Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Lanky Ogre Baggy Pants 10-24-04, 09:49 PM	I was creating a character for a new campaign and got a little stuck, so I decided to ask y'all for help. What alignment would a character like the Punisher, Boondock Saints, or Washington's character in Man on Fire be? Obviously its not evil, but can it be considered good? For the most part they enforce the laws when the laws can't enforce themself.
Draco Strang 10-25-04, 01:02 AM	well, my first response would be chaotic good...but that can't be it. They do some brutal ****. Honestly, i would have to lean towards NE or CN. That's because they see what needs to be done ,and take it into their own hands. However, it's some hardcore ****.....Robinhood was chaotic good, and he didn't do the stuff they did. Anyone else got any ideas?
Dartanel 10-25-04, 01:06 AM	A vigilante, especially the ones listed, would fall under neutral on the moral axis. They are willing to perform evil acts to acheive a goal which is obstensibly good. A good example of this type of character in DnD is St. Cuthbert. A deity whose concept is 'I hate evil' taken so far that he is himself nongood. However, where a Vigilante stands on the Ethical (Law/Chaos) axis is a matter of methodology.
Mister Mayhem 10-25-04, 05:11 AM	Depending on his means, methods and motives, a Vigilante could probably be of any alignment. Does he rigidly adhere to a personal code of behaviour? Then he is most likely lawful. Does he simply do whatever it takes to get the job done? Then he is most likely chaotic. Is he doing it to protect the innocent and make the world a better place? Then he is probably good. Is he doing it because he hates criminals and enjoys torturing them to death? Evil. Is he simply rounding up people with bounties on their heads, for the money? Maybe Neutral. **** You need only to look at super-hero comics - especially the independant stuff. Take take the Watchmen, for example, all of whom were vigilantes at least at some point in their career. These Alignments are not meant to be definative for the complex characters in question, just an example of how pretty much any alignment might become a vigilante. (Trying to avoid spoilers, though if you havn't read it by now, shame on you. Go and buy it immediately!)) Ozymadius (before retirement): Lawful Neutral He almost certainly began his vigilante career as Lawful Neutral, fighting crime not to help people or hurt criminals but to challenge himself, to prove to himself that he could do it, relentless driving himself towards physical perfection. The events that transpire after he retires from Vigilante-ism are very dichotomous, making his alignment in his later years very, very hard to define. His rigourous pursuit of a noble goal to the exclusion of all else might brand him Lawful Good, but the acts he is willing to perform to achieve this goal might equally brand him Chaotic Evil. Doctor Manhatten: True Neutral His interest in humanity is purely intelectual. He firmly beleives in predestination, and that even though most of the time he can see the future, he feels no compulsion to try to change it for the better. Fights crime only because his powers have resulted in him being labelled a super-hero, and fighting crime is what superheroes do. Has no personal feelings on the matter. The same is true to his service to his country - it proves remarkably easy to sever any lingering ties of loyalty or patriotism that he might have had when he was human. Silk Spectre (V. 1): Chaotic Neutral Her primary motive appears to be publicity for her acting career. Doesn't appear to have any scruples, or feel particularly compelled to help people who are less fortunate than herself. In it purely for fame and fortune. Captain Metropolis: Lawful Good An ex marine, with the inbuilt sense of duty and honour that results from serving your country so diligently. Whilst somewhat narrow-minded, he fights crime because he is trying to protect people, not for any selfish reasons. Nite Owl (v. 1): Neutral Good He doesn't have a particular code, but he does at least stay within the tramlines of ordinary human morality. He takes the fight for justice to the streets out of a genuine desire to help and protect - during the day, he is a policeman. Rorshach: Lawful Evil Has a code of behaviour, in his own words "never compromise, even in the face of Armageddon". Even when faced with two of the most compelling reasons to break this code a person can possibly face, he chooses to stick to it. Hates crime and criminals. Has little or no empathy. Actively enjoys violently apprehending criminals. Will routinely torture people for information. When offered a number of ways of defending himself, has been seen to deliberately choose that which will cause the most harm to his attacker, far beyond any definition of "reasonable force". The Comedian: Chaotic Evil The comedian appears to fight for his country, pure and simple, a true patriot. But the methods he chooses are not those that his country would necessarily condone - if he fough the enemies of the state as a "model citizen", he might considered be lawful. But instead, he seems simply to enjoy fighting, and has rather cynically decided that patriotism will give him a veneer of "respectability" that other vigilantes lack. He is an inherently violent, brutal man, a muderer and attempted rapist, and if the solution to an immediate problem isn't violence, may be at somewhat of a loss as to what to do. A useful man if unrestrained violece is the solution to your problem. If it isn't, you'd better ask somebody else.
