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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dungeonosophy" data-source="post: 7979332" data-attributes="member: 6688049">JT said: "Despite the centrality of alignment in D&D, other RPGs rarely copy D&D’s alignment rules"One of the most curious examples is the Japanese Star Trek RPG, which ported D&D alignment into the Star Trek Universe: (!) Logical Good, Logical Evil, Neutral, Emotional Good, and Emotional Evil<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/52499/enterprise-role-play-game-star-trek" target="_blank">Enterprise Role Play Game in Star Trek</a> (1983) by Tsukuda Hobby (Japan only).</li> </ul>AFAIK, these are the sources for D&D alignment:The Austrian-Swiss occult Rosicrucian philosophy of Anthroposophy, with it three-way alignment, personified as Ahriman (Lawful), the Representative of Humanity (Good), and Lucifer (Chaotic). There's even a gigantic wooden statue of the three figures in the Anthroposophic HQ in Switzerland. What's interesting is that the central alignment here is Goodness, rather than grey neutrality.Michael Moorcock attended an Anthroposophic primary school in Britain. He explicitly credits that philosophy (along with Zoroastrianism) as a primary source for his Elric cosmology (including the very concept of a 'Multiverse' of Higher Worlds). The Elric Multiverse of course has a three-way struggle between the metaphysical forces of Law, Balance, and Chaos. See "<a href="https://sites.google.com/site/moorcocknsteiner/" target="_blank">Moorcock and Steiner</a>" article.From Moorcock, Gygax adapted that for the three "stances" of Chainmail: Law, Neutrality, and Chaos. Which became the threefold "alignments" of OD&D and Moldvay and Mentzer BD&D. See "<a href="https://grognardia.blogspot.com/2009/04/changing-meaning-of-alignment-in-od.html" target="_blank">The Changing Meaning of Alignment in OD&D</a>" by James Maliszewski. Of course Moorcook is listed in Appendix N.Then a second axis was added to make a fivefold (Holmes) and ninefold (AD&D) alignment system. (IIRC it was J. Ward who suggested adding the Good-Evil axis.)As a sidenote, the Warhammer universe adapted these metaphysics from D&D and Elric but collapsed it more into a twofold, binary the Realms of Man vs. Chaos dynamic, and brought in a Lovecraftian element to Chaos.Also of note, a case could be made that besides Moorcock and Gygax, Tolkien also picked up the Anthroposophic three-way metaphysics via his acquaintance with his fellow Inkling Owen Barfield, who was the foremost Anthro occultist in Britain at the time. As seen in Saruman (Order), Gandalf (representative of the Free Peoples), and Sauron/Mairon/Annatar (Desire). The name "Saruman" is suspiciously close to Steiner's "Ahriman." See "<a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20150930215735/https://invisiblekingdoms.wordpress.com/2012/05/18/sauron-saruman-and-owen-barfield" target="_blank">Sauron, Saruman, and Owen Barfield</a>" by Karl Beech.</blockquote>

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