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paladin_carvin
2009-07-23, 01:43 PM
Lawful Good? Not just for paladins anymore! Well, actually, I'm not so sure about that. I know we have Roy the LG fighter... but what about you? Have you ever played a LG character that isn't a paladin?

Blackjackg
2009-07-23, 01:46 PM
Yeah, lawful good is one of my favorite alignments to play. Just need to make sure that the player and the DM have the same idea of what that means, and you're fine.

PLUN
2009-07-23, 01:46 PM
All the time, it's a decent alignment. It's one of my go tos when i just need something to go on my sheet for 'decent enough bloke' and my GM gives about as much of a cahoot about alignment as me.

jmbrown
2009-07-23, 01:51 PM
Lawful Good is a dangerous alignment to play because DM's are of the belief that it means you're a fanatical zealot that must follow the straight and narrow at all times.

Lawful means you respect the traditions and customs of your civilization or culture.

Good means you have a respect for life which extends to all creatures not just yourself and your friends.

I've played plenty of LG characters but in every case I only do so once I learn if the DM is mature enough not to purposefully toss me in a stupid situation because he holds some sort of LG grudge. It's kind of like how most DM's are adverse to CN characters because every novice player thinks a CN guy is completely random and insane.

Xefas
2009-07-23, 01:51 PM
I think I'd be more prepared to play any class but a paladin as Lawful Good. That way, if the DM doesn't think the way I'm acting is Lawful Good, then I still get to keep my class features. And whatever alignment he wants me to put down on my sheet, I can still go along acting Lawful Good.

For instance, I think killing one morally gray person to save 10 million innocent people is perfectly within the bounds of Lawful Good. I can play my Crusader that way, do huge mounds of good deeds along the way, and then sacrifice that one person when the choice comes up, and when the DM says I'm Chaotic Evil now, well, I can just keep on, doing good deeds with all class features intact. No skin off my nose.

Pharaoh's Fist
2009-07-23, 01:52 PM
I am (or try to be, at any rate) Lawful Good in real life, so I find it the easiest alignment to play for my characters,

FMArthur
2009-07-23, 01:54 PM
Sometimes, I just wanna roll up a normal hero. LG does well for that type.

AstralFire
2009-07-23, 02:02 PM
I am frequently NG or CG, even Exalted CG, but pretty much am only LG if I'm a Monk. (Never played a Paladin, per se.) LN, LE, CE, NE are all alignments I've never played except as DM.

Civil War Man
2009-07-23, 02:03 PM
I am typically the Neutral Good/Chaotic Neutral/Neutral Evil type.

At one point, though, I want to play a Lawful Good Necromancer. You don't really see too many of those. Maybe follow that up with a Chaotic Evil Bard.

paladin_carvin
2009-07-23, 02:10 PM
I'm glad to see so many people use LG. Myself, I play a lot of LN and suggest it to my players when it fits their style... which is decently often. What classes do you play when you play LG?

CWM: I've thought about the whole LG necromancer. It would be difficult, but very interesting.

kamuishirou
2009-07-23, 02:12 PM
Lawful Good Rogue. He was a rogue that worked for the Azorius guild from Ravnica. So his rogue talents where more for tracking people down in the city than robbing and stealing.

Hmmm....I think I may up a Lawful Good Rogue :).

jmbrown
2009-07-23, 02:17 PM
I'm glad to see so many people use LG. Myself, I play a lot of LN and suggest it to my players when it fits their style... which is decently often. What classes do you play when you play LG?

CWM: I've thought about the whole LG necromancer. It would be difficult, but very interesting.

Any class without a restriction does well with LG it's just a matter of roleplaying. Obviously fighters and clerics make the best LG classes since they're so generic as far as abilities go.

I've played a LG necromancer before. He was a caretaker who believed a man's grave was to be honored as his home. Whenever he came across an unburied body he'd sprinkle dust over it and say a prayer. He battled evil necromancers believing that the undead was the ultimate perversion of life that should be eradicated.

