For a long time I've had the idea of mirror twin sisters that are mirrored mentally as well as physically, so I for awhile have been thinking about what's more mirror than a paladin and an anti-paladin?
Now, the problem then would be them getting along... the paladin of course can't do anything evil, but she can kinda sorta still work with her sister as I understand it, just can't help her do anything against good and she has to keep trying to get her sister to change her ways.
The anti-paladin has a bit more leeway, in that she can work with a good person and even do good things sometimes, as long as she's keeping her eye on the big picture of evil. Plus, as some have said in other threads, just cause you are evil doesn't mean the evil wizard in the tower is your friend. You want his artifacts, you go kill him and steal them. So, in that sense if she's helping her good sister kill the evil wizard, then takes his magic items for her own ends, hey... That's all within the anti-paladin code.
Then, there is also the deity codes though. A Calistrian paladin, as I see it, takes what they want with no concern for others, you screw them they get vengeance, but they don't necessarily have to be kicking puppies and biting the heads off kittens.
So, WHEN THEY ARE TOGETHER the paladin would keep her anti-paladin sister somewhat in check, keeping her from kicking puppies but as I said above, oh look that evil wizard is harassing this town, let's kill him. The paladin would probably give alms to the poor and and then her sister would roll her eyes, probably come back later and steal the money (if she has time)
That's what I've been thinking, and it's not really enough... I mean I'm thinking this is just too crazy but I thought I might see if anyone has any ideas on how it could work for them not to be trying to kill each other and to get along so far as each is trying to "convert" the other and overall they are doing good, yet at the same time the anti-paladin sister is getting more powerful as she takes out other evil people. Maybe someday the paladin sister will realize that her sister has become a greater evil than all the evils they fought before, and they'll have to fight. That also is kind of a draw to the idea... them getting along, both trying to "corrupt/save" the other, until one day they realize that's never going to happen...
This definitely reminds me of Caramon/Raistlin in Dragonlance, all though Raistlin was more Neutral and didn't become "evil" until he left Caramon behind.
I feel like they would need some form of goal to keep them working together. The Paladin would fall for knowingly working together with an evil being. The Paladin would obviously know her sister is evil, unless she refused to believe it so strongly, she wouldn't even Sense Evil in her direction. With the right character development, I definitely see it working out.
If they had been separated for a long period, and then came back together, one becoming a Paladin and the other the Anti-Paladin, that may help. A-Ps get bluff so she could hide her true colors for a while, and give the Paladin penalties because she wants to believe her sister.
Personally, I house ruled anti-paladins into Blackguards in my campaign and made them LE again, I just can't get behind the CE. In that way, I can definitely see them working together, one just being much more ends justify the means, and Paladin focusing more on Mercy and doing right because it's right.
The Paladin could be actively working to convert the A-P, also. Slow, supportive influence over forceful action, like a Probation or Parole officer.
Personally, I house ruled anti-paladins into Blackguards in my campaign and made them LE again, I just can't get behind the CE. In that way, I can definitely see them working together, one just being much more ends justify the means, and Paladin focusing more on Mercy and doing right because it's right.
Yeah, I thought about that too, would then be a more realistic way of doing the "Paladin of Asmodeus" that Paizo now says "OMG we screwed up forget we ever printed that" (and I kind of agree, it was a crazy stretch) I can use the archetype from Way of the Wicked :)
Sorry for this =P Can you just imagine family reunions? Awkward!
This idea would be more fun if it was not paladins but just a good and evil twin the paladin<>anti-paladin thing is a parody IMOP.
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For a long time I've had the idea of mirror twin sisters that are mirrored mentally as well as physically, so I for awhile have been thinking about what's more mirror than a paladin and an anti-paladin?
Now, the problem then would be them getting along... the paladin of course can't do anything evil, but she can kinda sorta still work with her sister as I understand it, just can't help her do anything against good and she has to keep trying to get her sister to change her ways.
The anti-paladin has a bit more leeway, in that she can work with a good person and even do good things sometimes, as long as she's keeping her eye on the big picture of evil. Plus, as some have said in other threads, just cause you are evil doesn't mean the evil wizard in the tower is your friend. You want his artifacts, you go kill him and steal them. So, in that sense if she's helping her good sister kill the evil wizard, then takes his magic items for her own ends, hey... That's all within the anti-paladin code.
Then, there is also the deity codes though. A Calistrian paladin, as I see it, takes what they want with no concern for others, you screw them they get vengeance, but they don't necessarily have to be kicking puppies and biting the heads off kittens.