Thorak 10-25-04, 09:12 AM	Most Vigilantes are Chaotic. Because the entire essence of vigilanteism is that you don't trust the regular forces of law enforcement to succeed at their job, so you'll do it for them illegally. (If we were discussing a 'vigilante' fighting for what's right against a corrupt government, then we're discussing a rebel, not a vigilante, who might be Lawful; following a code different from his country's) So we've got Chaotic (as a general rule, at least). Beyond that, look at their actions. Do they do as much good as possible, while ensuring the only person they hurt is the bad guy? They're Good. Are they willing to, but disliking of, engaging in relatively horrible acts like torture to get what they need? They're Neutral. Do they feel no compunction, regret, or attacks of conscience for what they do to those they've deemed "the bad guy"? Evil. Yes, the Punisher is Chaotic Evil. Heck, Batman always trode the line between Good and Evil, and in the later series' he's fallen pretty firmly down on the Evil side; the biggest conflict in Batman always was the relatively good-natured Bruce Wayne vying with the bloodthirsty vengeance-seeking Batman for supremacy. A battle "Bruce Wayne" eventually lost. Sure, both those guys are people you'd really like on your side. As long as you make sure you stay on their side, or at least irrelevant to them. Getting in their way, even if you mean well, is a very dangerous thing to do.
Marchen 10-25-04, 10:12 AM	Good does not mean ***** footing around and spreading love in an effort to cause no harm. A good person can still fight evil, violently if neccessary. A vigilante who fights evil is likely Chaotic Good. If they go an extra mile and decide that they don't care who gets in the way (civilians, blowing up buildings in order to kill one evil person) then that would make them evil. Otherwise, they are Good people who decided to take charge.
Seeker95 10-25-04, 10:49 AM	Chaotic Good (for those who are willing to break laws to accomplish good): Robin Hood Lawful Neutral (for those who operate outside the law to enforce the law): Batman/Punisher
Thorak 10-25-04, 10:53 AM	Good does not mean ***** footing around and spreading love in an effort to cause no harm. A good person can still fight evil, violently if neccessary. A vigilante who fights evil is likely Chaotic Good. If they go an extra mile and decide that they don't care who gets in the way (civilians, blowing up buildings in order to kill one evil person) then that would make them evil. Otherwise, they are Good people who decided to take charge. My point being that the classic Vigilante, especially in superhero literature, does cross that line into not caring who gets in the way. They take a "if you're not with me, you're against me" view on things. Batman only gets away with it for so long because he's friends with the Chief of Police, who understands what Batman's about and knows it'll be worse trying to stop him than just letting him go about his business. Of course, I'm talking about the original, struggles-every-time-to-not-kill-the-badguy borderline insane Batman, not the kiddiefied saturday morning cartoon or hollywood movie versions. Though the newer cartoon, Batman 2000 I think? gets back into that dynamic fairly well, the one scene I recall had the retired Bruce Wayne screaming over the radio at the new Batman to kill the badguy, while the new Batman is screaming back that it's crazy and wrong. Same with the Punisher. Lots of heavy-fire gunfights. Does he ever wonder what his stray bullets might be hitting? Nope. Couldn't care less as long as he gets the badguy, even if he's accidentally gunning down pregnant ladies and soccer moms in the process. This is why cops do their best to not start firing weapons; they generally can control their own weapon, but often the area isn't clear and they don't want any stray bullets from the badguy hitting an innocent bystander.
Sulaco 10-25-04, 11:10 AM	Vigilantes work outside the law so, by definition, they must be chaotic. The question then is to assess the G/N/E axis, which can only be answered by examining the motivations of the character. The Punisher's sole motivation is to punish evil, thus he is Chaotic Good.
Mister Mayhem 10-25-04, 11:14 AM	Most Vigilantes are Chaotic. Because the entire essence of vigilanteism is that you don't trust the regular forces of law enforcement to succeed at their job, so you'll do it for them illegally. "Lawful" does not equal "Law Abiding." Whilst a given individuals lawful nature might require him, personally, to to adhere to the laws of the land, it is equally possible to have a Lawful character who is beholden only to his own internal code of honour. There are plenty of comic-book Vigilantes who adhere to an internal code of behaviour strict enough to qualify them as Lawful, and that IME includes The Bat.
