D&D 5E What Alignment am I?

[rgoodbb]

What Alignment am I?
I am a Changeling Rogue Thief.

Background. I am a Sgt in the City Watch who uses shape-shifting to track down murderers and bring them to justice. This lets me work alone and gives me a lot of leeway. I have recently turned on to the fact that I can take all the criminal's stash for myself. This is exciting me.

So by day (so to speak) I uphold the law and imprison criminals, and this is something I enjoy and do wholeheartedly. On the sly, after I capture/kill the criminals, I take their stuff (gold, contraband, stolen Items, anything). This is not allowed by the rules of the city watch. Therefore I am a thief.

If by bringing criminals to justice and embracing the policeman's job I am Lawful, what does this mean for my other activities.

If I am not Lawful, am I deceiving everyone all the time during my day job?

If by being a thief I am the opposite of Law (Chaos), how do I not exhibit any of that behaviour during the day job

Ps. I do not deliberately just set out to kill Criminals for enjoyment or just to take their stuff, so I don't believe myself to be Evil.

What Alignment would you consider me to be, and why?

 

[I'm A Banana]

What Alignment am I?
I am a Changeling Rogue Thief.

Background. I am a Sgt in the City Watch who uses shape-shifting to track down murderers and bring them to justice. This lets me work alone and gives me a lot of leeway. I have recently turned on to the fact that I can take all the criminal's stash for myself. This is exciting me.

So by day (so to speak) I uphold the law and imprison criminals, and this is something I enjoy and do wholeheartedly. On the sly, after I capture/kill the criminals, I take their stuff (gold, contraband, stolen Items, anything). This is not allowed by the rules of the city watch. Therefore I am a thief.

If by bringing criminals to justice and embracing the policeman's job I am Lawful, what does this mean for my other activities.

If I am not Lawful, am I deceiving everyone all the time during my day job?

If by being a thief I am the opposite of Law (Chaos), how do I not exhibit any of that behaviour during the day job

Ps. I do not deliberately just set out to kill Criminals for enjoyment or just to take their stuff, so I don't believe myself to be Evil.

What Alignment would you consider me to be, and why?

This might help.

From your description, leaning toward Lawful. Maybe Lawful Neutral/Lawful Evil.

What might help determine this is why your character steals from the criminals, even though it's against the rules that he respects and supports in other respects. Is it because you're greedy? To pay off debts from kneecap-breaking-types? Because who cares about them, they're just criminals anyway? Do you feel guilty about it? Do you feel like it's part of "justice" that this money doesn't go to buy armor and swords and lanterns for the watch and instead goes into your pocket?

Most of those answers don't point at you being non-Lawful, they just give some context for why you don't think this particular rule is very important. Lawful characters don't have to obey every law all the time, they just kind of respect the general idea of law. You clearly do that, because you bring criminals to justice. You value the greater law. Stealing from the coffers like that isn't especially advancing the cause of Chaos in any intentional way.

If you lean toward more amoral reasons for keeping the money, you lean toward Lawful Evil - you're twisting the law to your own ends in that you have a position that lets you access other peoples' money easily, for your own personal benefit.

If you lean more toward convenience/necessity, you lean more toward Lawful Neutral or maybe even Lawful Good if there's a particularly noble reason. If it's because it's easy and you don't care so much about the watch that you'd give them a cut of your hard work like that, LN sounds about right.

 

[dmnqwk]

You are Neutral Evil.

While the link provide by Banana may assist you, that test is very much skewed towards providing neutrality in answers, as if neutrality means average, not an additional option.

Regarding your definition think to yourself what kind of real world cop would behave in the same way you do - upholding the law and bringing criminals to justice as a paycheck, but then supplementing your income by stealing their stuff, something you've recently discovered.

Your character sounds like they will evolve into accepting kickbacks from wealthy criminals, extortion of criminals who "should pay you to keep quiet" at your behest and eventually leading to either moving up in the police corruption ranks or getting ousted by that one lone good cop you see in the tv shows.

