The Campaign Builder's Guild

In reading over some of the settings and house rules here, I think that alignment has gotten something of a bad reputation. The somewhat inflexible way it's represented in D&D can't help the matter, I'm sure. I have not looked at later editions much but the earlier versions of D&D had something called an "Alignment language" which always seemed completely absurd to me, and reinforced the idea of alignments as pigeonholing characters rather than simply describing their tendencies.

To put it simply, I think the key is to think of it not as "I act in a certain way because of my alignment," but rather, "my alignment is this way because I act in a certain way." It can't be used as the sum total of the character's morality, but it makes a handy way to get a 'snapshot' of it.

Part of it, too, has to be the biases of some players and DMs. I remember in basic D&D, there was no "good" or "evil" section of the alignment. You were lawful or chaotic, and there was the implication that "lawful" was "good," and "chaotic" was "bad." To me, AD&D's system (and 3rd edition's) has a lot more color and depth, but I think people still, perhaps somewhat subconciously, think of it in more limiting terms than it necessarily has to be.

For example, Lawful Good. Boring, right? Well, ok, a goody two-shoes is likely to be LG, but so is Judge Dredd. And that's where the shades of character description come in.

Now I just keep track of their alignments behind the screen, and let them act. They can't seem to switch those two sections around, and I was sick of hearing 'Well I have to do this because I'm X...'

I allow players to state their alignment on their character sheets, but the other players never, ever have any idea as to what the other player's alignment is. Those sorts of game mechanics should be entirely private.

I also track alignment movement along a chart, with three steps between each. Meaning, third strike you move closer to another alignment for each action that is entirely out of character.

For instance, we had a crusader-type fighter who started out as LG. He committed a few acts that could be perceived as being entirely cruel and cold-hearted. On his third act, he became LN. If he continues to act without accord to personal honor and his house's guidelines, he'll begin to move toward NE.

Never understood the bad rap it gets.
As long as alignment is a respocne, not a predictor, it works fine.  I don't have my players choose an alignment, I actually graph it in 3 dimensions (Order/chaos, good/evil, active/passive) based on their actions, for my DM use.  The Gods of Celtricia are bounded by the aspect that the worshippers percieves of them, not by the God itself.  Gods in Celtricia are huge...and misunderstood.
(I'm sorry, there is no one in a town who would go to church at the 'evil' church)

That snapshot you mention is actually really intersting if you graph it.  I give each player little points on most of their major actions, and actually graph it When you have a 13 year PC's graph, you get some really intersting movement and deviation (and a ratty old piece of graph paper, to boot.)


But the reason I am posting onto this is the misunderstood place of Lawful-good.  I have seen in so many threads people mentioning intolerant, pious, self righteous churches or church-sponsored folks who are called by their respective GM handlers 'Lawful-Good'.  
Good people don't persecute other people.  Good PCs and good NPCs don't round up people who don't beliecve as they do. That's lawful-evil, or at best lawful neutral.

:blah: This could be a fun thread.

Judge Dredd is LE, maybe LN.

I've never had issues with the alignment system. I throw my lot in with the group who believes alignment is a measure of how you act, it doesn't dictate how you act. In my games, it has never been a problem; my players all play their alignments well, and they've come to me in the past and asked to change their alignment when the situation warranted it (for example, a CN Barbarian turned N after his first major adventure drew to a close; he began to care more about stability; a NG rogue in the same party also turned N, having grown a little more self serving after all he did to help others backfired).

Good is definitely not persecution.

As for no one going to the "evil" church, only LE would have "churches". Other evil faiths would have cults and covens, and be a sanctuary for those who feel that the other faiths don't represent their interests. In a world where someone can actually draw tangible, undebatable power from a deity, evil people will flock to evil deities.

Just look at the real world. There are people who do horrible things in the name of their god, and in a D&D world they may be following an evil deity pretending to be their good deity. After all, many polytheistic faiths believe in definably evil deities, such as storm or war gods, but these gods receive veneration (often to placate them, but also often to direct their wrath or to gain their blessings).

hmm, no one from the "anti-alignment" group seems to be speaking out.  I personally do not use the traditional alignment system for my world of Avayevnon, but not because I have anything against it inherently.  I just choose a different system.

I use a system of astrological signs instead, and Sun signs and Moon signs give a basic portrait of people's (sometimes contradictory) personalities.  It's a bit more vague, and people of the same "alignment" can act in very different ways, some for good and some for evil.

Quote from: LordVreegThat snapshot you mention is actually really intersting if you graph it.  I give each player little points on most of their major actions, and actually graph it When you have a 13 year PC's graph, you get some really intersting movement and deviation (and a ratty old piece of graph paper, to boot.)

Curious, how to you accurately graph 3d movement on a 2d surface?

I am decidedly anti-alignment; in fact, the general quantification of social/mental characteristics in most games bugs me.  It probably stems from my exacting, often pedantic approach to the metaphysical in setting creation. (Those of you who've read the Cosmology section in Dystopia would know all about that).

Of course, we've all heard the arguments against it, so I shan't reiterate.  Rather, I'll mention one occasion where it's inclusion actually enhanced the gaming experience:

[spoiler]In order to curtail the spiritual atrocities committed by the first humans, the Fleshless Men created a Quartet of laws which all mortals must abide.  Alas, in the eons that followed, the spirit of those laws was corrupted (and in time, the laws themselves were lost).  New commandments eventually supplanted the first, and by the scheming contrivances of some celestial ne'er-do-well, these false axioms attained the merit and force of those created by the Fleshless.

Arbitrary though they were, the laws could not be broken by humans without the perpetrator being consigned to some altered existence, and the establishment of worldly courts (in the form of the myriad religions) further cemented the false axioms as arbiters of the nature of the mortal spirit.

These axioms, contained in an unnamed text, described the Degrees of Freedom (or constraint): The Stave (law/chaos), the Lantern (good/evil), and the Crown (Ascendence and Descendence); and delineated the actions that a mortal could take in order to traverse a certain path.

Thus, in that setting, Good and Evil (the Bright and Dark Lanterns) were explicitly defined, and straying too far in either direction had evident material and spiritual consequences.  Subversively, this resulted in the reality of morality being near nonexistent: the rigidity, constriction and subjection of the Axioms made every act of seeming spiritual freedom a lie.

The overall campaign arc was ultimately geared around the discovery and destruction of the text, such that the Six Degrees could be condensed into one, reducing the spiritual realms to a singularity and thus destroying the archetypal Stave, Lantern and Crown.  In so doing, the responsibility and consequences of all human action would be restored to men themselves.  Heaven and Hell; the devouring machine Moloch and the bewildering haze Pandaemonium; the infinite Tower and the infinitesimal Hollow; all would unravel.

I suppose, in the end, it was all a really elaborate and symbolic way of sticking it to the classic alignment system, but it was freakin' good fun.[/spoiler]

I don't use alignment because it simplifies things too much. Some people may be evil, some good, but most simply have personal goals, likes, dislikes, and maybe a strong conviction about something or other.

(The pointless arguments about definitions don't help, either.)

I dislike alignment simply because the world is not cut into nine different types of people. There are shades of grey. I might play an evil orc who rips arms off humans, eats their brains and drills holes through their skulls, but then goes home to his family and loves them and cares for them as much as any orc can. There's no room for defining that in the DnD system.

Quote from: WensleydaleI dislike alignment simply because the world is not cut into nine different types of people. There are shades of grey. I might play an evil orc who rips arms off humans, eats their brains and drills holes through their skulls, but then goes home to his family and loves them and cares for them as much as any orc can. There's no room for defining that in the DnD system.

But Orcs are naturally evil and never deviate, that's the way it works![/sarcastic mocking of D&D]

One of the problems with RAW D&D is just that. As a DM adjudicating what might work on such an orc, I'd probably judge alignment based on how he treats the enemies he's fighting. Because he's evil to humans/the people he's fighting(Edit: More accurately, he acts in an evil manner towards them), "Protection From Evil" would work on him. His family would never need to cast protection from evil on him, so it wouldn't work.

