Valid points, all. I don't think it's possible to fix an alignment to Tony beyond all doubt, but I do think there's more evidence for him being lawful than seems apparent at first glance. As with all things, the truth is probably somewhere in the middle (inasmuch as a fictional character can have "truth").
I personally like my headcanon of a tormented lawful Tony trapped in a chaotic lifestyle, but that's fan fiction an argument for another time...
Thanks for reading my incredibly long posts! I get a bit carried away when Tony Stark enters the picture.
And I agree that there's arguments on both sides of the fence. As you say, it is hard to pin a label on any one character, particularly as they are sometimes written by multiple writers each with their own ideas on what the character is/should be.
I am going to make the case for Tony Stark as Lawful Good.
My favourite character in the MCU is, hands-down, Iron Man. Anyone who works with me for any length of time soon learns of my obsession. I offer as my qualifications to make this claim, a picture my friend painted of me and Iron Man together which I keep on my desk (Exhibit A). I also saw the original Iron Man six times in the theatre (Exhibit B ).
I'll tackle Iron Man and Iron Man II to begin.
Iron Man We start with Tony Stark in Afghanistan demoing weapons for the US military. In a flashback, we learn that Tony considered his father a patriot. This is an important scene (with the reporter Christine Everheart) because it implies that Tony considers himself a patriot as well. He sees his actions as “good.” Others, like Everheart, may disagree of course but Tony considers himself fundamentally working for the good of his country.
We're also quickly introduced to Tony's unreliability seeming indifference to other peoples' needs, which we'll circle around to later.
The military demonstration goes horribly wrong and Tony is kidnapped by terrorists (uh, spoiler alert I guess). We get some great shots of muscley Tony hammering iron or whatever, and his interactions with Yinsen where Tony displays compassion on an individual level when the stakes are high. He may be late for appointments and dismissive of social events, but when it comes to life or death situations he cares about his fellow human beings. Another point for good.
He gets back to the US and everything. Now, one of my favourite scenes in cinema. The press conference. I could write an entire essay about the press conference but I'll limit myself to one particular line:
“I saw that I had become comfortable with a system that has zero accountability.”
Tony saw himself as a patriot designing weapons to protect “American men and women.” Now that he knows the system he backed is not working as it should, he disables the system until he can repair it. To me, that is the action of a lawful man who cares about the integrity of an agreed-upon code of rules.
Even when it costs him both personally (damaged relations with Obadiah and Rhodes) and financially (with his huge stock drop), he does the right thing.
Fast-forward through all the (awesome) suit-building montages and we have Tony learning about the atrocities in Golmira. Although he had no direct influence in the sale of Stark Industry weapons to the Ten Rings, he feels personally responsible. These were his inventions and they're being used to hurt innocent people. He confronts Obadiah, and is genuinely upset and shocked to learn their business dealings have not been honest (lawful).
Tony decides he has to be held accountable for his inventions and help the people who have been injured by them (another point for good and, I would argue, lawful). He flies over to Afghanistan which apparently takes like an hour (?) (I think there were some deleted scenes here) and beats up the bad guys.
When he subdues the ringleader, though, he doesn't take revenge himself. Even though this man injured Tony personally and Tony would have every right to be angry at him, Tony leaves him for the villagers to dispense justice on. “He's all yours.” Again, I would argue, a lawful action where the victims of the crime collectively decide on the punishment for the perpetrator.
On the flight back to Malibu, Tony flies afoul of the US military. (Here it's shown that, in a sense, he is breaking the law in that the military wasn't cleared to enter Golmira. However since Tony is a civilian, he arguably didn't break any laws at all.) Here we come to another important point.
Tony Stark rarely lies. He tells the truth even when it's clearly making things harder for him. (“Don't I even get a reaction?” “Panic. Panic is my reaction.”) When he does lie, he almost immediately tells the truth right afterward. His treatment of Killian in IM3 is remarkably out of character. Rhodey calls Tony and Tony makes up an unbelievable lie (that neither he nor Rhodey seem to think is actually intended to fool Rhodey) and then almost immediately calls him back and fesses' up. Though that may be self-preservation, it's a pattern he repeats throughout the series. Tony Stark is an honest man—another point for lawful.
He returns to Malibu and is caught by Pepper. He has one of his most LG moments as he explains to her how he cannot turn a blind eye to the damage his inventions have caused, and how he is personally responsible for undoing the evil he has done.
Then we skim through the Pepper scenes and Ironmonger beating up the city until we get to the end, with Tony and Obadiah on the rooftop. He sees an opportunity to take down Ironmonger and put an end to the destruction and calls for Pepper to blow the roof, or the reactors, or whatever. In The Avengers, Captain America accuses Tony of not being willing to “lie down on the wire and let the other guy crawl over you” though that is exactly what Tony does in this scene. He's even physically lying down, willing to sacrifice himself to save others. Definitely good, arguably lawful.
