Developing a Values System (no Alignments)

[Indagare]

Oft discussed on these forums, the Alignments (which are meant to be a helpful guide to creating a character) too often end up a strait jacket that GMs are rumored to use to beat their players over their brows with (yes, I'm looking at you Paladin). Although the type of abuses seem to be on the order of urban legends (there may be cases where they occur, but it's not frequent), I thought I might present a potentially different system for dealing with this.

These values are based on the values scale developed by Shalom H. Schwartz.

Keep in mind, this system needs work and that's why I'm putting it here. Suggestions for improvement or clarification would be very welcome.

Values:

Every society, and every person within that society, has a basic philosophy of life and what is important to leading a “good life”.

These philosophies change from society to society and person to person, but they nonetheless play an important role in how your character views the world. This is not an alignment system. Whether a particular set of values is seen as ‘good’ or ‘evil’ is always dependent on the values of those around the person. The values are, instead, meant to help you develop a character. If you already have a good idea about how you want to play your character, you can skip this section entirely.

There are twelve values presented here to help in the process of character creation. These values are given a color star code (as opposed to a specific word) to avoid any prejudice for or against the values espoused by that particular star. That is, all the values are considered equally valid within the game. Note that these are not all possible values or philosophies, and how strongly and to what end you have your character pursue them is up to you.

The star values are set up with four parts; a belief, a motivation, a seeking, and a suggested personality. The belief is the very core of that value, the motivation is what actions your beliefs lead you to do, the seeking is what you hope to obtain in the future based on your beliefs, and the suggested personality is a very basic kernel of idea for how your character might behave and can be ignored or expanded on.

Values come in different strengths. There are three types of values you may have: primary values, secondary values, and tertiary values. You should start your character with only one star value within each category. You may add more, but it’s not a good idea to have more than six star values (at that point the character has no strong values). Starting with tertiary values may be a good idea if you’re not sure what, exactly, your character should have for primary values. Generally, there will be one primary, two secondary, and three tertiary values, but other combinations are possible.

Primary Values:

These are the character’s core values and that character’s basic outlook on life. These could be what the character was raised to value or could be values the character picked up later in life. Violating these values is always a source of extreme discomfort for the character and will generally cause remorse, shame, anger, or frustration for a long period of time.

Secondary Values:

These are values that the character has picked up in addition to the primary values. The character will adhere to them most of the time. Violating secondary values makes the character uncomfortable, but usually not as distressed as violating primary values, particularly if there’s a good reason for the violation. In general, secondary values are no more than one star removed from the primary values.

Tertiary Values:

These are values that the character thinks are a generally good idea, though the character may not always adhere to them. Violating them makes the character slightly uncomfortable but never particularly remorseful. They are generally no more than two stars away from the primary values.

Dual Prime Values:

Sometimes it’s impossible to pick just one prime value, particularly among adjacent values. It is perfectly allowable to have two prime values, but such a duality must be of adjacent star values.

Contrary Values:

Though usually the star values a character has are complimentary, there are times when contrary values exist. Most often it is a matter of tertiary or secondary values being contrary to primary ones. Such values could be leftovers from the society the character was raised in (usually if they are secondary values) or ideas the character is playing around with (usually as tertiary values). Though characters will try not to violate their primary values, they will still feel conflicted over what the best course of action is and whether they made the right choice.

Changing Values:

The values your character starts out with are flexible. Experiences can change view points and life-altering event can causes the character to question previously held values. Primary values tend to be the most resilient and least likely to change, but any event that causes characters to question their world view will also cause a prime value to be questioned as well. Secondary values are less resilient, generally changing slowly over time barring life-altering events. Tertiary values are the least resilient and most likely to change over time. There should be no penalty for changing values, but players should be encouraged to explain any sudden changes, particularly to primary values.

Table:

The table below lists all the star values for quick reference as to which are located next to one another. The arrows are used to show the connection between any two values. Keep in mind that unless your character was raised with an opposing star value (and has kept it as a secondary or tertiary value), your character will see its tenants as flawed at best, morally wrong at worst.

