"IM EVIL!" and other alignment things that annoy me.

[Xuldarinar]

I was just thinking about the alignment system and I just wanted to share a few gripes I have with it and how it relates to a couple different things.


1. Alignment Knowledge: Lets be honest, how many people are going to say they are evil, or even recognize that they are evil? What is evil anyways? One culture may deem something unholy, malevolent, evil.. where another may exalt the very same action or simply be ambivalent to it. Lets face it, given the wrong DM a male paladin might risk falling for kissing another man, or using their left hand predominantly.

2. Deity Knowledge: In two senses this bothers me. The presumption that most/all individuals in a setting know what we do regarding a deity, which may just be a perception of mine (Asmodeus? Everyone knows Asmodeus! He's of evil and law and rules hell, and .ect.), but also how deities define themselves. For instance, would Rovagug know they are evil? What about Zon-kuthon? Any of the prominent demon lords? Would even Asmodeus go "Hi, I am evil."? Somehow, I doubt this. They have their way of seeing the universe, favor certain qualities in individuals, and work towards their specific ends. Tying back into #1, would the cultists devoted to an evil deity believe that their patron is evil? If we were to use the Greco-roman deities, unless I am failing my Knowledge (religion) check; Aphrodite/Venus and Artemis/Diana could have the same individual register as opposite alignments, one telling me to kill them and the other telling me not to simply over whether or not they ever 'got lucky'.

3. Antipaladins: This is a matter not dissimilar to #1, but I felt it deserved its own spot. Now I like the themes of many of the evil classes and powers, but I am a tad strange in that, and really wouldn't do the deeds they require. Now, ignoring the stupidity of the name for a moment, consider this; Lets say I make a deal with a demon for power, or I am trained from a young age to be a sort of knight, and I am given a code of conduct (something inherently Lawful in nature, but i have to be chaotic evil). One; Who or what cares if I decided to save a kitten from a tree? If I am furthering their agenda with the majority of my actions, it shouldn't matter if I do selfless things from time to time. If it doesn't get in the way, who cares? In fact, why should it care about my alignment and conduct at all, so long as I do as they want? My soul should be going to them regardless. If we rationalize all actions are selfish on some level, then.. what can't an antipaladin do? The code becomes pointless. Two; Impose tyranny? Outside of the hypothetical I know that this would make me drift towards LE and cause me to fall, something that is counterproductive. Inside of this, I'd have to wonder why explicitly imposing tyranny is a requirement of mine to keep my newfound power. Third; Associates. So if I am in a party and an orphanage is burning down, not only am I not allowed to go in and help unless I come up with a reason this specifically benefits me besides not bestowing a burden upon my conscious, I have to actively prevent them from running into the building to help? And fourth; I have to be basically aware that what I am making a deal with is evil and what I am doing is wrong, because being ignorant of that and maintaining the class is very difficult apparently, and at all times hence forth I have to be a prick to keep my powers which primarily pertain to killing good people. How does this help me one bit? If I murder everyone in the orphanage and bump off the charity organization in town, I get nothing out of the deal except being better at killing that nice elderly couple a few doors over. A fighter gets more than that. Sure, I could take down an angel, but why would I want to? Principle? Do I get these abilities because I really don't like that one paladin that came into town? Was I a cleric's son and decided to rebel and now feel committed to it? Was I raised to think feathered wings mean something should die, and holding the door open for someone else is an offense that corrupts the soul of both the person holding it open and the person who accepts it?



..Thats all. I just, felt like typing a bit of a rant. I can contemplate a antipaladin who doesn't think they are evil, but.. the setting and how things are written make it difficult.

[Zanos]

The default settings are such that Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos are real, primal forces.

1. The majority of people aren't significantly invested in the churning of the outer planes. It is unlikely that the greedy merchant who lets people starve to fatten his coinpurse recognizes or flaunts that he is capital E Evil, it's just a consequence of how he conducts his life. I suspect the only people who advertise their allegiance to Evil are those who are truly invested in it. Likely clerics of Evil powers. Culture has very little to do with whether or not one is Evil or not. The laws of the planes are not subjective to one's cultures, like it or not.

2. I would suspect everyone has some inkling to the behavior of the greatest of the gods. While they might not recognize a minor deity, Asmodeus is a major enough power in most settings that many individuals are familiar on a passing level with who he is, although perhaps not the particulars of his dogma. As far as "Hi I am Evil" goes, I don't see how they couldn't recognize it. Evil powers are champions and living embodiments both of the very concept of Evil.

3. An anti-paladin is essentially charged with the task of bringing more cosmic Evil and Chaos into the material plane. So yes, stopping to rescue a kitten from a tree goes directly against what they have been charged with, as minor as it is. I do agree the class is not very well written, though.

Pretty much all your issues trace back to the fact that alignment is not considered a subjective idea under the core system assumptions. You can (and probably should) change that for your games. I am not personally a fan of objective alignments.

[bahamut920]

I usually dump alignment for non-outsider races and declare that alignment (and alignment-based effects) don't function on creatures without an alignment subtype. If this ends up making a class useless (like paladins, so heavily focused on smiting evil), I alter class features to compensate. Paladins simply get the Destruction domain's Smite ability, are fluffed as holy warriors who fight for the churches of their deities, and must strictly follow their deity's dogma to retain their powers. This allows for paladins of Kord, Hextor, and Erythnul without requiring a separate class per alignment. As for abilities like Lay on Hands, well, even an Evil church can understand and accept the benefits healing magic brings to their warriors. Evil isn't necessarily stupid. Obviously, this change means that there aren't any more alignment restrictions on classes.

For sapient races, morality is subjective and they generally go to the plane of the deity they follow (and since most campaign settings have active deities, I rule that most creatures tend to worship a deity, and atheism, agnosticism, misotheism, and distheism are all rare). If they don't follow a deity, they end up on the Outlands (or wherever the equivalent is for the setting; FRCS has a place specifically for atheists, and it isn't fun).

[Slayer Lord]

I think part of the problem is that 1st Edition when black and white morality was still the vast majority in writing (particularly like in Lord of the Rings), so Gygax and the other early writers had this Cosmic Good vs Cosmic Evil thing, which apparently translates to alignment being objective even in people's daily lives. ESPECIALLY in novelizations (I'm looking at you Salvatore, Hickman, and Weis). And for whatever writers of later editions have neglected to evolve beyond this. The paladin code and antipaladin code are the biggest examples of this older mindset, since in each case we are given a list of things which are objectively good and objectively evil, and you absolutely must or absolutely cannot do these things, hence why the paladin gets such a bad rap. Yes, later editions and Pathfinder have tried to make alignment a little more subjective in terms of "This is how you play this alignment," but there's still a lot of the old Gygax mindset behind it, I think.

One of the things I like about Pathfinder is how in Inner Sea Gods, gods with a compatible alignment to paladins and antipaladins have a list of suggestions for them to use for their code, and tries to explain the why of it, within the context of that deity's personality.

Treating alignment as unrigidly objective to the point that characters know they are evil and are open about it, is very silly. This is why my group prefers to treat alignment as a guideline for a character's personality. We've had a lawful evil cleric of Hades who was trying to perform a coup on his father because his old man was a self-serving tyrant and thought he could do better, and had a genuinely loving relationship with his mother and the party's fighter; and he was one of the most interesting characters our group has even seen.


If they don't follow a deity, they end up on the Outlands (or wherever the equivalent is for the setting; FRCS has a place specifically for atheists, and it isn't fun).

Now see, I've always wondered how you can have a genuine atheist in a DnD world when you have clerics performing miracles, and demons and godly avatars running around all over the place. Especially in Forgotten Realms. I thought everyone had to be attached to a deity in some way or another. Sure, I can see someone being an agnostic- "those so-called gods are just another super powered immortal"- but not outright deny they exist.

[Slayer Lord]

Sorry, doubleposted

[Pex]

You're falling into the trap of relativism. The game specifically defines what is Good and what is Evil. It is irrelevant how an Evil creature views his ways of going things. He can think it all Proper and Right as he sees fit. What he's doing is still Evil, and that's what makes him Evil.

