Why evil?

[adwyn]

While I have seen all types of evil characters over the years, recently I have noticed many experienced players choose neutral or evil aligned characters when the DM's micromanage the actions of the good aligned characters.

 

[ThirdWizard]

You mean playing Drizzt´s clons is out of date, now playing drow is up to date?

Everything can be blamed on the drow!

Drow do have that "evil is sexy" thing going for them. If you're into that dominatrix stuff.

 

[mhacdebhandia]

I'm not sure that there's anything more unusual about people who consistently play evil characters than about people who always play quiet lone wolves, chivalrous nobles, self-sacrificing martyrs, seemingly selfish mercenaries with a heart of gold, flirty good-time girls with big weapons, et cetera.

Some players just have a "type" they like to stick to. The first game I played at university included a player who long experience has shown always plays the same character - a reticent ranged warrior who likes to go off and work alone. Even his attempt at a James Bond-style superhero who could walk through walls ended up like this.

I've known players who rarely play evil characters - and who have expressed some discomfort about the decisions they took on these characters' behalf. I've known players who regularly play amoral - if not necessarily immoral - characters, some modelled on fictional characters they admire and some simply for the freedom it affords them to act as they can't or wouldn't in real life.

This latter isn't necessarily a sign of deep-rooted desire to steal, cheat, lie and murder, of course; quite often my uneducated guess would be that the key is the lack of consequences - not the "you get sent to jail" consequences but the "you feel really guilty for what you've done" consequences, and guilt is often the sign of a healthy conscience. People who act out their selfish impulses in a roleplaying game can do so without hurting others, which is the ideal opt-out for people who would feel horrible if they ever did something that really was wrong, selfish, or evil in real life.

I enjoy playing evil characters from time to time because I find their stories interesting - where others enjoy stories of noble courage and self-sacrifice, perhaps finding them heartwarming or inspirational, I sometimes gravitate towards stories about people without that kind of strength of character, people beset by temptation and corruption who don't always manage to find redemption. There's even artistic merit, to my mind, in a story exploring the unremitting corruption and, well, vileness of an individual with no hope that he or she will change.

Along with this, you can also tell excellent stories about people who believe they are right to commit the terrible wrongs they do. Characters with profound religious, philosophical, or political convictions that require them to trample on the lives of others can make for really interesting situations and games. To use an Eberron-related example, a DM can present the Lord of Blades as a genocidal lunatic out to rid the world of flesh races, as a profoundly dangerous ideologue willing to do whatever he must to carve a place in the world for his people (or those of his people willing to serve his cause), as a misunderstood figure neither noble nor villainous who just wants the space for his people to discover their place in the world and who is willing to fight for it, as a truly high-minded individual forced to resort to desperate measures in the face of prejudice, bigotry, and persecution, or anything in between.

Some people will be more interested in one end of this scale or another - for some, stories about conflict between good but fundamentally opposed people is most interesting, others prefer a different kind of moral ambiguity where neither side is right or virtuous and there's no good choice, still others like their villains (or characters) to be understandable but still intolerable, and even more people prefer their villains (or characters) to inhabit the most lightless depths of depravity, for one reason or another.

My ultimate point is this: some people just like the stories they can read, play, or imagine which arise from the actions and lives of characters who aren't necessarily heroic, admirable, or even tolerable. One might as well ask why other players prefer stories which focus on noble, self-sacrificing, decent people and their struggle against evil, ska more than industrial, or white bread more than rye. You can always articulate reasons, as I've done here, but I think all gulfs of preference and taste are ultimately unbridgeable.

 

[Jdvn1]

playing a Paladin can really be rather interesting and difficult.

I don't think it has to do with "interesting" or "difficult." I think it's more what they think is fun. Then again, it might be a problem with the portrayal of alignments. People think Evil characters can do whatever they want -- eventhough that's more indicative if Chaotic. I know someone who can not play good characters because the first plan she always gets in her head involves some sort of evil act, but maybe that's atypical too.