Red Star <-> Orange Star <-> Yellow Star <-> Chartreuse Star
^**************************************^
|***************************************|
v***************************************v
Rose Star****************************Green Star
^**************************************^
|***************************************|
v***************************************v
Magenta Star*************************Turquoise Star
^**************************************^
|***************************************|
v***************************************v
Indigo Star <-> Blue Star <-> Azure Star <-> Cyan Star

Red Star:

You believe in having prestige and dominance over people and resources. You are motivated to preserving your own public image and having social recognition. You seek to have social power and wealth.
Suggested personality traits: You are authoritative and controlling.

Orange Star:

You believe in self-preservation and enhancing your own welfare. You are motivated to pursue personal success through demonstrating competence and adhering to social standards. You seek personal gains and societal influence.
Suggested personality traits: You are cunning and resourceful.

Yellow Star:

You believe in self-respect and self-reliance. You are motivated to enhance your own welfare and gaining more prestige. You seek to be influential and successful.
Suggested personality traits: You are ambitious and capable.

Chartreuse Star:

You believe in self-pleasure and gratification. You are motivated to pursue new sources of pleasure and avoid pain for yourself. You seek to enjoy life and gain new pleasant experiences.
Suggested personality traits: You are passionate and indulgent.

Green Star:

You believe in excitement and novelty. You are motivated to pursue adventure and new experiences. You seek new challenges and greater variety.
Suggested personality traits: You are daring and innovative.

Turquoise Star:

You believe in freedom of thoughts and actions. You are motivated to pursue creative endeavors and independent thoughts. You seek your own goals and to explore new ideas.
Suggested personality traits: You are curious and creative.

Cyan Star:

You believe in tolerance and understanding. You are motivated to advance equality and social justice for all. You seek to protect the welfare of people and nature.
Suggested personality traits: You are broad-minded and accepting.

Azure Star:

You believe in being helpful and responsible. You are motivated to enhancing and preserving the welfare of those you have a personal connection with. You seek mature love and true friendship in others.
Suggested personality traits: You are honest and loyal.

Blue Star:

You believe in the reciprocation of favors and stable relationships. You are motivated to ensuring family security and having a sense of belonging. You seek stability for yourself and those close to you.
Suggested personality traits: You are protective and amicable.

Indigo Star:

You believe in honoring parents and elders. You are motivated to restrain actions, inclinations, or impulses likely to upset or harm others. You seek to have self-discipline and to maintain societal expectation and norms.
Suggested personality traits: You are polite and obedient.

Magenta Star:

You believe in accepting traditional customs and religion. You are motivated to being devout and committed. You seek to accept your own portion in life and to take life in moderation.
Suggested personality traits: You are humble and respectful.

Rose Star:

You believe in safety through traditional customs and religion. You are motivated to ensuring the stability of society and your own position within society. You seek to ensure national security and preserve the social order.
Suggested personality traits: You are logical and persuasive.

These would work with divination spells and abilities to detect values, yielding knowledge of them. Protection spells would not work against values, but could work against outerplanar entities or other beings if they are treated as having some sort of energy aura.

[Atarlost]

For starters this is not actually useful with colors. You need to use words whether you're afraid of accidentally making value judgements or not or it's neither readable in text nor useful to anyone without a fair sized collection of colored writing implements.

[shadowmage75]

where's the pink triangle and the bear in leather with a ball gag?

[Mordo the Spaz - Forum Troll]

Yay for Lythande reference!

[Indagare]

Atarlost wrote:

For starters this is not actually useful with colors. You need to use words whether you're afraid of accidentally making value judgements or not or it's neither readable in text nor useful to anyone without a fair sized collection of colored writing implements.

I'm not unaware of this, and frankly I find using the color star thing silly, but I'm not sure what words to use for each of the different values. I'm open to suggestions.

shadowmage75 wrote:

where's the pink triangle and the bear in leather with a ball gag?

