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  1. - Top - End - #1
    Titan in the Playground
     
    DrowGuy

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    Question Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    I know that good and evil characters hate each other and they're always fighting all the time but is it possible that they can get along?
    Last edited by Bartmanhomer; 2020-12-14 at 10:22 PM.
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    Bugbear in the Playground
     
    PaladinGuy

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Short term with a common goal? Sure. Long-term no.

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    DrowGuy

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by Jason View Post
    Short term with a common goal? Sure. Long-term no.
    Can you explain a bit more please.
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    Bugbear in the Playground
     
    RedKnightGirl

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    d6 Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Ok I play a neutral evil sorcerer. The cleric in the group is chaotic good.

    I have saved him 3 times. By saving myself. This fool is talking me up as a redemption case.

    We get along I brought him to a meeting from a halfling he was there to witness a good deed I on the other hand was recovering money for thieves guild. Not a good act. His presence allowed me to case the place. If he had been fired upon. They didn't I would have had an evil deed on him.

    So long as I do curb my activity we get along.

    If I cast deeper slumber and then the next round coup de grace with my spear. He may turn on me at the least refuse to heal me magically.

    If I go and slaughter the halfling he may have me leave the party if I was an NPC.
    9 wisdom true neutral cleric you know you want me in your adventuring party


  5. - Top - End - #5
    Ettin in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Yes.

    Good characters are often fairly judgemental so Evil characters might have to not be overt in their evil but then many evil characters aren't that overt to begin with.

    But even when the evil character is not subtle they can still get along with good characters providing they share a long term common interest.
    For instance a Good Druid and an Evil Druid might disagree on approaches to protecting a forest but if both agree it needs protecting they could be friends (or at least get along) and working together they might be very successful.

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    NecromancerGuy

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Yes.

    Both in the short term, and the long term.

    The main realization is that characters are people and people are complex. They may make compromises between their various objectives. To maintain their friendship the saint might forgo some pro bono work that the sinner would find pointless and the sinner might forgo some of their worse vices to accommodate the saint's frail stomach.

    And that is assuming the characters are peers. They don't have to be. A BBEG might only be doing all this evil in order to provide a better life for their innocent child. Or a human fighter might be keeping a halfling ranger in line (see the site's webcomic).

  7. - Top - End - #7
    Orc in the Playground
     
    Devil

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by Bartmanhomer View Post
    I know that good and evil characters hate each other and they're always fighting all the time but is it possible that they can get along?
    Absolutely. They will need a shared value or goal, mind you, but they can definitely get along. It might be a shared alignment (I.E. a Lawful Good Angel and a Lawful Evil Devil teaming up to deal with a Balor), a common enemy (see last example), or something elses entirely.

    For example:

    _Out in the back end of Nowhere, there is the small village of Bogpeat. Bogpeat has a militia, which is led by a lawful evil marshal. The man is a harsh but fair commander, who loves his home and does all he can to keep it safe. If that means ordering some of his militia to their deaths, so be it. (He typically won't, there aren't enough people in Bogpeat to be able to throw away militia willy-nilly.)
    _In Bogpeat also resides a chaotic good bard. He wants the village to prosper and it's people to be happy and healthy. As such he knows a few healing spells, and commonly performs at the local tavern. He dislikes the way the marshal treats the members of Bogpeat's militia, and often heals them from their punishments. The marshal doesn't like this, but also doesn't raise a fuss because he would rather have the militia be healthy and able to fight at full strength at a moment's notice. The bard also grits his teeth and looks the other way when the marshal takes a captured enemy to the edge of Bogpeat to torture/interrogate them.
    _Neither man likes the other. They get along, because they both want Bogpeat to thrive and recognize the value the other brings. (The marshal sees the healing and morale from the bard, while the bard sees a strong and dedicated militia defending Bogpeat.)
    Last edited by Laughing Dog; 2020-12-15 at 12:15 AM.
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  8. - Top - End - #8
    Ogre in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    People of incompatible morality can "get along" as long as the situation does not draw attention to and require them to act in accordance of open conflict of their values.

    They can also seem to "get along" when one or all parties are being intellectually dishonest or deceitful about their motives. A lot of scenarios where "good" and "evil" seem to get along are founded on all involved parties being hypocrites: the "good" is not all that good, the "evil" is not all that evil, they share common goals and common values and are more committed to those than their declared morality.

