Is Chaotic/Lawful Alignment Axis really necessary?

[Wombat]

Between the two threads addressing alignment currently, I have come up with a common question:

Do actions count more when considering alignment or is intentionality the deciding factor?

fusangite brings up a very valid point. Most players define alignment in at least semi-modern terms. If a more medieval standpoint were adopted almost every single PC would have to be labelled as Chaotic due to breaking societal norms of social-non-mobility, willingness to commit semi-random murder and larceny, and ignoring of authority figures. But what if the characters intend to do greater good for the society through these actions? Does that mitigate the action?

In the end, due to this and myriad other problems with alignment, I have dropped alignment and I have been happier since.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

In vast majority of fantasy books main conflict is between Good and Evil, and concept of Chaos is usually associated with Evil, also in most real life moral concepts/religions( Divine Law/Holy Order- are there similar phrases concerning Chaos and Anarchy?), not to mention that D@D definitions of Law and Chaos are confusing- following law of the society is NOT the same as having a strict invidual code of conduct. It is obvious that Morgoth/ Emperor Palpatine or Satan are incarnations of Evil but one can argue whether they are Chaotic or Lawful. In conclusion, me and my co-players have reached a conclusion to throw Lawful-Chaotic Conflict, which never was very prominent, out of the game. Any comments ?

Sure, if it doesn't add anything to your game, by all means throw it out.

Personally, I've created a nice
in-game rationale for my setting why all those "Detect Chaos/Law" spells work, but such a setup is not appropriate for every campaign setting...

 

[Trickstergod]

Do actions count more when considering alignment or is intentionality the deciding factor?

Both count, but I'd say that actions count more. The road to hell is paved with good intentions, after all. One diminishes or empowers the other, however. If something bad happens that had the best of intentions, it's not quite so inherently horrible as if it was done with the worst of intentions. Intent could be all that saves a paladin from losing that status, or at least, being able to atone. By that same token, an ostensibly good thing done with the worst of intentions tarnishes the act. Doing good things because they will directly benefit you isn't so good after all.

Actions count more than intent, but only by a hair at times.

fusangite brings up a very valid point. Most players define alignment in at least semi-modern terms. If a more medieval standpoint were adopted almost every single PC would have to be labelled as Chaotic due to breaking societal norms of social-non-mobility, willingness to commit semi-random murder and larceny, and ignoring of authority figures. But what if the characters intend to do greater good for the society through these actions? Does that mitigate the action?

This is why, in general, I generally try to give motive and reason for what my characters, or those in games I run, are doing. Very rarely do I just allow someone to get away with the reason, "Well, I'm just going to go do good things." That doesn't usually fly by me.

Furthermore, your point also brings up why I think Lawful Neutral tends to be the most inappropriate of adventuring alignments. Breaking into dungeons, violating graveyards, and dishing out frontier justice generally don't strike me as very Lawful. At least a Lawful Good individual is seeking out something more, something that society usually cannot provide, and a Lawful Evil one has darker motives to bring them out into the world.

But yes, for the most part, I do not believe Lawfulness is overly appropriate to a free-booting lifestyle.

However, alignment is not an adventurer-centric thing.

Ahh well. I personally find it to be a good shorthand to work off of, at the very least.

 

[S'mon]

You don't need either axis to run a workable game. Indeed law-chaos axis is meaningless to many while the good-evil axis encourages a simplistic approach appropriate only to the most clear-cut 'high fantasy' settings (eg Tolkien). Recently the whole thing has been bugging me more and more. My inclination is to rework my approach to emphasize the subjective nature of individual perceptions. Eg: I'm not going to tell any player what their PC's alignment is - they can put whatever they want on their PC sheet. It may not coincide with what they register as to other people's perceptions (or detection spells), but other people's perceptions may be equally subjective. Most groups the PCs perceive as 'evil' won't consider themselves evil, for instance.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

People who say that the good/evil axis is simplistic or vague IMO misunderstand the purpose of alignment as well as the difficulties of the law/chaos axis. Alignment is not meant to represent the human personality. Nor is it meant to encompass all human worldviews. Nor is it meant to encompass the whole of the allegiances and loyalties of characters or nations. Instead, as I understand it, it is meant to define characters' standing in relation to the moral and supernatural orders.