I left them in my bag of holding with my Daisy duke shorts, fishnet shirt, and rainbow bracelets.

[Coyote_Ragtime]

Classy. Lol.

I actually really like this idea. The colored star thing is silly, kinda reminds me of kindergarten, but I can see how its necessary to show things on a wheel with opposing values. And symbolically, having a color spectrum would represent moral ambiguity as opposed to the current black and white, good and evil system.

The titles of the various stars arent really an issue, those will come in time. What I suggest is point out some negatives to each value. It seems like red is the only star painted negatively.

[Wildebob]

Interesting. Love the concept. I can see how you are testing the waters with these values. In order for them to be playable, I would want a little more detail on each. At least a full paragraph maybe? I thought the color thing was confusing and weird until Coyote_Ragtime said "color wheel" and it clicked. That's actually pretty cool…although no one is every going to say "I'm playing a character with the chartreuse value. " Some kind of names for the values might go over better. I wouldn't think that saying "I value 'Discipline' or 'Resourcefulness' would be too confining or loaded.

My 2 cp.

[Oceanshieldwolf]

This is not an attempt to derail the thread nor is it criticism for criticism's sake. I'm genuinely interested in the reasoning.

So you advise removing a complex and unsuitable alignment system with an even more complicated system?

Why not just remove any personality/motivation mechanics or codifications altogether? I've never seen the value or need for such an approach. Myers-Briggs, Astrology, Enneagrams. Lotsa fun, but ultimately too specific and unable to adequately quantify or qualify approaches to agency.

How would this help in game?

[Indagare]

Coyote_Ragtime wrote:

I actually really like this idea. The colored star thing is silly, kinda reminds me of kindergarten, but I can see how its necessary to show things on a wheel with opposing values. And symbolically, having a color spectrum would represent moral ambiguity as opposed to the current black and white, good and evil system.

The titles of the various stars arent really an issue, those will come in time. What I suggest is point out some negatives to each value. It seems like red is the only star painted negatively.

Thanks! Well, I was aiming for moral ambiguity, and if red is negative at all, it's a mistake on my part. I was aiming to initially put them as neutral or slightly positive so someone might want to play any of them. But I can add more to each of them to show the faults of that particular value. If you have any suggestions, or see me being particularly negative or positive for any of the others, please let me know.

Wildebob wrote:

Interesting. Love the concept. I can see how you are testing the waters with these values. In order for them to be playable, I would want a little more detail on each. At least a full paragraph maybe? I thought the color thing was confusing and weird until Coyote_Ragtime said "color wheel" and it clicked. That's actually pretty cool…although no one is every going to say "I'm playing a character with the chartreuse value. " Some kind of names for the values might go over better. I wouldn't think that saying "I value 'Discipline' or 'Resourcefulness' would be too confining or loaded.

My 2 cp.

Thanks! *nods* Like I said, I'm open to suggestions on the names. Schwartz used Universalism, Benevolence, Security, Tradition, Conformity, Power, Achievement, Hedonism, Stimulation, and Self-Direction. Some of them would be okay, but things like Benevolence, Conformity, and Hedonism might be a bit loaded. I'm cudgeling my brain for better terms.

Oceanshieldwolf wrote:

This is not an attempt to derail the thread nor is it criticism for criticism's sake. I'm genuinely interested in the reasoning.

So you advise removing a complex and unsuitable alignment system with an even more complicated system?

Why not just remove any personality/motivation mechanics or codifications altogether? I've never seen the value or need for such an approach. Myers-Briggs, Astrology, Enneagrams. Lotsa fun, but ultimately too specific and unable to adequately quantify or qualify approaches to agency.

How would this help in game?

It's not derailing at all. I thought a great deal about it beforehand. I intended them as a help for players new to the game. At the end of the second paragraph I put, "If you already have a good idea about how you want to play your character, you can skip this section entirely." This, I think, is unlike the alignment system.