If that makes any coherent sense. If not, I'll try again, lol.

The problem is not the categorization, but rather the mechanical effects of the system. Things like detect evil turn a world/game into a failure.

EDIT: Psychotic barber's interpretation, while good, is a houserule. RAW alignment is a failure. (//../../e107_files/public/1185985449_9_FT35568_motivator6446734.jpg) Houseruled alignment systems, I think we can all agree, can be good.

The biggest problem with D&D alignment isn't so much the shades of gray, as the fact that the same person can be lawful, chaotic, good, and evil all at once, albeit in different aspects of their life and personality.

Take Robin Hood for a simple example. He and his outlaws were, well, outlaws, opposed to the legitimate exercise of authority delegated to Prince John in the absence of King Richard. So chaotic, right? Or maybe not, since they retained their loyalty to King Richard in their belief that John was misusing his authority. So lawful in that respect. Nevertheless, they didn't scruple at robbing people, at least those they felt acquired their wealth wrongly. So maybe chaotic after all. But their code of loyalty to each other speaks toward a lawful aspect.

The point is, that trying to choose lawful or chaotic for this just sweeps all the interesting aspects under the rug. And throwing your hands up with a default "neutral" is surely no better.

The D&D approach assumes something like this:

behavior => alignment => mechanical effects

And so whenever you have mechanical effects, you have to make a judgment about behavior. And the example above (and hundreds of others) show that making that judgment is flaky at best.

My preference is to break the linkage between behavior and alignment. That is, mechanical effects apply only to some kind of spiritual or supernatural alignment, and this is not dictated by your behavior but rather by your associations. Associate with the "good" church, and you are "good" even if your actions are frequently bad. Of course, if you are bad enough, often enough, the church might kick you out and you'd lose your "good" association. But this would be essentially a role-playing issue - how long will the church tolerate your antics? - possibly culminating in some kind of formal excommunication.

In this case, Robin Hood would probably end up as "chaotic" because his actions threaten the security of the "lawful" church leaders, so they'd withdraw their protection. But with the return of King Richard and subsequent reform of the church, he could easily become "lawful" again, and all without changing behavior or personality at all.

Quote from: RaelifinEDIT: Psychotic barber's interpretation, while good, is a houserule. RAW alignment is a failure. Houseruled alignment systems, I think we can all agree, can be good.

Yep. Sorry, I didn't mean to pass off my interpretation as anything but that. My apologies if it came off as more.

Quote from: psychoticbarberYep. Sorry, I didn't mean to pass off my interpretation as anything but that. My apologies if it came off as more.

Oh, not at all. I didn't mean to accuse. I just wanted to make a general point about the difference between alignment systems and the RAW alignment. Sorry for the insinuation.

Can we all agree that this thread should be a discussion of new alignment systems?

Here are two threads on the Wizards boards that I find address alignment the best.
The Tome of Fiends (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=646241) - The second post in the thread is the one dealing with alignment.
Having a Sandwich. Good or Evil? (http://boards1.wizards.com/wotc_archive/index.php/t-584995) - A Mocking look at alignments in DnD. Since this is on the Mature Boards you'll have to be logged on and have whatever setting configured that'll allow you to access the mature boards.

My favourite quote on the subject comes from the Tome of Fiends.

"D&D at its heart is about breaking into other peoples' homes, stabbing them in the face, and taking all their money. That's very hard to rationalize as a Good thing to do, and the authors of D&D have historically not tried terribly hard."



Anyway, here's what I've been contemplating for Alignment in my setting. It's still very much a rough draft, and I have no idea if it would work in actual game play.

I'm going to put together a list of ## virtues and vice, avoiding the number 7 at all costs. Each of these will be a possible motive for killing another.

At character creation everybody is going to pick a fate. Each of these fates will have one virtue and one vice associated with them. For example the Crusader might have Protecting Others and Judgemental.

Whenever a character kills another character they get a blood point next to the virtue or vice that best represents their motive. If this virtue/vice is associated with their fate, they instead get two blood points.

I then plan on having some kind of in game mechanic that uses these blood points. Not quite sure what yet, perhaps an aura or something.

Quote from: PellanorMy favourite quote on the subject comes from the Tome of Fiends.

"D&D at its heart is about breaking into other peoples' homes, stabbing them in the face, and taking all their money. That's very hard to rationalize as a Good thing to do, and the authors of D&D have historically not tried terribly hard."

This is...genius. And so getting sigged, right now.

Quote from: Wensleydalethe world is not cut into nine different types of people

I might play an evil orc who rips arms off humans, eats their brains and drills holes through their skulls, but then goes home to his family and loves them and cares for them as much as any orc can.[/quote]I don't use alignment because it simplifies things too much.[/quote]
I would say that your way is already an improvement because a lot of mediocre players and DMs would instead go:
alignment => behavior

By new, I mean non-RAW. As is written, no evil politician would ever enter office, because detect evil would keep them out. (Same thing for chaotic) By the RAW, alignment is a mash of brutally simplified morality, cosmic labeling, and nonsensical restrictions.

There's a lot of talk about Mr. Orc. Your point was that Mr. Orc is evil (by the RAW, in the same basket as undead and demons) because of how he "slaughters innocent townsfolk to feed his children." Now, this is, of course, clearly in contrast with the elves, dwarves, men, etc. who go and kill off hundreds of orcs for no reason other than the fact that they ding when they walk through the alignment detectors.

It makes no sense for a creature to show kindness to those outside of their perceived allies. The only difference is how far the perception extends. A person raised to hate and fear age-old enemies will kill without hesitation, and that's not evil -- that's smart.

Yes, you can keep your nine-fold system, and adapt it to not suck, there are plenty of ways to do it. I just want to be clear that the RAW is not an agreeable solution.

* RAW = Rules as Written

Well you could break it up into several 'virtues,' and alter spells and such do detect 1-3 of the virtues (of which there should be several).

Each side would have a 'positive' and 'negative' side, and work like a slider, as follows:

Neglectful......................Devoted
Ruthless........................Merciful
Bloodthirsty....................Pacifist

There'd be more, but you get the idea. Instead of detect evil/law/good/chaos, you might have Detect Mercy, or Detect Devotion. Stuff like that.

Quote from: Raelifingo and kill off hundreds of orcs for no reason other than the fact that they ding when they walk through the alignment detectors.

Objective vs subjective evil[/url]

To me, the concept of objective vs. subjective evil fits right in here, and in that case, the detect evil spell gets new life-- it's more "detect whatever the caster finds to be morally repulsive."

Quote from: RaelifinA person raised to hate and fear age-old enemies will kill without hesitation, and that's not evil -- that's smart.

why[/i] it exists, and work to resolve it. "We kill them because we hate them and we hate them because we always have" might not fit with some concepts of a "Good" morality.

I'd like to respond to some of this with a few observations:

First, D&D isn't really aiming for an accurate or psychologically realistic portrayal of an individual. They're using alignment to evoke some kind of epic, good vs. evil themes. They are painting with deliberately broad strokes. If that is the kind of game you want to run, then it makes sense to use alignment that emphasizes those aspects of the game. If not, change it or don't use it.

Second, if all you want to do is use alignment as a general, vague label, that is not really a problem. I'm just not sure what you gain from it. But D&D (RAW) doesn't really do that. Imagine you've classified someone's Robin Hood-type character as Chaotic Good (perfectly reasonable IMO) and then some baddie casts Dictum on him. Significant game events can depend on such judgments. It's no wonder that alignment arguments occasionally break up games.

Third, the issue of alignment "dictating" behavior usually comes about through the following mechanism. Player wants to play Paladin; mechanical effects require Lawful Good; player must conform actions to this alignment or suffer mechanical penalties. So the player feels that his actions are constrained by the rule-dictated alignment, rather then the reverse. If you were to do away with alignment restrictions, you'd do away with a solid majority of this issue.

