Lawful has nothing to do with following the law. Following an internal personal code in a strict manner, as well as an orderly method of doing things is what makes one lawful.
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Paladins are required to be Lawful Good (unless your DM decides they don't need to be).
He may break the law IF AND ONLY IF he believes the law is against the greater good. A Paladin who grew up in, and is working against the government of Cheliax would absolutely be considered "breaking the law," but he'd be working to better the lives of the people of that place, which would mean he is still working for the greater good.
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Paladins dont have to be lawful good, they can be any alignment they want. They just cant use any powers, or gain any levels.
the concept of lawful is that there should be an ideal 'law' or order that everyone should follow
versus chaos where one doesnt believe that there should be that order, and that people choose for themselves, even if others disagree
paladins of different deities have different ideologies about the 'order' that ought be established in the world
it could also be argued that individual paladins have their own codes and beliefs on the way the world should be
but it is always in the sought of goodness and harmony that these personal beliefs fall into, as long as someone has the basic principle of goodness behind what their belief in order is (otherwise referred to as 'local law') then the paladin should respect and follow, even if he on some obscure level disagrees
if the basic principles of local order do not follow the lines of harmony and goodness, then all bets are off, and you're paladin can go hacking away at the tyranny
neutral on the law/chaos axis respects that order can exist and also respects that some dont want to follow it
as long as they care more about goodness and harmony rather than forcing their ideology on others, then you qualify as neutral good
Its not a huge difference really. I think you could pass for either. By RAW the paladin is Lawful Good only unless they decide to add archetypes that break free of that silly code of theirs. If your forced into a situation between your code, law, and doing the right thing, your having a very very bad day and hopefully the GM won't punish you for having making a choice.
there is a big difference between neural good and lawful good.
neutral good only care how the good gets done, and very little about the means
lawful good whats to do good and increase order at the same.
A lawful Good character would almost never be a party to revolution because they are inherently chaotic and also tend to create chaos. A neutral good person would only care about the tyrant being overthrown.
another good example of would america after the civil war vs south africa after aphartied.
The reconstruction was a little vengance but it was also about trying to do the most good as possible by whatever means neccessary it did not turn out well, because of all the chaos it created. a good example of only caring about the good.
on the other hand look at the tact mandela took. the truth and reconcillation commission is the empitome of lawfull good. Did it create the most good, no because a lot of evil people went unpunished, but some good was done, at the same time order was increased. because white south africans did have worry that there was an arrest warrant out for them out the corner.
The problem is people want to cheat and take the easy way. Galahad is the defination of a paladin, he would be considered a mary sue and lawful stupid. Most saints and matyrs would be considered lawful stupid, most of them could easily have escape dying if they had used common sense or had been reasonable, of course they wouldnt be saints then.
A paladid is not a normal LG person. You are a personfication of divine goodness which by definition means you are going to be unreasonable because the world is not going to meet your standards. This is not a flaw, this to me is the whole point and tension of the class, if you remove that, then the whole point of the class is defeated. If it were easy we would all be saints.
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A lawful Good character would almost never be a party to revolution because they are inherently chaotic and also tend to create chaos. A neutral good person would only care about the tyrant being overthrown.
I respectfully disagree here. If a ruler is abusing his position and making the people suffer then a Paladin would definitely step in to stop this. A Paladin believes in an orderly society that benefits the people, if they have to rise up to oppose this then so be it.
Put it this way, if what you are saying is true then it would be impossible for a Paladin to play Jade Regent, Council of Thieves or Curse of the Crimson Throne.
there is a big difference between neural good and lawful good.
neutral good only care how the good gets done, and very little about the means
lawful good whats to do good and increase order at the same.
A lawful Good character would almost never be a party to revolution because they are inherently chaotic and also tend to create chaos. A neutral good person would only care about the tyrant being overthrown.
another good example of would america after the civil war vs south africa after aphartied.
