D&D 5E Do you care about setting "canon"?

[Imaro]

I didn't ignore it. I refuted it.

The fact that the game provides only a broad label ("Good") rather than two narrower labels ("Neutral Good", "Chaotic Good"), doesn't stop a player or a GM from characterising a particular person in the game in such a way as to exemplify, under the broad label, the sort of behaviour that would also fall under the narrower label.

For completeness, here's the passage from the 4e PHB (p 19):

If you’re a good character, you believe it is right to aid and protect those in need. You’re not required to sacrifice yourself to help others or to completely ignore your own needs, but you might be asked to place others’ needs above your own . . .

[Y]ou’re keenly aware that power tends to corrupt those who wield it, too often leading them to exploit their power for selfish or evil ends. When that happens, you feel no obligation to follow the law blindly. It’s better for authority to rest in the members of a community rather than the hands of any individual or social class. When law becomes exploitation, it crosses into evil territory, and good characters feel compelled to fight it.​

Her is the description of CG alignment from the 2nd ed AD&D PHB (which is the edition in which Eladrin originate):

Chaotic good characters are strong individualists marked by a streak of kindness and benevolence. They believe in all the virtues of goodness and right, but they have little use for laws and regulations. They have no use for people who "try to push folk around and tell them what to do." Their actions are guided by their own moral compass which, although good, may not always be in perfect agreement with the rest of society.​

I'd be interested to learn what you and Elderbrain think are the significant differences between CG, thus described, and the quote from the 4e PHB.

So by the book... and using the alignments given in the book... you can't be chaotic good... only good. You didn't refute anything, you ignored it and then gave us the reason you ignored it.

EDIT: A large difference is the good alignment mentions nothing of individuality being a part of your alignment.

 

[Shasarak]

I didn't ignore it. I refuted it.

The fact that the game provides only a broad label ("Good") rather than two narrower labels ("Neutral Good", "Chaotic Good"), doesn't stop a player or a GM from characterising a particular person in the game in such a way as to exemplify, under the broad label, the sort of behaviour that would also fall under the narrower label.

For completeness, here's the passage from the 4e PHB (p 19):

If you’re a good character, you believe it is right to aid and protect those in need. You’re not required to sacrifice yourself to help others or to completely ignore your own needs, but you might be asked to place others’ needs above your own . . .

[Y]ou’re keenly aware that power tends to corrupt those who wield it, too often leading them to exploit their power for selfish or evil ends. When that happens, you feel no obligation to follow the law blindly. It’s better for authority to rest in the members of a community rather than the hands of any individual or social class. When law becomes exploitation, it crosses into evil territory, and good characters feel compelled to fight it.​

Her is the description of CG alignment from the 2nd ed AD&D PHB (which is the edition in which Eladrin originate):

Chaotic good characters are strong individualists marked by a streak of kindness and benevolence. They believe in all the virtues of goodness and right, but they have little use for laws and regulations. They have no use for people who "try to push folk around and tell them what to do." Their actions are guided by their own moral compass which, although good, may not always be in perfect agreement with the rest of society.​

I'd be interested to learn what you and Elderbrain think are the significant differences between CG, thus described, and the quote from the 4e PHB.

From your quotes, the most significant difference is that a CG character would not believe that "authority should rest in the members of a community rather than the hands of any individual or social class" rather people should be "guided by their own moral compass"

 

[pemerton]

So by the book... and using the alignments given in the book... you can't be chaotic good... only good.

This makes no sense.

Upthread, in the post that [MENTION=6779993]Elderbrain[/MENTION] quoted, I said that "they [Eladrin] are also extraplanar creatures of a CG bent". You and [MENTION=6779993]Elderbrain[/MENTION] are arguing that this is false because there is no official CG alignment label. It's like arguing that, by the book, a 4e PC can't be a man or a woman, only a human, because the PC-build mechanics don't call out sex as a mechanically salient aspect of the character (cf 1st ed AD&D, where sex is called out in both the STR stat rules and the height-and-weight charts).

 

[pemerton]

From your quotes, the most significant difference is that a CG character would not believe that "authority should rest in the members of a community rather than the hands of any individual or social class" rather people should be "guided by their own moral compass"

"It’s better for authority to rest in the members of a community rather than the hands of any individual or social class" does not entail "Authority should rest in the members of a community rather than the hands of any individual or social class".

Like the Good person, the CG person doesn't think that authority should rest in the hands of any individual. The CG person probably doesn't think there should be authority at all; s/he prefers to follow his/her own moral compass. But s/he clearly doesn't think that everyone should follow his/her own moral compass (eg s/he doesn't think that orcs or paladins should be guided by their own moral compasses; s/he thinks they commit moral errors when they do so!).

The 4e Good person can certainly take the same view that authority is undesirable. That is quite consistent with thinking that authority is better exercised by members of a community than by any individual or social class.

 

[Imaro]

This makes no sense.

Upthread, in the post that [MENTION=6779993]Elderbrain[/MENTION] quoted, I said that "they [Eladrin] are also extraplanar creatures of a CG bent". You and [MENTION=6779993]Elderbrain[/MENTION] are arguing that this is false because there is no official CG alignment label. It's like arguing that, by the book, a 4e PC can't be a man or a woman, only a human, because the PC-build mechanics don't call out sex as a mechanically salient aspect of the character (cf 1st ed AD&D, where sex is called out in both the STR stat rules and the height-and-weight charts).

No it's not because alignment is called out as a salient aspect of the character and by the books one cannot choose to be chaotic good.

