Differences between Lawful Good and Neutral Good

[FalloutJack]

I have a very easy line of thinking for this.

Lawful Good, you have a specific code of honor you uphold for very strong reasons.

Neutral Good, "They're more like guidelines, really."

There's gotta be a more defined line, because, by that logic, I'm of a Lawful alignment. I'm pretty adamant when it comes to following a personal code that I've developed over the years, yet I'm a very neutral person otherwise. You could argue that I'm Lawful Neutral, but I'm also the type who agrees that some rules are meant to be broken for a greater benefit (though I'll still adhere to my own code to the letter).

There's also the fact that, for a number of things (such as the 2016 election), I tend to adopt a True Neutral mindset.

I was mostly defining the lawfulness, since that appeared to be the point of confusion. Your goodness is down to your standards of what is good.

 

[Chimpzy_v1legacy]

I used to harass any paladin in my party because I often think that lawful is in opposition to good. They'd lose their paladinhood if they either violated the laws of the land or did something dastardly. So I used to send a party with a paladin on an a adventure in a land where slavery was legal. My favorite hook was sending a bloody and freshly whipped slave into the party's path. They'd beg for succor and to be hidden from their obviously cruel master. Since the paladin had already been informed of the laws of their land they had no choice but to return them or be breaking the laws they vowed to uphold upon entering the land and thus would be forced to atone. They would be forced to either break an evil law or return a slave toa master who made it clear they would legally kill the slave.

Only one player ever got past my little anti-paladin gambit. They offered to buy the slave out of their own $ and then immediately set them free. Then told the slave owner if they ever saw them near the freeman again in any manner that they would legally defend them with full force. The slave owner took the money and ran and the paladin kept his well earned paladinhood.

There are various interpretations of what lawful good means in the case of paladins and how (not) upholding the lawful part would affect their paladin abilities.

For example, suppose a paladin is a follower of a lawful good deity and that one of that deity's laws is that all creatures have the right to freedom (i.e. slavery is forbidden). In the example you mentioned, it could be argued that the paladin would not fall if he broke the evil land's law and freed the prisoner, because his abilities come from his deity and its divine law is a higher form of law than the evil land's.

Of course, if another of that deity's tenets is that you should always keep your word and the paladin vows to uphold the evil land's law, then he would fall. Not because he broke the evil land's law, but because he broke his deity's.

Anyway, in my games I generally rule that good mostly takes precedence over lawful and that whatever grants the paladin his divine power would let infractions slide if they're small and rarely happen, judged on a case by case basis.

 

[Saelune]

Should add that the law-chaos and the good-evil parts dont have to be so fused together.

A lawful character likes order and structure. A chaotic character likes freedom to do what they will.

A good character likes to help people, and thinks about others. An evil character is selfish and/or cruel to others.

Ive never used it in a DnD game, but I like the 5x5 alignment chart, to allow for favoratism to certain axis. Such as a Lawful Good character who is more good than lawful, or a Neutral character who still prefers to help people than hinder them.

 

[sageoftruth]

Should add that the law-chaos and the good-evil parts dont have to be so fused together.

A lawful character likes order and structure. A chaotic character likes freedom to do what they will.

A good character likes to help people, and thinks about others. An evil character is selfish and/or cruel to others.

Ive never used it in a DnD game, but I like the 5x5 alignment chart, to allow for favoratism to certain axis. Such as a Lawful Good character who is more good than lawful, or a Neutral character who still prefers to help people than hinder them.

I love it! It might take a bit for new role players to remember the new terms, like Social, impure, rebel, etc. but I felt like I didn't really need an explanation for them. They just worked, and it's much more appropriate for our absolute-free fiction of today.

 

[Saelune]

I love it! It might take a bit for new role players to remember the new terms, like Social, impure, rebel, etc. but I felt like I didn't really need an explanation for them. They just worked, and it's much more appropriate for our absolute-free fiction of today.

Alignment I feel should be more as a guideline/suggestion rather than a hard stat. If you have items that effect alignment, like "protection from evil" or something, it might matter, but its probably better to not get number crunchy on it. The chart I feel just gives a better broader understanding of alignments.

I suggest sticking with the regular 9 alignments, but perhaps using this chart to help players understand better if they are perhaps unsure how their character should act, or what kind of character they want to make. Plus alignment can change. A good character can fall to evil, a chaotic character can come to embrace order.

 

[sageoftruth]

Plus alignment can change. A good character can fall to evil, a chaotic character can come to embrace order.

So true. At this point, I find it hard to take characters seriously when they don't ever question themselves.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

I used to harass any paladin in my party because I often think that lawful is in opposition to good. They'd lose their paladinhood if they either violated the laws of the land or did something dastardly. So I used to send a party with a paladin on an a adventure in a land where slavery was legal. My favorite hook was sending a bloody and freshly whipped slave into the party's path. They'd beg for succor and to be hidden from their obviously cruel master. Since the paladin had already been informed of the laws of their land they had no choice but to return them or be breaking the laws they vowed to uphold upon entering the land and thus would be forced to atone. They would be forced to either break an evil law or return a slave toa master who made it clear they would legally kill the slave.

Only one player ever got past my little anti-paladin gambit. They offered to buy the slave out of their own $ and then immediately set them free. Then told the slave owner if they ever saw them near the freeman again in any manner that they would legally defend them with full force. The slave owner took the money and ran and the paladin kept his well earned paladinhood.

That. Is. BEAUTIFUL.

All the more so because there IS in fact a way around it.

To be a truly good Lawful Good protagonist, you need to be smart about it, or you'll never make it.