The reconstruction was a little vengance but it was also about trying to do the most good as possible by whatever means neccessary it did not turn out well, because of all the chaos it created. a good example of only caring about the good.
on the other hand look at the tact mandela took. the truth and reconcillation commission is the empitome of lawfull good. Did it create the most good, no because a lot of evil people went unpunished, but some good was done, at the same time order was increased. because white south africans did have worry that there was an arrest warrant out for them out the corner.
The problem is people want to cheat and take the easy way. Galahad is the defination of a paladin, he would be considered a mary sue and lawful stupid. Most saints and matyrs would be considered lawful stupid, most of them could easily have escape dying if they had used common sense or had been reasonable, of course they wouldnt be saints then.
A paladid is not a normal LG person. You are a personfication of divine goodness which by definition means you are going to be unreasonable because the world is not going to meet your standards. This is not a flaw, this to me is the whole point and tension of the class, if you remove that, then the whole point of the class is defeated. If it were easy we would all be saints.
a paladin being LG is no different than anyone else being LG, behavior or otherwise
the only thing that makes paladins the center of all talks alignment is because they are the ones who lose their class abilities if their alignment changesanyone can choose to be a paragon of goodness, in 3.5 there was a whole book about it, the book of exalted deeds
choosing not to accept people who cant meet your standards and looking down on those who dont share your own point of view is only one way to play a paladins alignment, and only supported by a couple of deities
its borderline evil in fact, to be unreasonable and hold people to unrealistic standards
in that sense, no one is innocent, and the paladins code comes full circle
in any case, the ends should always justify the means, and if they dont, then the paladin falls
forcing the paladin to choose between killing evil, and protecting the sanctity of life shouldnt force the paladin to fall, it should set precedent for how the GM interprets the paladins personal alignment
anyone who honestly believes that paladins should fall left and right is just someone who wants to punish the player for trying to play a paladin when they dont want to have to adhere to some code, and i personally cant stand people who play that way
A chaotic Good player would try to tear down the entire system and start all over. "THey're ALL corrupT!" Maybe even do away with government entirely!
A Lawful Good player will try to minimize the damage by attacking the corruption at the root, removing it, and then attempting to implement neccessary changes at a controllable pace to keep order.
A neutral good character will do what needs to be done and is most expeditious.
==Aelryinth
A chaotic Good player would try to tear down the entire system and start all over. "THey're ALL corrupT!" Maybe even do away with government entirely!
A Lawful Good player will try to minimize the damage by attacking the corruption at the root, removing it, and then attempting to implement neccessary changes at a controllable pace to keep order.
A neutral good character will do what needs to be done and is most expeditious.
==Aelryinth
i dislike how incomplete this answer is; though not wrong per se
lawful characters on the whole believe that there should be an order controlling peoples behavior, a law to be followed, and the good follow that lawchaotic characters dont like being controlled, its not about being unpredictable in that sense of chaos, its about not adhering to law, and not having a code that dictates what is good or not, in other words, people can be good who dont follow the law
neutral good characters are indifferent to the law because they can see both the LG and the CG characters as good, they do not lean on the axis to believing that a code, order, or law should dictate what qualifies as good, nor do they believe that having one disqualifies someone as good, because both mindsets can be good
In short, yes.
Unless your DM allows some house-rule.
I've seen too many players play Paladins really badly, you know the classic Lawful Stupid or Policeman.
Handle with care.
A Paladin does not have to be a cookie cutter of all others, Several years back, I played a 3.0 Pally that was a LG tank in a party with a very nearly Dudley Do-right. We were both RPing as hard as we could, but our deities had substantially different codes. She was all sweetness and light, turn the other cheek and forgiveness while I was the living hand of a hard justice master. Dang! That was a great summer!
Wow this thread has reenforced why defining alignment is futile...to many ideas most of which disagree on at least one major point.
OP all you need to do to play a good pally and have a good time is talk to your gm and between the two of you set the ground rules for what is acceptable pally conduct. Then there are no surprises and you can play the char you want to play without constantly worrying.
