Chaotic Evil characters who are not insane

[Yora]

I just read another discussion about how all chaotic evil characters have to be completely insane mass murderers who behave completely randomly.

I think this isn't true, but when thinking about examples, not much came to my mind.

Do you have good examples for characters from fiction whom you would regard as chaotic evil while still being sane and able to not kill all their allies?

- Spike from Buffy. No doubt about either evil or chaotic, and he loves carnage, but he's perfectly capable of thinking about what he's doing.
- Tuco from The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly.
- Raziel from Soul Reaver. He's fighting Kain not because Kain is evil, but because he killed him. His own partner in crime.
- Zevran from Dragon Age. Murdering people for monney and enjoying your work is NOT neutral!
- Sniper Wolf from Metal Gear Solid is similar to Zevran. Same goes for Vamp who is even more evil. Yet he is completely loyal to his bosses and friends, and does his job without being a burden for his boss.
- Kerrigan from StarCraft. Pretty chaotic, I think. Conquers the galaxy just because she can but is willing to let enemies flee or surrender when she doesn't personally want to see them dead.

[Conners]

The problem is, DnD makes things really hard to tell....

Neutral Evil, means someone who can use the law for their goals, or swap to completely illegal means, on a heartbeat.

Chaotic Evil, means someone who doesn't seem to care about any laws... Which means: Stupid Evil. This can probably apply to a lot of teenagers who hang around slums. They avoid the law, but they often commit crimes on a whim, even if it'll get them busted, or worse.

And Lawful Evil means lawyers, BTW.


That's essentially how Evils are defined in DnD... It's a method that helps to destroy all subtlety, to confuse everyone half to death with arguing, and to make morality excruciatingly boring at the same time( as eating puppies while burning an orphanage).

[Krazzman]

Example:
Cyric from the Avatar Chronicles. (Yes he is CE but not Insane a bit slightly megalomanic later)

This is at least the example I know, what wasn't mentioned so far.

[Yora]

A chaotic evil character may not care about the laws. But he can still care for the consequences of breaking a law. Being hunted by the guard, having a bounty on your head, and having the assassins guilds top hitman after you is something that any sane person would want to avoid.

[Conners]

Then how are they different from the Neutral Evil people...? Because they simply refuse to use the law to their advantage...?

[Altair_the_Vexed]

Well, I've always seen CE as the might-is-right bully of the alignments.

I can get what I want because I'm more powerful. If you cannot defend yourself you deserve to lose. The weak are just chaff before my awesomeness.

... and so on.

That's not mad, it's just mean and really callous.

Unfortunately, I can only think of examples from real life, and politics are not to be discussed in the Playground. Let's just say that certain executives of certain corporations appear to have made some CE policy choices.

[The Reverend]

That's why I like the color wheel alignment system. Its only confusing till you get used to it.

[Conners]

Well, I've always seen CE as the might-is-right bully of the alignments. ... and so on.

That's not mad, it's just mean and really callous.

Unfortunately, I can only think of examples from real life, and politics are not to be discussed in the Playground. Let's just say that certain executives of certain corporations appear to have made some CE policy choices.

That was considered the fact of life, of the ancient world. I think Greece even sent a letter to a king, telling him to stop whining that the Persian Empire(?) was conquering him--because it had the right to from being stronger. Of course, I can't promise that's accurate--I might've misheard.

That's why I like the color wheel alignment system. Its only confusing till you get used to it.

Which, for some at least, is NEVER!

[The Boz]

OK, you guys up for a challenge?
Quantify Major Quartich from Avatar.

[Yora]

Easy, Neutral Evil.

Thanks to the one guy who replied to the threads topic.

[flumphy]

-Kratos from God of War.
-Illidan Stormrage from the Warcraft franchise. Okay, he arguably goes insane at the very end of his life, but he spends a good portion of his story arc possessing all his mental faculties while still being CE.
-Some incarnations of Catwoman.
-Sabretooth from the X-Men
-Starscream from Transformers.
-Morgoth from the Simarillion.
-Various depictions of Satan throughout the centuries.

