Darth Vader: Alignment

[Felix]

Rather the issue is hise swearing an explicit oath he has no intention of fulfilling, and that he could easily have avoided by choosing a different course.

Which oath is that?

Regardless of whether the action is legal or not, it's not lawful. A lawful character respects not only the letter of the law of his land, but lawfulness in general

It was my impression that a Lawful Evil character would obey the letter of the law, regardless how much he departed from the spirit. Why would a lawful Evil character have to respect diplomatic traditions as long as he was technically within his remit?

Vader breaks his assurances. A LE character wouldn't be threatening to break the agreement any further, he'd be rationalizing why he was allowed to break it at all.

I think an open-ended contract was mentioned earlier, being easy to bend; then there's something about verbal contracts not being worth the paper they're printed on; and isn't twisting bargains a hallmark of Lawful Evil?

 

[Treebore]

Darth Vader is lawful evil. The stupid brat from the prequels that don't exist is chaotic stupid.

Maybe not in your version, but the creator god of Star Wars says they do exist and that is why Anakin falls and becomes Darth Vader.

Plus his excellent use of manipulating and touting the Law to get what he wants is a supreme cover for all his selfish motivations.

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

I keep seeing mention of Vader breaking the Law, manipulating it, etc...but he doesn't.

Vader, and the Empire, ARE the law. The real manipulator of the law is Palpatine, who set up the system as it exists in the OT. Technically, Vader is acting BY the law, its just that the law is considerably....evil.

If I had to nail Vader down, it would be LE, though I could see NE working well. Of course, I don't think alignment works for Star Wars at all, and I'm glad its not in the d20 or the Saga edition.

 

[Klaus]

CE. He doesn't expect his officers to obey the law, but his personal commands.

In the Empire, he IS the law. He speaks with the authority of the Emperor, and the regime is pretty much an autocracy.

His service to the Empire is one of duty to the Emperor, personally, and because of his desire for power.

In the prequels it is shown that he looks up to Palpatine as a leader of men, as someone who can bring *order* to the galaxy.

He's a classic tyrant... both chaotic and evil,

Tyrants are Lawful Evil. They use the law to suit their needs.

willing to overturn any law on a whim if it suits his personal desire.

When has he done that? There's nothing in the six Star Wars movies that show Vader overturning any law. In Episode IV, the Emperor dissolves the Senate and gives each Moff complete authority over their regional sectors.

Threaten to murder an on-duty military officer? Check.

Harsh laws are still laws. If the penalty for failure is death, so be it.

Conspire against his own master, knowing his master is in turn conspiring against him? Check.

Where is this shown. Even so, he is following the Sith Rule of Two: there must be only two Sith, one master and one apprentice, one holding power and one desiring it.

Violate galactic law and customs of diplomacy? Check.

Once again, he *is* galactic law. Nothing he did in the six movies broke any laws. He turned on Mace Windu when he saw Mace attempting to execute the head of state without the benefit of a trial. He turned against the Jedi when they were branded traitors by said head of state. He stopped a ship suspected of harboring a traitorous politician with terrorrist aspirations.

Ignore the chain of command? Check.

His chain of command is: he answers to Palpatine, everyone answers to him. He was just being courteous in obeying Tarkin.

Pledge his loyalty to Sidious, simultaneously planning to overthrow him? Check.

He wasn't planning on overthrowing Sidious when he pledge allegiance in Palpatine's office.

Execute underlings without the benefit of a court-martial? Check.

What if there's no court-martial in the galactic law? Since he is the ultimate authority in the absence of the Emperor, he is well within his rights to act as Judge, Jury and Executioner and issue immediate justice.

People seem to have this idea that Chaotic individuals don't wish to rule others. That's not true at all. A Chaotic individual, as a ruler, expects their personal commands to be carried out, to the letter. If they declare that anyone wearing purple is to be flogged, anyone wearing purple is to be flogged. Why? Because they said so, and they are in charge. A Neutral individual's commands would be in service to their goals as ruler... for instance, Sidious, as a Neutral Evil individual, issues commands that further his personal power and frustrate his enemies. He expects the chain of command to be generally followed, but makes exceptions when useful. A Lawful Evil individual values hieararchy. Tarkin is a good example of LE. He gets annoyed when Vader tries to kill one of the other officers... they have work to do! Those Rebels aren't just going to go and kill themselves, you know. He also chooses to remain on the Death Star, despite being informed of the danger. Why? Sure, because he's arrogant, but also because it would be INCONSISTENT with his belief in himself as a courageous soldier.

A Chaotic ruler issues very few, if any, formal laws. When he does, it's usually on site of whatever prompted him to do so (see Kull, the Conqueror, in that Kevin Sorbo movie). A Lawful ruler values discipline, order, tradition. If people can't agree to something, they should be FORCED to agree (as Anakin himself stated in Episode II).

No, Vader is Lawful Evil throughout the Original Trilogy.

 

[wingsandsword]

Vader is classic NE. He's too comfortable working under his master, and working alongside the rest of the Imperial hierarchy, to be truly Chaotic--but he's also not acting out of any commitment to order or sense of obligation, which disqualifies him from being Lawful. He's a hateful, angry man who found himself in a position that basically works for him--it lets him crush his enemies and get his Dark Side fix, and, given the Emperor's influence, escaping would be way more trouble than it's worth. That seems pretty paradigmatically Neutral, to me.