The alignment based spells are a big-issue.  In Avayevnon, I am removing them.  Since the old alignments do not exist, the spells involved with them also do not exist.  

Stargate, see this thread. (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?s=97e2e5d042ba114c0d7465f02b44941e&t=881777) You might be interested.


Sparkletwist,
I do think that alignment simplifies things (by saying who is clearly good and who evil, mostly). This is good for many sorts of adventure games (group of heroes do good things) and hack and slash (adventurers kill things and take their stuff).
Unfortunately, I am not usually terribly interested in either. Sometimes they can be fun, but mostly, not for me.

So, alignments do nothing to make my games better. To add insult to injury, using them makes me think in alignments, which I dislike and find harmful when GMing.

If a game element doesn't help me, I have no reason to keep using it. Hence, no alignments for me, thanks. (I could design an alignment system that would be helpful, but personality traits implemented in good way do exactly the same thing, but better.)

Quote from: snakefingImagine you've classified someone's Robin Hood-type character as Chaotic Good (perfectly reasonable IMO) and then some baddie casts Dictum on him. Significant game events can depend on such judgments.

Dictum[/i] to keep him in line, it starts to feel a bit more sensible.

Quote from: Thanuiralignments do nothing to make my games better. To add insult to injury, using them makes me think in alignments

Oh, definitely, if having these labels around makes it more difficult, then there's no use for them. I would argue that "thinking in alignments" means that you're probably making too much of them, but rather than trying to completely revise your thinking to match some arbitrary system, getting rid of them is a perfectly reasonable alternative if you can do without them just fine. I personally find them useful.

As I mentioned, some people will never be happy with any sort of alignment system; I just simply think that for those "on the fence" the system can be revised to a happy medium rather than completely dumped.

I'm still unsure of where the real problems come from. Killing those who set off your Detect Evil is not good, I don't care who you are. Just because a creature is evil doesn't mean it deserves to die. Orcs are "often chaotic evil", not always, and not even usually. Demons and Chromatic Dragons are always evil, so they can be killed with impunity (because there mere existence is to cause evil), but Orcs have a choice. Their society makes them evil, not their nature.

Killing someone just because their alignment differs from the alignment you identify yourself with would be a Neutral act bordering on Evil in my DM judgment. I do not allow Paladins to go around detect eviling everyone and killing those who set it off; I do allow Paladins to go around detect eviling everyone and then being wary of those that set it off (or even investigating them; they could be spouse or child abusers, or any other sorts of lesser evils.

Remember, it takes a lot of HD for a humanoid to trigger anything higher than a faint evil aura. Heck, I'd even say that someone who just committed an evil act will "glow" with a faint evil aura for a little bit.

Likewise, altruism for your family is not good, it's neutral. It's simple reproduction; most animals will not look after themselves over their children, because they want their children to live on to reproduce, and thus cause their genes to further spread. Altruism for a complete stranger would be very good. Helping your own family at the expense of others would boarder on evil, depending on what you do (a little stealing would be chaotic, killing would be evil).

As for evil leaders and passing detect evil to get into office, you're assuming there's elections. You're also forgetting about all of the methods to mask alignment. I could see a very regimented Lawful republic or democracy having candidates stay in a temple for several days, ensuring that all possible spells have expired, and then be scrutinized by detect chaos spells. But for the most part, I believe the vast majority of people are Neutral, even though they'd like to be good, and they're more focused on Results.

Quote from: Kap'n XeviatHelping your own family at the expense of others would boarder on evil, depending on what you do (a little stealing would be chaotic, killing would be evil).

This depends on circumstances and what you mean by "helping."  If man came into your house seeking to rob you and ran into your wife in the process and so tried to kill her, killing the man to "help" your wife would not be an evil action at all in my opinion.  True, I could see the argument against it being a "good" action as you were protecting your own interests and did in fact kill a man, I do not see how it could be called evil.  You were not the one with malicious intent.

Now, if the same man succeeded in robbing you, tracking down the man and killing him to "help" your family recover valuables would be a neutral act at best, but most likely evil.  If the man had killed your wife in the process of robbing your home, killing him in revenge would be a borderline evil act as well.  You have greater mental justification, but revenge can very well be seen as evil.

Quote from: Seraphine_HarmoniumThis depends on circumstances and what you mean by "helping."  If man came into your house seeking to rob you and ran into your wife in the process and so tried to kill her, killing the man to "help" your wife would not be an evil action at all in my opinion.  True, I could see the argument against it being a "good" action as you were protecting your own interests and did in fact kill a man, I do not see how it could be called evil.  You were not the one with malicious intent.

Now, if the same man succeeded in robbing you, tracking down the man and killing him to "help" your family recover valuables would be a neutral act at best, but most likely evil.  If the man had killed your wife in the process of robbing your home, killing him in revenge would be a borderline evil act as well.  You have greater mental justification, but revenge can very well be seen as evil.

You're right, but everything you said isn't against what I said. I said that helping your family is neutral, not good, and helping your family at the expense of others is neutral, possibly even evil.

Likewise, killing in self defense, in the heat of the threat, is neutral. Killing a helpless person is evil or neutral (one could point out capitol punishment, but I think in a D&D alignment system, the death penalty sits on the boarder of neutral and evil).

Quote from: Kap'n XeviatI'm still unsure of where the real problems come from. Killing those who set off your Detect Evil is not good, I don't care who you are. Just because a creature is evil doesn't mean it deserves to die. Orcs are "often chaotic evil", not always, and not even usually. Demons and Chromatic Dragons are always evil, so they can be killed with impunity (because there mere existence is to cause evil), but Orcs have a choice. Their society makes them evil, not their nature.

That's another thing I dislike about alignment; their connotation with monsters, and them being always one thing. There is no way that anything with a greater than animal intellect doesn't have a choice as to its moral philosophy. The Red dragon raised form the egg in a temple of Pelor? Nope, sorry, you're red, so you've got to be evil.

Quote from: Kap'n Xeviat[You're right, but everything you said isn't against what I said. I said that helping your family is neutral, not good, and helping your family at the expense of others is neutral, possibly even evil.

Likewise, killing in self defense, in the heat of the threat, is neutral. Killing a helpless person is evil or neutral (one could point out capitol punishment, but I think in a D&D alignment system, the death penalty sits on the boarder of neutral and evil).

All this is well and good, but what is the end purpose of deciding whether act X is good or evil? To stick a label on someone so we can tell how they will be affected by various spells and effects?

To me, there are more interesting ways to approach this, depending what you want.

In the traditional D&D world, Good and Evil are these titanic, cosmic forces.  What matters is not whether people would think it is good or bad, or what Kant would have to say about it. What is iimportant here is whether the Good force or Evil force is attuned to that action. If, in your world, the Good force is perfectly okay with a (righteous) revenge killing, then that is Good. If, in your world, the Good force is more aligned with peace and forgiveness, then the killing is Evil.

On the other hand, if you want more personality depth and less of the epic feel, then you can skip the labels and go with a more descriptive approach. How do the motives of anger, revenge, justice, fear, or duty interact in the revenge killing? How will the rest of the community react? What consequences might there be? Simply labeling the act as good or evil doesn't help much here.

To go back to my example, suppose that Prince John persuades the local Bishop that Robin Hood is a threat to the church and good order. The Bishop, being deceived or maybe just corrupt, agrees. The next time he gets a chance, he casts Dictum in hopes of damaging, capturing, or killing Robin and his men.

Now the D&D rules state that Robin will be affected more strongly if he is Chaotic. So we could now get into a long discussion over whether Robin's general outlook and/or actions qualify him as Chaotic. But really, that isn't the issue at all. The question is whether the Bishop's religious powers hold sway in this case. Is the fact that he's working on behalf of a usurper, under false pretences, going to weaken his power over Robin? Or do the formalities of the circumstances rule the day? (Bishop acting within his authority, Robin flouting it.) To me, this is a much more interesting question, and goes much more directly to the nature of the world you are playing in, than some abstract discussion about whether Robin should be labeled Chaotic.