Sulaco 10-25-04, 12:44 PM	"Lawful" does not equal "Law Abiding." Actually, it does (under the D&D alignment system anyway).
Mister Mayhem 10-25-04, 01:04 PM	Lawful Neutral, “Judge”: A lawful neutral character acts as law, tradition, or a personal code directs her. Order and organization are paramount to her. She may believe in personal order and live by a code or standard, or she may believe in order for all and favor a strong, organized government.
Nyvinyd 10-25-04, 01:07 PM	Though I would say on my own thoughts that I agree with the idea that Lawful is more of an issue of discipline, and this IS the method I use in game that I run, I trust Sulaco to deliver factual truth based on the system. I would like to see where it officially states in an official D&D 3.5E supplement that this is the case, though. Until then I'm going to abide by the descriptions in the D&D 3.5E Player's Handbook and say that a vigilante would still be Lawful, assuming he abides by SOME set of laws. Perhaps not those handed to him by "The Man," but if he has a personal code that he follows, I'd say he's Lawful. I will say also though that Law *is* a real force, and it can even be forged into a physical weapon. Even though these are somewhat abstract concepts, the actual use of them in game terms is concrete. It doesn't matter so much that your decision is correct. It matters more that your decision is firm. This is because in D&D, your alignment is a natural force that can be detected and used, and is entirely real. Someone who emits the essence of Chaos and Evil can be smited particularly badly by a deity who is the cornerstone of Law and Good.
Ogre4Hire 10-25-04, 02:03 PM	Vigilantes work outside the law so, by definition, they must be chaotic. The question then is to assess the G/N/E axis, which can only be answered by examining the motivations of the character. The Punisher's sole motivation is to punish evil, thus he is Chaotic Good. "He who hunts monsters must be careful not to become a monster himself. For when a man stares into the Void, the Void stares back." Somebody who's name I can't remember. Up through the 90's, the Punisher was a Neutral with some good tendancies character. By now, however, he's gotten to the point where he can't possibly justify his actions and convince anyone that he's actually a good aligned character. At present, he's much worse that the criminals he battles (just take a look at some of the recent Punisher/Wolverine books). Fighting evil doesn't make you good; if that were the case, the Ba'atizu would be the most strongly good aligned creatures in existance for fighting the Tanar'ri (or the other way round).
Thorak 10-25-04, 03:00 PM	"Lawful" does not equal "Law Abiding." Whilst a given individuals lawful nature might require him, personally, to to adhere to the laws of the land, it is equally possible to have a Lawful character who is beholden only to his own internal code of honour. There are plenty of comic-book Vigilantes who adhere to an internal code of behaviour strict enough to qualify them as Lawful, and that IME includes The Bat. I'm well aware of the above, regarding that Lawful isn't Law-abiding. My point was that the Vigilante mindset goes beyond merely thinking "I don't agree with these laws" to "these laws are irrelevant to my need to vanquish my foes". A lawful character will abide by the laws of the land, unless those laws conflict with their personal code. This isn't true of Vigilantes, and that's why I distinguished between them and Rebels. A Vigilante is out for either Justice or Vengeance, with the capital letter for each. And in either case, everything takes a back seat to that overwhelming drive. The law of the land, personal codes, everything. Hence, they must be Chaotic. Robin Hood, for instance, would be a Rebel. He had a code of honour, and it was what set him above Prince John, who had none. He fought against only those laws that were unjust. Batman, however, doesn't care about any laws. The only kind of personal code he has is in the Bruce Wayne personality desperately trying to constrain the Batman side from doing what it really wants; kill the badguy to punish them for his parent's deaths. And that's not so much a personal code, but a desperate attempt to not become the very thing he detests. A struggle he eventually loses, in fact. If I had to give Batman an alignment, I'd say each facet was different, with Bruce Wayne being Neutral to Chaotic Good, and Batman being Chaotic Evil. In the early days, this tends to balance him out as Chaotic Neutral. In the latter days, with Bruce Wayne's side essentially gone, there's no more reins but the ravages of age on Batman, and he's completely without control. The only saving grace is that his parents were killed by criminals, rather than a hit-and-run drunk driver. If that had happened, Batman would have been beating the snot out of drunkards in bars his entire life instead of fighting crime. Or, heaven forbid, they were accidentally shot by cops in a gunfight with the crooks; Batman would have become the police force's worst nightmare, a nigh-unstoppable cop killer.