[hamishspence]

Now see, I've always wondered how you can have a genuine atheist in a DnD world when you have clerics performing miracles, and demons and godly avatars running around all over the place. Especially in Forgotten Realms. I thought everyone had to be attached to a deity in some way or another. Sure, I can see someone being an agnostic- "those so-called gods are just another super powered immortal"- but not outright deny they exist.

3.0 Deities & Demigods said that those who "actively oppose the worship of the gods" are the ones that get the Wall of the Faithless.


So, if you go around saying "Stop worshipping those beings" - that's what awaits you.


The FRCS definition was a bit different - saying it was those who paid lip service to them without truly believing in them, that suffered that fate.

I think the former makes more sense.

[Slithery D]

In a world of objective Good and Evil the terms would lose their connotations of an association with "right" and "wrong."

Good would just be doing charitable or helpful acts, but it wouldn't be "right" to a neutral or evil person who thought they were wasting time and resources on parasites or failures who deserve what they've brought on themselves. Evil would be hurting people (at least sometimes) to get what you want, but that would be entirely "right" to Evil people who had justifications for doing it.

[Slayer Lord]

3.0 Deities & Demigods said that those who "actively oppose the worship of the gods" are the ones that get the Wall of the Faithless.


So, if you go around saying "Stop worshipping those beings" - that's what awaits you.


The FRCS definition was a bit different - saying it was those who paid lip service to them without truly believing in them, that suffered that fate.

I think the former makes more sense.

I see. That makes more sense. Well, the second one makes sense too, just not in FR. Thanks for clearing that up.

[Spore]

..Thats all. I just, felt like typing a bit of a rant. I can contemplate a antipaladin who doesn't think they are evil, but.. the setting and how things are written make it difficult.

If you tie good and evil to the more common "altruistic" and "selfish" and remove the moral meaning of good and evil alignment you actually get a somewhat reasonable evil character. If you likewise tie law and chaos to the more common "just" and "opportunistic" I feel alignment debates become a lot more clear.

A Paladin is then a just and altruistic warrior of the Light. He should strife for what benefits the community the most, and care about fair solutions. On the polar opposite, an Antipaladin should strife for what benefits only himself, and care about exploiting the situation to his biggest advantage. An Antipaladin saving kids from a burning house would not loose his powers without context. Just as a Paladin should not fall for executing a murderer without trial before he can kill his next victim.

Paladins and Antipaladins are rare anyways (not from a player perspective but from a perspective of world building) so a god would not drop his champions just because they feel like it...well maybe an Antipaladin will be dropped out of the blue when he isn't useful anymore, best timed during a standoff with a Paladin, removing who could have a grudge left onto the god's clergy.

[Red Fel]

I know I wasn't summoned - and shame on you all for failing in your obligation to do so - but I'm going to jump in here anyway.

For my own amusement, if nobody else's.


1. Alignment Knowledge: Lets be honest, how many people are going to say they are evil, or even recognize that they are evil? What is evil anyways? One culture may deem something unholy, malevolent, evil.. where another may exalt the very same action or simply be ambivalent to it. Lets face it, given the wrong DM a male paladin might risk falling for kissing another man, or using their left hand predominantly.

As others have said, Evil is an objective and cosmically-recognizable force in D&D. You can point to Evil the same way you can point to a cat, the color red, or me, and say "That is a cat," "That is red," or "Please don't cut off my finger for pointing at you, Mighty Red Fel, I am weak and foolish." It's a concrete thing.

Moral relativism - the idea that what is evil (little e) to one person may be good (little g) to another - doesn't apply in such a world. By the rules of the game's reality, Evil (big E) and Good (big G) are concrete, tangible concepts, fairly rigidly defined. Now, how the DM interprets them creates its own set of issues, but that's a problem of a morally relativistic DM attempting to translate arbitrary game morality into subjective real-life morality, and we can't really get into that. But within the reality of the game world, the concepts are clear and discrete.

That said, you do touch on one thing - "How many people are going to say they are Evil?" I don't think people generally use terms like that. The word "Evil," even in the arbitrary morality sense, is negatively charged - there's no positive or praising way to say it. "Splendid work, keep up the Evil," just doesn't make sense.

In my mind, people use the concepts the alignment terms encompass. Instead of praising someone as Lawful, they recognize his sense of honor, his ability to keep promises, his virtue and his code. Instead of acknowledging a person's Chaos, they laud her free spirit, her independent thought, her passion and her drive. And instead of cheering a person's Evil, we learn to respect them for their strength, their ambition, their ruthless determination and single-minded drive. These are positive qualities encompassed within the word Evil, and often praiseworthy. These, in my mind, are the words that people in the arbitrary morality game world use.


2. Deity Knowledge: In two senses this bothers me. The presumption that most/all individuals in a setting know what we do regarding a deity, which may just be a perception of mine (Asmodeus? Everyone knows Asmodeus! He's of evil and law and rules hell, and .ect.), but also how deities define themselves. For instance, would Rovagug know they are evil? What about Zon-kuthon? Any of the prominent demon lords? Would even Asmodeus go "Hi, I am evil."? Somehow, I doubt this. They have their way of seeing the universe, favor certain qualities in individuals, and work towards their specific ends. Tying back into #1, would the cultists devoted to an evil deity believe that their patron is evil? If we were to use the Greco-roman deities, unless I am failing my Knowledge (religion) check; Aphrodite/Venus and Artemis/Diana could have the same individual register as opposite alignments, one telling me to kill them and the other telling me not to simply over whether or not they ever 'got lucky'.

First off, that presumption is just that - a presumption. Even with deities exercising very real power in the material world, it's doubtful that every NPC has even a basic understanding of deities beyond their extremely limited personal experience. Your average farmer will likely be familiar with the popular local deities, plus a few deities involved in agriculture, health, and prosperity, and that's about it.

Second, as stated above, Good and Evil in an arbitrary morality system are concrete and constant. An Evil deity knows that s/he is Evil. However, also as stated above, I don't think they'd express it that way. Asmodeus would self-describe as Lawful first, for instance, but even then he wouldn't use that terminology - he might say "Ruthlessly legalistic," or "Principled to a fault." Demons would describe themselves as "powerful," "brutal," and "dangerous," much of which tends towards the E, but rarely would they use the word itself.

Similarly, cultists of an Evil deity, assuming they are aware of their deity, are likely aware that their patron is Evil. That's not to say they can't be tricked into thinking they're serving something else, but generally the religious practices are a giveaway - most rituals dedicated to Good deities involve acts of selflessness and compassion, and most dedicated to Evil deities involve brutality and sacrifice. So if you're slicing open puppies, chances are you know your deity isn't on the side of the Archons.


3. Antipaladins: This is a matter not dissimilar to #1, but I felt it deserved its own spot. Now I like the themes of many of the evil classes and powers, but I am a tad strange in that, and really wouldn't do the deeds they require. Now, ignoring the stupidity of the name for a moment, consider this; Lets say I make a deal with a demon for power, or I am trained from a young age to be a sort of knight, and I am given a code of conduct (something inherently Lawful in nature, but i have to be chaotic evil). One; Who or what cares if I decided to save a kitten from a tree? If I am furthering their agenda with the majority of my actions, it shouldn't matter if I do selfless things from time to time. If it doesn't get in the way, who cares? In fact, why should it care about my alignment and conduct at all, so long as I do as they want? My soul should be going to them regardless. If we rationalize all actions are selfish on some level, then.. what can't an antipaladin do? The code becomes pointless. Two; Impose tyranny? Outside of the hypothetical I know that this would make me drift towards LE and cause me to fall, something that is counterproductive. Inside of this, I'd have to wonder why explicitly imposing tyranny is a requirement of mine to keep my newfound power. Third; Associates. So if I am in a party and an orphanage is burning down, not only am I not allowed to go in and help unless I come up with a reason this specifically benefits me besides not bestowing a burden upon my conscious, I have to actively prevent them from running into the building to help? And fourth; I have to be basically aware that what I am making a deal with is evil and what I am doing is wrong, because being ignorant of that and maintaining the class is very difficult apparently, and at all times hence forth I have to be a prick to keep my powers which primarily pertain to killing good people. How does this help me one bit? If I murder everyone in the orphanage and bump off the charity organization in town, I get nothing out of the deal except being better at killing that nice elderly couple a few doors over. A fighter gets more than that. Sure, I could take down an angel, but why would I want to? Principle? Do I get these abilities because I really don't like that one paladin that came into town? Was I a cleric's son and decided to rebel and now feel committed to it? Was I raised to think feathered wings mean something should die, and holding the door open for someone else is an offense that corrupts the soul of both the person holding it open and the person who accepts it?

