When a character turns evil....


Second Darkness

Shadow Lodge

So... I've got a little problem in my game. I'm doing Second Darkness Pathfinder conversion and I have a dwarf lawful neutral cleric of vengeance... but lately he's been acting rather evil.

Spoiler:

First, he decided to burn the Foamrunner because the captain tried to cheat them. He actually did it... (critical dice rolls, so nasty for GM's...).

Then, the team managed to capture thieves and thugs and Braddikar and Jasper during the night raid (Braddikar was tricked by the team before that and wanted revenge during night raid). Braddikar wanted money for information and promised to leave them alone and leave Riddleport, but this dwarf cleric decided it would be cheaper to chip off his leg to make him talk.

The newest idea he has is to kill all thieves and thugs that attacked Gold Goblin.


He's reasoning is as follows:

I am a priest of vengeance. If somebody crosses my path and wants or tries to kill me - I have no mercy and kill them. Even if they surrender.

Now, I told him it's turing a bit too evil... but he said the above thing and said he's neutral cuz he helps his allies and kills only those who wrong him. What do you think?


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I'm inclined to agree with the player - he's killing people who attack and/or wrong him. Lawful Neutral is exactly the kind of alignment to do the sorts of things that you are describing. If he starts hurting people who have done nothing to him, then he's dipping into Evil territory, but simply being merciless to one's enemies is well within the bounds of neutrality.


If he is killing them in combat that's one thing. If he's hacking them to death after they surrender that's a different thing altogether.


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A LN cleric of vengeance is going to be a vigilante, not a psychopath.

vengeance - NOUN
1. revenge: punishment that is inflicted in return for a wrong

Nobleman kills peasant family and escapes justice because he paid off the judge? Burn his house down.

The lawful aspect of his alignment means he should respect laws and abide by them and sometimes even enforce them if no one else is. The neutral means he cares not for the 'right' or 'wrong' of the situation. The law is the law and he's going to see it enforced. The vengeance is going to motivate him to seek out those who break the law and get away with it and then deal with them.

So if he's tracking down a murderer and the target surrenders, he is fully allowed to then kill the murderer if the laws support capital punishment.

However, if someone looks at him funny in the street and maybe punches his horse, he doesn't get carte blanche to crucify the thug's entire family. That's far beyond lawful punishment.

He may not be going evil, that depends a lot on purpose and motive. However, he is acting chaotically. He is not following any external laws and acts directly at odds with those laws. He is acting in terms of personal gain, which is generally considered chaotic in nature.


Adamantine Dragon wrote:
If he is killing them in combat that's one thing. If he's hacking them to death after they surrender that's a different thing altogether.

It's still within his alignment. Showing quarter to an enemy is a "Good" action; slaughtering a surrendering foe could be seen as "Evil". Both are valid options for a Lawful Neutral character, and the fact that he's a Cleric of "vengeance" would skew him towards the latter.

If the question is whether the character's actions are in line with his alignment, then the answer is yes. If the OP feels that the player is being disruptive to his game, then he should talk to the player directly, but I don't see anything inappropriate here.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

He's pulling a Hera. Whether it's the classical Greek version or the one fromt the Kevin Sorbo series, it's still sliding towards Evil, especially since the vengeance he's inflicting is repayment for slights done towards himself.


You say "cleric of vengeance" but vengeance isn't a deity. Does he follow Calistria? She's a deity of vengeance and she's chaotic neutral? Or are you house ruling that a cleric does not have to follow a certain deity but can follow an ideal? If so, that's cool just asking.

But the other part is being Lawful Neutral and vengeful... That doesn't compute for me. LAW is about Justice, not Vengeance. Vengeance breeds CHAOS. Justice you (usually) must prove the person did the act, then (usually) sentence is carried out. But just killing someone on the idea of vengeance... That's chaotic, and very possibly evil IMO.

