Chaotic Evil without Being the Joker

[blackjack50]

So I’m have an idea for a character. He is a drunken monk. He is haunted by his past (thus the drinking) and is generally a greedy alcoholic. He doesn’t believe in the established law or order. He doesn’t care about hurting people. He didn’t come from a monastery, but instead learned his fighting in a brawling pit in his home city.

So what are some other ideas y’all have? Things that aren’t the joker.

[Angelmaker]

I feel chaotic neutral might just be the alignment of someone who doesn't go out of his way to take advantage of other poeple for his own enrichmentl nothing in your description let's me see the reason why he should be evil.

Greed is perfectly neutral, if you don't go murderhoboing innocents and stealing every day. And if you are no sadist, lots of people actually don't care if they have to hurt other people for example in self defense.

[Gallowglass]

I tend to agree.

The important note in your description for me is "He doesn't care about hurting people"

Which means, to me, that he doesn't enjoy doing it, just doesn't feel moral compunction if it comes up.

I would peg him as Chaotic Neutral

to me, to be evil, you have to -enjoy- hurting people. You have to want to do it, either consciously or unconsciously.

[Angelmaker]

You either have to enjoy hurting people or you hate it just as much as twogoodshoes paladin over here but the greater good (the kingdom, your god, your coinpurse) demands to do it of you.

[blackjack50]

I feel chaotic neutral might just be the alignment of someone who doesn't go out of his way to take advantage of other poeple for his own enrichmentl nothing in your description let's me see the reason why he should be evil.

Greed is perfectly neutral, if you don't go murderhoboing and stealing every day. And if you are no sadist, lots of people actually don't care if they have to hurt other people for example in self defense.

Well within the confines of RP...I’d say that his actions trend towards self concern and harm. Mostly because he feels it is the most expedient means to an end. His actions make him evil. Evil, IMO, isn’t so much a restriction on doing good. It is doing evil due to convenience or lack of concern. Or in the case of chaotic? Because he wanted too. That’s where I will use the RP aspect of alcoholic too. To add the randomness without becoming too much of a burden to the party.

[blackjack50]

I tend to agree.

The important note in your description for me is "He doesn't care about hurting people"

Which means, to me, that he doesn't enjoy doing it, just doesn't feel moral compunction if it comes up.

I would peg him as Chaotic Neutral

to me, to be evil, you have to -enjoy- hurting people. You have to want to do it, either consciously or unconsciously.

What I see it as...is that it isn’t a moral obstacle. Since he was a pit brawler...he does enjoy it. But he can’t go doing it all the time. That wouldn’t be convenient for him.

[Segev]

to me, to be evil, you have to -enjoy- hurting people. You have to want to do it, either consciously or unconsciously.

I'd argue that that is sufficient, but not necessary, as a condition for being evil. It may not even be sufficient, depending on certain factors, but barring exceptional circumstances and corner cases, it would be sufficient.

You can be evil while taking no joy in hurting others. All it takes is a genuinely callous disregard for doing so. Neutral has some qualms about it. Neutral will take slightly less reward for NOT hurting somebody than they would get for hurting somebody. Evil will not.

Essentially, the sliding scale of neutral to evil is measured pretty well by just how willing the person in question is to hurt another, and for how little reward. Neutral is, in general, willing to cause harm to others for personal gain, but has lines they won't cross for it. The "deeper" those lines, the less neutral and more evil they are. A wholly evil person who doesn't take explicit pleasure in killing only balks at killing if it costs him more effort, standing, or resources than he feels he'd get in return.

[Gallowglass]

I'd argue that that is sufficient, but not necessary, as a condition for being evil. It may not even be sufficient, depending on certain factors, but barring exceptional circumstances and corner cases, it would be sufficient.

You can be evil while taking no joy in hurting others. All it takes is a genuinely callous disregard for doing so. Neutral has some qualms about it. Neutral will take slightly less reward for NOT hurting somebody than they would get for hurting somebody. Evil will not.

Essentially, the sliding scale of neutral to evil is measured pretty well by just how willing the person in question is to hurt another, and for how little reward. Neutral is, in general, willing to cause harm to others for personal gain, but has lines they won't cross for it. The "deeper" those lines, the less neutral and more evil they are. A wholly evil person who doesn't take explicit pleasure in killing only balks at killing if it costs him more effort, standing, or resources than he feels he'd get in return.

