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So I'd start by saying the Law-Chaos Axis is less well defined than the Good-Evil axis because characters can have vastly different views of what Law is. This is most obviously illustrated in my mind by the noble barbarian archetype; he may not believe in property rights, fighting fairly, or personal hygiene but he will fight to the death to defend the honor of his clan and he always pays his debts. Some parts of that are classically chaotic and some parts are classically lawful. To that end I generally try and avoid the Law-Chaos axis in my games.
For my games I recommend that characters choose an alignment to help them guide their character choices but I don't hold them to it. For characters who have alignment restrictions such as Paladins I would prefer to write out a specific code rather than rely on the somewhat arbitrary alignment system.
For starters,
Similarly, I’m sure that anyone who has been roleplaying for a while will have heard this conversation between a player and a GM:
No. No, I haven't. Is this really that common? It's certainly not in the rules.
Regarding the rest, and the future columns in which you match up your favorite fictional characters with one of the Big Nine: No disrespect intended, I just don't see the point. If the column was about informing players what each alignment means in terms of moral and ethical outlook, it might be relevant. Beyond that, where's the value in discussing where Brock Samson falls on the grid--especially if one believes the grid to be fundamentally unsound?
I guess where I'm going with this is that I'm not certain who the intended audience is, but I'm pretty sure it isn't me.
So I'd start by saying the Law-Chaos Axis is less well defined than the Good-Evil axis because characters can have vastly different views of what Law is. This is most obviously illustrated in my mind by the noble barbarian archetype; he may not believe in property rights, fighting fairly, or personal hygiene but he will fight to the death to defend the honor of his clan and he always pays his debts. Some parts of that are classically chaotic and some parts are classically lawful. To that end I generally try and avoid the Law-Chaos axis in my games.
For my games I recommend that characters choose an alignment to help them guide their character choices but I don't hold them to it. For characters who have alignment restrictions such as Paladins I would prefer to write out a specific code rather than rely on the somewhat arbitrary alignment system.
You see, the major problem with the Law-Chaos spectrum tends to be the players and the GM a lot.
There are a lot of actions that people call "evil" or "good" that are actually more "law" or "chaos", it is just that people tend to equate law with good and breaking the law as evil.
For instance, lays say your party has a rogue. Lets say the rogue stole something of value from a local church, unbeknownst to you. Well when you are leaving town lets say some Paladins ride up to guys with weapons drawn and command you to hand over your rogue. Lets say the paladins were acting in the "typical" "holier-than-thou arrogant butt-wipe stick up the rear" attitude. Well 1) lets say you are barbarian, 2) you don't really like magic and magical things (superstition+Witch Hunter), 3) you got anger problems, and 4) you actually like your rogue, he is a cool guy and helps you pick up chicks at the local pubs. So when this guy strides in all high and mighty and demanding your buddy and acting hostile to you, you do what your clan does best, take it as a sign of a challange and take a swing at the paladin. Lets say you take the Paladin out pretty quick and then high tail it out of there. So, how would you think this act falls in the alignment spectrum?
See the problem is most people would probably put it in the good/evil spectrum because people think 1) Killing is evil 2) Paladins are good so to kill one is obviously an evil act and 3) you broke the law which is an evil thing to do, when in reality, it would probably fall more into the Chaos/law spectrum. There was no animosity or anything here. There was no "killing for gain" or "killing for pleasure" or "killing for the sake of killing." No, it was a matter of personal freedom vs local laws and local standards and traditions vs personal traditions, which would actually firmly put this more in the Law vs Chaos spectrum, the fact that the officer was a Paladin is actually an irrelevent fact.
THAT is the problem that lies in the Law vs Chaos spectrum.. most people cannot divorce their own preconcieved notion that Law and Good are the same and Chaos and Evil are the same.
I agree with your comments Bardarok, and can see how why you ended up removing law/chaos from your game. I also like the way you don't force players to keep to their alignment, which means that the characters can be more 'realistic'. It can feel more natural when the game is run in this way.
See the problem with this is that there are many actions that people would call "evil" which actually have nothing to do with good/evil.