Antipaladins... I've expressed this sentiment before. They don't make sense. Antipaladin is basically just defined as "the opposite of a Paladin." And I take issue with things that are defined in the negative, because that tells me that this is a thing that is lacking in its own unique merits.

Now, with respect to an LE Paladin-equivalent, that's a different story. Your typical Antipaladin is simply an inversion of everything that makes a Paladin a Paladin. An LE Paladin-equivalent is a Paladin, but dedicated to Evil as a Paladin is dedicated to Good. And that can work for me, conceptually, if played well. Instead of being a beacon of hope and strength, this character becomes a symbol of severity and subjugation. As such, yeah, rescuing a kitten from a tree is a problem, because it shatters the image the character needs to cultivate. But again, separate issue.


..Thats all. I just, felt like typing a bit of a rant. I can contemplate a antipaladin who doesn't think they are evil, but.. the setting and how things are written make it difficult.

Ultimately, the only way an Antipaladin can think of himself as non-Evil is if he is insane, or profoundly dim and being tricked by a dark power. Paladins' powers come from their convictions; for him to take such a 180 alignment-wise is to abandon those convictions, which means that by all rights he should expect to have lost his powers. Only a truly and uniquely stupid individual can do the things he was raised to believe would cost him everything and, seeing his powers intact, assume himself to be in the right.

And I'll be taking that finger now.

[Coidzor]

The dark gods know they're dark gods. They don't care, though, because the only consequence for them is that their religions don't get along with goody-goody ones except for sometimes Hextor or Asmodeus and that they clash with the goody-goody gods when it comes to their portfolios and desires clashing.

Beyond social consequences, the only thing being evil really means is that Paladins oppose you from time to time in your schemes, but if you're scheming then you're going to have people from all parts of the alignment pool opposing or aiding you based upon what your schemes are, their ability to find them out, and what their goals and desires are. Also that unless you're one of the baddest badasses, you're screwed over after you die, depending upon what Power you dedicate yourself to.

[Gildedragon]

If you tie good and evil to the more common "altruistic" and "selfish" and remove the moral meaning of good and evil alignment you actually get a somewhat reasonable evil character. If you likewise tie law and chaos to the more common "just" and "opportunistic" I feel alignment debates become a lot more clear.

A Paladin is then a just and altruistic warrior of the Light. He should strife for what benefits the community the most, and care about fair solutions. On the polar opposite, an Antipaladin should strife for what benefits only himself, and care about exploiting the situation to his biggest advantage. An Antipaladin saving kids from a burning house would not loose his powers without context. Just as a Paladin should not fall for executing a murderer without trial before he can kill his next victim.

Paladins and Antipaladins are rare anyways (not from a player perspective but from a perspective of world building) so a god would not drop his champions just because they feel like it...well maybe an Antipaladin will be dropped out of the blue when he isn't useful anymore, best timed during a standoff with a Paladin, removing who could have a grudge left onto the god's clergy.

Some time ago I'd read an article that elaborates quite nicely on that idea. (http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/tabletop/checkfortraps/8386-All-About-Alignment) And it makes sense. For the GM, on a cosmic scale, Good and Evil & Law and Chaos work well (outsiders, spell effects, etc) but for players more descriptive labels such as "opportunistic" "prudish" "squeamish" "altruistic" "collaborative" "believes in absolutes" "believes in relatives" etc make for better play.

[Coidzor]

3.0 Deities & Demigods said that those who "actively oppose the worship of the gods" are the ones that get the Wall of the Faithless.


So, if you go around saying "Stop worshipping those beings" - that's what awaits you.


The FRCS definition was a bit different - saying it was those who paid lip service to them without truly believing in them, that suffered that fate.

I think the former makes more sense.

Which is ironic, because the Wall of the Faithless is the number one reason anyone would say that the gods don't deserve worship in the first place instead of just saying that certain gods are buttheads and need to be specifically starved of worship until they can be eliminated by the competition. :smallamused:

[Keltest]

Also that unless you're one of the baddest badasses, you're screwed over after you die, depending upon what Power you dedicate yourself to.

Not necessarily. Most evil afterlives aren't deliberately unpleasant. Its just that evil people don't necessarily get along with each other, chaotic evil people especially. But there are nice things about it too. A lawful evil person will be put in a hierarchy where they belong along with other people who believe in the importance of order and structure. A chaotic evil person doesn't have to worry about someone arbitrarily coming in and stopping them from skewering babies or whatever it is CE people do for fun because babies are "important" or whatever.

[bahamut920]

Actually, most of the Evil planes of existence are a pretty terrible place to "live", at least until you've climbing the totem pole. You start out as a petitioner (the weakest of the weak), with none of the memories or powers you had in life, and Evil in D&D is universally of the "strong rule the weak" variety. You start at the very, very bottom of the totem pole, with a very long social ladder above you, chomping at he bit to get a new chew toy to play with. And the Fiendish Codex II explicitly states that petitioners to the Nine Hells are tortured, not only for fun, but to wring every ounce of "divine power" out of them before they're tossed back to the masses. And even on the off chance that a petitioner does manage to get a promotion to an actual devil, the lower ranks of baatezu are essentially cannon fodder for the Blood War and infernal political maneuvering. It's probably the best of the Lower Planes, though, if you plan around it, because baatezu have been known to sign agreements granting immediate promotion(s) to a higher rank.

And don't think that the other Evil alignments have it any better. Tanar'ri are prone to devouring, torturing, and issuing plenty of other unspeakable and horrifying punishments, petitioners (and lower ranks of tanar'ri) on a whim. Advancement is essentially random, with the Abyss itself promoting and demoting demons according to some unfathomable agenda or whim. Hades is explicitly the most miserable place in all of existence, with the plane itself sapping all joy, happiness, and willpower from anyone entering. Most petitioners to the Gray Waste simply sit around and do absolutely nothing. Carceri is specifically and explicitly a prison for all who enter, including the wardens (who are understandably pissed about it). I'll admit I don't know all that much about the fate of Gehenna's petitioners, but given the mercenary and exploitative nature of the yugoloths, it can't be that much better.

[Darth Ultron]

1. Exactly the same number of people in real life that say it?

2. Well, naturally people would know a lot about gods. Religion is a big part of lots of peoples lives. Also remember that the gods are real and do talk to people.

And do evil cultists think that the evil thing they worship is evil? Well...yes. But remember it's not like our world where ''good=right'' and ''wrong=evil''. So an evil cultist has no problem saying they are evil.

3. Same as above

[Duke of Urrel]

1. Alignment Knowledge: …


In regard to this, there's an old thread with a discussion that may interest you. It's here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?324596-Do-things-in-the-D-amp-D-multiverse-know-they-have-an-alignment).

[Milo v3]

1. Well, you have individuals who can literally tell you "Well, your radiating evil" once you become powerful enough. But what specific acts are objectively good and evil would probably take a while to specifically isolate, so you'd have to go off the word of superior beings like deities which will likely be biased towards promoting their view. Though, once you have a general gist of "this "sorta" stuff is "generally" evil" you have a foundation towards people being able to guess when someone or yourself is evil. Also, individuals are probably more likely to be willing to accept they are evil, since it is sort of more a political view/cosmological statistic than ethics anymore.