Take for example Marvel's Punisher. He is ALL about vengeance. Would you characterize him as a Lawful person? Not in a million years. He's AT BEST Chaotic Neutral, if not Neutral Evil, or AT WORST Chaotic Evil. But, he's in no way Lawful.

EDIT: Ah, yeah I agree with Murphy, he posted faster than I did. As he said, he's being at best chaotic. In fact, if I were the GM he'd be in danger of a Law/Chaos axis shift not a Good/Evil axis shift.


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I can see lawful and vengeful. It is the roll of Judge Dredd. He seeks out wrongs and makes them right according to a strict law (either local or religious). Murderers are to be put to death; thieves are to lose a hand. There is little in the way of excuses or caveats in such a person though.


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The Punisher is absolutely a Lawful character. He does not punish people randomly, nor does he ever let people off the hook. He is enforcing a strict code of law. He is the definition of Lawful Neutral.

You seem to be confusing Lawful Good with Lawful Neutral. A Lawful Good character cares about both the law and the sanctity of human life. A Lawful Neutral person only cares about what is "right", regardless of the consequences. That's what "neutral" means. The "goodness" of an action is irrelevant to a Lawful Neutral character. What matters is the letter of the law, not "justice".

Silver Crusade

Ask him if he's familiar with the term "disproportionate retribution".


MurphysParadox wrote:
I can see lawful and vengeful. It is the roll of Judge Dredd. He seeks out wrongs and makes them right according to a strict law (either local or religious). Murderers are to be put to death; thieves are to lose a hand. There is little in the way of excuses or caveats in such a person though.

Well, yes but Judge Dredd is still appointed with the RIGHT to be a Judge, Jury, and Executioner. It's a slippery slope for him to be vengeful, but he can be, because he is still an agent of Justice for his society. Unless the local government has appointed the cleric to act as their agent in these matters, he's breaking the law and Lawful persons don't do that.


spectrevk wrote:
The Punisher is absolutely a Lawful character. He does not punish people randomly, nor does he ever let people off the hook. He is enforcing a strict code of law. He is the definition of Lawful Neutral.

This, in a heartbeat.

My answer to "Would you characterize [Punisher] as a Lawful person?" was "Isn't he the Poster Boy for LN right alongside Judge Dredd?" even before reading Murphy and Spectre's replies.


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AbsolutGrndZer0 wrote:
MurphysParadox wrote:
I can see lawful and vengeful. It is the roll of Judge Dredd. He seeks out wrongs and makes them right according to a strict law (either local or religious). Murderers are to be put to death; thieves are to lose a hand. There is little in the way of excuses or caveats in such a person though.
Well, yes but Judge Dredd is still appointed with the RIGHT to be a Judge, Jury, and Executioner. It's a slippery slope for him to be vengeful, but he can be, because he is still an agent of Justice for his society. Unless the local government has appointed the cleric to act as their agent in these matters, he's breaking the law and Lawful persons don't do that.

*FACEPALM*

Lawful alignment =/= obeys the law!!!

A Lawful character adheres to a PERSONAL code of conduct, ethics, or behavior, and is orderly and (usually) predictable in their actions. It has ZERO to do with whether or not they obey the laws of the land. A Paladin does not become non-lawful just because the laws of the land are written by an LE tyrant! Nor does said tyrant become non-lawful when he refuses to obey the border laws set by the neighboring goodly kingdom during his invasion and conquest!

Admittedly, most Lawful characters RESPECT local laws, but that's less because they must always obey them and more because they recognize the usefulness of orderly codes of conduct that laws represent and enforce. But if their own code and the local laws are in conflict, you can bet your damnedest that a Lawful character will be first in line to break the latter. Because his own personal code is THE. MOST. IMPORTANT guiding force in his morality and mindset, and a local ruling that conflicts with that is basically telling him "The strict rules that you live your life by are WRONG". And he will fight tooth and nail against anything that tries to keep him from doing what he believes, utterly devotedly and unwaveringly, is the right thing to do.


spectrevk wrote:

The Punisher is absolutely a Lawful character. He does not punish people randomly, nor does he ever let people off the hook. He is enforcing a strict code of law. He is the definition of Lawful Neutral.