For instance:
lets say You have a Robin Hood-esque character leading a rebellion vs an "oppresive" king. Lets say the farmers and the peasents felt oppressed enough and decide to revolt. Well lets say the king is actually a decent guy, but there is a bigger threat that had been demanding much from his country and he had been working to keep his people sheltered from it. So when the Revolution Leader goes out taking out soldiers and guards "simply doing their duty" to capture strategic locations to help further the cause of "freedom and justice for all" in a simple 1 axis alignment scale he would fall to evil, even though most of the people would actually call him a good guy. In a 2 axis system, he would actually more into the Chaos Side, causing him to become CG vs say the king who is LN.
And if this set up look familiar its because I got it from Fable 3.
Speaking of which, Fable 3 is a perfect example of the problems with only have G/E bar. Building sweat shops and working your people ragged is actually NOT evil. The people may call you evil and a horrid person but technically it is not evil. If anything, institutiong heavy tax systems and strict legal code would actually amke you more LN than anything...
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I've recently started discussing alignment, and would love some more input. We've started looking at the pro's and con's of using alignments, and intend to start looking at each alignment in turn. I would really value your input, and welcome all comments.
http://wp.me/p4QvVz-E
And yes, I know the meme is flawed!
I fixed all of my issues with this link:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/tabletop/checkfortraps/8386-A ll-About-Alignment
We've started looking at the pro's and con's of using alignments, and intend to start looking at each alignment in turn. I would really value your input, and welcome all comments.
Honestly? There is none.
I've only ever used alignments because it is a stat. Spells and features are affected by alignment.
The biggest issue is that people, fictional or otherwise, have to complex of personalities to be defined by nine different alignments. Not to mention all the different interpretations of what alignments are - particularly Law and Chaos. Lawful could be someone who follows the law... Or follows a code of conduct/order. Even something like Evil is entirely subjective.
An assassin, for instance, could be considered either Lawful Neutral (does not enjoy killing, does it as a profession, and follows a strict set of rules about assassination) or Chaotic Evil (does not follow the law, prefers freedom of thought, and is uncaring about murder) and still be the same character with the same personality and character traits.
In my years of gaming, I have never - not even once - seen alignment be used for anything except restricting what both players and GMs can do to tell a story or make characters. If you've been rolling all this time without alignment and have been doing fine, I sincerely suggest you keep on trucking with that.
This website helped me understand every alignment and the subpages for each alignment gives examples of characters with the alignments and further clarifies each alignment.
The pros and cons of having alignment really depend on the group you have. I personally like alignment as it helps me define my characters and gives me a guideline for how they should act.
Alignment is not a straitjacket. You can occasionally do something against your alignment. Obviously you can't go too far but that's why the GM is there. The Paladin can jaywalk from time to time but he can't murder a baby. The line isn't as fuzzy as some people seem to think.
The best games I've played are the ones where the GM didn't care all that much about alignment after character creation. If you have good enough players everything will work out in the end. For example, I was playing a CN Barbarian in a country in the middle of a civil war. I sided against the rebels and with the lawful authority. At first, I just went against the rebels because their plan sucked and I didn't want to waste my time correct their numerous flaws. As I went on I found another, more chaotic reason to side with the Empress: she was a slammin' hottie. We worked out a reasonable compromise with the rebels the Cleric supported and my character married the Empress. My actions were kinda Lawful but also Chaotic enough that my GM didn't have to worry about it.
Really I find alignment most useful for GMs. The guideline the players choose helps you in determine the best situations to challenge them. Having a choice to steal a valuable Macguffin or guard it is not hard for a LG character but for a CN character it could be an opportunity for good roleplay and moving the story along.
The good option in the fable 3 situation? The good option wasn't allowed in game. The good option is to share the information you have with everyone, and see if you can't get them all on board to do something about it.
I thought the good option was paying for everything yourself, out of pocket, because you're everybody's reasonable landlady. Not too dissimilar from what a queen or king was.
So I'd start by saying the Law-Chaos Axis is less well defined than the Good-Evil axis because characters can have vastly different views of what Law is.
Heh...I disagree. Ever read Beyond Good and Evil, by F. Nietzsche?
I'd say there is more consensus among westerners (though not so much between cultures) as to what is good and what is evil, but that doesn't make the consensus correct.
I tend to not use alignment, at all, in my games, and settle alignment-dependent effects like spells and smiting with respect to whether or not they further the agenda of the god(s) served. This means, among other things, that atheist arcane casters only gain the benefits vs. outsiders from magic circles, and I'm willing to live with that.