So, WHEN THEY ARE TOGETHER the paladin would keep her anti-paladin sister somewhat in check, keeping her from kicking puppies but as I said above, oh look that evil wizard is harassing this town, let's kill him. The paladin would probably give alms to the poor and and then her sister would roll her eyes, probably come back later and steal the money (if she has time)
That's what I've been thinking, and it's not really enough... I mean I'm thinking this is just too crazy but I thought I might see if anyone has any ideas on how it could work for them not to be trying to kill each other and to get along so far as each is trying to "convert" the other and overall they are doing good, yet at the same time the anti-paladin sister is getting more powerful as she takes out other evil people. Maybe someday the paladin sister will realize that her sister has become a greater evil than all the evils they fought before, and they'll have to fight. That also is kind of a draw to the idea... them getting along, both trying to "corrupt/save" the other, until one day they realize that's never going to happen...
This reminds me of the idea a friend of mine had but never got to set into motion. We wanted to make a couple of Paladins, siblings, each of an opposed alignment (one normal, one anti) and have them work together in the same party. Both family and rivals, as it were, with each trying to prove the superiority of their method through action, both both legitimately loving and caring for each other because they are family.
Are they cute?
A Paladin of Sarenrae makes the most sense, since she's the one most tolerant of evil and wants to change rather than destroy evildoers.
An Anti-Paladin of Gorum would be good, since Gorum is not about evil - just fighting, so an Anti-Paladin of him would basically focus on just being a Blood Knight. Calistria would be trickier since you've got a holy warrior of revenge who will go to extreme and cruel lengths against anyone (even/especially) her sister if they cross her path.
pair of half-elf sisters. both with improved eldritch heritage: abyssal
Paladin (oath of vengeance optional)
racial heritage: kobold
scaled disciple
Pal 4/Oracle 1/Dragon Disciple X
Antipaladin
Pal2/Bard 1/Pal +2/DD X
archeologist, fate's favored, lingering performance, arcane strike
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Then that's simply not an Anti-Paladin. An Anti-Paladin MUST embody chaos and evil just as much as her opposite must embody Law and Good. Neither are allowed to compromise or be wishy washy on those departments.
An Anti-Paladin of Gorum would be good, since Gorum is not about evil - just fighting, so an Anti-Paladin of him would basically focus on just being a Blood Knight.
I'm not going to get into a Paladin debate here. But suffice to say, No - you don't have to play Paladins and Anti Paladins as Lawful/Chaotic Stupid.
The ONLY requirement to be an Anti-Paladin is a CE alignment and that all their actions serve their own interests. So if compromise serves an APs interests - they will do so.
If both are being true to their classes, at least one must fall or die.
True. But that doesn't have to happen by the end of the adventure. That's what makes the concept so fun.
In fact, both suffer very much from a sunken cost fallacy. They HAVE to stick together because if either of them walks away it counts as failing to uphold their tenants - and similarly, both can't let the other die, because the same reasons. They could try to kill each other, but that would be "the easy way out" ideologically - plus, neither class requires being suicidal, so internally both could say that fighting it out is the lesser good/evil because they'd die.
If you want to get around the Paladin can't party with evil people make the two sisters Half-Orcs(maybe even half sisters) and have the Paladin take the Redeemer archetype(or if you can convince your GM/are the GM open up the archetype to other races) Half-Orc sisters to me seems like a good idea have one move from the ways of most of her orcish ancestors and the other sister was pulled into them. As second to Anti-Paladin of Gorum or maybe Calistria they seem like they'd be the least confrontational of the Anti-Paladin codes.
Yeah, initially I was thinking of a Paladin of Shelyn and an Anti-Paladin of Calistria. However, when someone above reminded me of the "Lord of Darkness" from Way of the Wicked, I realized they could be advance into Hellknights, Order of the God Claw. The antipaladin then would be a Lord of Darkness, Lawful Evil instead of Chaotic Evil, worship Asmodeus, then I could either make the paladin sister worship Iomadae (or maybe Sarenrae). Or, I could always make them both follow Asmodeus :P I know that Paizo retconned the Paladins of Asmodeus as being a bad idea, but... reading over it, it does make some sense, especially with this concept... she's already walking a razor-thin wire working with her sister.
Also, they have a feat (still a sort of work in progress, if you have any additional insight into that, it would be cool too!) that I created where their souls are semi-connected. The TL;DR of it is any time one of them takes damage the other takes an equal amount of nonlethal and most spells (good and bad) are shared, so they also can't just kill each other, because they'd (possibly) both die.
As for making them half-orcs (I am the GM, mostly this is just fun character ideas, although sometimes I run games with just one or two players so I make NPCs to pad the party if the players don't want to play more than one character themselves) I really was thinking of having them be Peri-Blooded aasimar. I might consider opening up the Redeemer archetype to them due to that (peri are descended from fallen angels... so they are the most likely of the aasimar to be evil), or I also was making them Scion of Humanity already, which would then qualify them for the "Racial Heritage" feat and allow them to pick up Half-Orc and legally by the RAW get Redeemer. :P
Hmm okay something else I just ran across reading through my books, Oath of Loyalty. Very much all about keeping your word, enforcing contracts, etc. If I am going to go with the Council of Thieves idea that rare Paladins can follow Asmodeus, then Oath of Loyalty is pretty much perfect for a Paladin of Asmodeus.
