Do All Good Characters Share The Same Values And Principles?

[Bartmanhomer]

Do All Good Characters (Lawful Good, Neutral Good And Chaotic Good) share the same values and principles in the name of goodness and heroism?

[JNAProductions]

In a word? No.

[Bartmanhomer]

In a word? No.

Please explain yourself.

[KillianHawkeye]

Obviously, people of different alignments can't possibly share ALL of the same beliefs and values. But even within a single alignment, different people will care about and value different things.

For example, one Chaotic Good hero might rob from the rich and give to the poor, while another Chaotic Good hero might be more mercenary and take jobs paying gold so they can use that money to better equip themselves to fight a tyrannical dictator. Or literally a million other possible motivational factors that someone can choose to focus on.

It's all based on the concept of individuality.

[Bartmanhomer]

Obviously, people of different alignments can't possibly share ALL of the same beliefs and values. But even within a single alignment, different people will care about and value different things.

For example, one Chaotic Good hero might rob from the rich and give to the poor, while another Chaotic Good hero might be more mercenary and take jobs paying gold so they can use that money to better equip themselves to fight a tyrannical dictator. Or literally, a million other possible motivational factors that someone can choose to focus on.

It's all based on the concept of individuality.

Ok, I understand it now. Everybody different and doesn't have the same values as everybody else. I totally get it. Thank you for explaining that to me.

[hamishspence]

They will all have at least 3 things in common - respect for life, altruism, and concern for the dignity of sapient beings.

Exactly how each of these things manifests, can vary considerably - but they will have them.

[MoiMagnus]

Even within the same alignment, different peoples might have different values.

Just looking at Lawful Good, a paladin might have a strong belief that their god's commands are universal, while a lawyer might be convinced that local laws and customs are to be expected and respected, because no two places are the same, no two culture is identical.

In Neutral Good, you will find pacifists and interventionists.

In Chaotic Goods, you will find peoples that believe in "just help the peoples you encounter, and travel around making good acts", or peoples that come with a unshakable objective like "freeing all the slaves in the world", rationally evaluating when to who and when to use its resources to help in order to maximize the good.

And I'm just scratching the surface of all the possibilities.

Chaotic Good vs Lawful Good is even a common trope of opposition in stories. (Where the moral of the story is, depending on the writer, "Lawful peoples cannot fully be good while remaining lawful", "Chaotic peoples cannot fully be good while remaining chaotic", or "If only good peoples could set up their difference to unite, they could defeat Evil")

[Clistenes]

Of course they would have different values.

Just think how differently a good person from 100-200 years ago did treat animals.

Or how people used to think war was an honourable and cool thing, even when neither side was "bad".

Or how different was their view of gender roles.

Or how even good people saw homosexuality as a mental disorder just a few decades ago...

And if we speak about sexuality, oh boy! We go from parents telling children to be virgin until marriage to the "sex is always good, do it at every opportunity" attitude to the "if two teens have sex both are pedophiles and both must go to jail" attitude to the current "don't even think of speaking of sex unless it's on Tinder" thing...

I think most good people would react alike when they see a life in danger or in suffering, but besides that, they could behave completely different in their daily lives...

[OldTrees1]

People do not know whether something is moral, amoral, immoral. Even with magical assistance they only know that the magic labels it as X, Y, or Z. So good characters are as flawed as Moral Agents as people IRL are. We all develop or adopt moral theories as a means of navigating these unknown waters. However moral theories are diverse. Two different moral theories can lead different people to the same place.

In certain circumstances dramatically different moral theories will happen to agree on the what but not the why.

It is self evident, to the point of a tautology, that immoral killing is immoral. Different LG characters might disagree on what makes immoral killing immoral (is it a respect for Life, a respect for Wills of other sapients, a golden rule, or something else). However, since they are described as LG (and therefore G), it is likely that their theories are more accurate than inaccurate despite being different or even in opposition.

[Pleh]

They will all have at least 3 things in common - respect for life, altruism, and concern for the dignity of sapient beings.

Exactly how each of these things manifests, can vary considerably - but they will have them.