Then the final press conference. (It's a minor aside, but I'd also like to note that Tony had no objection to a debriefing with Coulson and though he didn't enthusiastically pursue an appointment with the government, he was willing to cooperate with legitimate authority.) Tony has his lines all prepared. He's in the clear! But... Tony Stark doesn't lie. He's not good at it and he rarely does it. He gets a few lines in, goes off track, and then goes for the truth. He is Iron Man. He's willing to let others cover for him (“training exercise”) but he can't or won't do it himself. It's a strong lawful moment for Stark.
No, I said earlier in the thread that I never got into comics.
Well that's not true, I read like two Iron Man comics, a recent one and an older one. I also read Jem & the Holograms and the new Ms. Marvel (both amazing). But my analysis is based solely on the MCU Tony Stark.
@the_spyder neutrality does not imply abstinence. Neutrality implies doing whatever you are doing for the sake of it, disregarding if it is ultimately good or evil.
Just like a lawful neutral character who follows their orders without questioning their good or evil intent, a chaotic neutral character will follow their own whim, disregarding if their actions are ultimately good or evil.
quote class="Quote" rel="Amber_Scott">No, I said earlier in the thread that I never got into comics.
Well that's not true, I read like two Iron Man comics, a recent one and an older one. I also read Jem & the Holograms and the new Ms. Marvel (both amazing). But my analysis is based solely on the MCU Tony Stark.
WOW. I bow to your Iron Man movie prowess here! You made some truly awesome points, and watching you and @the_spyder debate was fascinating. Thank you for posting! @the_spyder, you brought up some intriguing points as well, and I'm glad to see you here for civilized debate.
@Amber_Scott , I found your analysis of Tony Stark's character quite fascinating, as well as @the_spyder 's counterpoints.
My conclusion from these kinds of dialogues is that no real person or well-written character fits neatly into one alignment category. People are complicated. I'd say all real people (and "realistic" fictional characters) drift constantly around the alignment axes according to the situation.
You can be good, but lean neutral. You can be evil, but lean neutral. And you can be neutral, leaning either way. You can be good with a strong repressed "evil" side that occasionally comes to expression, and you can be evil with a strong benevolent streak.
Everybody drifts along the law-chaos axis over their lifetimes.
I think your analysis of Tony Stark indicates that you judge him to qualify as lawful good, but if he's neutral or chaotic good, he still has strong lawful leanings. His goodness can also lose points towards neutrality in the way he treats other people in his personal life and relationships.
Also, I think there is a problem in less mature thinking about D&D alignments that a lawful good character can't be a "cool badass". There are people who say they hate lawful good characters, and what I hear from their opinions is "Lawful good characters aren't cool, man. They're boring sticks in the mud with wooden, uptight personalities."
"Boring", "wooden", and "uptight" are personality characteristics that have nothing to do with moral alignment. You can be any alignment and be those things, just as you can be any alignment and be "cool", "a badass", or whatever.
Your Tony Stark analysis gives us a good example of a character who is arguably lawful good, and even paladin-like, and yet has character flaws and a rebellious, fun-loving personality. Most people think the characteristic of "rebelliousness" makes you automatically of chaotic alignment, but that's a gross oversimplification. It depends on what you're rebelling against and why you're rebelling. A paladin would be perfectly within her alignment to rebel against her Order or her government if she became convinced that the leadership had been corrupted.
Most D&D players I've met who stereotype the alignments usually seem to me to be either very young and inexperienced with life, or lacking in education in performing arts, liberal arts, and social sciences.
So, again, thank you so much for a really deep character analysis. There's lots of food for thought in it, and lots of insight. Well done.
@the_spyder neutrality does not imply abstinence. Neutrality implies doing whatever you are doing for the sake of it, disregarding if it is ultimately good or evil.
Just like a lawful neutral character who follows their orders without questioning their good or evil intent, a chaotic neutral character will follow their own whim, disregarding if their actions are ultimately good or evil.
@iKrivetko - "As I play it", neutrality (as in Lawful Neutral or Chaotic Neutral) is being Neutral towards Good and Evil. Otherwise there is no reason for that alignment. If you don't play that way, you are either greater or lesser good or evil and not neutral.
I see a lot of people who play 'Chaotic Neutral' as meaning "I can do whatever I want including a little good or a little evil, so long as it balances out". That's not playing an alignment "In my personal and subjective view", that's not committing to anything. Which is the main crux of my position.