 

[FreeTheSlaves]

Maybe there is a perception that "evil" wears cool clothes and gets a monopoly on playing the anti-hero. In part I think that there are some that believe by tagging their character with the term "evil" somehow they will turn a 2D, cardboard, bowl of cold porridge into something that shouts "Wow!" Then again there are some who think that the "evil" tag grants them immunity to break law and custom with wild abandon.

Finally there are decently complex characters that are best suited to the "evil" tag due to some character flaw. These are characters that I can work with.

 

[Tric]

Evil characters are often more colorful, I think... And it's a freer lifestyle, you're not bound by the laws in the same way anymore. You open up a plethora of new possibilities.

Going Good again and again and again gets repetitive. Even if you don't do it so often, you might get "scared off" by others who run stereotypical good guys.

Paladins... I don't like them myself. They're forced to be LG, which I don't think is a very good viewpoint. CG but mostly NG are better good alignments. Lawfulness is dangerous sometimes...

As for myself, my latest five or so characters have been something like this: LN, TN, CN, CN, TN. I don't know how, but I'm drawn to neutral alignments. I just don't like the onesidedness of good/evil, I guess.

 

[AuraSeer]

Asking me why I sometimes play evil characters is like asking why I sometimes play a dwarf, a wizard, or a redhead.They're different from my real-life self, and the whole point of playing an RPG is to take on a new role.

If we had alignments in real life, I like to think I'd be Good, or at worst Neutral. So whenever I play a Good or Neutral character, I am to some extent playing myself. I can change everything else in the character's personality-- history, mannerisms, beliefs, prejudices, whatever-- but if his alignment stays the same, he always has that one thing in common with me. Sometimes it's fun to change that, and put myself in the shoes of a character whose mindset is that much more different than my own.

 

[ThoughtBubble]

Evil all the time? Probably due to some bad expierences in the past. Like, maybe a game where they were constantly dissuaded from a course of action by being told that it was evil. Maybe they've played in too many games where they feel like they have to save the day beacuse the word 'good' is written on their character sheet. Being herded is often an un-fun expierence, and if alignment has been used in the herding, they might want to avoid it.

Me, I could go for an evil character if it fit in. In heavily RP games it's sometimes fun to play a darkly contrasting guy, or a guy who is capable of doing horrible things. However, it's not the sort of thing you can just try and drop into a game.

Also, sometimes it's nice just to be able to say "I really don't like him." and then just kill him dead and move on and not have it be breaking character. Especially with some of the potentially annoying re-occurring NPCs.

 

[DrZombie]

There's evil and there's evil. The problem is that some people think they're playing an evil character when they're actually playing a deranged psychotic homicidal lunatic with the personality and intelligence of a dead slug.

I blame comic books and cartoons. .

I mean, let's face it, do you really think the Nazi's were sitting around a coffee table practicing maniacal evil laughter and telling each other how evil they were?

Good and evil are matters of perception when judging your own actions. Doing evil just because you're evil doesn't make any sense whatsoever. Even serial killers have some deranged kind of reasoning, using spurious and convoluted logic, to justify their actions. While their acts might seem random, they are not.
An "evil" character justifies himself for not obeying the "common rules of being good" be they the ten commandment or the universal human rights, or the Elven Manifesto or whatever, usually by excluding certain groups from what he considers to be "humans".
These can be "orcs", thereby justifying slaughtering whole caverns of Orcs, men wives and children, because they are thieving murderous creatures who cannot listen to reason, they're all evil, a drain upon society and they piss in the genepool by making half-orcs.
Or women, because they are weaker then men, therefore the Gods have clearly indicated that they are inferior, so they can be sold and abused and whatever.
Or the poor, because poverty is clearly a sign that they are not to be trusted. If they were, they wouldn't be poor. And so on.

If society as a whole agrees with your exclusion as a subgroup, you're considered good.
For example : If the Human adventurers clean out The Caves Of The Goblin King and bring back his head, laden with treasure, they'll be celebrated heroes and the mayor will offer the hand of his daughter in marriage.
If they don't, you're evil.
For example: If the Humanis Policlubbers in the Shadowrun Universe go to East-London and set fire to the housing projects, gunning down any Orc or Troll that comes running out of the inferno, they will be celebrated by some, but hunted down by the police and army as dangerous violent terrorrists.
Same action, different setting.