You seem to be confusing Lawful Good with Lawful Neutral. A Lawful Good character cares about both the law and the sanctity of human life. A Lawful Neutral person only cares about what is "right", regardless of the consequences. That's what "neutral" means. The "goodness" of an action is irrelevant to a Lawful Neutral character. What matters is the letter of the law, not "justice".

No, I am seeing Punisher as someone who breaks the law by being a vigilante.

You want a D&D example?

I forget the name of the developer, but at a convention one of the TSR developers was running a 2nd edition game that took place in Calimshan (Forgotten Realms) Slavery is legal there. A paladin in the adventuring party saw an elven girl who was the slave of a wizard. He confronted the wizard on this, and in the end strongarmed the wizard to free his slave. As he was a paladin of Tyr, the Lawful Neutral God of Law, he was stripped of his Paladinhood. Reason being, like it or not, slavery is legal in Calimshan and by FORCING a wizard to free his slave, he broke the law. He broke the LAWFUL part of his alignment.

As for the last part of what you say, that might be true, but I still say Punisher isn't Lawful. He hunts down criminals and kills them without remorse, and in later issues he will even shoot and kill a hostage rather than risk the "bad guy" getting away. We may have to agree to disagree, but I can't in any way see Punisher as Lawful Neutral.


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AbsolutGrndZer0 wrote:

You say "cleric of vengeance" but vengeance isn't a deity. Does he follow Calistria? She's a deity of vengeance and she's chaotic neutral? Or are you house ruling that a cleric does not have to follow a certain deity but can follow an ideal? If so, that's cool just asking.

But the other part is being Lawful Neutral and vengeful... That doesn't compute for me. LAW is about Justice, not Vengeance. Vengeance breeds CHAOS. Justice you (usually) must prove the person did the act, then (usually) sentence is carried out. But just killing someone on the idea of vengeance... That's chaotic, and very possibly evil IMO.

Take for example Marvel's Punisher. He is ALL about vengeance. Would you characterize him as a Lawful person? Not in a million years. He's AT BEST Chaotic Neutral, if not Neutral Evil, or AT WORST Chaotic Evil. But, he's in no way Lawful.

EDIT: Ah, yeah I agree with Murphy, he posted faster than I did. As he said, he's being at best chaotic. In fact, if I were the GM he'd be in danger of a Law/Chaos axis shift not a Good/Evil axis shift.

Thats not a houserule. THe core rulebook states a cleric can follow an ideal. Its listed in the cleric section.

Second, the Punisher is definitely lawful. Don't confuse respect for authority with having to obey the local laws. There is a scene in Marvel Cival War which I think characterizes this perfectly. Captain America and the Punisher stumble across some villians who wish to negotiate peacefully. The punisher instantly pulls out a machine guns and kills them. Captain America starts beating up the punisher, but the punisher doesn't respond. He simply lets himself get beaten up. He has a very strict code that he follows. Evil must be punished. Good people must not be hurt. He doesn't seek to exploit the law(which is evil) and exceptions can't be made(good).

Rorschach is another good example.

Webstore Gninja Minion

Changed "player" to "character" in the thread title. Moved thread. Added spoiler tag.


johnlocke90 wrote:


Thats not a houserule. THe core rulebook states a cleric can follow an ideal. Its listed in the cleric section.

Ah sorry I always forget since most campaign settings I run (like Forgotten Realms and Golarion) usually state otherwise.