This. Good characters will ultimately adhere to a few critical principles. Each individual is free to determine exactly how this is best pursued and expressed, which leads to a great diversity of values and traits. As long as these auxilliary or derivative values and traits doesn't compromise the core principles, they are a Good character.

[Jay R]

There are more than nine approaches to values and principles.
[I suspect that there are more than nine million.]

Therefore alignment alone cannot define what values and principles a character has.

[InvisibleBison]

They will all have at least 3 things in common - respect for life, altruism, and concern for the dignity of sapient beings.

Exactly how each of these things manifests, can vary considerably - but they will have them.

And Lawful Good and Chaotic Good characters will occasionally prioritize Law or Chaos over good, so even these principles aren't guaranteed. For example, if a criminal was sentenced to public shaming, a neutral good character would be outraged at the violation of the dignity of a sapient being, while a lawful good character might accept it as a sad but necessary part of maintaining a just society.

[Kaptin Keen]

In my book, none of your thoughts, ideas, ideals, words or opinions make you good. Talk is cheap, and none-alignment-altering. You move away from Neutral - only by doing.

So all Good people have at least one thing in common: They work actively to make the world a better place.

Evil people are different. They also work actively, but for a majority of them, they propably just work to make their own lives better with no care what so ever for who has to suffer for it.

[Lemmy]

IMO, the only thing that all Good people have in common is a strong inclination to help others, even at their own personal cost and risk.

Similarly, the only thing common to all Evil people is a general willingness to harm others for their own benefit.

Of course... Even Good people take Evil actions sometimes, and Evil people take Good actions on occasion... What changes is the frequency and intensity of their actions, and how easily they resort to it.

[daryen]

So all Good people have at least one thing in common: They work actively to make the world a better place.

Of course, what "a better place" even means will get a million different interpretations. Sometimes to the point of armed conflict.

[ExLibrisMortis]

At a sufficiently abstract level, yes, they do.

At a sufficiently concrete level, no, they don't.


In more useful terms:

All Good-aligned people share a general liking of a few things, like [good] effects, positive energy (because of tradition, in my opinion, rather than principle), and altruism/beneficence/general well-wishing to most or all beings. In fact, I'd say that the basic attitude of Good is to consider the happiness and well-being of all (with some exceptions, greater scope of which drive one closer to Neutrality) when evaluating ethical problems, whereas Evil considers only the subject's happiness and well-being (with some exceptions, etcetera).

You can do a similar thing for Law and Chaos, where you replace "happiness and well-being" with "moral authority", i.e. Chaos sees the individual (or family unit, larger units driving one closer to Neutrality) as the ultimate moral authority, whereas Law sees the planar community, tradition, public opinion, and universal principles (literally, in D&D)(smaller units driving one closer to Neutrality) as the ultimate source of ethics.

Whatever definition of Law and Chaos you prefer, the combinations of those with Good will give you the variety that at least exists in D&D (for 3.5, anyway). There's probably more (at least one type of Good per Good deity), but that's a start.

[Kaptin Keen]

Of course, what "a better place" even means will get a million different interpretations. Sometimes to the point of armed conflict.

There is that, yes. Specifically, the very worst villains tend to believe they're doing the world a favor. Often in the vein of 'only I am able to make the harsh decisions needed to save us from ourselves.'

[Azuresun]

Please explain yourself.

Maybe you could explain why you think they would? It's a rather odd question to drop in without explanation.

[Bartmanhomer]

Maybe you could explain why you think they would? It's a rather odd question to drop in without explanation.

I assume that all good characters has the same values.

[Keltest]

I assume that all good characters has the same values.

Ok, but why? Even within just the D&D alignment system, theres an entire second axis (law versus chaos) that reflects differences in priorities between people on the same square of the moral axis.

[Bartmanhomer]

Ok, but why? Even within just the D&D alignment system, there's an entire second axis (law versus chaos) that reflects differences in priorities between people on the same square of the moral axis.

Because all good characters focus on heroism, protecting other people and sacrifice.

[Keltest]

Because all good characters focus on heroism, protecting other people and sacrifice.

Sure, within the context of PCs. But that's not all they focus on.

[Bartmanhomer]

Sure, within the context of PCs. But that's not all they focus on.

