Most "evil" good alignment.

[Teapot Salty]

Hey guys. It's time for an opinion post. The basic question is: of the good alignments, which one is the most "evil." I get that none of them are truly, but which one is capable of doing the most heinous acts, or even terrible thoughts.

On one hand, lawful is terrible. They could watch the entire world get destroyed just because an authority told them to. They blindly follow laws, which can lead to more terrible things, and can bend them to their will. They can put nations at risk to fallow rules. Example:Party captures an assassin. Party wants to kill assassin because he will kill them if he lives. Paladin doesn't allow this because oh my oaths restrict it and I'll lose my powers. They are at worst restrictive and tyrannical, although at best they are kind and orderly. The means justify the ends.

I honestly can't think of anything wrong with neutral good except for maybe being pacifists (which Isn't even that bad, if that) maybe you guys can come up with a reason.
Just do genuinely nice things.

Chaotic can do terrible things. Oh ya I slaughtered an entire village of innocents to save the princess. Lieing, thieving, murdering can all be a means to the end. At worst they are brutal and murderous, but at best they are arguably the goodest of the good
The ends justify the means.

In my opinion lawful is the worst, the things I mentioned above are just terrible. At its very best, it is not as good as chaotic, and at its very worst, its worse then chaotic.

And as always, go nuts.

[Scow2]

Lawful can result in letting a greater evil come to pass out of refusal to settle for a lesser evil (And getting chewed out because "While you didn't commit an Evil Act, the world is still dead")

Chaotic... can come across as more evil because it shuns responsibility and remorse - What happens, happens, and there's no use fretting about it any more.

[Leviting]

well, chaotic good is generally associated with characters such as Robin Hood. Robin Hood was a THIEF. He STOLE things. Generally, theft is perceived as an evil act.
Of course, that is coming from a lawful good(with LN tendencies) person...

[Tengu_temp]

The examples OP gave for chaotic and lawful characters are just bad roleplaying. Good-aligned people don't act that way.

I've seen too many people play CG as CN lite, the "I can do whatever I want and none of it counts as evil because I'm chaotic" alignment, but that's also bad roleplaying.

[squiggit]

Both of those descriptions sound more "Outright evil" than "good but questionable

[Worgwood]

None of them.

People acting within the grounds of their alignment are all still capable of doing bad things. But no one person is an ambassador for their alignment, nor is their alignment a stringent code of conduct. They're individuals. What makes someone good or evil isn't if they follow their gut or the rulebook, it's what they let slide on their watch, and both Lawful and Chaotic characters can do that... or not.

[Mastikator]

Alignments are descriptions, not prescriptions.
Willingness to compromise isn't a matter of law vs chaos either. In D&D alignments the ends do not justify the means or vice versa, either they are just or they aren't. If you're very good then you'll seek the most good means that lead to the most good ends. And if you're clever enough you can probably find it.
(and murdering a whole village to save a princess is probably on the lawful evil side of the spectrum, since believing in social hierarchy is explicitly lawful and murder is Evil)

[aberratio ictus]

The examples OP gave for chaotic and lawful characters are just bad roleplaying. Good-aligned people don't act that way.

I've seen too many people play CG as CN lite, the "I can do whatever I want and none of it counts as evil because I'm chaotic" alignment, but that's also bad roleplaying.

This.

(and murdering a whole village to save a princess is probably on the lawful evil side of the spectrum, since believing in social hierarchy is explicitly lawful and murder is Evil)

You could argue that, but I suppose that depends on the character. Murdering a whole village to save a princess could equally well be on the chaotic evil side of the spectrum, since being flexible about how to reach your goals and choosing the easiest path is explicitly chaotic and murder is Evil.

Just as easily, you could turn around the OP's example concerning lawful characters - Maybe the chaotic character won't let the party kill the assassin because he thinks he's merely misunderstood? Or maybe, incidentally, he has fallen in love with the assassin?

I've often seen chaotic good characters collaborate with demons from hell because they were charismatic and led them to believe they were simply misunderstood.

In essence - none of the good alignments is more evil than the others, and all of them can be equally misguided in their own way.

[Mastikator]

A chaotic good character is more likely to abandon the goal of saving a princess than murdering a whole village for the sake of saving a princess.
Only an evil character could stomach killing a whole village.

[Socksy]

well, chaotic good is generally associated with characters such as Robin Hood. Robin Hood was a THIEF. He STOLE things. Generally, theft is perceived as an evil act.
Of course, that is coming from a lawful good(with LN tendencies) person...