Just because two characters are good doesn't mean that they will see eye to eye or even that they'll join together and fight against the bad guy. A good king might send his neutral Marquis and a good duke to fight a neighboring kingdom whose evil Emperor might dispatch his armies under the leadership of a good count. The good count might follow the evil king out of respect for the law of succession/divine right/rule of law or because of a pragmatic calculation that any realistic alternative is even worse. He would probably also defend his land (and his liege's) even against the good invaders out of loyalty to the throne or tradition or simple love for his country and a desire to see it ruled by natives who understand it rather than foreigners. When he meets the Duke on the field of battle, odds are good that only one will walk away even though both are good and respect each other and, under different circumstances might have been friends. The romantic myths about Richard the Lionhearted and Saladin during the crusades (although probably not the reality) illustrate this. As does, IIRC, the real life (or at least widely reported as true) example of the friendship of Jesse Owens and Luz Long, the german sprinter at the 1936 Olympics--even though less than four years later, they both served in armies on the opposite sides of World War II.

Alignment is what is supposed describe the difference in how God or the gods would view Luz Long and Jesse Owens and Goerring. It's not meant to tell us Jesse Owens' views on racial integration (although it undoubtedly plays a part in that) or whether or not Luz Long would be willing to serve in the Wehrmacht (although it also plays a part in that).

There's nothing necessarily simplistic about saying that there are good and evil people--in fact, it seems to me to be more simplistic to adopt a shallow relativism that is unable to see real differences in human character.

And responding to a few other posters, Law is said represent absolute control and unmoving, rigid order and chaos to represent constant change (a rather nonsensical understanding when it's applied to physical reality--as it often is when it sullies fantasy literature weith its presence--since the theoretical position of maximum entropy (generally connected with chaos) is actually (as I understand it) quite analogous to motionlessness (generally connected with Law) and real states of maximum order (generally associated with Law) generally involve motion and change (generally associated with Chaos); the decay of a planet's orbit increases entropy and decreases order even though it is a step in the motion towards the elimination of change). Neither of these, however are desired by much of anyone in the world (Fascists talk about freedom in work and order and anarchists dream that people will naturally find a justly ordered society if formal power structures just stopped interfering--they certainly don't see their movements in the terms that Law/Chaos proponents do). In that case, where everyone's professed desire is arguably neutral, there's not much point in having a Law/Chaos axis at all unless it's to claim that the cosmos and spiritual forces of the world are alien, incomprehensible, and utterly uninterested in the good of humanity (which is what I understood to be the worldview of the Elric books when I read them--or more properly I read one, so I may be mischaracterizing them).

And, as to Law/Chaos representing the "ethical" and Good/Evil representing "moral" as another poster put it, what on earth are you smoking? Moral and ethical are used pretty much interchangably--even in philosophical circles, moral theory falls under the field of "ethics." If you wish to create a new distinction not recognized in normal or philosophical English, that's fine but you'll need to clearly define your terms with words that, unlike Law and Chaos have clearly understood meanings.

Or Chaos-theory mathematicians?
seriously though...

I think just a Good-Neutral-Evil system is too vague. Same with the OD&D Lawful-Neutral-Chaotic system. Combining the two makes a much more complex system that encompasses a greater number of worldviews.

But still, a lot of character concepts are very difficult to fit into a specific alignment, so we just pick one that's kind of close and move on with our lives.

In the rules as written, alignment is a total absolute. It is determinable via spells and abilities. Different weapons do different damage based on your alignment. It is a tried and true FACT that all creatures in the multiverse can be pidgeonholed into one of nine categories.

I don't think we can do away with any particular axis on the alignment grid - it would trivialize the shades of gray we all know exist. We could add MORE axes, to make the system more realistic, but that would get pretty cumbersome pretty fast. We could do away with alignment entirely, but then entire chunks of the game go away.

I dunno. I'm done rambling now.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

I like the idea of what you're proposing here and have run a game this way myself, however, it's significant to note that by keeping the PCs alignments secret, you haven't actually eliminated alignment from your game. You've just placed it behind a veil of uncertainty, pierced, at times and in places by detection spells. (Which, IMO is where it ought to be).

