When "it's what my character would do" is actually true.

[Cyberserker]

Getting pretty sick of people judging my CN in character actions when my IRL alignment is chaotic neutral. Look, spending all my adventuring money funding a charity orphanage to turn the kids into my own little Oliver Twist style thieves guild is the literal definition of chaotic neutral. I'm committing an act of both helping and corrupting people simultaneously and breaking the law in the process. What's more chaotic neutral than that? Please validate me so my DM can see and doesn't change my alignment. What, you thought there would be a pretense? I'm chaotic neutral, remember? We're the most honest people in the game. We're not on anyone's side.

[Velaryon]

I've been fortunate enough to not have to play with too many people who use "it's what my character would do" as an excuse for being a jerk at the table. And those that I have had to deal with are generally long in the past at this point.

The first thing to come to mind for me in terms of legit "it's what my character would do" moments is actually from the very first D&D game I ever played in, back in the early days of 3rd edition. Our party had ended up in a forest full of evil lycanthropes, who managed to capture the party (thanks to a weretiger pouncing my fighter while he was climbing into the rope trick and then threatening to end me if the others didn't surrender). The party cleric had his holy symbol built into his armor and refused to remove it or hand it over, even with the DM urging him OOC. So the lycanthropes killed him, which the player accepted gracefully, and brought in a new character.

[Pex]

It's not a question of what it is you are actually doing. It's a question of how disruptive you are being to the game. Are you derailing the campaign plot everyone else agreed to play and the DM wants to run? Are you monopolizing game time with your own personal story, with or without continuously passing notes with the DM? Are you stealing from the party or keeping found loot to finance yourself and/or your schemes? When the party agrees to do something do you deliberately don't do it or do what you want anyway that happens to ruin the plan? Do you withhold from the party vital information learned? Do you mock other players in whatever decisions or actions they take, especially when it's to help an NPC or otherwise be a 'goody-two-shoes'? When other party members are talking to NPCs do you do or say something that ticks off the NPCs and ruin the conversation, with or without causing a combat encounter?

The more yeses you answer the more you're being a disruptive donkey cavity and that it what everyone is yelling at you about, not because you want to be Fagin of "Oliver Twist".

[Pauly]

Getting pretty sick of people judging my CN in character actions when my IRL alignment is chaotic neutral. Look, spending all my adventuring money funding a charity orphanage to turn the kids into my own little Oliver Twist style thieves guild is the literal definition of chaotic neutral. I'm committing an act of both helping and corrupting people simultaneously and breaking the law in the process. What's more chaotic neutral than that? Please validate me so my DM can see and doesn't change my alignment. What, you thought there would be a pretense? I'm chaotic neutral, remember? We're the most honest people in the game. We're not on anyone's side.

Theft is evil.
Recruiting and training orphans to break the law is evil.
Creating a guild that follows your rules is lawful.

Nothing about what you’re doing is chaotic or neutral.

[Mastikator]

Your roleplaying chops are not in question. You're the author of your character, if you decide to make a character that would do disruptive things then you are a disruptive player.

Also being on "not on anyone's side" is disruptive. You're supposed to be on the party's side.

[Vahnavoi]

The thread title and the question asked have next to nothing to do with one another.

Ideally "it's what my character would do" is true of most or all you do with a character in a game... because that is basics of roleplaying. It's also the most common explanation for why you would do something in a game that you would not do outside of it... because your role dictates or suggests it. Duh.

The phrase gets a bad rep because some people use it to excuse dubious behaviour - in the exact same way people may use "it's just a game", "we're just playing" or "it's a joke" to excuse dubious behaviour. The thing to remember is that a lot of the time, it is just a game, you are just playing or it is a joke, so the behaviour is perfectly fine in that context.

So what, if anything, does this have to do with OP's conundrum?

Well. A lot of D&D players struggle with few basic notions about Chaotic alignments. Despite the fact that they were spelled out in 1st edition AD&D that codified the system. Mostly because 2nd edition forward kept the same terms and framework but changed the definitions, to the point where Chaotic Neutral was called Alignment of lunatics and madmen. This isn't at all what it was about in 1st edition.

What was it about? Individualism and radical freedom. On the level of characters, 1st edition calls the opposition as Law and Chaos being that of large, organized groups versus the individual. The opposition between Good and Evil is the opposition between promoting life and happiness (or "weal") versus promoting death and suffering (or "woe").