I'm not trying to offend anyone, but I think some people's offense to labeling acts as good or evil is that they don't want to admit that they would perform an evil act. I think of myself as a reasonably good person, and I'd place my alignment somewhere in the upper left triangle (NG, LG, LN, though I think its more likely NG or LN than LG), but I've performed my fair share of evil deeds. Now, most people won't perform truely vile deeds (things that will get you a one trip ticket to an Evil alignment, lets say eating a still living baby in front of its mother, for instance). D&D tries to make a concise list of what is good and what is bad; anything else is just neutral.

Here's another way of looking at it. A creature whose alignment is good is someone to whom the thought of performing a truely evil deed is disheartening (most people couldn't sit with themselves if they purposefully ran over a kid on a whim, or pushed an old lady down stairs, or poisoned a town's water supply), while someone whose alignment is evil is someone to whom the idea of performing a truely good deed is a waist of time ("Why should I help him, he should help me, I should help myself to his things ..."). Likewise true for Lawful and Chaotic people; lawful people would object to doing things on a whim, while Chaotic people would object to being held down for too long.

I think one trouble many of us have with the alignment system is that modern society has attempted to teach us to view every viewpoint as right in its context. That works for Good, Law, and Chaos, but not for Evil in D&D. Evil is never right; it might be easiest, it might be the "best" solution, but it is never the right solution.

Stargate: An evil dragon is always evil, but there are always exceptions. Angels are always good, but there are many fallen Angels in D&D. Likewise, a risen fiend is possible, but not probable. Demons and Devils are always evil, because they are born from the very cosmic embodiments of evil; chromatic dragons are so greedy, lusty, wrathful, and selfish that evil is just their nature. If you don't like this, change it. But I don't think it's a flaw of the alignment system.

Quote from: Stargate525

Quote from: Kap'n XeviatI'm still unsure of where the real problems come from. Killing those who set off your Detect Evil is not good, I don't care who you are. Just because a creature is evil doesn't mean it deserves to die. Orcs are "often chaotic evil", not always, and not even usually. Demons and Chromatic Dragons are always evil, so they can be killed with impunity (because there mere existence is to cause evil), but Orcs have a choice. Their society makes them evil, not their nature.

That's another thing I dislike about alignment; their connotation with monsters, and them being always one thing. There is no way that anything with a greater than animal intellect doesn't have a choice as to its moral philosophy. The Red dragon raised form the egg in a temple of Pelor? Nope, sorry, you're red, so you've got to be evil.

What I've started doing is, at least with humans (and I'm working on how to expand this), I've made the decision that one is born lawful/neutral/chaotic, and one's actions dictate good/neutral/evil. Changes in lawful/neutral/chaotic happen rarely, and usually when they do it's because the character was mislabeled during the creation process.

Also, I've found a cool thing on the Wizards board that might help you figure out how your character might act, and once you've got these things all filled out, it's much easier to figure an alignment based on it. Find it here (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?s=97e2e5d042ba114c0d7465f02b44941e&t=881777).

Quote from: Kap'n XeviatI'm not trying to offend anyone, but I think some people's offense to labeling acts as good or evil is that they don't want to admit that they would perform an evil act.

I think of myself as a reasonably good person, and I'd place my alignment somewhere in the upper left triangle (NG, LG, LN, though I think its more likely NG or LN than LG)[/quote]
Interesting thoughts. I consider myself probably CG. If I do something bad, I feel bad about it. If I just break some stupid arbitrary rule, though, I don't.

I think we've hit upon one of the biggest faults of the DnD alignment system. It's too open for interpretation.

Good vs Evil has always made sense to me, but what I consider to be good and what I consider to be evil are different than most people.

Good: Going out of your way to help others at no real benefit to yourself.
Neutral: Avoids hurting others, but won't put much effort into helping others either. Killing in Defence (self or of others).
Evil: Not feeling remorse when harming others. Killing for any other reason.

Where I run into issues is Lawful vs Chaotic. I can typically justify any one of the three alignments for any character.

Anyway, since nobody seems to be reading it I'm going to quickly quote the tome of fiends here. I agree with 95% of what he says here, so you can basically just count this as my opinion, but written much better.

[blockquote=Tome of Fiends]Morality: How Black is the Night?

Those readers who have been following this series will remember the basic moral question regarding Necromancy: namely the fundamental decision for each game as to whether to treat Negative Energy as an objective force or an ultimate moral indictment. The central question surrounding fiends is less obvious, but in no way less important to your game. We know that a Gelugon is Evil, he's got a subtype that denotes him as being specifically Evil, that's not the question. What we don't know is how Evil he is. That's a central question that has to be addressed within the context of each game. Let's face it, a lot of people really aren't comfortable with villainy more pernicious than the antagonists in a Saturday morning cartoon. Other people have a different and equally valid hang-up: they aren't comfortable having their characters stab enemies in the face repeatedly until they bleed to death unless those enemies are extremely bad people. As so frequently happens, the rules for Dungeons and Dragons are written to accommodate both play styles, which in reality ends up including nothing. Perhaps unfortunately, you must come to a table-wide consensus about what your gaming is not doing before  you can have your game do anything at all.

Keep in mind that none of these play styles are "worse" or "better".

Moral Option 1: A Worthy Opponent
"Fools! You have interfered with my plans for the last time!"

For many games, the fact that the bad guys are bad is pretty much sufficient. Like the villains in Saturday Morning Cartoons, their villainy requires '" and gets '" no explanation. Actual villainy is fairly upsetting to contemplate, and a lot of people don't want to do it. I don't blame them, cannibalism, deliberate infliction of pain, and exploitation of the innocent are unpleasant. Talking about secret prisons where torture is conducted night and day without respite or reason is super depressing.

Implications: The biggest implication here is that since Evil and Good are basically just political parties or ethnic hats, it is perfectly OK to have mixed alignment parties or to ban mixed alignment parties. You're never going to have a serious discussion about what it is that Evil people do, so it's actually not important how you handle them. You can even switch how you're handling it in the middle for no reason. One day, the Atomic Skull can just chip in to save the world from Darkseid. Another day you can go kill the Atomic Skull without feeling bad. It's very liberating, because you can tell a lot of stories '" so long as none of those stories involve actual evil actions happening on camera.

Pit Falls: While it is certainly a load off the mind to not be constantly reminded of child abuse, torture, and sexual misconduct, bear in mind that this is Dungeons and Dragons '" your foes are more than likely going to be killed with extreme stabination. Possibly in the face. Possibly more than once.  If the villains aren't doing anything overwhelmingly bad, it's entirely possible that it won't seem like they deserve being killed. If subjected to enough analysis, one might even find that your own "heroes" appear to be the villains in your cooperative storytelling adventure. Certainly, He-Man never took that sword and chopped Skeletor into chunks. Star Wars: Episode One was such an unsatisfying movie in no small part because the villains never did anything bad.

Glossing over the villainous activities of the bad guys should go hand in hand with all of the players acknowledging and understanding what you are doing and why you are doing it. As long as everyone is making the active and informed choice to not deal with the heavy moral questions '" it's all good.

Moral Option 2: The Banality of Evil
"It's 9 O'clock, time to get back to some Evil."

Many DMs will want to play their fiends pretty much like Nazis '" their agenda is hateful, but in their off time they go hang out at the pub just like everyone else. You could even sit there with them and drink together unless you happen to be a Jew. This is the default assumption of a lot of Planescape literature, for example. An Evil creature is Evil because it ever does Evil things, not because it's necessarily doing any Evil right now. Darkness and light are, in this model, pretty ephemeral concepts '" characters who wish to save their own sanity will end up either paying perhaps too much attention or ignoring them completely often as not.

