If Good is a tangible and objective force, shouldn't a good BBEG be possible?

[Spore]

I am in a mood for thought experiments as of lately. My latest thought was.

1. In D&D it is often mentioned that 'good' is a cosmic force, as in: good deities, good outsiders.

2. Good is objective, it is an item or person's determinable quality

So in theory, similar to a well written villain with a good goal whose values are completely shifted into 'vile' deeds i.e. slaughter everyone in the city so they cannot be turned into undead. be pulled on its head?

A good creature does evil things for the sake of good with such efficiency and effectivity that it is just silly not doing the "dubious thing" to further the cause of good (maybe force their good god onto everyone so people receive spells and abilities that can improve their lives, even if it means killing of vast majorities of rivaling faiths?

How would you build a campaign around an (L/N/C) good villain, be it outsider, divine caster or other? Caveat would be that the creature would not loose their "good" alignment or status short of DM fiat and/or good reasoning behind them being ultimatively evil.

[Consensus]

Your caveat at the end says that even if they're evil... they can't be evil. I don't think anything productive can come out of this topic

[Thrudd]

I don't think you could call it "good" by the common understanding of morality. But sure, if there is an ongoing war between cosmic forces, either side in the war may do things that create collateral damage or harm innocents in their pursuit of victory. However, if this is the case, neither side is really "good" - there might be one side that has more or less benefit for different groups of bystanders or that treats their followers better. You might like one side better than the other or think one side would be better as the ruler of your world - but that doesn't make them "good".

I would just remove "good and evil" or "law and chaos" as terms that describe competing cosmic factions, since they are loaded with undesired moral implications. Give them an actual name - like Elysium and Abyss and Mechanus and Limbo, or whatever. Give them each their own methods and philosophy and goals, and people can choose if they want to align themselves with any of these factions.

[sabernoir]

I am in a mood for thought experiments as of lately. My latest thought was.

1. In D&D it is often mentioned that 'good' is a cosmic force, as in: good deities, good outsiders.

2. Good is objective, it is an item or person's determinable quality

So in theory, similar to a well written villain with a good goal whose values are completely shifted into 'vile' deeds i.e. slaughter everyone in the city so they cannot be turned into undead. be pulled on its head?

A good creature does evil things for the sake of good with such efficiency and effectivity that it is just silly not doing the "dubious thing" to further the cause of good (maybe force their good god onto everyone so people receive spells and abilities that can improve their lives, even if it means killing of vast majorities of rivaling faiths?

How would you build a campaign around an (L/N/C) good villain, be it outsider, divine caster or other? Caveat would be that the creature would not loose their "good" alignment or status short of DM fiat and/or good reasoning behind them being ultimatively evil.

Alignments in D&D are completely broken and make no sense whatsoever. In this case, I'm not certain how you could do this. If someone does something (e.g. smash in an innocents skull) for the greater good, is it even evil?

[Yora]

To dig up old Nietzsche: "Good" really means "we are right" and "evil" means "they are wrong". You can't really claim to be good and oppose someone for dooing good things.

What you can have is characters who are evil and who get really annoyed about a big NPC doing good things (that are opposing their evil ways).

[Spore]

To dig up old Nietzsche: "Good" really means "we are right" and "evil" means "they are wrong". You can't really claim to be good and oppose someone for dooing good things.

That is the main point. Your morality is subjective. D&D is objective. You can derive a morality from a creature's D&D alignment. You cannot however pinpoint an alignment from a creature's actions because different actions have a different impact so alignment discussions will always come up because different players will have different values set to each action.

Our group's rogue freed a group of evil clerics and slaughtered an angel to free his imprisoned sister. The DM valued him as being chaotic evil (selfish and thoroughly liberal), the player thought his actions within the (infamous) chaotic neutral alignment.

In the smallest picture he freed his sister - a good and/or neutral deed. In the bigger picture he killed an angel and freed evil clerics, furthering the evil in the world. In the biggest picture, all of this was done to show off that our villain was acutally a good guy the whole time and we subsequentially cleansed a corrupted god changing a tyranny into a LG state.

It is simply impossible to have a satisfactory alignment derived from these actions for all discussing parties. That's because we won't try it.