I recall in a very old copy of Dragon Magazine (may have been just before issue #100, or just after), where they had an article that had a type of paladin for each of the 9 alignments. They had different names for each, only the LG variety was actually called a paladin. Would be a very cool idea to have incorporated into PF.
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The easiest way to play Paladin-style lawful good:
Ask yourself what Superman would do.
I also miss the Blackguard.
Anyone know why it was dropped?
Is it WotC property?
Nope. Its Open Content. The only prestige class from the Dungeon Masters Guide that is not Open Content is the Red Wizard of Thay.
My guess is that the Blackguard wasn't included because they had plans for the Antipaladin alternate class (Advanced Players Guide).
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I recall in a very old copy of Dragon Magazine (may have been just before issue #100, or just after), where they had an article that had a type of paladin for each of the 9 alignments. They had different names for each, only the LG variety was actually called a paladin. Would be a very cool idea to have incorporated into PF.
They were way overpowered relative to the Paladin and Anti-Paladin, but here they are:
Myrikhan - NG rangery paladin. FE...EVIL. +1/+1 Th/dmg evil/level.
Garath - CG Church guardian paladin
Lyan - OMFG nasty-powerful LN paladin. d12's, awesome spell list, +1/+1 th/dmg per level vs chaotics...and 500k xp to advance a level past 10th.
Paramander - TN manipulative theif-paladin, plays the alignments against one another.
Paramandyer - FM 'extinguisher of extreme alignments' assassin of paladins. Foe of all extreme alignments, in death there is balance.
Faran - CN barbarous tribal protector paladin. Non-tribal people are little more then intelligent beasts.
Illrigger - "unholy shiznit these guys are nasty ' assassin paladins knights. Stealth, armor, wizard and cleric spells, assasin kill %.
Aarikhan - NE hunt down and kill everyone anti-ranger paladins. Basically the anti-myrikhan.
These classes were nominally balanced by armor restrictions and xp required to advance. Lyans were the most expensive class to level that was ever published in 1E.
and I never understood why the Garaths were CG church guardians. CG doesn't seem to be the 'wait around and protect' alignment.
Paramandyers were cool. The story for the article is a little snip of a paladin riding out to confront an anti-paladin, only to make it to his keep and find the bastard strung up with the sigil of the paramandyer Fein inscribed on his armor...and knowing that Fein is going to come looking for him next...
==Aelryinth
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Wow this thread has reenforced why defining alignment is futile...to many ideas most of which disagree on at least one major point.
OP all you need to do to play a good pally and have a good time is talk to your gm and between the two of you set the ground rules for what is acceptable pally conduct. Then there are no surprises and you can play the char you want to play without constantly worrying.
An even better question than the whole "what is lawful good?" thing is ... why do some people insist on typing 'pally' instead of paladin??? That is one of my Top Ten Pet Peaves (patent pending)
Maybe I'll start calling wizard 'wizzies' or better yet, how about instead of clerics, we start calling the class 'gloofbams'? :)
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There were several questions in this thread:
1) OP asked if Paladins have to be lawful good. Answer is by RAW, yes. Houserules can alter that.
2) Can a paladin break civil laws and not fall from paladinhood? Answer: certainly. If the laws do not promote the general weal or exploit a class of people or a hundred other reasons. Lawful (alignment) and legal are only loosely connected. As someone else wrote, lawfully aligned characters believe in a higher order to the world/universe. They believe that the best means to securing general weal is through orderly systems (like laws, religious institutions, traditions, etc.). But they can certainly fight these systems if they are doing harm.
3) What is the difference between neutral good and lawful good? Answer is a walk through what alignment is. Alignment is a roleplaying tool used by a player to explain a character's general motivations. Good characters believe that sentient beings have certain rights (for lack of a better term) and these rights should be protected by society. Evil creatures care nothing for other creatures' rights, only for their own. Lawful characters believe that order and systems are the best means to an end. Chaotic creatures believe that freedom of choice is the best means to an end. A lawful good character would want to protect others by using systems and order to do so. A neutral good character would take a pragmatic approach using systems or freedom or both as the means to protect others. Chaotic good characters would want to use freedom of choice to protect others. A chaotic good character would certainly defend a government that secured and protected the freedom of its people.
