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Calanon
2012-02-27, 03:33 AM
Why would a good aligned character want to conquer the world?

This character can be of any sort of Good based Alignment and can be of any class, Go wild playground and explain to me why a Good Aligned character would want to conquer the world :smallsmile:

This isn't for any particular game this is purely academic in nature.

Yora
2012-02-27, 05:37 AM
Ever heard of New World Order? It's supposed to be a horror scenario, but I think it sounds really nice. Work towards uniting the worlds country and spreading a common shred systems of values that enable a peaceful coexistence. But in the process, you have to remove all those evil people who are unwilling to give up the power they have because of the conflicts between their countries.

gkathellar
2012-02-27, 06:07 AM
"Look at the world. Actually look at it, for one second. It's full of stupidity and horror and disgusting cruelty, while the forces of light dance above doing nothing more than providing a counterbalance for the legions of demons and terrors that lurk below the surface. The world is awful, and horrible, and unless someone does something drastic it's going to stay that way. Maybe no one can do anything, but I'm sure before the first stone building was built people thought no one could do that, either.

"Someone has to take the first step, clear the refuse and the rubble so that we can actually start to get things right, so that what is good and kind and just in the world can prevail. Good should mean something here, in this world, and if no one is going to help me make a paradise of this hell on earth then yes, I will drive all of its peoples before me like stampeding cattle away from a cliff. Because if these people refuse to take responsibility for themselves, then they have no right to refuse my taking responsibility for them.

"World domination? I prefer to call it world-optimization."

Saintheart
2012-02-27, 06:18 AM
If you want to look at the Dragonlance series of books, Google up "The Kingpriest of Istar." He pretty much anthropomorphised this concept.

Megaduck
2012-02-27, 06:19 AM
"I give my people freedom, liberty, roads, and schools. Under my care they go to bed every night safe and well fed.

"Across the boarder they are starving, armed robbers stalk the lands, and evil gods demand blood and pain.

"I must save those people from the horror that they live in. Why wouldn't they want to be part of my empire?"

Acanous
2012-02-27, 06:19 AM
It's academic, really. end suffering by ending scarcity. End Scarcity with Magic. Enough magic means a perfect society, so long as there are responcible wizards to run it. I am a responcible wizard, ergo it is my responcibility to run the world.

Radar
2012-02-27, 06:26 AM
Take Klaus Wulfenbach as an example: he came back to Europe and found it in ruin - everyone was fighting everyone else. The only way he found to put a stop to it, was to force everyone to surrender and it worked. He hates dealing with politics, paperwork and babysitting all the noble families, but someone has to do it.

Another possibility is an outside threat, that would require the whole know world to unite against it. Let's say our good hero gains information about the threat, but is ignored by the people in charge. The clock is ticking and he is out of options. Depending on the time ramaining, this would most likely call for a sneaky takeover (dominate a king here, swap another for a duplicate there).

There might be also a deranged good character, who tries to force the world to unite by becoming a serious threat himself, but it's an inversion of the topic at hand.

Calanon
2012-02-27, 06:31 AM
It mostly just seems that a Good Aligned character aiming to conquer the world would just be doing it to make the world a better place... but wouldn't an evil person be able to do it for the same reason? all in all it just feels like the Evil character would be more willing to step on a few "bugs" then the Good character :smallconfused:

hamishspence
2012-02-27, 06:34 AM
Almost any motivation for a Good character is a valid motivation for an Evil character- Evil alignment can often be more about methods, than motivations.

Vendle
2012-02-27, 11:18 AM
Perhaps, but more often an evil character enjoys power and decadence, and those are often his reasons for trying to run things. The good character sees power as a burden/responsibility (typically).

Even if your typical DnD world seems to have a lot of good, responsible governments trying in earnest to stem the tide of darkness, remember there are a lot of worlds out there that are in worse hands.

Be a responsible adventurer; practice planar triage.

JoshuaZ
2012-02-27, 11:28 AM
"World domination? I prefer to call it world-optimization."

Ah, yes, HJPEV. I actually came to this thread to make a comment about him.

For a really interesting take on why a good person might want to take over the world, very few things beat Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5782108/1/Harry_Potter_and_the_Methods_of_Rationality) which is possibly the greatest HP fanfic ever written.

gkathellar
2012-02-27, 11:46 AM
For a really interesting take on why a good person might want to take over the world, very few things beat Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5782108/1/Harry_Potter_and_the_Methods_of_Rationality) which is possibly the greatest HP fanfic rationalist author tract ever written.

Fixed that for you. I'm not even sure HPMoR counts as proper HP Fanfic anymore.

jidasfire
2012-02-27, 12:21 PM
Well, if the world is ruled by some really evil power, and the heroes overthrow said power and thus end up inheriting the rule of the world, that would be within the bounds of a good character, I think.

I will say I never bought the notion of the Kingpriest of Istar actually being good, despite what the Dragonlance authors said. That guy was all about destroying and suppressing races and robbing people of their free will. Whatever he thought he was doing, dude was Lawful Evil to the core, along with a lot of the supposedly good characters in that setting who weren't the Heroes of the Lance.

Engine
2012-02-27, 01:15 PM
Meanwhile, at the League of Good Aligned Characters' Building...

