The thing with 1st edition is that there was an erroneous assumption made that players would never choose to play as evil characters.
I wanted my very first 1st edition character to be a paladin, because I really liked the idea of a devout knight in shining armor type who fights the good fight, protects the innocent, and destroys evil.
My friends quickly advised me that it would not be possible, for the reasons being mentioned here. They were all playing chaotic neutral characters, which was defined in their teenaged minds as being able to just do anything they wanted with no regard for morality, and the DM accepted that.
I discovered that what they were calling "chaotic neutral" game behavior was actually what I would call "neutral evil", and several of them were brazenly playing "chaotic evil", and being allowed to do so by the DM. (teenagers, remember)
I wound up playing a lawful good priest, who was tormented by his friends' immorality, but needed to stay with them to survive in a harsh world. I always had my character do things like give gold to the temples in penance, and I loudly objected to all the evilness every time they were doing it. The DM and I were 17, and the others were 14 and younger. I think I started making the DM feel guilty about his permissiveness, because he started to support my playing a believable lawful good character, and he started up alignment drift charts on his players and stuff like that. So we influenced each other a bit there.
Believe it or not, the younger teens gradually came to respect me as a good player, so there was some cross influence there as well. We wound up being a good group that had a lot of fun together for quite a few years, until everybody graduated from high school and college and real life started happening.
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My friends quickly advised me that it would not be possible, for the reasons being mentioned here. They were all playing chaotic neutral characters, which was defined in their teenaged minds as being able to just do anything they wanted with no regard for morality, and the DM accepted that.
I discovered that what they were calling "chaotic neutral" game behavior was actually what I would call "neutral evil", and several of them were brazenly playing "chaotic evil", and being allowed to do so by the DM. (teenagers, remember)
I wound up playing a lawful good priest, who was tormented by his friends' immorality, but needed to stay with them to survive in a harsh world. I always had my character do things like give gold to the temples in penance, and I loudly objected to all the evilness every time they were doing it. The DM and I were 17, and the others were 14 and younger. I think I started making the DM feel guilty about his permissiveness, because he started to support my playing a believable lawful good character, and he started up alignment drift charts on his players and stuff like that. So we influenced each other a bit there.
Believe it or not, the younger teens gradually came to respect me as a good player, so there was some cross influence there as well. We wound up being a good group that had a lot of fun together for quite a few years, until everybody graduated from high school and college and real life started happening.