"I don't like the heroes, therefore the villains are good"

Khwarizmi

>You were rooting for the sociopath who killed criminals?

Yes, yes I was.  He was very heavily flawed, and at times I thought his actions were reprehensible, but I still strongly sympathised with him and wanted him to succeed.  I saw him more as a tragic, broken and misguided hero than an outright sociopath, though the two are not mutually contradictory and he was arguably both.

>^^Hussie doesn't troll that often.

Maybe not, but I don't think he could have written a more divisive character than Vriska, and at times she seems intentionally provocatively written to both anger and entertain.  She has both villainous and heroic qualities.  She's conceited, violent, petty, cruel and controlling, and she's also funny, intelligent, and has frequent sympathetic moments.  She also lies frequently and gambles with and manipulates the lives of other characters.  Her unpredictableness is a big part of what makes her such an interesting character.

I think also, she rarely attains any kind of victory or murders any sympathetic character without suffering some kind of humiliating and comic injury for it, which takes the edge off her more villainous actions.  It's the same reason that Belkar from The Order of the Stick can get away with doing evil things while still remaining entertaining, whereas, say, Richard from Looking for Group can drift into disturbing Sue-ish territory.

>What about Nite Owl I? He was pretty admirable IIRC.

He was likeable, but less interesting to read about than Rorschach and in a considerably less central role.  Mostly I just felt sorry for him because of what happened to him.

Iaculus

Actually, I didn't consider Dan that much of an unambiguous good guy. He was more of an immature thrill-seeker, having fun with being a costumed hero whilst shying away from the big moral decisions. Sure, he griped about Ozymandias's plan and the Comedian and Rorschach's methods, but only whilst abetting or simply running away from them. He was simply too weak-willed, too devoid of moral conviction, to be a true hero. I think that's what makes him an interesting mirror to Rorschach, the driven vigilante sociopath with the insanely strict moral code. They were two halves of a complete hero, fundamentally meaningless on their own.

Khwarizmi

Dan was the second Nite Owl, not the original.

Iaculus

I was mostly referring to Juan's post, which was a reference to Dan and Laurie.