No love for Neutral alignments in OOTS

[Blas_de_Lezo]

Correct me if I'm wrong but it seems that there is a lack of main characters with strong neutral alignments in OOTS, excepting V.

Where are the neutral good, lawful neutral, neutral evil and chaotic neutral recurrent characters?

I like how Rich develops the alignment system and that's why I always wanted to know what a neutral good character would look like in OOTS, as I think it's one of the most interesting alignments to develop in a character, specially if he/she is intelligent.

For the record, I like the extra fluff for alignments from this web http://easydamus.com/alignment.html

[TRH]

Lots of people argue that Miko was LN by the end, but that's not much of a role model, I'll grant. Tsukiko seemed NE, and from Start of Darkness we had Lirian, who was NG. Admittedly, if she had been even a little less of a bleeding heart then Redcloak's crusade would have been over early, but what are you gonna do.

Oh, and some argue that Haley was more CN than CG near the beginning. Belkar nearly talked her into slave trading, you'll recall, and that was the point in the comic where character development was really starting to matter, so it's of some relevance.

Oh, I almost forgot, but Leeky Windstaff was NE, as well. All of the Neutral alignments have been done at some point, albeit possibly not to the degree you might like.

[Blas_de_Lezo]

Lots of people argue that Miko was LN by the end, but that's not much of a role model, I'll grant. Tsukiko seemed NE, and from Start of Darkness we had Lirian, who was NG. Admittedly, if she had been even a little less of a bleeding heart then Redcloak's crusade would have been over early, but what are you gonna do.

Oh, and some argue that Haley was more CN than CG near the beginning. Belkar nearly talked her into slave trading, you'll recall, and that was the point in the comic where character development was really starting to matter, so it's of some relevance.

Oh, I almost forgot, but Leeky Windstaff was NE, as well. All of the Neutral alignments have been done at some point, albeit possibly not to the degree you might like.

Yeah, but they are not mostly recurring characters anyway...

[137beth]

I think that the MitD is true neutral...

[Gift Jeraff]

Nale tends to come across as textbook Neutral Evil, despite his claim of being Lawful early in the comic. My personal guess is that he started as just barely Lawful like Roy, but that was mostly as a result of training under his father most of his life, and as he spent more time away from home (plus Sabine's influence) he became more dedicated to pure Evil, without regards to Law or Chaos.

Note that I would personally peg Roy as Neutral Good (with Lawful tendencies), so maybe Nale is Lawful enough for Rich to consider him LE.

[Thokk_Smash]

What about Therkla? She was pretty strongly Lawful Neutral; I don't have Don't Split the Party, but I think the Giant even mentioned as much in a commentary.

[Gift Jeraff]

What about Therkla? She was pretty strongly Lawful Neutral; I don't have Don't Split the Party, but I think the Giant even mentioned as much in a commentary.

Yeah, he refers to her as a spokesperson for Neutral, with regards to the Good-Evil axis.

[Rakoa]

Note that I would personally peg Roy as Neutral Good (with Lawful tendencies), so maybe Nale is Lawful enough for Rich to consider him LE.

I think the Giant hinted playfully in a forum post that Nale is not, in fact, Lawful Evil.

[Goosefarble]

Enor and Gannji are both True Neutral, too, and while hardly "main" characters, they had quite a large stint in the comic and were both pretty good characters (in my opinion).

[MrBanana]

Well for starters, most of the characters are heroes or villians, whcih means a lot of good and evil alignments, V being the exception.

Belkar and Thog (if Thog is not-dead) both have the potential to be come neutral characters. The Thieves Guild is most likely filled with chaotic neutral characters.

I think neutral (in case of good vs. evil) are rare because that's the alignment most normal people have, and this comic isn't about the normal people, it's about the adventurers and villains. And the only major NPC faction they meet are all paladins, so that's not balancing it out either.

[F.Harr]

V's true nutral and I suspect that, in the balance, Eugene is neutral good and Haley is something-neutral, too.

[Kish]

One post which asserts both that Eugene Greenhilt is good and that Haley is not. Poor Haley.

[bguy]

What about Therkla? She was pretty strongly Lawful Neutral; I don't have Don't Split the Party, but I think the Giant even mentioned as much in a commentary.

Didn't Therkla murder someone just, so she could be her class valedictorian. That screams evil alignment. (To say nothing of her then happily serving as the personal assassin for a lawful evil aristocrat who was in league with fiends.) Maybe at the very end she switched over to a neutral alignment but for most of her life she seemed very Lawful Evil.

