Chaotic Evil D&D character

My roommate's got a chaotic evil character in mind.

Now, my roommate wants to play this character in a campaign full of neutral-good, chaotic-good, mostly "good" characters.

How can she hide her alignment so that the party doesn't KILL her?

She can't. A Chaotic-evil character lies, cheats, abuses, murders, mistreats, hoards, and fucks corpses for the hell of it.

Seriously, if she wants to be evil and hide it, try Neutral-Evil. Chaotic Evil characters are raving psychopaths, and those types don't blend in well.

Would you like to know more?

Seriously, if your friend is remotely conscionable, they won't be ABLE to play a CE character.

Does it help that the character is a bard changeling?

No. CE characters in a D&D campaign are the fucking worst. If this person insists on going this route, stand by for the game to become a frakkin' drag. Been there, done that.

CN, on the other hand, will do all of the above from CE and still be able to have a polite conversation. :|

Do Chaotic Evil characters just do evil for the sake of doing evil? Don't they just hold back, till they have some motivation to do it? (Such as riches, fame, power, etc.)

Well, my roommate says her character has +12 base bonus to disguise and a huge bonus to hide checks, etc.
Says she can disguise her character's lies, so she can pretend to be neutral or good and no one will be able to tell.

She's gonna give it a try, but at the first slip-up, if I'm playing in her campaign, I'm killing her.

dp

What do they do that's such a drag? (I've never seen one played).

I played as a chaotic evil character once, I asked the DM if i could make a special ring of hide alignment.

He allowed it because it fit the purpose of his campaign.

... Well, if a horde of orcs are coming on you, the CE chara is just likely to help them pillage and destroy...

He allowed it because he's retarded and easily amused.

TKO, the moment a Cleric or Paladin comes into the view, your friend is screwed. CE isn't a horrible alignment per se, but nearly everyone who picks it just wants an excuse to murder and cause havok which will cause major headaches for you and your party.

Also, if your party kills someone based on their alignment and not their actions, there's no way you're "good".

The alignment is inherently selfish and imbalanced. Most characters only behave out of fear of reprisal.

Why such rigid rules on personality type?

Also, I'm missing how you "Press Start" on a tabletop RPG.

They're guidelines really, it's just how everybody plays them.

Lawful Good Paladins always have a stick up their ass. Chaotic Evil is an excuse to kill and murder. Chaotic Neutral is CE without incurring the DM's wrath.

It's a fun game if you have serious roleplayers involved. Yet you'd never know, since you avoid the game like the plague...

Choatic Evil - selfish, unempathic (or very empathic and just uses empathy to get his/her own way), zero morals, and behaves in any way possible to get what the character wants as long as doing so doesn't endanger themselves (doesn't give a damn if it endangers others).

Personally, I don't see how a Chaotic Evil character could feasibly hang around (or would want to hang around) with neutral good characters at all - the kind that are giving by nature and respectful of other people's feelings at almost all times. Unless the character is preying on their good nature for his/her own gain and this would only last until the NGs decided enough was enough. In such a dynamic the CE character should end up rather abusive and domineering - think about battered wife syndrome - with the CE character having the rest of the party thinking that deep down he/she is truly a good person and doing their best to try to make that person "change".

I've played Lawful Evil with a group of goodie-goodies; that was a load of fun because they knew I was evil as hell, but also knew I was true to my word and would honor agreements, plus I was in a position of power and often enjoyed turning their "good works" astray when it served my purpose. It was a very interesting campaign and I never actually harmed any of the good characters directly; but I had no qualms about converting their corpses into mindless undead minions.

Neutral Evil might even be worse than Chaotic Evil to tell you the truth; with Chaotic Evil you get the possibility that a character is with a good party for his own ends, and while selfish and cruel knows which side the bread is buttered on. A neutral evil character would attempt to undo any good works a party might undertake simply because he feels that it is right to do so; where a chaotic evil character would gladly do good works if it benefitted himself more than anyone else. A NE character would murder a good character if he could - NE characters have morals (twisted and sick morals, but at least a moral compass of some nature) CE characters have whims.

CEs tend to have a hard time getting along with others and working as team members. That's one of the things that has led to the generally accepted rule that you don't allow real players to choose that type.

If you start handing out magic items and special skills to allow them to hide their true natures, I'd say your DM had better have darned good reasons for doing it and do something special to keep game play in balance. Otherwise there's a lot of risk of abuse and worse, eventual boredom as it gets harder and harder to really challenge the players.

Oh and just an aside here based on one of your comments.

A truly "good" party won't simply kill an evil character out of hand (hey, that would be evil!) They'd do their best to change the person and would give them some benefit of the doubt (especially CG characters) - remember the CG philosophy is that individuals are important and goodness is inherently stronger than evil.

Here's what I'd suggest - let your CE character be related; a sibling or a child of one of the other players (or perhaps disguised as such!) so that the party has some desire to keep the character around and would turn a slightly blind eye to some of the more minor transgressions the character might make. Let them know ahead of time that the CE character had always been a "black sheep" of the family - gloomy, misunderstood, perhaps treated badly by a parent or other authority figure but was once a really interactive and friendly child (you were saying the character is a bard, right?)

With a good backstory you've got an interesting character; the charismatic Manson who most think is simply had a rough life and has a chance of being brought back to the side of good. Especially if the CE is likeable (and as a bard...) Such a dynamic would even give a paladin pause - think about how your other players would react - would they kill a sibling if pressed? Would they turn the other cheek against petty manipulations or theft? They key is to make it interesting to everyone - nobody is going to enjoy a game where one of the party members simply murders them in their sleep without any sort of forewarning; but a game where everyone knows up front that they might have trouble in their midst but (at least initially) feel either powerless or compelled to "help" the person has MUCH more tension and is all around a better gaming experience than the simple "hidden agent of evil" that can strike without warning.