If you play Good alignment, you are committed to the cause of good. If you are Evil you are committed to the cause of Evil. If you are neutral, you have to be committed to something and not just doing whatever. So you are committed to the cause of Neutrality (meaning not doing good or evil).
Subjective and only the way "I play". I don't speak for the game nor how anyone else does or should play, nor how it was "Intended" to be played.
And frankly, storytelling gets in the way of the argument. Bat man is a good guy. He's a superhero. He the protagonist. So how could he not be good? And the story makes that easy for us to accept. The villains he fight are undeniably and completely evil. When compared to the joker, most prison inmates make a pretty good "good guy".
@ikrivetko - there are any number of actions that may be deemed neutral.
A pick pocket runs by you on the street, obviously being chased by the police, but equally obviously getting away. The good person trips the thief so that the authorities can catch him. The Evil person trips him and steals his stuff and then leaves him to be caught by the police and take the fall. The neutral person steps back and lets him run by, not getting involved (thus Neutral).
Or another simple situation. You come across a person lying bleeding in an alley. The good person binds the wounds and offers what aid is available. The evil person slits his throat and robs him of his valuables. The neutral person doesn't get involved and walks past the person.
My point is that each alignment requires choices and a commitment to that alignment. If you play neutral just because you don't want to commit to anything that isn't really a choice. What's more is that even if you take the outlook that 'do a little good and then do a little evil', sooner or later one of two things is going to happen. Either you eventually slide one direction or the other OR you end up spending your entire life measuring and counter measuring your actions until you are paralyzed for choices.
Playing neutral shouldn't be 'The easy choice'. It should be just as hard as either of the other options. Far to many people play it as the easy way out and do whatever they want, in effect not playing an alignment at all.
Now, to be clear, alignment is a continuum. A good person might do the odd bad thing, and vice versa. And a neutral person may occasionally go out of their way to do either good or evil. But that should by far be the exception, otherwise the DM better step in. Also, not everyone takes their ethos as seriously. It's OK to play it a bit loose and slip, but there should be circumstances where you have to make a choice. Otherwise you are playing lazy alignment rather than actually playing your character.
At least that is how I play alignment. I don't speak for anyone else, nor recommend any particular way to go about alignments.
I think there are people who want to play D&D while following their whims to their hearts' content. They see the entire game as just that, a game. I don't think I've ever met anyone in real life, or encountered (almost, but for one) any fictional character, who had quite that attitude.
Sometimes they want to make a joke of the entire story offered by the GM/game. Other times, they want to play through when they feel silly, or rarely, serious, but still be able to build their power-gamed "character" to god-like levels of power while approaching their game world according to their whims, as though they were "The Squire of Gothos", or "Q", who are usually granted just what they want by CRPG's, according to their secret and usually strongly repressed irl heart's desire.
They *sometimes* approach "The Game" as though they have a care about the inhabitants of it, but more often they are just in it to express their silly, totally random, whimsical natures that they can't express in real life without serious consequences.
I know this because I played D&D when I was 17 with several 13-15 year olds, who played as though they were insane, and called it being "chaotic neutral".
I saw a quote somewhere in one of these games, and I can't for the life of me remember where, but it said, and I thought it was one of the most insightful things I've ever seen in a game, "Face it, you're neutral evil."
I'd rephrase it a step further: "Face it, you're chaotic evil!"
Now, who in nerd literature eptiomizes and personifies that attitude of "Hey, I'm a god in this world, and I'm gonna play silly and commit mass murder, while occasionally trying to confuse everbody that I might have a shred of decency by making my jokes and pursuing my godhood without killing and stealing everything in sight?"
Oh yeah, I think it's from the Batman universe, and we call him The Joker. He's the very incarnation of CHAOTIC EVIL.
So, face it, all you chaotic neutral lovers who take that alignment to be your free pass to follow your whims, YOU'RE CHAOTIC EVIL.
BTW, yes, I think Neera is really chaotic evil, as are all wild mages by definition, because they don't care who they hurt or when they do it. Jan Jansen is chaotic neutral. He's whimsical and funny, but he would never hurt anybody intentionally who didn't threaten his friends, or his lover, and he's in control of his actions. Neera is CHAOTIC EVIL. She just doesn't realize she is. That's why I don't want to use her in any of my playthroughs. The thought of chaotic evil people like her who think they're chaotic neutral just sends shivers down my spine. At least the openly chaotic evil people are honest about it.
BTW, yes, I think Neera is really chaotic evil, as are all wild mages by definition, because they don't care who they hurt or when they do it. Jan Jansen is chaotic neutral. He's whimsical and funny, but he would never hurt anybody intentionally who didn't threaten his friends, or his lover, and he's in control of his actions. Neera is CHAOTIC EVIL. She just doesn't realize she is. That's why I don't want to use her in any of my playthroughs. The thought of chaotic evil people like her who think they're chaotic neutral just sends shivers down my spine. At least the openly chaotic evil people are honest about it.