[sengmeng]

Neutrality = no drama. No complex motivations, no exploration of what it means, and neutrality is hardly something that people have a strong dedication to. It would be a one-off joke, most likely, like when one of the guys I played D&D with would use "For neutral!" as his battle-cry. Look at Julia Greenhilt: "I'm True Neutral. I swing both ways." Funny, yes, but the underlying message is: I'm just a pragmatist and kind of self-centered.

[ORione]

V's true neutral and I suspect that, in the balance, Eugene is neutral good and Haley is something-neutral, too.

He's waiting to get in the Lawful Good afterlife, so I doubt it.

[snikrept]

Well, Belkar is Chaotic Neutral, and he's a major character!

*ducks*

[Sir_Leorik]

Neutrality = no drama. No complex motivations, no exploration of what it means, and neutrality is hardly something that people have a strong dedication to. It would be a one-off joke, most likely, like when one of the guys I played D&D with would use "For neutral!" as his battle-cry. Look at Julia Greenhilt: "I'm True Neutral. I swing both ways." Funny, yes, but the underlying message is: I'm just a pragmatist and kind of self-centered.

That is not what True Neutral means at all. It means that

a) a creature is incapable of making ethical and moral judgments (Animals, many Magical Beasts, some Aberrations)

b) a character chooses not to get involved in the affairs of others, focusing on herself, her family, her neighbors; she says "what's mine is mine, what's yours is yours, don't bother me or ask me for help and I won't bother you or ask you for help

c) a character, such as Mordenkainen, is actively seeking to maintain a balance of power between Law and Chaos and between Good and Evil to prevent any one side from becoming too dominant. When Iuz the Old or Vecna threaten to conquer the Flanaess or destroy millions of lives, Mordenkainen rallies the Circle of Eight to the aid of the forces of Good. Once Vecna or Iuz are on the ropes, Mordenkainen will allow the forces of Evil to escape, because he fears that an attempt to destroy them will either undermine the fabric of reality or will lead Good to become complacent and unable to meet the next threat from Chaos or Evil. Despite his best efforts to explain this philosophy, Mordenkainen has lost the friendship of Tenser and Bigby as a result of following this philosophy dogmatically. Mordenkainen is not interested in riches, not anymore; he earned more in a single dungeon crawl into Castle Greyhawk decades ago than most adventurers earn in a lifetime nowadays. (Stupid wealth by level guidelines for 3.X!) He is willing to sacrifice his friendships with Bigby and Tenser, to pursue an agenda promoting Neutrality, in the hopes that all of Oerth will be better in the long run.

[Morty]

Or it might just mean that the character's good and evil traits and actions balance out.

[LadyEowyn]

Main heroes are typically likely to be Good-aligned, otherwise they wouldn't be going through so much to save the world; having the team have a Neutral member like V (and grappling with the issues of an Evil member like Belkar) is an interesting addition in itself. Likewise, villains are generally going to be Evil, otherwise why would the heroes oppose them? (It's different in a story where you just have protagonists and antagonists, not 'heroes' or 'villains', but OotS isn't that kind of story.)

V is (or was) True Neutral, Girard was probably Chaotic Neutral (his family did a lot of bad stuff in the course of protecting the gate, but the fact that they were protecting it and thus giving up normal lives to safeguard reality makes them at least Neutral), Enor and Gannji were True Neutral, I'd expect the bandits from Book 2 were some flavour of Neutral; so I'd saw we've had a decent number of neutral-aligned characters on the good-evil axis.

The observation that most Good and Evil characters are either Lawful or Chaotic is a good one; I suppose it's easier and more interesting to write characters that lean to one side or the other to provide more contrast between members of the same team (e.g., Elan and Roy; Redcloak and Xykon).

EDIT: Also, regarding the post two posts above this discussing Neutrality: the second type doesn't really provide much for a character to do in a comic, since they just want to be left alone and stay out of things, but we do have examples in Enor and Gannji. The balance-preserving kind always seems weird to me - Good and Evil are two arbitrary extremes. Good is, well, good, and Evil is evil. Why should their be a balance between people who want to save, preserve, and improve life, and people who want to kill everyone they dislike, or just everyone it amuses them to kill? The Good afterlives are idyllic, the Evil ones are horrific. I can understand the idea of wanting a reasonable "balance" between Law and Chaos, but why would someone who wasn't evil deliberately want more Evil (ie: more people being murdered and tortured) in the world?