Implications: Since bad guys (and presumably good guys as well) spend most of their time being regular guys and only infrequently perform acts worthy of praise or scorn, it's extremely easy for heroes to fall to Evil and extremely easy for villains to be redeemed for full value. People on both sides of the Good/Evil axis are doing pretty unexceptional stuff most of the time, so the allegiance that even Evil Clerics have to darkness is pretty tenuous.

This way of handling things is so much better at handling mysteries than are other morality systems that it may as well be a requirement if you ever want to play a "who-done-it" adventure. Since the good guys and bad guys spend most of their day being actually indistinguishable one from another, it makes distinguishing them actually difficult '" and that has to happen if there is to be any question of who the PCs are supposed to stab.

Pit Falls: Be wary of over-humanizing the villains. In many stories, the bad guys are a lot more interesting than the white hats; and that can seriously derail a campaign if it happens in a role playing scenario. Beware also of the fact that if the Evil Overlord is mostly chillin like a villain with his family and having brews with his bros, it's going to be pretty hard to justify it when you inevitably stab him right in the face. Also remember that while The Banality of Evil is great for mysteries, it's actually so good for mysteries that the game can bog down. Players can get caught up in the minor goings-on of characters you don't even care about. Paranoia can be paralyzing when any scullery maid could really just go Evil at any time and poison your food to try to get your wallet. It can be realistic, but realism takes place in real time. That's not good if you're trying to raise hippogriffs as steeds.

Moral Option 3: The Face of Horror.[/size]
"I think I have Evil sand. In my pants."

Many DMs will want to make their Evil as Evil as possible. That can get'¦ pretty Evil. It can actually get so Evil that people who overhear you playing the game will get a very bad impression about your group and the things you talk about. The starker the contrast between Good and Evil, the more righteous the acts of heroism the players commit. Tales of monstrous action are fascinating and the horrid and disgusting can hold people's interest indefinitely. By having the forces of Evil disembowel people in loving detail you can capture the imaginations of your players with actually relatively little creative work on the part of the DM. There have been over 10 Jason movies because those things practically write themselves, and people keep watching them because they genuinely are as intriguing as the are revolting.

Implications: With the forces of Evil running around doing actual stomach churning crime, having Evil and Good "team up" is essentially implausible. In fact, having Good and Evil characters in the same party is pretty much a non-starter. When playing with The Face of Horror the universe is essentially a cosmic battle between Good and Evil, the forces of Law and Chaos have some fights too, but essentially that's just crime compared to the world shaking conflict of darkness and light.

Further, while Good and Evil being as immiscible as Rubidium and Water makes for a well defined party demographic, it also has other far reaching consequences. When you go to the Abyss, the sand itself is Evil. Once you've made the determination that this means more than that Paladins can find every grain '" you've bought yourself into the determination that beaches in the Abyss are themselves morally reprobate somehow.

Pit Falls: While The Face of Horror ends up making Good and Evil a much more important distinction than Law vs. Chaos, that's not really a problem. Sure, it's not reciprocal or equivalent and that's a breach of the Great Wheel tirade, but that's not really important to the game. Let's face it, when was the last time you saw a statted up enemy prepared to cast dictum? No, the problem is that if you make Evil as nasty as it can be made, it's really nasty. It makes other people in the game uncomfortable, and it disturbs people who hear portions of your game out of context. People like talking about stabbing their sword into an evil monster, that's all heroic and crap, but actually looking at sword wounds is icky. People don't want to do it.

Evil, if defined as "things we don't like", is pretty much exclusively composed of things we don't like. That means that the more we focus our attention on the details of what's going on, the more we'll want to clean our eyes out with soap. And while skirting that line can make a story grimly compelling, remember always that different people have different tolerances for this sort of thing. Just because something is gross enough to catch your prurient interest without wrecking your lunch doesn't mean that it isn't so nasty as to drive other people away. Tolerance for discussing child murder in the context of a story is not a virtue, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with the people who don't enjoy watching movies in the splatter horror genre.

Moral Option 4: Perfection in Balance
What use is the light that casts not a shadow?"

In this model, evil is a force that sits diametrically opposed to good. In order for one to exist, the other must exist as well.  Evil is what gives good its meaning, and in fact one can simply define one by the other: to be good is not-evil, and to be evil is to be not-good.  When playing with this option, evil plays a vital role in society and cannot be eliminated without dire consequences.  For example, when the Jedi eliminate the Sith Lords, they set themselves up for an even more powerful Sith Lord to rise and kill them all, ushering in a new order of Evil, which is in turn later demolished by the calling out of a powerful Jedi who can defeat it.  Neutrality is the rule of the day in this model, in the sense that evil and good will always be in the midst of trumping each other in an effort to 'win', a goal that is as meaningless as it is impossible.

What does that mean for your game?  In this model, evil will always be the fly in your ointment and the **** in your cheerios, and good will always be the silver lining in the stormcloud and the complementary bag of nuts in your red-eye flight.  Even the most powerful and good organization of clerics in your world will have a cruel inquisitor, and even the most death-hungry cabal of necromancers will have a guy who is kind to puppies and little children.  Organizations and people will be 'mostly' one thing or the other, but not all of anything, and people will be OK with that.  Kind kings will be mostly good, but will have no problem massacring an entire generation of goblinkind in an effort to keep the roads safe, and liches who eat souls will defend the land from rampaging chimera without reward in an effort to keep the peace.

Implications: In a sense, this is the easiest of moral options, as you won't need to really keep track of what's going on with alignments.  People will occasionally do things out of character, and that's fine.  Society will be quite tolerant, as they completely think its OK for there to be a Temple Street with a shrine for Orcus worshippers competing for space with a hospital sponsored by the clergy of Pelor.  When one organization for good or evil gets stomped down, another one will pop up to replace it in an endless game of cosmic whack-a-mole.  

For character with alignment related class features, atonement is a far easier process.  Occasional deeds that violate your alignment are tolerated, as long as attempts at acts of atonement are made in a reasonable time frame.  The Paladin that kills an innocent to defeat a powerful demon may have to visit the innocent's family and make restitution after the battle, and the Cleric of Murder who defends the king from an assassin may have to seek out several of the King's loved one's in order to rededicate himself to his dark god.

Pit Falls: It can be pretty cool to have a party that has an assassin, a druid, and a champion of light in it '" there's a lot of early D&D that has that as virtually the iconic party '" but if the great game between Good and Evil is an inherently pointless game, that can make the story of your characters seem pretty banal. It's a line that can be hard to walk. It's just plain difficult to simultaneously have any individual attempt to destroy the world be important while having it be built into the contract that there will be another one tomorrow.

To Triumph Over Evil

Equally important to the place of ultimate Evil in your game is the activities of Good in your game. Like Evil, the designers have tried to run the spectrum of possible interpretations of righteousness'¦ and the results are that the overlap of actions depicted as Good with those described as Evil is almost total. Ultimately, your campaign is going to have to come to a consensus over what you are going to accept as Good. Most importantly, the inverse of Evil is not Good. It really takes a lot less harm to be Evil than it takes aid to be Good. If you fix twenty people's roofs, you're Jimmy the Helpful Thatcher. But if you eat your neighbor's daughter, you're Jimmy the Cannibal '" and no additional carpentry assistance will change that. This is why the Book of Exalted Deeds is such an unsatisfying read'¦ you can't just take the material in the Book of Vile Darkness and multiply by negative one to get Good.

The Importance of Consequentialism

Every action has motivations, expectable results, and actual results. In addition, every action can be described with a verb. In the history of moral theory (a history substantively longer than human history) it has at times been contested by otherwise bright individuals that any of those (singly or collectively) could be used as a rubric to determine the rightness of an action. D&D authors agreed. With all of those extremely incompatible ideas. And the result has been an unmitigated catastrophe. Noone knows what makes an action Good in D&D, so your group is ultimately going to have to decide for yourselves. Is your action Good because your intentions are Good? Is your action Good because the most likely result of your action is Good? Is your action Good because the actual end result of that action is Good? Is your action Good because the verb that bests describes your action is in general Good? There are actually some very good arguments for all of these written by people like Jeremy Bentham, Immanuel Kant, and David Wasserman '" but there are many other essays that are so astoundingly contradictory and ill-reasoned that they are of less help than reading nothing. Unfortunately for the hobby, some of the essays of the second type were written by Gary Gygax.

