I’m playing a LG character (on paper) at the moment and have occasional disagreements with my fellow players regarding what that means and whether my character’s actions fall within that alignment. Without getting into it, I’ll admit up front that I’m probably right as often as I’m wrong.
But the debate got me thinking about what the limits of lawful good are and I was wondering what everyone else thought. Here are some questions that I am curious to see answered. In your opinion:
1. What makes a good LG character?
2. What makes a bad LG character?
3. When does LG become lawful stupid?
4. What are some of your favorite or least favorite LG tropes or stories?
Personally I don’t think people should care that much about the alignment on the character sheet unless there’s some specific reason to (IE it’s a requirement for an item or class or something) but it comes up pretty often at my table. Looking for ideas and experiences from my fellow players.
I’ll have to agree with your final sentiment. The more I’ve played, the less emphasis is put on alignment. For one, in many campaigns, a character’s alignment can change and alter depending on the circumstance and situations they come into contact with during the campaign. A reflection of character growth and development. However:
1. A good LG character should uphold the law for the interest of the betterment of those around him/her. The good of the people outweighs written law.
2. A bad LG character is one that is all about the law and nothing but the law. The law is there to keep order for the betterment of people, but it’s laws first. People second. This character generally becomes or is a lawful evil character.
3. Lawful Good can often be stupid for the most hilarious reasons. Players can get a bit carried away is trying to uphold that alignment the best they can. A perfect example is one player I play with has a character that is a local folk hero and lawful good. He rushes into situations deemed suspicious and often gets in over his head. He’s punched an old woman in the face in-game because he thought she was kidnapping a child. His response is always “I’m Lawful good!” Anytime we all gasp in horror. lol! Even though this can be played as Lawful Good getting stupid, the only reason he is still alive is because we all love this character way too much to let him die. And, Lord knows, he’s been close to death in more sessions than not. I guess this also answers number 4.
4. What are some of your favorite or least favorite LG tropes or stories?
Has strong morals or a personal creed that they follow. Tries to follow local laws and customs so long as they don't conflict with those morals. Generally tries to help people and make the world safer for civilized races.
Overly focused on the letter of the law. Acts as judge, jury, and executioner in an effort to uphold and enact justice.
Attacks party members over morally grey or selfish actions like looting bodies or hoarding treasure. "If you are not with me, you're against me" attitude.
'Lawful Good' means the character believes in their fellow man - both as an individual and as a social structure. At least to me, and since the thread is "what does LG mean to you?", I'm gonna take you at your word for that.
Lawful Good means that the character believes society is inherently a good thing, and that the people in it and that make it up are worth defending. In contrast to Chaotic Good, which champions people at the expense of institutions or structures and who may not believe that society is a good thing, Lawful Good is a protector of both the lives of the people and the civilizations that people have built.
1.) What makes a good LG character? Exactly that. A good LG character serves civilization. They are the light that guides the way forward, seeking to enlighten and empower both people and society. A LG character doesn't necessarily need to be pointlessly selfless, suicidally Questy, or any of the other stuff. The entire point of LG is that when you are presented with a decision that matters, one that will deeply affect the lives of innocents or the course (or existence) of civilization? The LG character makes the choice to preserve civilization and those who live within it, at their own expense if need be, to the best of their abilities.
2/3.) What makes a bad LG character/when does LG become Lawful Stupid? These are both basically the same question, and amount to the same thing. LG becomes LS when the character takes actions based on 'lawfulness' that are harmful to society or civilization, or which cause needless strife and anguish at the smaller scale. The paladin who chops off the hand of the starving beggar who stole a day's rations from the party Because The Law Demands It, and for no other reason, is Lawful Stupid. So is the paladin who murders the entire guard force of a local village because they tried to arrest said beggar (and then tried to defend their own lives against the marauding paladin) Because Good Demands It is equally lawful stupid. Taking actions which are harmful or disruptive and hiding behind the law - or the Good - when called to task for them is Lawful Stupid.
4.) What are some of your favorite/least favorite LG stories? Michael Carpenter of the Dresden Files is a picture-perfect paladin. A humble man who upholds his vows and seeks the betterment of himself, his friends, those around him, and the human race. If the betterment of those things, or the foiling of a vicious evil that seeks the downfall of those things, requires him to break the law? So be it. If they require him to do something awful lest far worse befall the world, so be it. That does not absolve him of those things, and to the best of his abilities he must make reparations for what he did, and he is willing to do so without complaint. Michael Carpenter is the gold standard of Lawful Good.