  9. - Top - End - #9
    Ogre in the Playground
     
    Batcathat's Avatar

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by Bartmanhomer View Post
    I know that good and evil characters hate each other and they're always fighting all the time but is it possible that they can get along?
    Yes, I think so. While I don't believe we have objective good and evil in the real world, we certainly have a lot of different opinions and sometimes people get along despite not really sharing a lot of values or opinions. I've been close friends with people I disagree with on most things and haven't been able to stand some people who agree with me on almost everything.

    Of course, it depends a lot on the people in question. If the Good person is the super-judgemental type and/or the Evil person is the kicking puppies for funsies type, it probably won't work.

  10. - Top - End - #10
    Ogre in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Sure they can get along. I would even say they have better chances of getting along than pure evil groups, as "evil" often is linked to some kind of behavior many people of all alignments don't like and the more of them you have, the more likely a problem will occur.

    The longest running D&D group i played in had a mixed good evil party. And it only created a problem once : One of the players wanted to multiclass into Paladin but we played 3.5 and the "don't associate with evil" clause would kick in. Before, one of the evil teammembers was his characters best friend with perfect teamwork but suddenly it was relevant.

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    As usual, the question is too vague and unspecified to give a meaningful answer. Who are these good and evil people? Why do we call them good and evil? What are they doing? How much do they know about each other? What context are they interacting in? Once we've established that, we can say something of value.
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    Ettin in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Good and evil characters can get along forever.
    You just need the evil character to not be a representation of ultimate evil which constantly and intentionally wreaks havoc on a wide scale(those evil characters usually can not get along evil ones either).
    Last edited by noob; 2020-12-15 at 04:32 AM.

  13. - Top - End - #13
    Ogre in the Playground
     
    Planetar

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    I will assume the neutral zone is small enough to allow for "evil" characters that are not "I like to backstab peoples because seeing the world burn is fun".

    (1) The good character might like/love the evil character so much they will do anything they can to redeem them. E.g in Avatar TLA, the initial antagonist (Zuko) is evil, but mentored by a good aligned character (Iroh). The mentor used to be evil too but redeemed himself, and now want to help his nephew to do the same.

    (2) The other way around, an evil character might chose to maintain a good behaviour because they love/like the good character enough to do anything they can to remain with them.

    The most common situation being a mix of the two. The evil character value enough their relationship with the good character enough to temperate their evil behaviour, while the good character might turn a blind eye on some of the evil character behaviour as he hopes they will eventually redeem themselves, or at least do more good than evil.

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    Troll in the Playground
     
    Flumph

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by Morty View Post
    As usual, the question is too vague and unspecified to give a meaningful answer. Who are these good and evil people? Why do we call them good and evil? What are they doing? How much do they know about each other? What context are they interacting in? Once we've established that, we can say something of value.
    This. I mean to answer it trivially - yes, some good characters can get along with some evil characters. Some of them can't. But that's not really saying anything.

    I think sometimes people focus too much only on whether the party gets along on a personal level though. You can't really ignore evil in the long run and not be somewhat complicit yourself, unless it's evil in name only.

    Like imagine:
    "So I know this guy, and he's a serial killer."
    "I haven't tipped off the police though, there are bigger fish to fry."
    "And besides, he's never tried to kill me or anyone I know personally."
    "I don't help him with the murders, of course!"
    "I mean, I do share an apartment with him, and we're co-owners in a business, and I helped him with his YouTube channel, but that's it."
    Last edited by icefractal; 2020-12-15 at 04:58 AM.

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    Firbolg in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    People of incompatible morality can "get along" as long as the situation does not draw attention to and require them to act in accordance of open conflict of their values.

    They can also seem to "get along" when one or all parties are being intellectually dishonest or deceitful about their motives. A lot of scenarios where "good" and "evil" seem to get along are founded on all involved parties being hypocrites: the "good" is not all that good, the "evil" is not all that evil, they share common goals and common values and are more committed to those than their declared morality.
    It helps that alignment doesn't require declared morality. You can certainly have a character who does bad things regularly without actively singing the praises of evil or putting forth explicit moral justifications mandating those actions. Similarly, a character might be inclined to be self-sacrificingly helpful to others and disinclined towards acts that cause suffering or harm without their explicit reason being the morality of the actions. 'I like helping people so I do', 'I'm happier when the people around me are happy, so why would I do something to make them suffer?', etc.

    If the particular actions that got the evil person their alignment don't threaten the community that the generally good person is a part of, then alignment can be a non-issue between them. 'Yeah, Fred killed his own son, that's really sad and I bet he's struggling with it. Why should that mean that I abandon him and stop being his friend?'
    Last edited by NichG; 2020-12-15 at 04:57 AM.