This is not an easy question to answer. The rulebooks, for example, are no help at all. D&D at its heart is about breaking into other peoples' homes, stabbing them in the face, and taking all their money. That's very hard to rationalize as a Good thing to do, and the authors of D&D have historically not tried terribly hard.

Godliness isn't Goodliness

Whatever religion you personally have, the religion in D&D revolves around a set of gods both Good and Evil of equal strength and importance. Most modern day religions have however many gods they worship be of sufficient goodness that they are at least worthy of respect '" so it can be hard to remember that in D&D the gods as a whole are precisely zero sum on any issue. Being "divine" doesn't make you Good in D&D, it just makes you more. If you're Good it makes you more Good, but if you're Evil it makes you more Evil. Clerics detect strongly of whatever alignment they have, but there's nothing Good about priests as a whole. Turning your back on the gods isn't a bad thing in D&D, it's a perfectly valid and neutral choice. If Ur Priests are to have any alignment restriction at all, it should be the same as Druids '" stealing from the gods is a profoundly neutral act, not Good and not Evil.

There is no Salvation or Redemption in D&D

All of the major religions of our world that utilize the concepts of Ultimate Good and Ultimate Evil use the concept of Redemption (that people have a state of innocence that they can lose and perhaps regain through atonement) or Salvation (that people have a state of inherent unworthiness that they can overcome). D&D, despite having a spell called atonement actually has neither of those concepts. The atonement spell actually dedicates (or rededicates) a character to any alignment, Good or Evil, Law or Chaos. Baby kobolds are not born into original sin and baby elves are not born in a state of grace, D&D doesn't even have those concepts. Creatures with an alignment subtype (most Fiends, for example) are born into that alignment and are only going to stray from it if subjected to powerful magic or arguments. Everyone else is born neutral.

In D&D, creatures do not "fall" into Evil. Being Evil is a valid choice that is fully supported by half the gods just as Good is. Those who follow the tenets of Evil throughout their lives are judged by Evil Gods when they die, and can gain rewards at least as enticing as those offered to those who follow the path of Good (who, after all, are judged by Good Gods after they die). So when sahuagin run around on land snatching children to use as slaves or sacrifices to Baatorians, they aren't putting their soul in danger. They are actually keeping their soul safe. Once you step down the path of villainy, you get a better deal in the afterlife by being more evil.

The only people who get screwed in the D&D afterlife are traitors and failures. A traitor gets a bad deal in the afterlife because whichever side of the fence they ended up on is going to remember their deeds on the other side of the fence. A failure gets a bad deal because they end up judged by gods who wanted them to succeed. As such, it is really hard to get people to change alignment in D&D. Unless you can otherwise assure that someone will die as a failure to their alignment, there's absolutely no incentive you could possibly give them that would entice them to betray it.

Code of Conduct: Paladins

Nothing causes more arguments in-game than Paladins. Can Paladins kill baby kobolds? What about baby mind flayers? Honestly, while these questions have generated a lot of ink and a lot of bad feelings, they aren't important. Paladins are Lawful Good, but they aren't "champions of Law and Good" '" that's an Archon. A Paladin doesn't get Smite Chaos, they aren't forced to abandon team members who behave in a Chaotic fashion (whatever that means, see below). Paladins are Champions of Good,,¢ and they are required to be Lawful. Whether or not that makes any sense depends on how you're handling Law and Chaos.

Paladins are as Good as any character can be, and they are required to follow a code of conduct. However, following this code is no what makes them Good, we know this because Clerics of Good (who detect as being just as Good as Paladins) don't have to follow that code. The code is completely arbitrary, and has no bearing on the relative Goodness of a character. Paladins also lose their powers if they don't drink for a few days, but that doesn't put Blackguards in danger of losing their alignment when they quaff a glass of water.

The Paladin's code is uncompromising, but it is also exhaustive about what it won't allow:

*

The Use of Poison: If a park ranger hits a bear with a tranq dart, that's not an Evil act. Poison isn't any more or less Evil than a blade. Paladins can't use poison because they agreed not to '" not because there's anything wrong with poison. Maybe Paladins only get to keep their magically enhanced immune system so long as they don't take it for granted by using things that would tax it on purpose. Maybe their concern for public safety is so great that they are only willing to use weapons that look like weapons. Whatever. The point is that Paladins have to be Good and they can't use Poison, and these are separate restrictions.
* Lies: A Paladin can't lie. Whether telling a lie is a good or evil act depends on what you're saying and who you are saying it to. But a Paladin won't do it. That means that if the Nazis come to the door and demand to know if the Paladin is hiding any Jews (she is), she can't glibly say "No." That does not mean that she has to say "Yes, they're right under the stairs!" '" it means that she has to tell the Nazis point blank "I'm not going to participate in your genocidal campaign, it's wrong." This will start a fight, and may get everyone killed, so the Paladin is well within her code to eliminate the middle man and just stab the Gestapo right there before answering. That's harsh, but the Paladin's code isn't about doing what's easy, or even what's best. It's about doing what you said you were going to.
* Cheating: Paladin's don't cheat. They don't have to keep playing if they figure out that someone else is cheating, but they aren't allowed to cheat at dice to rescue slaves or whatever. Again, there's nothing Good about not cheating, it's just something they have to do in addition to being Good all the time.
* Association Restrictions: Paladins are not allowed to team up with Evil people. They aren't allowed to offer assistance to Evil people and they aren't allowed to receive assistance from Evil people. Intolerance of this sort isn't Evil, but it isn't Good either. It's just another thing that Paladins have to do.
[/list]

Law and Chaos: Your Rules or Mine?

Let's get this out in the open: Law and Chaos do not have any meaning under the standard D&D rules.

We are aware that especially if you've been playing this game for a long time, you personally probably have an understanding of what you think Law and Chaos are supposed to mean. You possibly even believe that the rest of your group thinks that Law and Chaos mean the same thing you do. But you're probably wrong. The nature of Law and Chaos is the source of more arguments among D&D players (veteran and novice alike) than any other facet of the game. More than attacks of opportunities, more than weapon sizing, more even than spell effect inheritance. And the reason is because the "definition" of Law and Chaos in the Player's Handbook is written so confusingly that the terms are not even mutually exclusive. Look it up, this is a written document, so it's perfectly acceptable for you to stop reading at this time, flip open the Player's Handbook, and start reading the alignment descriptions. The Tome of Fiends will still be here when you get back.
'¦
There you go! Now that we're all on the same page (page XX), the reason why you've gotten into so many arguments with people as to whether their character was Lawful or Chaotic is because absolutely every action that any character ever takes could logically be argued to be both. A character who is honorable, adaptable, trustworthy, flexible, reliable, and loves freedom is a basically stand-up fellow, and meets the check marks for being "ultimate Law" and "ultimate Chaos". There aren't any contradictory adjectives there. While Law and Chaos are supposed to be opposed forces, there's nothing antithetical about the descriptions in the book.

Ethics Option 1: A level of Organization.[/size]

Optimal span of control is 3 to 5 people. Maybe Chaotic characters demand to personally control more units than that themselves and their lack of delegation ends up with a quagmire of incomprehensible proportions. Maybe Chaotic characters refuse to bow to authority at all and end up in units of one. Whatever the case, some DMs will have Law be well organized and Chaos be poorly organized. In this case, Law is objectively a virtue and Chaos is objectively a flaw.

Being disorganized doesn't mean that you're more creative or interesting, it just means that you accomplish less with the same inputs. In this model pure Chaos is a destructive, but more importantly incompetent force.

