D&D 5E The Multiverse is back....

[Sadras]

Hey, when did my nice little bitch fest about The Planes become an alignment wank? Didn't we just have like an 80 page alignment wank, with the exact same participants, like a couple of months ago?

I think it was well over 100 pages. If it was a wank, it was the least satisfying wank I've experienced.

 

[aramis erak]

Just to clarify...I'm not speaking to the detecting of alignment... I'm speaking to alignment being defined as absolute...

AD&D (both 1E and 2E) defined the alignments in an absolute, 3rd person way. A LN character might consider himself "good", but for mechanics purposes, it was very much an absolutist approach.

The ultimate expression of this was the charting of alignment in certain setting books... every session, the DM would move your position on a big grid, and if you stayed across the line for so many sessions, you had changed alignment, which itself had penalties.

The Dragonlance Adventures book for 1e emphasized Good/Evil, downplaying the law/chaos axis.
Greyhawk Adventures (late 1e) has a system for 0-level PC's... and in it, a method of developing alignment based upon actions at 0-level. The charting and definition, however, is pretty concrete, and very absolutist. (Having used it, certain players were VERY surprised at what they came out as.)

As for detection, if Alignment is relativistic, detection spells are an absurdity.

 

[Nivenus]

Trying to roll this back into cosmology (which, is after all, what this thread is allegedly about), I went ahead and took a closer look at what the planar sourcebooks have to say about alignment. And I have to admit that I have to revise my position somewhat... according to the lore, neutral good (on a cosmological scale) is more good than lawful good or chaotic good and neutral evil is more evil than lawful evil or chaotic evil. Which actually kind of makes sense when you consider LN is clearly more lawful than the other lawful alignments and CN is more chaotic.

Here's what the Manual of the Planes (3rd edition) has to say about Elysium (the celestial plane found at the center between the planes of law and chaos):

It is the source of the River Ocean.

It is a place of ultimate goodness.

It is a land so pleasant you may never want to leave.

Elysium is the most strongly good-aligned plane of the Great Wheel, a place of good untrammeled by issues of law or chaos. On this plane doing well by others is more highly valued than any other ideal.

And here's what it has to say about Elysium's opposite, the Gray Waste of Hades:

It is where evil springs eternal.

It is a plane of endless apathy and despair.

It is the great battlefield of the Blood War.

Hades sits at the nadir of the lower planes, halfway between two races of fiends each bent on the other's annihilation. Thus, it often sees its gray plains darkened by vast armies of demons battling equally vast armies of devils who neither ask nor give quarter. If any plane defines the nature of true evil, it is the Gray Waste.

Additionally, the Outer Planes each have alignment characteristics which negatively effect those of opposing alignments. Elysium is the only "strongly good" plane and Hades is the only "strongly evil" plane. Celestia and the Hells, conversely are "mildly good/evil" and "mildly lawful" while Arborea and the Abyss are "mildly good/evil" and "mildly chaotic."

This is, incidentally, backed up by the 1st edition Manual of the Planes:

Elysium is the plane of ultimate good, unsullied by the concerns of hierarchy or anarchy. The spirits that reside here cannot be summoned or controlled, for they are at final rest. The Powers of the plane answer only those callings that they deem worthy (or profitable).

The layers of Hades are called the glooms of Hades. This is an adequate description of the nature of evil at its worst. These are realms without joy or emotion, without hope or peace, and without good will or intentions. It is a grey land with a grey sky in all its layers. Any colors but muted blacks and whites stand out here. There is neither sun, moon, stars, nor passing of the seasons. It is merely a state of waiting, with no end to the waiting in sight.

Interestingly though, the Planescape Campaign Setting supports a (slightly) more nuanced view:

[Elysium] gets called the Restful Plane or the Land of the Thoughtless, depending on a sod’s attitude. The Ciphers’ll tell a berk it’s the perfect place, having goodness without thought. Then again, the Guvners can barely stand it because there’s no order or discipline on the plane at all. That’s because the driving force of Elysium is goodness and goodness only. Order or anarchy - it doesn’t matter, as long as it’s for the good.

Oinos, Niflheim, and Pluton - these are the fabled “three glooms” of the Gray Waste that a cutter hears so much about. This land is evil solely, and them that’s here don’t care if they’re in it alone or together. This is the great battlefield of the Blood War, called Hades by some primes, but anyone who’s ever been here knows why “the Gray Waste” says it all.

Either way though, there does seem to be a consensus (on the whole) that Elysium and its inhabitants represent the purest example of supernatural good while Hades and its inhabitants are the purest representatives of planar evil.