OK, you guys up for a challenge?
Quantify Major Quartich from Avatar.

I'll go with LE, actually. He definitely values the idea of a hierarchy and possesses a strict personal code. Parts of it just happen to be Evil.

[Yora]

With Kratos I am not so sure. He slaughters everyone without second thought, thinks that it's awesome, and doesn't really have anyone he cooperates with. He just slaughters everything that gets into the very long reach of his weapons.

[Hyudra]

When I define Chaotic Evil vs. Lawful evil, I like to relate to serial killers.

Now, before I get into that, a few notes on my personal perspective on alignment:

• Lawful does not mean "obeys the law" - this creates a whole lot of problems and conflicts in a world like D&D's. Like lawful paladins in a society where the law involves murder and human rights violations. I think it's an unfortunate word choice for one end of the alignment spectrum. Rather, lawful is about being ordered. Lawful individuals are about tradition, stricture, loyalty, planning, premeditation, routine and goals. Monks are lawful because they believe in tradition and they hone their abilities through endless practice. Paladins are lawful because they hold themselves to a code.
• Conversely, chaotic doesn't mean 'anarchy'. Rather, it means creativity, emotion, flexibility, exploration and impulse. Barbarians are chaotic because they tap into the most emotional and impulse driven part of themselves to Rage.
• Being lawful does not mean being smarter, better or even more efficient. Conversely, chaos doesn't mean stupidity or being disorganized. Lawful societies can be bogged down by needless tradition or bureaucracy, for example. Lawful people may hold to a routine because it's most comfortable to them, even if it's not the best way to go about things.

So with this interpretation, a very lawful musician would be someone who practices one instrument religiously. Sits down to the piano and practices over and over until their work is flawless. The sort of musician who hammers out Rachmaninov Piano Concerto No.3. A chaotic musician is someone who tries every instrument, every genre, and learns a little something from each. This is the bard with a huge fan following who plays something different every time, or always adds something new.

The same logic extends to killers. There's two major types of serial killer; there's the logical killer, someone that can be effective because they're so methodical, so careful. The logical killer plans things out to the last detail, covers up the evidence. However, they can be easier to catch because they're so prone to patterns, even ones they aren't aware of. The spree killer, by contrast, is constantly changing, with no pattern. They're effective because they're unpredictable. Their way of killing, their choice of targets, it's new every time, and there's little if anything to link one crime to the next.

Again, one type of killer isn't necessarily better or worse, nor is one smarter or dumber. A logical killer can still make mistakes because they're too dumb or too weak to do everything they should to cover up, or devolve into rituals that make them too easy to catch. A spree killer can flub a crime or walk straight into an ambush set up by the local sheriff, push their spree too hard, too fast, and get in over their heads.

Logical killer vs. spree killer is the same distinction you'd make between law and chaos.

Characters that are Chaotic Evil:

• Sylar of Heroes
• Marlo Stanfield from The Wire.
• Kratos
• Belkar
• Richard of Looking for Group
• Hyenas of Lion King (they bicker, they're kooky, but that's just on the surface. Beyond that, they work together where necessary).

[Yora]

Good: Takes risks and makes sacrifices to protect and save strangers.
Evil: Is not bothered if strangers suffer because of his actions.
Lawful: Follows his principles and prefers to plan things through.
Chaotic: Follows his feeling and prefers to adapt to situations as they arise.

Really easy if you break it down to the basics, and works every time.

[Conners]

A lot of people will vary based on the topic, though. Like those criminals who seem to be chaotic and like to let everyone do what they like, but for some reason "raep" is something they disapprove of so they have a hard Lawful law against it.

And by "those criminals", I mean movie-villains.

[Hyudra]

A lot of people will vary based on the topic, though. Like those criminals who seem to be chaotic and like to let everyone do what they like, but for some reason "raep" is something they disapprove of so they have a hard Lawful law against it.

And by "those criminals", I mean movie-villains.

Well, look at it this way. Even evil villains will usually have some good traits, and good guys will usually have some vices. It makes sense, therefore, that a lawful character is liable to have some chaotic traits and vice versa.