But take a good creature without an explicit code (like Paladins) for example. Maybe Archons, the embodiment of Law and Good. They would gladly burn through several thousand human souls in a large scale war to reduce the influence of a singular demon lord. Maybe the group is part of the country siding with the demon lord? Maybe the party has a better way of removing said demon lord. In this case, the archon is the villain and the 'bad guy' because he simply values mortal life as null and void if he can stop a single demon lord. Yes, he would still sacrifice himself to kill said demon lord. He does command said army from within the established command structure (in other words he adheres to his alignments). But he is still deeply inside the bad guy and can be antagonized by a good party, even a (possibly conflicted) Paladin.

[Frozen_Feet]

Yes and you're 40 years late to the party. 1st edition AD&D Dungeon Master's Guide gives an example of two warring nations with Lawful Good leaders, and that just the beginning.

An option would be to have a conflict of interest along an axis that is not Good versus Evil - with Law versus Chaos being the obvious, codified alternative.

An example would be a Lawful Good leader seeking to found a nation, rallying together people, creating punitive systems and codifying natural rights in law - with Chaotic types in opposition because they see this new system as smothering personal liberty and individual creativity and because they see the demands of adherence to a group as fostering a form fascism, classism or other form of oppression.

The equally obvious alternative is for the PCs to be something else than Good. For example, in AD&D terms, True Neutrality is defined in terms of cosmic balance and adherence to status quo. Good, Evil, Law and Chaos are all parts of necessary whole, and things can never be improved expect temporarily and locally. To a group of True Neutral characters, a determined champion of any kind of Good would be horrifying, as they are a disturbance in the balance and the more they struggle to bring forth whatever "good" they're after, the more inevitable the eventual backlash from Evil is going to be. Say, a Paladin seeking to re-establish Gods of Good in a non-religious setting, is from a True Neutral viewpoint begging to bring back all the Devils as well. From an objective viewpoint, the Paladin does not need to be doing anything wrong - they're just doing business as usual, slaying dragons, saving princesses, helping people in need, spreading the Good Word, donating to the Church, buying Girl Scout cookies - but from the viewpoint of a different aligment, this is an intolerable violation of how things are meant to be.

[Quellian-dyrae]

You can absolutely have good-aligned major antagonists, as Frozen_Feet above covered. But a good-aligned villain - someone who is unquestionably good and trying to do something unquestionably good yet who must be opposed on moral grounds by other good-aligned individuals, without either losing a claim to being good - that's trickier.

Say you have an objectively evil group, not just "has Alignment: Evil in their statblocks" but a group that is actively doing evil and needs to be stopped. Let's go with the classic orc horde actively rampaging throughout the countryside killing and pillaging with abandon. They aren't just a tribe of orcs that are supposedly okay to kill because they have green skin and "usually Chaotic Evil" in their MM entry, they're an unquestionable threat to thousands of lives.

You could then probably set up a conflict between one side that wants to whelm forces and decisively end the threat through force of arms, and another that wants to end the threat peacefully. Killing the orcs is absolutely justified as defense of others, and if you're risking your own life to do it that puts you solidly in the Good column, but it nonetheless still means killing a large number of sapient beings. Flip side, trying to solve a conflict through negotiation, understanding, passive resistance, and so on is absolutely a Good form of conflict resolution, but it nonetheless may be slower or less reliable, which could mean putting more lives at risk (or livelihoods; even if you can evacuate the villages in their path or something you're uprooting people from their lives and homes, etc).

Team Fight's attempts to attack the orcs, of course, would be extremely damaging to Team Talk's attempts at negotiation. Likewise, Team Talk could very well interfere with Team Fight to try to keep the orcs alive or by revealing planned ambushes or so on. In this way, for either to be able to end the threat, the other probably has to be stopped. Either side could be the heroic or villainous side depending on how you structure the narrative. And I think that either an overzealous warlord who wants to go out and put every last orc to the sword or a holier-than-thou technical pacifist who is willing to put actual lives at risk just to keep the blood off their own hands would make a satisfying villain.

...And even if they don't you can always fall back on the rampaging orc horde!

[Morty]

I've yet to see anyone actually enact the "objective Good" idea in practice; it only seems to come up in Internet discussions. As Frozen_Feet explained, you can absolutely have an antagonist who's "good", whether by D&D definition of the word or another. All it takes is having goals and motivations that put them in conflict with the PCs, even if they're "good" themselves.

[ArlEammon]

Just because someone is loving, even generous and kind, doesn't mean they can't be malevolent.