This doesn't necessarily apply to mortals though. Whereas a guardinal or a yugoloth is, by its nature, essentially good or evil (barring very rare exceptions) a mortal who's alignment shows up as "neutral good" or "neutral evil" isn't necessarily "pure" good or evil. A neutral good character can, for instance, exist somewhere between neutral good and true neutrality... or between neutral good and lawful good (or neutral good and chaotic good). A lawful good character can, on the whole be more lawful than good... or more good than lawful. As Rich Burlew (author of The Order of the Stick) has said, alignment isn't meant to represent a straight-jacket for player characters: nuance is allowed (and indeed expected). Three lawful good characters may differ significantly in how lawful or good they are. The Great Wheel even takes this into account; there are three planes in the multiverse that are at least partially lawful good in nature: Celestia (equally lawful and good), Bytopia (more good than lawful), and Arcadia (more lawful than good).

On a cosmological level though, the gods and outsiders of pure good are those of a neutral good alignment. And the gods and outsiders of pure evil are neutral evil. And pure chaos is chaotic neutral. And pure law is lawful neutral.

My point is that, per the D&D rules, degree of evil is not a matter of perspective - eg Detect Evil doesn't yield a different result, when cast on a demon or a devil, depending on whether or not the caster is lawful or chaotic.

And why should it? All detect evil does is detect evil; it doesn't detect the specific quantity of law, evil, chaos, and good in a subject, just the fact that evil is present. The only degree to which the strength of evil detected is dependent on how supernatural it's nature is. A mortal creature that's just evil comes up fairly faint on the spell's radar. Conversely, an evil outsider (like a fiend) or the cleric of an evil deity (who channels their patron's power) comes up very strongly. But nowhere in the rules does the detect evil spell say it should be able to determine how evil any individual creature is.

 

[Shemeska]

Imaro is correct, it's canonical in D&D (well, o.k., Planescape) that several Celestial beings have gone bad and that a few Fiends have become good or at least Neutral. The Archon Triel the fallen became the Archdevil Baalzebul, for instance. Fall-From-Grace is a Succubus that became Lawful Neutral after starting Chaotic Evil. A Hamatula devil turned Lawful Good and joined the Celestial (and recruits other Fiends wanting to change). And some standard types of demons (Alu-fiend and Cambion) could be either non-evil aligned (CN for Alu-fiend, CN or ÇG for Cambions, in Planescape and even in their 1e MM writeups, I think...) So even if Fiends are evil in their essense, clearly their essence can change!

Either their essence can change, or they possessed a spark/flaw of some other alignment which ultimately led to an eventual shift.

In 3.x there was a risen ultroloth, Felthis ap Jerran published in Dragon magazine (which I'm responsible for).

Here's a list from a few years ago of some other risen fiends and the source for each

 

[pemerton]

according to the lore, neutral good (on a cosmological scale) is more good than lawful good or chaotic good and neutral evil is more evil than lawful evil or chaotic evil.

<snip>

On a cosmological level though, the gods and outsiders of pure good are those of a neutral good alignment. And the gods and outsiders of pure evil are neutral evil. And pure chaos is chaotic neutral. And pure law is lawful neutral.

Here are some extracts from your quotes:

Elysium is the plane of ultimate good, unsullied by the concerns of hierarchy or anarchy . . .

the driving force of Elysium is goodness and goodness only. Order or anarchy - it doesn’t matter, as long as it’s for the good. . . .

The layers of Hades are called the glooms of Hades. This is an adequate description of the nature of evil at its worst. . . .​

From the point of view of a paladin, these descriptions of Elysium can't be true. Because from the point of view of a paladin, a concern for lawfulness/order does not sully good, but is a necessary condition of achieving it. The paladin doesn't regard him-/herself as less than fully good!

Which goes to show that even the D&D writers can't maintain the logic of their aligned cosmology when they have to describe it!

The description of Hades makes no sense either: why is the gloom of Hades worse than the Abyss, where demons rend each other, plus visitors, limb from limb? How does the chaotic violence of the Abyss mitigate the evil there?

(In each case, the same point could be made from the perspective of a CG bard or ranger, or in respect of the Hells.)

All detect evil does is detect evil; it doesn't detect the specific quantity of law, evil, chaos, and good in a subject, just the fact that evil is present.

From Gygax's DMG, p 41:

Basically the degree of evil (faint, moderate, strong, overwhelming) and its general nature (expectant, malignant, gloating, etc) an be noted.​

 

[Beleriphon]

Here are some extracts from your quotes:

Elysium is the plane of ultimate good, unsullied by the concerns of hierarchy or anarchy . . .

the driving force of Elysium is goodness and goodness only. Order or anarchy - it doesn’t matter, as long as it’s for the good. . . .

The layers of Hades are called the glooms of Hades. This is an adequate description of the nature of evil at its worst. . . .​

From the point of view of a paladin, these descriptions of Elysium can't be true. Because from the point of view of a paladin, a concern for lawfulness/order does not sully good, but is a necessary condition of achieving it. The paladin doesn't regard him-/herself as less than fully good!