2. Asmodeus should probably say he's evil, otherwise it's going to be hard for this good clerics since you need to be in one step of the alignment to get any benefit from worshipping a god. I mean, is saying your evil that bad anymore? It's a justified cosmological view in a setting with such a set up. Generally it's in the god's interest in telling their clergy what they are like, since otherwise they often end up doing stuff you don't want them to do.

3. Antipaladin is weird.


Its just that evil people don't necessarily get along with each otherAdmittedly, this is true of all alignments.

[Clistenes]

Evil cultures probably don't know or give importance to the concept of "Evil" and "Good". Orcs, for example, probably have an ethos based on Strength and Weakness; their priests would use "Detect Strength" and "Detect Weakness". Or they use Detect spells that focus on people's allegiance to the Orcish pantheon ("Detect Unbeliever" and "Detect Believer").

Evil people in Good cultures probably rationalize their evil deeds and regard themselves as non-evil. Even if a priest tell them that they are Evil, they will still rationalize it as "that priest it trying to get a donation from me", or something like that. Those who are forced to acknowledge their evilness probably trick themselves into believing that they can change their behaviour later in life, be forgiven and go to a good place after death (much like in the real world).

And of course, there are Neutral churches that accept evil members. Those religions allow evil people to carry on being evil AND to have a non-horrid afterlife waiting for them.

[Telonius]

I find that it makes more sense for people to have a strong attachment to their deity than to an abstract concept of "Good" or "Evil." Deities have a built-in anthropomorphic (or elfo-morphic, or dwarfo-morphic, or whatever) component. The deity might be Evil, but the deity also has a personality and style separate from their alignment. Evil isn't the only thing it's about. It's that personality and style that lets people connect with them, and gets them worshipers.

[Darth Ultron]

Evil cultures probably don't know or give importance to the concept of "Evil" and "Good". Orcs, for example, probably have an ethos based on Strength and Weakness.

A lot of what a culture does is not exactly alignment based, it just is. The orc culture has no concept of a tax, but the human culture keeps on adding more and more and more taxes all the time to it's citizens. The orc culture is very ''take care of yourself or die'', the human culture bends over backwards to try and ''help all''. The orc culture settles disputes with fights, the human culture has a twisted web of laws and lawyers and judges to sort of settle disputes.

And they don't compare well. The orcs will say ''Klarg is weak so we give him no food, he die soon'' and the humans would be outraged and demand that the government steal/tax the workers(but not the nobles) so that the rich can pocket most of that money and set up false things to ''help the poor'', but not really do anything but keep them poor..oh, and feed poor Klarg.


I find that it makes more sense for people to have a strong attachment to their deity than to an abstract concept of "Good" or "Evil." .

This is very true too.

[Sayt]

I think there is room for a form of moral relativism in DND's strict Alignment system, you just need to distort it a little to fit.

Personally, I find it very hard to answer the question "Is it better to be/play/act Lawfully, or Chaotically?" Yes, lawful acts are inherently lawful, can only be lawful. Chaos can only be chaotic (Just don't try and tell it that). Both have advantages and disadvantages, both are absolutely defined (As much as Chaos would deny this), and they're both diametrically opposed. Neither is practicably better than the other.

But what if we put aside our real, live, societally influenced beliefs that Good is good, and Evil is bad. What if Good and Evil Just Are? the Relativist answer to "But that is EVIL!" is "Yes, and? It'll work." Part of it might be the Top/Bottom aspect of the alignment chart. If you rotate the grid 90 degrees, it starts to look more like Warhammer fantasy or 40k, framing it more as Order Vs Chaos than Good v. Evil. A lot of games are themed on GvE (Or Light V. Dark), and treat Law and Chaos as means to the ends of Good and Evil. One of the things that I think Paizo's Golarion setting does well is twist Good and Evil into means for a specific end. That setting's Asmodeus is Evil as a means to Law. He see's Evil as valuable because it is an efficient carrier-pathogen for Law.

In our world, Evil is a signifier for things which are Bad. In DND, Evil is a signifier for Evil, which is objective, and is seen as bad by Good people, which is subjective.


Also, on the subject of Paladin's and Anti-Paladins (I /love/ the new Tyrant Archetype for the AP in Ultimate Intriegue), they don't have to constantly be thinking "I AM [alignment]!". No, what they need to do is behave in a good or evil fashion. They have to act in a way which they are rewarded for, but they don't have to do it knowingly.

In fact, one of Pathfinder's NPC Codexes has a level 1 paladin, and the flavour text for him more or less states "He's an arrogant bully who became a paladin for the power and is going to fall. He just hasn't yet". Contrast this to Captain America/Steve Rogers: He doesn't do good because of The Rules (though he doesn't mind working outside them, obviously), he does good because he personally has a moral compass in tune with Goodness, and because it wouldn't occur to do otherwise. On on the other side we Kylo Ren. TFA showed Kylo Ren struggling with his 'alignment' and tortured by his actions, but maintains his course for....reasons. Somethingsomething Vader.

The Antipaladin code (The one is PF, at least, I'm not super familiar with 3.5's) is... not great. In fact it's pretty terrible, mostly because it's an almost exact mirror of the Paladin's, and almost requires you to antagonize your own party. I felt they could have milked the "Evil is easy" side more. What Paladin's and Anti-Paladin's really need, more-so that most classes, is a Quest. They need a big goal to work towards. In a world embattled by evil, this is comparatively easy. Find people in need and help them. But it's much harder for APs. You need a selfish goal, despicable motives, and ruthless striving for...something. But something that's compatible with group play, which kinda rules out Mayhem/violence/death for it's own sake.

But mostly, playing Evil Character works when you reject the assumption that Good is better than Evil, or that Evil is a bad thing to be, in my experience.

At the risk of runnign on too long, I recently had a decent amount of fun playing an Evil character. He wasn't evil because he liked other people's suffering, or enjoyed his superiority. He was Evil because he wasn't emotionally involved in other people, didn't have a conscience, and he had a job to do, which was help found a city/colony. Hobgoblin raiders in the surrounding hills? Take them as slaves. Agitators protesting extensive mining, calling or one to be closed? Collapse the mine for now. With the Agitators inside, because agitators are dangerous, troublesome, and a certain sense of poetry makes the job more interesting.

He was an honourable man, he kept his word, didn't lie, was profoundly loyal to his country and friends. He was also unthinkingly cruel if you got in his way.

[Strigon]

In a world where Evil can be objectively detected, and people's morality determined to one of nine subtypes, I'd imagine that many Evil people would recognize that they were Evil, but might not think that's necessarily a bad thing.
In our world, where it isn't clearly defined, we can simply say that evil is bad, it's morally a negative thing. But we might disagree with what actions are considered evil; there are plenty of real-world examples of this that I won't mention directly because this is the internet and I don't want to start a flame war.

However, in D&D, the opposite is true - you know whether actions are Good or Evil, but not necessarily whether that's good (lower case) or bad.

Now that I think about it, this is something like the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle; you can either know what actions are Evil, or whether evil is always bad, but not both.

[Gildedragon]

I think there is room for a form of moral relativism in DND's strict Alignment system, you just need to distort it a little to fit.

Personally, I find it very hard to answer the question "Is it better to be/play/act Lawfully, or Chaotically?" Yes, lawful acts are inherently lawful, can only be lawful. Chaos can only be chaotic (Just don't try and tell it that). Both have advantages and disadvantages, both are absolutely defined (As much as Chaos would deny this), and they're both diametrically opposed. Neither is practicably better than the other.

But what if we put aside our real, live, societally influenced beliefs that Good is good, and Evil is bad. What if Good and Evil Just Are? the Relativist answer to "But that is EVIL!" is "Yes, and? It'll work." Part of it might be the Top/Bottom aspect of the alignment chart. If you rotate the grid 90 degrees, it starts to look more like Warhammer fantasy or 40k, framing it more as Order Vs Chaos than Good v. Evil. A lot of games are themed on GvE (Or Light V. Dark), and treat Law and Chaos as means to the ends of Good and Evil. One of the things that I think Paizo's Golarion setting does well is twist Good and Evil into means for a specific end. That setting's Asmodeus is Evil as a means to Law. He see's Evil as valuable because it is an efficient carrier-pathogen for Law.