  16. - Top - End - #16
    Ogre in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    I mean, alignment by itself barely touches on the conclusion about how two characters will interact. You need a lot more information than that.

    For one thing, how fanatical are they? A good character vould simply be altruistic and an idealist, or they could be an aggressive, borderline murderhobo type of church inquisitor. Likewise, an evil character can be a mustache twirling enemy of all life, or just a pragmatic survivor who ultimately puts his own needs before others.

    As others have pointed out, we have to also establish goals and motivations. Even when they would normally be natural enemies, the CG vigilante and the LE dictator commonly team up against a larger threat to society, because both camps place a high priority on the security of civilization (if for very different reasons).

    Alignment is really adjacent to the question of mutual cooperation. Determine personality, bonds, flaws, and ideals (regardless what system you are playing), and then use those to determine a character's goals, motivations, alignment, and their willingness to cooperate
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  17. - Top - End - #17
    Barbarian in the Playground
     
    RedWizardGuy

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    I find good and evil characters can exist perfectly fine in the same party. I have played an evil character in a majority good party, and it is easy to make work. Because it was clear my number one concern was the safety of my team mates. Sure, we had differences in opinion on how we treat prisoners, other peoples property, and what constitutes an innocent, but at the end of the day, I could only accumulate the wealth and power I desired, by having a group of people I could trust implicitly not to stab me in my sleep, and guard me from the beings whose knowledge I sought to plunder. And I could only do that by not treading too heavily on their own values and beliefs. In turn they were willing to overlook my occasional callousness and pragmatism.

    Trust is the key. Adventurers by their nature go in to life and death situations daily, and if you are going to do that, you have to be absolutely confident you can trust the guy at your back. Because this guy is going to be in your blind spot when you fight, he will be watching over you when you sleep, he will be holding the rope you are using to climb down a cliff face, and it will be his word you will be relying on when he says "this door isn't trapped". If there is even an ounce of distrust, your character would be unwilling to place his life so regularly in the hands of another, and in that case, you wouldn't be willing to step out the door with him. Sure, an evil character might be self-serving, but your are not served by hanging around heavily armed combat specialists who do not trust you - establishing and maintaining trust with your collegues is the most self-serving thing you can do in such situations!

    That doesn't mean an evil character has to be 'boring' or hide his nature to hang out with a good party. No matter how good your companions are, there will be times when they find the good approach to resolve a situation just that little bit too hard or time consuming. That's when you step in and offer the more expedient option. Sure, sometimes you have to slightly bend the truth, but there will be plenty of times when a good character will allow the devil on his shoulder to convince him. This especially works if you are good friends out of game - in a past session, my friends were laughing out of game at the somewhat twisted version of events I was spinning to justify taking the faster and more ruthless option, while painting it as the only right and logical course of action (when it of course wasn't). I find it removes the element of distrust when you are "evil in plain sight". If you don't hide being that bit more ruthless and pragmatic, and openly suggest less palatable solutions to problem, then your allies don't need to worry about you hiding evil plans.

  18. - Top - End - #18
    Ogre in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    It helps that alignment doesn't require declared morality.
    *snort*

    Of course it doesn't because the Alignment system is about measuring a player character's actual actions and weighing them independently of any declaration.

    I wasn't talking about that.

    I'm talking of much more general human behaviour where people claim they are for this or against that, but when push comes to shove, fail to act in accordance. You know. Everyday hypocrisy. Like openly claiming you're against bad behaviour X, then when your nominal friend does X, brushing it aside, pretending they didn't really mean it and trying to forget about it, because social cost of taking action against your nominal friend would be too much effort.

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    Ettin in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by Pleh View Post
    I mean, alignment by itself barely touches on the conclusion about how two characters will interact. You need a lot more information than that.

    For one thing, how fanatical are they? A good character vould simply be altruistic and an idealist, or they could be an aggressive, borderline murderhobo type of church inquisitor. Likewise, an evil character can be a mustache twirling enemy of all life, or just a pragmatic survivor who ultimately puts his own needs before others.

    As others have pointed out, we have to also establish goals and motivations. Even when they would normally be natural enemies, the CG vigilante and the LE dictator commonly team up against a larger threat to society, because both camps place a high priority on the security of civilization (if for very different reasons).

    Alignment is really adjacent to the question of mutual cooperation. Determine personality, bonds, flaws, and ideals (regardless what system you are playing), and then use those to determine a character's goals, motivations, alignment, and their willingness to cooperate
    A pragmatic survivor that puts their own needs first is technically neutral if it is a npc(there is a lot of things that are evil only when you are a player character)

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    Ogre in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    *snort*

    Of course it doesn't because the Alignment system is about measuring a player character's actual actions and weighing them independently of any declaration.