Secretary: "Good morning, Good Aligned Characters. Reports from the Kingdom of Somewhere says that Lord Evil is trying to conquer it."
Fighter: "Uh? AGAIN?"
Rogue: "Didn't we vanquished him last month?"
Wizard: "Twice."
Cleric: "Yup. Well, I hope the new army we raised would stop him, this time."
Secretary: "Uhm, I doubt it. Seems that Lord Evil used some sort of conniving scheme to bluff his way into the kingdom. All the court is applauding him."
Rogue: "But they're the relatives of all the nobles he slaughtered last time!"
Fighter: "In front of them."
Wizard: "While laughing."
Cleric: "Well, guys, I have an idea."
Group: "Uh?"
Cleric: "Guys, you know I'm a Good Aligned Character like you. And I truly support free will and democracy and so on, but..."
Group: "Just say it."
Cleric: "I'm thinking we should rule Somewhere. And not only Somewhere, the whole world."
Fighter: "But that's what evil schemers always try to do!"
Rogue: "Well, not exactly. They try to conquer the world so they could rule with an iron fist. We just want to protect the world."
Wizard: "And it will be easier to fight evil, you know. Evil guys will try to overthrow us, so we'll not waste so much time trying to find them."
Cleric: "And the whole world seems constantly unable to protect itself from the last Evil Overlord so it needs our help."
Fighter: "Weekly."
Rogue: "So it's decided, then?"
Fighter: "I'm not still conviced."
Secretary: "Women think that Lord Evil is hot because, you know, he has power."
Fighter: "Deal."

Endon the White
2012-02-27, 02:16 PM
Ah, yes, HJPEV. I actually came to this thread to make a comment about him.

For a really interesting take on why a good person might want to take over the world, very few things beat Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5782108/1/Harry_Potter_and_the_Methods_of_Rationality) which is possibly the greatest HP fanfic ever written.

Was gonna say that, but you ninja-ed me. Harry James Potter Evans Verres. I really hope the author doesn't give up on it.

Necroticplague
2012-02-27, 02:58 PM
Good characters are allowed to have flawed personalities to. A Good character might simply want to rule the world because he thinks he is better than everyone else, and thus would be making the world a better place by ruling it. See Also:Napolean Bonaparte.

Devils_Advocate
2012-02-28, 12:58 PM
Almost any motivation for a Good character is a valid motivation for an Evil character- Evil alignment can often be more about methods, than motivations.
The funny thing is that a fairly typical D&D "good guy" can actually be pretty Evil if you get all deontological about it. It's really only adventurers who think, "Hmm, how can I solve this problem? Oh, right, bloodshed!" (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0537.html) (That way you get to loot corpses!)

Empires seem to have a tendency to collapse eventually. And also to be not exactly Good. How about trying to establish a new world order peacefully? Getting people to do things that will clearly improve their lives generally doesn't require the use of force. It just requires demonstrating the superiority of new methods. Which shouldn't be hard, if you have such strong evidence that something is a good idea that you've just got to get everyone to do it.

So, show everyone why they would be better off doing things the way that you think they should. It just might be crazy enough to work! Maybe there doesn't need to be a lot of fighting about everything. Wouldn't that be refreshing?


I'm not even sure HPMoR counts as proper HP Fanfic anymore.
Oh, the whole thing is most definitely a great big rationalist author tract. By design. That's nearly the entire point.

But it doesn't suffer for it at all. In my opinion. Which is a bit surprising, because I frankly considered most of E.Y.'s prior fictional writings (at least of the ones that I encountered) to be some of his worst stuff. He seemed to have a tendency to construct contrived scenarios to illustrate points in ways that I found neither persuasive nor entertaining. (I do love The Simple Truth (http://yudkowsky.net/rational/the-simple-truth), but that's more of a philosophical dialogue than a story.) Given this, I was simply amazed at how wonderful I found this fanfic to be.

But then, I've never read the Harry Potter books. (This work seems to be quite accessible to non-fans.) Maybe to someone who has, the scenarios in this story do look contrived? If so, I could understand someone questioning its status as "proper HP Fanfic" on that basis, I suppose. But if you are by chance disdaining it for that reason -- I'm not saying that you are, but just in case! -- I feel compelled to provide you with a particular quote from the author of the work in question. Said quote is contained within the spoiler box below.

I should not have been surprised, but I was, to find my work being read by many people who took their Harry Potter fanfiction extremely seriously, and who were shocked at the way I was casually violating some of their most cherished artistic conventions.

And if I claimed that there was anything odd about taking Harry Potter fanfiction just as seriously as, say, 18th-century classical music, then I would of course be revealing myself as a great big snobby snob.

I came in thinking that I was making a great show of defiant iconoclastic spirit by writing Harry Potter fanfiction, and that means I wasn't nearly as iconoclastic as I thought. And for this I am heartily ashamed.

However.

If you think that everyone who writes Harry Potter fanfiction should take it as seriously as you take yours, and that it is sinful for anyone to enjoy it unless it's done exactly your way according to your favorite artistic conventions, then you are being a snob about Harry Potter fanfiction. I am just barely sensitive enough to the status conventions of the real world to notice that this is a tiny bit incongruous.

Don't get me wrong. You can write Harry Potter fanfiction. You can take it seriously. You can craft it with care. You can make it mature, emotional, and deep. You can have artistic conventions, and criticism of work that tries to obey those conventions and fails. And you can do all that with a straight face, because beauty knows no law but beauty.

What you cannot do with a straight face is be a great big snobby snob about Harry Potter fanfiction.

Shadowknight12
2012-02-28, 01:13 PM
The best way for a good character to be ruthless and murderous and hell-bent on conquest and slaughter is to make him or her absolutely convinced that every other living being is Evil to the core. How true this is skews the tone of the campaign. If everyone is rather nice, the "good" character is actually rather evil. But if the people they're conquering are corrupt, backstabbing, morally bankrupt and despicable, things get a whole lot muddier.


Ever heard of New World Order? It's supposed to be a horror scenario, but I think it sounds really nice. Work towards uniting the worlds country and spreading a common shred systems of values that enable a peaceful coexistence. But in the process, you have to remove all those evil people who are unwilling to give up the power they have because of the conflicts between their countries.

This is horror in its purest, most undiluted form. I'd take the vicissitudes of war any day.

