Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
This is a question you can only ask if you've never read the actual rules for biaxial alignment in 1st Edition AD&D. Alignment under default rule has always been a continuum, with there being room to move around in each category. Some of your finer-grained ideas, like detection spells returning variable results based on how strongly a person is aligned, have been actual parts of the rules for several editions, with multiple different variations!

So, like many other takes and fixes on alignment, yours is based on a strawman built out of popular misconceptions, not any genuine rules. You want to talk alternate alignment rules, pick an edition and read through the actual rules first.
errr.... why would you expect anyone to read 1st edition ad&d rules? why would you consider that as a prerequisite for talking about alignments?
I have read the 3.x rules, and that's all I did care to read. I didn't like them, I certainly have no intention of looking through other editions too. At my table we barely use them anyway.
I had an idea sparked by other threads and I wanted to have a discussion on it. So you say that somebody else, a few decades ago, already came up with the same idea? Quite unsurprising.

On a specific point
Some of your finer-grained ideas, like detection spells returning variable results based on how strongly a person is aligned, have been actual parts of the rules for several editions, with multiple different variations!
Wrong. Just because they were published somewhere in the 1st edition, it does not make them part of the rules. Just in the same way that class/race restrictions are not part of the rules even though they were printed at some point.
Not that I ever really cared what the rules say on alignments. I care what the table decides to make with them.

Now, I can't help thinking we could have a better discussion without you acting snob and trying to talk down each participant