Quote Originally Posted by Vrock_Summoner View Post
Alignment objectivism
I second that, but I'll add a caveat. I tend to push things towards the side of alignments as cosmic Energies myself, because I think that's the best way to make it make sense. The caveat is : it's not actually written that way. Or rather, sometimes it is and sometimes it's not. The designers seem not to have completely renounced the idea of alignments as subjective indicators of morality. It looks like their ambition was to make Good and right, Evil and wrong, coincide. Hence the confusion with the words - as you have pointed out -, the change of which is the basis for several excellent homebrew rewriting of alignments (see easydamus). Hence the damn blurry line where Good and Evil are objective forces but are characterized by subjective characteristics and expressed through personal choices.

Point is, it's never made clear that alignment and morality are separate things, because they're not. Or else we would be able to quote a manual and resolve once and for all the deontology/consequentialism question in D&D, which is at the heart of most of the alignment threads here. Alignment by RAW is objective, but with just the (respectable) amount of subjectivity our spontaneous conceptions and the designers' fancies gave it.
In other words, you can't play alignment by RAW because it doesn't work. It's self-contradictory.

Mind you, for most games alignment as written is fine, and that's a relief. But for those who really want to delve into roleplaying-heavy, morally ambiguous games, and explore alignment and its ramifications, then the system needs to be modified. I recommend the objective interpretation. Materialistic, even. (Basically, the way I represent it is : there are such things as Good, Evil, Lawful and Chaotic atoms. They are created by certain kinds of act. They stick to the one who performed that act. Outsiders, auras, etc. are made of them. They react chemically with a soul in different ways. The sum of all occurrences and effect of one of these kinds of matter in the Multiverse at any given time gives you the influence and the advancement of the corresponding cosmic force).