I want the values to be a help for someone that's new to roleplaying, not as a more complicated system of alignments. Everyone has some motivation for what they do and some kind of personality, but if you're new to playing and aren't sure how you want your character to act, it at least provides a sort of outline until you get the hang of things.

Finally, when it comes to divination spells related to figuring out what someone's motivations are, the system can be used to let the GM know what might be detected in such cases. Does this make sense?

[Oceanshieldwolf]

Sure does. More power to ya. And thanks for answering my query without being ruffled by my possible impertinence.

I bestow upon you a Cyan star with Turquoise, Indigo and Blue tips. With a Green hue rising.

[Oceanshieldwolf]

How would aligned Outsiders fit into this system? Fiends and Celestials spring to mind. Or to put it another way - when alignment mechanics intrude?

[Indagare]

Oceanshieldwolf wrote:

How would aligned Outsiders fit into this system? Fiends and Celestials spring to mind. Or to put it another way - when alignment mechanics intrude?

I haven't quite worked the entire thing out yet, but here are my basic thoughts:

While they'd certainly have motivations like everyone else, what allows them to be warded against (or harmed) is the fact that they're aligned to a given plane. It would be no different than dealing with Outsiders from a given elemental plane.

For instance, someone from Elysium would have a particular energy which would be countered by channeling energy linked to the plane of Hades (and vice versa). In essence, it's like how fire and cold energy act against one another.

So when someone casts something like protection against evil they are channeling the energy of an outer plane that repels and harms creatures aligned with planes opposed to that energy. This doesn't work on ordinary people or creatures at all. Wards against evil protect against outsiders or things corrupted by energy from that outsider plane, not against Primes with malevolent intents (unless, of course, that intent is due to said corruption).

So, for instance, a house is warded against evil. Things from any plane aligned with evil can't get in, but an ordinary murderer could because the murderer is not aligned with the outer plane the ward protects against.

Does this make any sense?

[Wildebob]

My ideas:

Welfare, loyalty, restraint, tradition, order, power, success, pleasure, excitement, independence.

I like the idea of channeling the energy of a specific plane. Pretty cool. But I don't see a reason why positive and negative energy wouldn't still work. Some planes, like Elysium, are powered by positive energy, while others, like Hades, are powered by negative energy. Anyone channeling the power of ANY plane powered by negative energy channels negative energy. Anyone channeling the power of ANY plane powered by positive energy channels positive energy.

I actually totally agree with spells like detect evil or protection from _____ not working on mortals (only outsiders or summoned creatures), unless maybe they're strongly infused with the energy of a plane they serve, like a cleric or paladin. I DO really like the idea of a spell like protection from enemies. It reminds me of the voodoo magic from movies like "Skeleton Key".

@OceanShieldWolf, I actually don't see this system as more complicated than the current alignment system. Yes, you have more options, but you generally just pick one value that's dear to you, MAYBE 2. There no mess with interactions, like how do Good and Law interact, as opposed to Neutral and Law. And within a value, 2 people might go about it in incredibly different ways and be totally within the bounds. That's cool RP, to me! I believe this system more accurately represents the spectrum of human value. Currently, there's "I value life" and "I don't value life." That's it. But that's not really how most people think. Maybe if you truly boiled all human action down far enough, it might come to such a grand dichotomy, but day-to-day people are motivated by much more tangible values.

Anyway, I'm drinking the Kool-Aid here, Indagare. I'll be curious to see how you develop this idea. Keep us posted!

[Coyote_Ragtime]

It could work against ordinary types if you used the logic that all malicious or benevolent intent is planar in origin. You could phrase the spell as Ward Against Malicious Intent. That wouldn't interfere with the values system since no value really leans toward or away from committing actions considered 'evil' or 'good'.

If anything it would make more sense than the current system. A 'good' character healing an 'evil' character is kind of logically spotty, but there's nothing saying a disciplined character couldn't heal a resourceful character.

@Wildebob
Skeleton Key = rad movie.