AbsolutGrndZer0 wrote:
I forget the name of the developer, but at a convention one of the TSR developers was running a 2nd edition game that took place in Calimshan (Forgotten Realms) Slavery is legal there. A paladin in the adventuring party saw an elven girl who was the slave of a wizard. He confronted the wizard on this, and in the end strongarmed the wizard to free his slave. As he was a paladin of Tyr, the Lawful Neutral God of Law, he was stripped of his Paladinhood. Reason being, like it or not, slavery is legal in Calimshan and by FORCING a wizard to free his slave, he broke the law. He broke the LAWFUL part of his alignment.

As per my prior post, I would have argued tooth and nail with said GM. Or more accurately, I would have talked with him in advance as to how he planned to adjudicate the Paladin code (something I encourage everyone playing a Paladin to do prior, to make sure you and GM are on the same page) and Lawful/Chaotic alignments, and if I couldn't convince him to change his mind on this particular point, would have either not played a Paladin or not played at all.

That may be his ruling at his table, but it's not one that jives with the definition of Lawful alignment and not the one I play by, regardless of which side of the screen I'm on. And if it's gonna be a situation where alignments determine class capabilities (Paladin, Monk, Cleric, Druid, etc.) I'm going to make sure I'm on the same page as the GM or go our separate ways. Nothing in the Paladin's action violates his Code, nor does it violate his ethos of Lawful alignment - he's still acting in character for his personal set of beliefs and code of behavior (which is probably pretty closely tied into the Paladin Code anyway). And last I checked, Tyr himself was pretty anti-slavery anyway. It's been a long time since I played FR though.


AbsolutGrndZer0 wrote:
spectrevk wrote:

The Punisher is absolutely a Lawful character. He does not punish people randomly, nor does he ever let people off the hook. He is enforcing a strict code of law. He is the definition of Lawful Neutral.

You seem to be confusing Lawful Good with Lawful Neutral. A Lawful Good character cares about both the law and the sanctity of human life. A Lawful Neutral person only cares about what is "right", regardless of the consequences. That's what "neutral" means. The "goodness" of an action is irrelevant to a Lawful Neutral character. What matters is the letter of the law, not "justice".

No, I am seeing Punisher as someone who breaks the law by being a vigilante.

You want a D&D example?

I forget the name of the developer, but at a convention one of the TSR developers was running a 2nd edition game that took place in Calimshan (Forgotten Realms) Slavery is legal there. A paladin in the adventuring party saw an elven girl who was the slave of a wizard. He confronted the wizard on this, and in the end strongarmed the wizard to free his slave. As he was a paladin of Tyr, the Lawful Neutral God of Law, he was stripped of his Paladinhood. Reason being, like it or not, slavery is legal in Calimshan and by FORCING a wizard to free his slave, he broke the law. He broke the LAWFUL part of his alignment.

Well, someone with a systematic unbending code that he always adheres to(like Rorshac or the punisher) isn't going to be labeled as either chaotic or neutral.

For instance, the punisher isn't chaotic. Chaos implies "freedom, adaptability and flexibility". The punisher isn't any of those. He isn't neutral either, as that would imply he breaks his code sometimes.

I think the issue is that that someone who follows a personal code unerringly doesn't fit any of the Pathfinder alignments.


Orthos wrote:


That may be his ruling at his table, but it's not one that jives with the definition of Lawful alignment and not the one I play by, regardless of which side of the screen I'm on. And if it's gonna be a situation where alignments determine class capabilities (Paladin, Monk, Cleric, Druid, etc.) I'm going to make sure I'm on the same page as the GM or go our separate ways.

Well, the player did fight tooth and nail, and it was plainly pointed out that Tyr was the God of Law. So, maybe your case actually applies more in this sense, as being a paladin of the God of Law, he was beholden to follow the law of the land, not his own personal ideals. Because in Forgotten Realms Tyr was about the LAW. He didn't care if the law said all firstborn female children must be put to death, then a paladin of Tyr who rescued a firstborn female child would be stripped of his paladinhood. Maybe that's the difference in my example.