[Sir_Leorik]

V's true nutral and I suspect that, in the balance, Eugene is neutral good and Haley is something-neutral, too.

Eugene's rudeness, foul language and absentee parenting aside, nothing Eugene has done indicates he isn't Lawful Good. I keep repeating over and over, but no one listens to me: a Character's personality and a Character's Alignment are two different things. That's how Miko could be arrogant, condescending and rude, and still be a Paladin, while Elan can be cheerful, friendly and honest, and still be Chaotic Good. Tarquin can love Elan dearly, and still be a Lawful Evil tyrant, and Belkar can love Mr. Scruffy and still be a Chaotic Evil psychopath when it comes to Humans and Kobolds.

[Bird]

Eugene's rudeness, foul language and absentee parenting aside, nothing Eugene has done indicates he isn't Lawful Good. I keep repeating over and over, but no one listens to me: a Character's personality and a Character's Alignment are two different things. That's how Miko could be arrogant, condescending and rude, and still be a Paladin, while Elan can be cheerful, friendly and honest, and still be Chaotic Good. Tarquin can love Elan dearly, and still be a Lawful Evil tyrant, and Belkar can love Mr. Scruffy and still be a Chaotic Evil psychopath when it comes to Humans and Kobolds.

This is very well put. The contrast between Eugene's being a jerk and his LG-ness is one of my favorite things about the character. (I do think that the "absentee parenting" which you mention would push him a bit away from LG -- leaving your wife with all the child-rearing duties is the sort of non-malevolent selfishness that strikes me as very neutral. Though I agree that he's probably LG overall.)

My favorite kind of TN has always been a simple one -- not principled and self-sacrificing enough to be good, not malevolent or unprincipled enough to be evil. Similar deal with respect to law/chaos. That's it. Such a character can still have tons of motivations that lead to great drama -- they can fall in love, they can protect their families, they can try to get rich, they can try to save the world, whatever. They just aren't as likely to be as principled or as unprincipled about it as the white or black hats.

[F.Harr]

He's waiting to get in the Lawful Good afterlife, so I doubt it.

Eugene's rudeness, foul language and absentee parenting aside, nothing Eugene has done indicates he isn't Lawful Good. I keep repeating over and over, but no one listens to me: a Character's personality and a Character's Alignment are two different things. That's how Miko could be arrogant, condescending and rude, and still be a Paladin, while Elan can be cheerful, friendly and honest, and still be Chaotic Good. Tarquin can love Elan dearly, and still be a Lawful Evil tyrant, and Belkar can love Mr. Scruffy and still be a Chaotic Evil psychopath when it comes to Humans and Kobolds.

Well, he's waiting for AN afterlife. And I think it's a great point Sir Leorik makes. But if Roy keeps trying, Eugene quit trying a long time ago. Even when the world is at stake, he cares more about his and his issues than the mission. I accept that he's good in that he decided that his family should come before the oath and that he has some passing regret for not being an attentive father to Roy. But although his inability to deal with his family reasonably can't really be layed at the feet of his alignment, the fact that when he started something, he lost focus on it tends to not-very-lawfulness.

But that's just me.

This is very well put. The contrast between Eugene's being a jerk and his LG-ness is one of my favorite things about the character. (I do think that the "absentee parenting" which you mention would push him a bit away from LG -- leaving your wife with all the child-rearing duties is the sort of non-malevolent selfishness that strikes me as very neutral. Though I agree that he's probably LG overall.)

My favorite kind of TN has always been a simple one -- not principled and self-sacrificing enough to be good, not malevolent or unprincipled enough to be evil. Similar deal with respect to law/chaos. That's it. Such a character can still have tons of motivations that lead to great drama -- they can fall in love, they can protect their families, they can try to get rich, they can try to save the world, whatever. They just aren't as likely to be as principled or as unprincipled about it as the white or black hats.

Yeah, that's valid.

[Blas_de_Lezo]

Neutrality = no drama. No complex motivations, no exploration of what it means, and neutrality is hardly something that people have a strong dedication to. It would be a one-off joke, most likely, like when one of the guys I played D&D with would use "For neutral!" as his battle-cry. Look at Julia Greenhilt: "I'm True Neutral. I swing both ways." Funny, yes, but the underlying message is: I'm just a pragmatist and kind of self-centered.