*shrug* I would argue that your hypothetical person who claims that they are just killing/hurting others because it is expedient and that they are not taking any pleasure in it, is lying to themselves. That the "genuinely callous disregard" cannot come about with some pleasure tinged to it. In other words, it doesn't actually happen that way.

But, for the love of Gods, I don't want to get into a debate about it.

When i read the OP post I imagined the Drunken Brawler going to a Bar, sitting in the corner and getting drunk. And if someone comes up and harrasses him, he'd kill them, both to make a point to others to leave him alone but also because killing has proven to be expedient and useful tool. But he genuinely was just there to get drunk and for no other reason. So I say Neutral.

The Evil character would go to the bar, subtly HOPING to have that encounter, perhaps even subconsciously manipulating things to make it happen (i.e. finding people who are obvious drunk bores and sitting by them on purpose.) Maybe telling themselves "I just want to be left alone" but not really.

You know, the way I keep responding on alignment threads, telling myself I don't want to get into arguments about it anymore, but still going and doing it seemingly oblivious to my self-masochism. *sigh*

[sktarq]

The wonderful joy (terror, blinding stupidity) of the DnD alignment system is that basically anything can be argued.

I wouldn't say you need to enjoy hurting people to be evil. Just not caring if people get hurt would certainly count...saying other people's pain, suffering, or death means nothing to you and is irrelevant to your choices is pretty evil.
I mean a person who just kills whoever is in their way in order to get to what they want is generally classed as evil.
A business person who does not withdraw a product they are selling even though they know that they are killing people with it and just continues to sell their poison is generally not considered "neutral"...we have laws against this sort of behavior for a reason. And seeing killing, maiming, scaring etc as USEFUL but not enjoying it is generally still pretty evil if you actually employ it...I mean genocide, terrorism, or even just threatening people and then following through to make an example to others, etc can be effective means to ones goals in a lot of scenarios-doesn't make them neutral.

If in a sweatshop the overseers beat the workers, keep them trapped in horrid working conditions, etc etc...sure some may take some sadistic pleasure in it...but the factory owner you sets up the system where that is okay...who knowing sets it up and protects it...it may well just be less work to do it that way...no sadism needed...but would they be any less evil?

Some just don't care CE horrible horrible characters

a noble sorcerer who does not value precedent, measures/judges people as individuals instead of representatives of their birth groups, only obeys the law when he fears being punished for it and ignores it the rest of the time, believes that people should be free to make whatever decisions they so choose in their life and his decisions include things like having his way with any young lady he so desires and using a charm person spell (or dominate person, or any other enchantment spell of the sort) if she is so gauche as to say no...and after the spell she says yes and acts like someone who did so it is no different to him...and if she can not make the will save well she obviously should have invested in magical protection or cared enough to build up some class levels......that he is free to use and gain information by whatever means he so desires and imps/quasits/whatever have proven to be the most economical...I mean I could go on. but you get the point

a thief who just wants to high life in secret and his high life is all about doing his own damn thing...and will kill, poison, etc whoever is needed to get his target. Doesn't mater the consequences to the people who have such items either...the donation to the orphanage have low security? that's his target then...may start a war if he steals the jewels of the ambassador? not his issue the war is unlikely to reach this city anyway and hell may drive a bunch of people into moving in with "portable wealth" (good targets) and will be fencing items they brought themselves from the warzone (so fencing his items will be easier)...so if anything the ambassador may be an especially GOOD target in his eyes.

both would rather keep the benefits of OTHER people being civilized and producing the stuff they want to have..they just want certain things and experiences...and others don't really matter.

also could go for many people who just think of nothing about lying, steeling, conning their own families, pushing others into harms way, physically harming people, and doing any and all of the above totally varying by day and hour....which honestly describes a fair number of serious drug addicts....yeah basically imagine they don't care who gets hurt for them to get their drug...they get nothing from hurting people and may even hate it...but if it will get them their drug then they will...now just replace "drug" with "money", "acclaim", or pretty much anything else and you have the crux of it.

[jjordan]

There's the Belkar route: In it for himself but capable of recognizing that other people are sometimes a valuable resource and that faking some more socially acceptable traits is good for personal survival and profit.

The Jade: Has been burned by life and people so many times that he thinks everyone is, deep down, horrible and the only way to prosper, or survive, is to take advantage of them before they take advantage of you.