Chaotic Neutral, then, puts the concept and pursuit of individual freedom above that of Good and Evil - and might not believe in things such as "Good" and "Evil" to begin with. The balancing act between those things does not happen because it is the goal, but as a result of pursuing that individual freedom above all else, with neither malice nor strong desire to do good.

So, this thing about taking in orphaned kids to raise them to be your thieves' guild... is not "literal definition" of Chaotic Neutral at all. Thieves, in the original iteration, can be of any alignment except Lawful Good. Guilds and charities, meanwhile, imply large, organized groups - engaging in such activities implies Lawfulness. Thieves's guilds and Assassins' guilds are, on paper, archetypical Lawful Evil organizations - creating identity with and demanding loyalty to a group that's fundamentally decided other groups are deserving of exploitation for their benefit. In practice, members of these organizations might fail to be so because they don't actually follow their rules when it isn't to their individual benefit (no honor among thieves).

This a very basic observation anyone with two brain cells could make - highly individualistic people don't necessarily work well in a group. And indeed, the 1st edition books outright say this to prospecting game masters: general agreement and prolonged co-operation can only exist WITHIN an alignment category. Expecting it amidst people with radically different alignments is nonsense. This gaming trope where you have have party members with five different alignment? Yeah it was never meant to work. These kinds of set-ups naturally lead to a situation where two characters are diametrically opposed on some opinion. Why the Hell would the guy who places their individual freedom above all else got along well with, say, a religious militant who believes individual freedom should be subservient to common good?

Expecting 100% unproblematic group play, nevermind demanding it, is ridiculous. Yet that is exactly what a lot of D&D players expect and demand. They fail to get that this kind of "Everything is for the Party" mentality is not what Chaotic alignments are about.

[Satinavian]

If "It is what my character would do" is used i good faith, it is a solid argument. If actions are fiiting for th character and still a problem, the mistake was bringing that particular character into the group/adventure. That is why you always think about that before you start the game. And this is also how you fix those problems most of the time: Changing the PC when the party dynamics just doesn't work or when there is a bad fit to the campaign.

Now, sometimes that argument is used in bad faith. When players want to be disruptive for whatever reason and hide behind their character. But that is rare and in those cases the underlying problem is always something else.

[Mechalich]

From the perspective of the average human society a Chaotic Neutral individual is only slightly less disruptive than a Chaotic Evil one. Chaotic Neutral characters tend to make a huge mess simply because they prioritize their individual needs and wants above everything else. They aren't trying to hurt people, but if people get hurt - and people used to the norms of a lawful society who don't know what they are dealing with will get hurt - which turns them into a problem that society has to handle irrespective of the lack of maliciousness. This is exponentially more so when the Chaotic Neutral individual isn't helpless (humans aren't actually very good at surviving entirely on their own and individuals of this type have a tendency to end up in dreadful circumstances), but is the kind of deadly superhuman represented by a D&D adventurer with a few levels under their belt.

Accurately roleplaying a CN character is likely to result in that character doings things that causes society to come down upon them like a ton of bricks, almost certainly leading to exile, imprisonment, or execution, almost as rapidly as happens for a CE character (in some cases even more rapidly, because many CN individuals lack the malevolent paranoia that keeps CE individuals a step ahead of consequences). So really, playing a CN character, without some fairly significant restraints that pull the character away from the full-Slaadi experience, is almost as inherently disruptive as playing as CE one.

Considered this way "it's what my character would do" is not a defense, but rather ammunition for prosecution.

[Morgaln]

Theft is evil.
Recruiting and training orphans to break the law is evil.
Creating a guild that follows your rules is lawful.

Nothing about what you’re doing is chaotic or neutral.

And yet, Robin Hood is the textbook example for Chaotic Good even though he:

Robs people (robbing is arguably worse than stealing)
Recruits and trains people to break the law.
Creates an organized group of rebels that follow his rules.


Alignment was and is the worst idea ever implemented in D&D. It's trying to objectively measure something that is largely influenced by circumstances and subjective opinion. You cannot neatly compartmentalize morality.