Civil War Man
2009-07-23, 02:21 PM
CWM: I've thought about the whole LG necromancer. It would be difficult, but very interesting.

I have thought about it, too, and figure it would probably incorporate one or more of the following
1. Someone who wants to be a healer, but can't quite get the hang of it
2. Only creates undead using consenting souls (if there is an empty corpse, it's okay so long as the soul does not show up and protest)
3. Does not control the undead, but raises them with free will and then orders them around the same way a different character would order around living creatures.
4. Views and treats the undead they create as their children (kind of like the way Tsukiko acts in OOtS).

Edit: Or you could do jmbrown's necromancer, but for me part of the challenge would be a Lawful Good Necromancer that still has the zombie hordes.

Keld Denar
2009-07-23, 02:30 PM
Looking over Myth-Weavers, I have 5 LG characters, 3 NG characters, and 1 NE character (inactive). The only reason the 3 characters are NG is because of alignment restrictions (Bard, Barbarian, and Radiant Servant).

I agree with Mr Fist. I am LG in real life, and often find its easiest to be LG in game, especially "hero" games.

AstralFire
2009-07-23, 02:45 PM
I am definitely LG or TN leaning towards LG IRL, which is why I tend to like being CG - it's nice saying "screw the rules, I have moral superiority" now and then, albeit not to an anti-heroic level.

Piedmon_Sama
2009-07-23, 02:48 PM
I have no lawful characters. XD

I guess it's because I'm a rash, hotheaded person IRL. Split-second decisions and heavy improvisation are part of the way I game, whether I'm DMing or playing. Also unless my characters have willingly joined a group like my Half-Orc Druid being initiated into his circle, they all have serious problems with being told what to do. Both my disciplined, quiet Psychic Warrior and my wild, aggressive Neanderthal Barbarian would have almost the same reaction as some local town guardsman trying to arrest them, or some random official telling them what to do.

Zeta Kai
2009-07-23, 02:49 PM
It's not my usual forte (I'm more of a Chaotic Good man myself), but I ran a LG Rogue for a while. She was an interesting, conflicted character, one of those "for the greater good" types that had to walk a tightrope between opposed aspects of her own personality.

I miss Arden; maybe one day she'll make a comeback in one of my campaigns.

jmbrown
2009-07-23, 02:59 PM
Edit: Or you could do jmbrown's necromancer, but for me part of the challenge would be a Lawful Good Necromancer that still has the zombie hordes.

Raise dead is an evil spell so you'd have to do some homebrewing there. Animate dead creates a mindless corpse, it doesn't rip the soul from whatever plane. You're basically defiling someone's body so there's no "if it's willing."

If someone wanted to play a LG necromancer that raised dead, I'd probably modify the spell to create deathless as described in the BoED. They're undead with the souls still attached meaning they have free will which also means they're not restricted to the creatures HD (which is 1 for all the base races and sucks) and they could instead take class levels. You'd be restricted to maybe 1 but you've got a powerful, free will ally who more than likely shares your alignment on your side.

Of course, the soul has to be willing to return.

Epinephrine
2009-07-23, 03:00 PM
My dwarven saboteur is lawful good. He's got dwarven rogue levels and can spring locks/traps/etc., but they are the skills he's picked up to work in a military setting, preparing traps for an opposing group, ensuring the way is clear for our troops, sneaking around to take out sentries. I remember when we were going to explore a glassworks in a module and the party asked him to pick the lock... he only did so because we had good evidence that someone might be in trouble inside, and he wouldn't let anyone loot the place - we were on a rescue mission, and we can pay for any damage we cause.

First time ever playing a lawful good rogue-type, though.