@HPMoR talk: I hate author tracts with the fury of a thousand suns, even if it may belong to a philosophy I could actually sympathise with. It saddens me to hear it's still going.

VeliciaL
2012-02-28, 01:39 PM
Peace through superior firepower?

Also, I'd say the wuxia film Hero (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero_(2002_film)) is another good example of this.

polity4life
2012-02-28, 01:44 PM
No consistent concept of good is mutually exclusive with autocratic rule. Compound this with the fact that good is in itself hard to define and nearly entirely subjective and you have plenty of opportunities and internally valid reasons for a Good-aligned character to seek global rule.

JonRG
2012-02-28, 01:52 PM
When I saw this thread, I immediately thought of this tidbit from DOB on The 4 Biggest Missed Opportunities in Fiction (http://www.cracked.com/blog/the-4-biggest-missed-opportunities-in-fiction_p2/).


Imagine a Superman movie where Superman is tired of protecting the people who have absolutely nothing to offer him. These stupid people, running around and constantly getting into trouble -- what could they possibly do for Superman? They're just accident-prone little children, and when you're the parent of a child, your house is not a democracy; it's a dictatorship. Superman III (or Superman Returns) should be Superman coming out and saying, "Look, I want to keep you safe, but because you're so bad at staying safe, I have a new rule: Do whatever the hell Superman says."

It would work. Superman is all-powerful, so all he'd need to do to protect everyone is rule them with an iron super-fist. No one would break Superman's laws or else he'd fry them with laser vision. America would be full of completely safe slaves.

gkathellar
2012-02-28, 05:37 PM
(I do love The Simple Truth (http://yudkowsky.net/rational/the-simple-truth), but that's more of a philosophical dialogue than a story.)

Oh god, the Simple Truth is fantastic.


But if you are by chance disdaining it for that reason

I'm not. I love it. You'll notice I was the first to quote it.

havocfett
2012-02-28, 06:47 PM
The premise is actually pretty workable, especially in the face of an existential threat that would require a unified plane. Taking over and instituting social reform, etc, ought to be workable as a motivation.


Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5782108/1/Harry_Potter_and_the_Methods_of_Rationality) which is possibly the greatest HP fanfic ever written.

What. No, God no. That isn't even a well-written fanfic. It's an author tract, and it doesn't have grammatical issues, and that is the best you can say about it.

To point out that the author has no real understanding of tension, pacing or, you know, conflict, would be a decidedly kind criticism.

Harry Potter, in the story, is horribly written as a character, and anyone who disagrees with the author's view is portrayed as irrevocably incorrect. Harry is given new powers almost randomly, for the sole purpose of letting the author promote his worldview even more.

There isn't even any serious discussion of the author's worldview, just the assertion that he must be right, because everyone else must be stupid, because they disagree with him and he's smart so it must be true.

It's an author tract, it is well written for an author tract, but it is utterly inexcusable as a story.

JoshuaZ
2012-02-28, 07:56 PM
What. No, God no. That isn't even a well-written fanfic. It's an author tract, and it doesn't have grammatical issues, and that is the best you can say about it.

Huh. Interesting. I consider grammar to be not one of the strong suits. Grammar issues have been pointed out by reviewers on multiple occasions.



To point out that the author has no real understanding of tension, pacing or, you know, conflict, would be a decidedly kind criticism.

I agree on pacing. As to tension and conflict, I think that the Azkaban chapters showed pretty well that he can do that, but it is a YMMV issue.



Harry Potter, in the story, is horribly written as a character, and anyone who disagrees with the author's view is portrayed as irrevocably incorrect.

Both Dumbledore and Quirrell strongly disagree with the author, and they don't seem to have their views portrayed as "irrevocably incorrect" (although I'm not quite sure what you mean by irrevocable in this context). Harry also doesn't agree with Eliezer on everything- it is pretty clear that Eliezer doesn't approve of how Harry uses people. That said, I agree there are serious characterization issues (although if I had to pick anyone who has characterization issues I'd suggest Mcgonagall who is clearly only tolerant of Harry's crap for purposes of the story).



Harry is given new powers almost randomly, for the sole purpose of letting the author promote his worldview even more.

Hmm, do you have a specific example? The closest seems to be the Time Turner, which seemed to be introduced more for plot than anything else.



There isn't even any serious discussion of the author's worldview, just the assertion that he must be right, because everyone else must be stupid, because they disagree with him and he's smart so it must be true.

I don't think that's the case. The discussions that Dumbeldore and Harry have don't seem to fall into that category, and there's an obvious limit to how much detailed philosophical discussion one can have in general before it becomes disruptive to having a plot actually advance.

Overall, I think a lot of these issues may fall into the YMMV category.

Traab
2012-02-28, 09:41 PM
The Rand al Thor method. Armageddon is coming, he must unite the nations of the world under his banner in order for evil to be defeated. (Ill admit I stopped reading after book 7, so the focus may have changed, but that was the general gist of it) if he didnt outright conquer or rule the nation, like Tear, or the Aeil, then he formed alliances with them, like the borderlands. Good guy taking over the world, all in order to face the ultimate evil.

The moral superiority route. "My way is the best, its time to make everyone follow it." Your good character has come up with his system of ethics that could turn the world into a utopia. Now he just has to find a way to enforce it on the world. Only solution? Take over the world and rule it as he wishes.

Grinner
2012-02-28, 10:17 PM
The moral superiority route. "My way is the best, its time to make everyone follow it." Your good character has come up with his system of ethics that could turn the world into a utopia. Now he just has to find a way to enforce it on the world. Only solution? Take over the world and rule it as he wishes.

You make it sound like ethics is a simple, clean concept. In truth, it's far from it. Sure, you can unite the world under a single banner, but you'll end up homogenizing humanity.

