Emphasizing Law vs. Chaos

[Asmor]

One of the things that's always been a minor annoyance to me is that, while the Law vs. Chaos conflict is theoretically as important as Good vs. Evil, it's really really not. Virtually every party out there has people of both lawful and chaotic alignments, but it's very rare (and usually disruptive) for good and evil characters to mix.

So... What would happen if we flipped the alignments on their head... Instead of emphasizing Good vs. Evil, we emphasize Law vs. Chaos. Taking it a step further, we de-emphasize the Good vs. Evil conflict so that it's about as important as Law vs. Chaos currently is. Good and evil characters can easily party together, but lawful and chaotic characters have issues.

The de-emphasis portion seems particularly tricky... How do you make it ok for a Hound Archon and a Chain Devil to adventure together in their common fight against chaos?

As for making Law vs. Chaos matter, one way it might work out is having humans and other short-lived races vs. elves, dwarves, and the others which live for a long time. The old races are steeped deeply in tradition and control most of the land, while the younger upstarts are more capricious and, as they try to carve their own niche in the world, necessarily have to take over some of the elders' land.

Any ideas?

 

[funkysnunkulator]

the first thing you would have to do is really think it through.

ask the following (in cosmic terms)..

what IS chaos? what IS order? what IS good? what IS evil? what IS neutral?

it is one thing to declare a demon "a force of destruction". it is another thing to think of that being as one that understands destruction on a cosmic scale.

for the sake of brevity, it might go something like this.

chaos represents the PRINCIPLE of change... change as CONCEPT.
law represents the PRINCIPLE of stasis... stasis as CONCEPT.

sounds simple. but it really isn't. eliminating good and evil for a moment, we are left with two forces/concepts/principles: one tends toward everything happening simultaneously. always. the other tends toward nothing happening at all. ever.

the way these forces are expressed is different depending on the being enacting it. mortals, being finite in lifespan, can only barely comprehend and therefore relate to, these forces, let alone influence them.

immortals (modrons and slaad in particular), not only understand these forces, but also represent a level of mastery over them mortals cannot possibly relate to.

because of this, the goals of mortals and immortals seem alien to each other.

gamers tend to think of chaotic beings as fundamentally "disordered". scattered. not necessarily. just more individualistic.

gamers tend to think of lawful beings as fundamentally "ordered". focused. not necessarily. just more interdependent.

of course, there is a tendency toward one extreme or another, but it is only the tendency.

the designers even went so far as to demonstrate in a recent product that the drow, while chaotic (extremely) have a viable society. a drow walking down the road isn't just randomly going to leap off a cliff. but, they have a strong tendency toward unconventional thinking. experimental methods.

the collary of this is that a lawful society (like dwarves) is likely to be more methodical, perhaps slower to develop. everything by the book.

 

[funkysnunkulator]

also, if you take several chaotic or several lawful races, you will see several very different answers to the same alignment.

same with morals. good and evil. in any world, including our own, you will get many versions of good and evil. even celestials wage vast wars in the name of thier own particular version of good.

think of chaos and law as the impetus for action or inaction (ie. there is a choice here). good, evil tend to be the measuring stick used to make the action decision.

then go further and introduce neutrality. or concordant opposition. what is it REALLY?

it is the balancing influence. given the variable ranges offered by chaos and law, we find that neutrality equates roughly to "the way of things". it is the buffer zone, that area of potentiality where chaos and law are permited to comingle, but in limited fashion.

in answer to your question about the celestial and infernal.... being axiomatic beings, that is representations of concepts, they see things differently that us mortals. they realize that cosmically, they are beings of law. this alone grants the possibility of cohabitation and limited cooperation. good and evil tend to be thier measuring stick for interacting with mortals. remember, as FORCES they oppose each other, but philosophically, they exist to interact with mortals, influencing mortals in one way or another.

if the players/characters in your game do not acknowledge law and chaos to any particular degree, just look to our own lives, we all have friends, family and associates that tend toward order and disorder.

jsut becuase someone is a navy seal, does not necessarily mean they are lawful. they simply made a choice to do a job and tolerate the conditions. just because someone never picks up around the house does not necessarily mean they are incapable of the discipline to study martial arts, or religion or academia. they make a choice and tolerate the condition.

a good man will kill if necessary. a man who will not kill might not be a good guy. he may just wish to avoid getting caught. some of the deadliest monsters our species has ever produced believed they were acting for the greater good. many we hail as good and decent are found later to be monsters. those we call lazy invent revolutionary things.

don't be afraid to adjust alignments as needed. if a class is alignment restricted, give in-game warnings (paladins recieve warnings from thier deity for example). alignment describes mortals, it doesn't really restrict them. alignment restricts immortals, but fails to actually describe them.

 

[delericho]

I would suggest, rather than trying to work out how a LG and LE, or a CG and CE can adventure together (which will probably always feel like a stretch), instead have the campaign emphasise the struggles between LG and CG, and between LE and CE.