To a lesser and yet much more poignant extent, the story of Garg and Moonslicer is one of my favorite D&D vignettes. Google it, should come up. An ogre finds a paladin's lost sentient blade, and the sword browbeats the ogre into doing good works for a nearby village towards the goal of answering Garg's question: "what is good?" The way it ends, and how Moonslicer (the sword) answers Garg's question, is also a fantastic example of Lawful Good.
Lawful Good is both the easiest and the hardest alignment to play. Simply do the right thing. You know what it is, you know what it isn't. Just do the right thing whenever the chance comes your way. No matter how painful it is.
So, caveat to this, is that each individual character will take their own alignment differently. For some characters, it can be a core piece of their identity. For others, it's not set into their being, as they aren't sure of themselves. It's a personal conscience thing, and some people have a strong one, others a weak one, and still others that haven't really figured it out yet. As such, whether or not you play a character into their alignment or not should, in part, depend on the other traits of the character itself.
With that out of the way... You have to separate the Good/Evil spectrum from the Lawful/Chaotic first to really analyze them properly.
Good versus Evil may sound like it's super heroes vs super villans, but it's not in the context of DnD. It would be more accurately described as whether the good of all, or the good of self, is more important to the character in question. A Good character will put others before themselves if they think of themselves at all, while an Evil character thinks about themselves first, and only sometimes about others afterwards. The more Good a character is, the more likely they are to sacrifice themselves to protect others, even if it means dying to do so. The action Batman takes at the end of The Dark Knight, taking the fall for Harvey Dent's crimes in order to preserve what Dent stood for is a great example. Up until that point, Batman was generally thought of as a hero, if a vigilante taking the law into his own hands. He was willing to sacrifice that position in order to protect the legacy of another, that was doing positive things for Gotham City that Batman never would be able to do. A less Good version of Batman would not have done this. A Neutral Batman would have simple gone back to business as usual, continuing to fight crime himself because the police and legal system in Gotham could not. An Evil Batman would never have entered into that situation in the first place, because he probably wouldn't be tying criminals up for the police to deal with, and would probably have simply killed the Joker in their first personal encounter at the fundraising party at the loft.
Lawful versus Chaotic is about doing what you're supposed to do versus what you want to do. While Lawful is most easily thought of as following the actual law, it's not limited to just that. The individual in question might be part of some order that has core tenants that cannot be violated (like the Prime Directive of the Federation) or the individual might have established a set of rules for themselves that they vow to never break (like how Batman or Superman won't kill). A Chaotic individual is fully aware of what they are doing, but feel like rules don't actually apply to them. Rules are meant for lesser creatures, who need them to find meaning or guidance in their lives. They find codes of conduct to be constraining. But that doesn't mean they wander around f**king s**t up, like Loki does in Thor and The Avengers. I mean, that is one way to play Chaotic Evil, but in the context of a DnD party it's generally counter-productive and highly disruptive to both the group and to any storyline ongoing.
The other really important thing about this system that I feel gets left behind the overwhelming majority of the time is that it is all a measure of degrees. A lot of people think that all Good is created equal, and that if you list your alignment as Good on your character sheet, that you're automagically Captain Steve Rogers, Captain America, who can do no wrong, and is the champion of justice and honor. That's.... not true at all. Good can be that, but that's a fairly extreme example of what Good can be. Good is also the villager who sweeps the town square just because they think that makes it look nicer. Good is that random stranger coming out of a door, and holding it open as you approach to enter. All 9 alignments are a range of possibilities, not just neat boxes that are separate from one another. They blend at their edges, like how Red and Blue become Purple. It's messy and unclear. It can, in some situations, be definitive, but more often than not it isn't.
I would hope you can decipher for yourself the answers to your first 2 questions from what I wrote above. As to the other 2...
Lawful Good usually becomes Lawful Stupid when your character's personality and depth are entirely what their alignment is itself. If there is no other good way to describe a Lawful Good character than simply Lawful Good, it's not a good character. Alignment should be integral to the character's identity to some degree, yes. But when that is the entirety of their identity, it's Stupid.
