Can Good And Evil Characters Get Along?

[Jason]

Yeah, that's pretty much the worst use of Alignment there is. Worse than one-dimensional straight jacket alignment. Because it's the DM telling the player how to role play.

Absolutely not. The DM is merely telling the player what alignment his PC's behavior fits. The player still has complete freedom to do whatever he wishes. He just can't play a chaotic evil character and call him lawful good.

[icefractal]

Motivational (you could call it "future based") vs Judgement (aka "past based") alignment is a tricky one.

On the one hand, future-based alignment is what people practically care about in most cases. Should we join forces with this person and trust them in life-and-death situations, or should we be wary of them and keep them at a distance? It depends on what they're going to do. Usually we don't have precognition, so past actions are the best way to guess this. Ultimately though, if we knew someone who'd lived a purely benevolent life up until this point had suddenly changed and was planning to go on a murderous rampage, we wouldn't let them take watch alone, right?

On the other hand, it doesn't seem very fair to label people for a guess or prediction that you can't even guarantee is accurate. Past actions are concrete, a more objective basis for judgement. And usually they're coincidentally accurate for the future, because people don't change their entire outlook and behavior very often.

Eliminating alignment doesn't even totally solve this - people still care about the difference between Hannibal Lecter and Gandhi - but it means that in the majority of cases it's not necessary to have total agreement.

[kyoryu]

I also think that, in general, an evil person that has genuinely turned non-evil would want to try to make some amends for their actions.

So, especially when there's evidence of lack of motivation/opportunity to commit evil, I don't really think that simply not committing evil for a while is enough to turn neutral.

Making some effort to make amends for past evil done, combined with not committing evil acts given motivation and opportunity to do so, is where I'd personally start looking at an alignment shift.

[NichG]

Motivational (you could call it "future based") vs Judgement (aka "past based") alignment is a tricky one.

On the one hand, future-based alignment is what people practically care about in most cases. Should we join forces with this person and trust them in life-and-death situations, or should we be wary of them and keep them at a distance? It depends on what they're going to do. Usually we don't have precognition, so past actions are the best way to guess this. Ultimately though, if we knew someone who'd lived a purely benevolent life up until this point had suddenly changed and was planning to go on a murderous rampage, we wouldn't let them take watch alone, right?

On the other hand, it doesn't seem very fair to label people for a guess or prediction that you can't even guarantee is accurate. Past actions are concrete, a more objective basis for judgement. And usually they're coincidentally accurate for the future, because people don't change their entire outlook and behavior very often.

Eliminating alignment doesn't even totally solve this - people still care about the difference between Hannibal Lecter and Gandhi - but it means that in the majority of cases it's not necessary to have total agreement.

Alignment as written is Judgment. Alignment as useful in-character is future-based. But spells to detect alignment are a DM nightmare if they start to get thrown at PCs (or if the setting would call for that). It's not a problem for me to run a spell called, say, 'Detect If This Guy Will Betray Me' - I can commit to having the guy not betray the caster under the current conditions if the spell returns 'No' for those conditions. But if it gets cast on a PC, or if somehow that's worked into the criteria for other mechanics like 'you get access to this class ability only for so long as the spell Detect Betrayal would return a No for you', its a practical nightmare.

[Segev]

What the purpose of judgement-label alignment though? Besides final disposition once the character dies, and spawning internet threads where we all debate alignment based on a subset of actions taken. But what's the table time purpose?

Motivation roleplay-aid alignment on the other hand, has a useful purpose anytime the moral and social attitudes of the character might be pertinent. Just as long as it doesn't become a one dimensional caricature and straight jacket.

Basically, my view is both descriptive and proscriptive alignment are either not particularly useful, or even actively harmful.

Mainly, it interacts with a few spells and other things, and may not have any strong impact depending on the game. Planescape games will care a lot more, for instance. A game that avoids interaction with outsiders and isn't big on questions of morality probably won't care as much.

[OldTrees1]

Motivational (you could call it "future based") vs Judgement (aka "past based") alignment is a tricky one.

