D&D 5E The "Lawful" alignment, and why "Lawful Evil" is NOT an oxymoron!

[seebs]

Ok, well if people can have multiple alignments, then sure, one of Doom's is LE.

While still looking at [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION]'s analysis, I just don't think LE makes sense under moral philosophy.

I would argue that a philosophy which can't handle that position has not done a good job of describing human nature.

Ultimately, the purpose of terms like this is to give us ways to describe how people behave. It is pretty easy to find contrasting examples of human evil which are LE, CE, or NE. Therefore, they are useful descriptors which map onto ways people behave.

 

[Eric V]

Sure. I just think it makes more sense, IMO, to say something like "Dr. Doom is NE" rather than "Dr. Doom is primarily LE, but sometimes LN, sometimes CE."

I don't mind descriptors, obviously, I just think philisophically, LE doesn't make sense. All examples of LE that I can think of end up being NE upon closer inspection.

 

[Maxperson]

Sure. I just think it makes more sense, IMO, to say something like "Dr. Doom is NE" rather than "Dr. Doom is primarily LE, but sometimes LN, sometimes CE."

But you really don't get to say that. All that does is say "Dr. Doom is primarily NE, but sometimes LE and sometimes CE" His behaviors that fall inside the other alignments don't go away by tagging him as NE.

I don't mind descriptors, obviously, I just think philisophically, LE doesn't make sense. All examples of LE that I can think of end up being NE upon closer inspection.

Fair enough. Alignment is vague enough for you to run it your way and for me to run it mine

 

[Eric V]

But you really don't get to say that. All that does is say "Dr. Doom is primarily NE, but sometimes LE and sometimes CE" His behaviors that fall inside the other alignments don't go away by tagging him as NE.



Fair enough. Alignment is vague enough for you to run it your way and for me to run it mine

Well, alignment is not really a good moral philosophical tool in the first place, IMO; it's primarily narrative, so yeah, it's flavour for the game, in the end. Nothing more. Hence no wrong way to do it.

The ethics teacher in me wants it to make more sense (and I can see why Wyatt did what he did for alignment in 4e), but I suppose for narrative purposes, it's useful for things like the Blood War.

Happy gaming.

 

[aramis erak]

I think that is "Lawyer Evil".

Lawyer and Lawful Evil are nearly synonyms. Certainly, many lawyers are LE.

 

[pemerton]

Would you say Ayn Rand is chaotic? I ask this with great care, as I know Rand is highly controversial and I don't see the need to discuss her work here. I'm only asking about position on a fantasy chart.

For the reason you give I'll probably refrain from talking about Rand directly.

What I will say is that some versions of libertarianism are, in the AD&D 1st ed terms I'm using, best described as CN: they prioritise freedom and individualism irrespective of whether or not it leads to universal wellbeing.

Also, this is an example that shows that Gygax's alignment system isn't itself morally neutral. It doesn't fully specify the nature of the good - eg Gygax doesn't distinguish between a rights approach and a utilitarian/wellbeing approach - but it does rule some things out.

You return to Gygax, and while that is only natural since this is D&D, I'm not convinced morality and ethics begin with Him.

I agree that they don't. The reason I return to Gygax is because I think the framework he sets out in his DMG (around p 23) and his PHB (around p 33) is basically coherent. (Which isn't to say it's true - see above for why some people might think he's wrong about the nature of the good.)

Whereas I am very sypmathetic to the view that once alignment is taken down the path that Law and Chaos are distinct values - which Gygax himself suggests in Appendix IV of the PHB (on the outer planes), and which is strongly reinforced in later D&D texts (eg Planescape) - then it becomes incoherent, and LE becomes oxymoronic.

Please explain the difference between alignment methodology and literary interpretation.

The way I see it, alignment is a label for a certain complex of beliefs and actions.

So until you know what a literary character believes, and how s/he acts, you can't apply an alignment label. Working out how a character acts and what s/he believes is a task in literary interpretation. A reasonable amount of the work of literary critics involves debating about the actions and motivations of characters.

 

[pemerton]

While still looking at [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION]'s analysis, I just don't think LE makes sense under moral philosophy.

I'm hoping you agree with my restatement of your reductio ad absurdum on LE. And also I hope you can see how it depends on a premise that Law is a distinct value to which the LE person is committed.

The main additional thing I want to add about my analysis is that it is relatively modest. It is not purporting to be a general framework for moral classification. It leaves unanswered the question of whether goodness is about rights or about happiness. It's about framing one particular point of disagreement: is social order a recipe for human wellbeing, or a recipe for the imposition of an oppressive yoke upon the world.

 

[Dit464]

In a sense all I take lawful alignments, LG LE LN, as a predetermined set of conduct such as a creed or oath whether these things be from actual laws or the character's upbringing. In this sense the Lawful spin on all the alignments should take place regardless of who you encounter, if you encounter a half-orc rogue who stole your fortune, who at that point realizes there is no way he is going to get away alive with one of you still breathing, looks to protect himself but is unarmed, you toss him a weapon of some sort. The same would go for someone who offends you verbally -most cultures in medieval times there were literally fights to the death over a man not saying "bless you" when you sneezed in public- you'd toss that person a weapon of some sort and proceed to hack him to pieces. Although cases like this are rather exaggerated within the environment of the game.