Ethics Option 2: A Question of Sanity.[/size]

Some DMs will want Law and Chaos to mean essentially "Sane" and "Insane". That's fine, but it doesn't mean that Chaos is funny. In fact, insanity is generally about the least funny thing you could possibly imagine. An insane person reacts inappropriately to their surroundings. That doesn't mean that they perform unexpected actions, that's just surrealist. And Paladins are totally permitted to enjoy non sequitur based humor and art. See, insanity is when you perform the same action over and over again and expect different results.

In this model we get a coherent explanation for why, when all the forces of Evil are composed of a multitude of strange nightmarish creatures, and the forces of Good have everything from a glowing patch of light to a winged snake tailed woman, every single soldier in the army of Chaos is a giant frog. This is because in this model Limbo is a place that is totally insane. It's a place where the answer to every question really is "Giant Frog". Creatures of Chaos then proceed to go to non Chaotically-aligned planes and are disappointed and confused when doors have to be pushed and pulled to open and entrance cannot be achieved by "Giant Frog".

If Chaos is madness, it's not "spontaneous", it's "non-functional". Actual adaptability is sane. Adapting responses to stimuli is what people are supposed to do. For reactions to be sufficiently inappropriate to qualify as insanity, one has to go pretty far into one's own preconceptions. Actual mental illness is very sad and traumatic just to watch as an outside observer. Actually living that way is even worse. It is strongly suggested therefore, that you don't go this route at all. It's not that you can't make D&D work with sanity and insanity as the core difference between Law and Chaos, it's that in doing so you're essentially making the Law vs. Chaos choice into the choice between good and bad. That and there is a certain segment of the roleplaying community that cannot differentiate absurdist humor from insanity and will insist on doing annoying things in the name of humor. And we hate those people.

Ethics Option 3: The Laws of the Land.[/size]

Any region that has writing will have an actual code of laws. Even oral traditions will have, well, traditions. In some campaigns, following these laws makes you Lawful, and not following these laws makes you Chaotic. This doesn't mean that Lawful characters necessarily have to follow the laws of Kyuss when you invade his secret Worm Fort, but it does mean that they need to be an "invading force" when they run around in Kyuss' Worm Fort. Honestly, I'm not sure what it even means to have a Chaotic society if Lawful means "following your own rules". This whole schema is workable, but only with extreme effort. It helps if there's some sort of divinely agreed upon laws somewhere that nations and individuals can follow to a greater or lesser degree. But even so, there's a lot of hermits and warfare in the world such that whether people are following actual laws can be just plain hard to evaluate.

I'd like to endorse this more highly, since any time you have characters living up to a specific arbitrary code (or not) it becomes a lot easier to get things evaluated. Unfortunately, it's really hard to even imagine an entire nation fighting for not following their own laws. That's just'¦ really weird. But if you take Law to mean law, then you're going to have to come to terms with that.

Ethics Option 4: My Word is My Bond.[/size]

Some DMs are going to want Law to essentially equate to following through on things. A Lawful character will keep their word and do things that they said they were going to. In this model, a Lawful character has an arbitrary code of conduct and a Chaotic character does not. That's pretty easy to adjudicate, you just announce what you're going to do and if you do it, you're Lawful and if you don't you're not.

Here's where it gets weird though: That means that Lawful characters have a harder time working together than do non-lawful characters. Sure, once they agree to work together there's some Trust there that we can capitalize, but it means that there are arbitrary things that Lawful characters won't do. Essentially this means that Chaotic parties order one mini-pizza each while Lawful parties have to get one extra large pizza for the whole group '" and we know how difficult that can be to arrange. A good example of this in action is the Paladin's code: they won't work with Evil characters, which restricts the possibilities of other party members.

In the world, this means that if you attack a Chaotic city, various other chaotic characters will trickle in to defend it. But if you attack a Lawful city, chances are that it's going to have to stand on its own.

Adherence to Self: Not a Rubric for Law

Sometimes Lawfulness is defined by people as adhering to one's personal self. That may sound very "Lawful", but there's no way that makes any sense. Whatever impulses you happen to have, those are going to be the ones that you act upon, by definition. If it is in your nature to do random crap that doesn't make any sense to anyone else '" then your actions will be contrary and perplexing, but they will still be completely consistent with your nature. Indeed, there is literally nothing you can do that isn't what you would do. It's circular.

Rigidity: Not a Rubric for Law

Sometimes Lawfulness is defined by people as being more "rigid" as opposed to "spontaneous" in your action. That's crap. Time generally only goes in one direction, and it generally carries a one to one correspondence with itself. That means that as a result of a unique set of stimuli, you are only going to do one thing. In D&D, the fact that other people weren't sure what the one thing you were going to do is handled by a Bluff check, not by being Chaotic.

I Fought the Law

Regardless of what your group ends up meaning when they use the word "Law", the fact is that some of your enemies are probably going to end up being Lawful. That doesn't mean that Lawful characters can't stab them in their area, whatever it is that you have alignments mean it's still entirely acceptable for Good characters to stab other Good characters and Lawful characters to stab other Lawful characters (oddly, noone even asks if it's a violation of Chaotic Evil to kill another Chaotic Evil character, but it isn't). There are lots of reasons to kill a man, and alignment disagreements don't occupy that list exclusively.

Code of Conduct: Barbarian

A Barbarian who becomes Lawful cannot Rage. Why not? There's no decent answer for that. Rage doesn't seem to require that you not tell people  in advance that you're going to do it, nor does it actually force you to break promises once you're enraged. It doesn't force you to behave in any particular fashion, and noone knows why it is restricted.

Code of Conduct: Bard

If anyone can tell me why a concert pianist can't be Lawful I will personally put one thing of their choice into my mouth. Music is expressionistic, but it is also mathematical. Already there are computers that can write music that is indistinguishable from the boring parts of Mozart in which he's just going up and down scales in order to mark time.

Beating Back Chaos

Long ago "Law" and "Chaos" were used euphemisms by Pohl Anderson for Good and Evil, and that got taken up by other fantasy and science fiction authors and ultimately snow-balled into having a Chaos alignment for D&D. If you go back far enough, "Chaos" actually means "The Villains", and when it comes down to it there's no logical meaning for it to have other than that '" so the forces of Chaos really are going to show up at your door to take a number for a whuppin at some point. Depending upon what your group ends up deciding to mean by Chaos, this may seem pretty senselessly cruel. If the forces of Chaos are simply unorganized then you are essentially chasing down hobos and beating down the ones too drunk to get away. If Chaos is insanity than the Chaos Hunters in your game are essentially going door to door to beat up the retarded kids.

The key is essentially to not overthink it. Chaos was originally put into the fantasy genre in order to have bad guys without having to have black hatted madmen trying to destroy the world. So if Team Chaos is coming around your door, just roll with it. The whole point is to have villains that you can stab without feeling guilty while still having villains to whom your characters can lose without necessarily losing the whole campaign world.

Code of Conduct: Knight

Sigh. The Knight' code of conduct doesn't represent Lawful activity no matter what your group means by that term. They can't strike an opponent standing in a grease effect, but they can attack that same person after they fall down in the grease! They also are not allowed to win a duel or stake vampires (assuming, for the moment that you were using some of the house rules presented in The Tome of Necromancy that allow vampires to be staked by anyone). So the Knight's code is not an example of Lawfulness in practice, it's just a double fistful of stupid written by someone who obviously doesn't understand D&D combat mechanics. If you wanted to make a Knight's Code that represented something like "fighting fair", you'd do it like this:

* May not accept benefit from Aid Another actions.
* May not activate Spell Storing items (unless the Knight cast the spell into the item in the first place).
* May not use poison or disease contaminated weapons.