Ideally, every man, woman, and child would be fed, clothed, and sheltered. The logistics of such a task is nigh impossible. Any attempt at doing so is more so, given the potential for corruption at any level of production and distribution. People do always want more.

And let's say you achieve this. What then? Will we spend our days celebrating our flawlessness? No, life will carry on. Humans will argue and plot against one another. We'll keep on exacting petty vengeance, just to feel good.

No, human nature lends itself to a need for struggle and conflict, for it's what we do best. If you want utopic world domination, you'll need to excise human nature entirely.

Tengu_temp
2012-02-28, 10:31 PM
Utopia is impossible, but that doesn't mean a world-spanning government that improves the lives of everyone isn't.

Bastian Weaver
2012-02-29, 02:31 AM
Call Adrian Veidt. He might have an answer for your question.

frigidmagi1
2012-02-29, 05:12 AM
I thought about this and my answer was... You need one bad day. Let me illustrate.

"I was clearing out a camp of bandit gnolls, it kept me out late. I got home the next morning and you know what I found? NOTHING! While I was saving the neighbors, my home was torn down to the bedrock. There wasn't even ash! All my heroics, all my efforts, everything and I couldn't even keep one patch of ground safe. I was to late. I couldn't be everywhere and because of that people were being tortured, crippled, enslaved, murdered. The authorities were corrupt or weak. I will never be to late ever again. I can be everywhere. A line will be drawn and behind it, there will be safety, there will be freedom... I Will Create Justice, one hacked out mile at time."

If a good character feels that his efforts are wasted, that there is no justice, no freedom, no safety, no matter how much work he puts in. He can quit. He can have that bad day and say no more! Or he can decide that the problem was that he wasn't going far enough.

ClothedInVelvet
2012-02-29, 05:48 AM
Ironically, the best thing a perfect ruler could do would be to refuse to cede power to anyone else. The second best thing he/she could do would be to expand his/her control, both in the number of people under control and in the depth of that control.

The perfect ruler would know what's best for the kingdom and the people and would always do it. And if that means forcing people to do what's best for themselves, that's just the way the cookie crumbles.

The counter to this argument would be Dr. Who's argument against the Daleks. Humanity's greatest asset is it's ability to reach, fail, mess up, dust themselves off, and reach again.

Radar
2012-02-29, 06:45 AM
Arguably Leto Atreides II could be painted as Good, or at least you could make a convincing Good character with the same plan. As far as I understood, his main goal was to force humanity to stop relying on Spice, because it chained their civilisation to a single planet with limited resource output.

Mastikator
2012-02-29, 09:07 AM
The world is already "taken over" in many ways by many people on many levels, most abuse their power, some are nice.
Taking over the world is neither good nor evil, what is good or evil is how you do it. If you take over the world by democratic means, i.e, you become an elected leader, help other countries become democratic (without doing it in evil ways!) and let them vote to become a part of your country, and do this to all the countries, then you've taken over the world peacefully. Which could arguably be seen as good by at least the mainstream view of political goodness/evilness.

Wyntonian
2012-02-29, 11:19 AM
"Look at the world. Actually look at it, for one second. It's full of stupidity and horror and disgusting cruelty, while the forces of light dance above doing nothing more than providing a counterbalance for the legions of demons and terrors that lurk below the surface. The world is awful, and horrible, and unless someone does something drastic it's going to stay that way. Maybe no one can do anything, but I'm sure before the first stone building was built people thought no one could do that, either.

"Someone has to take the first step, clear the refuse and the rubble so that we can actually start to get things right, so that what is good and kind and just in the world can prevail. Good should mean something here, in this world, and if no one is going to help me make a paradise of this hell on earth then yes, I will drive all of its peoples before me like stampeding cattle away from a cliff. Because if these people refuse to take responsibility for themselves, then they have no right to refuse my taking responsibility for them.

"World domination? I prefer to call it world-optimization."

First, I'd like to offer up my ninja sword to gkathellar for his epic ninjahood. Well done.

If you need to write some sort of backstory, I recommend using an adapted version of Buddha's story. A rich, sheltered price sees a sick man and a dead man, and is confronted with the sadness and failures inherent in human society. He then saw an ascetic and learned how one can combat these evils.

It's a paraphrase, so if someone wants to elaborate, be my guest.

You could have the sick and dead men be nations ruled or destoryed by evil people, and the ascetic be a sort of idealized nation, maybe a vision, that the "hero" sees.

Traab
2012-02-29, 12:02 PM
You make it sound like ethics is a simple, clean concept. In truth, it's far from it. Sure, you can unite the world under a single banner, but you'll end up homogenizing humanity.

Ideally, every man, woman, and child would be fed, clothed, and sheltered. The logistics of such a task is nigh impossible. Any attempt at doing so is more so, given the potential for corruption at any level of production and distribution. People do always want more.

And let's say you achieve this. What then? Will we spend our days celebrating our flawlessness? No, life will carry on. Humans will argue and plot against one another. We'll keep on exacting petty vengeance, just to feel good.

No, human nature lends itself to a need for struggle and conflict, for it's what we do best. If you want utopic world domination, you'll need to excise human nature entirely.

Good doesnt always mean right you know. A good man who comes up with a good code for doing good and decides he wants to make the world follow it in order for the world to be a better place may be wrong, but he is still a good man trying his best to improve the world in a visible way. Im not trying to get into an ethics debate, im just coming up with a bare bones justification for a good aligned character to try to conquer the world.

Grinner
2012-02-29, 12:56 PM
Good doesnt always mean right you know. A good man who comes up with a good code for doing good and decides he wants to make the world follow it in order for the world to be a better place may be wrong, but he is still a good man trying his best to improve the world in a visible way. Im not trying to get into an ethics debate, im just coming up with a bare bones justification for a good aligned character to try to conquer the world.