[Killer Angel]

I believe many characters in ASOIAF fit the CE alignment, and very few of 'em can be called "stupid" or "insane"...

[Spiryt]

Then how are they different from the Neutral Evil people...? Because they simply refuse to use the law to their advantage...?

Well, to sum up quickly what's written above me:

Chaotic/Lawful - has. not. much. to. do. - with laws and other stuff. Necessarily, at least. It can, as written in the rules.

Otherwise, we would have something like 20 personalities in whole setting.

Lawful and chaotic axis is about individual personality traits - spontaneousness, rigidity, fondness of habits/traditions/plans etc.

As far as Tuco goes - most of Western 'cliche' baddies are CE IMO, in fact.

Frank from Once upon time in the west - story of marauding, spontaneous, restless being, that happens to commit cruel atrocities without shade of compassion, remorse or regret.

[The Boz]

I, for one, am still not convinced that Quartich is actually evil.
Wanting to kill your enemy that wants you dead is not being evil.
Wanting to destroy the home of the "enemy" is not being evil.
He is not the one that declares someone enemy, he's the one that wages the war against the enemy.
Personally, I'd make him a Lawful Neutral, with maybe a 20% chance of being Lawful Evil.

[flumphy]

Wanting to destroy the home of the "enemy" is not being evil.

This is exactly the part that makes him evil. He harms innocent civilians and destroys non-military targets, mainly for revenge rather than out of tactical necessity.

I'll agree that merely participating in a war does not make someone evil by D&D standards, however.

[The Boz]

When did he deliberately target civilians? He did target civilian structures mainly because the enemy he is fighting does not have a military outside of the normal tribe organization. And every time he did target civilian structures, he gave plenty of warning before striking.
And he never once did this out of revenge, not as far as I remember. If you analyze his strategic decisions in the "campaign", every single one is made with the goal of minimizing tactical engagements, minimizing human losses and minimizing local population losses, in that order.

[Tengu_temp]

I don't see post-fall Raziel as CE, unless you purposely attack humans in the first game instead of protecting them. I'd say he's firmly neutral, which is closest you get to a heroic character in the Grimdark World Of Shakespearean Voice Actors. Sigh, pity we'll never see the resolution to that series...

[Winds]

Also from Batman's corner...Penguin qualifies in some iterations. Two-Face might, depending on whether you think he takes the coin flip as seriously as he claims. (I don't think he does. Too many times where he'll flip again if the result is 'good' and he wants to kill them.)

[Ninja_Grand]

When I define Chaotic Evil vs. Lawful evil, I like to relate to serial killers.

Now, before I get into that, a few notes on my personal perspective on alignment:

• Lawful does not mean "obeys the law" - this creates a whole lot of problems and conflicts in a world like D&D's. Like lawful paladins in a society where the law involves murder and human rights violations. I think it's an unfortunate word choice for one end of the alignment spectrum. Rather, lawful is about being ordered. Lawful individuals are about tradition, stricture, loyalty, planning, premeditation, routine and goals. Monks are lawful because they believe in tradition and they hone their abilities through endless practice. Paladins are lawful because they hold themselves to a code.
• Conversely, chaotic doesn't mean 'anarchy'. Rather, it means creativity, emotion, flexibility, exploration and impulse. Barbarians are chaotic because they tap into the most emotional and impulse driven part of themselves to Rage.
• Being lawful does not mean being smarter, better or even more efficient. Conversely, chaos doesn't mean stupidity or being disorganized. Lawful societies can be bogged down by needless tradition or bureaucracy, for example. Lawful people may hold to a routine because it's most comfortable to them, even if it's not the best way to go about things.

So with this interpretation, a very lawful musician would be someone who practices one instrument religiously. Sits down to the piano and practices over and over until their work is flawless. The sort of musician who hammers out Rachmaninov Piano Concerto No.3. A chaotic musician is someone who tries every instrument, every genre, and learns a little something from each. This is the bard with a huge fan following who plays something different every time, or always adds something new.