Good, if a tangible and objective force, might be at the mercy of someone's subjective views, IF the ultimate source of that tangible and objective force is misunderstood.
Case in point, the King Priest of Istar, as a very weak example. However there are other examples I can't quite think of right now.

[denthor]

Yes, how it has been suggested that they are working for another good church or organization..


So it is a complete party looking for the same thing as your players.

[LordCdrMilitant]

It's possible to have a good party and a good antagonist, if that's what you're asking.

Just as evil isn't all one big happy family, neither is good.

[Yora]

That is the main point. Your morality is subjective. D&D is objective. You can derive a morality from a creature's D&D alignment. You cannot however pinpoint an alignment from a creature's actions because different actions have a different impact so alignment discussions will always come up because different players will have different values set to each action.

If Good is objective, then it can be clearly defined. And for it to work it has to be defined. What definition of objective Good are you going with?

[weckar]

Not to be pedantic, but wouldn't such a character by definition be a BBGG??

[Lemmy]

Not to be pedantic, but wouldn't such a character by definition be a BBGG??

Or maybe a BGGG?

[Lord Haart]

Think of The Doctor. Big Good? Generally, unquestionably. Has a past, present and most probably future littered with blood, danger and whole civilisations he couldn't save, refused to save or even actively (if reluctantly) doomed? He does, old fellow, he does oh so much. If he sees a civilisation that isn't rotten to the core — there are good people, poor shmoes, lots of good people — but that amounts to evil in the grand sum (misguided, misleaded, misused)? He will try to save everyone worth saving, he will try to get to the root of the problem, but if he thinks everything has gone too far — if he thinks there's no preventing the Great Omelette War without blowing up all the eggs, good and bad ones together… Then he's sorry. He's so, so sorry.

(Not to mention he kicks you out of "people he will try to save" club if you do something that's against his moral code, even if you acted with good intentions, in good faith, and without crossing any lines. And he'll destroy your career with just six words. Even if you were going to do a lot of good, and he knew it, and his actions will bite him in the ass something fierce. "Good" does not mean "free of making errors", you see — he is a great force of good, but he makes great mistakes as well.)

Think of being at the wrong end of The Doctor's burden of dire decisions. Or worse, of doing your best and earning the Doctor's judgement.

Actually, it's enough to think of attracting The Doctor's attention. Generally, that's enough to, at best, utterly destroy your life.

[Pleh]

It depends a lot on how your setting defines things. Essentially, yes, it is possible, if statistically less likely.

I mean think about it this way: if someone were to take over the world by doing REALLY nice things for people and their entire dictatorship were based around being the best possible leader the world had ever seen, exactly who would be objecting to this?

So really making a Good character someone the party has to take down is really just one complication to this scenario: now the Good dictator can only provide this utopian fantasy at some unacceptable cost. If the sacrifice were moral, then it would be hard to argue that the dictator is still Good, so it's more likely that the sacrifice is Freedom.

A Lawful Good Dictator who rules in benevolence and with an iron fist, maintaining a pure society through strict adherence to the law. The movie adaptation of I, Robot covered this story arc rather well: "The conclusion of the Three Laws mandates that I protect humanity from itself and therefore must confine their choices to only what is beneficial or not harmful, even against their will if need be."

[Frozen_Feet]

I mean think about it this way: if someone were to take over the world by doing REALLY nice things for people and their entire dictatorship were based around being the best possible leader the world had ever seen, exactly who would be objecting to this?

All the people who cannot believe that someone would do this out of their good will, and think there must be some ulterior motive to it all.

Of which there are quite a lot.

Special mention goes to people who think "does nice things to everyone" = "a doormat" and then get predictably burned when the "nice person" doesn't let them walk all over them. Quite a lot of room for resentment and objection there.

The above may sound petty, irrational or even paranoid, but let's remember that some of people reject the very concepts of moral good and "being nice" as irrational.

Or, an example in AD&D Alignment terms:

Lawful Evil sees the world in terms of destinies, groups, and hierarchies between groups. It is the natural order for some to rule, and others to serve those who rule. Someone who is "nice" across group boundaries upsets this order and must be opposed.

Chaotic Evil sees the world in terms of might makes right. There is no such thing as power that should go uncontested. If someone rules by virtue of "being nice", how do you know if they're actually strong or just a weakling coasting by the strength of others?