The worst you can be is Loki from Thor and The Avengers. Chaotic Evil, only seeking personal power, will happily backstab anyone and anything to get what he wants, even when it has been made clear that he's already not getting what he wants (ie he himself was backstabbed). He starts changing after that, and eventually ends up being more Chaotic Neutral, maybe just slightly leaning Chaotic Good a tiny bit. But the early days... leave the early days in the backstory, don't bring it to the game table.
There's a lot of good overview stuff here. IMO, in the most abstract sense, I view LG as being the students; collectors; curators; and protectors. People who see the beauty of the universe and want to preserve it for others. As opposed to CG who are the creators and the explorers, people who make new things to be shared with others. As opposed to LE who are takers and thieves and slavers, for whom the universe should belong to them and who would take it with them when they died, if they could. As opposed to CE who are focused on their own aggrandizement, who value nothing else, and who will destroy anything to give themselves more room to grow.
Preserve ------------------------------ Create
| | | | | |
Capture ----------------------------- Expand
Now let's get more into the weeds:
1) A good Lawful Good character has a code of behavior, but not for its own sake. They sort of naturally are focused on tomorrow's problems as well as the immediate ones and are aware that other people might end up having to take up the cause if they fall. The code provides a framework for building a consensus among like-minded individuals for the purpose of solving multiple societal problems. Lawful AND Good.
A smart LG character doesn't think the law will naturally lead to good, because that IS Lawful Stupid. They understand that laws are created by people. If you drop an old-school LG paladin into an evil society, they don't start becoming evil because "that's the law." They do everything possible, exploit every loophole and push every envelope to bring solace to the afflicted and justice to the innocent. And they don't ask permission.
Now to dig even deeper: the most common way this all impacts players is how they conduct themselves in a fight. To give an example, my paladin will go out of her way to avoid a fight unless it has to happen to further her mission or to defend herself or others. Happily, now that she's endgame-level, she has a lot more leeway about how to solve problems non-lethally, and often even non-violently. But she will throw sand in a dude's face without warning, then kick him in the nuts while he's blinded, if the fight is worth having. She will take advantage of a guy's stupidity, of his lack of imagination, of his lack of information, she will take advantage of a guy's physical infirmities, up to and including Lou Gehrig's Disease, if the fight is worth having. The one thing she will never ever do is take advantage of a guy's decency. She doesn't sneak up under a white flag and then hit a guy because that disincentivizes him from respecting white flags in the future, which makes the world a crappier place overall. She doesn't torture and she wouldn't torture because it incentivizes the other guys to torture. That's why they wrote Zone of Truth into the game. So weirdos would quit writing these fantasy "24" scenarios to justify their own OOG issues.
2) Being stupid or violent or self-righteous or vain or any number of other character defects that don't impact on alignment necessarily are what make a bad Lawful Good character. If you want my opinion on shortcomings inherent to the alignment: I'd say they're small-c conservative; prone to debate and consensus-building, not fast off the blocks; risk-averse; rarely original, although they might be fantastic synthesizers of others' ideas. All these things fit the stereotypes, but I hope I'm explaining WHY. It's in their nature as preservers and protectors to also be squares. It's in their nature as cataloguers and curators to seek out consensus and long boring debates with others.
3) LG NEVER gets Lawful Stupid, imo. Players get Lawful Stupid, and most of them do it knowingly as a misguided criticism of something they don't understand. They (or the DMs who demand it of them), think some Dudley Do-Right satire of a well-intentioned, feckless, naif will serve as a good foil for their badasssssssss wisecracking anti-hero types.
As I mentioned above, I think there's a distinction to be made between character flaws and alignment. I think it's possible to be closed-minded and LG, or stupid and LG, but that's not an inherent problem of being LG. YMMV.
4) I was DMing Curse of Strahd. The party had killed Doru and left Donavich a weeping wreck. They'd met Mad Mary and left her a weeping wreck. They saw Granny putting a kid in her bag and the paladin says "let the kid go." Granny says "I paid for him fair and square!" Paladin has done divine sense on Granny and knows she's a fiend of some kind and probably out of the lowbie party's league, puts his hand on his hilt and says "I won't ask again." (Is this Lawful Stupid? I guess some people would say so.) Anyway, Granny doesn't need to fight for something she can always come back and get later, so she gives them the kid. Paladin susses out the situation with the parents who are currently in a drugged-out stupor. Takes the kid to Mad Mary's, takes them both to Donavich. Tells Donavich "Grieve for your son, then get up and get back to work. The people here need you too much. This is your family now. Take care of each other." Best Lawful Good moment I've ever seen in my life.
