What alignment was Nero?

[Zhentarim]

Nero was a Roman Emperor

[hamishspence]

I think this might fall under the "no politics" rule.

A better way might be "What alignment is the fictional version of Nero in (movie) or (book)."

I'd say that Peter Ustinov's Nero in the Quo Vadis movie was closest to CE.

And that the Nero in the Rick Riordan novel The Trials of Apollo: The Hidden Oracle was more NE or possibly LE.

[Zhentarim]

I think this might fall under the "no politics" rule.

A better way might be "What alignment is the fictional version of Nero in (movie) or (book)."

I'd say that Peter Ustinov's Nero in the Quo Vadis movie was closest to CE.

And that the Nero in the Rick Riordan novel The Trials of Apollo: The Hidden Oracle was more NE or possibly LE.

Its been 2000 years. How long is long enough?

[hamishspence]

How long is long enough?

On this forum, 10,000 years wouldn't be long enough. :biggrin:

[denthor]

According to Rich in his comic NEro is Neutral Evil.

Now in real life he was the ultimate ruler so take your pick
Lawful/ nuetral Evil

[BowStreetRunner]

If I were to stat a Nero character, I think it would be much more interesting to represent him as suffering from Moral Insanity (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/other-rules/sanity/).

[Ramza00]

There are so many different takes on Nero through time and space. Even during his time he was very popular with some groups and unpopular with other groups (for example there was rivals and coups and rebellions) but other places celebrated him with an almost cult like fashion with some seeing him as a religious leader, others as a messiah, and others just liked him for he was popular and brought them stuff with bread and circuses.

All these people wrote their "histories" of who Nero was, and furthermore there was no real "neutral history" who tried to synthesize a gestalt / consensus that exists from this time period and was a Nero contempary.

So what I am saying is we can't really describe what was Nero's alignment as it really happened in an analytical / objective way.

-----

This is not trying to tell you to stay away from making a Nero character, but you need to accept the ambiguity of the situation. Need to accep that people loved or hated Nero, for different reasons, and even if two people loved him they did so for decent reasons and so on. For example Nero is especially revivled by many Christian historians / story tellers throught time for Nero was emperor during the time the first generation of apostles was executed and then the Epistles / Gospels were written 3 or so decades after the time of Nero. Thus Nero is either a monster human, or literally he may be a greater than normal human / emperor and be something like an antichrist.

Other people literally see Nero as someone like this.

https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/typemoon/images/0/07/Nero_Claudius_Fate_Extella.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/180?cb=20160322103445

And besides the gender swap in this fantasy work, this version focuses on the concept of the imperial cult of ancient rome and how Nero's suicide literally started a civil war with 4 emperors. Yet Nero was celebrated in life, but cause a civil war and you will be even more celebrated for you were the last king before the chaos, making some people love you more out of nostalgia and others hate you more for they blame you for causing this mess.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_cult_of_ancient_Rome

-----

You must choose how you write your history lesson, and the choice may not be a simple one for different people have their opinions on history.

[Ellrin]

Nero was a real human being, and, despite historians who have tried to spin his legacy in one way or another, likely a fairly typical example.

In other words, he was probably neither good nor evil.

From what we can tell, it seems unlikely that he was really interested in or adept at ruling, and since his rule is what is most remembered about him, it's hard to judge his specific alignment by what history tells us. Since, however, there are historically documented incidences of his frequent neglect of his responsibilities as ruler in order to pursue his own interests (such as acting), we can probably assume that he had a chaotic lean.

It's a fairly safe assumption, then, that Nero was CN, with maybe a slight tendency towards CE—though the tendency towards evil is nearly omnipresent in the highest echelons of the imperial period Roman patricians, as their political maneuvering and struggle for power was often underpinned with murder.

[Zhentarim]

Nero was a real human being, and, despite historians who have tried to spin his legacy in one way or another, likely a fairly typical example.

In other words, he was probably neither good nor evil.

From what we can tell, it seems unlikely that he was really interested in or adept at ruling, and since his rule is what is most remembered about him, it's hard to judge his specific alignment by what history tells us. Since, however, there are historically documented incidences of his frequent neglect of his responsibilities as ruler in order to pursue his own interests (such as acting), we can probably assume that he had a chaotic lean.

It's a fairly safe assumption, then, that Nero was CN, with maybe a slight tendency towards CE—though the tendency towards evil is nearly omnipresent in the highest echelons of the imperial period Roman patricians, as their political maneuvering and struggle for power was often underpinned with murder.

Thank you.