This would leave chaotic alignments to be more random, you would stab the man even when he is unarmed, you would take from two equally wealthy individuals differently leaving one slightly burdened and the other completely broke. Chaotic would literally mean the situation would play out matching your whims, if you felt like murdering the next person you see,you do it, if you feel like taking everything from a merchant you do so.

 

[CaptainGemini]

This may work best: Lawful is moral absolutism, while Chaotic is moral relativism.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

What do you mean by "stories with LE characters"? If you're talking about D&D novels, I'm not familiar with them (other than the first few Dragonlance ones, and that was a long time ago).

I was referring to non-D&D stories, where one could identify clearly villainous characters who strictly adhere to their word, even while they plot and scheme to gain an advantage over everyone they can. For a more D&D-centric example, many high-level "devils" exhibit this kind of behavior. For example, in...one of the NWN games, I don't remember which, there's a point where you meet somebody who has gotten into a serious bind with a devilish entity. There's an enormous and minutely-worded contract, requiring the guy you're helping to do certain services in exchange for power. Should these services fail to happen, the guy's soul is forfeit; now he's being asked to do something really really awful (like murder a family member or something) and he can't bring himself to do it.

If you have the stats for it (high Wis or Int, IIRC, and appropriate skills), you can read through the contract and find an escape clause that the devil clearly didn't think through--or (rightfully) didn't think the signer would figure out the use of. By exploiting that clause, you end the contract safely, so the guy doesn't have to do the Terrible Thing and doesn't lose his soul either. The devilish entity would love nothing more than to hide this fact, and will do everything it can to dissimulate, distract, or try to make you think it won't work. But if you do find the loophole, you can use it, and the devilish entity will reluctantly accept it, because it prides itself in never violating a contract and always executing its promises exactly as given. It just also relies on those promises being never quite as nice as people expect them to be!

How do we deal with that sort of situation--which is perfectly cromulent and crops up all the time in D&D fiction, especially now that the Warlock has been a core class for two editions running?

I think a person who sticks to his/her word no matter what is either LG or, if not concerned with others' wellbeing but only with keeeping his/her word, LN. An evil person can't be fully honourable - as per Gygax's PHB (cited upthread), a LE person scorns truth.

Then it sounds to me like it is Gygax's fault for presenting a standard that is incoherent. Hence why I'm not really big on using his definitions.

I cited Gygax's DMG (p 23) upthread: "Evil, on the other hand, does not concern itself with rights or happiness; purpose is the determinant."

That does not seem to me to be consistent with "not concerning oneself with rights or happiness".

Why not? "Not concerning oneself with rights" just means you don't believe people inherently "deserve" anything. They only "deserve" what they are allotted by law, and no more. An LE person will pursue those laws which permit minimally fettered influence on their own interests, and maximal protection of those interests from outside influences. See, for example, the concept of the "wicked corporation." In the archetypal case, "Evil Inc." cares nothing for others' rights and privileges, but seeks maximal rights and privileges for itself; it opposes* laws about minimum wages, overtime, sick leave, workplace safety, taxation, etc. because they reduce profits, but it supports** laws protecting IP, enforcing contracts, creating sanctioned monopolies, shielding from legal culpability, etc. because they increase profits (at least in the short term, in both cases--long-term is hotly debated).

And putting your own interests--which, generally, include "happiness"--categorically before the interests of others is perfectly commensurate with saying that a person doesn't concern herself with happiness. She doesn't care whether a thing makes other people happy or not; she cares whether it accomplishes a particular goal. People generally have their own happiness as one of their goals--but that need not always be the case either.

*Read: "tries to legitimately prevent the creation of, and tries to legitimately remove extant examples of"
**Read: "tries to foster the creation of, and prevent the removal of"

I'm not really sure what "malice" adds here - it seems like it's just emphasising the ruthlessness of the ruthlessness.

Ruthlessly pursuing law and order seems like LN to me. Per Gygax (running together p 23 of the DMG and p 33 of the PHB):

"Ruthless" means "without pity." "Malice" means "desiring harm, injury, or suffering of another." The former indicates that no clemency is provided, the latter indicates that harm inflicted on others is, in fact, exactly what is wanted. Stripping out the malice is precisely why it doesn't make sense to you--you're removing the "harming others is AWESOME" part.

Upthread I've been saying that neither the LG or the LE regard law as valuable in and of itself. It's value is purely instrumental. The Lawful Neutral do regard law as valuable in itself - they insist on, and enforce, order whether or not it serves human wellbeing. This is why Gygax is able to say that the LN "tak[e] a middle road betwixt evil and good." They are not evil, because they recognise some external constraint upon the pursuit of self-interest (namely, law and order). But neither are they good, because they don't care about wellbeing, rights or happiness.

Wait, so now we are treating Law as being instrumental? I thought you were against that notion. What's wrong with having both things--instrumental and whatever the not-instrumental side would be, because my brain is fried at 3 am--counting as "values"? You even use the word that way: "Its value." What if L/C is by its very nature an Instrumental axis?