Theft isn't always evil, right? I'd say Lawful is worse, because had he been lawful, he would have sat around and let the poor people starve because he was unwilling to steal. Although I reckon a full on rebellion and uprising would have been so much cooler than the original story.

Of course, considering respective alignments, it would only be natural that you defend LG whereas I have the opposite view...

[Wardog]

If you are Chaotic, you will probably think LG is the least "good" Good, and the most likely to let the other axis of their alignment interfere with doing Good, or lead to making Evil decisions. And a Lawful character will think the reverse.

The neither LG or CG is "Evil" in the alignment sense of the terms by definition, and you would have to be a pretty extreme-aligned character (probably LN or CN) to think the opposite was "evil" in the more general sense.

The examples in the OP are particularly bad.

Someone who would "watch the entire world get destroyed just because an authority told them to" is not LG. That's LN or LE at best, and mainly just Lawful Stupid.

"Blindly following laws" is also not LG. It's LN at best, and LE if they are routinely or uncaringly going "terrible things".

And refusing to kill an assassin even though he will probably kill you if you don't isn't evil, its just foolish. And depending on your reasons for (not) doing so, could be CG just as easily as LG.

As for Chaos - slaughtering a village of innocents is evil, full stop. If someone does that just because they feel like it, or because they can't be bothered thinking of a more sensible solution they are probably CE, but there are plenty of reasons and justifications why a LE or NE character might do the same thing. But either way, someone who does that is Chaotic Evil, not Chaotic Good.



I would suggest that LE is probably worse than CE simply because it is better organized and more likely to achieve its goals, and so more dangerous - at least in real life. Although in a world with CE gods and demons, who potentially have the means and motivation to destroy the whole world, they might be more dangerous instead.

And by the same argument, I suppose LG is potentially more dangerous than CG, because if they have some plan to make life better for everyone and it goes wrong, they will affect more people than CG would. But at the same time, they can potentially do more good as well.

So to repeat- whichever (CG or LG) you think is best (or most dangerous) will depend on your own alignment. But the examples in the OP are not examples of the problems with CG or LG behaviour.

[Tengu_temp]

So to repeat- whichever (CG or LG) you think is best (or most dangerous) will depend on your own alignment. But the examples in the OP are not examples of the problems with CG or LG behaviour.

Very well said. Have a cookie.

[Segev]

LG, NG, and CG are all good. There is no "evil" act that falls within their purviews (though, of course, nobody is perfect and so all of them likely have some bad things they have done and will do again). However, I tend to think of LG and CG as being both equally-less-good than NG, because they concern themselves with considerations other than "what is the most good I can possibly do?"

NG is neutral wrt law and chaos because it understands that laws are necessary to codify ways to behave and to constrain the acts of those entrusted with power to preserve the well-being of all. That is, laws exist so that those entrusted with the collective power of the community (in the form of taxes to pay and/or authority over the constabulary and the monopoly on legal use of aggressive force) cannot simply apply their whims to the people. Laws dictate what that force can be used to punish or prevent, and how those accused but not yet convicted must be treated.

NG also recognizes that laws are imperfect, and there will always be corner cases and exceptions. Laws can be twisted by the clever to do things they never were meant to do, and even written by the evil to empower and enrich themselves at the expense of others. While it's always preferable to work within a legal framework, it is not so preferable as to be an ethical quandary when a neutral good character sees laws being used to harm the innocent or pervert true justice. The NG guy will reject the law being applied in such circumstances.

The LG guy will not make such a rejection, not easily. He's still GOOD, so he'll interpret and enforce the law within its letter in the most benign way possible, and a clever LG man is as able to find loopholes and tricks within the law as is an LE one; he just does so to counter-"gotcha" those LE types who try to hide behind the law. But if the law ties his hands, an LG guy will find himself struggling to worm his way into a loophole (or out of whatever one the villain put into effect) to do what is right, and, just as he might allow some evil to happen in the name of upholding the law, he might allow some lawbreaking to happen in the name of upholding the good. He won't be happy about it, and he might do it in a "knowingly turning a blind eye" sort of way rather than actually aiding and abetting, but he'll do it. At the same time, it requires much greater good or evil to push him to ignore the Law.

The CG guy will also still recognize that some laws are helpful; they spell out, if applied lightly, how people can treat each other and avoid misunderstandings. But of course, the CG person is not Lawful or even Neutral on the ethical scale, so has no respect for laws that fail to do good. He sees exceptions to the law as more common than not, and views it as guidelines where the NG person might view it as important to follow.