Fair enough. Really, I had the intent of responding to string of replies like Yora's NWO comment. Your post had simply been the most recent of them.

Cerlis
2012-02-29, 11:17 PM
in order for this to be Good and not neutral or Evil (New world order is the halmark of LE), the leader(s) would have to have some sort of supreme power or skill allowing them to make allowances without risking death, treachery and rebellion.

for it not to be evil you'd need to embrace, talk to and even help your enemies, usually after subjugating them of course. however most powers, in order to prevent their enemy from killing them from the inside, whether metaphorically or not, end up executing or exiling the countries former occupants (at least the rebellious ones).

You'd have to have leaders who could stop any, all and frequent assassinations, and police that would be able to subjugate any threat without murder as a tool. So that even though these guys are constantly trying to slit your throat, you are giving em enough time to if not like the new world order, at least get used to it.

with that in mind it would have to be an army of clerics with special non stealable artifacts/magic items, with the direct blessing of a diety to make them unstoppable.

which would make for a great non-evil villian.

gkathellar
2012-03-01, 06:36 AM
First, I'd like to offer up my ninja sword to gkathellar for his epic ninjahood. Well done.

:smallbiggrin:


You could have the sick and dead men be nations ruled or destoryed by evil people, and the ascetic be a sort of idealized nation, maybe a vision, that the "hero" sees.

No, not an ascetic. Kamina. (Or Claire Stanfield. Or Madoka. I watch too much anime.)

The ascetic ideal stands in almost direct opposition to the kind of "good guy" who wants to conquer the world - the conqueror, whether he admits it or not, wants to be involved in life, wants to be catch its rhythms and draw them like silk from a cocoon, and weave them into his own image. While he may have certain tendencies we would identify with the ascetic, the conqueror by his very nature doesn't hate earthly existence - he loves it and he loves the world, which is why he wants to own it and make it his, and why he's capable of the utmost kindness or cruelty.

Roderick_BR
2012-03-01, 08:00 AM
For a non good intentioned dictatorship scenario, the world may actually be pretty broken, politically-wise, and you are trying to bring everyone together under a flag, but many small-countries will refuse to give up power, and the good guy may need to take it by force.

Notice that in this kind of scenario, these small nations may be very independent, and make rules as they want, harming it's population in favor of the rich and powerful, so taking ove forcefully is something good to do.

Just claiming that you *think* the world needs a "strong leader" when everything is more or less fine, just means you are playing Doctor Doom (even if the unified world do turns out better, you'll still be seen as a villain in the beggining.)

Traab
2012-03-01, 12:11 PM
The world has been taken over by evil. Think of it like.... if voldemort had won, then proceeded to open an evil can of magical whup ass on the rest of the world. There are pockets of survivors, resistance groups spread all over, but voldy rules from his whole mountain of pain, castle of skulls, throne of blood deal. A good aligned character would work to unite the various resistance factions and fight back, retaking control of the various countries as they can.

Oracle_Hunter
2012-03-01, 12:41 PM
It mostly just seems that a Good Aligned character aiming to conquer the world would just be doing it to make the world a better place... but wouldn't an evil person be able to do it for the same reason? all in all it just feels like the Evil character would be more willing to step on a few "bugs" then the Good character :smallconfused:
There are lots of ways to conquer the world.

My personal favorite is "we're the government and we're here to help."
First, make the Good Guys a powerful nation-state. They establish embassies all throughout the world and keep a standing offer on the table: join our empire and we'll protect you from Evil. Any entity that takes this offer gains the protection of the Legions of the Light but also the presence of Imperial Governors that remake the laws and punish Evil. Each entity gained is eventually incorporated into the Legions of the Light as their norms become the norms of the Empire. Provided your power projection capabilities are up to snuff, you can take over the majority of the non-Evil areas with relatively few "bugs" that need squashing. Prosperity and safety are powerful motivators after all.

Once you've done all you can with persuasion, send those Legions to "liberate" any Evil or belligerent areas. Remaining hold-outs can then be left alone because they pose no threat to the Empire.
My latest application of this approach is an island-nation of 4e Deva who developed Warforged and now use their Warforged Legions to help the helpless :smallcool:

Admittedly when you're dealing with a single guy trying to rule the world you have to do a lot more by raw power but that is exactly why LG Conquerors always build up an organization first. NG types should as well, but CG often run into the problem that they don't like operating that way and so they end up with a lot more bugs to squish -- so to speak.

Calanon
2012-03-01, 07:36 PM
What I'm picking up here is that all it takes is the right kind of person and you can easily have a "Heroic" Conqueror, What is bothering me though about good guys ruling the world is what if there is an internal evil? a Tumor in your perfect society like Kubato from OotS, I mean I've noticed in my life that people will always be... Self-Invested... but why? When I ask myself this question I come to the conclusion time and time again "Power, Money, Pleasure" CLEARLY NOT LAWFUL GOOD

Say in example that a Good Nation is established, how does it remain that way? Surely the citizens can't be counted on for there "Altruistic" activities to secure the system and the nobles will be corrupted by power within 3 generations at the least. How does such a nation remain so uncountable? :smallfrown:

Shadowknight12
2012-03-01, 07:42 PM
Massive, constant brainwashing. You have to make sure every child gets raised the same way, and that their ethical compass gets calibrated the same way. Randomness is your enemy, because it produces deviations from the conduct you seek in your society. Therefore randomness (and freedom) is to be abolished at all costs. A strong lawkeeping force to immediately apprehend deviants and prevent them from infecting the rest of the populace is a must, as is a unifying philosophy that conveys your code of conduct (a religion is best in this regard).

This is, of course, the best, most effective and most frighteningly horrific way for a society to preserve a Good alignment, not the only one.

