The minimum requirements of each alignment?

[Jon_Dahl]

The thing about alignments is that few agree with each other on how should they be played. Since everyone has a different view, maybe it would be best just agree what would be the absolutely minimum requirement of each alignment. Anything that doesn't go within that description is not a reason to change alignment. Let's call this "the Alignment for Dummies".

Here's my take:

All lawfuls: Lawful characters should only make serious commitments, unless there is a lot to gain from cheating or oath-breaking. In addition, they must follow the same restriction as Neutral (something). If a lawful character makes frivolous commitments without being forced to do so, the alignment will change.

Neutral (something): Must follow common rules when it suits him/her. If the character doesn't follow common rules with common sense like normal people, the alignment will change.

All chaotics: Must display selfish and uncaring attitude for the opinion of others in matters of opinion. Conforming without argument to the wishes of others is not chaotic. Maybe good friends and family members could be excluded from this. After all, chaotic characters are not consistent.

Good: If a good characters doesn't have anything urgent at the moment regarding their own or family's well-being, he/she must answer the call if others are in danger and helping is not too difficult or risky. Not volunteering to use spare resources to help others in danger is not good. In addition, he/she must follow the same restriction as (something) Neutral.

(something) Neutral: Must avoid threatening or hurting innocent people. Must use common sense when dealing with other people. Treating people more generously or crueler than is expected from an average person is not neutral.

Evil: This one is hard... I guess helping people with little to gain and plenty of lose is not evil and would merit an alignment change.

Things like cowardy, womanizing, bad mouthing, greed, conflicting cultural issues etc. etc. are not themselves reasons for alignment change in any category.

[Clistenes]

Monte Cook uses a gradation for Evil/Good and Chaos/Law:

Level of Good
1 Doesn’t like to see bad things happen to others
2 Helps others occasionally, particularly friends
3 Willing to help strangers on occasion
5 Gives of himself to help others, whether it be time, money, possessions, or something else
7 Takes concepts like purity, innocence, and other higher principles very seriously
8 Would sacrifice anything, even his life, for others in a heartbeat
9 Refuses to harm anything or anyone, even if it brings misfortune or death on himself

Level of Evil
-1 Finds joy in the misfortune of others, but usually wouldn’t act to hurt others
-2 Willing to cause others pain or misfortune to better himself
-3 Actively enjoys lying, stealing, and inflicting pain on others
-4 Willing to cause harm even to friends to get ahead
-5 Willing to kill to better himself
-7 Will kill for the sheer pleasure of bringing pain and death to others
-9 Hates life, goodness, and light and does everything in his power to destroy them

Level of Law
1 Generally tries to keep his promises and, when in doubt, follows the rules
2 Has a set of guidelines he generally lives by
3 Genuinely respects authority figures for their positions
4 Willing to see one person killed or hurt if it helps large numbers of people
5 Willing to follow a code or a strict set of principles even if it brings misfortune on himself
8 Would be willing to see many people harmed or killed if it helped society as a whole
9 Follows a set path in such an orderly manner that it risks blind self-destruction. Despises and fears individuality.

Level of Chaos
-1 A bit of a nonconformist or free spirit
-2 Will lie if it suits him, hates to be ordered around
-3 Disorganized but extremely easygoing
-5 Rejects the idea of majority rule
-6 Would prefer anarchy to any other form of organization
-7 Occasionally destroys things in reckless abandon
-9 Hates structure and order so much that destruction for its own sake becomes desirable

An individual needs a level of at least 2 or -2 to be considered Good/Evil/Lawful/Chaotic. Somebody with a level 1 of Good or Law or a level -1 of Evil or Chaos registers as Neutral to all alignment-detecting spells and effects.

[Maginomicon]

The main problem I've seen with a lot of these alignment description discussions is that they focus on what you do instead of why you do it.

Everyone is different, with different standards for acts of morality between cultures and from person to person (as evidenced by the fact that this thread even exists). Furthermore, "the gods" in D&D are essentially the ultimate arbiters of what good and evil are, are capable of supreme understanding and leniency, and they essentially determine where the soul goes after death (see the pact primeval (http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaign/lords-of-darkness/wikis/the-pact-primeval), Fiendish Codex II page 4).

I've found one penultimate way around this problem: make it about why you do it instead of what you do (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=283341).

NOTE: Be sure to read the Real Alignments theory article (http://easydamus.com/alignmentreal.html).

[undead hero]

The problem most people have is that they don't get that Alignment in the game is not subjective and is a "real world force".

An evil action is always evil. Murdering a goblin child is just as bad as murdering an elven child.

Calling an evil creature is an evil act, even if you cast the spell to save someone from an evil dragon.

Way to many people think that their alignment is based on what they think their character is and not what their character does or based on the rules as written.