 

[Shasarak]

"It’s better for authority to rest in the members of a community rather than the hands of any individual or social class" does not entail "Authority should rest in the members of a community rather than the hands of any individual or social class".

Like the Good person, the CG person doesn't think that authority should rest in the hands of any individual. The CG person probably doesn't think there should be authority at all; s/he prefers to follow his/her own moral compass. But s/he clearly doesn't think that everyone should follow his/her own moral compass (eg s/he doesn't think that orcs or paladins should be guided by their own moral compasses; s/he thinks they commit moral errors when they do so!).

The 4e Good person can certainly take the same view that authority is undesirable. That is quite consistent with thinking that authority is better exercised by members of a community than by any individual or social class.

So then the 4e Good alignment is not the same as the 2e CG alignment, probably following the more general NG tendency in that as a rule it follows society rather then its own moral compass.

Of course I could choose to roleplay any possible variation of an alignment that I wanted to but then I am not really following the canon at that point, am I? Which really nicely ties back around to how much you care about setting canon.

 

[Manbearcat]

I'd say the 4e alignments of Good and Unaligned rather straddle the classically CG composite. Its instructive to take a look at the following Players Handbook deities:

Evandra (Good)

* Luck favors the bold. Take your fate into your own hands, and Avandra smiles upon you.
* Strike back against those who would rob you of your freedom and urge others to fight for their own liberty.
* Change is inevitable, but it takes the work of the faithful to ensure that change is for the better.

Sehanine (Unaligned):

* Follow your goals and seek your own destiny.
* Keep to the shadows, avoiding the blazing light of zealous good and the utter darkness of evil.
* Seek new horizons and new experiences, and let nothing tie you down.

In one of my 1-30 games a PC was divinely sponsored by Avandra. In another one off game a character venerated the tenets of Sehanine. Despite some central and peripheral nuance, liberty, individuality, self-actualization, and skepticism of hierarchy/power as the best ethos for the commonweal was prominent in both characters.

 

[pemerton]

No it's not because alignment is called out as a salient aspect of the character and by the books one cannot choose to be chaotic good.

But one can write GOOD on the relevant character sheet/stat block, and then play the character/creature as someone who does not think that authority should be vested in particular individuals or social classes, and who prefers power to be diffused across the members of a community because, especially when concentrated, it tends to corrupt.

Lo and behold - a 4e character of a CG bent!

The absence of a particular label doesn't stop one doing it, any more than the absence of a mechanical label for a character's sex stops one playing a human who is not merely a human but is a woman.

So then the 4e Good alignment is not the same as the 2e CG alignment, probably following the more general NG tendency in that as a rule it follows society rather then its own moral compass.

I don't see where you are taking this from.

You are treating X follows his/her own moral compass as equivalent to X thinks that everyone else should do likewise. But obviously they are not - as I said, a CG elf in any edition of AD&D does not think that orcs should follow their own moral compasses, because whenever they do that they go berserk and kill everyone around them!

Like a CG person in 2nd ed AD&D, a 4e Good person thinks it is better for power to be diffused than concentrated, and better for it to be generally diffused rather than located in a particular person (say, a monarch) or a particular class - because this is a recipe for corruption in virtue of self-interest!

But nothing requires a 4e Good person to disagree with a CG 2nd ed AD&D person that the ideal would be for there to be no authority at all! (How all this is to be reconciled with the existence of CG gods who rule their planes, and the like, I don't know - but I leave that as something for alignment/PS fans to sort out.)

 

[Mecheon]

Nope. In 4e, there's no such thing as "Chaotic Good", not if you go by the official (and only) alignments available to you in the books; If you are good-aligned, you must either be Lawful Good or just Good. If you are Chaotic, you are automatically Chaotic Evil, because that's the only alignment in 4e with the word "Chaotic" in it. Likewise, there is no "Lawful Evil" in 4e; if you are Lawful, you must be Lawful Good, because that is the only alignment with the word "Lawful" in it. Which is ridiculous.

Or you've thrown Alignment out the god damn window because all alignment is good for is arguments

Like,let's not even kid ourselves? No one can agree on the definition of any alignment, the oft-said of 2E versions of them are bloody awful for certain alignments (CHAOTIC NEUTRAL), and it has been a metaphorical albatross around D&D's neck for far too long. I am so glad that it is all but removed in present editions. Destroy it. Burn it.

I understand Planescape's use for it, but this doesn't mean it wasn't a bloody mess either making people play stupid characters, or giving DMs excuses to screw over players

(Also technically, y'know, chaotic creatures such as Eladrin probably aren't all for staying around as CG things all the time. something chaotic staying stable that long seems a bit Lawful. Taking another life by embracing their nature as Fae and forsaking the limiting way of the Celestials, too obsessed with their laws and goodness, is entirely chaotic)

 

[Imaro]

But one can write GOOD on the relevant character sheet/stat block, and then play the character/creature as someone who does not think that authority should be vested in particular individuals or social classes, and who prefers power to be diffused across the members of a community because, especially when concentrated, it tends to corrupt.

Lo and behold - a 4e character of a CG bent!

but still not Chaotic good in ALIGNMENT which was the original statement... again the argument was if you go by the official alignments available in the books.

not if you go by the official (and only) alignments available to you in the books

The absence of a particular label doesn't stop one doing it, any more than the absence of a mechanical label for a character's sex stops one playing a human who is not merely a human but is a woman.

Yet the argument was about whether that alignment exists officially in 4e... the alignments in 4e are listed and it does not.

EDIT: What was the earlier comment about pedantry and gyrations...