[Pauly]

And yet, Robin Hood is the textbook example for Chaotic Good even though he:

Robs people (robbing is arguably worse than stealing)
Recruits and trains people to break the law.
Creates an organized group of rebels that follow his rules.


Alignment was and is the worst idea ever implemented in D&D. It's trying to objectively measure something that is largely influenced by circumstances and subjective opinion. You cannot neatly compartmentalize morality.

Legends vary but in the most common versions of the Robin Hood story the people he robs either gained their wealth through unfair taxation (nobles) or exploitation of the their charitable donations (abbots) and thus he is returning the wealth to the people from those who unjustly took it.
Nor does Robin raise or recruit people to break the law. People decide to join him because they have either been outlawed themselves, often unjustly, or they believe that John Lackland’s laws and taxations were an unjust usurpation of the true King Richard’s rights as king.
Nor are the outlaws of Sherwood Forest represented as a group trained to follow Robin’s orders in any disciplined way. They are presented as a group of like minded individuals that choose to work together to achieve their aim of returning the kingdom to as it was before John became regent in Richard’s absence. The outlaws are free to leave at any time and in some of the legends less well known outlaws return to their farms because of family reasons.

[Alcore]

IRL alignment? Unless you found a burning bush and it told you so I doubt that... besides; people are more of a spectrum.

What's more chaotic neutral than that? Please validate me so my DM can see and doesn't change my alignment. What, you thought there would be a pretense? I'm chaotic neutral, remember? We're the most honest people in the game.

1. Acting CN would be a start. The incident feels CE or even LE in some contexts.

2. No.

3. Yep.

4. Being the most honest is a strong choice of words. CN has a worse reputation than CE...

We're not on anyone's side.

And this flawed "That Guy" reasoning is why I have an easier time applying with CE than CN; the sheer amount of honesty is considered refreshing. Unlike that wildcard CN where you have no clue as to how evil or good they are going to habitually remain at.

Also being on "not on anyone's side" is disruptive. You're supposed to be on the party's side.

+1 to this and...

When you sit down at the table it is your job to make a member of the party. Even a CE nutjob needs to be a net positive for the group. Not only are you being disruptive but adversarial; what three (or more) positive things do you add by being you?

[Vahnavoi]

Again, in the original iteration, thieves can be of any alignment other than Lawful Good.

Robin Hood is the archetype of a Good thief, for reason Pauly mentioned. Whether he is the best archetype for Chaotic Good, specifically, is a bit more shaky. As Pauly notes, some of the elements are definitely there, with people joining the Merry Men out of their own free will, etc.. But just as well, in many versions, Robin Hood's actions are founded in opposition of unlawful governance. He is not fighting for freedom of individuals per se, he's figting to restore lawful rule of the land. Characterizing Robin as non-Lawful is hence mostly based on the notion that thievery is socially disruptive - or in D&D's terms, he's Neutral or Chaotic because his opponents are Lawful Evil. With rightful rules on the throne, the motive for Robin's thievery disappears, and so does the objection to him being Lawful Good.

---

EDIT:

IRL alignment? Unless you found a burning bush and it told you so I doubt that... besides; people are more of a spectrum.

The Law - Chaos axis is defined by opposition of large organized groups versus the individual. Nothing exotic is required to determine if a person is group-minded or individual-minded.

Good - Evil axis is defined by life & happiness versus death & destruction. Furthermore, detailed description of the individual alignments place the nine alignments within particular philosophical frameworks. Nothing exotic is required to determine if you are, say a classic Utilitarian versus a moral nihilist.

Also? This is the actual, original alignment graph. This is a two dimensional spectrum. It literally shows each alignment has an area to it and the rules explicitly call out that a person can move within an area without changing their overall alignment, such as a Lawful Good person leaning more towards Law at a point in their life and then towards Good at another. Saying "people are a spectrum" is no argument against Alignment, the actual implementation literally gives you a moral spectrum.

[Faily]

Again, in the original iteration, thieves can be of any alignment other than Lawful Good.

