D&D General Muscular Neutrality (thought experiment)

[I'm A Banana]

Yea, I feel the same way about the Planescape factions.

Yea, they're flawed, and have tons of gaps. But they're recognizable, which makes them interesting to talk and argue about.

Heck, I think one of the excellent things about the game design of the PS factions is that each one is both a potential ally and a potential enemy for the PC's, in much the same way as Snarf likes the Greyhawk NPC's, but in a way that's more organizational and (IMO) believable. Like, yes, of course, there's a sect of the faction that dedicated entirely to entropy who believes things are moving a little too fast ("Just because I'm a Doomlord doesn't mean I don't support INFRASTRUCTURE projects!"). And of course the faction that believes in everyone cooperating for the greater good gets a little fashy about it ("ACAB means Harmonium!").

It really resonates on one of the big themes in Planescape - that nobody is "right," but everyone wants to be. Which I feel is a very relatable human experience! It's WHY the tone is jaded and distant - so many big ideas, and the regular folk just need to find out where their next meal is coming from, a world full of evangelists who are all trying so hard to make their worldview correct.

It's also how I became fond of alignments. Pobody's Nerfect, and that includes angels and devils and gods and pontiffs and eternal cosmic beings. Being a literal exemplar of good doesn't mean you aren't secretly funding a multiversal war (for the greater good, of course).

Anyway, that's my PS affection showing.

 

[Clint_L]

Again, it's not the intention but how it's implemented. I'm willingly joining the Godhead, or are you forcing me to do it? It doesn't matter if you give me the ultimate bliss, if that bliss is forced, because that would be tyranny.

We are Borg!

 

[TwoSix]

Heck, I think one of the excellent things about the game design of the PS factions is that each one is both a potential ally and a potential enemy for the PC's, in much the same way as Snarf likes the Greyhawk NPC's, but in a way that's more organizational and (IMO) believable. Like, yes, of course, there's a sect of the faction that dedicated entirely to entropy who believes things are moving a little too fast ("Just because I'm a Doomlord doesn't mean I don't support INFRASTRUCTURE projects!"). And of course the faction that believes in everyone cooperating for the greater good gets a little fashy about it ("ACAB means Harmonium!").

And you can mix and match so many flavors of alignment, planars, and factions. You can have a Harmonium devil running a soup kitchen because society runs more functionally when everyone gets to eat.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Heck, I think one of the excellent things about the game design of the PS factions is that each one is both a potential ally and a potential enemy for the PC's, in much the same way as Snarf likes the Greyhawk NPC's, but in a way that's more organizational and (IMO) believable.

Well, I did recently do the long boring history of alignment.

D&D General - The History of Alignment: Why D&D Has the Nine-Point Alignment System 4 UR Memes

What, it's Wednesday again??!!! Wait, it's not Wednesday.... it's THURSDAY? Wow, time flies when you're out of pocket. I mean, I haven't even had the chance to catch up on the 500 posts that I generated in the nuTSR thread about the etymology and usage of "out of pocket"! But anyway, as...

www.enworld.org

I think that the one thing that helps to remember is that alignment didn't start as a way of roleplaying or choosing personalities, it started as a way of picking sides in a wargame.

Goodies (Law) v. Baddies (Chaos) with neutrals that could be used by either side.

As you note about Planescape (which I give you permission to love almost as much as I love Greyhawk, because as we all know, I love Greyhawk with the same intensity that I despise bards .... a hate so strong it will both outlive me and the heatdeath of the universe), it's great for organizing groups, not so much for individual choices.

Well, except DEREK!!!! We all know that he is truest paragon of chaos.

 

[Quickleaf]

In the October Greyhawk thread from @Snarf Zagyg, there was (to me) an interesting back and forth about muscular neutrality:




Ok, so the thought experiment is this:

Taking it as given that

1. Muscular neutrality between good and evil is a metaphysically valid position,
2. "Good" is "altruism, respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings",
3. and "Evil" is "harming, oppressing, and killing others",

what justifies a position of muscular neutrality?

I suspect some folks will be inclined to refuse the premise here--either by stating that there isn't a valid muscular neutrality for the good v. evil dichotomy, fudging "good" somehow, substituting law and chaos for evil and good, or in some other way (Enworlders are never short on ways to refuse a premise).

...But the goal here is to start with seemingly contradictory premises and reconcile them in an interesting way. In my experience, that always makes for cooler and more novel ideas than I would have come up with otherwise.

Some answers I came up with (not that they're particularly good ones):

1. There is some kind of Problem of Evil or Free Will logic going on, where Evil is necessary as a counterpoint to good. I don't think this really makes sense as justification for neutrals to prop up dark lords and armies of Evil, and it's too philosophical for my tastes... but it's there, with centuries of argumentation to consider.
2. Evil has a Dead Man's Switch and the muscular neutrals are acting in the enlightened self interest of reality.
3. Variant of 2, Evil and Good can both bring about mutually assured destruction--and this is poorly understood by everyone except the muscular neutrals, who have taken it upon themselves to prevent Armageddon.
4. Also sort of a variant of 2, the creator of the universe is a stifling and ignorant demiurge who wants there to be Evil in the multiverse. The muscular neutrals are carrying out its will for fear of what would happen if they didn't.