    I wasn't talking about that.

    I'm talking of much more general human behaviour where people claim they are for this or against that, but when push comes to shove, fail to act in accordance. You know. Everyday hypocrisy. Like openly claiming you're against bad behaviour X, then when your nominal friend does X, brushing it aside, pretending they didn't really mean it and trying to forget about it, because social cost of taking action against your nominal friend would be too much effort.
    But that is the thing. Alignment describes action.

    Siplificated :

    You can't be good if you do Evil thing X.
    But you can very well be good if you don't care whether other people do Evil thing X or not.


    And if you are good but don't care about X and your partner is Evil because he regularly does X, you can easily work together without anyone being a hypocrite.

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    Flumph

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by Bartmanhomer View Post
    I know that good and evil characters hate each other and they're always fighting all the time but is it possible that they can get along?
    It's extremely difficult to get along with evil people because they're selfish and will betray your trust if they have that opportunity. It's what evil is. Deep down all evil people care about is themselves and sometimes they don't even care about that.

    This is why good people, people who care about others, have constant problems with evil. Best case scenario the good people can convince the evil ones to change for the better. Worst case you lock the evil people up before they harm others.
    Last edited by SwordCoastTaxi; 2020-12-15 at 07:44 AM.

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    Ogre in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by Satinavian View Post
    But that is the thing. Alignment describes action.

    Siplificated :

    You can't be good if you do Evil thing X.
    But you can very well be good if you don't care whether other people do Evil thing X or not.


    And if you are good but don't care about X and your partner is Evil because he regularly does X, you can easily work together without anyone being a hypocrite.
    Willingly "turning a blind eye" to out-of-alignment actions, is an action in the context of the alignment system. You can't knowingly not care about your partner's misconduct in the way you describe without it impacting on your alignment.

    This is still not what I was talking about. I was talking about people's declared morality conflicting with their behaviour: where "good" get along with "evil" because no-one genuinely acts according to conflicting values. This thing obviously happens in games and real life both, before needing to take any alignment system into account.

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    Ogre in the Playground
     
    Planetar

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by SwordCoastTaxi View Post
    It's extremely difficult to get along with evil people because they're selfish and will betray your trust if they have that opportunity. It's what evil is. Deep down all evil people care about is themselves and sometimes they don't even care about that.
    It's a very restrictive view of evilness.

    Where do you put the slave owner which is the most honest and trustful person (with peoples of his race), always helpful and generous with stranger (of his race), and fighting for the peace and prosperity of the kingdom, except that he has plentiful of slaves (or other race) that he considers as animals he owns fully and entirely, and exploit them up to their last breath for extra money?

    Since slavery is evil as per D&D rules, he would be evil by RAW. But, assuming you're part of the good race, he will not backstab you or try to exploit you personally, and might even sacrifice himself and/or his fortune to protect you in an act of generosity.

    But then, maybe you would classify him as neutral, keeping the evil alignment only for actual psychopaths incapable of empathy with anyone other than themselves. In which case yes, any relationship with an evil character is a lost cause.
    Last edited by MoiMagnus; 2020-12-15 at 09:02 AM.

  24. - Top - End - #24
    Firbolg in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    *snort*

    Of course it doesn't because the Alignment system is about measuring a player character's actual actions and weighing them independently of any declaration.

    I wasn't talking about that.

    I'm talking of much more general human behaviour where people claim they are for this or against that, but when push comes to shove, fail to act in accordance. You know. Everyday hypocrisy. Like openly claiming you're against bad behaviour X, then when your nominal friend does X, brushing it aside, pretending they didn't really mean it and trying to forget about it, because social cost of taking action against your nominal friend would be too much effort.
    People aren't really privy to the reasons they do things, so often when they're asked to explain their stance, the words are a local approximation to how they feel in that context and not a rule that they follow. I don't know if I'd call it hypocrisy if someone acts a certain way, is called upon to explain that action, and then acts inconsistently with the evoked explanation in the future. Its the fundamental failure of post-hoc explanation, but it's only hypocrisy if someone actively pushes that explanation as a stance or expectation on the behavior of others.

    And while that's something to be expected of paladins and clerics whose calling is fundamentally to be community role models of some form, there's no reason why other characters have to define their moral code verbally first and then follow it rather than just acting in the moment.