Robin Hood is the archetype of a Good thief, for reason Pauly mentioned. Whether he is the best archetype for Chaotic Good, specifically, is a bit more shaky. As Pauly notes, some of the elements are definitely there, with people joining the Merry Men out of their own free will, etc.. But just as well, in many versions, Robin Hood's actions are founded in opposition of unlawful governance. He is not fighting for freedom of individuals per se, he's figting to restore lawful rule of the land. Characterizing Robin as non-Lawful is hence mostly based on the notion that thievery is socially disruptive - or in D&D's terms, he's Neutral or Chaotic because his opponents are Lawful Evil. With rightful rules on the throne, the motive for Robin's thievery disappears, and so does the objection to him being Lawful Good.

The Chaotic-part of his alignment could also simply be because he's breaking against the established law of the land and society's expectations. In the Robin Hood-legend (and historically), Prince John *was* lawfully the temporary-regent until King Richard would return. He was lawfully tasked running the country on his brother's behalf. So while Robin Hood might fit Lawful Good (or Neutral Good) in many respects overall, he dedicates himself to a Chaotic-mission in D&D terms by fighting against a lawful ruler.


EDIT: To stay on topic; OP, what is the motivation for your character in creating this thieves guild of kids?

[KorvinStarmast]

It's not a question of what it is you are actually doing. It's a question of how disruptive you are being to the game. {snip} The more yeses you answer the more you're being a disruptive donkey cavity and that it what everyone is yelling at you about, not because you want to be Fagin of "Oliver Twist".

In a nutshell, yes. Teamwork is an implied part of playing in a D&D party.

The thread title and the question asked have next to nothing to do with one another.

We also are unsure how many people are in the party, what level of play they are in (low level, medium level, high level) and how many discussions OP has had with fellow players. We then get to this:

Please validate me so my DM can see and doesn't change my alignment.

Your DM is free to change your alignment if your behavior doesn't match your professed alignment; you've gotta walk the walk, not just talk the talk. But if you are at the state of the game where you are in argument mode with the DM, and the other players, I'd suggest that you take a step back and discover why you arrived at that point.
"Not getting along well with others" may be a below average grade at this point.
Re engage with your fellow players and see how your character can be an asset to the party.

Well. A lot of D&D players struggle with few basic notions about Chaotic alignments. Despite the fact that they were spelled out in 1st edition AD&D that codified the system. Mostly because 2nd edition forward kept the same terms and framework but changed the definitions, to the point where Chaotic Neutral was called Alignment of lunatics and madmen. This isn't at all what it was about in 1st edition.

When I was told by some 3.x ers that CN was sociopaths (having played a few CN in AD&D 1e) I was appalled at that lack of understanding. Since you could not have a good alignment and be a Thief in AD&D 1e, you had to pick something else. (CG rogues/thieves were more acceptable in 2e).
What you are advising me is that this is a product of the game morphing over time due to devs not grasping what was going on with the original two axis scheme. Aha, thanks, that makes sense. The other problem is that it's a continuum along two axes, there are Not Nine Boxes.

And indeed, the 1st edition books outright say this to prospecting game masters: general agreement and prolonged co-operation can only exist WITHIN an alignment category. Expecting it amidst people with radically different alignments is nonsense. This gaming trope where you have have party members with five different alignment? Yeah it was never meant to work.

Indeed. There's an old note that Arneson left during an interview about some back stabbing players creating a need as referee to come up with chaotic alignment and the restraints/penalties that imposed. I'll see if I can find that.

When you sit down at the table it is your job to make a member of the party. Even a CE nutjob needs to be a net positive for the group. Not only are you being disruptive but adversarial; what three (or more) positive things do you add by being you?

Nice framework. +1

[Kardwill]

Your roleplaying chops are not in question. You're the author of your character, if you decide to make a character that would do disruptive things then you are a disruptive player.

Also being on "not on anyone's side" is disruptive. You're supposed to be on the party's side.

Yeah, if a player's only explanation for ruining other players' fun is "it's what my character would do", then maybe play another character? He made that caracter, decided on its behavior, and then took decisions according to this. If the only way to be true to a character is to be disruptive and disrespectful of the other players' feelings, then I don't care if "it's what my character would do" is true or just an excuse, that character is a problem.