But remember: such a code of fair play is no more Lawful than not having a code of fair play. Formians are the embodiment of Law, and they practically wrote the book on cooperation. So while a Knight considers getting help from others to be "cheating", that's not because he's Lawful. He considers getting such aid to be cheating and he's Lawful. What type of Lawful a Knight represents is determined by your interpretation of Law as a whole. Maybe a Knight has to uphold the law of the land (right or wrong). Maybe a Knight has to keep his own word. Whatever, the important part is that the arbitrary code that the Knight lives under is just that '" arbitrary. The actual contents of the code are a separate and irrelevant concern to their alignment restriction.

Code of Conduct? Monk

Again with the sighing. Noone can explain why Monks are required to be Lawful, least of all the Player's Handbook. Ember is Lawful because she "follows her discipline", while Mialee is not Lawful because she is "devoted to her art". FTW?! That's the same thing, given sequentially as an example of being Lawful and not being Lawful. Monk's training requires strict discipline, but that has nothing to do with Lawfulness no matter what  setup for Law and Chaos you are using. If Lawfulness is about organization, you are perfectly capable of being a complete maverick who talks to noone and drifts from place to place training constantly like the main character in Kung Fu '" total lack of organization, total "Chaotic" '" total disciplined Monk. If Law is about Loyalty, you're totally capable of being treacherous spies. In fact, that's even an example in the PHB "Evil monks make ideal spies, infiltrators, and assassins." And well, that sentence pretty much sinks any idea of monks having to follow the law of the land or keeping their own word, doesn't it? The only way monk lawfulness would make any sense is if you were using "adherence to an arbitrary self" as the basis of Law, and we already know that can't hold.

Code of Conduct: Paladin Again

This has to be repeated: Paladins don't get Smite Chaos. They are not champions of Law and Good, they are Champions of Good who are required to be Lawful. If your game is not using Word is Bond Ethics, Paladins have no reason to be Lawful. Paladins are only encouraged to follow the laws of the country they live in if those laws are Good. They are actually forbidden by their code of conduct from following the precepts of Evil nations. The Paladin shtick works equally well as a loner or a leader, and it is by definition distinctly disloyal. A Paladin must abandon compatriots.[/blockquote]

That Tome of Fiends stuff was a pretty good read. I don't really agree with a lot of it, but it was definitely rather thought-provoking.

My major issues are below:

QuoteOptimal span of control is 3 to 5 people. Maybe Chaotic characters demand to personally control more units than that themselves and their lack of delegation ends up with a quagmire of incomprehensible proportions. Maybe Chaotic characters refuse to bow to authority at all and end up in units of one. Whatever the case, some DMs will have Law be well organized and Chaos be poorly organized.

Sometimes Lawfulness is defined by people as adhering to one's personal self. That may sound very "Lawful", but there's no way that makes any sense. Whatever impulses you happen to have, those are going to be the ones that you act upon, by definition.[/quote]
Perhaps, but it seems to me that having a personal code of conduct that you follow day and day out, consistently, is more "Lawful" than allowing one what one deems acceptable to shift rather capriciously.

My own personal version, I guess, is that "Lawful" characters tend to look out for the long term, "Chaotic" for the short term. The "Law" is that of trying to keep order, internal and external, and though "Lawful Good" characters may believe in individual rights, they also believe that your rights end where the good of society begins. On the other hand, "Chaotic" is to live for the moment. If you're CE, you'll do what feels good, and if you're CG, you'll do what is good, but the point is that you're thinking of right now.

Oh, and maybe this is the easy way out-- the virtuous fellow who was described above is clearly Neutral Good. ;)

I agree with the Tome of Fiends, really - that the major problem is that it is too open to interpretation.

This is why I don't use alignment. If I was to run a game with paladins, I'd allow them to smite fiends, planars, etc, but not mundane creatures. I'd let them be any kind of good, too, at that. But yeah. Happiness.

Quote from: sparkletwistMy own personal version, I guess, is that "Lawful" characters tend to look out for the long term, "Chaotic" for the short term. The "Law" is that of trying to keep order, internal and external, and though "Lawful Good" characters may believe in individual rights, they also believe that your rights end where the good of society begins. On the other hand, "Chaotic" is to live for the moment. If you're CE, you'll do what feels good, and if you're CG, you'll do what is good, but the point is that you're thinking of right now.

I think this is pretty good, actually.

It's difficult to define. Generally I tend to use the alignments as written but with an open mind. I try to keep a mind towards context, like in one of my earlier posts about an Orc.

I definitely agree with the idea that Paladins are good before lawful, though I've seen posts that say according the WotC that is not true. But nevermind the WotC.

The Paladin's code is workable, I think. It takes a GM who is not as strict as many players interpret the code to be, but one violation of the code does not a fallen Paladin make.

I am, of course, defending the Paladin out of habit, as I have found a better home-brewed version that I like more ;). (Linky) (http://www.corporation.walagata.com/fax/wiki/index.php/Paladin)

I don't really think this issue is going to get solved, but that's okay, because I think the discussion is just as important as the result.

Quote from: sparkletwist

Quote from: Kap'n XeviatI'm not trying to offend anyone, but I think some people's offense to labeling acts as good or evil is that they don't want to admit that they would perform an evil act.

A little of both, I think. We all want to think of ourselves as good, and that what we do is good. But what's right for us might not be what's good; as neutral entities, the majority of what we do is neutral; it's biological, animalistic instinct that exists solely to keep ourselves alive and ensure our reproduction. Every action can be listed as good, evil, lawful, chaotic, or neutral. Now, the definition of these acts is what is debatable, but the PHB lists what acts are good and what are evil in the description chapter; you can change these for your world (one thing I think could be useful would be to drop the faint auras from the detect alignment spells; this way, your normal Joe-shmo Evilguy who likes to think about doing horrible things all the time, wouldn't register to the paladin, but a serial murderer would.

Quote from: Kap'n Xeviatone thing I think could be useful would be to drop the faint auras from the detect alignment spells; this way, your normal Joe-shmo Evilguy who likes to think about doing horrible things all the time, wouldn't register to the paladin, but a serial murderer would.

That's a remarkably simple change that would make things work much better. I think that'll get house ruled into my current campaign next session.

Quote from: psychoticbarberI don't really think this issue is going to get solved, but that's okay, because I think the discussion is just as important as the result.

I don't think there's really a "right answer," in the sense of something everyone's going to be happy with. I started the thread merely to just throw out some new ideas (and encourage people to re-think some old ones), and I'm glad to see it's doing that. :)

Quote from: sparkletwistI don't think there's really a "right answer," in the sense of something everyone's going to be happy with.

The right answer is to decided how you're going to handle alignments ahead of time, and make sure everybody who's playing your game understands what you're doing. That way you don't have any cries of "But I didn't know that turning that baby kobold into lunch meat would cause me to lose my paladinhood!"

Quote from: Pellanor

Quote from: sparkletwistI don't think there's really a "right answer," in the sense of something everyone's going to be happy with.

The right answer is to decided how you're going to handle alignments ahead of time, and make sure everybody who's playing your game understands what you're doing. That way you don't have any cries of "But I didn't know that turning that baby kobold into lunch meat would cause me to lose my paladinhood!"

Veeeery true.

Very very very true.

On a completely unrelated note, I wonder how baby kobold would TASTE...

like turkey-bologna, I am sure.

And I echo that there is no correct answer here, except that alignment, if used, must be consistent throughout the campaign.  It must be stated ahead of time, and clearly.  Anything with consequences must be.  I thought that because I only use it for myself when I DM, it did not matter, but the biggest fight my PC's ever had was over whether and act that a knight was performing was really lawful, or was it chaotic and he was just twisting the logic to rationalize it.
(A PC member of the Collegium Tortoris slew him the next session, and he was one of the most powerful PC fighters that has been run in two and a half decades...so this alignment stuff matters to us, but the PC's need it as well, if they role-play their characters well.)

I will also throw out there that when you actually score this stuff, the hardest part is that it is relative.  The baby kobold bologna example might be pretty heinous to everyone, but when a paladin does it, it's huge, richter shaking news, while for Sam the Assassin Lord, it may be a normal lunchtime.
In other words, moral-relativism affects alignment.