To answer 1 through 3, the player determines if their LG is an enjoyable one or an intolerable one.
I watched a player use LG as an excuse to disrupt everyone's game - a fanatic that treated everyone else like NPCs in his story.
I've watched several players use LG to add something to the game - realizing they can't control others and simply being a foil to people's antics or vice versa depending on the encounter - cooperative.
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Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider. My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong. I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲 “It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
Alignment in 5E isn’t something you even need to ask about. Unless your DM really gets annoyed—there’s no repercussion.
In previous rules—there were real consequences (losing powers, losing your character, etc). A DM would even warn you...uhh..you do this and uhhh...that’s it for this character, right?
Now it just seems like like you spend more time arguing about your alignment vs. what your character does—when someone says hey wait..you’re a Druid and you just burned down a forest and murdered a bunch of villagers because the barmaid brought your beer and it was slightly warmer than you expected.....
You’re lawful good but sacrificed the NPC wilderness guide because it would give the party hitpoints back after a dumb fight....etc.
Don’t fuss...don’t play with ****** bags....and until the rules have a hard consequence for not sticking to what you wrote on the paper-have fun.
Thanks for the great answers! I was happy to see Michael Carpenter's name thrown out there, but that may be too high a standard for my character to live up to...
This has given me a lot to play with.
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I’m playing a LG character (on paper) at the moment and have occasional disagreements with my fellow players regarding what that means and whether my character’s actions fall within that alignment. Without getting into it, I’ll admit up front that I’m probably right as often as I’m wrong.
But the debate got me thinking about what the limits of lawful good are and I was wondering what everyone else thought. Here are some questions that I am curious to see answered. In your opinion:
1. What makes a good LG character?
2. What makes a bad LG character?
3. When does LG become lawful stupid?
4. What are some of your favorite or least favorite LG tropes or stories?
Personally I don’t think people should care that much about the alignment on the character sheet unless there’s some specific reason to (IE it’s a requirement for an item or class or something) but it comes up pretty often at my table. Looking for ideas and experiences from my fellow players.
I’ll have to agree with your final sentiment. The more I’ve played, the less emphasis is put on alignment. For one, in many campaigns, a character’s alignment can change and alter depending on the circumstance and situations they come into contact with during the campaign. A reflection of character growth and development. However:
1. A good LG character should uphold the law for the interest of the betterment of those around him/her. The good of the people outweighs written law.
2. A bad LG character is one that is all about the law and nothing but the law. The law is there to keep order for the betterment of people, but it’s laws first. People second. This character generally becomes or is a lawful evil character.
3. Lawful Good can often be stupid for the most hilarious reasons. Players can get a bit carried away is trying to uphold that alignment the best they can. A perfect example is one player I play with has a character that is a local folk hero and lawful good. He rushes into situations deemed suspicious and often gets in over his head. He’s punched an old woman in the face in-game because he thought she was kidnapping a child. His response is always “I’m Lawful good!” Anytime we all gasp in horror. lol! Even though this can be played as Lawful Good getting stupid, the only reason he is still alive is because we all love this character way too much to let him die. And, Lord knows, he’s been close to death in more sessions than not. I guess this also answers number 4.
'Lawful Good' means the character believes in their fellow man - both as an individual and as a social structure. At least to me, and since the thread is "what does LG mean to you?", I'm gonna take you at your word for that.
Lawful Good means that the character believes society is inherently a good thing, and that the people in it and that make it up are worth defending. In contrast to Chaotic Good, which champions people at the expense of institutions or structures and who may not believe that society is a good thing, Lawful Good is a protector of both the lives of the people and the civilizations that people have built.
1.) What makes a good LG character?
Exactly that. A good LG character serves civilization. They are the light that guides the way forward, seeking to enlighten and empower both people and society. A LG character doesn't necessarily need to be pointlessly selfless, suicidally Questy, or any of the other stuff. The entire point of LG is that when you are presented with a decision that matters, one that will deeply affect the lives of innocents or the course (or existence) of civilization? The LG character makes the choice to preserve civilization and those who live within it, at their own expense if need be, to the best of their abilities.
2/3.) What makes a bad LG character/when does LG become Lawful Stupid?