But frankly, finding a reason for which your CN thief type can get along with the group or follow the same adventure as the rest of the group should be easy, and even fun. We are social animals, and are pretty good at rationalizing the stuff we do IRL, and we have far more control about our characters' thoughts in the game. A playgroup can usually find goods reasons for the paladin and the rogue to play together, as long as the 2 players are willing to respect each other's fun, and willing to make some small adjustments about their characters' backstory/motivation/relations :)

And if you really want your character to do something that you know will cause friction (like recruiting kids into a city-based thieves guild when your PC group is a bunch of goody-2-shoes never staying at the same city), then discuss it with the players. See if you find a way for it to be interesting/fun/palatable for all at the table, or how to adjust the idea to not disrupt the flow of the game. Maybe the paladin will agree to "never find out as long as you don't do anything blatant, but please don't eat up too much gametime"? Sure, the surprise will be lost, but I think that surprising the other players with something they find unpleasant or disruptive is not worth it. Some predictability in your CN character is a small price to pay to avoid unpleasantness at the gametable.

[Morgaln]

Legends vary but in the most common versions of the Robin Hood story the people he robs either gained their wealth through unfair taxation (nobles) or exploitation of the their charitable donations (abbots) and thus he is returning the wealth to the people from those who unjustly took it.
Nor does Robin raise or recruit people to break the law. People decide to join him because they have either been outlawed themselves, often unjustly, or they believe that John Lackland’s laws and taxations were an unjust usurpation of the true King Richard’s rights as king.
Nor are the outlaws of Sherwood Forest represented as a group trained to follow Robin’s orders in any disciplined way. They are presented as a group of like minded individuals that choose to work together to achieve their aim of returning the kingdom to as it was before John became regent in Richard’s absence. The outlaws are free to leave at any time and in some of the legends less well known outlaws return to their farms because of family reasons.

I agree with everything you are saying here but you claimed that theft is evil and training to break laws is evil. Considering that "steal from the rich" and "outlaw" are major defining features of Robin Hood, that should make him evil by your argument. My point is that you cannot infer alignment just by classifying certain actions as good and other actions as evil. Intentions and circumstances matter; in fact, even subjective opinion can matter (rather like the difference between terrorist and freedom fighter).
In other words, I refuted your point of "theft is evil" and in extension that "OP cannot be acting CN" by pointing to a well-known example of thief that is commonly not considered evil in any way, shape or form. Although I'm sure the Sheriff of Nottingham would disagree...

[Alcore]

The Law - Chaos axis is defined by opposition of large organized groups versus the individual. Nothing exotic is required to determine if a person is group-minded or individual-minded.

Good - Evil axis is defined by life & happiness versus death & destruction. Furthermore, detailed description of the individual alignments place the nine alignments within particular philosophical frameworks. Nothing exotic is required to determine if you are, say a classic Utilitarian versus a moral nihilist.

Also? This is the actual, original alignment graph. This is a two dimensional spectrum. It literally shows each alignment has an area to it and the rules explicitly call out that a person can move within an area without changing their overall alignment, such as a Lawful Good person leaning more towards Law at a point in their life and then towards Good at another. Saying "people are a spectrum" is no argument against Alignment, the actual implementation literally gives you a moral spectrum.

I think that those labels are irrelevant and harmful when a person tries to embody them. If you say you are "classical Utilitarian" that only tells me that is the label you wish to embody. It does not mean you actually embody that. And classical Utilitarian paints a much clearer picture than chaotic neutral ever could for the people hearing it.


I am making no argument against alignment (an in-game mechanic). I am making an argument against trying to embrace an in-game alignment in real life. I feel it is detrimental to his or her own health; preticularly in the social area.

I carry no label for I know that I will forsake such a thing the moment it interferes with my own morals.

When I was told by some 3.x ers that CN was sociopaths (having played a few CN in AD&D 1e) I was appalled at that lack of understanding.

alas... if I were to run a DnD game seeing CN would be a red flag. CN has been warped by bad players.

[LibraryOgre]

Theft is evil.
Recruiting and training orphans to break the law is evil.
Creating a guild that follows your rules is lawful.

Nothing about what you’re doing is chaotic or neutral.

I disagree on pretty much every point.

Theft is chaotic; it only becomes evil if the foreseeable consequence is harm to another person (i.e. stealing money from the poor, causing them starvation, is evil; stealing money from the rich, who are mildly inconvenienced, is simply chaotic).

With point one refused, point two becomes irrelevant.