In our world, Evil is a signifier for things which are Bad. In DND, Evil is a signifier for Evil, which is objective, and is seen as bad by Good people, which is subjective.


Also, on the subject of Paladin's and Anti-Paladins (I /love/ the new Tyrant Archetype for the AP in Ultimate Intriegue), they don't have to constantly be thinking "I AM [alignment]!". No, what they need to do is behave in a good or evil fashion. They have to act in a way which they are rewarded for, but they don't have to do it knowingly.

In fact, one of Pathfinder's NPC Codexes has a level 1 paladin, and the flavour text for him more or less states "He's an arrogant bully who became a paladin for the power and is going to fall. He just hasn't yet". Contrast this to Captain America/Steve Rogers: He doesn't do good because of The Rules (though he doesn't mind working outside them, obviously), he does good because he personally has a moral compass in tune with Goodness, and because it wouldn't occur to do otherwise. On on the other side we Kylo Ren. TFA showed Kylo Ren struggling with his 'alignment' and tortured by his actions, but maintains his course for....reasons. Somethingsomething Vader.

The Antipaladin code (The one is PF, at least, I'm not super familiar with 3.5's) is... not great. In fact it's pretty terrible, mostly because it's an almost exact mirror of the Paladin's, and almost requires you to antagonize your own party. I felt they could have milked the "Evil is easy" side more. What Paladin's and Anti-Paladin's really need, more-so that most classes, is a Quest. They need a big goal to work towards. In a world embattled by evil, this is comparatively easy. Find people in need and help them. But it's much harder for APs. You need a selfish goal, despicable motives, and ruthless striving for...something. But something that's compatible with group play, which kinda rules out Mayhem/violence/death for it's own sake.

But mostly, playing Evil Character works when you reject the assumption that Good is better than Evil, or that Evil is a bad thing to be, in my experience.

At the risk of runnign on too long, I recently had a decent amount of fun playing an Evil character. He wasn't evil because he liked other people's suffering, or enjoyed his superiority. He was Evil because he wasn't emotionally involved in other people, didn't have a conscience, and he had a job to do, which was help found a city/colony. Hobgoblin raiders in the surrounding hills? Take them as slaves. Agitators protesting extensive mining, calling or one to be closed? Collapse the mine for now. With the Agitators inside, because agitators are dangerous, troublesome, and a certain sense of poetry makes the job more interesting.

He was an honourable man, he kept his word, didn't lie, was profoundly loyal to his country and friends. He was also unthinkingly cruel if you got in his way.

A good play of lawful evil. Evil can be, and ought often be (within party play), affable.

I agree wholeheartedly with you: the antipaladin ought be driven by selfish goals, his evil ought be easy, the code simple "take what you will" and "do not help the cause of good" or "only aid good to stab it in the back" makes for a more playable and more anti-paladin paladin. Where the paladin is honorable and exists to serve others, the antipaladin is in it for personal glory no matter the cost.

CE and NE are trickier: The former regarding personal desires above all; the desires can be pro-social/pro-party-play (the desire to keep their friends happy and healthy and rich for example; or the desire to avenge their family). They may play along with people but they won't hesitate to ruin someone for some gain.

[tadkins]

Now see, I've always wondered how you can have a genuine atheist in a DnD world when you have clerics performing miracles, and demons and godly avatars running around all over the place. Especially in Forgotten Realms. I thought everyone had to be attached to a deity in some way or another. Sure, I can see someone being an agnostic- "those so-called gods are just another super powered immortal"- but not outright deny they exist.

I played a character once that balked at the thought of choosing a deity.

"By submitting yourself to a god, you admit to yourself that you'll never have the potential to become one."

Gods, to her, are powerful creatures, little more.

[Âmesang]

CE and NE are trickier: The former regarding personal desires above all; the desires can be pro-social/pro-party-play (the desire to keep their friends happy and healthy and rich for example; or the desire to avenge their family). They may play along with people but they won't hesitate to ruin someone for some gain.
I attempted this with a chaotic evil character once. As a player I loathe screwing over other characters, so I attempted to play the character as wholly vain, conceited, selfish, self-centered, proud, etc., etc… behind a kind smile and silver (forked?) tongue was one who thought of everyone around her as little more than pawns and tools; but, regardless, the more care you give to your tools, the longer they'll last and the more willing they'll be to aid you (at least that's what her own deluded mind told her). It also helps having Bluff as a trained class skill.

(Now said character also had some stereotypically evil traits, such as enjoying the sight of one's pain and misery, especially if she inflicted it herself, or twisting otherwise good folk to act as depraved as she was—bonus points if they did so willingly—mainly everything she did was for her own personal enjoyment, doing whatever tickled her fancy or suited her whim… but while lacking in Wisdom she had Intelligence and I'd like to think was at least clever enough to know that sometimes "playing nice" was a good way of drawing attention away from one's private proclivities, and while thievery and murder is a quick and easy way to get what you want, convincing another to aid you through [self] righteous and "kind" behavior was better for the long term.)

(…no wonder I sometimes think she'd be more appropriate as "neutral evil," but that might also be due to me playing her as being not quite so below-average Wisdom than she really is; acting hastily without a second thought or the barest plan is a great way to get into trouble, after all. On the other hand a little more unplanned spontaneity could make for more interesting times, too…)

EDIT: I might be thinking too much about this, but I suppose she can be the type to plan… but without having a backup plan; or at least enough to come up with a "brilliant" idea without thinking about any of the consequences, simply "winging it" if things go awry—perhaps thinking such an idea is so brilliant the very concept that something could go wrong never crosses her mind.

[squiggit]

I have to disagree that moral relativism is irrelevant. It's very, very relevant. Yeah, on a cosmic scale Good and Evil have objective, quantifiable definitions, but for a big number of characters those cosmic forces aren't going to be relevant to them, it's too high concept and too grandiose to be part of their lives.

Even for people who might give a damn about the nuances of cosmic good and cosmic evil still might not see themselves that way. The ruthless LE noble who's made pacts with devils may very well know what alignment he is, but that doesn't stop him from believing that all it means is that he's one of the only people willing to do what has to be done for the good of his country.

It might not be significant in a cosmic sense, but it's very important for the setting itself.

[2D8HP]

I was just thinking about the alignment system and I just wanted to share a few gripes I have with it and how it relates to a couple different things.


1. Alignment Knowledge: Lets be honest, how many people are going to say they are evil, or even recognize that they are evil?
I.R.L. I repair the plumbing fixtures in a County Jail.
Some of the inmates, and some of the staff do brag about being "Evil". No I can't look deep into a man's soul and know if they truly feel that way or if they're just trying to appear "tough" (no real life detect alignment).
It's a fantasy game. Don't over think it.

[Segev]

Antipaladins... I've expressed this sentiment before. They don't make sense. Antipaladin is basically just defined as "the opposite of a Paladin." And I take issue with things that are defined in the negative, because that tells me that this is a thing that is lacking in its own unique merits.

(...)

Ultimately, the only way an Antipaladin can think of himself as non-Evil is if he is insane, or profoundly dim and being tricked by a dark power. Paladins' powers come from their convictions; for him to take such a 180 alignment-wise is to abandon those convictions, which means that by all rights he should expect to have lost his powers. Only a truly and uniquely stupid individual can do the things he was raised to believe would cost him everything and, seeing his powers intact, assume himself to be in the right.I always see the true "Antipaladin" as the fallen paladin who, in his bitterness at the betrayal he feels his fall represents by the powers of good and law against him, has embraced a dark well of power offered by who-cares-what.