True neutrality maybe, but neutral good, neutral evil and chaotic neutral can be very dramatic.

For example, a neutral good character is the champion of good (and not lawful good), because he's not attached to traditions, rules but neither to individuality and undiscipline. That makes a NG a very complex character, if he/she is smart, because he will struggle to follow the best path to do the right thing, and that implies using intelligence and analysis. That's a problem that LG or CG chacters don't even consider.

probably[/I] Chaotic Neutral

Please...
Girard is THE archetype for Chaotic Good. Chaotic Neutral characters are incaple of sacrifices for the common good, even less comitting their entire lifes to guard an "absurd" Gate...

Chaotic Neutral characters are, on their best, independent, pragmatical and individualists. But as true individualists, they would never involve in lifetime activities for the promotion of good causes. If they could give their life to a project, being CN as they are, they would be philosophical followers of Chaos. One example of this could be the Joker ("I'm an agent of Chaos") in the Dark Knight Batman.

EDIT: What the boards seem to forget here is that the "true hero" is the Neutral Good alignment, (one that it's entirely committed to the cause of Good, without restrictions) and not the Lawful Good... Take a look at this wheel http://easydamus.com/Composite2.png

[Morty]

Girard is THE archetype for Chaotic Good. Chaotic Neutral characters are incaple of sacrifices for the common good, even less comitting their entire lifes to guard an "absurd" Gate...

For someone who wants more Neutral characters in the story, you seem to misunderstand the Neutral alignments quite badly.

[Blas_de_Lezo]

For someone who wants more Neutral characters in the story, you seem to misunderstand the Neutral alignments quite badly.

Very good reason, yeah...

[Gift Jeraff]

Protecting the world != automatically Good

It could be done for selfish reasons. Or it could be done for Good reasons, but with Evil means. Or it could be for Good reasons with Good means, but you also happen to murder orphans for fun.

[Kish]

And Blas's description of Chaotic Neutral bears a very close resemblance to the Player's Handbook description of one alignment.

Unfortunately, that alignment is Chaotic Evil, not Chaotic Neutral. Any time you find yourself saying, "That character can't be X Alignment, he has a good quality"...even if X Alignment is Something Evil, you're wrong. You're much more wrong if X Alignment is Chaotic Neutral--as for Girard*.

Liking extra "fluff" some random Internet person writes is one thing. Losing sight of the clear descriptions in the Player's Handbook is quite another. People on the board correctly "forget" that "Neutral Good is the 'true hero' alignment" because it's absolutely wrong to say that Neutral Good is officially better or more good than either other good alignment.

*Girard's behavior appears to have been quite Chaotic Evil. The only obstacle to classifying him that way, is that he traveled with Soon for as long as he did without Soon appearing to either Fall or kill him. Good has been quite thoroughly off the table ever since the comic revealed the Draketooths' horrific "recruitment" methods.

[AgentofHellfire]

Eugene's rudeness, foul language and absentee parenting aside, nothing Eugene has done indicates he isn't Lawful Good. I keep repeating over and over, but no one listens to me: a Character's personality and a Character's Alignment are two different things. That's how Miko could be arrogant, condescending and rude, and still be a Paladin, while Elan can be cheerful, friendly and honest, and still be Chaotic Good. Tarquin can love Elan dearly, and still be a Lawful Evil tyrant, and Belkar can love Mr. Scruffy and still be a Chaotic Evil psychopath when it comes to Humans and Kobolds.

While I agree that Eugene being rude=/=Eugene not being LG, there are other events that make it more likely that Eugene has fallen from grace. Namely, the fact that his reactions to Vaarsuvius' actions while soul-spliced was one of approval. He didn't even think of them as morally appalling, just...totally fine. That definitely puts him lower on the Good end of things than, well, most of the other comics' good guys.

Not to mention the fact that he interfered with the Summoning in the Trial arc (at least a Chaotic act), and collaborated with Shojo in interfering with the trial to a far greater extent than Roy. And his abandonment of the Blood Oath was problematic enough for the Lawful Good afterlife not to let him in, even though they were fine with allowing Roy.

So Eugene is, by this point, at best True Neutral.

[snoopy13a]

Belkar is neutral good

[Flame of Anor]

Thog ... [has] the potential to become neutral

"It's weird, no matter how many people he kills, the audience still thinks he's lovable."
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