Defining Law and Chaos

[Zappo]

Personality should dictate alignment, but you shouldn't allow generalizations to cause the reverse (alignment dictating personality).

That's what I do. It's the only way that truly works IMO.

Real people usually have some chaotic traits and some lawful traits (like Robin Hood - though I'd see that as a matter of goodness, more than honor), but trying to have alignment determine personality means that all people will either have only lawful traits, or only chaotic traits, or none. This is both oversimplicistic, and unrealistic.

 

[Left-handed Hummingbird]

There are lots of different definitions on the alignments and the end you should use the one that works in your game. I usually use a very simple definition: Lawful is what a knight does/would have done, Chaotic is what a rogue does/would have done. It never fails.

If I want to get philosophical about it - which I usually don't - I say that Lawful places the group before the individual where as Chaotic does the opposite. That is irrespective of good or evil.

 

[Hand of Evil]

Take a Robin Hood-like character who is honourable and trustworthy, but disrespects authority and, as a rebel, lies when he needs to.

Lawful, Neutral, or Chaotic?

Oh, this one can go so many ways and would cause this thread all sort of problems.

You could say Robin was lawful because he followed the true king and said there is only the King's Law and everything else was against that. I don't think you can call him neutral because he did pick a side and he did have a code. Chaotic, maybe but it was never about him but others...

 

[Monde]

You could say Robin was lawful because he followed the true king and said there is only the King's Law and everything else was against that. I don't think you can call him neutral because he did pick a side and he did have a code. Chaotic, maybe but it was never about him but others

I have always seen Robin as a Chaotic Good character. He did break the Laws and go against even the Kings Law by stealing but he did it for a greater good. He was a rebel but always working for a greater good.

 

[FireLance]

Boiled down to the fundamentals, I think the main difference between Law and Chaos is this:

Law: There should be rules, and people should follow them.
Chaos: There should not be any rules, and nobody should stop me from doing whatever I want.

Lawful people want rules, and they want everyone to follow them. Of course, they can argue about which rules are desirable and should be followed, e.g. the Paladin versus the Mafia boss.

Chaotic people don't want rules to restrict them. If they follow a code of honour, it is because they want to, not because they feel they have to. A Chaotic person may demand that everyone else follows "the rules" except himself, or he may seek to "free" others from "oppression", but at the end of the day, he does so simply because he feels like it.

 

[Valiantheart]

I apologize before hand cause this post goes all over the place:

I dont understand why people always associate Lawful with honor. You can have personal honor, and grant quarter to your enemies without being lawful. Drizzt for instance has an abundance of honor but is chaotic good. Artemis Entreri has had his alignment shifted from chaotic evil to lawful evil back to chaotic neutral(maybe). He is extremely disciplined but not honorably. You can have personal honor and chaffe under the rules of others.

There is also a difference between how you treat your friends and how you treat your enemies.

Playing Lawful/Chaotic always has seemed easy to me. Playing neutral good/neutral evil seems really really hard. I cant seem to get their motivations or personality points.

IMO, I have always thought Robin Hood was the archetypical chaotic good character.

 

[Tom Cashel]

"Law" is the name chaotic characters give to a system they do not fully understand.

"Chaos" is the name lawful characters give to a system they do not fully understand.

cf. The Relativity Theory of Alignment (1956), by Timothy Schnack, PhD.

 

[Camarath]

To me, when playing chaotic or lawful character, the differance in personality has been what do I base my character's decisions on. If the character is chaotic I base their actions on how they feel. If the character is lawful I base their action on what they think. In chaotic characters thoughts feed into emotions and emotions feed into actions and in lawful characters emotons feed into thoughts and then into actions. Moral alignment detremines how and what one thinks and feels about things happening around one and ethical alignment detremines the process by which one arranges and make sense of these thoughts and feelings and translates them into acton.

These are my personal opinions on character personality and alignment.

 

[Steverooo]

Playing Lawful/Chaotic always has seemed easy to me. Playing neutral good/neutral evil seems really really hard. I cant seem to get their motivations or personality points.

Neutrals don't much care about laws vs. personal freedoms, or they care somewhat about both, and seem to vacilate. Neutral Goods care about bringing the greatest good to the largest number of people while simultaneously bringing the least harm to the fewest, without caring whether the good/harm is brought by laws and their enforcement, or personal freedoms and an abscence of law or order. Such concerns are less important to the NG than seeing that good is done.

A LG Paladin may have problems with a CG Elven society. A NG Elven Ranger may be the best guide and intercessor between the two, as he can adapt better to the Paladin's strict ways without offending the freewheeling Elves'.