Calanon
2012-03-01, 07:56 PM
Massive, constant brainwashing. You have to make sure every child gets raised the same way, and that their ethical compass gets calibrated the same way. Randomness is your enemy, because it produces deviations from the conduct you seek in your society. Therefore randomness (and freedom) is to be abolished at all costs. A strong lawkeeping force to immediately apprehend deviants and prevent them from infecting the rest of the populace is a must, as is a unifying philosophy that conveys your code of conduct (a religion is best in this regard).

This is, of course, the best, most effective and most frighteningly horrific way for a society to preserve a Good alignment, not the only one.

The complete and total removal of freedom? Why do I get the feeling this will end badly... :smalleek:

The complete and total supression of Freedom, Free thinking, Expression, breeds chaos and seems Lawful Evil in my opinion... Hell just having a secret police is pretty Lawful Evil

Oracle_Hunter
2012-03-01, 08:04 PM
The complete and total removal of freedom? Why do I get the feeling this will end badly... :smalleek:

The complete and total supression of Freedom, Free thinking, Expression, breeds chaos and seems Lawful Evil in my opinion... Hell just having a secret police is pretty Lawful Evil
Eh, a Righteous Inquisition can do it.

Basically, you need an elite force of LG detectives who are above the law. They have freedom to investigate any and all goings-on within the empire, and be judge, jury and executioner if they judge it necessary.

These are the guys who take care of your high-level rot.

Are they scary? Hell yes, but like any dictator, they're dangerous but not automatically Evil (http://www.schlockmercenary.com/2009-09-15). If you keep them well indoctrinated and make sure they keep an eye on each other too, they're about the best internal police you can ask for.

Oh, and if your magic system permits Detect Alignment effects then they're pretty easy to keep pure. If you shift from LG, they're off the team.

Shadowknight12
2012-03-01, 08:05 PM
The complete and total removal of freedom? Why do I get the feeling this will end badly... :smalleek:

The complete and total supression of Freedom, Free thinking, Expression, breeds chaos and seems Lawful Evil in my opinion... Hell just having a secret police is pretty Lawful Evil

Freedom begets randomness, and randomness begets Evil (this isn't actually false at all. If you let Chaos have its way, you end up with roughly the same distribution of all nine alignments in your population (perhaps skewed towards Neutrality, depending on your cosmology) which means that anywhere from 66% to 90% of your society is no longer Good-aligned. The fact that this applies towards Evil societies who want to remain Evil is entirely coincidental).

And I never said secret police! It would be a regular police, very transparent. The thing is, the citizenship would be indoctrinated to see their actions as just and protective. And the funny thing is, they actually are. By removing Evil citizens that have resisted brainwashing, they are preventing them from doing Evil, fostering Evil actions and thoughts, and damaging society. They needn't execute them, of course. Merely keeping them away from the general populace (imprisonment or exile) will do.

It's still terribly frightening, but the logic behind it is dreadfully sound.

Aergoth
2012-03-01, 08:17 PM
I'd call a secret police lawful neutral at best.
It's the application of said secret police that makes them evil.
Does your secret police report on the activities of cabals of necromancers, foreign spies, corruption and other threats to the well-being of the nation and it's peoples? Does it then deal with them (quite possibly ruthlessly and efficiently). Lawful, maybe. Good? Probably not. Evil, very likely not unless the country itself is. Chaotic... nope? So Neutral, leaning lawful.

On the other hand, if your secret police breaks into houses in the middle of the night, scoops up dissidents and naysayers in big black bags and carts them off to be used as slave labour? Well then yes, they're very likely lawful evil.

Eberron would be the place to see a good-aligned character turn into a conqueror. Gilgamesh's World of Cardboard speech (http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20080229) seem to nicely sum up the feelings of such a conqueror.
"Always I try to be reasonable. To be fair. I try to talk to people.
And no one EVER takes it as anything other than weakness. You listen to me try to be civilized, and you think- 'Oh he's nothing'
'Him we can ignore.'
'Him we can push around'
'We can do whatever we want- he won't stop us!'
Because nobody ever takes me seriously- unless I shout and threaten like a cut-rate despot.
Well you know what? I can do that. I really can. And it looks like I'm going to have to."

RandomNPC
2012-03-01, 10:16 PM
Shadowknight never said secret police.

That being said, someone asked once, "What would you do if you could not fail?"

My answer was:
"Take over the world by talking people into getting along, solving all arguments about racism, religion, territory, wealth, health care, and so on, until everyone agreed on everything, and I was left as the solver of problems. Then I'd appoint my family line not as direct rulers, but as dispute solvers, with a yearly tithe enough to support but not leave them in excessive luxury, with transparency enough that the population would know of bribes and favors.

Someone got offended about my wanting to solve disputes over religion and quickly made in a board inappropriate discussion, but most people present were surprisingly pleased with my idea and a little ashamed about how self centered the answers they gave were.

Basically if I couldn't fail, I'd become the worlds greatest diplomancer and rule that way.

Gnoman
2012-03-01, 10:51 PM
It's a fairly easy path to take for the right sort of mind. It's a question of Power.

The desire for power is usually associated with Evil, because it is here that the worst traits of Power addiction are seen. This does not mean, however, that one cannot seek or even lust for Power with the noblest of intentions. It simply means that the addiction to great power is an easy path to Evil, and the person seeking it must seek in all his doings to remain on "the side of the angels" lest he slip from the path.

A young warrior or mage might first seek greater strength when they find a beggar knifed for the coins in his cup, or a child trampled by a fleeing bandit's horse. The thirst to bring this crime to justice is an easy and comfortable one. It is also not too difficult to satisfy said thirst. A spell in a back alley or a swift charge on the field of honor and the victim is avenged.

