Five Alignments?

[Charwoman Gene]

IHonestly, I think the big gripe is that Lawful now equals good.

The only facts you have are that Lawful Good and Good exist.

You also have a playtester/freelancer winking and nudging at my ideas saying that something that at least shows the idea of the way alginments have shifted and my ideas are nothing like your understanding.

Try this one. There are two poles of Cosmic Philosophy, good and evil. "Alignment" means you have taken an interest in devoting yourself to acheiving the goals of that pole. The are two Sub Categories. "Lawful" Good is a subcategory for people who are good, but tie themselves to a defined code. "Chaotic" Evil is the subcategory of Evil that are beyond selfishnes and into raw destruction.

Order and Chaos are awesome for use as cosmic poles, but only in a relativistic G/E framework. Good and Evil at the same time higlight the alieness of these poles and ruin their applicability.

 

[Clavis]

I never quite understood the difference between morals and ethics, to be honest.

Morals define what a given society views as acceptable and unacceptable behavior in a broad sense. Ethics defines the acceptable way to do what a society allows as moral. Morals are what is allowed; ethics are the proper way to do it. For example, in the United States it is moral to make a monetary profit. It is not ethical, however, to make a profit by selling defective goods, or deceiving your customers.

 

[Michael Morris]

As I stated when introducing my own alignment system the problem with "good" and "evil" is they are not values - they are judgments.

The problem quickly magnifies once real values are brought into play. Someone who values nature will call the callous destruction of habitat 'evil.' Some call killing for any reason 'evil' while others hold that mitigating circumstances count and self defense (usually) makes things ok. Giving a beggar money seems good - but by enabling him to continue begging aren't you doing an evil thing to him (if begging didn't work he'd get a job).

I realized this pitfall in Good/Evil based alignment systems a long time ago and only moved away from them reluctantly - prior to that time I'd written several essays defending the old 9 point alignment system. So I moved to an alignment system of interlinked value pairs.

Very brief version: (Long version here)
Gold - represents Order and community. Opposed by Red (Chaos) and Silver (Individualism)
Blue - represents Logic and Artifice. Opposed by Green (Nature) and Red (Emotion).
Silver - represents Individualism and Death. Opposed by Green (Life) and Gold (Community)

While the system has antagonistic and sympathetic relationships I could expound several pages on - the key to the system is that these alignments are non-exclusive (why that is so is beyond the scope of this post). An individual can possess the self-contradicting alignment of Gold/Silver. Indeed, these five base alignments can form 41 possible combinations, which is a far greater depth and scope than this new 4e system could ever hope to deal with and well beyond the capacity of the two axis 9 point alignment system.

The fun part though is these alignments call each other evil all the time - but in truth it's the actions the possessors of the alignment choose that earn or discredit those labels. Each alignment can be the hero, each can be the villain, each one doing this though in their own way.

The beautiful part of this arrangement is it offers no real guarantees. Detect Alignment may reveal the subject's nature - but it will not disclose their intentions, disposition, or most importantly whether they are a friend or foe. At the end of the day alignment systems with Good and Evil involved fail because of this one truth - they are a cop out for players since they provide absolute "friend or foe" detection. While the DM can harry this somewhat at the end of the day the solutions to this problem are kludges only.

To elaborate - If you detect a subject has a Silver alignment (more properly a "Sodran" alignment - silver is merely the color of their aura under the scrutiny of the spell) you know that they hold individual rights above most all other concerns. From this you know they are likely to be greedy, acquisitive and very likely to want to profit on whatever they provide to you in some manner - perhaps without even consciously intending to. However, you don't know if they respect the law (Sodreans *tend* not to, but many are willing to because working within the law is easier and more profitable). Most importantly you don't know if they are evil - you may feel their greed and selfishness (or selfish tendencies) makes them evil from your point of view, but that's a subjective call for your character. Objectively the alignment grants you no insight into this question.

 

[VannATLC]

I like that.

A lot.

A virtue-based alignment system. Like virtue-based ethical, kicks the crap out of this polar duality business.

Morals define what a given society views as acceptable and unacceptable behavior in a broad sense. Ethics defines the acceptable way to do what a society allows as moral. Morals are what is allowed; ethics are the proper way to do it

*sniff*

I'm an immoral, unethical individual.

Polyamory immediately excludes me from morality, and therefore, ethicality, eh?

 

[VannATLC]

sigh*

I hate alignment arguments.