Since the characters (both PCs and their foes) have real alignments even if they don't recognize what they really are, the game is able to explore the difference between subjective moral experience/perception and objective moral reality. Without the concept of alignment, it would be impossible to explore that theme as there would be nothing to illustrate the reality portion of that equation. And, IMO, that's the best use of alignment there is.

You don't need either axis to run a workable game. Indeed law-chaos axis is meaningless to many while the good-evil axis encourages a simplistic approach appropriate only to the most clear-cut 'high fantasy' settings (eg Tolkien). Recently the whole thing has been bugging me more and more. My inclination is to rework my approach to emphasize the subjective nature of individual perceptions. Eg: I'm not going to tell any player what their PC's alignment is - they can put whatever they want on their PC sheet. It may not coincide with what they register as to other people's perceptions (or detection spells), but other people's perceptions may be equally subjective. Most groups the PCs perceive as 'evil' won't consider themselves evil, for instance.

 

[S'mon]

There's nothing necessarily simplistic about saying that there are good and evil people--in fact, it seems to me to be more simplistic to adopt a shallow relativism that is unable to see real differences in human character.

I think the problem for me and my campaign is not that alignment is simplistic but that it is supposed to be objective and inherent 'in the universe', separate from human belief.

Personally, IRL I believe in 'good' and 'evil' in the sense that I, as a thinking human being, can evaluate a person, or actions, as good or evil (given sufficient information). Therefore I am not a moral relativist. Nor do I go entirely by 'what I would do in that situation' or 'this is what my home culture thinks'; although my home culture is undoubtedly influential in forming my world view I can recognise that other individuals & other cultures are 'more good' than me and mine.

However, I certainly do not believe that 'the cosmos' rates things as 'good' and 'evil' or 'lawful' or 'chaotic'. For D&D purposes I've always taken the approach that 'Good' 'Evil' and the planar cosmology of the Great Wheel et al are the cultural constructs of philosophers within the mythos and of general belief - they exist (sort-of) because they're believed in by enough people. Hence the whole system is ultimately subjective, not objective. This works OK as long as everyone in the campaign world believes in the D&D default cosmology. When different belief systems run up against each other it gets messy.

BTW I agree that in the Elric novels Law & Chaos are not presented as sympathetic concepts, a Balance between them is presented as desirable both for humanity and for the multiverse at large.

 

[S'mon]

And, as to Law/Chaos representing the "ethical" and Good/Evil representing "moral" as another poster put it, what on earth are you smoking?

This moral/ethical distinction has been knocking around a long time in Alignment discussions. I agree it's kinda dumb.

 

[S'mon]

I like the idea of what you're proposing here and have run a game this way myself, however, it's significant to note that by keeping the PCs alignments secret, you haven't actually eliminated alignment from your game. You've just placed it behind a veil of uncertainty, pierced, at times and in places by detection spells. (Which, IMO is where it ought to be).

Since the characters (both PCs and their foes) have real alignments even if they don't recognize what they really are, the game is able to explore the difference between subjective moral experience/perception and objective moral reality. Without the concept of alignment, it would be impossible to explore that theme as there would be nothing to illustrate the reality portion of that equation. And, IMO, that's the best use of alignment there is.

Not exactly - IMC there isn't exactly a truly 'objective moral reality' - but where D&D-standard Good & Evil etc are believed in by mortals and gods, the weight of that belief is what causes Detection spells etc to register the presence of good & evil. If not enough people believed in these things they wouldn't exist - and on many worlds & planes they _don't_ exist. IMC if PCs from Greyhawk arrived in a version of the Traveller univese, say, even if their detection magic still worked they would find that the locals didn't register as having any 'alignment'. By contrast a Traveller character arriving on Greyhawk would acquire an alignment, either (edited for spelling) immediately or over time. I use the concept of 'Reality Factor' (similar to 1e MoP's Physical, Temporal & Magic Factors) to determine the extent to which the rules of one reality can override the rules of another when the two meet.

 

[Urbannen]

Is it necessary?

The Law/Chaos isn't necessary to play the game. However, it might add to the game if it were consistently defined, say as Order vs. Chaos or Law vs. Crime.

Right now LG and CG characters and groups can work together in WotC settings. However, LG and LE cannot. Heck, LN and LE can't even work together (note Helm vs. Bane). CG and CE can't work together, either (elves vs. orcs). The Law/Chaos axis is shown to be unnecessary because it is ignored in practice.