The same logic extends to killers. There's two major types of serial killer; there's the logical killer, someone that can be effective because they're so methodical, so careful. The logical killer plans things out to the last detail, covers up the evidence. However, they can be easier to catch because they're so prone to patterns, even ones they aren't aware of. The spree killer, by contrast, is constantly changing, with no pattern. They're effective because they're unpredictable. Their way of killing, their choice of targets, it's new every time, and there's little if anything to link one crime to the next.

Again, one type of killer isn't necessarily better or worse, nor is one smarter or dumber. A logical killer can still make mistakes because they're too dumb or too weak to do everything they should to cover up, or devolve into rituals that make them too easy to catch. A spree killer can flub a crime or walk straight into an ambush set up by the local sheriff, push their spree too hard, too fast, and get in over their heads.

Logical killer vs. spree killer is the same distinction you'd make between law and chaos.

Characters that are Chaotic Evil:

• Sylar of Heroes
• Marlo Stanfield from The Wire.
• Kratos
• Belkar
• Richard of Looking for Group
• Hyenas of Lion King (they bicker, they're kooky, but that's just on the surface. Beyond that, they work together where necessary).

This....Has redifned D&d for me.... Thanks for being smart!

[MukkTB]

Quaritch Hmmm...
I always get pissed off because he was so dumb in fighting his battles. There are so many things he could have done. My favorite would be to clear forest for about 5 miles in every direction around the complex. Now there's a killing zone that no primitive is going to cross without dying. The Na'vi would be forced to trench warfare across the thing which would be a mess. Considering how little construction they seem to actually have done I could imagine that being very difficult.

But for alignment.
Quaritch cared about his men.
He didn't respect the Na'vi rights as sentients.
He didn't commit atrocities for the joy of committing them and minimized how atrocious his actions were.

So that's either a very moderate evil or a very dark neutral. It depends on which definition of the alignments are used.

His reliance on military order makes him lawful.

I'll go ahead and say that he chose actions that would lead to suffering that were probably not optimal for achieving his goals. So Lawful Evil but a fairly weak evil that would be very close to neutral if you were using a sliding scale.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXraSkgssFk

A Chaotic Evil character doesn't need to be stupid. They're evil because they're sadistic, greedy, or don't empathize with others. Chaotic because they're random, pragmatic, creative, or divorced from any code of conduct.

So Bob could be a Chaotic Evil businessman, Greedy and Pragmatic. He'll follow the laws when they benefit him but he's willing to do anything to make cash.

Lets compare Bob to John the Lawful Evil businessman and Marvin the Neutral Evil Businessman. The trio of greedy bastards.

John follows the laws. Bob does not. Maybe John feels that following the laws gives him cover from judgement of society. Bob Probably doesn't care what society thinks as long as it doesn't impact him in the short term. Maybe John is risk averse and doesn't want there to be a possibility the authorities will come after him. Bob is probably risk loving. At least that's a trait we would normally associate with chaos. Maybe John feels that as long as he follows the laws he isn't actually a 'bad' person. Bob doesn't even bother worrying about it. "Bad' is just a way society tries to control you.'

Marvin won't deal with child prostitution because its just too icky. He doesn't mind selling drugs. He doesn't mind theft. But for him some crimes just go too far. Bob would totally go in for child prostitution if it made cash. Marvin is going to treat long term associates with respect and feel more comfortable working with people he has known. Bob would shoot them in a second if he felt they were double crossing him. Marvin is going to stick with business ventures he is familiar with. Bob is willing to try something he has no previous experience with and do his best to learn about it and make it work.

IDK maybe that helps.

[aazru]

CE: Sick and twisted sense of humour.
NE: Self before others.
LE: Diabolic planning.
LN: Lives buy rules.
TN: Enjoys life as it is.
CN: Enjoys life and tries to make it more enjoyable.
LG: No sense of humour. Has a sense of grater Good(what he thinks is Good) in its place.
NG: Generally good natured guy. Does good because it feels good not because it is good.
CG: Does good with no empathy or regard for others.

Anything with a C or L is a fanatic(how much it shows depends on characterization), unless there is an N in it.

[Irish Musician]

When I define Chaotic Evil vs. Lawful evil, I like to relate to serial killers.

