The Order of the Stick

At the time they were right, I think he was faking it but he's become the mask since then. However Roy also treats Elan as if he were the same as at the beginning of the strip.

That said, Belkar probably thinks he's faking it too.

What is Belkar's alignment shifting to, anyway? Just evil with neutral tendencies, or straight up True/Chaotic Neutral?

He's gone from Stupid Evil to good old fashioned Chaotic Evil, although he might slowly work his way towards Neutral Evil if he keeps it up. But we've already seen from his epiphany sequence that he likes being Chaotic. He's not trying to suddenly turn into a law-abiding citizen; rather he's learned to accept that the game has rules and that if he wants to keep playing it, he'll have to at least acknowledge them.

edited 2nd Oct '14 9:38:38 AM by Fighteer

If he lived long enough and interacted with the right people I could feasibly see him reaching chaotic neutral in some very selfish form. Maybe. In behavior if not in spirit. But he won't.

Right now he's just chaotic evil.

edited 2nd Oct '14 9:47:28 AM by Arha

Belkar had a great shift in personality, but his alignment budged very little (yet).

But that still leaves Haley, Varsuvius, Elan and Roy himself all of whom have changed enough that Durkula acting as if they hadnt would really stand out and at least cause some questions. Since V is already open to Belkar's suggestion that Durkula isnt what he seems, H/she would be the best target, but of course Durkon doesnt know that.

Interesting to wonder what Durkon thought about Belkar's development, actually. Have we ever seen anything on that?

I doubt he noticed. Durkon's so far up Lawful that Belkar's slight shift within Chaotic Evil looks pretty much the same from his point of view.

I think he's gonna start noticing though, if only because character development is gonna be on is mind.

If you ask me, I think Belkar has pretty resoundingly moved into "Neutral Evil" territory.

Belkar hasn't done anything that demonstrates he recognises or respects laws, personal codes, or other such Lawful things. Sane and rational doesn't mean 'no longer Chaotic'. Just look at Haley.

Well, not all systems of codes are institutional- he's been demonstrating a lot of loyalty and respect (for him anyways) to the team and he's been less inclined to fallow his whims and personal indulgences lately when they would be detrimental to his bigger objectives.

Or in another way, he's acting more in-line with systems of morality because its better in the long run for fulfilling his desires (or acting Lawfully in order to benefit his Chaotic wants, which is pretty neutral.)

Yeah I can see him going CN before going NE. The fact is that he was bitter about his evil nature when he reflected on it after Durkon's death, when he reflected on his chaotic nature he embraced it during the Shoujo vision quest. Both outcomes are unlikely however.

Remember though CE isn't just "extraordinarily evil" it means "evil that seeks freedom over all other outcomes" like LE is "evil that seeks order over all other outcomes". Belkar has realized that by suppressing his base urges he gets more freedom in the long run, that doesn't mean he values rules, but he understand that sometimes you need to abide by them.

Again, Haley's basically the prime example of how you can be a responsible adult serving a greater cause while still being as Chaotic as the day is long. For me, Belkar is sloooooowly tracking up to Chaotic Neutral, but making no progress towards Neutral Evil. All he's done is shed his Chaotic Stupid and Stupid Evil tendencies.

I still think that Belkar is a wonderful example of somebody learning how to play Chaotic Evil after they've had a beating from a GM about not being Stupid Evil and/or Chaotic Stupid all the damn time, dammit.

Chaos just means "values freedom: subject to seeking thrills and change without much notice". Within that, there is scope to use the rules, even if it ultimately is to subvert them into doing your own thing. After all, flags are made to be burned, baby — if you don't find one you like. They don't have to be burned just for being flags, regardless of whether you like the ideas behind them or not. <_< Something Belkar took a while catching on to (and, seeing the example of a Chaotic Good Old Dude do it superbly in front of him helped).

edited 3rd Oct '14 3:51:20 AM by Euodiachloris

I would never call Belkar's change of alignment to be leaning towards less chaotic. Remember, his Character Development started from his vision with Shojo, a CG character. The title of one of these strips is also called "The Philosophy of Chaos". This is the point when Belkar starts to learn how to be CE without being either Stupid Evil or Chaotic Stupid. A good example of a LE character is Tarquin. Also Redcloak. The question is: is Belkar starting to act more like Haley/Shojo, or more like Tarquin/Redcloak? I think it's definitely the former. But he is still CE nevertheless.

I agree with others. Belkar is still Chaotic Evil and he hasn't done anything to want to redeem himself from Evil, so I believe that's the alignment he will be at the time of his death.

Given more time, I could believe a shift to Chaotic Neutral, but as his allotment has nearly run its course, I'm forced to agree as well: there just isn't enough time for Belkar to truly change.

How long does he have left at this point?

Don't know for sure, but probably a week. Ish.

I'd give him a couple weeks, time's been fuzzy since they got to the desert.

I think it's a ~month minus however long they've spent on the airship

I thought we knew it was less than two weeks around the time the Order got to the desert.

I love how, with a simple prophecy, Rich has every single reader of the comic frantically counting days, wondering when the deadline will arrive.