Creating a guild that follows your own laws is NOT lawful; it's chaotic, because the laws and rules are dependent upon yourself, and they are enforced by your strength (be it physical, magical, or mental). Chaos is not the absence of rules... it is the dependence of those rules on a singular individual, rather than institutions which uphold themselves through the effort of people directed towards those institutions.

I think making a thieves guild out of children you're rescuing from poverty is fairly chaotic neutral... you're providing them a benefit, but mostly for your own ends (morally neutral; selfish, but without the destructive edge that pushes it to evil), and you're using them to further your own ends at the expense of other people. It might cross into evil, especially if you're encouraging them to hurt people (either directly, through violence, or indirectly, through theft of necessary resources), but so long as you're keeping above that threshold (especially personally), you stay out of evil.

[Slipjig]

This kind of reads like a fake letter to an advice column. I just wanted to point out that not caring whether your actions hurt others so long as you get what you want is NOT Neutral. You don't have to be deliberately spreading woe to qualify as Evil, it just has to be the predominant outcome of your actions.

And I think the issue may be less about alignment than it is about whether your *character concept* fits the campaign and the party. It's entirely possible to have PCs with compatible alignments who don't work as a party for other reasons.

[Kvess]

Treating Neutral as 'a little good and a little evil' is a rookie mistake. Neutral is an entirely separate category of behaviour.

Good people are rare and remarkable; they would put themselves in harm's way to help others. An evil person would be willing to harm others to get what they want, but might be willing help others if there was some benefit to them. A neutral person would be reluctant to put themself in danger without reward, but wouldn't cross the line of sacrificing others to get what they want.

Without mitigating factors, I would be inclined to see press-ganging orphaned children into a life of crime as evil. Sure, you're giving them a home — but they don't have much choice, and it seems fairly exploitative. If it was a particularly crapsack world where they would have few other prospects and you were teaching them to steal from tyrants and corrupt nobles, I might be inclined to see it differently.

[hamishspence]

Treating Neutral as 'a little good and a little evil' is a rookie mistake. Neutral is an entirely separate category of behaviour.

Some books do recommend playing "ruthless yet altruistic" people as Neutral. Heroes of Horror, for example.

If the character routinely commits evil deeds in the cause of Good (animating the undead but using them to protect the innocent, for example, and fighting alongside those undead in the process, risking their neck as a combatant) then they "are probably neither Good nor Evil but a flexible Neutral".

Good people are rare and remarkable; they would put themselves in harm's way to help others.

Good is defined by "making sacrifices" but that doesn't have to mean Going in Harms Way - not every Good character is constantly putting themselves in physical danger.

[Vahnavoi]

I think that those labels are irrelevant and harmful when a person tries to embody them. If you say you are "classical Utilitarian" that only tells me that is the label you wish to embody. It does not mean you actually embody that.

I am making no argument against alignment (an in-game mechanic). I am making an argument against trying to embrace an in-game alignment in real life. I feel it is detrimental to his or her own health; preticularly in the social area.

I carry no label for I know that I will forsake such a thing the moment it interferes with my own morals

It's not meant to work that way even in the game. Personal claims of alignment are aspirational, a game master determines actual alignment by observing behaviour. Applied to real world, this is no different than any other personality test, matching patterns of observed behaviour to a set of descriptions. You can question reliability of self-reporting, but there's still nothing exotic to any of it. Your opinions of "harmfulness" and "irrelevance" are besides the point. You might as well be making those arguments abou Big Five personality model or the Kinsey scale.

And classical Utilitarian paints a much clearer picture than chaotic neutral ever could for the people hearing it.

Irrelevant. I might as well argue measuring distance using the metric system is much clearer than using the imperial system.

[truemane]

Your character is made up. And so their motives are made up and their priorities are made up and their goals and dreams and likes and dislikes and fears and everything else are all made up. So, even if your character (were they a real person) absolutely would do action X, you can just find a reason why they don't.

Even if your real-life alignment is Chaotic Neutral, you probably wear matching socks and obey the speed limit and don't shoot heroin for kicks and cross busy streets on green lights and avoid punching old people randomly and etc etc.

Because, even if in your deepest heart of hearts there is no such thing as good or evil and the only thing in life that's worth anything is the subtle whispering whims of your wild untamed soul, there are all kinds of reasons presented to you (from social judgement to prison) to make different choices.