He sees "clearly" how foolish he was to have faith in the gods and powers and causes of "good" and of "law." "Good" is weakness. "Law" is a crutch and a hobble. If he is to be damned for doing what he knew he had to do (whatever it is that caused his fall), or for (similarly) whatever "minor" act of self-interest he finally performed when his selflessness went unrewarded for so long, then let him be damned. He has found a new source of power, and he'll use it as he sees fit. Why should he help the weak, unless it helps or empowers him to do so? Why should he spare the just, when they condemn him for no good reason at all? Why should he tolerate the presence of those who would hold him back?

He is not dedicated to Chaos and Evil as he once was to Law and Good; no, he is dedicated to HIMSELF and his own selfish desires, and will spread his self-righteous justifications to any who will listen, lest they ignorantly blame him for their own weaknesses and their own cowardly, hypocritical beliefs.


And I'll be taking that finger now.
Dibs on the rest of the corpse.

[druid91]

I have to disagree that moral relativism is irrelevant. It's very, very relevant. Yeah, on a cosmic scale Good and Evil have objective, quantifiable definitions, but for a big number of characters those cosmic forces aren't going to be relevant to them, it's too high concept and too grandiose to be part of their lives.

Even for people who might give a damn about the nuances of cosmic good and cosmic evil still might not see themselves that way. The ruthless LE noble who's made pacts with devils may very well know what alignment he is, but that doesn't stop him from believing that all it means is that he's one of the only people willing to do what has to be done for the good of his country.

It might not be significant in a cosmic sense, but it's very important for the setting itself.

Part of it is the language.

Don't use Good to mean positive. Good is now a political party. Good now means JUST those cosmic forces. And nothing else.

So, if you look at it like that. "The ruthless LE noble who's made pacts with devils may very well know what alignment he is, but that doesn't stop him from believing that all it means is that he's one of the only people willing to do what has to be done for the betterment of his country." is a better way of saying it. Because Saying "For the good of the country" no longer makes sense. Because Good in D&D just means the planar political party.

Evil conversely isn't the wrong choice. It's not BAD. it's just an opposing belief system where you can earn rewards just as appealing as those of good. And it may very well be a valid way to accomplish what a person wants to achieve in their life. Obviously WE think it's wrong. Because Puppies being sacrificed to dark gods.

[bahamut920]

Now that I think about it, this is something like the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle; you can either know what actions are Evil, or whether evil is always bad, but not both.
I like this, and your post before it. I vote we dub the concept the "Strigon Uncertainty Principle". Mind if I sig it?


I have to disagree that moral relativism is irrelevant. It's very, very relevant. Yeah, on a cosmic scale Good and Evil have objective, quantifiable definitions, but for a big number of characters those cosmic forces aren't going to be relevant to them, it's too high concept and too grandiose to be part of their lives.

Even for people who might give a damn about the nuances of cosmic good and cosmic evil still might not see themselves that way. The ruthless LE noble who's made pacts with devils may very well know what alignment he is, but that doesn't stop him from believing that all it means is that he's one of the only people willing to do what has to be done for the good of his country.

It might not be significant in a cosmic sense, but it's very important for the setting itself.
True. And, while spellcasters can objectively determine alignment and have the ability to know where you personally sit on the objective moral compass that is the alignment system, not everybody cares to go to a spellcaster to be told whether they're a jerk or not. The common folk, or even the nobility, probably don't care overly much about their alignment, and might not even have access to a spellcaster to determine it. And, of course, Evil people are less likely to care whether or not they're Evil, unless they happen to actually be the "Evil for the sake of Evil" type.

[Strigon]

I like this, and your post before it. I vote we dub the concept the "Strigon Uncertainty Principle". Mind if I sig it?

Go on ahead; I'd be very pleased by both of those things :smallbiggrin:

[Talya]

The Antipaladin code (The one is PF, at least, I'm not super familiar with 3.5's) is... not great. In fact it's pretty terrible, mostly because it's an almost exact mirror of the Paladin's, and almost requires you to antagonize your own party.

The Calistrian Antipaladin code isn't so bad, but the default one is horrible.

[Thealtruistorc]

I've said it before and I'll say it again: the cornerstone of playing an antipaladin is the awareness that your actions have consequences. Powerful consequences, if you play your cards right. A capable antipaladin should be sowing chaos and destruction in ways that reverberate across cities, nations, or even entire worlds, making the pathetic mortals tremble in their hovels as the tides of brutality brought by one of their own kin set the land afire and fill the sky with an endless orchestra of agonized wailing. Demons are certainly capable of this, certainly, but there is one thing that only a mortal can destroy, the thing that many antipaladins are enlisted specifically to annihilate. That thing is hope.

If a beast from another plane comes to butcher you like a hog, you will either run or fight. Either you flee like a scared mouse or bite like a cornered one, but in both cases you possess some miniscule hope that their is good in the world that will save you. As the alien abomination stares you down, you're secretly praying that the cavalry is going to show up to deliver cosmic justice and save you from your doom, and you are going to stubbornly hold out until that cavalry comes. In spite of everything telling you that your scenario is hopeless, you'll never give in to fear so long as you can separate yourself from the horror you face. When that hope can make the difference between winning and losing a battle, the ravager needs some way to break it. That's where antipaladins come in.

Imagine the horror of seeing a person just like you marching in the stead of the demon. You are tempted to fight and tempted to run, but deep down you know that this person is a human and that he might be capable of mercy. So you stand there paralyzed, thinking that the stranger approaching you out of the smoke and fire is something other than your enemy. Imagine the shock when he leaves you barely alive with a dagger buried in your chest, his grim visage smiling as he walks away. In this moment, your faith in cosmic balance, in a greater good the keeps us human, has vanished. Your hope is gone, and the abyss has finally won.

Why has evil triumphed by scarring this poor sap for the rest of his life? I'll tell you. When a man sees the truth of the universe's oblivion, he will be pulled towards it for lack of anything else to cling to. He will seek power to try and fill the hopeless void, and it is quite likely that in his heartless struggle he too will strike the fear of eternity into the hearts of others before drawing his last breath. The cycle continues endlessly, an eternally propogating system of misery that will eventually consume the earth. That, my friend, is consequence, and that is what an antipaladin should aim for.

Now let me ask you this, comrade: How do you lie to yourself about the soulless brutality of the universe long enough to convince some poor civilian that their life will turn out okay? If you are truly dedicated to oblivion, you will bare the truth openly to him: nothing that he says or does will ever save him from the chokehold of desolation. Neither Lawful Good nor Lawful Evil paladins possess the courage or awareness to state this fact openly, but you, armed with the revelation brought about by your power, cannot hide from this truth. Denying what you understand what against everything that you believe in, deep down. Whether these beliefs coincide with your patron is irrelevant; the truth must be made clear through word or sword. Law itself is an illusion, because the sheer presence of chaos proves that order is finite and can never be absolute. Chaos, on the other hand, simply embraces the falsehood of order as yet another aspect of the nightmare, and is more than happy to prove its inadequacy in the larger body of the cosmos.

You do this, of course, because you cannot escape from what you know. The futility of being anything other than mad and cruel haunts you forever, and like the prophet who cannot restrain his words you are forced to make your dark knowledge known to all the world. You won't save the children in the orphanage because you know that delaying their death would be pointless, and any poor shmucks who insist otherwise are too stupid to be of any worth to you or your cause. Hence, you should either teach them or ditch them, because they are no longer of any use to you. They are lying through their teeth about how the world can become a better place, or how people can hope for salvation or improvement. A paladin would never tolerate being told that tyranny and murder is the right thing to do, so why should you have to suffer all those idiots insisting that there exist good things worth fighting for? You are viewed as evil because you get the world in ways that nobody else does, and as a result they all hate you for it. Naturally, you need to fight back from time to time.

Also, I wrote a whole page on this for my CE guide. Check that out if you need further resolution

[Clistenes]

Part of it is the language.

Don't use Good to mean positive. Good is now a political party. Good now means JUST those cosmic forces. And nothing else.