These are both basically the same question, and amount to the same thing. LG becomes LS when the character takes actions based on 'lawfulness' that are harmful to society or civilization, or which cause needless strife and anguish at the smaller scale. The paladin who chops off the hand of the starving beggar who stole a day's rations from the party Because The Law Demands It, and for no other reason, is Lawful Stupid. So is the paladin who murders the entire guard force of a local village because they tried to arrest said beggar (and then tried to defend their own lives against the marauding paladin) Because Good Demands It is equally lawful stupid. Taking actions which are harmful or disruptive and hiding behind the law - or the Good - when called to task for them is Lawful Stupid.
4.) What are some of your favorite/least favorite LG stories?
Michael Carpenter of the Dresden Files is a picture-perfect paladin. A humble man who upholds his vows and seeks the betterment of himself, his friends, those around him, and the human race. If the betterment of those things, or the foiling of a vicious evil that seeks the downfall of those things, requires him to break the law? So be it. If they require him to do something awful lest far worse befall the world, so be it. That does not absolve him of those things, and to the best of his abilities he must make reparations for what he did, and he is willing to do so without complaint. Michael Carpenter is the gold standard of Lawful Good.
To a lesser and yet much more poignant extent, the story of Garg and Moonslicer is one of my favorite D&D vignettes. Google it, should come up. An ogre finds a paladin's lost sentient blade, and the sword browbeats the ogre into doing good works for a nearby village towards the goal of answering Garg's question: "what is good?" The way it ends, and how Moonslicer (the sword) answers Garg's question, is also a fantastic example of Lawful Good.
Lawful Good is both the easiest and the hardest alignment to play. Simply do the right thing. You know what it is, you know what it isn't. Just do the right thing whenever the chance comes your way. No matter how painful it is.
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So, caveat to this, is that each individual character will take their own alignment differently. For some characters, it can be a core piece of their identity. For others, it's not set into their being, as they aren't sure of themselves. It's a personal conscience thing, and some people have a strong one, others a weak one, and still others that haven't really figured it out yet. As such, whether or not you play a character into their alignment or not should, in part, depend on the other traits of the character itself.
With that out of the way... You have to separate the Good/Evil spectrum from the Lawful/Chaotic first to really analyze them properly.
Good versus Evil may sound like it's super heroes vs super villans, but it's not in the context of DnD. It would be more accurately described as whether the good of all, or the good of self, is more important to the character in question. A Good character will put others before themselves if they think of themselves at all, while an Evil character thinks about themselves first, and only sometimes about others afterwards. The more Good a character is, the more likely they are to sacrifice themselves to protect others, even if it means dying to do so. The action Batman takes at the end of The Dark Knight, taking the fall for Harvey Dent's crimes in order to preserve what Dent stood for is a great example. Up until that point, Batman was generally thought of as a hero, if a vigilante taking the law into his own hands. He was willing to sacrifice that position in order to protect the legacy of another, that was doing positive things for Gotham City that Batman never would be able to do. A less Good version of Batman would not have done this. A Neutral Batman would have simple gone back to business as usual, continuing to fight crime himself because the police and legal system in Gotham could not. An Evil Batman would never have entered into that situation in the first place, because he probably wouldn't be tying criminals up for the police to deal with, and would probably have simply killed the Joker in their first personal encounter at the fundraising party at the loft.
Lawful versus Chaotic is about doing what you're supposed to do versus what you want to do. While Lawful is most easily thought of as following the actual law, it's not limited to just that. The individual in question might be part of some order that has core tenants that cannot be violated (like the Prime Directive of the Federation) or the individual might have established a set of rules for themselves that they vow to never break (like how Batman or Superman won't kill). A Chaotic individual is fully aware of what they are doing, but feel like rules don't actually apply to them. Rules are meant for lesser creatures, who need them to find meaning or guidance in their lives. They find codes of conduct to be constraining. But that doesn't mean they wander around f**king s**t up, like Loki does in Thor and The Avengers. I mean, that is one way to play Chaotic Evil, but in the context of a DnD party it's generally counter-productive and highly disruptive to both the group and to any storyline ongoing.