So your made-up character can do the same. Be Chaotic Neutral all you want inside your heart, but just find reasons to be a part of the game without being a distraction or a detriment.

AND IF THAT'S NOT POSSIBLE, even if your character is just too particular to ever betray their moral code for anything, then why did you make that character? It's not every table's job to find room for every single thing that every single player wants every single character to do. Every table is a contract (stated and implied) between the people who have sat down around it. And, by joining, you declare your allegiance to that contract.

If someone came to my table and said "I want to pretend to be someone who's Chaotic Neutral, in a bad way." I'd say "Can you find reasons to toe the line so we can all have fun?" And they said, "Nope." I'd respond "Well then pretend to be someone else instead."

[Jay R]

First, let me deal with the alignment issue. You are not the first to disagree with your DM about alignment; you won't be the last. If you have clearly communicated what you are doing to the DM, and he wants to change your alignment, then don't worry about it. The DM thinks those actions belong to that alignment, so in that universe, they do. And it won't impede your actions at all, because he thinks those actions are consistent with that alignment.


Now, on to "it's what my character would do".

I run a very wide variety of characters. They have very different alignments, motivations, and goals.

But one thing they all have in common is this: they all get along with the party, and work for the party's shared goals.

Why do all my characters have that one thing in common? Because all the games have this in common: we are a group of players working together.

If you work together with the party, then I do not care about your PC's alignment, or how you spend your PC's money, or anything else. And if you don't work together with the party, then no excuse will justify it.

In this case, if your character is spending his (or her) own money building an orphanage/guild, while supporting the party in all things, then I have no problem with it. I don't even think it's any of my business. But if it gets in the way of the party's business, or you use it as an excuse to disrupt, or even not to support, the party, then it's a problem. But the problem isn't about the orphanage. It's not even about not getting along with the party. It's about not getting along with the other players.

Most often, I have seen, "It's what my character would do" used as an excuse to not get along with the party.

I don't care what the excuse is. I just don't. The problem isn't about "It's what my character would do." The problem is about not getting along with the party.

Because that isn't about the PC. That's about not getting along with the players.

When you are considering not getting along with the players, in any form, you shouldn't ask what your kind of person your character is and what your character would do. You need to ask what kind of person you are, and what you would do.

[Pauly]

I disagree on pretty much every point.

Theft is chaotic; it only becomes evil if the foreseeable consequence is harm to another person (i.e. stealing money from the poor, causing them starvation, is evil; stealing money from the rich, who are mildly inconvenienced, is simply chaotic).

With point one refused, point two becomes irrelevant.

Creating a guild that follows your own laws is NOT lawful; it's chaotic, because the laws and rules are dependent upon yourself, and they are enforced by your strength (be it physical, magical, or mental). Chaos is not the absence of rules... it is the dependence of those rules on a singular individual, rather than institutions which uphold themselves through the effort of people directed towards those institutions.

I think making a thieves guild out of children you're rescuing from poverty is fairly chaotic neutral... you're providing them a benefit, but mostly for your own ends (morally neutral; selfish, but without the destructive edge that pushes it to evil), and you're using them to further your own ends at the expense of other people. It might cross into evil, especially if you're encouraging them to hurt people (either directly, through violence, or indirectly, through theft of necessary resources), but so long as you're keeping above that threshold (especially personally), you stay out of evil.

Theft is not wrong because it is against the law, theft is against the law because it is wrong. If you try to take a bone from a dog it will tell you that you are doing a wrong to it despite it having no concept of man made laws. Apart from predator-prey theft is the primary source of conflict in the animal world - attempted kill stealing by scavengers; territorial disputes to prevent other animals stealing your stuff as there are no territorial disputes with animals who do not for the same resources. Theft is a direct harm to another person and is evil, as is coercing others to steal.

Coercing others by force to follow rules is lawful behavior. Criminal organizations based around the use if children use savage violence to enforce their rules, nor are the children allowed to keep anything they steal. The children are not free to choose which rules they will follow.

What would be chaotic neutral would be to create an orphanage that trains children in circus skills. The children would learn things such as acrobatics, stage magic sleight of hand, lockpicking for escape artistry, disguises with makeup and costumes and so on. Then allowing the children to run free at nights and turning a blind eye if they used their skills as thieves. The children might freely choose to give the owner of the school gifts from their ill gotten gains as a sign of gratitude. That’s the type of thing a CN would do.