Or in other words: some will oppose the Benevolent Dictator because they're nice to the wrong people, or of the wrong people. Others will oppose them on principle, because only through their retaliation to opposition is their right to rule earned.

[Yora]

It depends a lot on how your setting defines things. Essentially, yes, it is possible, if statistically less likely.

I mean think about it this way: if someone were to take over the world by doing REALLY nice things for people and their entire dictatorship were based around being the best possible leader the world had ever seen, exactly who would be objecting to this?

People who like to do things that are bad for themselves. Like taking drugs or not participating in a common health insurance pool. We don't want what is good for us, but what we enjoy the most. Which can never be objective, so one way will never make everyone happy.

[Thrudd]

It depends a lot on how your setting defines things. Essentially, yes, it is possible, if statistically less likely.

I mean think about it this way: if someone were to take over the world by doing REALLY nice things for people and their entire dictatorship were based around being the best possible leader the world had ever seen, exactly who would be objecting to this?

So really making a Good character someone the party has to take down is really just one complication to this scenario: now the Good dictator can only provide this utopian fantasy at some unacceptable cost. If the sacrifice were moral, then it would be hard to argue that the dictator is still Good, so it's more likely that the sacrifice is Freedom.

A Lawful Good Dictator who rules in benevolence and with an iron fist, maintaining a pure society through strict adherence to the law. The movie adaptation of I, Robot covered this story arc rather well: "The conclusion of the Three Laws mandates that I protect humanity from itself and therefore must confine their choices to only what is beneficial or not harmful, even against their will if need be."

In the "real world", benevolent and just dictators and leaders are generally opposed by people who feel they are being treated unfairly or who feel threatened by changes to the system. That's often people who benefit from the initial unfairness and don't want their social advantages to be reduced. Are they going to be suffering under the new regime? Not compared to the suffering others had under their regime. But they consider it "suffering" to have to give up their slaves, for instance, or to have half of their wealth seized and redistributed (even though they will still have more than 90% of all people and will easily be comfortable for multiple lifetimes). Or, are they members of a previously privileged tribal group, and now those who were their social inferiors are to be treated as equals? Or a bunch of people that are your tribe's ancestral enemies are now living next door to you, and you're just supposed to give up your sacred blood feuds and be friendly?

There are lots of reasons that a "good" and benevolent ruler might be opposed without actually doing anything that is objectively wrong or unfair or harmful.

Also, it seems that few people in power are able to remain completely objective and benevolent when they remain in power for any amount of time. Some of their opponents oppose them on not totally unjustified grounds of fearing eventual abuse of power.

[2D8HP]

"Get back here you no good rotten cub!", yelled the mud-streaked women after a filthy child, "I'll give you such a tearing!"

"Filthy savages" said the Elf Lord, " They beat their children, and leave them to wallow in these vermin infested surroundings, for their good we must do what's right"

"They've taken all my children away!", wailed the woman, her tears cutting channels on her dirty face, her flattened nose and hints of tusks showing some Orcish blood.

"Who?", asked the wandering adventurer.

"The Elves!" She sobbed.

"We've grown to love these younglings as our own, and we will not just give them up without struggle!"

Take what people fight over, sprinkle pointy ears and tusks, serve with a dash of xenophobia, and BAM!, you've got conflict!

No "good" or "bad", just sides.

It helps to describe things as "otherworldly":

“How beautiful they are, the lordly ones
Who dwell in the hills
In the hollow hills.
They have faces like flowers
And their breath is wind that stirs amid the grasses
Filled with white clover.
Their limbs are more white than shafts of moonshine.
They are more fleet than the March wind.
They laugh and are glad and are terrible:
When their lances shake, every green reed quivers.
How beautiful they are
How beautiful the lordly ones
In the hollow hills"

"The trolls don't like the orcs
the orcs don't like the elves
the elves don't like the goblins
the goblins, don't like themselves

Fairies can be such snobs
on this, each and all agree
whether alone, or in mobs
each, proud of pedigree

The singular exception
and it makes sense to me
a need of complete contraception
eradicating, the goblin family tree"

Total fantasy, nothing like that happens in real-life.

Right?

[Pleh]

It doesn't sound like any of you are actually disagreeing with me, just phrasing it differently.