[Indagare]

Wildebob wrote:

My ideas:

Welfare, loyalty, restraint, tradition, order, power, success, pleasure, excitement, independence.

I like the idea of channeling the energy of a specific plane. Pretty cool. But I don't see a reason why positive and negative energy wouldn't still work. Some planes, like Elysium, are powered by positive energy, while others, like Hades, are powered by negative energy. Anyone channeling the power of ANY plane powered by negative energy channels negative energy. Anyone channeling the power of ANY plane powered by positive energy channels positive energy.

I actually totally agree with spells like detect evil or protection from _____ not working on mortals (only outsiders or summoned creatures), unless maybe they're strongly infused with the energy of a plane they serve, like a cleric or paladin. I DO really like the idea of a spell like protection from enemies. It reminds me of the voodoo magic from movies like "Skeleton Key".

Anyway, I'm drinking the Kool-Aid here, Indagare. I'll be curious to see how you develop this idea. Keep us posted!

Thanks for your suggestions! I included some in the rewrite below. I never said positive and negative energy couldn't work - it'd actually be a fairly simple and elegant solution to the whole outerplanes thing.

Coyote_Ragtime wrote:

It could work against ordinary types if you used the logic that all malicious or benevolent intent is planar in origin. You could phrase the spell as Ward Against Malicious Intent. That wouldn't interfere with the values system since no value really leans toward or away from committing actions considered 'evil' or 'good'.

If anything it would make more sense than the current system. A 'good' character healing an 'evil' character is kind of logically spotty, but there's nothing saying a disciplined character couldn't heal a resourceful character.

Well, a spell of ward against malicious intent would be a very logical way of dealing with any action since it's not the values that are inherently good or evil, but the actions people perform through them. Of course, in theory you could also have a ward against benevolent intent as well.

Yeah, my intention is to try and make something that make more sense than the current system.

Here's the rewrite. Some of the information is similar or the same while other information has changed a lot.

Values:

Every society, and every person within that society, has a basic philosophy of life and what is important to leading a “good life”. These philosophies change from society to society and person to person, but they nonetheless play an important role in how your character views the world. This is not an alignment system. Whether a particular set of values is seen as ‘good’ or ‘evil’ is always dependent on the values of those around the person.

There are ten values presented here to help in the process of character creation. All the values are considered equally valid within the game. Note that these are not all possible values or philosophies, and how strongly and to what end you have your character pursue them is up to you. It is also important to remember that these values are meant only as a guide to roleplaying a character. If you already have a good idea about how you want to play your character, you can skip this section entirely.

The values are set up with a brief paragraph that describes what is important to someone holding that value and a suggested personality which contains descriptors for how your character might behave. The suggested personality traits can be ignored or expanded on.

Types of Values:

How strongly your character believes in a particular value can vary. Some values are so vital to your character that living without them would seem anathema, while others are seen mainly as good ideas but not as life-defining. Because of this, there are three types of values you may have: primary values, secondary values, and tertiary values.
You should start your character with only one value within each category. You may add more, but it’s not a good idea to have more than six values (at that point the character has no strong values).

Primary Values: These are the character’s core values and that character’s basic outlook on life. These could be what the character was raised to value or could be values the character picked up later in life. Violating these values is always a source of extreme discomfort for the character and will cause feelings of remorse, shame, anger, or frustration for a long period of time.

Generally a character has only one primary value. It is okay to have two prime values, but such a duality must be of adjacent values as shown on the table below. In no case should a character have more than two prime values.

If you simply cannot choose among the values, place all values you think your character feels strongly about as secondary values. As you play, it should become obvious which value or values your character favors.

Secondary Values: These are values that the character has picked up in addition to the primary value. The character will adhere to them most of the time. Violating secondary values makes the character unhappy but usually not as distressed as violating primary values, particularly if there’s a good reason for the violation. In general, secondary values are no more than one place removed from the primary values.