One could argue that Jan's behaviour is actually Chaotic Good, and Neera is actually Chaotic Neutral. It's not like she intentionally hurts people, like an evil person would. This is just based on what I saw here, since I never use Neera either, although that's for totally different reasons.
My point is that each alignment requires choices and a commitment to that alignment. If you play neutral just because you don't want to commit to anything that isn't really a choice. What's more is that even if you take the outlook that 'do a little good and then do a little evil', sooner or later one of two things is going to happen. Either you eventually slide one direction or the other OR you end up spending your entire life measuring and counter measuring your actions until you are paralyzed for choices.
Yet what you describe is exactly what druids do. Weighing the good and evil in the world, and actively keeping it in balance by supporting either side. Of course, they ultimately side with nature but for druids the balance is the natural order of things, which they seek to preserve.
To add a second point, not doing anything, even if by choice, doesn't really fit into an adventuring environment. I think in the context of RPG's, neutrality should never be interpreted as inactivity or indecisiveness. The neutral person you described would have screwed the prophecy of Alaundo, and hit the pubs instead.
@the_spyder in that case, basically the only way you should play a neutral character is stay at home and read books, lest you have to kill or heal somebody.
@iKrivetko - actually no. it can be quite a fun and rewarding way to play. As with any alignment, you have to find your 'Neutral' reason for what you are doing.
@Yannir - I am not proposing that neutrals need to "Maintain the balance", merely not overtly get involved in either Good or Evil. And the alignment that I describe is internal. What druids do is more external as in the balance of nature as opposed to what we do individually.
But a neutral character can be QUITE the adventurer. they just need to have a non-good and non-evil outlook. I am looking for my treasure, my hoards of gold. Let the other guys save the damsel and slay the dragon.
Fighter: I am just the sword. You point me in the direction and I fight. I don't want or need to know your cause, I am just good with steel.
Wizard: I search the world for arcane magics to make myself stronger. I don't necessarily like spelunking in dank dungeons and foul swamps, but I'm not there to right wrongs, just to grow my library.
Thief: I pick locks because I am really good at it. Always have been. And hey, if I can get rich into the bargain? Great.
Cleric: I follow the will of my Deity. He/she preaches balance in all things and I follow.
I'm not saying that these are the only ones, but as I said, loads of "Neutral" outlooks for adventurous types. Not everyone is out to save the kingdom or to overthrow it.
Fighter: I am just the sword. You point me in the direction and I fight. I don't want or need to know your cause, I am just good with steel.
To be honest, I find this statement (when taken at face value, since I'm not sure if it is that simple) I see more evil depending on the "cause" they fight for.
The way I see most neutral characters is that, given the mores of most fantasy societies, they would avoid evil far more than they would avoid good.
I struggled a little bit with it myself. If the fighter is all about the killing, I could see that as evil. But if he is simply just good at fighting (defending etc...) it isn't necessarily 'Evil'. As for causes, he may choose to pick who he works for I guess.
Fighter: I am just the sword. You point me in the direction and I fight. I don't want or need to know your cause, I am just good with steel.
Wizard: I search the world for arcane magics to make myself stronger. I don't necessarily like spelunking in dank dungeons and foul swamps, but I'm not there to right wrongs, just to grow my library.
Thief: I pick locks because I am really good at it. Always have been. And hey, if I can get rich into the bargain? Great.
Cleric: I follow the will of my Deity. He/she preaches balance in all things and I follow.
I'm not saying that these are the only ones, but as I said, loads of "Neutral" outlooks for adventurous types. Not everyone is out to save the kingdom or to overthrow it.
But those are contradictory to your "abstinence" stance, since they might have to do a lot of evil or good. For example, the fighter that you describe can serve the most chaotic evil villain as a mercenary and end up slaughtering hundreds of people. Yet he will stay neutral because he is only doing what he is paid for.
Which brings me back to my point:
neutrality does not imply abstinence. Neutrality implies doing whatever you are doing for the sake of it, disregarding if it is ultimately good or evil.
@iKrivetko - actually what I posted was not contrary to my stance, as I see it anyway. I also agree that neutrality is not a total abstinence of action. All I was saying was 'in my view' neutral is "I'm not involved in the greater Good vs evil" plot. But in my view neutrality is not abstinence but neither is it 'doing a little good' and then 'doing a little evil to balance the scales.
It's a hard concept to express. But that is how I play Neutral.
