Breaking Down the Character Alignment System: Lawful Evil

*Originally published on 3/11/12



Rounding out the trinity of "lawful" classes, we come to Lawful Evil. It sounds paradoxical, but the general concept is actually a common one.

Lawful evil in a nutshell is pretty much the extreme anti-hero, someone who tries to maintain order by using extreme measures to enforce them.

Take Dexter for example, no not that child scientist with the annoying sister, I'm talking about the serial killer from the Showtime series of the same name. He's a serial killer, but he was trained by his father to aim his more violent impulses at other serial killers.

So basically, what you have is one psychopath taking down other psychopaths in order to preserve what could be seen as a greater good. On the one hand, he's saving lives by eliminating these threats, but he's doing it in very gruesome and sadistic ways. He's by no means heroic, and his deeds are far too malicious to qualify as neutral, so it falls under the category of "lawful evil".

Marvel Comics vigilante "the Punisher" could also arguably fall under this alignment as he has no qualms about torturing or killing people who commit crimes, but there's a method to the madness where he believes that he's helping out in the long run.

Entire government regimes could qualify for this trope as well, enacting harsh laws in order to maintain peace and order in the city, state, or in the case of the Empire in Star Wars, the entire galaxy.

Much like with "lawful neutral" you also see quite a few cop characters take on this mentality. Those who take a "shoot first, ask questions later" mentality would fall under this category since they have no qualms about killing and maiming in order to achieve some greater goal.

While such a character may not fit into the traditional heroic RPG party, such a character does make an interesting addition. Not only does it make for some nice character and party development, but it makes for a nice X-factor when dealing with certain threats.

Considering the ambiguity involved, such an alignment would really give a player something to sink their teeth into and provide ample opportunities to really get into character and work through whatever situation they may be dealing with.

As with the other two lawful archetypes, lawful evil characters adhere to their own code of honor. They are certainly more than willing to get their hands dirty, but it is always in order to hurt and punish those who would hurt others and to protect those that the character sees as innocent.