A paladin prior to 4E might be quite happy livingin Elysium, she gets to organize her little lawful area and hangout. The chaotic dude gets his little chaotic area. Sometimes they have debates about the relative merits of laws vs freedom. The paladin still isn't any less good, just that Elysium isn't more good than the paladin, but rather that the plane in and of it self focuses exclusively on Good rather than Law + Good or Chaos + Good. There are no extraneous other processes to make things Good going on, or if you prefer the plan by its nature accepts both chaotic and good as valid so either are fine so long as neither dominates.

Which goes to show that even the D&D writers can't maintain the logic of their aligned cosmology when they have to describe it!

I suspect is has more to do with extremely complex topics getting a few paragraphs at best rather than maintaining logic. There is logic to the statements, its just hard to explain with so little page space.

The description of Hades makes no sense either: why is the gloom of Hades worse than the Abyss, where demons rend each other, plus visitors, limb from limb? How does the chaotic violence of the Abyss mitigate the evil there?

It doesn't but again the plane itself has no forces making things inherently Chaotic or Lawful. Whatever is most evil goes, whether its a lawful or chaotic option.

 

[Nivenus]

Here are some extracts from your quotes:

Elysium is the plane of ultimate good, unsullied by the concerns of hierarchy or anarchy . . .the driving force of Elysium is goodness and goodness only. Order or anarchy - it doesn’t matter, as long as it’s for the good. . . .The layers of Hades are called the glooms of Hades. This is an adequate description of the nature of evil at its worst. . . .​

From the point of view of a paladin, these descriptions of Elysium can't be true. Because from the point of view of a paladin, a concern for lawfulness/order does not sully good, but is a necessary condition of achieving it. The paladin doesn't regard him-/herself as less than fully good!

Actually, unless the paladin is delusional they likely realize they're less than fully good by their very nature as a mortal, regardless of their specific alignment. On a temporal scale, I'm not sure any mortal creatures can really be "fully" good, evil, lawful, or chaotic. Even a paladin can be tempted to sin or fall from grace (indeed, it's a major archetype). So no paladin is fully good.

Celestials are another matter. They're essentially good by their very nature and while they can fall, it's a much rarer occurrence than the fall of a paladin, just as it's much easier for a criminal to turn a new leaf and reform than it is for a fiend to become good.

Again, you're confusing how alignment works on a temporal/individual scale vs. a cosmological/wider one. Pure neutral good is more good than pure lawful good and pure lawful neutral is more lawful than pure lawful good; that's how the cosmology works. An archon is less fully good than a guardinal and less fully lawful than a modron. But a paladin is not necessarily less fully good than a neutral good cleric or less fully lawful than a lawful neutral druid, because neither the paladin, the cleric, nor the druid are essentially good or lawful: their behavior doesn't have to be 100% consistent with an idealized version of their alignment (whereas an archon, guardinal, and modron do by default).

Three lawful good characters may exhibit differing degrees of lawful and good behavior, despite possessing the same basic alignment. One might be more willing to overlook the laws of society when an innocent's life is at stake where another believes the law must be obeyed at all time except in the direst circumstances. Another might see things through a more nuanced lens, leaning toward neither law nor good particularly. A good example are Roy Greenhilt, Durkon Thundershield, and Miko Miyazaki in The Order of the Stick: Roy's obviously more good-leaning than lawful (but is still overall lawful good) while Miko's priorities clearly favor law over good (but again, she's still good enough to be LG); Durkon falls somewhere in-between.

The conflict between the priorities of law and good actually is a canonical feature of lawful good characters, as others have pointed out (just as chaotic good characters must balance their desire for freedom from authority with their desire to do good). Each alignment has its strengths and its faults, even neutral good (arguably naivete or indecisiveness).

The description of Hades makes no sense either: why is the gloom of Hades worse than the Abyss, where demons rend each other, plus visitors, limb from limb? How does the chaotic violence of the Abyss mitigate the evil there?

Again, this comes back to my earlier discussion of which you find worse: inescapable but perfectly stable tyranny or a perilous world of endless strife but absolute free will. A lawful good and a chaotic good character's answers might differ substantially on this question, but canonically D&D says the answer is neither: the worst possible world is one where there is no hope at all, which is exemplified best by the Gray Waste of Hades.

A relevant point can be found in the Book of Exalted Deeds:

If the most soullessly evil villains relish spreading despair and devouring every last shred of hope, it naturally follows that the cause of good involves rekindling hope in the face of despair. This might be the most nebulous of all good deeds, hard to define or measure, but it might also be the heart and essence of good. All the other good deeds discussed in this section, in addition to their often concrete and physical benefits to people in in need, have the additional intangible benefit of increasing hope. A man whose body is wasting away from disease actually has two illnesses: the physical disease that consumes his flesh and the despair that gnaws at his soul. Healing him not only heals his body, it also restores his lost hope. A woman who throws herself on a paladin's mercy and turns from her evil ways struggles along the difficult road to redemption. The paladin's mercy and forgiveness offer the most important assistance along that road, a vision of the reward that lies ahead.