@the_spyder indeed, neutrality is neither abstinence nor purposeful balance (although either could be used as a basis for a neutral character, druids being a notable example). "I'm not involved in the greater Good vs Evil" does sound quite right to me, yet I find it contradictory to what you described as being "committed to neutrality", which implies that you are involved in the aforementioned plot, but happen to choose to be in the middle of it. The way I see it is that if you aren't involved in something, you don't make your actions based on that something, but rather perform according to what you find right.
In other words, you don't have to be a hindu or a muslim to not eat beef or pork, respectively.
"For me", Druids are more the exception rather than the rule (monks as well) in that they actually focus on the external balance (at least as far as nature is concerned). What I am talking about is more the internal compass rather than external stimulus.
You hit on a good distinction though. I DO see Neutrality as a "Side" as it were, but not necessarily (and in deed not absolutely) one of abstinence. And maybe that is where we are getting bogged down. A fighter who fights for no other reason than he is good at it and gets paid to do it would be seen to be a 'Neutral' fighter. Sure, he isn't going to go out of his way to pick a good or evil cause to fight for, but in the end even if he ends up on the side of good or evil, it isn't for the ideology but for the pay check. The old adage "I just did what I was told" comes to mind.
But there are times when 'Strict Neutrality' is a cause in and of itself, which is where my arguments from above come in. To enhance one of my examples from above.
You come across a dying person lying in an alley. A good person binds the wounds and provides aid to the person. The Evil person slits his throat and tosses the body for gold and items of value. The neutral person does nothing but keeps on walking by. This isn't done "Necessarily" because the person wants to abstain from anything, but because he knows that there are consequences for either action. Neutrality doesn't want to aid an evil person back to health, nor kill a good person. Nor, given the ability to determine what type of person is lying there, does he want to effect that person's destiny such that it will put other things out of balance. Save the good guy only to have there be more good guys than bad guys later on in a fight thus tipping the scales cosmically.
And yes, even a Good person might do 'Some' evil (and vice versa). Alignment is supposed to be a scale or a continuum upon which a character generally occupies one location, but can slip. 'For me' (and I don't propose this way of seeing things for anyone else, but am merely attempting to explain how I play it), neutrality is it's own cause. It is it's own force (of nature if you like) in EXACTLY the same way that Good and Evil are. A good person doesn't decide that he hasn't done enough EVIL today and go out to kick some babies. An evil person doesn't go out and decide that they have done more EVIL than is necessary and go do some good 'just because'. Neutrality should have the same rules and a cause that you stick up for, not the total absence of one, and not waffling all over the place either.
In our world, a neutral person walks on by a hurt individual or develops "bystander's syndrome" wihen someone is being hurt, because of some very practical fears and considerations. The person you try to help might turn around and sue you because you didn't administer first aid correctly. The person who did/is doing the harm might turn the violence onto you. The "victim" might suddenly join forces with the attacker and attack the "rescuer" because they were related and the "resucuer" is an outsider. The authorities might arrive, and a confused "victim" says you did it, and you go to jail.
All these considerations can very easily lead a person into inaction unless they have a very strong "good" conscience. Given the number of incidents of "bystander syndrome" we see in the real world, often by entire streets, blocks, or neighborhoods of people witnessing someone being hurt, I think there are far more true neutral people in the world than there are truly good people or truly evil people.
The trouble with neutrality in a fantasy game, is that if you acted like you do in real life, you'd avoid all the danger and just work on a farm or in a shop or in a smithy or something. You couldn't be a hero or a villain, and actually participate in a story.
Most of us are commoners, and most of us are true neutral in real life, I think. I used to qualify for lawful good, wanting to actively work to make the world better, but over a lifetime I drifted down to lawful neutral and finally to the common true neutrality as I lost my youthful ideals and just started accepting everything. At it's best, the philosophy is a sort of Zen Buddhist mindset of peace, and at it's worst, it's just cynical and jaded, I guess.
The trouble with neutrality in a fantasy game, is that if you acted like you do in real life, you'd avoid all the danger and just work on a farm or in a shop or in a smithy or something. You couldn't be a hero or a villain, and actually participate in a story.
I can see how this might be a popular opinion, particularly in this age of computer gaming where there's the obviously 'Goody two shoes' response, the 'Despicable jerk' response and the 'Snarky' response. Plus a lot of games are written from the perspective of you were always going to be the hero or villain.
PnP is (was) different for me. I could play the active and interested "Neutral" without having to hop the fence on a daily basis just to keep my alignment. Again, the fighter who just does what he does best and doesn't care much for the cause. The wizard looking to gain power for it's own sake and not in the service of some overloard. The thief who just goes adventuring because it is better than sitting in a jail cell, the bard looking for experience to weave into a song.
Not that these are removed from action, but that they don't take up 'The cause of the day' other than their own.