Generally a character has no more than two secondary values. It is possible to have three (or more) secondary values, but the more your character has, the greater a chance there will be for conflict or the more likely it is the values are really tertiary.

On rare occasions, secondary values conflict with one another. This generally happens if the character was raised with one set of values but has come to believe in opposing or near-opposing values. Though characters will try to avoid violating primary values, such characters will always feel torn between the conflicting values and constantly wonder whether they made the right choice.

Most often, conflicting secondary values result in there being no primary value at all until the character decides to fully embrace or reject one of the conflicting values.

Tertiary Values: These are values that the character thinks are a generally good idea, though the character may not always adhere to them. Violating them makes the character slightly uncomfortable but never particularly remorseful. They are generally no more than two places away from the primary value.

Tertiary values cannot conflict with primary values. They may conflict with secondary values, but a character will never feel torn when choosing a secondary value over a tertiary one.

Changing Values: There should be no penalty for changing values, but players should be encouraged to have such changes in their character occur gradually over the course of game play. Primary values tend to be the most resilient and least likely to change, but any event that causes characters to question their world view will also cause a prime value to be questioned as well. Secondary values are less resilient, generally changing slowly over time barring life-altering events. Tertiary values are the least resilient and most likely to change over time.

Table of Values:

The table below lists all the values for quick reference as to which are located next to one another as well as which are opposed. Keep in mind that unless your character was raised with an opposing value (and has kept it as a secondary or tertiary value), your character will see its tenants as flawed at best, morally wrong at worst.

Governance<->Success<->Independence<->Indulgence
^-------------------------------------------------------------^
|---------------------------------------------------------------|
v--------------------------------------------------------------v
Tradition-------------------------------------------------Novelty
^-------------------------------------------------------------^
|---------------------------------------------------------------|
v--------------------------------------------------------------v
Restraint<----->Community<----->Security<----->Equity

Governance:

You are able to encourage people to see things your way and to allocate resources decisively. Maintaining a strong public image and having strong connections allows you to maintain social power and wealth. You enjoy having prestige and respect among your peers as well as recognition of your position by others.
Suggested personality traits: Authoritative, Persuasive, Regal, Self-Confident.

Success:

You enjoy demonstrating your competence and always look out for new opportunities whenever they present themselves. Enhancing your skills and challenging yourself gives you a great deal of satisfaction. You like having your skills acknowledged by others even when you don’t claim credit.
Suggested personality traits: Ambitious, Capable, Enthusiastic, Motivated.

Independence:

You are able to take care of yourself very well and you like to ensure that you always have enough. Improving your own welfare and gaining more resources gives you a sense of comfort. You prefer to have great personal wealth and power and you are always looking for ways to gain more.
Suggested personality traits: Crafty, Cunning, Resourceful, Shrewd.

Indulgence:

You enjoy all the good things that life provides and enjoy partaking in them as much as possible. Gaining new sources of personal satisfaction and gratification always interests you. You prefer to avoid anything that makes you feel unhappy or unsatisfied and actively seek out things that make you feel good.
Suggested personality traits: Epicurean, Indulgent, Passionate, Voluptuous

Novelty:

You are able to think independently and to express yourself in different creative ways. Sharing ideas with others and hearing the ideas others have help you to be innovative. You actively try to think of new ways to do something and tend to encourage those around you to think more creatively.
Suggested personality traits: Curious, Daring, Enterprising, Inquisitive

Equity:

You enjoy encouraging others to share their own points of views with you and to understand the merits and flaws of differing traditions and cultures. Protecting the welfare of people and nature are important to you, as is advancing social justice for all. You look for ways to help ensure everyone has equal footing.
Suggested personality traits: Accepting, Broad-minded, Communal, Equianimous

Security:

You are able to appreciate the diversity of those around you while still looking for ways to promote stability within your community. Being able to preserve your community, while also enhancing the welfare of those within it, is important to you. You like to keep people and places safe.
Suggested personality traits: Amicable, Diligent, Just, Protective