But the CG person is not more good than the NG person! The NG person will disregard the law immediately when it causes evil to occur, and find another solution. The CG person is more likely to ignore the law even when it could be used to do good; he's there, and it's more expedient to take matters into his own hands, even if his way is illegal.

This also means that the CG man is going to take matters into his own hands and into his own judgment even without, necessarily, following all the due process stuff that is typically portrayed as tying LG types' hands. Even the NG will follow due process stuff; he recognizes that it's there to make sure that the truly guilty are gotten, and not innocents framed by man or circumstance. The CG guy values making sure what is "right" is done by his own judgment that he'll trust his judgment and risk making a mistake.

If any "good" alignment might make the mistake of falling for the "ticking time bomb" scenario in the Good vs. Evil thread in the 3.5 forum, it's CG. Because he won't let petty things like ethics get in his way. (He still very well might not fall for it; murder is evil and he knows it. But he's the most likely to make the "greater good" argument when it comes to his PERSONAL actions.)

Therefore, NG is the "most good" alignment of the three, because it prioritizes good above all else, and follows the law all the way to the point that the law CAUSES evil, then throws it over without a second thought to do what's RIGHT. While the LG will follow it even if it means allowing some evil to happen (lest violating it over this peccadillo cause more strife in the future as the system breaks down under the personal judgments of too many), and the CG will ignore the law the moment it looks like it might even risk allowing evil to occur (risking being the CAUSE of harm to an innocent or overturning the underpinnings of civilization that keep people working together), the NG will instead respect the law insofar as it promotes good, and reject it where it does not. He might seem to have his hands tied by the former or risk overturning respect for the law with the latter, but in the end, his goal is good overall. He uses the law to guide him and keep him from making a mistake, but won't let it get in his way.

[The_Werebear]

Both have dangers on a micro level.

From what I have seen, Lawful might be prone to stringent self rules that interfere with their ability to do good (not bushwhacking the evil Duke because it's not honorable, even if he'd lose in straight combat; accepting and trusting truces from evil creatures that he knows will break them; letting small evils slide because of a greater plan, or conversely, bringing a greater plan to a halt because he can't stand a small evil in it.)

Neutral is prone to trying to help those who will not be helped or can not be helped (trying to convert a fiend who rejects all forms of compassion/conversion, and has for about the third time).

Chaotic is prone to trusting their gut overmuch, which can lead to (depending on their sense motive,) trusting the wrong people, mistrusting the wrong people, or skipping out on doing the right thing "because they didn't like" some aspect of it. They're also more prone than lawful to taking potentially disastrous shortcuts ("that part of the binding ritual hardly seemed necessary, and we were in a hurry")

These are, of course, broad generalizations based on how I've seen the alignments played.

[Joe the Rat]

So to repeat- whichever (CG or LG) you think is best (or most dangerous) will depend on your own alignment. But the examples in the OP are not examples of the problems with CG or LG behaviour.

There you go.

Now, if we're talking players, the answer is Lawful Good. Denied Evil or Chaotic Neutral, the jackass player will be a Paladin.

[Vitruviansquid]

If I HAD to give a straight answer to this question... Let's see... Lawful Good is more likely to be compromised than Chaotic Good.

The Lawful Good character serves two masters - the Law and the Good. The Law part, whether it's a monarch, a military superior, a vote by the populace, or whatever, can tell the Lawful Good character to compromise on the Good side sometimes. Perhaps the Lawful Good character will listen to the Law or perhaps he will listen to the good.

To me, Chaotic represents a feeling of not giving two ****s about others' opinions and thoughts and prescriptions. The Chaotic Good character serves only one master, Good. Chaos isn't going to tell him what to do. The Chaotic Good character might come across as anti-social or unlikeable, but that's only because society wants him to compromise on goodness in the first place.

I figure 4e had its alignment system about right, with its spectrum of Good, Lawful Good, Unaligned, Chaotic Evil, and Evil.

[Hopeless]

The DM is usually the answer to that in the games I played in, quite literally.

Ran a LN Cleric who faced a foe who deliberately led an uprising after his master an assassin was slain in battle and when confronted my character mentioned he might have accepted his surrender had he chosen to before starting this uprising and he promptly claimed my character had agreed to insure his safety so he could have a fair trial... talk about outright lying!