Unless you want to come to me and tell me you are an objectivist, the whole mess is broken. If you come and tell me you ARE an objectivist, I won't play with you.

I've always tended to utterly scrap alignment, and all spells based off it. It serves no useful purpose.

I have a vampire NPC who fosters and grows a community around him, maintains their safety in an uncertain world, hold fortnightly competitions in physcial and mental skills, then awards the winner with an invitation to a light dinner. At a certain age, the elderly are assisted in writing the memoirs, then drained of blood.

He is good for this community. There is no two ways about it. He knows things they would forget in a generation or two, otherwise. He defends them when necessary. Its a true symbiotic relationship, not a parasitic one. Without him, the community would fall within a generation.

Why should he be evil?

I strongly like the new system, because it allows for a LOT more flexibility.

You've got a single axis, this is true. I understand the concerns that chaotic=evil and law=good.

However, most of those concerns are bunk. Chaotic things are not anarchists. They are inherently destructive. A person who has an internal code, of any sort, is NOT chaotic. They may care nothing for tradition, or laws, or social mores. But they are not chaotic. Chaotic = Insane.
I've never been able to comprehend any other meaning. As soon as somebody makes a rational decision based on their own personal beliefs (Ignoring, for the moment, the validity of those beliefs) then they are not a chaotic person.

Even then, my little rant is ultimately pointless, as chaos is only an idea that is represented by an incomplete understanding of a system. (I'll grant there is a philosophical possibility of true randominity inherent in what we understand of the truly base levels of existance. Quantum Fluctations and other similar random events.)

You can have a character, of course, who is opposed to social laws. An anarchist.

Describe them as an anarchist. Not chaotic good.


Korgoth

You do no have the scope of knowledge to objectively judge Good or Evil. Or even to define them.

 

[Kordeth]

I have a vampire NPC who fosters and grows a community around him, maintains their safety in an uncertain world, hold fortnightly competitions in physcial and mental skills, then awards the winner with an invitation to a light dinner. At a certain age, the elderly are assisted in writing the memoirs, then drained of blood.

He is good for this community. There is no two ways about it. He knows things they would forget in a generation or two, otherwise. He defends them when necessary. Its a true symbiotic relationship, not a parasitic one. Without him, the community would fall within a generation.

Why should he be evil?

To be fair, what you're arguing against here isn't alignment, it's the D&D statement that vampires are "always chaotic evil." This character works just fine as a neutral or good-aligned character within the framework of the old alignment system.

Nevertheless, I agree with all of the points you make.

 

[Intense_Interest]

I imagine that the 5-note scale alignment, like evil gods, is something for players (mortals) to understand.

To a person with a limited life span, the scale of "Murdering Sociopath" to "Charitable Altruist" is far, far more important than whether or not he pays his taxes or jaywalks.

To Gods and other Immortals, who could spend decades deciding the proper methodology over one specific point of order, the Chaos-Law spectrum is considerably more important.

 

[CleverNickName]

Bah. I'm not finding anything about the 4E alignments that I like. But in fairness, I haven't seen the 4E books yet. Maybe there is something in the context, some sort of subtleness or rationalle, that will explain it all in a way that will make me fall helplessly in love with it.

Which isn't likely, but I'll entertain the notion.

The thing is, I like the old system of Good/Evil and Law/Chaos, with Neutral covering all of the "shades of grey." Of course the old system isn't perfect...but it is much closer than this new-fangled one.

 

[VannATLC]

To be fair, what you're arguing against here isn't alignment, it's the D&D statement that vampires are "always chaotic evil." This character works just fine as a neutral or good-aligned character within the framework of the old alignment system.

Nevertheless, I agree with all of the points you make.

Hmm, you're right, that is what it sounds like.

The important part is, this guy is still a vampire that drinks blood and arranges to have people killed for his benefit.

Under most sorts of mortal-time framed Good/Evil axis' this would qualify as Evil, would it not?

I mean, I personally would be very swingy. His net effect appears to be positive. His methods are questionable. He could, presumable, do all of this and feed off savage humanoids, or animals, instead, which would, in my book, make him much more 'Good'.

*shrug*. Its mostly a personal beef with the poor nature to good and evil.

 

[Andor]

I think we could avoid all this argument be using a clear and intuitive alignment track that uses easily understood terms to show the characters... um... character. For example:

Scientologist - Vegan - Hippie - New Yorker - Redneck - Rush Limbaugh - Walmart