Everything else has been covered.
Andy
A lawful Good character would almost never be a party to revolution because they are inherently chaotic and also tend to create chaos. A neutral good person would only care about the tyrant being overthrown.I respectfully disagree here. If a ruler is abusing his position and making the people suffer then a Paladin would definitely step in to stop this. A Paladin believes in an orderly society that benefits the people, if they have to rise up to oppose this then so be it.
Put it this way, if what you are saying is true then it would be impossible for a Paladin to play Jade Regent, Council of Thieves or Curse of the Crimson Throne.
I don't think you're really disagreeing. There's a big difference between "stopping this" and "being a party to revolution." Someone could certainly work to supplant the tyrannical ruler in an otherwise functional system without joining in a revolution -- and in fact, most people would do that. If the mayor of your town is corrupt, the solution that strikes most people first is to vote him out of office, or indict him for his crimes, or something like that. Storming City Hall and putting it to the torch crosses the line for most people.
So i agree with ikarinokami, a paladin would "almost never be a party to revolution"; the cure would (in his mind) almost certainly be worse than the disease. Hundreds or thousands of innocents will die even in a successful revolution, and once that particular can of worms is open, there is no telling what the outcome will be. Who would really prefer the Terror of the French Revolution to the Ancient Regime that came before?
But I also agree with you that he'd try to stop an abusive ruler. The difference in this case between law and chaos is in the methods they would use to stop evil.
NAPAT - Not another Paladin alignment thread
:)
a paladin should be allowed his choice, if he chooses to uphold the law over protecting the innocent or chooses protecting the innocent over obeying the law, neither should cause him to fall, because both are under his code
punishing players because you want to punish them is wrong, and if your DM seriously brings this up you need a new DM
for a paladin, the ends should always justify the means, and if they dont, then you fall
any paladin whos main goal isnt good should fall, all others should not
being so harsh on a class for being the good guy is ridiculous to me
a paladin who becomes anything but lawful good wil cease to be a paladin!
NewDM: As you can see, you're not going to get one answer on this. But if you REALLY want to explore different opinions, here is a little light reading.
No no.
Ask yourself what Batman would do.
They only are required to be Lawful Good at nonsensical tables (and in the core rules). But a Paladin does have a code of conduct with their church.
Maybe I'll start calling wizard 'wizzies' or better yet, how about instead of clerics, we start calling the class 'gloofbams'? :)
I'm totally using gloofbams from now on.
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Lawful has nothing to do with following the law. Following an internal personal code in a strict manner, as well as an orderly method of doing things is what makes one lawful.
It's true, "Law" isn't the same as "the government". The code can be internal, but it comes from an external source to which you are loyal and whose judgement you place above your own.
In the real world, real "law" doesn't come from a state government (a relatively very recent invention), it comes from a culture. A Lawful person is someone whose identity is grounded in their belonging to that culture, regardless of whether it's a state, family, religion, corporation, or perhaps, even just an adventuring party.
Another way to think of it: Anyone who goes out of their way to be "cool" is Lawful. This includes being a "non-conformist" purely for the purpose of being cool. If you're rebelling to be cool, you're not rebelling at all. My experience, on a certain level, is that there's an inversion effect, eerily similar to the way your eye turns images upside-down before your brain turns them rightside-up again, as you go from inside a person's mind to how others perceive them. But I could write a godsdamned doctoral thesis on this stuff.
Granted, I know I'm talking more about highfalutin alignment philosophy in general and not Paladins, who, more than anything else, are a caricature of Arthurian chivalry. OP's best bet may actually be not to think about it too hard - Paladins aren't normally very smart. ;)