Vigelante Codes of Honour

[Vernon King Avaritt III]

I have made several codes of honour for vigilantes and I was wondering how much they should cost. Thank you in advance.


Vigilante Code of Honour 10 points
1) Never kill officers of the law. This includes superheroes.
2) Only kill serious criminals not petty criminals.
3) Never let the criminal get away if you can help it.
4) Protect and never hurt innocent bystanders.
5) Never rob your target or businesses. We are vigilantes not thieves.


Army of Vengeance COH
The Army of Vengeance was started by American Vendetta and several other vigilantes. They got together and made their code of honour.
1) Defend your countries honour. America is the greatest country in the World.
2) Never kill an officer of the law or a superhero. They are just doing their job. You may fight them to escape.
3) A felon is worthy of death, do not let them escape.
4) Protect the public and don't attack innocent bystanders.
5) Only kill criminals who hurt other people; even if they are lawman or superhero.
6) Defend your brother or sister.
7) Do not marry. A family will only impede your mission. You may sleep with others though but don't form long term attachments.
8) Do not betray your team mates. Your team mates fight is your own. Team mates should not fight each other.
9) Never rob the criminal nor rob businesses. We are vigilantes not thieves.
10) Always keep your teams secrets and never betray them to the law.

[jason taylor]

Should they have some creepy ritual(a secret tatoo of Nemesis for instance)?

[jason taylor]

Make sure the crime is proven(you have your own standards of proof of course).

[Leynok]

Also another thing to remember is, how much do these Vigilantes do because it's their honor, and how much do they do because they're part of a group that just has those rules?
The first means that even if the group were to be disbanded, they would probably still follow those rules, and disobeying them has no real punishments aside from maybe others being disappointed in them. If the group actually has solid rules for these things, there would be actual punishments for disobeying.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Vernon King Avaritt III

...
Army of Vengeance COH
The Army of Vengeance was started by American Vendetta and several other vigilantes. They got together and made their code of honour.
...
3) A felon is worthy of death, do not let them escape.
...

As they are committing felonies left and right, this may cause an issue.

And also do they acknowledge the prevalence of false convictions? If they feel that the system is so corrupt it needs vigilantes, why wouldn't they consider innocents in jail as much as guilties getting off?

[robkelk]

Originally Posted by Vernon King Avaritt III

I have made several codes of honour for vigilantes and I was wondering how much they should cost. Thank you in advance.


Vigilante Code of Honour 10 points
1) Never kill officers of the law. This includes superheroes.
2) Only kill serious criminals not petty criminals.
3) Never let the criminal get away if you can help it.
4) Protect and never hurt innocent bystanders.
5) Never rob your target or businesses. We are vigilantes not thieves.


Army of Vengeance COH
The Army of Vengeance was started by American Vendetta and several other vigilantes. They got together and made their code of honour.
1) Defend your countries honour. America is the greatest country in the World.
2) Never kill an officer of the law or a superhero. They are just doing their job. You may fight them to escape.
3) A felon is worthy of death, do not let them escape.
4) Protect the public and don't attack innocent bystanders.
5) Only kill criminals who hurt other people; even if they are lawman or superhero.
6) Defend your brother or sister.
7) Do not marry. A family will only impede your mission. You may sleep with others though but don't form long term attachments.
8) Do not betray your team mates. Your team mates fight is your own. Team mates should not fight each other.
9) Never rob the criminal nor rob businesses. We are vigilantes not thieves.
10) Always keep your teams secrets and never betray them to the law.

Let's see,,,

• Army of Vengeance COH point #2 is Vigilante Code of Honour point #1, re-worded.
• Army of Vengeance COH point #3 is Vigilante Code of Honour point #2 plus #3, re-worded.
• Army of Vengeance COH point #4 is Vigilante Code of Honour point #4, re-worded.
• Army of Vengeance COH point #9 is Vigilante Code of Honour point #5, re-worded.

Thus, your Army of Vengeance COH is a superset of your Vigilante Code of Honour, and should be worth more points.


However, you've set this up so that anyone who tries to follow the Army of Vengeance COH is doomed to fail eventually. If an officer of the law hurts someone, point #2 says let him go while point #5 says kill him - the vig is damned if he does and damned if he doesn't. If I was creating a PC for your game, there's no way I would take that COH as it stands.

[Leynok]

Originally Posted by robkelk

However, you've set this up so that anyone who tries to follow the Army of Vengeance COH is doomed to fail eventually. If an officer of the law hurts someone, point #2 says let him go while point #5 says kill him - the vig is damned if he does and damned if he doesn't. If I was creating a PC for your game, there's no way I would take that COH as it stands.

Indeed, it should be reworded to make exceptions. Perhaps a never harm a "True Officer of the Law", or however you want to word it. Meaning basically that any sufficiently corrupted police officer is no longer viewed as one, and may be treated as a criminal. Make sure you spell out the meaning in your description, and specifying what counts as corrupt enough to be an applicable target.
Alternatively just add "Ignore if #5 would be applicable" or words to that effect.

[Flyndaran]

Ouch, that springs up the No True Scotsman Fallacy inevitably leading to failure of the code's spirit.
The'd eventually define True Officer so narrowly that no one qualifies allowing them carte blanche.

Also "felons" allows the corrupted state to define their enemies. They may want a broader term of abusers of the innocent such that major hardship or injury occurs as a direct and forseeable consequence.
Of course that leads to defining innocent, but in that case thier aggressive beliefs may help them by keeping that group small.

That way they wouldn't see someone that was convicted of beating their rapist to death as a "felon". But they might harshly judge a white collar bureacrat found guilty of a minor grift as he callously used sub-quality materials on an orphanage's roofing leading to one child's pneumonia from the draft.

Unless OP wants a gropu that started out with the "right" motivation but has become murdering spree "let god sort them out" sorts.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by Leynok

The first means that even if the group were to be disbanded, they would probably still follow those rules, and disobeying them has no real punishments aside from maybe others being disappointed in them. If the group actually has solid rules for these things, there would be actual punishments for disobeying.

Code Of Honor is a Self-Imposed mental disadvantage. You have to follow the Code Of Honor. You can, of course, decide one day that you don't want to any more. It's self imposed after all! But if you do that, you don't have the disadvantage any more, and the GM takes all your bonus points from it away and possibly halts your earned CP for the session for bad roleplaying; you may end up in point debt.

If it's externally imposed behavior, it's just something that comes with your Duty; the more difficult it is to live by, the worse your Duty probably is. You can generally just give up a Duty at will as well, but for severe ones like this it usually quickly turns into other social problems.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Ouch, that springs up the No True Scotsman Fallacy inevitably leading to failure of the code's spirit.
The'd eventually define True Officer so narrowly that no one qualifies allowing them carte blanche.

Also "felons" allows the corrupted state to define their enemies. They may want a broader term of abusers of the innocent such that major hardship or injury occurs as a direct and forseeable consequence.
Of course that leads to defining innocent, but in that case thier aggressive beliefs may help them by keeping that group small.

That way they wouldn't see someone that was convicted of beating their rapist to death as a "felon". But they might harshly judge a white collar bureacrat found guilty of a minor grift as he callously used sub-quality materials on an orphanage's roofing leading to one child's pneumonia from the draft.

Unless OP wants a gropu that started out with the "right" motivation but has become murdering spree "let god sort them out" sorts.

That is actually a feature, not a bug. We get to see how far they really take this before they get into He Who Fights Monsters territory.