    And if you're not doing things in the context of stated codes and violations, it opens up many more ways to relate to the behavior of others rather than just deciding to be 'for it' or 'against it'.
    Last edited by NichG; 2020-12-15 at 09:10 AM.

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    DwarfClericGuy

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Your alignment is how you behave towards people you don't care about.

    Evil characters can love their innocent children. And the children can love them back.

    Same goes for friends, lovers, and others who they consider important/close to them.

    Evil != sociopathic

  26. - Top - End - #26
    Ogre in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Nonsense post-hoc rationalizations of behaviour are one of the classic examples of hypocrisy, so you're wasting a lot of words to not even disagree with me. Bringing up paladins or clerics is completely pointless, because a persob doesn't have to be either to make moral declarations.

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    Firbolg in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    Nonsense post-hoc rationalizations of behaviour are one of the classic examples of hypocrisy, so you're wasting a lot of words to not even disagree with me. Bringing up paladins or clerics is completely pointless, because a persob doesn't have to be either to make moral declarations.
    A person doesn't have to make moral declarations at all.

  28. - Top - End - #28
    Ogre in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    As stated initially there are no requirements on knowledge of the others actions. The unscrupulous Miller could be loved by his family and friends all the while tricking others out of their coin or extra grain. There is no paladinesque mandate that the friends and family rabidly police the actions of those around them in order to fall into their neat little Good category. They act on principles of kindness and selflessness in dealing with those around them both friends and foreigners and so get assigned the Good label. The Miller acts selfishly to better him and his at the expense of others and so gets assigned evil
    If all rules are suggestions what happens when I pass the save?

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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    Nonsense post-hoc rationalizations of behaviour are one of the classic examples of hypocrisy
    I don't think he was talking about the same post-hoc rationalization as you do.

    Example:
    I believe that THING is bad <= The rationalisation I think NichG is talking about.
    But my friend does THING but that's ok because of REASON <= The rationalisation you seems to be talking about.

    When you make a moral declaration, you are rationalising your thoughts and trying to find a simple and concise way to present them, but necessarily approximative.

    PS: This discussion really make me think about game AIs. When you code a game AI, you will put some negative values to some actions to discourage the AI from taking them, but (1) other positive factors might compensate for those negative values in some contexts (2) special procedures will downright ignore those values in exceptional situations.
    Last edited by MoiMagnus; 2020-12-15 at 10:29 AM.

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    Firbolg in the Playground
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    Default Re: Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

    Can, say, siblings with different political, religious, moral, or ethical values get along? Absolutely!

    Can siblings with similar political, religious, moral, and ethical values fight? Absolutely!

    Alignment has very little bearing as a predictor of such behaviors.

    Quote Originally Posted by OldTrees1 View Post
    Yes.

    Both in the short term, and the long term.

    The main realization is that characters are people and people are complex.
    Agreed. Characters and people are so much more than alignment caricatures.

    Quote Originally Posted by Satinavian View Post
    Sure they can get along. I would even say they have better chances of getting along than pure evil groups, as "evil" often is linked to some kind of behavior .
    "Good" is also linked to some kind of behavior - for adventurers, that is usually "killing anything that disagrees with us, and calling it 'evil'.".

    As good characters can disagree with one another, I find that good characters are usually bad for party cohesion.

    Quote Originally Posted by NichG View Post
    If the particular actions that got the evil person their alignment don't threaten the community that the generally good person is a part of, then alignment can be a non-issue between them. 'Yeah, Fred killed his own son, that's really sad and I bet he's struggling with it. Why should that mean that I abandon him and stop being his friend?'
    Quote Originally Posted by SwordCoastTaxi View Post
    It's extremely difficult to get along with evil people because they're selfish and will betray your trust if they have that opportunity. It's what evil is. Deep down all evil people care about is themselves and sometimes they don't even care about that.
    Rather than Fred, how about this example:

    Imagine two "defenders of the people". Both love their xenophobic clansmen. They work side by side defending them from external threats.

    One is good, the other evil. The evil one would murder the babies of their enemies, poison their enemies' wells, sell their enemies disease-infested blankets, etc. The good one would not.

    They can get along perfectly as best friends for a lifetime. Or they could have a falling out - possibly over "alignment", possibly over a girl.

    Alignment is not a synonym for personality.

    Quote Originally Posted by Democratus View Post
    Your alignment is how you behave towards people you don't care about.

    Evil characters can love their innocent children. And the children can love them back.

    Same goes for friends, lovers, and others who they consider important/close to them.

    Evil != sociopathic
    I vote this "best answer in thread".
    Last edited by Quertus; 2020-12-15 at 10:34 AM.

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