Spoiler

Show

Now, before I get into that, a few notes on my personal perspective on alignment:

• Lawful does not mean "obeys the law" - this creates a whole lot of problems and conflicts in a world like D&D's. Like lawful paladins in a society where the law involves murder and human rights violations. I think it's an unfortunate word choice for one end of the alignment spectrum. Rather, lawful is about being ordered. Lawful individuals are about tradition, stricture, loyalty, planning, premeditation, routine and goals. Monks are lawful because they believe in tradition and they hone their abilities through endless practice. Paladins are lawful because they hold themselves to a code.
• Conversely, chaotic doesn't mean 'anarchy'. Rather, it means creativity, emotion, flexibility, exploration and impulse. Barbarians are chaotic because they tap into the most emotional and impulse driven part of themselves to Rage.
• Being lawful does not mean being smarter, better or even more efficient. Conversely, chaos doesn't mean stupidity or being disorganized. Lawful societies can be bogged down by needless tradition or bureaucracy, for example. Lawful people may hold to a routine because it's most comfortable to them, even if it's not the best way to go about things.

So with this interpretation, a very lawful musician would be someone who practices one instrument religiously. Sits down to the piano and practices over and over until their work is flawless. The sort of musician who hammers out Rachmaninov Piano Concerto No.3. A chaotic musician is someone who tries every instrument, every genre, and learns a little something from each. This is the bard with a huge fan following who plays something different every time, or always adds something new.

The same logic extends to killers. There's two major types of serial killer; there's the logical killer, someone that can be effective because they're so methodical, so careful. The logical killer plans things out to the last detail, covers up the evidence. However, they can be easier to catch because they're so prone to patterns, even ones they aren't aware of. The spree killer, by contrast, is constantly changing, with no pattern. They're effective because they're unpredictable. Their way of killing, their choice of targets, it's new every time, and there's little if anything to link one crime to the next.

Again, one type of killer isn't necessarily better or worse, nor is one smarter or dumber. A logical killer can still make mistakes because they're too dumb or too weak to do everything they should to cover up, or devolve into rituals that make them too easy to catch. A spree killer can flub a crime or walk straight into an ambush set up by the local sheriff, push their spree too hard, too fast, and get in over their heads.

Logical killer vs. spree killer is the same distinction you'd make between law and chaos.

Characters that are Chaotic Evil:

• Sylar of Heroes
• Marlo Stanfield from The Wire.
• Kratos
• Belkar
• Richard of Looking for Group
• Hyenas of Lion King (they bicker, they're kooky, but that's just on the surface. Beyond that, they work together where necessary).

Agreed. Thank you Hyudra for writing all that down. That is kind of how I feel about it as well. That lawful didnt exactly mean following the laws of the state, but more following the laws of your conscience. Sometimes, yes, the laws of the land are part of the conscience of the character, but sometimes not. Very well said Hyudra and once again, that you for putting it so eloquently!!

[Mixt]

*Points at Vanitas from Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep*

What about that guy?

[Conners]

CE: Sick and twisted sense of humour.
NE: Self before others.
LE: Diabolic planning.

See, this is what it boils down to, generally... CE is stupid, the other two are smart. LE might be lesser to NE, though, depending on if the L means needless restrictions, like a dwarf merchant who doesn't break the law but is a total ba****d (Baldur's Gate).

[Friv]

See, this is what it boils down to, generally... CE is stupid, the other two are smart. LE might be lesser to NE, though, depending on if the L means needless restrictions, like a dwarf merchant who doesn't break the law but is a total ba****d (Baldur's Gate).

Chaotic Evil doesn't have to be stupid; it's just a refusal to follow anybody's rules, and being willing to kill or injure others for your own amusement.

The Joker is Chaotic Evil, and while he doesn't meet the OP's guidelines, he sure isn't stupid. Kimbery from the Full Metal Alchemist anime is neither stupid nor crazy (well, not crazy in a manner that affects his capabilities.) A schoolyard bully who knows how to dodge teachers is not crazy or insane, but he's going to ruin your kid's life.