I think anybody "just doing his job", "minding her own business", or say, an attorney, an accountant, a doctor, an official, a soldier, or a police officer who follows orders and keeps at the job for no other reason than that he or she is good at it and has nothing better to do for a living, qualifies as some form of neutral.
So, the characters you describe from your pnp games, @the_spyder , strike me as those sorts of people. They're doing their jobs and following their professions, when they happen to become associated with a group of adventurers and get caught up in whatever story or scenario has been designed for play by the DM.
I guess that sort of character could work in a computer game or some other form of storytelling as "the reluctant hero", which does have a lot of precedent in fantasy literature. But, in the literature, he or she usually transforms into the classic lawful good hero (or neutral good or chaotic good "anti-hero") by the end of the story arc. Neutral people who stay that way just don't make very inspiring protagonists, (or antagonists), in my opinion.
Comments
I personally like my headcanon of a tormented lawful Tony trapped in a chaotic lifestyle, but that's fan fiction an argument for another time...
Thanks for reading my incredibly long posts! I get a bit carried away when Tony Stark enters the picture.
Thanks for the debate.
Neutral Good: Spiderman, Thor.
Chaotic Good: Wolverine.
Lawful Neutral: Living Tribunal, Punisher.
True Neutral: Galactus, lady death, the watcher.
Chaotic Neutral: Deadpool.
Lawful Evil: Magneto, Doctor Doom.
Neutral Evil: Thanos, Norman Osborn(as himself), Loki.
Chaotic Evil: Carnage, Green Goblin, Bullseye.
Well that's not true, I read like two Iron Man comics, a recent one and an older one. I also read Jem & the Holograms and the new Ms. Marvel (both amazing). But my analysis is based solely on the MCU Tony Stark.
Though, I don't know about the rest of you, I prefer Tom Hiddleston as Loki versus that guy in the picture.
Just like a lawful neutral character who follows their orders without questioning their good or evil intent, a chaotic neutral character will follow their own whim, disregarding if their actions are ultimately good or evil.
Well that's not true, I read like two Iron Man comics, a recent one and an older one. I also read Jem & the Holograms and the new Ms. Marvel (both amazing). But my analysis is based solely on the MCU Tony Stark.
WOW. I bow to your Iron Man movie prowess here! You made some truly awesome points, and watching you and @the_spyder debate was fascinating. Thank you for posting! @the_spyder, you brought up some intriguing points as well, and I'm glad to see you here for civilized debate.
My conclusion from these kinds of dialogues is that no real person or well-written character fits neatly into one alignment category. People are complicated. I'd say all real people (and "realistic" fictional characters) drift constantly around the alignment axes according to the situation.
You can be good, but lean neutral. You can be evil, but lean neutral. And you can be neutral, leaning either way. You can be good with a strong repressed "evil" side that occasionally comes to expression, and you can be evil with a strong benevolent streak.
Everybody drifts along the law-chaos axis over their lifetimes.
I think your analysis of Tony Stark indicates that you judge him to qualify as lawful good, but if he's neutral or chaotic good, he still has strong lawful leanings. His goodness can also lose points towards neutrality in the way he treats other people in his personal life and relationships.
Also, I think there is a problem in less mature thinking about D&D alignments that a lawful good character can't be a "cool badass". There are people who say they hate lawful good characters, and what I hear from their opinions is "Lawful good characters aren't cool, man. They're boring sticks in the mud with wooden, uptight personalities."
"Boring", "wooden", and "uptight" are personality characteristics that have nothing to do with moral alignment. You can be any alignment and be those things, just as you can be any alignment and be "cool", "a badass", or whatever.
Your Tony Stark analysis gives us a good example of a character who is arguably lawful good, and even paladin-like, and yet has character flaws and a rebellious, fun-loving personality. Most people think the characteristic of "rebelliousness" makes you automatically of chaotic alignment, but that's a gross oversimplification. It depends on what you're rebelling against and why you're rebelling. A paladin would be perfectly within her alignment to rebel against her Order or her government if she became convinced that the leadership had been corrupted.
Most D&D players I've met who stereotype the alignments usually seem to me to be either very young and inexperienced with life, or lacking in education in performing arts, liberal arts, and social sciences.
So, again, thank you so much for a really deep character analysis. There's lots of food for thought in it, and lots of insight. Well done.
I see a lot of people who play 'Chaotic Neutral' as meaning "I can do whatever I want including a little good or a little evil, so long as it balances out". That's not playing an alignment "In my personal and subjective view", that's not committing to anything. Which is the main crux of my position.
If you play Good alignment, you are committed to the cause of good. If you are Evil you are committed to the cause of Evil. If you are neutral, you have to be committed to something and not just doing whatever. So you are committed to the cause of Neutrality (meaning not doing good or evil).