So, if you look at it like that. "The ruthless LE noble who's made pacts with devils may very well know what alignment he is, but that doesn't stop him from believing that all it means is that he's one of the only people willing to do what has to be done for the betterment of his country." is a better way of saying it. Because Saying "For the good of the country" no longer makes sense. Because Good in D&D just means the planar political party.

Evil conversely isn't the wrong choice. It's not BAD. it's just an opposing belief system where you can earn rewards just as appealing as those of good. And it may very well be a valid way to accomplish what a person wants to achieve in their life. Obviously WE think it's wrong. Because Puppies being sacrificed to dark gods.

I, for my part, intensely dislike that view of Good and Evil. I prefer Good to be good and Evil to be evil. Yes, Evil is an option in that you can play an Evil character, and you can fight for Evil and have a chance of winning and profit from it, but chosing between Good and Evil shouldn't be a morally neutral option.

I don't like the disconnection between what we call a good or evil person, and what you imply.

If Good and Evil are just cosmic political parties, what is the point of even having them? Just call the cosmic parties something else.

I can see that some people don't like cosmic Good to really be the good side, because it kinda reduces your options. But you can oppose Good for other reasons than being a demon worshipper. Even Good Exemplars can be mistaken, or you can oppose them for your own selfish interests.

[Red Fel]

I, for my part, intensely dislike that view of Good and Evil. I prefer Good to be good and Evil to be evil. Yes, Evil is an option in that you can play an Evil character, and you can fight for Evil and have a chance of winning and profit from it, but chosing between Good and Evil shouldn't be a morally neutral option.

I don't like the disconnection between what we call a good or evil person, and what you imply.

If Good and Evil are just cosmic political parties, what is the point of even having them? Just call the cosmic parties something else.

But that's just the point. You can call them something else. The authors chose to call them Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos. They could have just as easily said they were Smeerp, the party of selflessness and altruism; Preems, the party of self-expression and freedom; Empers, the party of order and honor; and Slytherin, the party of ambition and power.

In D&D/PF, arbitrary alignment is arbitrary. That's just how it is. That's why you have Exalted spells and abilities that rob a creature of free will and forcibly convert it to the Smeerp side. In that instance, "Good" is clearly not "good." This illustrates that the disconnect is not merely in the heads of a few people; it is a concrete thing. "Good" is as it is defined, irrespective of how we actually feel about "good."

[Segev]

But that's just the point. You can call them something else. The authors chose to call them Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos. They could have just as easily said they were Smeerp, the party of selflessness and altruism; Preems, the party of self-expression and freedom; Empers, the party of order and honor; and Slytherin, the party of ambition and power.Nonsense. Everybody knows the alignments are Emotionals, Foodies, Hassidics, and Gryffindor.


In D&D/PF, arbitrary alignment is arbitrary. That's just how it is. That's why you have Exalted spells and abilities that rob a creature of free will and forcibly convert it to the Smeerp side. In that instance, "Good" is clearly not "good." This illustrates that the disconnect is not merely in the heads of a few people; it is a concrete thing. "Good" is as it is defined, irrespective of how we actually feel about "good."

Nah, what it illustrates is that multiple different people with inconsistent views on what is and is not "Good" wrote the rules at various times, and that the BoED and BoVD are not particularly good pieces of writing. It's pretty clear, before we delve into the splatbooks and extended, contradictory commentaries, that they really did mean for the alignments to represent something like real moral and ethical boundaries.

[hamishspence]

It's pretty clear, before we delve into the splatbooks and extended, contradictory commentaries, that they really did mean for the alignments to represent something like real moral and ethical boundaries.

It seems to me that this was what BoED, unlike BoVD, intended:



"Being Ahead Of Your Time"

Heroic characters often end up at odds with their culture and society. The standards expected of good characters in D&D, especially those who lay claim to exalted status, bear much more similarity to modern sensibilities about justice, equality, and respect for life than to the actual medieval world that D&D is loosely based on, and that is quite intentional. It is certainly possible that your campaign world might be a more enlightened place than medieval Europe--a place where men and women are considered equal, slavery is not practiced in any form, torture and capital punishment are shunned, and the various human and humanoid races live together in harmony. In such a case, an exalted character can live in relative peace with her culture, and focus her attention on slaying evil creatures in ruins and dungeons or rival, evil nations.

On the other hand, your campaign world might more closely reflect the realities of life in Earth’s Dark or Middle Ages. Perhaps women are not viewed as men’s equals or even sentient beings in their own right, slavery is widespread, testimony from serfs is only acceptable if extracted through torture, and humans of a certain skin tone (let along nonhumans) are viewed as demonic creatures. It is vitally important to remember one thing: these factors don’t change anything else said in this chapter (or in the Book of Vile Darkness) about what constitutes a good or evil deed. Even if slavery, torture, or discrimination are condoned by society, they remain evil. That simply means that an exalted character has an even harder road to follow. Not only must she worry about external evils like conjured demons and rampaging orc hordes, she must also contend with the evil within her own society.

it just didn't do it well.

[LudicSavant]

The default settings are such that Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos are real, primal forces Which is a far less meaningful statement than some make it out to be. Energy A, B, C, and D exist, and have certain properties defined by the rules.

But naming those forces Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos is entirely cultural, and has no particular mechanical cause or ethical implication. At no point, in any canon D&D setting of which I am aware, is it ever demonstrated that Good and moral goodness are equivalent concepts.

[Milo v3]

In D&D and PF, you can be a perfectly ethical person in everyway and be effectively exalted in the eyes of everyone, but will be considered Evil because you cast animate dead one too many times if you haven't been taught that animating skeletons is an Evil act.

Good =! good.

[LudicSavant]

Good =! good.

Indeed. To think otherwise is to commit the fallacy of false equivalence (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_equivalence).

[Segev]

Indeed. To think otherwise is to commit the fallacy of false equivalence (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_equivalence).

No, to think otherwise is to question the writing ability and judgment of those who have added rules later in the edition trying to further define them. :smalltongue:

Since splatbooks are things one can simply say, "nope," to, it is not valid to make a blanket statement that "it was written in a splatbook once, therefore it applies retroactively to anything labeled 'D&D'."

I will concede that "Good" is not good and "Evil" need not be evil if one uses the highly inconsistent, ill-thought-out RAW...but they aren't themselves, either, then, since they're often self-contradictory.

[LudicSavant]

it is not valid to make a blanket statement that "it was written in a splatbook once, therefore it applies retroactively to anything labeled 'D&D'." Good thing that's absolutely not what I said, then. :smallconfused:

[Segev]

Good thing that's absolutely not what I said, then. :smallconfused:

Good! I could foresee the argument being made, essentially, that excluding BoVD and BoED was not permitted without it being a "house rule." Hence I was heading it off at the proverbial pass.

[LudicSavant]

Good! I could foresee the argument being made, essentially, that excluding BoVD and BoED was not permitted without it being a "house rule." Hence I was heading it off at the proverbial pass.

I would not have made any such argument.

One needn't reference the BoVD or the BoED or indeed any splatbooks at all to accuse the Good=good position of being an example of false equivalence. In fact, you don't even need to reference a single line of poorly written, contradictory core fluff (though you certainly could).

The thing is, no amount of ignoring problematic or poorly written sources will help avoid the false equivalence problem, because core never establishes Good and good as equivalent in the first place.

Indeed, it is trivial to demonstrate that a person's pesonality is not the sole determinant of a person's alignment without even reading a single line of fluff or using a single splatbook.

For instance, zombies are mindless and Evil. Mindless things do not have personalities. Therefore, zombies cannot be Evil as a result of an evil personality. QED.

[hamishspence]

In D&D and PF, you can be a perfectly ethical person in everyway and be effectively exalted in the eyes of everyone, but will be considered Evil because you cast animate dead one too many times if you haven't been taught that animating skeletons is an Evil act.


Taken as a whole, the game does allow for Neutral characters of this kind.