Then the person begins to travel wider. He sees that banditry is rampant, that the poor have nothing to protect them from cutpurses and raiders besides a few poorly-equipped city guards and the local levy that always arrives to late. However many times he sallies forth, no matter how many foes die by his hand, he alone can not stem the tide of predation. He needs a band of warriors to fight by his side, so he sends out the call and hoists his banner for the first time.

Thus he begins, through force of arms, to beat back the darkness, if only in a small area. The roads become safer, and the guards, freed from their vigil, are able to clean up the worst of the bolt holes and back alleys.

Soon, he meets a company of the noble's household troops, whom he greets freely, expecting words of gratitude for a job well done. To his surprise, he is clapped in irons and thrown into a dungeon for usurping the authority of the lord and raising rebellion. Imprisoned, he dwells upon the undoing of all his toil by the paranoia and apathy of one man with Power greater than his. He realizes that, should he escape his bonds, the only way to achieve his goals, to protect the people that he cares so much for, is to become a rebel in truth, to gain Power enough of his own to challenge this lord, thus putting himself in a position to help the helpless ones.

Soon the servants, who admire his efforts, break him from gaol, and he rejoins his troops. Hoisting his banner anew, he makes war upon his former lord, take his keep, and casts him down. For a time, all is well. He is accepted by the other lords and the King, and his territory flourishes. The roads are clear, raiders are banished from his lands, and those in his care walk for the first time without fear.

However, as time passes he comes to realize that the lowly in the nearest lords domain are no better off than his people had been, and that lord no more concerned with their welfare. By now the path is clear to him. Again he buckles on his sword, again he hoists his banner. Again his foe is cast down.

Ere long, another territory falls in the same fashion, and another. He comes to realize that most lords are apathetic at best, cruel and greedy at worst. There is only one thing to do. Only one way to get the Power to bring them in line. He hoists his banner and marches against the King. When the battle is won, he sets the crown upon his own head and banishes the nobles from his kingdom, placing farmers in their jobs. For a time, he is content. Until the rumors of warfare, of the sackings of towns come to his attention, and the echoes of the screams of slaughtered children reach his ears. It must stop. He must MAKE it stop.

SiuiS
2012-03-01, 11:19 PM
An interesting tidbit I came across in the first edition Dungeoneer's Survival Guide. Apparently in ancient days of yore, all the world's creatures got together based on alignment/ideals. The side of good almost obliterated evil, which is why the Drow and Duerger retreated underground. They pushed their war to the point of genocide, and then over the next few centuries they disbanded.

Because of this long alliance (and D&D morality being objective) almost all creatures of the same alignment had the same codified goals, to the poit that good and evil even had their own languages (which eventually broke apart into lawful, chaotic and neutral dialects).

Good would conquer the world to be proactive against evil. Simple as that.

Grinner
2012-03-02, 03:46 AM
I've seen some good arguments here, but you're all forgetting one thing...

The D&D alignment system is riddled with inconsistencies. :smallsigh:

Necroticplague
2012-03-02, 07:20 AM
I've seen some good arguments here, but you're all forgetting one thing...

The D&D alignment system is riddled with inconsistencies. :smallsigh:

No, poisons are completely and utterly Evil,even if all they do is put you to sleep, except for this one angel that can poison others, it's special (coutles).
*later on, in the same chapter*
And here are some things that are poisons, but their o.k. because they only work on Evil people, and somehow work on several creatures that don't even have a biology for poisons to hurt.

hamishspence
2012-03-02, 07:35 AM
No, poisons are completely and utterly Evil,even if all they do is put you to sleep, except for this one angel that can poison others, it's special (coutles).
*later on, in the same chapter*
And here are some things that are poisons, but their o.k. because they only work on Evil people, and somehow work on several creatures that don't even have a biology for poisons to hurt.

They specifically called out poisons that "only put people to sleep" as Not Evil- it must be said.

The basic idea "All poisons that inflict damage/drain cause too much suffering to be deemed anything but evil" is a bit silly, it must be said.

Cerlis
2012-03-03, 06:46 AM
No, poisons are completely and utterly Evil,even if all they do is put you to sleep, except for this one angel that can poison others, it's special (coutles).
*later on, in the same chapter*
And here are some things that are poisons, but their o.k. because they only work on Evil people, and somehow work on several creatures that don't even have a biology for poisons to hurt.

its Venom, not poison :smallwink:

Seharvepernfan
2012-03-03, 08:02 AM
IRL, my motivation would be to wipe out psychopathy, which is (likely) genetic. How? I don't know.

Once psychopathy is gone, the world starts to make sense and all the other problems can be dealt with much easier.

In D&D however, there is no psychopathy, only alignments.

Shadowknight12
2012-03-03, 11:12 AM
IRL, my motivation would be to wipe out psychopathy, which is (likely) genetic. How? I don't know.

Once psychopathy is gone, the world starts to make sense and all the other problems can be dealt with much easier.

In D&D however, there is no psychopathy, only alignments.

You do realise that psychopaths only account for a tiny, tiny, tiny fraction (as they are actually fairly rare; diagnosing psychopathy is not as easy as it seems and only an incredibly small fraction of the populace fits the criteria) of what we could generally call "Evil" alignment? Which means you're not really affecting the global scale. And do you also realise that it's VERY debatable if people with mental disorders are actually aware of the ethical implications of their actions (which is what they need to be able to have any alignment other than True Neutral, like an animal)?

Furthermore, if psychopathy truly is genetic (a debatable fact), you can't wipe it out. Genetics don't work that way. Even if you eliminate any being that possesses the current genetic makeup that you think causes psychopathy, that's not a guarantee that it might not appear again after random mutations in a given population's genome.

