(Discussion) General Part V

[Thomas Hobbes]

I entirely agree- the only question is, can it work in Living ENWorld? The problem is, it seems like you almost always end up with the dreaded 1 or 2 evil characters in an all-good party...

 

[Aranel]

Why not make it PVP in some cases, a group of evil doers from one city/nation start a problem that a group of do-gooders have to go stop, whoever wins...

It would add some of the chaos to the world, then you'd get all the associated proiblems I haven't started thinking about yet which shape a world, like warring nations and who comes from where despite being good can't be in a party with so and so because they're from---

 

[dpdx]

I imagine to make it fair, people'd have to keep track of their current CR on their character sheets.

 

[Jack Haggerty]

Characters CAN be Evil by being devious, self-serving and greedy without necessarily being murderous or detrimental to the cooperative goals of a group. I can envision a Lawful Evil character, for example, that furthers the goals of the group by fighting dirty, lying, stealing and generally screwing over the enemies, but still has enough 'honor amongst theives' to not use the same tactics on his allies. Or a Neutral Evil character who won't actively work against the party, but if things go bad, he'll save his own skin instead helping the others.

Just remember that being Evil does not necessarily mean that you MUST kill everyone and steal all their stuff.

 

[Sparky]

I'd also like to point out that evil people need friends too. Adventurers, living outside the moral ken of common folk, are probably good candidates. They may, when the chips come down, betray those friends... but then again, they may not. Just as good folk are over come by their baser nature, sometimes evil folk are over come by their higher nature.

I tend to think the alignment system is pretty crocked myself - hence my penchant for Neutral alignments. Good and evil, law and chaos, all come down - with intelligent creatures - to a series of personal choices. People make choices every time they do something or continue to do something or don't do something. When choice becomes habit, it becomes nature. Thinking people have to think to continue to make the choices they believe in. So alignment, in this regard then, is more a coalescence of the choices behind a character than a map for the decisions to follow.

I think the alignment system should either be much more dynamic and integrated into the game mechanics or dropped all together. But this isn't really a discussion for LEW.

Evil characters, I'm fine with them. In good parties. Fine. There is a meta-game-respect for The Party that all players should have - part of the ettiquette of gaming - in addition to a respect for the in character drama that makes role playing games so interesting.

 

[nimisgod]

I think the only reason "Evil Characters" have so much of a stigma with gamers is because of the ubiquitous bad experience with umm... less than fun evil party members. I've seen fun evil characters and have played several myself. I wouldn't mind evil characters in LEW, since all of us are mature gamers, unwilling to ruin the fun of others.

That said, I don't think an evil character (without a ring of mind shielding) would fit in a party with any paladin (esp. Sir Ishmael).

By the way, Sparky, I agree with you in that Alignment should follow a character, not the other way around. IMO, one of the most common RP sins committed is the rationalization that "Hey, I did that bec. my character is CE!" instead of saying "Hey, I did that bec. my character is a sociopath!".

 

[orsal]

unapproved characters?

Macbeth just returned to campus, and to internet access, last weekend, and if I read the email I got from him then he's got a bit to catch up on -- not sure when he'll get around to approving characters. There are a number of unapproved characters, including three in the Red Dragon Inn for whom an adventure hook just came along. Is it the general feeling that it would be OK to suspend the character approval rule in deference to the circumstances?

 

[Sparky]

Ioleta needs approval as well. She's on TH's adventure. No hurry, the only offense on her sheet is probably that she has WAY too many outfits.

 

[doghead]

That said, I don't think an evil character (without a ring of mind shielding) would fit in a party with any paladin (esp. Sir Ishmael).

Assuming the ability does detect Evil alignment, it would be quite hard for evil people to take positions of power in DnD cities and societies for this very reason, I think. I was thinking on it the other day. Would you not, as townsfolk, take advantage of the Paladin's ability to screen people seeking positions in your society. While a bit of a plot killer, it has an internal logic I think.

 

[Uriel]

I'm not sure what we ever decided about Goblin PCs, but

*official temporary OK stamp*

Get those characters into a game and we can get them looked at when Macbeth has time.