The other really important thing about this system that I feel gets left behind the overwhelming majority of the time is that it is all a measure of degrees. A lot of people think that all Good is created equal, and that if you list your alignment as Good on your character sheet, that you're automagically Captain Steve Rogers, Captain America, who can do no wrong, and is the champion of justice and honor. That's.... not true at all. Good can be that, but that's a fairly extreme example of what Good can be. Good is also the villager who sweeps the town square just because they think that makes it look nicer. Good is that random stranger coming out of a door, and holding it open as you approach to enter. All 9 alignments are a range of possibilities, not just neat boxes that are separate from one another. They blend at their edges, like how Red and Blue become Purple. It's messy and unclear. It can, in some situations, be definitive, but more often than not it isn't.
I would hope you can decipher for yourself the answers to your first 2 questions from what I wrote above. As to the other 2...
Lawful Good usually becomes Lawful Stupid when your character's personality and depth are entirely what their alignment is itself. If there is no other good way to describe a Lawful Good character than simply Lawful Good, it's not a good character. Alignment should be integral to the character's identity to some degree, yes. But when that is the entirety of their identity, it's Stupid.
The worst you can be is Loki from Thor and The Avengers. Chaotic Evil, only seeking personal power, will happily backstab anyone and anything to get what he wants, even when it has been made clear that he's already not getting what he wants (ie he himself was backstabbed). He starts changing after that, and eventually ends up being more Chaotic Neutral, maybe just slightly leaning Chaotic Good a tiny bit. But the early days... leave the early days in the backstory, don't bring it to the game table.
The more I've played, the more I've tried to keep it simple.
Curently, I am using AngryGM's definition.
Good vs. Evil
Are you willing to suffer harm or make sacrifices to benefit others? If so, you’re good.
Are you willing to harm others for your own benefit? If so, you’re evil.
Otherwise, you’re neutral with respect to good and evil.
Law vs. Chaos
Do you think individuals should be expected to give up freedoms for the benefit of society as a whole? If so, you’re lawful.
Do you think you are better off retaining your individual freedoms by living outside of society? If so, you’re chaotic.
Otherwise, you’re neutral with respect to law and chaos.
I like it.
There's a lot of good overview stuff here. IMO, in the most abstract sense, I view LG as being the students; collectors; curators; and protectors. People who see the beauty of the universe and want to preserve it for others. As opposed to CG who are the creators and the explorers, people who make new things to be shared with others. As opposed to LE who are takers and thieves and slavers, for whom the universe should belong to them and who would take it with them when they died, if they could. As opposed to CE who are focused on their own aggrandizement, who value nothing else, and who will destroy anything to give themselves more room to grow.
Preserve ------------------------------ Create
| |
| |
| |
Capture ----------------------------- Expand
Now let's get more into the weeds:
1) A good Lawful Good character has a code of behavior, but not for its own sake. They sort of naturally are focused on tomorrow's problems as well as the immediate ones and are aware that other people might end up having to take up the cause if they fall. The code provides a framework for building a consensus among like-minded individuals for the purpose of solving multiple societal problems. Lawful AND Good.
A smart LG character doesn't think the law will naturally lead to good, because that IS Lawful Stupid. They understand that laws are created by people. If you drop an old-school LG paladin into an evil society, they don't start becoming evil because "that's the law." They do everything possible, exploit every loophole and push every envelope to bring solace to the afflicted and justice to the innocent. And they don't ask permission.
Now to dig even deeper: the most common way this all impacts players is how they conduct themselves in a fight. To give an example, my paladin will go out of her way to avoid a fight unless it has to happen to further her mission or to defend herself or others. Happily, now that she's endgame-level, she has a lot more leeway about how to solve problems non-lethally, and often even non-violently. But she will throw sand in a dude's face without warning, then kick him in the nuts while he's blinded, if the fight is worth having. She will take advantage of a guy's stupidity, of his lack of imagination, of his lack of information, she will take advantage of a guy's physical infirmities, up to and including Lou Gehrig's Disease, if the fight is worth having. The one thing she will never ever do is take advantage of a guy's decency. She doesn't sneak up under a white flag and then hit a guy because that disincentivizes him from respecting white flags in the future, which makes the world a crappier place overall. She doesn't torture and she wouldn't torture because it incentivizes the other guys to torture. That's why they wrote Zone of Truth into the game. So weirdos would quit writing these fantasy "24" scenarios to justify their own OOG issues.