So, at the very best if a player wanted to play a Lawful character as you describe, I'd require them to write down their "PERSONAL CODE OF ETHICS" that they follow and approve it.


I agree it is skewing evil. Not EVIL but a bit evil

I would warn him that he is on that line. If he continues he will be evil. Done and done. Make sure he knows which actions you think are leaning that way.

For example the burning of the ship. Did it kill anyone? That is a problem. He got cheated and then he killed people for it. A bit far. Not to mention completely ruined the livelihoods of a bunch of people that had NOTHING to do with it. I would say, had you done this in stead (insert example) I would have had no problem with it.


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That's definitely not the version of Tyr I'm familiar with. So either he was written very very differently in 2E, or the GM was running him very very differently. Because the Tyr I'm familiar with would not have settled for sacrificing of children regardless of what the law said, and would have had his paladins not only rescuing said children but working within the system to have that law changed. Was he LN in 2E? Because in 3E and beyond he's LG.

And I'd be okay with a GM who wanted me to lay out my character's personal ethos in advance, though I'd think it a little odd unless I was playing a cleric or a paladin. But again, I'm speaking from the position of someone who figures if you're Lawful, having some kind of personal code is a given, and we figure out through RP and exposure and experience what the boundaries of that code is.


johnlocke90 wrote:
I think the issue is that that someone who follows a personal code unerringly doesn't fit any of the Pathfinder alignments.

True, which is why a Palladium book I read (friend was trying to convince me to play it, he failed. I hate that game) specifically talked about alignments as being flawed. People aren't so rigid as in D&D. That's why I usually am pretty lenient with alignment breakers (except Paladins), but if someone is acting chaotic, and without a full write up from this player other than "I am a cleric of vengeance" all I see is a chaotic individual.


Orthos wrote:
That's definitely not the version of Tyr I'm familiar with. So either he was written very very differently in 2E, or the GM was running him very very differently. Because the Tyr I'm familiar with would not have settled for sacrificing of children regardless of what the law said, and would have had his paladins not only rescuing said children but working within the system to have that law changed. Was he LN in 2E? Because in 3E he's LG.

Ah, yes he was different in 2nd edition then. He was LN. Now yes, the RIGHT thing to do for the paladin in that game would have been to try to change the law in Calimshan to make slavery illegal. But, by freeing the slave without changing the law first, it was a technical violation of 2nd edition Tyr's dogma. IIRC he was able to easily get atonement cast at the next temple of Tyr they came to once the player (and therefore character) understood.

EDIT: Hmmm ok I couldn't find my old Faiths and Avatars book, and Wikipedia says nothing but that he is LG, so I could be remembering wrong. Either way, I still sort of agree that forcing the wizard to free the slave was the wrong way to handle it, because he was breaking the law, just law or not. When I played a paladin once, she actually at one point BOUGHT some slaves, then took them outside the borders of Calimshan, declared them free, and gave them some gold to get on their feet.

Quote:
And I'd be okay with a GM who wanted me to lay out my character's personal ethos in advance, though I'd think it a little odd unless I was playing a cleric or a paladin. But again, I'm speaking from the position of someone who figures if you're Lawful, having some kind of personal code is a given, and we figure out through RP and exposure and experience what the boundaries of that code is.

Well right as I said above, I'd only require that from a paladin (or maybe cleric) since you have a divine providence forcing your code.


AbsolutGrndZer0 wrote:
Orthos wrote:
That's definitely not the version of Tyr I'm familiar with. So either he was written very very differently in 2E, or the GM was running him very very differently. Because the Tyr I'm familiar with would not have settled for sacrificing of children regardless of what the law said, and would have had his paladins not only rescuing said children but working within the system to have that law changed. Was he LN in 2E? Because in 3E he's LG.
Ah, yes he was different in 2nd edition then. He was LN.

Okay, everything makes sense now. Overwhelming dedication to the law as-written, above and beyond all else, right or wrong be damned, is perfectly in place for an LN mindset, where basically the law itself is their code; and playing a Paladin of that kind of deity, especially in a non-good society like Calimshan is definitely playing with fire.