AstralFire
2009-07-23, 03:08 PM
I would see an LG necromancer as someone who is capable of returning the dead to life for a short time and helping them right wrongs so they may pass on. Would require homebrew rules and a world where normal resurrection is much harder or not at all possible, though. Sort of like Ghost with Patrick Swayze, only while the PC is playing Whoopi Goldberg, they don't get possessed by Patrick Swayze.

Mando Knight
2009-07-23, 03:10 PM
Raise dead is an evil spell so you'd have to do some homebrewing there.

Raise dead is an unaligned cleric spell. You probably mean Animate Dead.

NeoVid
2009-07-23, 03:17 PM
Just once so far, and I didn't intend for him to be LG.

It was a dwarf Warblade who I marked as NG at the start, but as the campaign developed, and he kept being shocked at how our party was being jerked around and backstabbed by the people we worked for, I realized he was Lawful, since he expected to be able to trust and rely on authorities. It never crossed his mind that he could get abuse for working within the system, which I figured was a very lawful way to think.

As a side note, these incidents resulted in him distrusting human authorities, not changing alignment.

LibraryOgre
2009-07-23, 03:41 PM
Dwarven Ranger/Rogue. His stay with the party was brief, due to the fact that he didn't feel that a drow was an appropriate travelling companion for decent folks.

ZeroNumerous
2009-07-23, 04:02 PM
I, like Zeta, lack LG characters. The few Lawful characters I play are Neutral or Evil. The Good characters I play are Neutral or Chaotic. The two ends of the spectrum just never meet.

Blue Ghost
2009-07-23, 04:04 PM
I don't actively play D&D, but here on GITP, my Blue Ghost persona is a Lawful Good wizard. Why must Lawful Good be only for paladins? There is no reason. Lawful Good is as good as any other Good, perhaps more so. I consider myself to be LG in real life (at least formerly), so that's the way I RP here. I've been (IMO wrongly) criticized as Lawful Stupid, once because of a slight misunderstanding about a spell I used, and once because someone didn't like the idea of Lawful Good punishing active evil.

Friv
2009-07-23, 04:18 PM
I actually played a Lawful Good necromancer, although he didn't do much raising of the undead directly. At low levels, he made use of Cause Fear, Ray of Enfeeblement, Scare, and Blindness/Deafness to end fights without our enemies having to die. The plan had been to more or less continue the trend (Gentle Repose, Ray of Fatigue, Bestow Curse, Fear, Waves of Fatigue, Undeath to Death, Clone, etc), but the game did not so much continue as collapse.

Still want to give him another shot some day.

Tar Palantir
2009-07-23, 04:26 PM
I've never played a LG character, paladin or not. I almost always play non-lawful, non-good alignments, simply because I find them more enjoyable, but that's just my personal preference. I have no grudge against LG characters, unless they have a beef with me, and I try to avoid unnecessary intraparty conflict.

AslanCross
2009-07-23, 05:48 PM
I played a LG wizard once (he PrCed into Silver Flame Pyromancer). Pretty awesome character, although I didn't get to RP him so much as it was a one-shot.

Yukitsu
2009-07-23, 05:57 PM
I always play either lawful good or chaotic evil. I've only played 2 paladins, and plenty more lawful gooders.

Mr.Moron
2009-07-23, 06:01 PM
I generally prefer Neutral Good, if I'm playing good. Generally only going LG/CG if it plays into a particular mechanic. Probably not something I'd do outside a Paladin or other Lawful-only class.

Aron Times
2009-07-23, 06:02 PM
My 4E sorcerer, Aron Times, is lawful good. I play him as a perpetually optimistic blaster mage.

Prime32
2009-07-23, 06:13 PM
For instance, I think killing one morally gray person to save 10 million innocent people is perfectly within the bounds of Lawful Good. I can play my Crusader that way, do huge mounds of good deeds along the way, and then sacrifice that one person when the choice comes up, and when the DM says I'm Chaotic Evil now, well, I can just keep on, doing good deeds with all class features intact. No skin off my nose.Generally, if it's a choice between saving a loved one and saving a million people the LG person would go for the millions first, while the CG person would either go for the loved one first or take a risk and try to save both at once.