If you're doing hellknights, Oath against Chaos is perfect. It's in inner sea combat.
If you're doing hellknights, Oath against Chaos is perfect. It's in inner sea combat.
True to some extent, but that would NOT fit because they would NOT be okay with Asmodeus in any way. Which, even if I didn't go with the retconned idea of "Paladin of Asmodeus" still would cause major conflict with the antipaladin sister being a Lord of Darkness (Asmodean Paladin from Way of the Wicked, 3rd party)
Course, I could be wrong maybe I am reading too much into the code? I mean, I read what it says... and.. now I'm like Wait.. how is that even... it's really coming off to me as something Paizo is going to be later going "Uh wait okay Paladins in the Hellknights makes no sense" like they did Paladins of Asmodeus.
I'm sort of wondering if it might be a bit too "opposite" even if they are paladin(LG)/antipaladin(LE)... so I'm looking at maybe the good sister being something like an oracle instead. Then, she could even be a somewhat pacifist. I mean, I still like the idea of them as Paladin(LG)/Antipaladin(LE), but it might be TOO crazy.
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This makes be think of the Professor X / Magneto conflict. They ultimately want something very similar (kind of) to happen in the world or with a similar population, but simply don't agree on how it's done or who get's hurt along the way. There is a sadness to it, because so much effort is spent fighting each other. Paladin tries to stop the Anti-Paladin. The Anti-Paladin doesn't want to hurt the Pally but want to accomplish her goals with or without her. Anti-pally will use force against her sister if it's necessary to do so.
I'd say work it into a story like that. Hard part is, this is more for a pair that doesn't need to be (and probably shouldn't be) together all the time.
It could be about race, or people with magical abilities. They could each start out under the same god, but the anti-pally eventually works with a a rogue faction of the faith that follows a different god to accomplish [whatever] their own way.
I wouldn't let the hard rules on paladins/anit-paladins get in the way here. If the story is good, just play it out however you need to.
It was not me, it was my evil twin.
*The paladin should be actively working to contain the anti-paladin. If not by killing, then by capturing and turning over to the proper authorities.
Conceal Alignment is a second level paladin/antipaladin spell, and can be applied to a touched person or object, and it lasts for a straight 24 hours. Now imagine if the evil twin used it on BOTH of them. Mwhahahaha
How about a Half-Elf and a Half-Orc get together and one twin feels closer to her Elf heritage and the other feels closer to her Orc heritage?
Well, part of the problem with that would be they are "mirror" twins, which today and even more so in medieval times...
"I swear, it wasn't me it was my twin sister! See? I'm left handed and she's right handed..." would be the only way to tell them apart really.
Now, granted Golarion might not have the hatred that the real world did for Lefties (heck, even up to the 70's at least, teachers would try to FORCE left-handed children to use their right hands, even punishing them for using their left) but "Oh it was my evil twin" is flimsy as an excuse anyway, try to 'prove' it with the only way they really could... would be kinda hard.
Although, as I think I mentioned earlier, I am really starting to lean toward maybe making the paladin sister an oracle instead. Dual-Cursed Legalistic/Tongues (Infernal) Then, she worships Asmodeus because she was raised to (I am making them Isger orphans), but she's overall a good person unlike her sister who actually is Lawful Evil.
This makes be think of the Professor X / Magneto conflict. .The thing is that Magneto and X aren't true opposites, their goals and ideals are pretty much the same. The thing is that Magneto has far fewer lines that he won't cross, thanks to his past, and he is reciprocating the monster label applied to him back at humanity as a whole.
Unlike the OP's situation, they are not an oppositely aligned pair, in fact I'd say their alignments are very close to each other, if I was going to use alignment in a comic book setting as non 4-color as X-Men.
Most of the attempts to fit the two sisters of the thread have been of the matter of watering down what it means to be a Paladin or more frequently an Anti-Paladin, far more than I would allow.
Alignment tends to break down rather seriously in describing Marvel characters. The heroes spend more time fighting each other than they do the bad guys, and many characters have good ideals and evil means. Alignment tries to force complex characters into simple boxes and it does many modern stories a severe injustice.
And would there even be a point in assigning alignments in a Frank Miller story?
Yeah, that's why I use alignments in D&D but I don't enforce them as strictly as many GMs. While I am not one of the "OMG I Hate alignments I throw that crap out" GMs, I can sort of understand why they feel that way and respect them (except those that come into a thread where someone is asking for alignment advice and just keep saying "Alignment sucks, get rid of it!" No, we choose to use it, we just need... "NO it sucks! Get rid of it!" Our GM chooses to us... "NO It SUCKS get rid of it!" like a broken record)