D&D General IMO, Alignment should be "Fill in the blank"

[the Jester]

OH! Absolutely.

Alignment should never be proscriptive. I don't actually think there's ever been a version of D&D that made it so.

Oooh, you must have missed the early years (1e and before, but especially 1e). Penalties for violating or changing your alignment were a big deal back then. I'm at my girlfriend's house right now and don't have the 1e DMG in front of me, but I believe it cost you a level. Like, you went down a level when you changed alignment.

 

[Steampunkette]

So, you seem to be describing someone who claims to hold a philosophical belief, but doesn't actually do so.

How would this be different if the character claimed to be Lawful Good, but didn't put that into practice?

In further posts I expressed the issue of Values.

Consequentialism states that the outcome dictates the morality of an action. Does the outcome create the least harm/greatest pleasure/whatever. Right? But as a moral framework it relies on the people who hold it to create the values which are "Good" or "Evil". And that moral valuation is dependent on the society involved.

What is "Harm" to a given individual? Some may value a traditional society more than the people who make it up, and oppose any change to that society. Even when that change would be better for a subset or even the entire society because it breaks with what they consider more important: Maintaining the Traditional Society.

Such a person may even claim, and mean, that they love the people their actions are causing continual harm toward, but their adherence to tradition makes change impossible, regardless of the cost. Because their valuation is skewed to support society above other forms of harm.

Big part of why no singular moral philosophy works for everyone, even within a given society. Moral Philosophies are Proscriptive and try to shape how things should be, but rely on everyone agreeing on that baseline consideration of Value.

As to Deontology, we could spend years arguing over individual rules and exceptions and miss out on countless little ways that people could find to be cruel and wicked while still following every rule we create.

Oooh, you must have missed the early years (1e and before, but especially 1e). Penalties for violating or changing your alignment were a big deal back then. I'm at my girlfriend's house right now and don't have the 1e DMG in front of me, but I believe it cost you a level. Like, you went down a level when you changed alignment.

I wound up playing 1e after several years of 2e. But in the end it's the same thing: Applying a cost to a significant change to yourself. Losing something as your moral identity grows.

It sucks. But it's still descriptive because you -can- change. It's just that change is hard.

 

[Stormonu]

Oooh, you must have missed the early years (1e and before, but especially 1e). Penalties for violating or changing your alignment were a big deal back then. I'm at my girlfriend's house right now and don't have the 1e DMG in front of me, but I believe it cost you a level. Like, you went down a level when you changed alignment.

Yep, and could cost you your class too. I used to be pretty severe about imposing these penalties, mostly in 2E, especially when I thought players were trying to "game" alignment for their own benefit (using certain magic items or spells, qualifying for classes, etc.).

Nowadays, I pretty much ignore alignment for PCs (except certain "good"/"evil" acts), and just use it for monsters/NPCs.

 

[Iry]

But then the supernatural powers that be would have a MUCH harder time classifying you, and hitting you with alignment spells.

 

[Oofta]

That’s the thing about alignment! In order for it to work as a cohesive part of the setting, the setting needs to have objective morality. It doesn’t have to be the one Gygax set up - it could be decided on by the DM, or by the group together. But one way or another, you need a standard by which it can be objectively determined what in the setting is good, evil, lawful, and chaotic. When you try to use alignment in a setting with a more postmodern outlook on morality, you run into a lot of problems.

I fundamentally disagree. Which is probably why I like alignment. Broadly speaking there's no objective "good", having a good alignment is part of your moral core and it means that in general you strive to good. A good person is altruistic, kind, generous, will try not to help others and not harm innocents. Being evil means that you lack that sense of common decency and have no qualms about harming others to get your way even or even enjoy causing other people harm.

Of course very few individuals fit into one alignment at all times, good people have blind spots and can make mistakes. Evil people can care about other specific individuals and love their children. People are flawed, groups with the same alignment can come into conflict. It's only when you demand that alignment be "perfect" or dictate every aspect of behavior that it stops working.

 

[Steampunkette]

I fundamentally disagree. Which is probably why I like alignment. Broadly speaking there's no objective "good", having a good alignment is part of your moral core and it means that in general you strive to good. A good person is altruistic, kind, generous, will try not to help others and not harm innocents. Being evil means that you lack that sense of common decency and have no qualms about harming others to get your way even or even enjoy causing other people harm.

Of course very few individuals fit into one alignment at all times, good people have blind spots and can make mistakes. Evil people can care about other specific individuals and love their children. People are flawed, groups with the same alignment can come into conflict. It's only when you demand that alignment be "perfect" or dictate every aspect of behavior that it stops working.

By declaring what good is, you are applying an external morality. By declaring what evil is, you are applying an external morality.

An external perspective which declares what a character does to be good or evil independent of that character's own personal idea of what is or is not good or evil.

Which is an appropriate thing to do because that is how you have heroes and villains and antiheroes and everything in between in a piece of media. The external viewer, player, or dungeon master has their own morality which they apply to the actions of the characters.

But even people who have a postmodern outlook on morality still apply values of good or bad positive or negative or whatever else to individual actions. They just tend to make characters who are a lot closer to neutral and seek a better definition of their particular brand of neutrality.

 

[Malmuria]

I really like the way they did Paladins in 5e, with the Oath tenant. It's much more evocative than "LG to the max" and makes them more fun to play, while still bringing into play breaking one's oath for those that are into that sort of thing. Paladins were so tedious previously (at least in 2e).

 

[Charlaquin]

I fundamentally disagree. Which is probably why I like alignment. Broadly speaking there's no objective "good", having a good alignment is part of your moral core and it means that in general you strive to good. A good person is altruistic, kind, generous, will try not to help others and not harm innocents. Being evil means that you lack that sense of common decency and have no qualms about harming others to get your way even or even enjoy causing other people harm.

Of course very few individuals fit into one alignment at all times, good people have blind spots and can make mistakes. Evil people can care about other specific individuals and love their children. People are flawed, groups with the same alignment can come into conflict. It's only when you demand that alignment be "perfect" or dictate every aspect of behavior that it stops working.

You’re literally describing your world’s standard of good and evil here.

 

[Charlaquin]

Double post. The forums acting strangely for anyone else?

 

[pemerton]

That’s the thing about alignment! In order for it to work as a cohesive part of the setting, the setting needs to have objective morality. It doesn’t have to be the one Gygax set up - it could be decided on by the DM, or by the group together. But one way or another, you need a standard by which it can be objectively determined what in the setting is good, evil, lawful, and chaotic. When you try to use alignment in a setting with a more postmodern outlook on morality, you run into a lot of problems.

My point was not just objective morality but, if truth is a value that feeds into the alignment system (which it is in AD&D), then also an objective epistemology. Which can quickly bump into issues of whose "perspective" on, say, a border skirmish, or social structures, or . . . , is the correct one; what exactly does it mean to say that one group of people has more INT than another; etc.

Which are issues that seem to be prominent in current debates around D&D and its received fantasy tropes.