The Lawful person would be more likely to beat themselves up for failing to save everyone though.


There should be no problem with playing an LG character as long as both you and your DM know the difference between Lawful Good and Lawful Stupid. An LG person is merely someone who is honest and kind - how troublesome is that? :smallconfused:

Look at some of the examples here (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LawfulGood) and tell me how many are mad zealots.

Woodsman
2009-07-23, 06:17 PM
I actually play more CG/NG types, but I see LG as the true "Hero" alignment. If I were to ever play Exalted (From BoED), I'd end up being LG.

Archpaladin Zousha
2009-07-23, 06:38 PM
Lawful Good tends to be the alignment I use no matter what character I play (of course, my username's proof of that).

Currently I'm working on building a 4e bard who's Lawful Good. It technically doesn't count since he'll be multiclassing into Paladin and isn't so much the flamboyant magic musician as he is a crusader for Bahamut with extensive musical training.

erikun
2009-07-23, 06:40 PM
I generally play Neutral-Good-leaning-Lawful or Lawful-Neutral-leaning-Good with my characters, which would probably end up being Lawful Good under some DMs. Most of the time, the difference doesn't matter too much to me. (Wizard and Good-aligned Clerics don't usually care if it says NG or LG on their sheet.)

I certainly don't have any problem playing a LG character, and have a few I pay who are very LG. However, I guess I have a neutrality streak in me, which shows up in my characters frequently.

Dragonmuncher
2009-07-23, 06:44 PM
Lawful good doesn't have to mean zealot, or uptight. Sam Vimes of Discworld is Lawful Good- he might be cynical and sarcastic, and extremely sneaky, but he has a fundamentally lawful outlook on life, and is definitely on the Good side.

Daze
2009-07-23, 06:55 PM
Good thread...

I always felt the alignment system guided how you played, not dominated it. Paladins were more restricted based on their particular religous order and character class, not so much because they were LG.

I was also of the opinion that the "goodest" (most good? heh) of all the alignments was NG and the most evil was NE. The thinking behind this being that if you have no regard for law or chaos and chose to be good, then good was your bottom line.. and vice versa for evil. If your lawful, you have more considerations or even justifications for doing or not doing good/evil.

I'd only play LG as a paladin now though, otherwise I find that alignment a bit too restrictive.

LE... Now THAT'S an alignment. Totally challenging and fun. Twist the laws to your own ends... cool stuff.

Mando Knight
2009-07-23, 06:56 PM
Look at some of the examples here (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LawfulGood) and tell me how many are mad zealots.

That Aragorn guy. He's just so crazy. I mean, claiming a throne that hasn't been used for a millennium, meanwhile traveling into the depths of a mountain to raise an army of those long dead to fight a near-unstoppable lesser deity of supreme evil? Come on, what does he think he can do with that ancient blade of elf-steel? Buy time for some kind of half-pint to drop the ancient evil's soul-hidey-place into the volcano in his back yard? Please.

And what's up with Superman? He's nigh-immortal, and yet he follows through with this "with Great Power comes Great Responsibility" schtick?

And Optimus Prime? He dies every time he tries to save us all. Why does he keep doing it?

:smalltongue:[/rhetorical sarcasm]

Thurbane
2009-07-23, 07:42 PM
I've played an LG cleric of St Cuthbert before.

spamoo
2009-07-23, 08:00 PM
I actually used to play LG heroic-archetype characters in my earlier days of D&D (3 or so years ago). However, my group could always count on at least two characters playing CN and myself being the only Lawful character. After a couple of sessions, I would always realize that my character would have no place in an adventuring party after it slaughtered the leaders of a crime syndicate just for the rogue to declare himself the new boss, then pass it off as "good roleplaying". Simply put, my party forced me out of it.