The Rationalizer: "I don't know why everyone is mad. The orphanage was taking up valuable space that can be redeveloped. The orphans are all safely in the hands of whatsername, that goddess they all worshiped, and safe from the really horrendous futures that awaited virtually all of them. The community got together for a great big bonding event as they tried to put out the bonfire. They should be thanking me, really."

The Zealot: "Don't you see? Order is stasis! It's the death of all life. We must churn the milk to make butter. We must keep the wheels turning. She sees our efforts. Accepts our sacrifices. Rewards us with life. With power. They don't understand, yet. But one day they will. One day we will recognized as the saviors we are."

[denthor]

Chaotic does not like others looking over shoulder. Frontier type quick to defend quick to look for a fight is a no one can help me.

Evil kills for fun (joker)
or
this guy. Kills because he did not plan...another man's bread, jacket blanket or water is the difference between his life and death. Don't ask, they may say no. If they are dead(they being any living thing D&D undead as well) they no longer need it I do. It is mine. This boarder line nuetral evil. You said he doesn't like to kill for fun sport .

[blackjack50]

*shrug* I would argue that your hypothetical person who claims that they are just killing/hurting others because it is expedient and that they are not taking any pleasure in it, is lying to themselves. That the "genuinely callous disregard" cannot come about with some pleasure tinged to it. In other words, it doesn't actually happen that way.

But, for the love of Gods, I don't want to get into a debate about it.

When i read the OP post I imagined the Drunken Brawler going to a Bar, sitting in the corner and getting drunk. And if someone comes up and harrasses him, he'd kill them, both to make a point to others to leave him alone but also because killing has proven to be expedient and useful tool. But he genuinely was just there to get drunk and for no other reason. So I say Neutral.

The Evil character would go to the bar, subtly HOPING to have that encounter, perhaps even subconsciously manipulating things to make it happen (i.e. finding people who are obvious drunk bores and sitting by them on purpose.) Maybe telling themselves "I just want to be left alone" but not really.

You know, the way I keep responding on alignment threads, telling myself I don't want to get into arguments about it anymore, but still going and doing it seemingly oblivious to my self-masochism. *sigh*

That is a fair point. I see your argument. And I think this is where it is more of a chaotic vs lawful rather than evil vs good.

Getting in to a drunken brawl and killing someone unnecessarily? That is evil and chaotic. And since alignment is descriptive and not prescriptive? I would say if a player consistently follows that pattern? They stay chaotic evil.

I would say it is not so much about the desire to hurt, but THAT you hurt people. Or steal from them. Or maybe set their house on fire. And if the pattern is random? That is what makes one chaotic.

[Segev]

I'm not sure why a casual disregard would have to have a hidden element of pleasure.

Let's say, for example, that you want to see what you're doing, but it's dark because the sun has gone down and therefore no more light is flooding through your windows. You get up, go over to the wall, and flip a switch to turn on some lights.

You have a casual disregard for the act of flipping a switch. It doesn't bother you morally, but you probably don't have any sort of secret, deep-seated pleasure from doing it, either.

A neutral person probably WOULD balk at flipping that switch if it ALSO killed somebody every time it was flipped. But maybe not, if he wanted to see badly enough. Probably, though; neutral people USUALLY don't disregard life quite that much.

An evil person would flip the switch and not even bat an eye at the increased cost of "killing somebody" over just the act itself.

Now, you could ALSO have an evil person who reveled in the killing, and who would look for any excuse to flip that switch. Or just flip it repeatedly for no other reason than the pleasure of killing people. But that isn't necessary; a man who has no problem flipping the switch as many times as is convenient for him, but doesn't revel in it any more than you revel in turning on lights in your house IRL, is still evil for his utter disregard for the lives he snuffs out with each flip of the light switch.

[Lord Raziere]

Chaotic Evil without having a specific joker monster clown personality? EASY.

Hate Incarnate:
This guy just hates everything. He hates everyone that isn't himself, he hates other races, other cultures for being different, he hates rules for trying to tell him what to do, he hates compassionate people for trying tell him what to do, he hates peace because its a lie, he hates war because other people are trying to kill him, he hates extremists because they're obnoxious and he hates moderate people because they're cowards, he hates people trying to be kind to him because its calling him weak and he hates being trying to be cruel for the exact same reason, he hates knowledge and people smarter than him and if he met anyone stupider than him, he'd hate them to. He hates people trying to suck up to him and he hates people telling the truth. He hates sadness for being weakness, he hates rage for being blind, he hates suffering because its eternal and will always return, and most of all he hates happiness because its clearly its the one thing that doesn't exist, and therefore anyone who is happy is a fool. There is just no pleasing him. And he kills everything he hates.