Oh and lastly to Bock's comment - I'd put unempathic CE characters in that category definitely; however a bard with high charisma strikes me as the Manson type - manipulative, evil, but somehow able to bring others around to his way of thinking. Not necessarily the type to work well with others; but certainly the type that could get others working well for him. That is a really tough challenge for the player of the CE character; I think it would take a very good roleplayer to pull it off - but if so it could be rewarding for everyone.

Your chaotic-evil player might hide it from the other characters, but by nature your friend will have to do some cruel, evil shit that WILL piss off a party-member. A CE character will go through peoples' loot bags when it is their turn to take watch at night, or they might just slit everyone's throats while they are asleep and steal all their gear.

Unless there is a VERY good reason, a CE will destroy a party and take what they can. Chaotic-evil characters are people like the Joker, or Hannibal Lecter, or Ted Bundy... or Jack the Ripper.

Seriously, a CE character doesn't WANT to hide their evil unless they're afraid of the party. And if they're afraid of the party, they'll leave. Your friend WILL be perpetrating acts of heinous, evil shit on the people you are playing the game with. Unless its a damn good reason, I imagine it going down like this:

DM: Okay, you enter the dungeon and see the Vampire Queen and her followers gathered around an altar, chanting.
Party Leader: Okay, lets spread out and get ready to throw spells.
Evil PC: HEY VAMPIRE QUEEN! OVER HERE! EAT MY FRIENDS AND GIVE ME ETERNAL LIFE! ITS TOTALLY A GOOD DEAL!
Party:
Evil PC: I'm evil, its totally in-character. Don't worry, you can spend a few hours making new character sheets.

If you want a suave, manipulatively evil bard, do NEUTRAL EVIL. They're smooth motherfuckers and get the cash without rocking the boat.

Lawful evil people are even better.

Doesn't specify that it has to be solely electronic games and gaming.

I dunno Chewie - a Chaotic Evil character might realize throwing the party to a vampire queen means he is going to be enslaved to her too; even if he gets eternal life. A Neutral Evil character wouldn't care about the enslavement but a Chaotic Evil character very well might (but not so much that it would necessarily make him stop). Pretty much any of the evil alignments would sell a party out in that situation though (considering that they thought they'd get eternal life out of the bargain).

I also think you're going to the extreme - From your link:

Every read Ender's Game? Peter Wiggin is exactly how I can see a charismatic CE character - manipulative, whimsical, cruel, but also conqueror of the world. Chaotic Evil doesn't mean stupid, just like Lawful Good doesn't mean stupid. A Chaotic Evil character is less likely in some regards to do evil, they don't have to be raving lunatics at all and will gladly show you the nicest time if it means they get their way down the line. But they are cruel and emotional - I personally think about 50% of teenage boys qualify as "Chaotic Evil". A chaotic evil person will put themselves ahead of everyone else at all times though - a neutral evil person might not if it means some minor benefit.

Too often (especially in novice gaming groups) people use Alignment to either justify a character's actions or to have a quick cookie-cutter response to something that happens in-game (ie. easy roleplaying) (Ex. My paladin kills him, since he detected evil on him, *yawn*) A much better experience comes when you actually attempt to feel what is going on - there are (or should be) very few extreme examples of *any* alignment - few paladins that kill everything evil that they meet and refuse to associate with anyone - good beings included - that don't obey the law to the letter, just like there are few raving lunatics. However; there might actually be more "evil" people than good even in a "nice" society.

A character that is selfish, whimsical, cruel, and empathic could fit a Chaotic Evil bard. The character doesn't need to kill every defenseless being it meets in order to qualify as Chaotic Evil. However the character *will* be manipulative, probably often insults other's short comings, uses its charisma to its advantage in any situation and demands "the best" of what the party finds. Probably steals if unlikely to get caught and is generally thought of as a "Bitch" or a "Bastard". There's nothing wrong with playing that kind of character - certainly chaotic and certainly evil - but by no means a raving lunatic bent on only slaughter.

Now, would a group of generally happy friendly people want to hang out with such a one? Probably not - but if you give the characters a hook to be together you suddenly have an interesting role-playing experience and a CE character freely associating with a good party (as long as they'll put up with the bitch that is).

I mean we've all seen pretty girls take advantage of men that keep coming back for more haven't we?

Damnit Fai, when are we playing together online?

How would you even play on a message board?

D&D Forge, here we come.

Actually, killing something without warning because you detected evil on them is one of the FASTEST ways to loose your alignment as a Paladin. You try to reform evil, or defeat evil, but a Paladin is rarely the executioner. What if he was already punished for his crimes? You don't know. He could just be a miserable bastard who is a pillar of his community (like Mr. Potter in Wonderful Life).

I had a Paladin once do a detect & smite on the town drunk because he was evil, and he found himself without powers and in prison forty minutes later.

I'm just saying that IN MY EXPERIENCE having one evil character in a party becomes that person's excuse to be a dick and wreck the game. If you have a Paladin in the party, it WILL break the group, unless it is a plot device.

That would be damned cool.

I think I'd give blood for that to happen.

The same way you do in real life. Forgo the grid and let the GM roll. Of course, there are a number of programs to help us; I own a copy of Fantasy Grounds II.

Actually, a D&D board is an idea I've been toying with. Are people actually interested?

I might be, depending on how it was set up, I've dicked around with one in the past but didn't have much player interaction

There's specially dedicated D&D 'chat' software, it has die rollers and other good things built right in.