Edit: I now realize why my DM would always give me a slightly larger share of the loot/better magic items...

Jergmo
2009-07-23, 08:04 PM
That Aragorn guy. He's just so crazy. I mean, claiming a throne that hasn't been used for a millennium, meanwhile traveling into the depths of a mountain to raise an army of those long dead to fight a near-unstoppable lesser deity of supreme evil? Come on, what does he think he can do with that ancient blade of elf-steel? Buy time for some kind of half-pint to drop the ancient evil's soul-hidey-place into the volcano in his back yard? Please.

And what's up with Superman? He's nigh-immortal, and yet he follows through with this "with Great Power comes Great Responsibility" schtick?

And Optimus Prime? He dies every time he tries to save us all. Why does he keep doing it?

:smalltongue:[/rhetorical sarcasm]

Superman doesn't touch Good with a 29 and a half foot pole in the comics. He's pretty gosh-darn evil, if you really think about it. Kryptonians in general are jerks. :smallfrown:

Just a couple examples:
http://www.superdickery.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=28&Itemid=45&limitstart=8
http://www.superdickery.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=28&Itemid=45&limitstart=9

Xefas
2009-07-23, 08:15 PM
There should be no problem with playing an LG character as long as both you and your DM know the difference between Lawful Good and Lawful Stupid. An LG person is merely someone who is honest and kind - how troublesome is that? :smallconfused:

Yes, but there are plenty of DMs out there who are good or halfway decent, with a major flaw of having absolutely no understanding of alignment or how to treat characters with mechanical alignment restrictions.

So, this way, it doesn't cause a problem. You get to play the character you want, and the DM gets to call your alignment whatever he wants, and the game goes on.

Instead of, you playing a Lawful Good Paladin, him creating progressively more contrived explanations of why eating that sandwich was an act of unspeakable evil, and the game coming to a grinding halt.

Sometimes its just not worth fighting the small battles. Another reason I like Crusader more than Paladin. Same fluff. More power. Less group problems.

woodenbandman
2009-07-24, 10:18 AM
I've played a character that is both good and lawful before.

I don't play alignments anymore. They're stupid and boring and I continually find myself disagreeing with a player's assessment of any given action as good or evil. So now in my games it is a cardinal sin to refer to alignment.

Tengu_temp
2009-07-24, 10:26 AM
Superman doesn't touch Good with a 29 and a half foot pole in the comics. He's pretty gosh-darn evil, if you really think about it. Kryptonians in general are jerks. :smallfrown:

Just a couple examples:
http://www.superdickery.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=28&Itemid=45&limitstart=8
http://www.superdickery.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=28&Itemid=45&limitstart=9

That's Golden/Silver Age Superman - those were different times, when things like "continuity" or "consistent character portrayal" were hints given with a wink and taken with a pinch of salt, rather than expected elements. In more modern portrayals he's pretty much the paragon of LG, apart from alternate universes.

John Campbell
2009-07-24, 03:33 PM
Lawful good doesn't have to mean zealot, or uptight. Sam Vimes of Discworld is Lawful Good- he might be cynical and sarcastic, and extremely sneaky, but he has a fundamentally lawful outlook on life, and is definitely on the Good side.

I've run into too many DMs who have insane ideas about what alignment - each of the nine specifically, and the appropriate role of the system as a whole - means. I tend to play the Chaotic Good / Chaotic Neutral corner of the alignment square in large part because it minimizes the amount of DM trying to tell me how to play my character. And because Chaotic Good is just better than Lawful Good, of course, despite decades of propaganda to the contrary.

Our current DM is The Guy Who Always Plays Paladins. I pretty much forced Guards, Guards and some others in the Watch subseries down his throat so he could meet Sam Vimes and Carrot Ironfoundersson and learn that being Lawful Good does not mean that you have to be an arrogant, holier-than-thou stick-up-the-butt wanker.