Perhaps the Blood War spills into the material plane, and the goodly folk decide they must take action... but the LG dwarves and the CG elves can't find the common ground to act effectively.

Alternatively, you could strongly de-emphasise one of the Good alignments, and posit an overwhelming threat from the corresponding Evil alignment, to play on the "enemy of my enemy thing"... So, perhaps the Devils launch a major offensive, infiltrating all the kingdoms, churches and institutions of the land, such that the assorted rebels of these lands are forced to deal with the Demons in order to beat them back.

 

[Cheiromancer]

It seems like the distance between good and evil is about twice as much as between law and chaos, at least as far as quantifying cooperation goes.

By this I mean that it is not too much of a stretch to think of CG and LG characters working together; there will be strains, of course, but it is doable. Similar, I'd say, to the strain between LG and LN (angels and inevitables, say) , or CE and CN (demons and slaadi). As far as working together goes, two steps on the Law-Chaos axis is equivalent to one step on the Good-Evil axis.

I think there are some ways you could help adjust the ratio. One is by ensuring that codes of conduct emphasize law/chaos rather than good/evil. Instead of Paladins being at risk of "falling" (the vertical alignment axis) emphasize the risk of "sliding" (moving horizontally). Allow them to associate with evil (but "trustworthy") characters, but not chaotic ones. Play up the tension between barbarians and monks. An elf/dwarf conflict could be used here as well.

Play LG types with LN tendencies, and likewise for LE types. Angels and Devils will have an understanding with each other, even though they are somehow opposed- like prosecutors and defense attorneys, perhaps.

In moral and ethical dilemmas, allow the "community answer " to be the right one for lawful types (involving precedent, tradition, consensus) and the "individual answer" be the right one for chaotic types (involving glory, creativity and individual rights). By "right answer" I mean the one that doesn't hit them with role playing or mechanical penalties.

It's a challenge- if you find something that works I'd be interested in hearing your solution.

 

[anton1066]

I think you have to look at good sources of inspiration for this to model to really shine. Fortunately, most mythological stories deal more with law vs order then good vs evil. Stories like Gilgamesh, The Trojan Wars and Beowulf are all more about civilization vs barbarism/law vs chaos then they are about good vs evil.

If i were going to make a setting out of it, i would have two major factions; the empire and the barbarians. Each faction has both good and evil members but the thing that separates them is law vs order.

Jakalandor, a 2E setting, did exactly this and was a great piece of work that didnt get a lot of support.

 

[Aust Diamondew]

Trojan War particuarly.

Achilles=Chaos
Hector=Law
Agamemnon=Law
Paris=Chaos

Which is why Achilles and Agamemnon came into conflict partially.

 

[Crossroads]

Inspired by Michael Moorcocks Elric saga, I'm currently working on getting together an OD&D campaign that focuses on this concept.

Currently, there are seven major gods, THE gods, if you will. Three gods from the law and chaos spheres, respectively, and one god that is purely neutral and represents balance. Each of the three gods on each side represent varying degrees of law or chaos, from absolute to less or more ordered forming a continuum (as noted in a previous post) from stasis due to absolutes. However, this end result will never be reached due to A) an infinite multiverse and B) the moderation by the remaining two gods on each side and the god of neutrality striving for balance. The gods themselves are driven by their ideals to form a perfect multiverse as they see it.

In game terms, this means that creatures following absolute law will always strive for control through perfection and order in everything they do to further themselves and/or ideals. Those that follow absolute chaos will strive for control using imperfection and disorder. And then there are the shades in between.

Good and evil will be based on moral relativism. In essence, players (and their characters) will have to make a choice as to defining for themselves what is good or evil based on situational circumstances.

This will be the backdrop for the campaign world and be referenced when designing NPC's and their motives.

Still a work in progress and will be changed and tweaked as as players actually run their characters in the game.

 

[Asmor]

Thanks for all the posts guy... I'm just replying to make sure it doesn't seem like I'm ingrateful... I just don't have anything to add. Some good ideas, and I think the idea of good-evil being twice as large a gulf as law-chaos is a very insightful one.

 

[billd91]

I would suggest, rather than trying to work out how a LG and LE, or a CG and CE can adventure together (which will probably always feel like a stretch), instead have the campaign emphasise the struggles between LG and CG, and between LE and CE.

I think this is probably the way to go. No matter how you look at them, it's almost impossible to consider the difference between Lawful and Chaotic as wide as the difference between Good and Evil. The philosophical difference between L and C are more about how the goals inherent in G and E are best accomplished and promoted.

If you really want to enable LG and LE characters to cooperate from time to time, you have to find a way to threaten the elements of L that an E character has in common cause with the G character and make that element the point of conflict. Perhaps the social structure of a culture is crumbling (with a lot of migration from another region), LG and LE characters might clash with C characters because they both want to uphold the old order while C characters might want to embrace the new changes or at least won't lift a finger to uphold the old structure due to their innate appreciation of letting people choose their own way.