Suffering Is Life:
This guys philosophy is to take "Life is Suffering" and turn it on its head: Suffering makes you alive, attachments make you alive. There he tries to make people have as many attachments and suffering through attachments as possible so that people embrace life to the fullest, to make them care so they experience both greatest highs and the greatest lows of life, from the greatest of debaucheries, to the darkest of tragedies. Manipulating you into finding your first love of your life so that you experience the perfect romance, then killing them in the most horrible way possible. to make you feel the greatest amount of despair from it as well.

The War Lover:
This guy thinks that enlightenment and joy can only be found through war and conflict. He wants to start as much war as possible so that everyone can tap into their inner potential and become great warriors from killing one another, and his ideal world is one of eternal war so that all the great warriors rise and all the weak warriors fall until great warriors fight one another in epic combat enjoying the clash of only the best warriors, not caring for the consequences or the suffering of his actions in the least.

All Impulse:
This person has no ability to think upon the consequences of their actions. They think only in the moment, past and future might as well not exist to them. They feel no empathy for anyone, and since their reasons for doing anything don't go beyond the moment, they quickly learn to constantly make up lies in moment that sound good to others but don't hold up to analysis, and they do all that they do for a momentary desire. They have no consistent philosophy or logic to their actions or proclaim their intentions at all- they just act without thinking to do whatever horrible action they want and constantly make things up after the fact while thinking all rules, social strictures and so on are just shallow empty things people only pretend are true, with no deeper understanding of people beyond what they need to manipulate them.

The Revenge-Aholic:
This guys wants revenge for something he will do anything to get it. Unfortunately, he doesn't at one big quest for revenge, he gets revenge for petty things as well. Every little wrong done to him, he gets back at the person in cruel manner, every little snub he pays back and so on. He always holds a grudge, and he can be just so petty about every single little bit of revenge he takes, worse he can sometimes imagine you did something wrong to him and get "revenge" on you anyways even if you didn't do anything, or isn't the person he originally wanted revenge on, or whatever. He will always insist on his own cruel ways of settling anything and won't forgive anyone for anything.

The Murder Thief
This guy likes to take valuable treasures from museums and such because they're shiny and he likes them. But he won't be subtle or a classy burglar....he will just kill everyone in his way, take the thing and leave so he can add it to his collection. He doesn't care about the blood he spills as long as he gets to have a bunch of shiny treasures in his collection to look at. and he kills anyone trying to take anything form his collection as well. simple but it works.

The Torture Connoisseur
This guy doesn't want to kill people. No, no no, peoples lives are too valuable to waste on that. No, they need torturing, why kill when you can create beautiful works of people broken by pure torture? It needs to be high quality too, only the best kind of people to torture and break you see, has to be very specific so as to create the most beautifully broken kind of person from it, with maybe a bit of irony in there, perhaps involving something important to them being being utterly destroyed, the tools of their agony have to the highest quality, and the kidnapping has to be done just right to stay below the radar, and best to drag out the agony as long as possible, having to squeeze every bit of art from it, because its not just the end result but the journey to their broken down state thats also important, and if he is confronted by anything similar to the Joker's work he'd be all like "bah thats so mainstream, so basic, come on have some creativity, the stupid gleeful evil clown gimmick again? Ugh. I prefer more indie works, thank you."

[blackjack50]

Chaotic Evil without having a specific joker monster clown personality? EASY.

Hate Incarnate:
This guy just hates everything. He hates everyone that isn't himself, he hates other races, other cultures for being different, he hates rules for trying to tell him what to do, he hates compassionate people for trying tell him what to do, he hates peace because its a lie, he hates war because other people are trying to kill him, he hates extremists because they're obnoxious and he hates moderate people because they're cowards, he hates people trying to be kind to him because its calling him weak and he hates being trying to be cruel for the exact same reason, he hates knowledge and people smarter than him and if he met anyone stupider than him, he'd hate them to. He hates people trying to suck up to him and he hates people telling the truth. He hates sadness for being weakness, he hates rage for being blind, he hates suffering because its eternal and will always return, and most of all he hates happiness because its clearly its the one thing that doesn't exist, and therefore anyone who is happy is a fool. There is just no pleasing him. And he kills everything he hates.