There's more than that?

[Keltest]

There's more than that?

Sure. Like I said, theres the entire law-chaos axis. Do they want to preserve people's personal freedoms, or do they believe that the individual has a duty to make small sacrifices for the greater whole of society? A lot of it comes down to the "how" of achieving those things you mentioned, but theyre important distinctions.

Robin Hood and King Arthur are both traditionally though of as "good" characters, but they have a lot of differences in values beyond the really fundamental aspects of being Good.

[Bartmanhomer]

Sure. As I said, there's the entire law-chaos axis. Do they want to preserve people's personal freedoms, or do they believe that the individual has a duty to make small sacrifices for the greater whole of society? A lot of it comes down to the "how" of achieving those things you mentioned, but they're important distinctions.

Robin Hood and King Arthur are both traditionally thought of as "good" characters, but they have a lot of differences in values beyond the really fundamental aspects of being Good.

You're right. I haven't forgotten about the Lawful Good and Chaotic Good. I mean the axis are different but they do believe the value of the good.

[OldTrees1]

There's more than that?

Yes, there is a whole lot more than just heroism, protecting, and sacrifice.

Ought you be honest? Probably (although not a universal belief). Ought you be honest always absolutely without exception? Now there is more uncertainty. What about omissions, do those fall under the same rules? Are there multiple kinds of omissions that have different standards to which we should aspire? What about unasked questions?

In that singular case of how one might answer a question, there are myriad nuances that moral philosophers debate to this day. Likewise there will be myriad opinions / beliefs among Good characters of the same alignment.

There are many more cases beyond those 3 categories. Morality is answering the question "What ought one do?" and thus beliefs about morality can touch every aspect of life.

If you pick a point on the alignment chart, you might find multiple characters that have no shared beliefs. This is a result of alignment trying to descriptively summarize the infinite dimensional matrix that is morality into a single axis.

There are more than nine approaches to values and principles.
[I suspect that there are more than nine million.]

Therefore alignment alone cannot define what values and principles a character has.

Indeed. The number of approaches to values and principles could be uncountable.

[Monsterpoodle]

Hell no.. If people can't even agree on what good means then how do you expect them to be similar in any other way. A man who steals from cruel landlords to feed orphans could be a good person. The man who catches thieves who steal from landlords could also be a good person. You could believe in "the greater good" or individual liberty is the most important.
All good people, all different.

[prabe]

Even in the same "type" of good (in D&D terms), there's no necessity for agreement in priorities. It's plausible (at least to me) to have two Lawful Good societies that are very different: One might be a highly-structured top-down hierarchy, the other might be a more-or-less egalitarian socialist society. They wouldn't agree on much about how society should look, and each might not understand how the other got there, but they could both be Lawful Good in outlook.

[Lord Raziere]

the only caveat to the "no good characters don't all share the same values and principles" I'd say is "at the same time, if any good character who hears another person's reasoning for why they're good and find out there is validity behind what they do and doesn't try to figure out some way for both of them satisfy their values like reasonable people, at least one of them falls to Neutral" because it means they put their own values over another without regard for another persons legitimate plight.

"we're both good but with opposing values we have to fight" is pointless melodrama that solves nothing and proves your Neutral at best. good people while not always having the same values, can set those values aside to help another persons good.

[OldTrees1]

the only caveat to the "no good characters don't all share the same values and principles" I'd say is "at the same time, if any good character who hears another person's reasoning for why they're good and find out there is validity behind what they do and doesn't try to figure out some way for both of them satisfy their values like reasonable people, at least one of them falls to Neutral" because it means they put their own values over another without regard for another persons legitimate plight.

"we're both good but with opposing values we have to fight" is pointless melodrama that solves nothing and proves your Neutral at best. good people while not always having the same values, can set those values aside to help another persons good.

That is quite the condition on that caveat.
1) Hears the other person's reasoning
2) Find validity behind it


I believe what you describe is a virtue, but different good individuals may prioritize virtues differently.

Also when time is of the essence, we remember that figuring takes time.

On yet another hand, despite this thread pointing out little is held universally in common, some are commonly held in common. Just not universally in common. I think what you described is one of those.