Seeker95 10-25-04, 03:10 PM	Thorak, I think the differences of opinion lie more in your re-approach to the term "vigilante" than anything else. By your definition, Robin Hood was not a vigilante. But most of us were treating him as the archetype of the Chaotic Good vigilante.
Maur'Dhiv 10-25-04, 03:40 PM	I would think it all depends on the character's approach to the job but for the purpose of Lanky Ogre's character I would have to say CN because of the punisher example. Chaotic because despite being obviously devoted to his task, he doesn't feel the need for it to be within the law and as such has no line he dares not cross to achieve his goal. and neutral because the character would consider collateral victims as unavoidable casualties in his war against (insert opposition) and that it is a little price to pay in order to rid the world of such opposition. the character doesn't think about the moral implication of his actions. all that matters is the job to be done. and by the way Thorak, I don't know where you take your info from but I've been reading and watching batman for over 2 decades now and besides a short period in the comics (when it wasn't even Bruce Wayne in the suit) Batman has never been a psycho out for blood. he'll scare the crap out of crooks with "implied" threats of doing worse but he never follows on those threats. of course accidents did happen over the years but it never was murder in cold blood.
Thorak 10-25-04, 08:49 PM	and by the way Thorak, I don't know where you take your info from but I've been reading and watching batman for over 2 decades now and besides a short period in the comics (when it wasn't even Bruce Wayne in the suit) Batman has never been a psycho out for blood. he'll scare the crap out of crooks with "implied" threats of doing worse but he never follows on those threats. of course accidents did happen over the years but it never was murder in cold blood. I base it on things like the recent series, where Bruce has retired and clearly gone over the deep end, the creator's stated intent that the character of Batman represented a dual-personality struggling for control of one person, the kind playboy on the one hand and the vicious Bat on the other, the fact that Bruce several times in various series states that he wishes he could stop, but can't... It's part of the whole dark aspect of Batman. It's why all his main enemies are insane, and go to Arkham Asylum rather than a jail cell, because it's a twisted mirror of the Bat's own psyche. Just because they removed that aspect at certain times to lighten up the character doesn't mean it's an accurate portrayal.
Lanky Ogre Baggy Pants 10-26-04, 12:22 AM	Essentially my character starts out as a paladin, but continualy approaches his superiors with the evil he sees and is told that nothing can be done about it because it can't be proven. Eventually he decides that he can do more good on his own, without the help of the church. I haven't started playing the character yet, so I don't know how far I am going to take him, but right now I am willing to play the character to the point where he doesn't care about who gets hurt as long as Evil gets punished. Like Washington's character, I won't care if I have to torture the BBEG's brother/sister/mother/wife, if it gets me the BBEG. I will draw the line with INNOCENT children and incarnations of Good though. Or, at least I will try. I won't go as far as Travolta's character in Swordfish. No taking banks hostage to get some extra cash, but if the only way to kill the BBEG involves killing a few innocents, then so-be-it.
Mister Mayhem 10-26-04, 07:33 AM	Sounds like you are starting LG, changing to CG, and gradually descending into CE. Sounds like it should be fun, if you do it gradually enough to get the rest of the paty on your side...
Seeker95 10-26-04, 08:05 AM	I dunno. I just feel like my heroic fantasy should be, well, heroic. Your character was a paladin. He may be breaking the code he has sworn to live by, but I don't see him doing so without embracing a new, stronger code by which to live. I wouldn't take him as far as you are describing for a few reasons. 1. This is a game for multiple players. Good ideas for solo artists abound. But will the other folks in your group have the same objectives? If not, your described character would probably part company quickly, since he can't be stringing along a bunch of losers who just don't get it. 2. Player-driven agendas might not fit with a DM-campaign. Talk with your DM about how this idea fits with his campaign plans. Having a motiviation that determines how you respond to the DM's campaign is one thing. Having an agenda that may result in ignoring much of the DM's plans is not good for long-term fun.
Lanky Ogre Baggy Pants 10-26-04, 07:24 PM	Seeker, as you said, how far he goes does kind of depend on the rest of the party. I have talked to the DM about htis character already and he is willing to help me make it work. He is of an opinion though, that a vigilante can retain a lawful alignment. It may be interesting, I may end up staying paladin.