Community:

You enjoy having a stable community of family and friends around you who help one another out when times are tough. Helping others and being responsible are important to you, as is having a sense of belonging. You prefer to have good status within your community and are always looking for ways to fit in.
Suggested personality traits: Dependable, Loyal, Observant, Responsible

Restraint:

You are able to restrain actions, inclinations, or impulses likely to upset or harm others. Self-discipline and maintaining societal expectation and norms are important to you. You prefer moderation to excess and dislike displays of wonton excess or indulgences since such excesses often lead to the destruction of society.
Suggested personality traits: Humble, Modest, Obedient, Polite

Tradition:

You enjoy having a stable environment around you. Ensuring the stability of society and your own position within society are important to you. You think that it is important to accept traditional customs and religion since they are the foundations of society. You like to preserve the social order and to take life in moderation.
Suggested personality traits: Courtly, Logical, Orderly, Respectful

Thoughts and suggestions for improvement would be greatly appreciated.

[Coyote_Ragtime]

I like it! Glad you came back, I was starting to worry this idea would fall into a forgotten pit of spiders or something. XD

The game Scion had an idea that I thought was pretty cool. You got to pick from a bunch of different "natures" and if you resolved a situation according to that nature, then you got an action point. For instance, there was one called Bravo, which is a thrill seeker, and whenever they took extreme physical risks and survived, they got an action point. There was also a Trickster, a Gallant, a Pacifist, and a ton more, but they all rewarded role play.

Any chance your system might do something similar? Or would you rather keep gameplay mechanics strictly out of it and make it an entirely out-of-game reference material?

[Indagare]

Coyote_Ragtime wrote:

I like it! Glad you came back, I was starting to worry this idea would fall into a forgotten pit of spiders or something. XD

The game Scion had an idea that I thought was pretty cool. You got to pick from a bunch of different "natures" and if you resolved a situation according to that nature, then you got an action point. For instance, there was one called Bravo, which is a thrill seeker, and whenever they took extreme physical risks and survived, they got an action point. There was also a Trickster, a Gallant, a Pacifist, and a ton more, but they all rewarded role play.

Any chance your system might do something similar? Or would you rather keep gameplay mechanics strictly out of it and make it an entirely out-of-game reference material?

Thanks! I just got busy and it took me longer than expected to rework this.

I could have it do something similar to the action point system. It would reward folks for acting in character during the session, though I'm not sure with what.

I might leave it up to the GM, though - much like with the alternate Hero Points system, the GM could then use the value points system to reward good rping or could keep the system as simply out-of-game reference material.

[Coyote_Ragtime]

I like it! I may implement it or something like it into my games.

[Wildebob]

I like the suggested personality traits. I get pretty into characterization for my PCs and things like that go a long way in helping me to create "round" characters.

Interesting work, Indagare. I like it.

[Indagare]

Coyote_Ragtime wrote:

I like it! I may implement it or something like it into my games.

Thanks! If you do I'd like to know how it's received and how it works out.

Wildebob wrote:

I like the suggested personality traits. I get pretty into characterization for my PCs and things like that go a long way in helping me to create "round" characters.

Interesting work, Indagare. I like it.

Thanks! I like good characterization too, which is why I started developing this to start with. I don't think the current alignment system really allows enough flexibility because it's harder to justify playing an "evil" character that gets along with others.

[Kazaan]