Heroes of Horror:

In literature, film, and comic books, an antihero is a protagonist who commands the sympathy of the reader (or viewer) while displaying flaws, failures, and questionable moral values. An antihero might have some great tragedy or dark secret in her past, or she might make use of evil means toward an ultimately good end. In D&D, such a character is probably neither good nor evil but a flexible neutral. A cleric of St Cuthbert who launches an inquisition to purge evil from the land, killing innocents in the process; a devotee of Wee Jas who animates undead in order to fight villains even more evil; a ranger hunting down all the agents, evil or otherwise, of the baron who burned down his childhood home - these are all examples of antiheroes appropriate to a dark, horrific D&D campaign.

Dread Necromancer
Alignment
Not all dread necromancers are evil, although the best of them could easily be described as evil-tolerant. No dread necromancer can have a good alignment. Performing evil acts is a basic feature of the class, but some dread necromancers manage to balance evil acts with good intentions, remaining solidly neutral (most PC dread necromancers fall into this category).


That said, the basic idea, that there exist Evil characters who are much "better people" than the PHB would imply, isn't that bad a one.


Champions of Valor

This book is about valorous characters - those who might be good or in some cases merely neutral, but are great and heroic in facing down the greatest dangers of Faerun. Most valorous characters are good, but a significant fraction of them are indifferent to good and evil, and a rare few are evil but recognize that some evils must be challenged (even the mad Halaster has battled on Mystra's behalf).

[Segev]

For instance, zombies are mindless and Evil. Mindless things do not have personalities. Therefore, zombies cannot be Evil as a result of an evil personality. QED.

Pff. Tell that to anybody with a temperamental computer, car, or other machine.

More seriously, I believe that zombies and skeletons do have personalities despite being mindless; don't they, uncontrolled and left to their own devices, have a canonical "hatred of life" and seek to rip it apart mindlessly?

edit: Or am I conflating with something else, now?

Hrm. No, I think I'm wrong. If I were right, that would actually lend weight to the animate dead spell rightfully being [Evil], and as of yet I don't recall finding a reason for it other than "we felt like labeling Necromancy as evil."

So I will grant that the inconsistency is in the core books. This does allow the "Good != good" argument to be valid, and from a pure RAW sense, it's probably accurate. I don't think it the best way to run the game, nor does it resolve all inconsistencies, though, as there remain contradictions within the game's own definitions of what constitutes Good and Evil and Law and Chaos.

[Keltest]

Pff. Tell that to anybody with a temperamental computer, car, or other machine.

More seriously, I believe that zombies and skeletons do have personalities despite being mindless; don't they, uncontrolled and left to their own devices, have a canonical "hatred of life" and seek to rip it apart mindlessly?

edit: Or am I conflating with something else, now?

Hrm. No, I think I'm wrong. If I were right, that would actually lend weight to the animate dead spell rightfully being [Evil], and as of yet I don't recall finding a reason for it other than "we felt like labeling Necromancy as evil."

So I will grant that the inconsistency is in the core books. This does allow the "Good != good" argument to be valid, and from a pure RAW sense, it's probably accurate. I don't think it the best way to run the game, nor does it resolve all inconsistencies, though, as there remain contradictions within the game's own definitions of what constitutes Good and Evil and Law and Chaos.

Zombies and skeletons are kind of weird. "Wild" ones brought about through some uncontrolled magic or whatever tend to meander about and attack things willy nilly, though this isn't a hard and fast universal rule. Intentionally created ones that have no orders will stand about waiting for them.

[Coidzor]

Pff. Tell that to anybody with a temperamental computer, car, or other machine.

More seriously, I believe that zombies and skeletons do have personalities despite being mindless; don't they, uncontrolled and left to their own devices, have a canonical "hatred of life" and seek to rip it apart mindlessly?

edit: Or am I conflating with something else, now?

Hrm. No, I think I'm wrong. If I were right, that would actually lend weight to the animate dead spell rightfully being [Evil], and as of yet I don't recall finding a reason for it other than "we felt like labeling Necromancy as evil."

So I will grant that the inconsistency is in the core books. This does allow the "Good != good" argument to be valid, and from a pure RAW sense, it's probably accurate. I don't think it the best way to run the game, nor does it resolve all inconsistencies, though, as there remain contradictions within the game's own definitions of what constitutes Good and Evil and Law and Chaos.

IIRC, that's something that people have proposed adding in to make the Necromancy = EVIL thing more consistent. Most famously Frank and K in their Tome of Necromancy, I believe, at least in the 3e milieu.

[LudicSavant]

Pff. Tell that to anybody with a temperamental computer, car, or other machine.

More seriously, I believe that zombies and skeletons do have personalities despite being mindless; don't they, uncontrolled and left to their own devices, have a canonical "hatred of life" and seek to rip it apart mindlessly?

edit: Or am I conflating with something else, now?

Hrm. No, I think I'm wrong. If I were right, that would actually lend weight to the animate dead spell rightfully being [Evil], and as of yet I don't recall finding a reason for it other than "we felt like labeling Necromancy as evil."

So I will grant that the inconsistency is in the core books. This does allow the "Good != good" argument to be valid, and from a pure RAW sense, it's probably accurate. I don't think it the best way to run the game, nor does it resolve all inconsistencies, though, as there remain contradictions within the game's own definitions of what constitutes Good and Evil and Law and Chaos.

I think you might be conflating it with something else. I can't find reference to a generic hatred of life in the zombie entry in the Monster Manual.


Zombies are corpses reanimated through dark and sinister magic. These mindless automatons shamble about, doing their creator’s
bidding without fear or hesitation.

[Segev]

Ah well. I remain comfortable claiming that the level of inconsistency is high enough that the same points used to say "Evil != evil" can also be used to say "Evil != Evil." Which is to say, they didn't MEAN to define "political parties divorced from actual morals and ethics." And that they didn't actually do so, either, since they failed, if you attempt to be consistent across the material (even within core alone), to define something at all. So we are left trying to divine what they MEANT to achieve.

[weckar]

To me personally, the Antipaladin makes sense. I see them as a balancing force against Paladin, for one thing, but it makes sense from their point of view too. A paladin who rides a white horse, wearing gleaming silver armor, helps whomever he meets no matter the personal cost... We believe that, we buy that. His mission is goodness, and he shaped his image after it. So why would an Antipaladin - chosen by their deity to spread evil - not revel in similar displays of evilness? Why would they not dress in all black with a flaming horse between their legs? They have no reason to hide who they are or what they serve; the thought itself would insult them as much as you would insult a regular Paladin for asking them to cover up their holy symbol...

[LudicSavant]

Ah well. I remain comfortable claiming that the level of inconsistency is high enough that the same points used to say "Evil != evil" can also be used to say "Evil != Evil." For sure. D&D alignment is overflowing with double standards, sadly.


Which is to say, they didn't MEAN to define "political parties divorced from actual morals and ethics." And that they didn't actually do so, either, since they failed, if you attempt to be consistent across the material (even within core alone), to define something at all. So we are left trying to divine what they MEANT to achieve.

I've never really understood the preoccupation with speculating about author intentions.

We've got what the authors wrote, and we've got what we create ourselves. If you don't like what they wrote, create something yourself. "Divine what the writers intended" always struck me as an unnecessary extra step.

[Segev]

I've never really understood the preoccupation with speculating about author intentions.

We've got what the authors wrote, and we've got what we create ourselves. If you don't like what they wrote, create something yourself. "Divine what the writers intended" always struck me as an unnecessary extra step.

The better you can do in figuring out what they meant, the more likely you are to find at least a consistent basis from which to expand your interpretation elsewhere. People are not, as a general rule, inconsistent in their own minds. There are those who are, but most are not. If you can figure out what it is they mean, what their core premises are, you can usually put what they're saying or doing in a light that makes it make sense. If their premises are not self-inconsistent internally, then you can use knowledge of what they were trying to do overall to inform a consistent "fix" to it.

Of course, you can also simply apply your own premises. If you're moderately lucky, these won't be so incompatible with what was written that you are unable to adapt everything to suit them.