Obviously you can disagree with the direction you take, but you don't enforce the law for the sake of believing in it, you uphold it for pay, and definitely exploit your position of power for personal benefits. When it comes to Neutral Evil characters they are the least predictable in a party setting, and one alignment I don't think works well in a non-evil campaign (you either dont play the alignment or you do, and have PCs killing each other over it).

Good luck in your campaign, however, and don't be fooled by that fact you arrest people, even bent cops do their job sometimes!

P.S. I only made an account to post a reply while I was looking for posts regarding how terrible it is 5th edition Rangers can't have bear companions as standard!

 

[rgoodbb]

Many thanks for your reply, I'm A Banana.

The tool you sent told me Neutral after a couple of goes regarding questions I wasn't exactly sure about, but you make a really good case for LN I think it fits too.

Cheers again.

 

[rgoodbb]

Thanks for your thoughts. I think I like the LN angle dmnqwk. My PC doesn't feel evil and does follow the code of his job mostly. He does not deliberately go under cover to kill or steal but on the odd occasion that he finds a scenario to take advantage of, he will.

The first time he did so, he felt guilty. As this progressed, it got easier and he disliked himself for it getting easier, but this still did not stop him.

He wouldn't work with criminals but only for himself

 

[Azurewraith]

Chaotic evil masquerading as chaotic neutral. Ok that was a joke based on 75% of the pcs i have seen. I would lean towards lawfull neutral for your character however

 

[rgoodbb]

Thanks Azurewraith

I think if you could have triple alignment, I would be , LNN, like North, North, East

 

[Herobizkit]

Alignment test aside, easydamus is a great site with lots of Alignment infomation. You can also search TvTropes.org for medial examples of each alignment, but you'd better have a chunk of time set aside, because it will suck you into a multiverse of hyperlinks...

But I feel you are the best D&D alignment, Lawful Evil.

Lawful Evil vs. Neutral Evil

Conflicts between lawful evil and neutral evil characters will deal with the question of loyalty. The neutral evil character's loyalty is to himself and those who aid him currently. He will not go out of his way to help another, unless he needs that individual's help in the future. The lawful evil character recognizes the need for comrades and will help those that he considers allies, even at some personal risk and cost. Whoever a lawful evil character calls an ally can expect loyalty and aid, unless he fails to support the aims of the group or organization. Woe to the person who betrays the group! The lawful evil character will not be forgiving and will seek to cause injury or kill the offender, whatever is appropriate for their crime. The neutral evil character will also make an example of those who cross him, there is no question. The difference between the neutral evil character and lawful evil character is that the neutral evil character will betray an ally for gain when the ally has done him no wrong, whereas the lawful evil character will only betray a former ally who has proven himself unworthy or if that ally betrays the group.

You work within the system and benefit by working against the system. While this would theoretically make you Chaotic, the the fact that you're still willing to work within the system means you tend to Lawful. If you are willing to KILL criminals for material gain, you're definitely Neutral Evil; if you're willing to use your position to remove criminals 'lawfully' and gain from their spoils, Lawful Evil.

The Mafia and the Yakuza are both examples of Lawful Evil archetypal groups, but the Yakuza better embodies the alignment as they are willing to support and grow the community over which they rule.

 

[rgoodbb]

Wow this is swinging.

So you are saying that even though I feel guilty, and even though I hate myself for feeling less guilty each time, that I am still Evil.

I see your rationale, but maybe I'm resisting this because I don't actually want to be an Evil aligned character

Just because someone wants to make a quick buck, and the way they do it isn't exactly legal, does that actually make them evil?
(Not disagreeing with you here btw but would like to hear your thoughts)

 

[Azurewraith]

Wow this is swinging.

So you are saying that even though I feel guilty, and even though I hate myself for feeling less guilty each time, that I am still Evil.

I see your rationale, but maybe I'm resisting this because I don't actually want to be an Evil aligned character

Just because someone wants to make a quick buck, and the way they do it isn't exactly legal, does that actually make them evil?
(Not disagreeing with you here btw but would like to hear your thoughts)

I think the issue is the word evil has been watered down Hitler was evil Stalin yep pretty evil some random addict murdering some one for a quick fix thats not evil its not right but evil seems a stretch by my definition. I wouldn't say lifting from the evidence locker makes you evil