I would say in this case that the issue is much less Lawful vs. Chaotic behavior and more the Good Paladin breaking the non-Good parts of his LN patron's dogma.


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AbsolutGrndZer0 wrote:
spectrevk wrote:

The Punisher is absolutely a Lawful character. He does not punish people randomly, nor does he ever let people off the hook. He is enforcing a strict code of law. He is the definition of Lawful Neutral.

You seem to be confusing Lawful Good with Lawful Neutral. A Lawful Good character cares about both the law and the sanctity of human life. A Lawful Neutral person only cares about what is "right", regardless of the consequences. That's what "neutral" means. The "goodness" of an action is irrelevant to a Lawful Neutral character. What matters is the letter of the law, not "justice".

No, I am seeing Punisher as someone who breaks the law by being a vigilante.

You want a D&D example?

I forget the name of the developer, but at a convention one of the TSR developers was running a 2nd edition game that took place in Calimshan (Forgotten Realms) Slavery is legal there. A paladin in the adventuring party saw an elven girl who was the slave of a wizard. He confronted the wizard on this, and in the end strongarmed the wizard to free his slave. As he was a paladin of Tyr, the Lawful Neutral God of Law, he was stripped of his Paladinhood. Reason being, like it or not, slavery is legal in Calimshan and by FORCING a wizard to free his slave, he broke the law. He broke the LAWFUL part of his alignment.

You're kind of making my point for me, here. In your example, the Lawful Neutral God defended slavery, because "Good" is meaningless to him. The suffering of the elven girl is irrelevant to Tyr, because he isn't Good. He's Neutral. The Paladin, in this case, was specifically empowered by a God of Law, which means that he was obligated to obey the local law. Had he been a Paladin of a Lawful Good deity, or even a Lawful Neutral one with a different portfolio, the results may have been different.

Regarding the Punisher, you are simply wrong. Nearly all vigilantes/superheroes operate without a formal endorsement from the government, and even those that do operate with a mandate would not cease to do what they do if that mandate expired. Vigilantes like the Punisher and Batman exist because of perceived failures in the operation of law enforcement as regards public safety and maintaining the peace. They are acting on behalf of the civilian population, rather than the government, and they operate within strict guidelines. The Punisher will not shoot someone simply because they cut him off in traffic. Batman does not break a guy's arm for littering.

Chaotic Neutral behavior, in a comic book, would be better exemplified by a character who randomly changes allegiances and cares nothing about the sanctity of human life - a mercenary, such as Deadpool, Deadshot, or Deathstroke the Terminator.

LG: Cares about maintaining order, and the preservation of sapient life. May have to do things he/she doesn't want to (such as letting an enemy escape) in order to either comply with an obligation, or save a life. (Superman, Captain America).

NG: Cares about the preservation of life and happiness. That's it. Would prefer to avoid conflicts with authority, but would be willing to do so in order to safeguard an innocent. (Wonder Woman, Spider-Man)

CG: Actively dislikes authority and/or is independent in the extreme, but is a genuinely good person. Often the alignment of loners. Would gladly break the word to an evil person. (Wolverine, Green Arrow)

LN: Cares about structure/order, and believes that this need outweighs any concerns about the sanctity of life. Would willingly sacrifice one person to save 20. Would use lethal force on an inferior combatant if that combatant's crime was severe enough. (The Punisher, Judge Dredd)

N: There are almost no truly Neutral characters in comics. Even The Watcher, who is supposed to be completely neutral, has broken his neutrality before. I suppose Death, particularly the Marvel Universe version, qualifies.

