Good vs Evil: a matter of aims or a matter of means?

[shilsen]

Li Shenron, please tell me what you think of each of the following situations, alignment-wise: Are the actions of the characters - whether their alignment is good or evil - morally good, evil or neither? Where you can discern it, feel free to point out the law/chaos axis as well. Everyone else's thoughts are very welcome, too, of course.

I'll take a crack, with the caveat that this is how it would work in my campaign (which is basically using core rules alignment).

A band of Good adventurers trespass on NE goblins' territory on the way to their destination on a quest to save a kind-of-Good city, and kill all goblin combatants they encounter on sight unless they are in the process of moving away from them. Goblins who survive the initial attack and surrender are spared, as are noncombatants. (Noncombatants are spared in this example because debates with a premise like "is killing goblin children wrong?" are tiresome and fruitless.)

Good or neutral in aim (travelling on a quest to save the city, self-defense). Neutral or evil in means (depending on whether they're killing creatures in self-defense or just killing any goblins they see who might be a threat). Neutral overall, but may differ depending on more details.

As above, but they don't accept any combatants' surrender, slaughtering them where they stand so they can't be a threat later. They also pursue and slaughter goblins they could have avoided to make sure they don't summon reinforcements. Goblin noncombatants are still spared.

Evil in aim (killing which don't threaten them) and means. Evil overall.

A red dragon obtains money through trading and uses it to spread the religion of a CE deity of slaughter. (Yes, this one is as simple as it seems.)

Evil in aim. Neutral in means. Evil overall.

A Lawful noble murders a N foreign adventurer to obtain his magic items because he needs more power to fight for his LN king in a war against CE orcs.

Neutral in aim (fighting for his ruler) and evil in means (killing someone purely for personal gain). Evil overall.

A paladin patrols through a LG city, constantly detecting evil, and kills every adult who detects as evil, no matter their combat prowess, who they are or what they are doing at the moment.

Neutral in aim at best (removing evil, but includes those who may not deserve it) and evil in means. Unbelievably stupid overall

A LG ruler of a generally G realm orders the imprisonment and execution of those 5% of his adult population who want his N cousin, who has an almost equally legitimate claim to throne, to become the ruler, no matter their alignment, combat prowess or previous acts (or lack thereof) to weaken his rule.

Neutral in aim (opposing a rival) and evil in means. Evil overall.

To prevent the spread of a magical plague that might cause great destruction, a paladin prince orders the slaughter of an entire city of his generally non-Evil people. Not wanting to lose valuable time, he doesn't even consider other options. (Yes, this is a Warcraft example.)

Neutral in aim (self-preservation) and evil in means. Evil overall.

A mostly NG human town and a NE goblin tribe have both grown in numbers over the years and are now regularly clashing over contested territory they both need to survive, leading to a war.

Neutral in aims (self-preservation) and means (presumably). Neutral.

As above. Hard-pressed by the humans, the goblins send a NE goblin assassin of high level to assassinate the human leadership to prevent their tribe's destruction.

Neutral in aims (self-preservation) and means (not very different to open warfare or humans hiring adventurers). Neutral.

As above, but the other way around: The humans are hard-pressed and send a NG ranger to assassinate the goblin leadership.

Same as above answer (hadnt even read this one before answering that!).

After a widespread famine, a Neutral-to-Good realm ruled by a Good queen is in great peril. One day, a powerful Evil outsider appears before the queen and offers her a deal: It will use its magical powers to continually provide food for the people but in exchange is given two citizens per week that it will eat. The queen, not wanting to see her people starve, reluctantly agrees.

Neutral in aim (preservation of her people) and evil in means (sacrificing some innocents for the greater good). Evil overall.

Due to the results of a large war in ages past, a tribe of CG elves are living as a minority under the rule of their human allies in the war, who are now ruled by a LN dictator. Neither the elves nor the humans have very much personal freedom but they are very safe and there is little crime. The Chaotic elves chafe very much under the dictator's rule and one day start to rebel against the dictator's forces to attain their freedom because they can't take it any longer, even though their actions will cause widespread chaos and destruction in the realm.

Neutral (tending to good) in aims. Evil in means. Evil overall.

There you go. Simple system. If either aims or mean are good/evil and the other is neutral, the overal judgement is good/evil as the case may be. And I haven't commented on degrees of evil or on law/chaos.