2) Being stupid or violent or self-righteous or vain or any number of other character defects that don't impact on alignment necessarily are what make a bad Lawful Good character. If you want my opinion on shortcomings inherent to the alignment: I'd say they're small-c conservative; prone to debate and consensus-building, not fast off the blocks; risk-averse; rarely original, although they might be fantastic synthesizers of others' ideas. All these things fit the stereotypes, but I hope I'm explaining WHY. It's in their nature as preservers and protectors to also be squares. It's in their nature as cataloguers and curators to seek out consensus and long boring debates with others.
3) LG NEVER gets Lawful Stupid, imo. Players get Lawful Stupid, and most of them do it knowingly as a misguided criticism of something they don't understand. They (or the DMs who demand it of them), think some Dudley Do-Right satire of a well-intentioned, feckless, naif will serve as a good foil for their badasssssssss wisecracking anti-hero types.
As I mentioned above, I think there's a distinction to be made between character flaws and alignment. I think it's possible to be closed-minded and LG, or stupid and LG, but that's not an inherent problem of being LG. YMMV.
4) I was DMing Curse of Strahd. The party had killed Doru and left Donavich a weeping wreck. They'd met Mad Mary and left her a weeping wreck. They saw Granny putting a kid in her bag and the paladin says "let the kid go." Granny says "I paid for him fair and square!" Paladin has done divine sense on Granny and knows she's a fiend of some kind and probably out of the lowbie party's league, puts his hand on his hilt and says "I won't ask again." (Is this Lawful Stupid? I guess some people would say so.) Anyway, Granny doesn't need to fight for something she can always come back and get later, so she gives them the kid. Paladin susses out the situation with the parents who are currently in a drugged-out stupor. Takes the kid to Mad Mary's, takes them both to Donavich. Tells Donavich "Grieve for your son, then get up and get back to work. The people here need you too much. This is your family now. Take care of each other." Best Lawful Good moment I've ever seen in my life.
For me, the real fun of lawful good happens when the lawful part and the good part come into conflict. Would you break your code to save a life?
"Not all those who wander are lost"
To answer 1 through 3, the player determines if their LG is an enjoyable one or an intolerable one.
I watched a player use LG as an excuse to disrupt everyone's game - a fanatic that treated everyone else like NPCs in his story.
I've watched several players use LG to add something to the game - realizing they can't control others and simply being a foil to people's antics or vice versa depending on the encounter - cooperative.
Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider.
My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong.
I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲
“It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
Ah, yes. When the boss says "you're off this case!" and then the LG has to say to themselves "there's still punks out there that need bustin'!"
One of the truest statements I've ever heard about an LG character in battle:
LAWFUL GOOD DOESN'T NECESSARILY MEAN LAWFUL NICE! >:D![](https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/d-d-beyond-general/general-discussion/<img src="https:/static1.fjcdn.com/comments/Gtnot+being+lawful+good+_a93cf20a49c19d2e133004d5849a1d9e.jpg" alt="Image result for lawful good doesn't mean lawful nice"/>)
Gandalf_The_Gray, goddess of the quote chain | NG | Knowledge, Life | Female brass dragonborn head facing left
NOTICE
I will be inactive until August. Thank you for your patience.
John McClain is lawful good.
Riggs is chaotic good. Murtaugh is lawful good.
:)
My .02:
Alignment in 5E isn’t something you even need to ask about. Unless your DM really gets annoyed—there’s no repercussion.
In previous rules—there were real consequences (losing powers, losing your character, etc). A DM would even warn you...uhh..you do this and uhhh...that’s it for this character, right?
Now it just seems like like you spend more time arguing about your alignment vs. what your character does—when someone says hey wait..you’re a Druid and you just burned down a forest and murdered a bunch of villagers because the barmaid brought your beer and it was slightly warmer than you expected.....
You’re lawful good but sacrificed the NPC wilderness guide because it would give the party hitpoints back after a dumb fight....etc.
Don’t fuss...don’t play with ****** bags....and until the rules have a hard consequence for not sticking to what you wrote on the paper-have fun.
YEAH!
Go Murtagh, Arya, and Eragon!
Did you know that Elva was going to be the green Rider, but the author decided that would make her too powerful?
Gandalf_The_Gray, goddess of the quote chain | NG | Knowledge, Life | Female brass dragonborn head facing left
NOTICE
I will be inactive until August. Thank you for your patience.
Thanks for the great answers! I was happy to see Michael Carpenter's name thrown out there, but that may be too high a standard for my character to live up to...
This has given me a lot to play with.