When that dm ran a paladin in a game he made a deal with a captured bandit who pleaded for the safety of his family and when we got inside the bandit lair he immediately stabbed the bandit in the back for absolutely no reason other than he believed paladins gave no quarter to foes whether captive or not...

That was a greyhawk game run by another player, as far as he was concerned he thought his character had the right as a noble to declare whatever he wanted done ignoring everybody else in the process... he was brought up short after the first game when he tried to ride off with the villain as his prisoner, but I was wondering if that qualified for this thread point of discussion is there anything more evil than a Paladin whose Lawful but anything but Good aligned?

[Red Fel]

While I don't think there's a most "Evil" Good alignment, I think there can be a least Evil Good alignment - Neutral Good.

Neutral Good isn't concerned with personal freedom or expression, or with laws or traditions or honor or order. It's concerned with Good. Just Good.

Any player can play CG or LG with emphasis on the C or L, and de-emphasis to the point of alignment abuse on the G. Any player (who wants to fall) can play a merciless Paladin, or a Robin Hood who revels just a bit too much in his acts of thievery and anarchy.

But in my mind it's extraordinarily difficult to play NG as Evil. I suppose you could play the "greater good" card, which can be Evil for anyone, but I find it hard to do it any other way. With CG or LG, you have another alignment prong that can justify bending the G; you can be more Lawful or Chaotic than Good and still technically be Good. You can't be more Neutral than Good without ceasing to be Good. I just can't wrap my brain around it.

The only exception to this I can consider is some of the truly scary stuff that came out of BoED, like the Emissary of Barachiel, although a lot of that stuff is more LG than just-G.

[aberratio ictus]

If I HAD to give a straight answer to this question... Let's see... Lawful Good is more likely to be compromised than Chaotic Good.

Now see, that's just like, your chaotic opinion, man.

Just as easily, you could argue that the CG Character serves two masters. Good, and his own whims, aka Chaos. Maybe he should bring that evil sorceress to justice, but damn, she's just too attractive, and our character is a lady-killer (not literally). Maybe he's just naive, and lets himself be persuaded with a hastily invented sob-story.

There are ways to compromise both of them, and it is up to the character, whether it works or not.

Joe says, in his experience, if we take in account players, it would be LG.
In my experience, it would definitely be CG, but then again, I realise that's because of the people I play with.

[Jay R]

I know that the books disagree with me, but if I were playing Robin Hood, he'd be Lawful Good.

King Richard, his sovereign, is being held for ransom. The king's brother, Prince John, is beggaring the countryside with taxes and not paying the ransom. True loyalty to the law requires me to support my sovereign and oppose the evil regent. Richard's laws are the true laws, and Prince John and his minions are committing treason against him by collecting this money and not using it for the ransom, and by leaving Richard's subjects to starve.

Robin Hood does not steal generally - he steals only from tax collectors who are collecting taxes passed against the will of the king, and in ways that harm the king.

As I said, I know that the books disagree with me, but it is perfectly reasonable for a Lawful Good man to act as Robin Hood does.

And that makes it a perfect example to show why questions like the one in front of us are unanswerable. Alignment affects action, but doesn't determine it.

[Tengu_temp]

Now, if we're talking players, the answer is Lawful Good. Denied Evil or Chaotic Neutral, the jackass player will be a Paladin.

Depends on the kind of jackass. Once again, I saw too many badly played CG characters. The most notable example is a kleptomaniac rogue who steals anything from anyone, even when the character is already stinking rich. Then you have people who think The Man is evil and who will spread anarchy and purposely go against any and all authority because they're rebellious teenagers, and selfish, violent jerks who will break an NPC's arm for talking them off and think they're being cool and edgy.

CG is the favorite alignment of people who think it's still the nineties.

[Janus]

Speaking as someone who plays paladins a lot, I have to say that if your good alignment is making you do "evil" things, you're doing it wrong.

[jedipotter]

Hey guys. It's time for an opinion post. The basic question is: of the good alignments, which one is the most "evil." I get that none of them are truly, but which one is capable of doing the most heinous acts, or even terrible thoughts.

All of them. It is the endless circle. If good goes to far it is evil, and if evil goes to far it is good.

Good people will often tell people what to do for the good of all. But too far makes everyone a slave. Evil people often don't care about people and give them freedom as they don't care. But too much freedom allows people to do anything they wish, even good things.

[Tengu_temp]

All of them. It is the endless circle. If good goes to far it is evil, and if evil goes to far it is good.