[KillianHawkeye]

Monte Cook uses a gradation for Evil/Good and Chaos/Law:

You appear to be missing a few numbers, or are not every number on every chart?

[Clistenes]

You appear to be missing a few numbers, or are not every number on every chart?

I have copied what numbers were given in the chart. If you want to create a character with a alignment level in between, you just have to figure it out (it shouldn't be difficult).

Anyways, your average Paladin is Lawful 5 / Good 5. Anybody with a alignment score above 5 is abnormal, a martyr, or a monster, or insanely fanatic, or just insane.

[Raven777]

I like the Monte Cook gradation, but I find it fails to deal with things like "is fine with raising the dead". Would a caster creating undead out of practicality count as Chaotic (Any) because he couldn't care less about society's taboos against it? Then, why is dead raising necromancy classified as Evil instead?

[Amnestic]

4 Willing to see one person killed or hurt if it helps large numbers of people


:smallconfused: Utilitarianism falls on the Lawful-Chaotic axis?

[Clistenes]

:smallconfused: Utilitarianism falls on the Lawful-Chaotic axis?

It's a individuality vs colectivity thing. When having to choose between hurting many people against a single one, a lawful person is supposed to believe that logic dictates that the good of many is more important than the good of a few, while a chaotic person would think that numbers don't matter and that nobody should be sacrificed for the good of the majority. It's an extension of the "chaotic" (in D&D terms) belief that your personal opinion/desires/values weigh more than the ones of the whole society.

I guess an evil enough person wouldn't care either way or would just take the option that hurts more people, just for the lulz (but, if asked about a purely hypothetically situation, he/she would say that the option more coherent with his/her position in the chaos/law axis is the best).


I like the Monte Cook gradation, but I find it fails to deal with things like "is fine with raising the dead". Would a caster creating undead out of practicality count as Chaotic (Any) because he couldn't care less about society's taboos against it? Then, why is dead raising necromancy classified as Evil instead?

Depending on the source, it's because it traps and warps the soul of the individual, turning him/her into an evil mockery. For mindless/souless undead it would be because it brings to existence am evil destructive source that wants to destroy life (zombies and skeletons attack living beings unless told to not do so).

I guess that if somebody created a spell that made skeletons who wanted to hug puppies instead of strangling them, that spell would be Good.

[Rosstin]

That Monte Cook chart is great, I wish more of my groups had seen that. People don't seem to get that not everyone is strongly aligned to an alignment.

[cerin616]

Uh, realistically, alignment is not a set of shackles. it does not dictate what you do, and what you do doesn't even necessarily define your alignment.

Your alignment is supposed to be a philosophical view of your character.

Good VS Evil

Is your character good? then he is more likely to put others before himself. He is more likely to show mercy, to give altruistically, to help others even at cost to themselves.

an evil character is more likely to put himself before others. They can be greedy and manipulative. they could even be evil so far as to enjoy the torture of others.

Neutrality tends to care about its self, and others as long as it isnt detrimental to themselves. they wont go out of their way to help people as much as a good character, but they also wont sacrifice others to benefit themselves.

Law VS Chaos

As regards to law vs chaos, this is generally how your character goes about meeting his goals.

A lawful character feels that law is what is the best tool in which to gain their means. a lawful good character feels that law is what will bring the best out in people, while lawful evil feels that manipulating laws is the best way to achieve wealth or power.

Chaotic characters fear or hate placing restrictions upon themselves. While they may follow law when they must, they refuse to accept a code in which to limit their actions. A chaotic good character, for isntance, will not regard a law that is designed to harm others, or will sometimes ignore a good law if it protects evil. Chaotic evil may follow laws when it is beneficial for them, but they dont care about breaking laws in order to gain what they want.

neutrality, again, can go either way. They feel that there should be balance between law and chaos to gain their ends. They recognize that not all laws need to be followed, but are willing to set limitations on themselves.

The big thing to realize here is that an evil act does not make you evil. regularly committing evil acts however, will eventually shift your alignment. It takes a seriously vile act to shift your alignment from good to evil.

in the same breath, evil characters regularly commit good acts to keep others from recognizing their evil.

Honestly there shouldnt be a regulation on alignment, but instead people should be able to recognize good vs evil, and use discretion in their decision making, and the dm should be able to recognize how their players behave and if their characters are strictly good or evil.

[Jon_Dahl]

I find it rather amusing when some people say that what you think dictates alignment and not what you do. DMG specifically says this:
"If a player says 'My neutral good character becomes chaotic good,' the appropriate response from you is 'Prove it.'."
You can find all this from the page 134.
For the good DMs worth their die, your opinions about the alignment of your character are worthless. What do you do in the game is all there is to it.