Hope in its truest form is more than just a vague wish for things to be better than they are; it is a taste of things as they might be. When an exalted bard comes to a city that groans under the oppressive rule of a pit fiend, he may inspire hope by singing tales of liberation or by demonstrating force of arms against the pit fiend's diabolic minions. But the best hope available to the oppressed residents of the city is when the bard simply shows them kindness, thereby reminding them of what it was like to live under a more benign rule. He brings them together in a community, whereas the devil have been turning them against each other, sowing distrust along despair. By experiencing a taste of kindness and freedom, however small, the citizens are inspired with hope. The hope empowers them to resist the devils, with or without the bard's force of arms.

This is an extremely idealistic (in the sense that it's literally idea-based rather than concrete) sense of good and evil, but it's the one D&D runs with. A villain who deprives the heroes of hope and leaves them wallowing in despair is worse than one who simply kills them. A hero who has hope might triumph over extremely long odds; a hero who is convinced there is no hope might fail even when the task they face isn't particularly insurmountable. A person kept alive but in a state of constant misery and despair suffers more in this view than one who dies quickly but with a shred of hope that evil will fail. From that perspective, the glooms of Hades, which literally sap a good character's capacity of hope from them, is worse than the Abyss or the Hells.

From Gygax's DMG, p 41:

Basically the degree of evil (faint, moderate, strong, overwhelming) and its general nature (expectant, malignant, gloating, etc) an be noted.​

​

Again, however, the spell distinguishes the degree of evil not by the actual moral weight of the individual in question but rather by how supernatural that evil is.

Here's what the 3rd edition Player's Handbook says:

Aura Strength: An aura's evil power and strength depend on the type of evil creature or object that you're detecting and its HD, caster level, or (in the case of a cleric) class level.

The following table (which is difficult to replicate here) explicitly has a hierarchy of regular evil creatures < undead < evil outsiders / clerics of evil deities. Basically, an extraordinarily cruel orc warrior scores a lower level of evil than even a neutral cleric of an evil deity, because that cleric channels the power of an extremely powerful and supernatural source of evil. The detect evil spell does not actually distinguish the individual evil of a character - only how supernatural it is.

The 5th edition Player's Handbook goes even less far: it just tells you if an aberration, celestial, fey, fiend, or undead is within a certain range and doesn't even distinguish between them the way the 3rd edition version of the spell does. So again, detect evil (and good) is very general in its use, rather than a highly sophisticated evil-o-meter.

 

[Viking Bastard]

So, to clarify, what is the actual debate going on now about exactly?

 

[Nivenus]

So, to clarify, what is the actual debate going on now about exactly?

At this point it seems to be over whether or not cosmological absolutes of law, chaos, good, and evil make any sense in D&D. I've tried to keep my comments as strongly focused on cosmology as possible, but there has definitely been some digression.

 

[aramis erak]

Gygax divided "morality" (Good-Evil) and "Ethics" (Law-Chaos). This is muddy, since the words mean the same thing, one is Latin (Mos-Mores) the other is Greek (Ethos). Both mean the set of habits and behaviors of a given person.

In English, especially in formal academic settings, they are not quite synonyms. Gygax was, despite his lack of formal post-secondary degree, very much "Ivory Tower Academic" in his expressions of concepts. His use is not too far from how several professors, including my Philosophy profs, taught the distinction.

Ethics generally refers to required behaviors as set by some outside force. What is allowed or not.
Morals generally refers to internally held beliefs of what is right. What is Right or Wrong, usually without regard to whether it's allowed or not, especially when contrasted with Ethics.

Some of the most ethical people I know are utterly amoral - their morality is to totally dissimilar to that of most people as to be understood as evil. On the other hand, their fear of the consequences of violation of their profession's code of ethics keeps them in line, and they function in society quite well, even earning respect - until they get to a position where they can speak their mind. Likewise, one of the nicest, kindest guys I've ever met was totally opposed to even the concept of laws, and supported themselves by what they saw as harmless agriculturalism... mind you, their crop was totally illegal.

The division into "Laws, Contracts and Oaths: " - Yes/WhenUseful/No (lawful/Neutral/Chaotic)
and "Do Unto Others" - "As you want them to do to you"/"nice as long as it's not inconvenient"/"Before they can do to you"...

The Chaotic Good Guy is going to ignore his oath if he thinks it's to general benefit; the LE guy will keep it, grudgingly and legalistically, in an attempt to screw you over... It's a very good guide to behavior types.