Motivation (CTH)

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Why is the thief what he is? You can ask this question even before you know specifically what his area of expertise or technical interest is. A person primarily motivated by greed could be a troubleshooter or a cat burglar, for instance, provided the job pays well.
We suggest six basic motivations: fame (or infamy), greed, justice, loyalty, survival, and whim. These are of course generalizations, and any particular character probably has motivations more complex than one of these simple descriptions. Also, characters often have more than one motivation, and different motivations can apply to different situations.
This may sound so convoluted that you may wonder why we should even approach the issue. It is useful to choose a basic motivation, however, as the basis for role-playing. As you play the character, more motivations will arise—and old ones may vanish. In this way a character may come to life.
A character who starts with the greed motivation may, in the course of his adventures, encounter a great deal of injustice wrought by the rulers of the land. He may even trace his own selfishness to the perverted values of the rulers. As he organizes his activities to oppose the rulers, then, his motivation may subtly swing towards justice. It is unlikely, however, that he would be so "converted" as to lose entirely the greed that drove him for so long. New conflicts and role-playing opportunities may arise within the character between his greed and his new-found sense of justice.
Be sure to keep your character's motivations in mind when you select his alignment. The description below of each general motivation includes a word on appropriate, related alignments. Note also that as the character develops in play and motivation shifts, alignment too may undergo change. (For a thorough discussion of alignment changes, see the AD&D® 2nd Edition Player's Handbook, p. 49, and the Dungeon Master's Guide, pp. 28-29.)
The motivation description may also include suggestions on thief kits appropriate to this motivation. The thief kits are fully detailed in Chapter 3.
Fame/Infamy: The fabled charm of a thief's life attracts many an adventurer in search of glory. In our own real world, many thieves have achieved great fame, and in literature even more such figures abound. Infamy surely accompanies the career of many a successful thief; for some it may even be their ultimate goal. If this is the case with your character, you must be certain to bring it out while role-playing. Every action should be considered in terms of how it may increase the world's knowledge of the thief's amazing exploits.
Greed: The simplest and perhaps most stereotypical motive behind the thief's life is greed. Combining greed with sloth, the thief shuns "real" work, and lightens his load by lightening others' purses. Or, the character simply loves wealth, but is unable to get it through acceptable channels.
Characters with greed as their primary motivation surely would not be of good alignment. Although even good thieves may have a certain element of greed, it would not be the biggest factor shaping their lives.
Justice: This is a rare and peculiar motivation, since thieves are generally considered to be anything but good. The classic example of the thief motivated by justice is Robin Hood—at least as popularly portrayed, if not in historical reality. Such a character must arise in a region or nation where injustice rules, though it need not do so officially. For instance, in one town the rulers may be blatantly evil and corrupt; a thief motivated by justice may devote himself to fighting those rulers.
Characters motivated by justice will probably be of good, lawful neutral, or true neutral alignments. Remember that each alignment has its own idea of what constitutes "justice"; to a true neutral thief, for instance, justice means maintaining the balances between good and evil, law and chaos.
Loyalty: Some connection in the character's past has drawn him onto the road of the thief, and he follows it faithfully out of loyalty or debt to that past. For instance, one character might have been born into a family of crimelords; he became a thief as a matter of family loyalty. Another thief may have been an orphan, sheltered and raised by the thieves' guild. Even though his moral sensibilities may lead him to question his benefactors' and even his own behavior, his loyalty and gratitude for the life and opportunity they gave him may (at least for the moment) outweigh his doubts.
Loyalty is most appropriate as the primary motivation of lawful characters. The conflicts of loyalty versus moral imperatives may lead to some very interesting role-playing.
Survival: Many thieves from the lower strata of society engage in theft and the like for the simple purpose of survival. Player-character adventurers are prone to garner more wealth than they need for mere survival, so (unless the Dungeon Master works diligently to keep them poor) they might need a new motivation after a few successful adventures. Probably a secondary motivation (such as greed, or even justice) would come to the fore and become primary.
Thieves who steal for survival usually don't have lawful alignments, though lawful evil is possible.
Whim: Some thieves engage in their activities for the sheer thrill of it. They can survive (materially) without it, they don't need or desire the money as such, and they are indifferent to fame. They simply desire to steal, to deceive people, to pull off the most impossible heist or scam—this grants them supreme pleasure. Whim-motivated thieves range from the ennui-stricken rich man's son to the compulsive shoplifter whose desire to steal may push him to the very edge of sanity.
This motivation is most appropriate for chaotic alignments.