Good people will often tell people what to do for the good of all. But too far makes everyone a slave. Evil people often don't care about people and give them freedom as they don't care. But too much freedom allows people to do anything they wish, even good things.

That's... not how any of these things work. At all.

Good that gets too good doesn't become evil, evil that gets too evil doesn't become good. They become really damn good and really damn evil, respectively.

Telling people what to do is lawful. Letting them do what they want is chaotic. This has nothing to do with good and evil.

[Isamu Dyson]

Speaking as someone who plays paladins a lot, I have to say that if your good alignment is making you do "evil" things, you're doing it wrong.

I blame the popularity of the anti-hero.

[Worgwood]

Someone can think the work they're doing is for the greater good, even if by our standards they're morally evil. Some of the worst things that have happened in our history can be attributed to that sort of thinking. Even selfish people might not necessarily think of themselves as "evil".

But someone whose alignment, which in D&D is a real cosmological force, is "good" doesn't do evil things for the greater good - and if they do it's because they slipped up or because they were left no other choice. They are still human and they can still slip up.

You can become evil because you were trying too hard to be good, but you can't become evil because you were doing too much good.

[Tengu_temp]

Someone can think the work they're doing is for the greater good, even if by our standards they're morally evil. Some of the worst things that have happened in our history can be attributed to that sort of thinking. Even selfish people might not necessarily think of themselves as "evil".

Very few people consider themself evil. Everyone is the hero in their own eyes.

However, just because you see yourself as good doesn't mean you actually are good.

[Worgwood]

Very few people consider themself evil. Everyone is the hero in their own eyes.

However, just because you see yourself as good doesn't mean you actually are good.

Exactly - there's a difference between someone who believes they are doing good and someone who actually is good.

That's kind of why this question doesn't work. If you're asking whether it's Chaotic Good or Lawful Good is capable of doing "more evil" then really, neither is really Good.

[Ravian]

I remember reading a passage on alignments in Eberron (where things are often very grey) that seemed to base it in an interesting fashion that completely allowed for evil acts to be undertaken by good people (and vice versa). As an example they gave two NPC rulers, the NG queen of one nation and the LE king of another. Both nations were in a state of cold war following the ceasefire of a centuries long conflict. (which resulted in widespread death famine and the magical destruction of an entire nation)

The NG queen was entirely willing to restart the war once she had assurances that such a thing wouldn't destroy her nation as well. She knew full well that the war would be costly in lives, but believes that it is her right to hold the throne of the five nations and that things will honestly be better under her rule. She's against unnecessarily cruel measures but realizes that lives are the cost of war.

The LE king on the other hand is the biggest supporter of continuing peace between the nations. He does this entirely out of selfishness, knowing that war will allow a third party (also evil, but hostile towards him) to gain more power within his nation and is currently focussed on removing them. It's not a nice peace though, since he holds his nation and it's people in a state of martial law and uses necromancy to maintain a force of undead soldiers as a standing army. He's a tyrant, but it's hard to argue that he's not accomplishing good things in the end (keeping the nations out of war and removing a dangerous cult from his lands).

Basically it argues that Evil is more synonymous with selfishness, while good is more altruistic. A goal that while likely result in deaths and other atrocities done for altruistic purposes is still often done by Good people. And evil people will often accomplish good while following their own selfish goals.

Many of these examples come up, even Paladins in Eberron (who still follow a code and must maintain a lawful good alignment) have participated in the slaughter of lycanthropes (which included a number of innocent shifters that were caught in the mess) because they believed that more good would come from the end of the lycanthropy plague even if mistakes were made and collateral damage was sustained.

[Segev]

Eh... if the evil king is using the peace to spread misery and suffering to his people, and they would gladly rise up in rebellion if they had a prayer of support from the NG queen, then I wouldn't say the NG queen starting a war is evil.

War is terrible. It should always be the last resort. But there are good reasons to go to it that do not involve being evil or selfish. It does require that you be willing to allow innocents to suffer...but the truth is, if you're going to war, it's because innocents are already suffering, and you're just changing how the bad guys distribute said suffering while you bring them to heel.

This is why, however, if one must go to war, one does so as swiftly and brutally as possible, to make the cuts swift, deep, and clean, and more easily heal the metaphorical wounds done by ensuring that all of the infected flesh is cut out. Half-measure wars are the worst sort of evil because they inflict the suffering of war with no promise of surcease.