It's interesting but fundamentally over-complicated. First off, it presumes that, even though different societies may value different things (Primary values for Orc society will be drastically different from primary values for Elf society), going against those societal values is inherently a source of shame and frustration. This isn't always the case. In any society, there will be conservatives who view traditions and values as something important and maybe even tangible which should be defended and radicals who think traditions and values hold society back and are a thing to be defeated. There are also liberals in the middle who think the traditions and values have their use, but are tools to accomplish a task rather than ideals to be defended and held to or abandoned and fought. And, if your society values mercy and compassion and non-violence, killing people would be viewed as "evil" while if your society values killing and martial prowess and power, mercy is considered "evil". There may even be some dichotomy in a society that values honorable combat where killing someone dishonorably is evil but letting someone live after honorably defeating them is also evil. Furthermore, if you are the type that eschews your society's values, you'd likely invert their views on good and evil. In the traditional alignment system, an Orc or a Demon is chaotic because they don't hold to predominantly Human societal values. But in a more reasonable view, Orcs who hold to Orcish values would be the equivalent of Lawful in relation to their own values; Murder and rape and pillaging would be good activities in their eyes because that's what Orcs do. By contrast, a Chaotic Orc views murder and rape and pillage as evil acts because they fight against traditional Orc values. Meanwhile the Neutral Orc thinks murder and rape and pillage are tools that can help orc society, but if they become a hindrance, they can be put to the side in favor of more advantageous activities.

Furthermore, there's the idea of Temperament. For those unfamiliar with the work of Carl Jung as a counter-point to the works of Sigmund Freud, here's the short version. For most of human history, our understanding of human psychology was rooted in the idea that there are four kinds of people. They were fundamentally different, driven by different desires and motives and goals and vices; they literally thought differently from one another. Then Freud came along and postulated that there aren't really four different types of people; he claimed there is only one type of person and the illusion of different types was generated by the different ways we try to satisfy the single shared motive that all people share (reproduction in his opinion). Others shared this general idea, though postulated a different motive shared by all humans; Pavlov suggested mere survival while Maslow suggested the abstract "Self Actualization". Others came up with different motives but the common theme is that this is supposed to be a single motive that all people strive to fulfill. Carl Jung was a contemporary of Freud and he took with the existing idea of different types of people, going on to postulate 3 different axes of mental processes and properties that govern the foundation of our personalities; our Temperament. These axes were Introversion vs Extroversion, Objectivity vs Subjectivity, and Intuition vs Perception. Each person has a propensity for one over the other on each axis and, while you can do all of them, your preference makes one side of each axis come easier and more naturally; your default position. While Freudian psychology took strong hold, many overlooked Jungian psychology until recently when others such as Isabella Myers and David Kiersey took the writings and analysed them for the common person to understand. Thus, now, we have from Jung's original theories a set of 4 axes; the original 3 plus an additional that further breaks down the propensity for one axis over another axis. This results in 4 large categories of people which, each, can be sub-divided into 4 more subtle distinctions among the 4 larger types. The four main types of people are Guardians, Artisans, Rationals, and Idealists. Guardians are staunch traditionalists and providers. They value hierarchy, tradition, history, and responsibility. Artisans are dynamic opportunists. They value pleasure and aesthetic and personal benefits and skill mastery. Rationals are intellectuals and analysts. They value objectivity, science, knowledge, and autonomy. Lastly, Idealists are self explanatory in their name. They value subjectivity, emotion, personal connection, and they champion causes. How would each alignment differ in the framework of each of these four temperaments and, conversely, how would each of the four temperaments differ in relation to the alignments. These are the questions that need to be answered in coming up with a better values model. More information on Temperament can be found at www.mypersonality.info, though it uses slightly different terminology from what I used here because my first exposure to the MBTI system was filtered through Kiersey's book Please Understand Me II so I tend to favor his terms for the temperaments.

Regarding the traditional 9 alignments, here's a thought I've come up with, highly abbreviated for you to come to your own conclusions. Replace Lawful/Neutral/Chaotic with Conservative/Liberal/Radical and replace Good/Neutral/Evil with Cooperative/Independent/Competitive. Conservative means holding to your society's values staunchly vs Radicals fighting staunchly against those same ideals while Liberals prefer to take the values that are useful, when they are useful or put them off to the side when they are not applicable. Cooperatives prefer and function best when they can work with others for a common goal while Competitives prefer and function best when they can compete with others for a common goal. Independents, meanwhile, don't like to work with or against others but prefer being unhindered by either mindset in their pursuits.