Thanks for reading, what are your ideas?

If there’s a fight between two sides, regular folks are likely to get caught in the crossfire. Muscular neutrals might want to control the engagement to prevent/mitigate harm to innocents - manifesting as sabotaging either side, depending on how the neutral evaluates that side’s strategy endangering folks.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

I think th dynamic was tension for most people in the real world is about self vs other.

Some animals are lone hunters and are independent. Social animals are different in many cases.

While a lone human might survive, our developmental dependence is long. And once established we hunt and survive together.

To focus too much on my own needs at the expense of others (some people are predatory) much of the time is only effective long term if you go from
Place to place, have few ties and rely on the establishment.

Totally altruistic people are likely to do poorly if they don’t feed themselves too. Most of us walk a middle path with more effort for self and “close others.”

In a game with cosmic powers, maybe a little bit of ruthlessness is needed. Perhaps folks can’t make and omelette without breaking a few eggs.

Perhaps some neutrals are in fact needed to protect the herd and hold back chaos and evil? And maybe if good if good is getting in the way of survival.

 

[Charlaquin]

Yeah, the goal is to come up with a muscular neutrality that isn't just wrongheaded on its face.

This is the dilemma you set up in the other thread, so I'm curious to see if it's a circle you can square.

Ok, I have an idea on how, but it’s specific to the way I prefer alignment to work in D&D, which is going to require some explanation, and some folks probably won’t like this take.

In my preferred approach to alignment in D&D, alignment is prescriptive for immortal beings like gods and devils, and descriptive for mortals. An Angel is lawful good by nature, and cannot act against its nature. A mortal is not any alignment by nature, but becomes an alignment by their deeds. Behaving altruistically makes a mortal good, and acting egoistically makes one evil. Acting in support of social order makes a mortal lawful, and acting in opposition to social order makes a mortal chaotic. Passivity is neutral, so a mortal who does not actively behave in accordance with good or evil, law or chaos, will gradually trend towards neutrality.

In a recent conversation in another thread, @abirdcall disagreed with this approach, and in expressing that disagreement quite rightly pointed out that this model would make it impossible for mortals to maintain lawful good alignment within a lawful evil society. When evil is enshrined within law, to oppose that evil would be chaotic, and to not oppose it would be neutral with regard to good and evil. So, how does one resolve this paradox? Well, a mortal who is ideologically committed to law and good would have to temporarily suspend their commitment to one axis or the other for the sake of long-term preservation of those ideals, either allying with agents of chaos to put an end to the evil social order, or working within the evil legal framework to change the system from within. But, immortal beings don’t have that luxury. A lawful good god would be unable to exert any influence within a lawful evil society at all. And as for their immortal agents? This is where fallen angels come from.

Notably, this vulnerability is pretty specific to lawful good. Law and good are by nature more restrictive than evil and chaos, so it’s much easier for evil to exploit a lawful good society’s rules to its own ends, and there’s no internal conflict in a lawful agent opppsing a chaotic society. But this vulnerability ends up making mortal agents essential for lawful good gods. If infiltration by evil forces can end up locking them out of lawful society, they need mortal servants who have the unique power of moral agency, and can make the decision to prioritize good over law or vice versa when those things come into conflict.

So, here is where I think there is room for muscular neutrality. Mortal actors who are ideologically in favor of law and good, but recognize this critical flaw in the cosmic system, and actively work to prevent it from being exploited. They oppose evil and chaos due to their ideological convictions, but recognize that the total victory of good over evil or law over chaos would make the world more vulnerable on the perpendicular axis. Muscular neutrality then is a purely pragmatic position, maintaining balance not because it is ideal, but because “good enough” is easier to defend against chaos than ultimate good, and “lawful enough” is easier to defend against evil than ultimate law.

 

[Vaalingrade]

The term 'muscular neutrality' is so weird that I really just want them to be opposing both good and evil because fighting both is a great way to get sweet gains, bruh.

 

[Zeromaru X]

But the original Muscularly Neutral Druid would be actively opposing things that other would call good, such as the march of civilization. Whether you are cutting down the forest to make arrows for your evil army, or just to clear a little space for a farm to feed your family, the Druid will terminate your activities with extreme prejudice.

But that would be a group of people choosing to behave that way because of their beliefs (and that is something I can use in my games), not because there is some cosmic force that enforces lukewarmness in the multiverse, something that makes no sense as it forces Good to be Actually-not-Good, or do some ridiculous mental gymnastics for that premise to work as written.

 

[Zeromaru X]

If I allow you to make a choice that produces more evil and suffering than taking your choice away, am I culpable for the evil done by my inaction?

Well, that's the point: taking away agency falls into the Evil department in my book. A person should be allowed to save or damn their soul on their own free will.

You can stop that evil choice by persuasion, force or another method of your choice, but the moment you take away that individual's agency, you are no better than Evilordius, the Evil Lord of Evilness.