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Jan 1, 2013 -- 10:32AM, Matyr wrote:

Jan 1, 2013 -- 10:29AM, Sir_Joseph_the_Crowe wrote:

Dec 28, 2012 -- 7:52PM, Salla wrote:

Dec 28, 2012 -- 7:36PM, EnglishLanguage wrote:

You don't need to have an "Evil" label on your character sheet to be evil. His actions and opinions are what make him evil, not the label.

Bingo.

Yep

So... why not just ignore what it says on the sheet and don't be restricted by it?

Alignment isn't a restriction. It's a guideline of how the character typically behaves. It's a broad brush. One Lawful Good guy organizes a guild to find a way to prevent corrupt business practices, the other becomes captain of the city guard. One Chaotic Evil guy burns a city and picks through the rubble for treasure, the other lurks in an alleyway on Skull Street.

The Lawful Good guard starts taking a few bribes here and there and next thing you know he's the ring-leader of the whole corrupt organization (and is now lawful evil). The guy on Skull Street 'rolls' a priest and finds an interesting book that changes his way of thinking. Not going so far as to turn himself in... he decides to go to other cities and preach to the local thugs about what he learned from the holy book and show them a better way of living. If nothing else, he'll put those Skull-breaking skills to use until they fall in line.

Alignments change. Hopefully for a good role-playing reason. What's on the sheet should be a rough guideline, though. A lot of times, the player writes something down as the intention, but when it comes to actual play, it comes out different than they originally planned. Sometimes one event changes the course of the character forever.

I DM the group that wildside316 is in. We use alignment as an RP tool, not a game mechanic, and he did specifically say that this was "an RP question". It's as important / meaningless as writing down your gender or background. It really has no effect on the game itself, especially since I'm not currently aware of any alignment-oriented spell effects (though I don't read up on wizard / sorcerer stuff), but it's intended as a reminder of the path which the character has chosen, and will be changed if the character exhibits conflicting behavior.

wildside316 also is not aware that the player using an evil character isn't really role-playing, but simply enjoying a game from his teen years while we play next door to where he lives, and only decided on 'evil' alignment to mess with our friend / player who said "I hate rogues", to which he responded "Fine, motha&@#%#@, I'm evil!" Ha! It's good that everyone here is capable of dissecting and deconstructing topics, though. It helps others to see things from multiple points of view.

NailsBoneski, If there is an evil person in a party with Paladins, then there is an almost inevitable conflict brewing, in much the same way that the CIA might react to discovering one of it's agents had secret ties with terrorist groups and foriegn governments. When the discovery is revealed there is bound to be what the rogue might consider an over-reaction that the Paladin would consider as being prudent measures, lol.
   


  

Dec 28, 2012 -- 7:36PM, EnglishLanguage wrote:

You don't need to have an "Evil" label on your character sheet to be evil. His actions and opinions are what make him evil, not the label.

No, which is why if your actions don't match the alignment the DM should consider changing it to match how your character is acting.

Keep in mind that the "Evil" label can reflect, not your current action, but your past actions. The character could have done any number of evil deeds in the past to have earned the Evil alignment (ie he used to work for a bandit group who's motto was "leave no witnesses" and would murder the people they robbed)

If the character generally behaves good and shows that his intentions (whatever reason he put Evil on his character sheet) are no longer evil, then the alignment can change if he wishes, an altruistic action of self-sacrifice may even be the catalyst of that change, and alignment change can even be seen as a reward. The Evil Alignment here doesn't dictate the character's actions, but it is a reflection of his current or past actions.


If anything Alignment can be used by a character to augment their actions. ie being Evil could be a statement of intent, an evil wizard willing to do anything to gain ultimate power, by declaring himself evil the player is basically stating that he isn't going to be held back by an moral scruples. Likewise an character with a dark past could be seeking redemption, and being Evil reflects the atrocities he commited in the past, his goal of redemption can be measured by his allignment change over the course of gaming, and he might behave more heroic then the Paladin he fights alongside of, regardless of his evil alignment.

Being Good is also a declaration, it doesn't stop a character's actions but Evil acts could cause the character to loose that alignment. Note it has no real mechanical value, a Neutral character can behave the same as a good character, it is only a declaration of intent really, or reflects an idealistic background. It doesn;t control a character unless they are intentionally seeking to be controlled by it (ie a Paladin from 3rd edition is trying to get the mechanical benifits of being good)

How about if, instead of getting into an argument about whether or not we should capitalize Good and Evi by adding mechanical effects (as they are just words and have many possible capitalizations), we come up with RP ideas for how/why good and evil people could work together?

As NailsBoneski said, "this was 'an RP question'"