Okay kids, let he who is without protection from alignment threads cast the first stone.

 

[Darkness]

Thank you, shilsen. IMO, your answers are generally sound.

Unbelievably stupid overall

Quite so, yes. But since it's a popular example in alignment threads and fit the general question at hand I figured I'd throw it in.

 

[Fenes]

Hm... as advocatus diaboli...

Is it evil to cause risk to innocents? Or to the whole world?

Is it evil to not save an innocent in need?

In other words, if you are on a quest to save the city/country/world, is it ok to take more risks than needed?

IMC, I go more with the ends than the means, as long as the means used are in relation to the ends sought, but then, I do not have much good or evil in the campaign which is not related to outsiders.

 

[Gez]

My understanding of the rules is that alignment is determined by actions. Hence why I give more importance to the means than to the ends.

Of course, there can be evil ends. Pursuing evil ends through good deeds is evil, just like pursuing evil ends through evil deeds, or even good ends through evil deeds.

 

[Li Shenron]

Thank you, shilsen. IMO, your answers are generally sound.

I think I mostly agree with shilsen's picks

However one thing I noticed from your questions Darkness is that you constantly quote the alignment of the "others"... I think we too basically do that all the time, but I'm not sure if this is already a symptom of believing that good/evil ends are more important (which I am starting to disbelieve).

Should it make always such a big difference if "the other" is good or evil? When I think about it, an truly evil individual would probably care nothing if the guy who he's beating is good or evil. A good character usually does, but I'm not sure that he should... not to the point of completely changing his means and ways of handling things.

 

[Darkness]

I think I mostly agree with shilsen's picks

Ok.

However one thing I noticed from your questions Darkness is that you constantly quote the alignment of the "others"...

Yeah. If I learned one thing from all the alignment debates I've seen, then that attention to detail is generally helpful. So I provide it. *shrug* But I agree that it doesn't really matter in many cases.
Good characters fighting one another probably should be more common than it is in many campaigns. It doesn't take anything more than two neutral organizations fighting: If both have a few good members, they just might face off against each other due to loyalty. It happens.
And yeah, for evil characters it doesn't really matter. Or does it? Is killing an evil person (NE professional legbreaker) in cold blood that much less evil than killing an innocent (NG shepherd's daughter) under the same circumstances that it's not evil but neutral?

 

[Aesmael]

Normally I would read an entire thread before responding. But these questions tend to provoke very eloquent responses from people and I would like to have a go at answering it 'untainted'.

First: I strongly suspect that both means and ends must be good for the character to be good. But means count more for determining alignment. The objective generally comes into play for arbitrating actions that could go either way.
No, scratch that. I have been led to believe that alignment in the standard system is almost entirely determined by actions. Thus it might be possible for someone to have evil ends but, so long as those are being pursued by good means, still be 'good' under this system. So wert the D&D system, Means trumps Ends.

Will try to add to the list - and certainly keep tabs on its progress. Such a list was one of the goals I hoped to achieve with this thread. Wert your personal power example, I would class it as neutral. It is only when they want it for something that the goal becomes aligned.

But I suspect the list will be very spare if everything is reduced, so: The accumulation of power would normally be accompanied by some desire to use it. Consequently, I submit that this will tend to be a Lawful goal rather than a good or an evil one, as your ultimate intention is to make things how they should be. Emphasis on tend.

To attempt to add to the list, I will start with something easy (?) and say that theft is a chaotic act. From the inspiration generated by that statement, I further submit that any act which confounds the expectations on which a society runs (i.e If I sleep in my bed I can reasonably expect not to be killed) will be chaotic.

With regards to your group, I find their paranoia amusing. I would say it is not good behaviour and probably not lawful but I am not confident to narrow it down further.

 

[Darkness]

... it might be possible for someone to have evil ends but, so long as those are being pursued by good means, still be 'good' under this system.

Interesting. I'd like to see an example or two.

 

[Aesmael]

For what it's worth, I really think most people should just jot down "True Neutral" on their character sheets, unless they're going for some sort of alignment restricted class.

I happen to agree wholeheartedly with this, and I will add that many who advocate 'enlightened' evil (including my younger self) that does not involve indiscriminate slaughter will also end up playing more neutral than actual evil.

 

[Gez]

Interesting. I'd like to see an example or two.

A'Kin the Friendly Fiend?