Suffering Is Life:
This guys philosophy is to take "Life is Suffering" and turn it on its head: Suffering makes you alive, attachments make you alive. There he tries to make people have as many attachments and suffering through attachments as possible so that people embrace life to the fullest, to make them care so they experience both greatest highs and the greatest lows of life, from the greatest of debaucheries, to the darkest of tragedies. Manipulating you into finding your first love of your life so that you experience the perfect romance, then killing them in the most horrible way possible. to make you feel the greatest amount of despair from it as well.

The War Lover:
This guy thinks that enlightenment and joy can only be found through war and conflict. He wants to start as much war as possible so that everyone can tap into their inner potential and become great warriors from killing one another, and his ideal world is one of eternal war so that all the great warriors rise and all the weak warriors fall until great warriors fight one another in epic combat enjoying the clash of only the best warriors, not caring for the consequences or the suffering of his actions in the least.

All Impulse:
This person has no ability to think upon the consequences of their actions. They think only in the moment, past and future might as well not exist to them. They feel no empathy for anyone, and since their reasons for doing anything don't go beyond the moment, they quickly learn to constantly make up lies in moment that sound good to others but don't hold up to analysis, and they do all that they do for a momentary desire. They have no consistent philosophy or logic to their actions or proclaim their intentions at all- they just act without thinking to do whatever horrible action they want and constantly make things up after the fact while thinking all rules, social strictures and so on are just shallow empty things people only pretend are true, with no deeper understanding of people beyond what they need to manipulate them.

The Revenge-Aholic:
This guys wants revenge for something he will do anything to get it. Unfortunately, he doesn't at one big quest for revenge, he gets revenge for petty things as well. Every little wrong done to him, he gets back at the person in cruel manner, every little snub he pays back and so on. He always holds a grudge, and he can be just so petty about every single little bit of revenge he takes, worse he can sometimes imagine you did something wrong to him and get "revenge" on you anyways even if you didn't do anything, or isn't the person he originally wanted revenge on, or whatever. He will always insist on his own cruel ways of settling anything and won't forgive anyone for anything.

The Murder Thief
This guy likes to take valuable treasures from museums and such because they're shiny and he likes them. But he won't be subtle or a classy burglar....he will just kill everyone in his way, take the thing and leave so he can add it to his collection. He doesn't care about the blood he spills as long as he gets to have a bunch of shiny treasures in his collection to look at. and he kills anyone trying to take anything form his collection as well. simple but it works.

The Torture Connoisseur
This guy doesn't want to kill people. No, no no, peoples lives are too valuable to waste on that. No, they need torturing, why kill when you can create beautiful works of people broken by pure torture? It needs to be high quality too, only the best kind of people to torture and break you see, has to be very specific so as to create the most beautifully broken kind of person from it, with maybe a bit of irony in there, perhaps involving something important to them being being utterly destroyed, the tools of their agony have to the highest quality, and the kidnapping has to be done just right to stay below the radar, and best to drag out the agony as long as possible, having to squeeze every bit of art from it, because its not just the end result but the journey to their broken down state thats also important, and if he is confronted by anything similar to the Joker's work he'd be all like "bah thats so mainstream, so basic, come on have some creativity, the stupid gleeful evil clown gimmick again? Ugh. I prefer more indie works, thank you."

Excellent uses.

[blackjack50]

I'm not sure why a casual disregard would have to have a hidden element of pleasure.

Let's say, for example, that you want to see what you're doing, but it's dark because the sun has gone down and therefore no more light is flooding through your windows. You get up, go over to the wall, and flip a switch to turn on some lights.

You have a casual disregard for the act of flipping a switch. It doesn't bother you morally, but you probably don't have any sort of secret, deep-seated pleasure from doing it, either.

A neutral person probably WOULD balk at flipping that switch if it ALSO killed somebody every time it was flipped. But maybe not, if he wanted to see badly enough. Probably, though; neutral people USUALLY don't disregard life quite that much.

An evil person would flip the switch and not even bat an eye at the increased cost of "killing somebody" over just the act itself.

Now, you could ALSO have an evil person who reveled in the killing, and who would look for any excuse to flip that switch. Or just flip it repeatedly for no other reason than the pleasure of killing people. But that isn't necessary; a man who has no problem flipping the switch as many times as is convenient for him, but doesn't revel in it any more than you revel in turning on lights in your house IRL, is still evil for his utter disregard for the lives he snuffs out with each flip of the light switch.