CN: Doesn't care about loyalty or sapient life; out for themselves. Likely to change allegiances frequently. (Deadpool, The Secret Six)

LE: Honorable, but actively disdainful of the sanctity of human life. Has no qualms about sacrificing others to accomplish a plan. (Dr. Doom, Ra's Al Ghul)

NE: Primarily concerned with personal advancement. Would lie to an ally or break an oath if convenient. Most "hireling" type villains fit in here. (The Rhino, most of The Flash's Rogues Gallery)

CE: Generally reserved for the criminally insane. (The Joker, Norman Osborne)


Just wanted to "bump" you guys to read the edit to my post about Tyr... Seems I couldn't find any reference to him ever being LN, and since I can't find my 2nd edition Faiths and Avatars, I just have wikipedia to go by and it says nothing about him ever being LN, just LG. I blame the fact that it has been about 12-15 years since I played Forgotten Realms (what year did 3.5 come out? Was shortly after that, when all "complete" stuff started coming out)

So, back to the main topic (but playing upon the "comic book alignments" thing), being Lawful MIGHT work, except then at least the punishment should match the crime. You don't execute thieves and thugs, just as in that comic book example Batman wouldn't break the arm of a guy who littered.

As for the rest of stuff I've said, maybe I'm just not thinking straight today. Because now that I've read your arguments against me, I do see where you guys are right for the most part, and I especially agree with FinalPaladin below about the LE thing. :)

I think though at the end I would I think very much question a player that tried to play a LN person of vengeance, both for the "evil"ness and how easily it would be to break any personal code tied to being vengeful.


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I'll give you the advice I give to everyone else who brings an alignment issue to the boards:

Talk with your players and come up with a mutually acceptable version of what the alignments for your group will be. Coming to the boards will just end up in 10000 different opinions from 10000 different posters in regards what they think. You'll rarely get complete agreement amongst everyone here.

My take on it is that he is playing well within his alignment. He's about vengeance and he's LN. He'll follow the laws, he has his own personal code of conduct that he follows which he seems to want to really play up the vengeance part of. As long as he's not killing innocent people then he's not doing anything "evil." If he is going after those who wronged him and/or his friends, then that is exactly what he should be doing with the alignment and vengeance aspect. It's really that simple, don't read more into it than that. He isn't a paladin, don't hold him to LG paladin standards/morals/codes.


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One: Tyr has always been the Lawful Good god of Justice, not the "Lawful Neutral God of Laws".

Two: Orthos is correct in that "Lawful" does not (at least, by definition) refer to codified law. It refers to a general sense of order and predictability: The appropriate response to X is to Y. I mean, look at the description of Lawful Neutral: "A lawful neutral character acts as law, tradition, or a personal code directs her."

"or".

Not "and". A lawful person is totally within their alignment to break local law if it's directly at odds with their own code of ethics.

In response to the original topic, though, my question is this!

What good does the character's unwavering vengeance-code actually do? Every example you're giving is evil because that's the case you're making, but does the same code cause roughly as much good?

Because, to me, it seems like a character whose entire code of ethics is built around the concept of vengeance would be inherently LE, and the problem is that it doesn't really make sense for that concept to have been LN to begin with. EDIT: Also, I should note that "Has vengeance on evil guys, too" does not count as 'doing good'. A cruel tyrant isn't Lawful Neutral just because he deposed a different cruel tyrant.


FinalParagon wrote:
One: Tyr has always been the Lawful Good god of Justice, not the "Lawful Neutral God of Laws".

Well, I meant to say "Law and Justice" but left out the Justice part since I thought that part of the portfolio didn't directly apply to my point, which was probably a mistake that caused a large part of the confusion. :( Sorry about that.


Lawful is about enacting justice.

Vengeance is about retribution.

Vengeance which involves burning people alive, hacking off legs to get them to talk and executing entire groups of people just for being in a group is not lawful by any definition of lawful I have ever seen.

In fact, vengeance itself is generally not "lawful" because "vengeance" is not "justice". The two are not only different in principle, but frequently are opposed in practice.

The acts listed above by the OP would get you listed as evil in my campaigns.


