A question on Lawful Good Kender

[Salad_Shooter]

I imagine this has been brought up countless times. How does everyone interpret the Lawful Good alignment? LG characters are orderely, and follow the law of the land. But what if theres other laws that supercede that? Would they still follow a cruel law? More specifically, I'm creating a Kender character in a DL campaign. He wants to be a Knight of Solamnia, and after some conversing with my DM, we decided the Knights declared him a Squire against a lot of their better judgement. Some because it was a way to make him leave, and they never planned on making him a Knight, and some because they felt that maybe he could live up to the standards of the organization. Solamnics have to be LG, and yet a Kender is decidedly NOT LG. Is such a thing possible? Any hints would be helpful, I have a feeling this character is going to be a handful to play, and I'm going to need the best grasp on him that I can get. Thanks!

 

[hong]

I imagine this has been brought up countless times. How does everyone interpret the Lawful Good alignment? LG characters are orderely, and follow the law of the land. But what if theres other laws that supercede that? Would they still follow a cruel law? More specifically, I'm creating a Kender character in a DL campaign. He wants to be a Knight of Solamnia, and after some conversing with my DM, we decided the Knights declared him a Squire against a lot of their better judgement. Some because it was a way to make him leave, and they never planned on making him a Knight, and some because they felt that maybe he could live up to the standards of the organization. Solamnics have to be LG, and yet a Kender is decidedly NOT LG. Is such a thing possible? Any hints would be helpful, I have a feeling this character is going to be a handful to play, and I'm going to need the best grasp on him that I can get. Thanks!

1) Make up a regular Solamnic knight.

2) Shrink him down to 3 feet tall.

3) Voila, LG kender.

 

[Argent Silvermage]

I am playing a Kender wizard in a PbP game. the concept is to have a balance of the lawful along with the chaotic. Kazareen is trying to remain scholarly and diligent in his studies. He also understands that he has a compulsion to be more chaotic than a mad cow. He is trying to balance the two aspects.

A Kender Paladin is a great idea just expect a lot of atonement spells being thrown his way. He should be making will saves to avoid borrowing things. Maybe he should be given a phylactery of faithfulness?

 

[DragonLancer]

Just because the kender is LG doesn't mean that there is a problem. Its an unusual alignment for a kender I admit, but alignment (even in Dragonlance) is still a guideline. He still borrows (since its not intentional theft), but he's a good character who does his best to help us and try and conform to the laws around him. I would imagine most kender would consider him quite mad.

 

[~Johnny~]

Hmmm... Try to focus on what could be "lawful" about a kender. In general, being lawful is about obeying rules. Like any society, kender have rules about how to treat each other. They just don't have a definition of property. It's not so much that they're disobeying a law, it's just that property is a law they don't really respect. Just as a paladin isn't going to follow a tryant's rules, the most loyal, reliable, dedicated kender isn't going to see property as "good." He might even get a bit haughty about it, just as a Solamnic knight might get about an unjust law he sees in some village he's passing through. Imagine that: a kender paladin who spends time rolling his eyes against the materialistic nature of non-kleptomaniacal comrades.

Another thing you can do is focus on the difference between chaotic good and lawful good, because that's where this character's balance lies. A chaotic good character is more likely to be a vigilante fighting against some unjustly imposed order. A lawful good character believes that working with others and obeying a set of rules is the way to go, and is usually motivated by a chaotic enemy.

So rebels tend to be CG, defenders against senselessness tend to be LG. Just give your character the appropriate motivation by having his backstory include exposure to chaotic evil enemies who sour him to the idea of randomness and lawlessness. As always, see alignments as a range, not discrete points. It should be a fun character to play!

 

[Balsamic Dragon]

Hmmm... Try to focus on what could be "lawful" about a kender. In general, being lawful is about obeying rules. Like any society, kender have rules about how to treat each other. They just don't have a definition of property. It's not so much that they're disobeying a law, it's just that property is a law they don't really respect. Just as a paladin isn't going to follow a tryant's rules, the most loyal, reliable, dedicated kender isn't going to see property as "good." He might even get a bit haughty about it, just as a Solamnic knight might get about an unjust law he sees in some village he's passing through. Imagine that: a kender paladin who spends time rolling his eyes against the materialistic nature of non-kleptomaniacal comrades.

I like that idea a lot! Here's another way to do it that might work: have the kender be extremely generous to others and want to give away all of his extra possessions. The problem is that the things he ends up giving away actually belong to other people So he's kind of like Robin Hood, but doesn't realize the problems that will cause. He walks into town, sees a fruit peddler, sees a hungry person and viola! He gives the hungry person some fruit that he just happened to pick up somewhere

Balsamic Dragon