Subjective and only the way "I play". I don't speak for the game nor how anyone else does or should play, nor how it was "Intended" to be played.
I don't quite understand the "not doing good or evil" part. What is a neutral deed?
And frankly, storytelling gets in the way of the argument. Bat man is a good guy. He's a superhero. He the protagonist. So how could he not be good? And the story makes that easy for us to accept. The villains he fight are undeniably and completely evil. When compared to the joker, most prison inmates make a pretty good "good guy".
A pick pocket runs by you on the street, obviously being chased by the police, but equally obviously getting away. The good person trips the thief so that the authorities can catch him. The Evil person trips him and steals his stuff and then leaves him to be caught by the police and take the fall. The neutral person steps back and lets him run by, not getting involved (thus Neutral).
Or another simple situation. You come across a person lying bleeding in an alley. The good person binds the wounds and offers what aid is available. The evil person slits his throat and robs him of his valuables. The neutral person doesn't get involved and walks past the person.
My point is that each alignment requires choices and a commitment to that alignment. If you play neutral just because you don't want to commit to anything that isn't really a choice. What's more is that even if you take the outlook that 'do a little good and then do a little evil', sooner or later one of two things is going to happen. Either you eventually slide one direction or the other OR you end up spending your entire life measuring and counter measuring your actions until you are paralyzed for choices.
Playing neutral shouldn't be 'The easy choice'. It should be just as hard as either of the other options. Far to many people play it as the easy way out and do whatever they want, in effect not playing an alignment at all.
Now, to be clear, alignment is a continuum. A good person might do the odd bad thing, and vice versa. And a neutral person may occasionally go out of their way to do either good or evil. But that should by far be the exception, otherwise the DM better step in. Also, not everyone takes their ethos as seriously. It's OK to play it a bit loose and slip, but there should be circumstances where you have to make a choice. Otherwise you are playing lazy alignment rather than actually playing your character.
At least that is how I play alignment. I don't speak for anyone else, nor recommend any particular way to go about alignments.
Sometimes they want to make a joke of the entire story offered by the GM/game. Other times, they want to play through when they feel silly, or rarely, serious, but still be able to build their power-gamed "character" to god-like levels of power while approaching their game world according to their whims, as though they were "The Squire of Gothos", or "Q", who are usually granted just what they want by CRPG's, according to their secret and usually strongly repressed irl heart's desire.
They *sometimes* approach "The Game" as though they have a care about the inhabitants of it, but more often they are just in it to express their silly, totally random, whimsical natures that they can't express in real life without serious consequences.
I know this because I played D&D when I was 17 with several 13-15 year olds, who played as though they were insane, and called it being "chaotic neutral".
I saw a quote somewhere in one of these games, and I can't for the life of me remember where, but it said, and I thought it was one of the most insightful things I've ever seen in a game, "Face it, you're neutral evil."
I'd rephrase it a step further: "Face it, you're chaotic evil!"
Now, who in nerd literature eptiomizes and personifies that attitude of "Hey, I'm a god in this world, and I'm gonna play silly and commit mass murder, while occasionally trying to confuse everbody that I might have a shred of decency by making my jokes and pursuing my godhood without killing and stealing everything in sight?"
Oh yeah, I think it's from the Batman universe, and we call him The Joker. He's the very incarnation of CHAOTIC EVIL.
So, face it, all you chaotic neutral lovers who take that alignment to be your free pass to follow your whims, YOU'RE CHAOTIC EVIL.
BTW, yes, I think Neera is really chaotic evil, as are all wild mages by definition, because they don't care who they hurt or when they do it. Jan Jansen is chaotic neutral. He's whimsical and funny, but he would never hurt anybody intentionally who didn't threaten his friends, or his lover, and he's in control of his actions. Neera is CHAOTIC EVIL. She just doesn't realize she is. That's why I don't want to use her in any of my playthroughs. The thought of chaotic evil people like her who think they're chaotic neutral just sends shivers down my spine. At least the openly chaotic evil people are honest about it.
To add a second point, not doing anything, even if by choice, doesn't really fit into an adventuring environment. I think in the context of RPG's, neutrality should never be interpreted as inactivity or indecisiveness. The neutral person you described would have screwed the prophecy of Alaundo, and hit the pubs instead.
@Yannir - I am not proposing that neutrals need to "Maintain the balance", merely not overtly get involved in either Good or Evil. And the alignment that I describe is internal. What druids do is more external as in the balance of nature as opposed to what we do individually.
But a neutral character can be QUITE the adventurer. they just need to have a non-good and non-evil outlook. I am looking for my treasure, my hoards of gold. Let the other guys save the damsel and slay the dragon.