I would say Justice is Lawful, but not all Lawful are interested in Justice. I'd lean it more toward LG and certain breeds of LN. Most LE wouldn't care much about Justice, at least not in the universal aspect. They might have some twisted variant of it they espouse, or their own personal bit of honor (An Evil Man has Standards, lines he won't cross, etc.), but true Justice is probably not within their purview, or even their interest, since they're ... well, Evil, and as such primarily motivated by self-interest, which is antithetical to Justice in many ways.


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"Revenge is an act of passion; vengeance of justice. Injuries are revenged; crimes are avenged."

--Samuel Johnson


Following an evil code is not a way to avoid being evil. Following an evil code is what lawful evil is.


Lamontius wrote:

"Revenge is an act of passion; vengeance of justice. Injuries are revenged; crimes are avenged."

--Samuel Johnson

Vengeance: Punishment inflicted in return for an injury or an offense; retribution; -- often, in a bad sense, passionate or unrestrained revenge.

Samuel Johnson apparently never read the dictionary.


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Dude please look up Samuel Johnson because unless you are giving that historically rad man sass for basically creating the preeminent english dictionary of his time then that post is just the worst.

The worst.

Dude seriously just say you were being sassy and give some crazy dictionary props to Sam.


Lamontius wrote:

Dude please look up Samuel Johnson because unless you are giving that historically rad man sass for basically creating the preeminent english dictionary of his time then that post is just the worst.

The worst.

Dude seriously just say you were being sassy and give some crazy dictionary props to Sam.

Sigh, irony is one of those things that is difficult to express in text...


I always assumed the difference between neutral, good and evil was a good act would be turning the other cheek, a neutral act would be replying with reciprocal force (or reciprocal intent) and evil act would be killing the guy before he threw a punch so he never has a chance to hit you.


AbsolutGrndZer0 wrote:

Just wanted to "bump" you guys to read the edit to my post about Tyr... Seems I couldn't find any reference to him ever being LN, and since I can't find my 2nd edition Faiths and Avatars, I just have wikipedia to go by and it says nothing about him ever being LN, just LG. I blame the fact that it has been about 12-15 years since I played Forgotten Realms (what year did 3.5 come out? Was shortly after that, when all "complete" stuff started coming out)

So, back to the main topic (but playing upon the "comic book alignments" thing), being Lawful MIGHT work, except then at least the punishment should match the crime. You don't execute thieves and thugs, just as in that comic book example Batman wouldn't break the arm of a guy who littered.

As for the rest of stuff I've said, maybe I'm just not thinking straight today. Because now that I've read your arguments against me, I do see where you guys are right for the most part, and I especially agree with FinalPaladin below about the LE thing. :)

I think though at the end I would I think very much question a player that tried to play a LN person of vengeance, both for the "evil"ness and how easily it would be to break any personal code tied to being vengeful.

Historically, executing thieves and thugs is quite common, particularly in societies with rigid legal systems. The modern idea of punishment is very different from punishment 400+ years ago. I don't think its fair to judge a player in a medieval games based on modern standards of law. Otherwise, you run into issues with like characters who supports a monarchy being evil.


Adamantine Dragon wrote:

Lawful is about enacting justice.

Vengeance is about retribution.

Vengeance which involves burning people alive, hacking off legs to get them to talk and executing entire groups of people just for being in a group is not lawful by any definition of lawful I have ever seen.

I am guessing you have never looked into Roman Law.


WWSD?

What would Seltyiel Do?

Silver Crusade

3 people marked this as a favorite.
Pendagast wrote:

WWSD?

What would Seltyiel Do?

Wax his chest, brood, and inspire shipping fic.

RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32

Mikaze wrote:
Pendagast wrote:

WWSD?

What would Seltyiel Do?

Wax his chest, brood, and inspire shipping fic.

Sadly, I can "favorite" this witty, yet accurate, observation only once.

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