groups. One of my buddies is currently working on an evil campaign so it may be usable than, but a class that you can't really use is BAD. No matter how good something is, if ya can't use it, it's useless. :P
That being said, the Antipaladin is most useful for GMs. These guys make awesome baddies. ;)
It shouldn't have been in the Advanced Player's Guide if it is an NPC only class, which it appears to be.
Actually, this homogeneity is absolute disorderHomogeneity literally means that everything is exactly the same. I cannot see how that could possibly mean anything but perfect order/law. Chaos/disorder is about randomness, differences, change, and evolution. Maximum homogeneity means there's no capacity for that whatsoever.
Don't argue with me. Argue with science. They came up with this.
It shouldn't have been in the Advanced Player's Guide if it is an NPC only class, which it appears to be.
It's for NPCs and advanced players.
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It's for NPCs and advanced players.
It shouldn't have been in the Advanced Player's Guide if it is an NPC only class, which it appears to be.
+1
One of the longest campaigns I ran was a Planescape-based 3.5 campaign where I allowed players to play evil characters, although I warned them in the initial house-rules handout "...however, if you choose to play a Chaotic Evil character said character may not survive for very long as those types of characters tend to hack up their 'friends' on a whim or cause others adventuring with them to have to leave someplace in a hurry because they just destroyed a holy site or a nursery because they were bored..." not remembering the exact wording.
The Anti-paladin class would have been great for that campaign, I had one player who wanted to be an "Evil Paladin" class and all they had in 3.5 was the Blackguard, and the character wanted to get the most out of it and so took the 7 levels of Paladin, fell from grace, and then had to wait an entire level before being able to take their 1st Blackguard level and just quit because they were bored with essentially being a Warrior for 2 sessions.
One of the funniest things was that as the campaign progressed, the most powerful fighter in the group ended up being a Chaotic Evil Halfling Fighter. He had begun the game Neutral Evil, but because of his rushing into battle and jumping off of things onto enemies and generally causing havoc and being nasty I advised him he was pushing CE and he said "that's fine by me". He was able to play Chaotic Evil without being Chaotic Stupid (he had a lot of contingency plans and magic items for getting into and out of trouble), and he also had no need to turn on the rest of the party because they were his ticket to power, and the party was completely willing to have to leave the current town they were in or plane they were on because the halfling (or one of the other Evil characters; at the end none were Good) burned down a nunnery or something, so it worked out for everyone.
A fun campaign to GM :-).
A CE person can work in a group as long as it is beneficial to him to do so. Of course, he's always going to be grabbing for power in the group, trying to make sure the others can't turn on him, all the while scheming how to get the most out of turning on them.
Just look to the Joker for inspiration. He works with others when it suits his whim. Then he does a patented Triple-Cross, laughing all the while.
I'm still reminded of him with the old JLA book in the maxwell lord days, where he's supposed to be trying to assassinate the Leaguers, keeps blowing away his drivers, refuses to shoot one Leaguer because she's in the middle of some orphans, and then comes up with a plan to kill another that would result in the death of thousands.
CE's exemplar of fun times, our man the Joker.
==Aelryinth
(1) Anti-Paladins, while better than "blackguards," still strike me as kinda "meh." I don't know what it is I'm not so excited about. Powerful? Sure looks it. Plausible? Maybe, maybe not...
(2) Anyone caught being one would probably be shunned/killed rather quickly even by most EVIL characters simply because, as is often quoted, "Evil isn't Stupid," meaning nobody but NOBODY wants some dude around who is compelled to be the exemplar of chaos, nevermind evil.
(3)
I don't like D&D's alignment system anymore. ... D&D is far too inconsistent in its approach ...I agree it's a bit arbitrary and often inconsistent. However, ever since a rant against "Balance" and the Kingpriest of Istar some time ago (a favorite post, and one I still show people), I've been a huge "Searn" fan. Please don't let this lack of alignments in your game stop your commentary on alignments.
No worries, when I have the time and see the need I will voice my opinions, as I always have. My thinking since the time of that post hasn't radically changed; I've just realized that, as inconsistent as Dragonlance's idea of "good" can be and the entire D&D notion of "balance," that is a systemic problem of the whole alignment and morality system. Different authors will weigh in on the subject with different opinions at different times, and I have to wonder if any of them have any grounding in real philosophy or logic. Another problem seems to be the notion that characters within the game-world have an understanding of the alignment grid, as well. This seems as artificial and illogical to me as the characters of the game understanding their own attack bonus or, in antiquated days, their own THAC0. OotS parodies such notions, but OotS is also just that: a parody.
That being said, whenever I actually find a playgroup again (it's been a long gaming drought for me), I probably will continue to use alignment for the simple reason that there are some game rules which interact with it, and I don't want to go through the effort of changing them. However, the alignment system's implementation will be with the understanding that characters in the game don't know about the grid and should follow whatever philosophies and take whatever actions make sense for the character, and the alignment will shift to reflect those situations (which is easier, but still rubs me the wrong way: What is Tyrion Lannister's alignment, I ask you?).
On the subject of Star Trek (and the original question of the thread):
"As a matter of cosmic history, it has always been easier to destroy than to create." - Spock