Lawfulness.

[Player Someone.]

Hello.
I have read about alignments and have played some. But I am still curious about lawful people. What are some of the characteristics of a lawful character. What are examples of lawful deeds. Have you ever played in a campaign with lawful people? What would you say is the major differences between lawful-good, lawful-neutral, and lawful-evil.
Thanks.

[Master of the Dark Triad]

Lawful Good- the ideal policeman. He follows and enforces the law, and he helps people out. Good, lawful guy.

Lawful Neutral- Your average person. We follow the laws, but we're selfish humans. We don't necessarily want to harm people, but we're also too selfish many times to give to help others.

Lawful Evil- Hitler. He was evil. Period. I shouldn't have to explain that. He was lawful too. After getting out of prison, he did everything legally. The Holocaust was perfectly legal.

[137ben]

Master of the Dark Triad wrote:

Lawful Neutral- Your average person. We follow the laws, but we're selfish humans. We don't necessarily want to harm people, but we're also too selfish many times to give to help others.

Pretty sure the average person is True Neutral.

[Master of the Dark Triad]

137ben wrote:

Master of the Dark Triad wrote:

Lawful Neutral- Your average person. We follow the laws, but we're selfish humans. We don't necessarily want to harm people, but we're also too selfish many times to give to help others.

Pretty sure the average person is True Neutral.

Eh, I'm not sure honestly. I'd say most people follow the laws that matter.

[Fomsie]

Master of the Dark Triad wrote:

137ben wrote:

Master of the Dark Triad wrote:

Lawful Neutral- Your average person. We follow the laws, but we're selfish humans. We don't necessarily want to harm people, but we're also too selfish many times to give to help others.

Pretty sure the average person is True Neutral.

Eh, I'm not sure honestly. I'd say most people follow the laws that matter.

They follow the laws, but not because they may have a strong belief in them, but more that they wish to avoid being in trouble. Not really lawful in the strictest sense... lawful entails an actual belief in the cause, a dedication, be it for good, evil or in the case of Lawful Neutral, a dedication to law and order itself. That is most certainly NOT the average person.

[Thank Dog]

I think too much emphasis is put on the "law" in lawful. Lawful also means disciplined, organised, promotes the benefit of teamwork above individual pursuits, etc.

I'm playing a character at the moment who is LN. His lawful aspect isn't really from any sort of strict adherence to whatever lawful society he is in but rather in his devotion to his comrades, those that fight beside him and who he is charged to protect. He would follow orders against his own prejudices or bias and would never betray his friends or his country. The politics of law, however, are beyond his cares.

[Fomsie]

Thank Dog wrote:

I think too much emphasis is put on the "law" in lawful. Lawful also means disciplined, organised, promotes the benefit of teamwork above individual pursuits, etc.

My reply was in response to the justification that most people were Lawful on account of following laws.

And the form of dedication you describe is in fact even greater support for the notion that the average person is NOT lawful, but neutral. They are not overly disciplined or dedicated to a system of beliefs and structure. They are just average folk going through life.

[TOZ]

Lawfulness.

[Bruunwald]

Are we being trolled?

[slade867]

Lawful Neutral = Javert from Les Miserables. Most perfect example I know.

[Jackanory]

Lawful Neutral (taken to its extreme) - Judge Dredd. Upholds the law for the sake of the law, whatever the cost, irrespective of any benefits.

"I am the law."

[thenobledrake]

There really is no such thing as a "lawful act" (or any act specifically fitting within one alignment word and not also fitting into others).

Only the motivation for and attitude towards an act can have an alignment.

This is how someone can cause harm or death to others and not become evil (because the circumstances where kill or be killed, and/or the involved party feels remorse that such an act took place), and how someone could be kind to others and not become good (because they are only doing so as part of a manipulation toward their own selfish goals with no concern to what might happen to other people once they reach said goal and abandon them).

[blackstarraven]

Great example of the ideal of being lawful. And why people misunderstand the ideal of lawfulness.
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Example: You are walking down the street. You pass a two story building, form the window upstairs you hear a scream and some on yell "HELP MURDERER!"

Chaotic #1: I don't want to get involved! They might kill me to! (Walk away)
Chaotic #2: Kick in the door, run up and kill the murderer! Run them down if you need to! Then run away, don't want to get involved in all that legal crap...

Neutral #1: Call the police and tell them that "Something is going on at this address." Maybe hang up after that.

Lawful #1: Call the police, tell them all the info you can, wait for instructions.. follow instructions.

Bonus: Lawful Good Paladin.

(Call the cops) Kick in the door (Breaking and entering) Run upstairs try to save a life (Or two) if the guy runs. Let him run, make sure the victim is not dying at the very least.

Wait for cops, tell them what happened, when they tell you "we are going to need you to come down to the station to fill out stuff, make statements." Say OK.

Heck If they are jerks as say. "You broke and entered, that's a 50 gold fine." YOU PAY THE FINE...
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Law is about actions and consequences. Its the entire reason that mens rea is a thing in law.

A Lawful action is not just about not breaking a law.. Its about following the law.
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Heck on of the reasons its so hard to play a good paladin is because a lot of DM's don't understand that you can break a law as a paladin.. just as long as you had a good/lawful intention. And actually face any legal fallout from the actions.

[DeathlessOne]

I think the easiest way to understand the law vs chaos issue is to understand that Law is really about Order and Chaos is the opposite.

Order is the belief that there needs to be rules to regulate and control the tendency of the universe. The opposite (Chaos) is that each tendency of the universe controls and regulates itself.

Everyone has their own code that they follow. That is the whole idea behind being an individual. Now, whether or not this code is fluid, allowing the person to ignore certain parts depending on the situation, determines whether or not that person is Chaotic or Lawful. The code of a Lawful person is not easily mutable, even when it causes trouble for that person.

Now laws are just rules society has put in place to regulate interactions between each individual so that harm is restricted between them. Laws themselves can be neutral in origin.