Another option is that your moral values are vastly different from the main society, usually because you're from an entirely different culture.
For example, the Aboriginals from Australia had no concept of animal husbandry. They could not understand that an animal could be owned by someone. So they did not understand the anger of the sheep-farmer wen they ate one of his sheep.
For the Aboriginals, the sheep-farmers were evil, because they attacked the aboriginals unprovoked, while they were having dinner, even offering to share their dinner didn't calm them down, it even made them more angry. Clearly, they were insane and evil.
While the sheep-farmers were quite enraged at those thieving aboriginals who added insult to injury by offering him the remains of his own bloody sheep that those thieving buggers stole. Evil buggers, better to get rid of 'em.

So playing an "evil" character is just a matter of perspective. Wich is why I sometimes enjoy playing them, it's quite an effort to consistently play such a character.

 

[Tric]

If we had alignments in real life, I like to think I'd be Good, or at worst Neutral. So whenever I play a Good or Neutral character, I am to some extent playing myself. I can change everything else in the character's personality-- history, mannerisms, beliefs, prejudices, whatever-- but if his alignment stays the same, he always has that one thing in common with me. Sometimes it's fun to change that, and put myself in the shoes of a character whose mindset is that much more different than my own.

Most people think of themselves as good, even those that aren't. Not saying you're wrong, just stating fact.

I consider myself CN. Chaotic because I resent many of the traditions in my family (like religion), Neutral because I like to keep my distance with both "good" and "evil".

There's evil and there's evil. The problem is that some people think they're playing an evil character when they're actually playing a deranged psychotic homicidal lunatic with the personality and intelligence of a dead slug.

I blame comic books and cartoons. .

I mean, let's face it, do you really think the Nazi's were sitting around a coffee table practicing maniacal evil laughter and telling each other how evil they were?

Good and evil are matters of perception when judging your own actions. Doing evil just because you're evil doesn't make any sense whatsoever. Even serial killers have some deranged kind of reasoning, using spurious and convoluted logic, to justify their actions. While their acts might seem random, they are not.
An "evil" character justifies himself for not obeying the "common rules of being good" be they the ten commandment or the universal human rights, or the Elven Manifesto or whatever, usually by excluding certain groups from what he considers to be "humans".
These can be "orcs", thereby justifying slaughtering whole caverns of Orcs, men wives and children, because they are thieving murderous creatures who cannot listen to reason, they're all evil, a drain upon society and they piss in the genepool by making half-orcs.
Or women, because they are weaker then men, therefore the Gods have clearly indicated that they are inferior, so they can be sold and abused and whatever.
Or the poor, because poverty is clearly a sign that they are not to be trusted. If they were, they wouldn't be poor. And so on.

If society as a whole agrees with your exclusion as a subgroup, you're considered good.
For example : If the Human adventurers clean out The Caves Of The Goblin King and bring back his head, laden with treasure, they'll be celebrated heroes and the mayor will offer the hand of his daughter in marriage.
If they don't, you're evil.
For example: If the Humanis Policlubbers in the Shadowrun Universe go to East-London and set fire to the housing projects, gunning down any Orc or Troll that comes running out of the inferno, they will be celebrated by some, but hunted down by the police and army as dangerous violent terrorrists.
Same action, different setting.

Another option is that your moral values are vastly different from the main society, usually because you're from an entirely different culture.
For example, the Aboriginals from Australia had no concept of animal husbandry. They could not understand that an animal could be owned by someone. So they did not understand the anger of the sheep-farmer wen they ate one of his sheep.
For the Aboriginals, the sheep-farmers were evil, because they attacked the aboriginals unprovoked, while they were having dinner, even offering to share their dinner didn't calm them down, it even made them more angry. Clearly, they were insane and evil.
While the sheep-farmers were quite enraged at those thieving aboriginals who added insult to injury by offering him the remains of his own bloody sheep that those thieving buggers stole. Evil buggers, better to get rid of 'em.

So playing an "evil" character is just a matter of perspective. Wich is why I sometimes enjoy playing them, it's quite an effort to consistently play such a character.

Beat me to it.

Well, amen. (no pun intended)