[Taevyr]

If you try to take a bone from a dog it will tell you that you are doing a wrong to it despite it having no concept of man made laws.

Just needed to chime in here that this is a ridiculous example: if my dog manages to get his paws on a piece of chocolate, he'll be just as annoyed with me trying to take it away as he'd be for something that he can eat. Or something that he thinks he can eat. Or something that obviously is inedible but he likes chewing on for some reason. Anyway, I doubt I'd be doing my dog a wrong by stopping him from eating poison, or some plastic thing he found while we're taking a walk.

The only thing the dog is telling you is "Me no want lose potential food", which doesn't really have anything to do with morality.

[King of Nowhere]

can we please get past the prejudice that chaotic neutral means unhinged?
CN is individualistic, not crazy.
CN would not hurt some children and protect some others because "hey, i do some good and some bad because I'm neutral". neutral doesn't work like that since 2e druids - and frankly, it was dumb even then.
CN has friends and family, and would generally stick for them.
CN is not contractually obligated to backstab anyone just because "chaotic". They have an underlying logic for their action, same as everyone else.
CN does not want to get in trouble any more than anyone else, and he would not do stuff that would likely get him in trouble. Therefore CN would respect most laws because they are sensible, and would likely respect the other laws too to avoid trouble - unless he had a good reason to risk trouble.
CN doesn't have to be a wild card or a disruptive character.
And if you play a CN with those traits...

You're the author of your character, if you decide to make a character that would do disruptive things then you are a disruptive player.

Also being on "not on anyone's side" is disruptive. You're supposed to be on the party's side.

this says it all

[Mechalich]

can we please get past the prejudice that chaotic neutral means unhinged?

Chaotic neutral doesn't mandate being unhinged, but because of the way the alignment system works most 'unhinged' (meaning presumably, persons with severe and probably disabling mental illness) individuals qualify as chaotic neutral. In fact, it is entirely possible that in a human population the majority of Chaotic Neutral individuals present such conditions especially considering the lack of medication or treatment in most quasi-medieval societies.

This is not the only alignment where this is true for humans. A significant percentage of the Neutral Evil and Chaotic Evil population is comprised of psychopaths and sociopaths respectively.

[Vahnavoi]

CN would not hurt some children and protect some others because "hey, i do some good and some bad because I'm neutral". neutral doesn't work like that since 2e druids - and frankly, it was dumb even then.

This one deserves its own reply because people keep strawmanning them druids...

There is nothing odd or exotic to sometimes hurting some children and sometimes protecting them. This directly stems from ecological conservatism - desire to retain some balance of nature - that is core ideology of druids.

Imagine that you're hunter. You want to snack on baby deer. But you also know that if you snack on too many baby deer, there won't be any deer left for you to snack on in the future. So when deer are plenty, you kill and eat some deer. When they're not, you protect the deer, from starvation and from other hunters.

Druids simply extend the same logic to humans and other "people". Humans in threat of dying out? Help them humans. Humans threatening the natural world? Time to cull the human population.

Simple as.

The big error is trying to use this rationale when you're not a druid - True or Absolute Neutral is not really meant for anyone else. Treating the middle of the alignment graph as some kind of large default when actually looking at the graph, it's one of the narrowest alignment, is the root of the error. The presentation of alignment as "nine boxes" obscures this.

[Tanarii]

Chaotic neutral (CN) creatures follow their whims, holding their personal freedom above all else.

Ideals associated with Chaotic are:
Change
Independence
Freedom
Creativity
Free Thinking
No Limits

Creating a guild that follows your own laws is NOT lawful; it's chaotic, because the laws and rules are dependent upon yourself, and they are enforced by your strength (be it physical, magical, or mental). Chaos is not the absence of rules... it is the dependence of those rules on a singular individual, rather than institutions which uphold themselves through the effort of people directed towards those institutions.

Most Thieves Guilds are usually envisioned as some kind of organize crime -alike, with some kind of code of tradition/honor. That's associated with Lawful Neutral or Lawful Evil, not chaotic anything.

Being (in effect) a strong-arm or charismatic gang leader heading up your own "guild" wouldn't be though.