Actually, he is working out of a sense of order.

Remember his political ramblings to Padme in Episode II, he wants to bring Order to the Galaxy. . .by force if neccesary. His ramblings could be written down as a classic example of LE political thought.

Then in Episode III, he turned against the Jedi because the Jedi were trying to overthrow Palpatine. Nevermind he was an admitted Sith Lord, he would rather see an evil tyrant in power (who promised to have the power to save a loved one) than be overthrown to save the galaxy from tyranny. That's definitely lawful evil.

In Episode V, he wanted to recruit Luke to bring an end to the conflict and bring Order to the Galaxy (with him in charge of that Order).

Darth Vader wants an orderly, ostensibly peaceful Galaxy with himself as absolute and indisputed ruler willing to do absolutely anything to maintain that order (kill subordinates, let pla), that's a dictionary definition of Lawful Evil.

 

[Treebore]

Part of my reason for saying he is neutral evil is because Neutral eVil only cares about what they want, and getting it the most efficient way possible.

So Vader see's his getting what he wants most efficiently in a lawful or ordered system, rather than a chaotic and corrupt system. So I see it as that is why he supports a "ordered galaxy", it makes and keeps it easiest for him to maintain power over the Empire, where as chaos would greatly restrict his influence, and therefore power.

So Vader's fundamental motivations are all about what he wants, and how best to get them. A lawful Empire is much easier to control rather than a chaotic one, hence he supports an "ordered empire".

But his personal motivations are simply to give himself everything he wants. SO that is why I call him neutral evil. Selfish evil.

Which is why giving up his life to finally save his own son "restores" him to the good side of the force. He finally put someone elses needs before his own. He finally understood why a person would sacrifice themselves for someone else, and did it. Which also finally revealed to him the one of the deepest meanings of "unconditional love".

Still, I could make a lot of solid arguments that the Jedi council was not good as a whole. Over all, the council was Lawful Neutral. Even so they also supported a lot of "chaos" as well. So maybe they could even be argued to be True Neutral in the overall effects of their decisions.

Doesn't really matter, though. Its a great movie series with great characters. Thats what matters.

 

[EvilPheemy]

Vader's extreme selfishness is why he's evil. His willingness to adhere to an ordered existence is why he's lawful.

Yoda's selflessness is why he's good. His indifference to structure is why he's neutral.

Annikan starts out very selfless (he wants to come back and free all the slaves in the Outer Rim, he wants to remove the tragedy of death from the galaxy), but he gets frustrated by the restrictions imposed on him by the Jedi Order, and the Senate. He is very much the maverick Chaotic Good aligned person.

By contrast, Obi Wan Kenobi is also selfless (he wants the citizens of the republic to lead happy, peaceful, prosperous lives and is willing to sacrifice his personal comfort and life to ensure that), but he believes in the Jedi Order, and the Republic. He believes in the rule of Justice and Law, and supports Order in the galaxy (until that law in order turn into oppression and tyranny). Which puts him in the ol' Lawful Good category.

 

[smootrk]

Chaotic Good?!?

 

[I'm A Banana]

Mmmmmmm, strawberry banana ice cream vader......

People seem to have this idea that Chaotic individuals don't wish to rule others. That's not true at all. A Chaotic individual, as a ruler, expects their personal commands to be carried out, to the letter. If they declare that anyone wearing purple is to be flogged, anyone wearing purple is to be flogged. Why? Because they said so, and they are in charge. A Neutral individual's commands would be in service to their goals as ruler... for instance, Sidious, as a Neutral Evil individual, issues commands that further his personal power and frustrate his enemies. He expects the chain of command to be generally followed, but makes exceptions when useful. A Lawful Evil individual values hieararchy. Tarkin is a good example of LE. He gets annoyed when Vader tries to kill one of the other officers... they have work to do! Those Rebels aren't just going to go and kill themselves, you know. He also chooses to remain on the Death Star, despite being informed of the danger. Why? Sure, because he's arrogant, but also because it would be INCONSISTENT with his belief in himself as a courageous soldier.

That seems entirely backwards to me. A LAWFUL ruler expects their personal commands to be carried out to the letter (the letter of the law). A CHAOTIC ruler doesn't expect everyone to obey his personal commands unless it suits them individually (and if it doesn't suit them individually, a CE ruler would kill them). A LAWFUL EVIL ruler would make arbitrary laws simply for the purposes of punishment, because that would (a) reinforce the power of authority and (b) amuse him when people are tormented.

Mister Chaotic Evil Despot wouldn't be that interested in issuing orders, because he would expect people to ignore them (they have no power, they're ineffective, he doesn't trust the system). He wouldn't operate at the head of a system, he'd operate at the core of a gang, a likeminded cadre of thugs who all enjoy that brutality and who kill those who don't. In this light, the Tanar'ri and the orcish hordes of D&D exemplify CE.

 

[Jeremy Ackerman-Yost]

But his personal motivations are simply to give himself everything he wants. SO that is why I call him neutral evil. Selfish evil.

Isn't that redundant? One can't really be Evil evil.