[Phelix-Mu]

I find it rather amusing when some people say that what you think dictates alignment and not what you do. DMG specifically says this:
"If a player says 'My neutral good character becomes chaotic good,' the appropriate response from you is 'Prove it.'."
You can find all this from the page 134.
For the good DMs worth their die, your opinions about the alignment of your character are worthless. What do you do in the game is all there is to it.

I can't type "+1" in large enough font.

This is more broadly true in all morality stuff. Words and theories are cheap. Actions define a person, not their thoughts, not their wishful thinking. Few things in the world are more subjective than the thoughts in a person's mind, and they have no bearing on an objective morality system, like the Alignment system that D&D establishes.

Which brings me to my point on the OP. A character starts with their starting alignment, theoretically based on whatever actions from the character's backstory impacted alignment. Until the character starts doing stuff in the campaign, there are no grounds for the DM to change anyone's alignment. Moreover, alignment should pretty much never change as a result of a single action (unless it's something epically iconic of a certain alignment...even then, I'd be tempted to only shift it a few steps).

I view Alignment as a composite sketch composed of the sum total of a character's actions in the campaign. Do good people commit Evil acts? Most surely. But the good people try not to, and when they do, they try to grapple with the evil, try to atone/repent, seek forgiveness, and the like. Do evil people do Good things? Sure, and then they turn around and sell their neighbors' kids, torture animals, and laugh at the suffering they cause.

[3WhiteFox3]

Ok, so if a good character commits an evil act with good intentions (such as calling a demon to assassinate a malevolent dictator). Then would an evil character performing a good act for evil purposes, (like saving hundreds of people, but only for the sake of his own ego or so he can gain power later) be a good act? If it's all about what you do, and not why you do it, then it should be.

I'm not arguing either way, but it is an interesting concept.

[TuggyNE]

Ok, so if a good character commits an evil act with good intentions (such as calling a demon to assassinate a malevolent dictator). Then would an evil character performing a good act for evil purposes, (like saving hundreds of people, but only for the sake of his own ego or so he can gain power later) be a good act? If it's all about what you do, and not why you do it, then it should be.

Yes it would. Of course, most evil characters can get away with doing good acts once in a while, much like good characters can lapse into the occasional evil deed without losing alignment.

[Curmudgeon]

I think the minimum requirement for Good (as opposed to merely nice enough) alignment is that the character go out of their way to help others. That doesn't mean just tossing pocket change at poor people, but giving enough of their time and gp to matter. I think at least a 10% gp tithe and 10% of the character's time helping others, with no reward for the character, is the minimum. Seeking out missions to fight bad guys, but keeping all the treasure, is not Good alignment; rather, it's entirely selfish and the alignment of the foes is irrelevant. Killing bad guys for their treasure is exactly the same as killing good guys for their treasure, or any other adventure based on a financial motive. That's either Neutral Evil or at least Neutral Greedy.

[Amnestic]

It's a individuality vs colectivity thing. When having to choose between hurting many people against a single one, a lawful person is supposed to believe that logic dictates that the good of many is more important than the good of a few, while a chaotic person would think that numbers don't matter and that nobody should be sacrificed for the good of the majority. It's an extension of the "chaotic" (in D&D terms) belief that your personal opinion/desires/values weigh more than the ones of the whole society.


I'm not really sure I agree with Cook's reasoning for that one - I'd rather he find an alternative for that area. That said, it's really my only major complaint with the system, so it's not all that bad.

[killem2]

Calling an evil creature is an evil act, even if you cast the spell to save someone from an evil dragon.



Not if you are arcane.


Yes, they can. Wizards themselves said that clearly in Expedition to the Demonweb Pits, on page 98. I quote the relevant part.


(Remember that wizards of any alignment can cast spells with the evil descriptor without ill effects.)

The spell in question is dread word, which, iirc, allows you to use the very Dark Speech. It doesn't get any more evil than that. And yet, as said by WotC themselves, a lawful good wizard can cast it without repercussion. Sure, the spell effect itself will probably effect him, but not the fact that he is casting an [Evil] spell.

[cerin616]

The alignment system is really challenging just because of some thigns people have said here.

The best thing I can say to define alignment is to read the book of exaulted deeds sections "The nature of good" and then read the book of vile darkness section "The nature of evil"

There are a lot of tough moral issues it brings up, such as how do we define that an evil character is redeemed? how many times will good show mercy to his enemy, only to watch him escape?

When is it okay to lie?

It is really interesting, as the books seem to describe that to be truely good in alignment, you need to not only have good intentions, but to perform good acts with good intentions. A good character will always show mercy, even knowing that it may lead to the enemy escape, that a good character will never lie (they are allowed to dodge the truth of course, but not outright lie) even if its for the greater good.

Evil doesn't have that issue. An evil character can perform as many good acts as he wants with the intention of wreaking havoc. Look at the politician who shows all these good qualities as he climbs the social ladder, only to bend the people to his will when he finally controls everything.