Fighter: I am just the sword. You point me in the direction and I fight. I don't want or need to know your cause, I am just good with steel.
Wizard: I search the world for arcane magics to make myself stronger. I don't necessarily like spelunking in dank dungeons and foul swamps, but I'm not there to right wrongs, just to grow my library.
Thief: I pick locks because I am really good at it. Always have been. And hey, if I can get rich into the bargain? Great.
Cleric: I follow the will of my Deity. He/she preaches balance in all things and I follow.
I'm not saying that these are the only ones, but as I said, loads of "Neutral" outlooks for adventurous types. Not everyone is out to save the kingdom or to overthrow it.
The way I see most neutral characters is that, given the mores of most fantasy societies, they would avoid evil far more than they would avoid good.
Which brings me back to my point:
It's a hard concept to express. But that is how I play Neutral.
Edited to clarify/simplify my stance.
In other words, you don't have to be a hindu or a muslim to not eat beef or pork, respectively.
You hit on a good distinction though. I DO see Neutrality as a "Side" as it were, but not necessarily (and in deed not absolutely) one of abstinence. And maybe that is where we are getting bogged down. A fighter who fights for no other reason than he is good at it and gets paid to do it would be seen to be a 'Neutral' fighter. Sure, he isn't going to go out of his way to pick a good or evil cause to fight for, but in the end even if he ends up on the side of good or evil, it isn't for the ideology but for the pay check. The old adage "I just did what I was told" comes to mind.
But there are times when 'Strict Neutrality' is a cause in and of itself, which is where my arguments from above come in. To enhance one of my examples from above.
You come across a dying person lying in an alley. A good person binds the wounds and provides aid to the person. The Evil person slits his throat and tosses the body for gold and items of value. The neutral person does nothing but keeps on walking by. This isn't done "Necessarily" because the person wants to abstain from anything, but because he knows that there are consequences for either action. Neutrality doesn't want to aid an evil person back to health, nor kill a good person. Nor, given the ability to determine what type of person is lying there, does he want to effect that person's destiny such that it will put other things out of balance. Save the good guy only to have there be more good guys than bad guys later on in a fight thus tipping the scales cosmically.
And yes, even a Good person might do 'Some' evil (and vice versa). Alignment is supposed to be a scale or a continuum upon which a character generally occupies one location, but can slip. 'For me' (and I don't propose this way of seeing things for anyone else, but am merely attempting to explain how I play it), neutrality is it's own cause. It is it's own force (of nature if you like) in EXACTLY the same way that Good and Evil are. A good person doesn't decide that he hasn't done enough EVIL today and go out to kick some babies. An evil person doesn't go out and decide that they have done more EVIL than is necessary and go do some good 'just because'. Neutrality should have the same rules and a cause that you stick up for, not the total absence of one, and not waffling all over the place either.
All these considerations can very easily lead a person into inaction unless they have a very strong "good" conscience. Given the number of incidents of "bystander syndrome" we see in the real world, often by entire streets, blocks, or neighborhoods of people witnessing someone being hurt, I think there are far more true neutral people in the world than there are truly good people or truly evil people.
The trouble with neutrality in a fantasy game, is that if you acted like you do in real life, you'd avoid all the danger and just work on a farm or in a shop or in a smithy or something. You couldn't be a hero or a villain, and actually participate in a story.
Most of us are commoners, and most of us are true neutral in real life, I think. I used to qualify for lawful good, wanting to actively work to make the world better, but over a lifetime I drifted down to lawful neutral and finally to the common true neutrality as I lost my youthful ideals and just started accepting everything. At it's best, the philosophy is a sort of Zen Buddhist mindset of peace, and at it's worst, it's just cynical and jaded, I guess.
PnP is (was) different for me. I could play the active and interested "Neutral" without having to hop the fence on a daily basis just to keep my alignment. Again, the fighter who just does what he does best and doesn't care much for the cause. The wizard looking to gain power for it's own sake and not in the service of some overloard. The thief who just goes adventuring because it is better than sitting in a jail cell, the bard looking for experience to weave into a song.
Not that these are removed from action, but that they don't take up 'The cause of the day' other than their own.
So, the characters you describe from your pnp games, @the_spyder , strike me as those sorts of people. They're doing their jobs and following their professions, when they happen to become associated with a group of adventurers and get caught up in whatever story or scenario has been designed for play by the DM.
I guess that sort of character could work in a computer game or some other form of storytelling as "the reluctant hero", which does have a lot of precedent in fantasy literature. But, in the literature, he or she usually transforms into the classic lawful good hero (or neutral good or chaotic good "anti-hero") by the end of the story arc. Neutral people who stay that way just don't make very inspiring protagonists, (or antagonists), in my opinion.