The switch analogy is a good one for representing good vs evil. Because evil does see life as the switch. Or any other moral conundrum.

[EndlessKng]

So this was sort of touched on, but evil can be done (and playably) by disregarding others' needs for your own. I played a martial artist in a non DnD game who got voted CE by the party not because he intentionally killed people for glee, but because he didn't hesitate to do so, nor did he follow rhyme or reason beyond "vague threat must die." He killed when it suited him, and how it suited him, without disregard for concerns like the other perspective or laws or whether it was the right time, but also didn't slaughter every random passerby because it didn't serve his desires to do so. They weren't a threat and weren't a challenge and some of them could help him find someone who was one or both of those things.

But YMMV.

[Xuc Xac]

So I’m have an idea for a character. He is a drunken monk. He is haunted by his past (thus the drinking) and is generally a greedy alcoholic. He doesn’t believe in the established law or order. He doesn’t care about hurting people. He didn’t come from a monastery, but instead learned his fighting in a brawling pit in his home city.

So what are some other ideas y’all have? Things that aren’t the joker.

"I drink because I feel bad about the stuff I've done, but I'm not about to quit doing bad stuff if I need to" sounds like Chaotic Neutral. Chaotic Evil doesn't feel guilty. When CE is "haunted by their past", it usually means "other people feel bad about what I did so they're hunting me down to make me pay".

[Pauly]

With regards to the OP, the character sounds a lot like Jackie Chan “The Drunken Master” and “The Drunken Master II”, except Jackie’s character is CG, not CE. But if you watch those movies you see that Jackie’s character is on the path to CE before the redemption story arc.

On a more general note, another way to play CE is internally LE, but externally CE. The character has a a strong series of rukes he/she follows. Those rules are logical and consistent only to the character and to other characters it appears illogical and inconsistent. If you watch the movie Chopper, about real life psychopath Mark “Chopper” Read you can see how Mark”s twisted internal logic looks chaotic to bservers.

[Tanarii]

You left out the most important piece of information: what edition are you playing? Chaotic evil means different things in different editions. Heck, alignment means different things in different editions.

In 5e, for example, Chaotic Evil means a character who's typical, but not perfectly consistent, behavior is to "act with arbitrary violence, spurred by their greed, hatred, or bloodlust." but it's only one of 5 personality traits, and due to the way alignment works in 5e, the other four will generally take precedence when they come into play.

[Pleh]

"I drink because I feel bad about the stuff I've done, but I'm not about to quit doing bad stuff if I need to" sounds like Chaotic Neutral. Chaotic Evil doesn't feel guilty. When CE is "haunted by their past", it usually means "other people feel bad about what I did so they're hunting me down to make me pay".

I disagree. Feeling remorse is not a sign that a character is not evil. It's an indicator, not a determining factor. It's perfectly reasonable for an evil character to feel conflicted about their actions.

If not, the Darth Vader was a neutral character, just because of his conflicted feelings.

I call BS. Vader is one of the showcase examples of evil characters. His remorse and even self loathing for his own conduct don't change that.

What really separates an evil character from a borderline neutral character is more about how far past their moral compunctions they are willing to push themselves. It's just easier if you don't have any moral compunctions.

We need to be careful not to define evil as having a morally deaf, psychopathic/sociopathic lack of empathy. Not only are such character capable of being anti heroes, but it overlooks the large cast of villains who are more complex.

[Tanarii]

Not only villains, some protagonists.

Spoiler: First Law series spoiler

Show

Logan, the Bloody nine, from Abercrombie's First Law series, by 5e D&D alignment would absolutely be a Chaotic Evil character. He is (not perfectly consistently) arbitrarily violent, spurred on by bloodlust. But he's definitely remorseful at this point in his life, and he tries to keep a lid on it.

Of course, as a multiple personality disorder berserker it could also be fair to define him as having two different alignments.

[sktarq]

"I drink because I feel bad about the stuff I've done"

is all that can be covered in "haunted".
He could have watched his whole group of buddies ripped apart mind, soul. and eventually body slowly by a mind flayer amusing himself and savoring their fear...
he could have been exposed to even a mild battle in the blood war and realized just how small he is the multiverse
he could have fallen under the influence of an enchanter who wanted muscle and can not trust anyone, himself, or his own senses and dealing with the dark side of plato's cave is too much so he blanks it out with booze.