[Seto]

That's not the way I'd go if I wanted a Good antagonist. You're describing an Evil (or maybe Neutral) antagonist whose actions you can sympathize with - but those actions are still Evil, precisely because Good is an objective principle, and the ends don't justify the means.
Instead of a disagreement on what Good means, I'd go with an agreement on what Good is, but a disagreement on whether some Good actions are permissible (or if they're good with a lowercase g). Like, a Good antagonist could be looking to "purge" all bad thoughts and instincts and essentially make humans into lower Celestials, willing or not - unambiguously a Good act, but perhaps not a good idea. Proponents of balance, or proponents of the freedom of choice, have a strong case to oppose this.

[Grek]

Have your heard the good new of the Heralds of Immaculate Morning?

Consider: The souls of the dead not only persist in the afterlife, but they are sorted according to their temperament. In death, the wicked dead can only perform their evil upon other wicked souls. The souls of the just are sent to live among the souls of the just. The Good are sent off to their eternal reward, in the heavens of the Gods of Goodness. Those who chafe against the law will be sent to the lawless planes, far from all tyrants and kings. In death, all are given that which they deserve and desire. Spiritual strife exists only in the temporary and unnatural state that we know as 'life'. Therefore, it is our absolute moral imperative to kill every creature as swiftly and painless as possible, that each may be delivered unto their richly deserved destiny.

On strictly utilitarian grounds, this is a very compelling argument. And if they're humane about it, nothing necessarily stops this from being Good. But I can imagine a party of adventurers strenuously objecting to this plan and wanting to put a stop to the people in charge.

[Consensus]

On strictly utilitarian grounds, this is a very compelling argument. And if they're humane about it, nothing necessarily stops this from being Good.

Yeah on first blush it SOUNDS compelling, but it is really taking away autonomy from people, if it the group was about providing the choice for people to be killed quickly and painlessly to enter the after life then it would be moral, but a lot harder for an adventuring group to object to.

[Max_Killjoy]

Have your heard the good new of the Heralds of Immaculate Morning?

Consider: The souls of the dead not only persist in the afterlife, but they are sorted according to their temperament. In death, the wicked dead can only perform their evil upon other wicked souls. The souls of the just are sent to live among the souls of the just. The Good are sent off to their eternal reward, in the heavens of the Gods of Goodness. Those who chafe against the law will be sent to the lawless planes, far from all tyrants and kings. In death, all are given that which they deserve and desire. Spiritual strife exists only in the temporary and unnatural state that we know as 'life'. Therefore, it is our absolute moral imperative to kill every creature as swiftly and painless as possible, that each may be delivered unto their richly deserved destiny.

On strictly utilitarian grounds, this is a very compelling argument. And if they're humane about it, nothing necessarily stops this from being Good. But I can imagine a party of adventurers strenuously objecting to this plan and wanting to put a stop to the people in charge.

Sounds like an excuse for a group of zealots to engage in slaughter.

And it's nothing like good.

[GrayDeath]

But in the grand Cosmic Scheme of Clear and Always X" D&D Alignment, it might very well be Good.

As horrible as it is to our modern (or heck, almost any historical) Sensibility....

[Frozen_Feet]

The horror of "kill them all and let God sort them out" is that it sort of works in a setting where there really is a God to sort them out. It's an extension of an even simpler observation: once existence after death is verifiably a thing, lot of the moral considerations over killing have to be given a second thought.

Whether Immaculate Morning would count as Good depends on specifics of a setting's cosmology, but it's a fun kind of adversary nonetheless.

[Aliquid]

Trying to justify slaughtering people as being “good” is a bad idea for multiple reasons.

The problem is trying to have your BGGG do traditional BBEG things to be an antagonist.

A BGGG could in theory force his/her LG views on others in a non-violent way, upsetting CG PCs

Or a BGGG could have cult followers who do evil in his/her name. (Which the BGGG doesn’t condone)

Imagine a BGGG who has charisma that is beyond epic, but a wisdom of 5... and convinces people to do things in the name of “good” that have horrible unintended consequences. But the BGGG is too proud and foolish to be convinced that they are making bad decisions... and attempt to “fix” their mistakes, only making them worse.

[NichG]

Easily. Take a prime world where Baator sent Erinyes to interbreed with the population centuries ago and now 10% of people there are half-fiends and most are tieflings to some degree. Now mix with D&D paladin 'you cannot compromise with fiends in any form under any circumstances' codes plus 'killing a fiend is never an evil act' and you've got a genocidal maniac who nevertheless qualifies as Good by the book.