Lets say you take the Paladin out pretty quick and then high tail it out of there. So, how would you think this act falls in the alignment spectrum?Your example is flawed, and I will get to why in a second. But first:
It's both chaotic and evil.
On the chaos side, you just decided to deliberately and illegally hamper an agent of local law enforcement. So that's chaotic.
On the good-evil side, yes the person being a paladin is irrelevant. The fact that the barbarian used lethal violence as a first resort is evil. No getting round that. If the "taking out" had involved non-lethal damage, or lethal damage applied to unconsciousness and then some healing magic, then there might be grounds for debate. But killing someone because you're essentially to bored to listen to them or pay attention to the notion that they might be in the right? Yes, that's evil. The point where you spontaneously decide that someone else's life is worth less than your convenience - that's evil.
Now onto that flaw. The paladins in your example are supposed to be good, and also lawful. Because that's what paladins are in this system. Note they have an aura of Good, not an aura of Law. Now, approaching a potential criminal and assuming they're guilty - that's probably not lawful (depending on local laws vis-a-vis presumed innocence), but it's not good either. The good approach to a potential criminal is to start by politely asking them to come in for some questioning. Because the good approach has to take into account the possibility that the people you're talking to are innocent and that you're about to waste some of their time with your questions.
Which is why "holier than thou and don't they know it" is not the way to play paladins, or anyone genuinely good. A really good person might or might not be better than you, but they don't want to be - they want you to be just as enlightened. And they're hoping to set a good example so that you become better. Which means not treating you treating you like s*$@.
Except that it is evil because you deem it so.
Like I said in the example. Lets say the barbarian is from a culture of "the strong lead, and if the someone challenges the strong, he is to step up" i.e. "stereo typical barbarian culture". The Paladin being aggressive would be a challenge to the barbarian and the barbarian simply answered his challange. Additionally, barbarians are well known (well the "stereo typical culture" ones) to be very protective of those they deem "part of the clan" from outsiders. Having a random dude coming up trying to take him away would be an affront to the barbarian. And what rightful barbarian would use "non-lethal" means of his weapon to a challenger? You are applying your own personal views of good vs evil on the law vs chaos axis.
As for the Paladin's approach, that is not quite correct either. There are many common examples of the "Holier-than-thou" paladin and Paladins do not necessarily need to be nice. Note also how I said the Rogue stole an item from the Church. That would be a personal affront to the Paladin as well. What you are saying is the POLITE approach, but POLITENESS and rudeness have absolutely nothing to do with "Good vs evil" in fact, that is another classic example of "law vs chaos", but its a very minor example (like saying you are "evil" for tipping a waitress only 3% vs the more standard
10%"). There is nothing wrong with the Paladin's approach.
The "good" approach does not need to assume one is innocent. Have you not read some of the right ups of the celestials? Who are the PHYSICAL EMBODIMENT of their alignment. Many of the LG ones are the shining example (no pun intended) of the stick up the rear, arrogant, know-it-alls who are the first to condemn a person.
As for the whole "trying to enlighten them" that is not entirely correct either. Sure, mayne that may be the case, but that is not the only way to play LG. There is also the "Punish the evil to stomp out evil" approach than many Archons and such use. And Paladins IF ANYONE are NOTORIOUS for playing "Lawful stupid" or "Stick in the arse stuck up".
Granted, it may not be the best attitude FOR A PARTY SETTING (because you will quickly piss off everyone else) but in a real world setting, it is not uncommon.. at all.
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5ed does interesting stuff with alignments.
Creatures created by the gods of good or neutral alignments are effectively left to make their choices. Their general alignments could be anything, and could indeed change throughout their lifetime.
The evil type gods though, they refuse to allow their creations that type of freedom, so their races are pretty much the alignment of the gods. It's possible for some to break free, buts a constant struggle against their basic nature.
In this situation, trying to put your own real life slant on what is and isn't evil is meaningless. We don't have gods directly intervening in our lives and natures like we see in DnD or Pathfinder.
Interestingly, 5ed also changed things like smite evil and detect evil etc to only work against undead and outsiders. Mechanically wise, it's a much better system balance wise for alignments. Worth reading and possibly pilfering for your own games if Pathfinder style alignment doesn't work for you.
Cheers