[NNescio]

IWe need to be careful not to define evil as having a morally deaf, psychopathic/sociopathic lack of empathy. Not only are such character capable of being anti heroes, but it overlooks the large cast of villains who are more complex.

Or straight up heroes, even. Like Peter Pan (but he has a "permanently has the outlook of a child" excuse to go with it). The original Barrie version, I mean.

Also maybe some incarnations of the Doctor.

[blackjack50]

"I drink because I feel bad about the stuff I've done, but I'm not about to quit doing bad stuff if I need to" sounds like Chaotic Neutral. Chaotic Evil doesn't feel guilty. When CE is "haunted by their past", it usually means "other people feel bad about what I did so they're hunting me down to make me pay".

But that’s the thing. If it is descriptive...then the actions someone makes are very important.

[Vhaidara]

My CE character is a complete psychopath. She enjoys watching other people hurt and bleed and die. She's also afflicted with a curse that binds her to kill VERY regularly (one person per hour that she's alive, yes she can bank kills ahead of time so she can do things like sleep) in exchange for which when she dies she is resurrected in the Abyss, where she has to Doomguy her way out.

How do I make her play with the party? Simple. Sure, she wouldn't mind seeing you bleed, but there are OTHER people who are MORE fun to see bleed. Like demons. You show her to an infestation of demons and you've now got a good friend who you can call on ANY time you need someone cut up.

Why is she like this? Because the aforementioned curse was applied when she was 12, and she spent the next 6 subjective years (6000 objective years) essentially learning to speedrun from where she resurrects to the nearest portal out of the Abyss, carving a bloody path on her way. And over the course of that, she died. Again. And again. And again. She does not see life as something valuable, because she knows how cheap it is

[Calthropstu]

I feel CE and CN gets misplayed more than any other alignment. You can be CE without ever killing.

Breaking into homes and stealing everything of value is CE. Finding dirt on a politician and blackmailing them is CE. Or faking dirt on a politician for that matter.

CE means you will do things that are against the law that will likely hurt others. Killing is the extreme of this, but a rapist, thief or random street thug can all fall into this category as well.

[Psyren]

OP - have you read the Chaotic Evil Handbook? Basically a bunch of forumites (I believe starting with Red Fel's approach to LE) decided to take one or more of the alignments and provide an in-depth guide on defining what it is and what it isn't, ways to play it in D&D, prominent examples from fiction and how it would function in a group environment, all of which would be valuable information for roleplaying that alignment in a party setting.

[Themrys]

I feel CE and CN gets misplayed more than any other alignment. You can be CE without ever killing.

Breaking into homes and stealing everything of value is CE. Finding dirt on a politician and blackmailing them is CE. Or faking dirt on a politician for that matter.

CE means you will do things that are against the law that will likely hurt others. Killing is the extreme of this, but a rapist, thief or random street thug can all fall into this category as well.

I suppose that is because most people want their character to be CG or LG, and if you define "evil" as someone who does evil things all the time and is a sadistic psychopath, there's more of a distance to your character that you want to be good. (Let's say, if the OotS were characters in a real game and the players of Haley and Vaarsuvius wanted their characters to be firmly established as Good - that would require Belkar to be as he is, because someone whose player openly says he's evil but who kills just a bit more callously than V and steals from just a bit more and a bit poorer people than Haley does ... would make them look not so very different.)



What I would find interesting to play is an evil "hero" who doesn't know he's evil. Just someone who thinks nothing of torturing enemies to get information, who always kills all the goblins in the camp, even if some are babies, et cetera.
Such a character could easily be chaotic, since things that make adventuring life easier such as exposing criminals by simply breaking into their homes to gather evidence should also count as chaotic. No need to be the Joker.

Evil is like poison - there needs only be a drop of poison in a glass of water so that it is poisoned, while a drop of water in a glass of poison won't change the fact it is poison. No need to overdo it in roleplaying.

[Psyren]

Finding dirt on a politician and blackmailing them is CE.

That depends; if the politician themself is corrupt and you're using the dirt on them for personal gain while allowing them to continue harming people, yes, that's likely CE. But if you're using them as a pawn in order to expose more corruption deeper in the system, your actions could be CN or even CG depending on the ultimate goal/motivation.