Bastian Weaver
2012-03-04, 07:42 PM
Furthermore, if psychopathy truly is genetic (a debatable fact), you can't wipe it out. Genetics don't work that way. Even if you eliminate any being that possesses the current genetic makeup that you think causes psychopathy, that's not a guarantee that it might not appear again after random mutations in a given population's genome.

Some psychopathological diseases are inherited, some are not. It's true that random mutations work like that... which means that we need to build giant mutant-hunting robots to save the world! Yay!

Urpriest
2012-03-04, 09:31 PM
Another way to do this is to live a life in which conquering the world is morally neutral. Think of most of the famous historical conquerors: Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Mohammad, King Arthur...if you're the leader of one kingdom in a world where trying to conquer other kingdoms is just part of what kingdoms do then conquering the world just means you're good at your job. You don't have to have any particular ideology about it, you just happen to win your wars rather than losing them. You can then be a good or evil person on the side as you wish.

This is also a straightforward way to get good vs. good conflicts without misunderstandings: just have two sides that happen to be opposed to eachother for purely sociopolitical reasons. As much as fiction tells us otherwise, very few international conflicts are about good vs. evil.

Calanon
2012-03-04, 09:51 PM
Another way to do this is to live a life in which conquering the world is morally neutral. Think of most of the famous historical conquerors: Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Mohammad, King Arthur...if you're the leader of one kingdom in a world where trying to conquer other kingdoms is just part of what kingdoms do then conquering the world just means you're good at your job. You don't have to have any particular ideology about it, you just happen to win your wars rather than losing them. You can then be a good or evil person on the side as you wish.

This is also a straightforward way to get good vs. good conflicts without misunderstandings: just have two sides that happen to be opposed to eachother for purely sociopolitical reasons. As much as fiction tells us otherwise, very few international conflicts are about good vs. evil.

God damn it Urpriest why are you always so smart? Its like whenever anyone has a moral problem on this forum you suddenly teleport in and provide the best possible answer... So not fair...

Enough ego stroking... the alignment system is so inaccurate in its depicting of moral righteousness that even using it as a base for conquering the world feels absurd... The proper answer would be "The same motivation for an Evil character to conquer the world" but that would also be wrong... Ah well... there is no right way to step on bugs

Vendle
2012-03-05, 09:29 AM
Another way to do this is to live a life in which conquering the world is morally neutral. Think of most of the famous historical conquerors: Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Mohammad, King Arthur...if you're the leader of one kingdom in a world where trying to conquer other kingdoms is just part of what kingdoms do then conquering the world just means you're good at your job. You don't have to have any particular ideology about it, you just happen to win your wars rather than losing them. You can then be a good or evil person on the side as you wish.

I disagree, mostly. Those rulers conquered other lands for several reasons, not the least of which was "My way of life is better, more Good, than the next country." Is there much distinction if they thought that was true because of their social norms, their technological advances, or their religious beliefs?

They also wanted to remove threats to the prosperity of their own people and promote safety and security. These can be purely practical goals or noble ideals, depending on who you ask.

Whatever their thought processes, it eventually boils down to a leader weighing the lives of X countrymen to the benefits of controling of that group/country/chunk of land. (Unless you're conquering through peace.)

Not getting too deep into the alignment debate for this thread, but I want to add that motives are huge, but actions also count, IMHO.

The Dark Fiddler
2012-03-05, 07:02 PM
The fact that he's Evil aside, I think Dr. Horrible gives a good Good motivation for conquering the world. "The world is a mess and I just need to rule it."

So, pretty much backing up what some others said, but I'm also referencing Dr. Horrible, so I'm doing it better :smalltongue:

http://anidea.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/dr-horrible-432x250.jpg

Frozen_Feet
2012-03-05, 08:09 PM
And I never said secret police! It would be a regular police, very transparent. The thing is, the citizenship would be indoctrinated to see their actions as just and protective. And the funny thing is, they actually are. By removing Evil citizens that have resisted brainwashing, they are preventing them from doing Evil, fostering Evil actions and thoughts, and damaging society. They needn't execute them, of course. Merely keeping them away from the general populace (imprisonment or exile) will do.

It's still terribly frightening, but the logic behind it is dreadfully sound.

... it also sounds like most existing countries with a working police force. Which are not actually all that terrifying. :smalltongue:

Gavinfoxx
2012-03-07, 01:37 AM
Yea, the Dr. Horrible reason, and the HPatMoR reason. I also liked this fanciful lesswrong take on a fantasy world...

http://yudkowsky.net/other/fiction/the-sword-of-good

It's an interesting inversion of several fantasy tropes...

Nerd-o-rama
2012-03-07, 11:59 AM
Frankly, there are more reasons for a Good character to want to rule the world than an Evil one (who are almost always motivated by greed or ego; or they have a Good reason and Evil methods since the latter are quicker). As enumerated in this thread, it largely boils down to responsible stewardship and truly benevolent dictatorship.

Another reason could be uniting the world against an Evil threat, or at least one that's perceived as Evil. Look at the antagonist of Watchmen, or any science fiction story where a conspiracy unites humanity against an alien threat or the stagnation of society because that's the only way to survive. Some of these examples have evil methods, others avoid them, but in a fantasy world where the threat of worldwide demonic invasion or something is entirely feasible, it's easy to see a Lawful Good man in power deciding that the only way to survive is the unite all sapient races in the purpose of living peacefully and cooperating against supernatural invasion - preferably with words, but by force if necessary.

Shadowknight12
2012-03-08, 08:30 PM
... it also sounds like most existing countries with a working police force. Which are not actually all that terrifying. :smalltongue:

*shrugs* Threading on thin ice here because of the boards rules, but let me just say this: You're completely correct on the first part. Most existing countries are like that indeed. Whether or not that's terrifying is entirely up to you.

Infernalbargain
2012-03-09, 03:00 PM
Easy motivation: "they're doing it wrong"