On the one hand, future-based alignment is what people practically care about in most cases. Should we join forces with this person and trust them in life-and-death situations, or should we be wary of them and keep them at a distance? It depends on what they're going to do. Usually we don't have precognition, so past actions are the best way to guess this. Ultimately though, if we knew someone who'd lived a purely benevolent life up until this point had suddenly changed and was planning to go on a murderous rampage, we wouldn't let them take watch alone, right?

On the other hand, it doesn't seem very fair to label people for a guess or prediction that you can't even guarantee is accurate. Past actions are concrete, a more objective basis for judgement. And usually they're coincidentally accurate for the future, because people don't change their entire outlook and behavior very often.

Eliminating alignment doesn't even totally solve this - people still care about the difference between Hannibal Lecter and Gandhi - but it means that in the majority of cases it's not necessary to have total agreement.

People still care about the difference between Hannibal Lecter and Gandhi, and in a majority of cases it is not necessary to have total agreement. Now imagine if there were eldritch entities that could not only constantly read the entirety of Hannibal's and Gandhi's minds, but also know all of their decisions at least a split second in advance. Those entities would have a decent vantage point to judge the future-based (actually present-based) morality of those people. When I DM I have those eldritch entities players be the primary source for information and judgements about the morality of those characters. If a pattern of behavior persists to the present that questions the judgement, I might raise a question, but my main concern is with "who are they now?".

So, to me, if a character that is still willingly do terribly immoral things but currently is not doing those things due to some practical reason, then that character is willing to do terribly immoral things.

But spells to detect alignment are a DM nightmare if they start to get thrown at PCs (or if the setting would call for that).

I suggest talking to the players since they can read the minds of the PCs. That can turn those situations from nightmares into great moments.

Or just not having that magic exist. Alignment can exist without the ability to detect it, but that might be too realistic (pick which horror genre you are in).

[NichG]

I suggest talking to the players since they can read the minds of the PCs. That can turn those situations from nightmares into great moments.

Or just not having that magic exist. Alignment can exist without the ability to detect it, but that might be too realistic (pick which horror genre you are in).

I tend to just not use alignment, and when there are spells such as Detect Betrayer they either (explicitly) refer to past actions (did you betray someone?) or have very specific forward horizons and criteria that would invalidate their results (if I do X, will you betray me in the next 24 hours? -> do Y instead of X and the guarantee is lost)

I don't tend to write or run 'will you betray anyone in the next decade?' kinds of effects. I also generally avoid Minority Report type things where it's acceptable in-setting to arrest or kill someone on the basis of a predictive spell cast, unless I'm explicitly running it as dystopian with examples of failures or mistakes existing and being a point of contention for subgroups in the setting. So e.g. no setting-wide universal agreement of 'of course if they ping this spell you can kill them'.

[OldTrees1]

I tend to just not use alignment, and when there are spells such as Detect Betrayer they either (explicitly) refer to past actions (did you betray someone?) or have very specific forward horizons and criteria that would invalidate their results (if I do X, will you betray me in the next 24 hours? -> do Y instead of X and the guarantee is lost)

I don't tend to write or run 'will you betray anyone in the next decade?' kinds of effects. I also generally avoid Minority Report type things where it's acceptable in-setting to arrest or kill someone on the basis of a predictive spell cast, unless I'm explicitly running it as dystopian with examples of failures or mistakes existing and being a point of contention for subgroups in the setting. So e.g. no setting-wide universal agreement of 'of course if they ping this spell you can kill them'.

Have you considered asking the players about who there character is now? You don't have to do Minority Report or dredge up the elementary school permanent record. I just as the player about who their character is. Well, there is no time like the present .

Although I tend to avoid detect alignment spells, regardless of being DM or PC, despite using alignment. They just don't serve a role.

[NichG]

Have you considered asking the players about who there character is now? You don't have to do Minority Report or dredge up the elementary school permanent record. I just as the player about who their character is. Well, there is no time like the present .

In general I don't think asking e.g. 'do you think your character is a good person?' is useful, because (as this thread and many others have shown) there's different concepts of goodness and also there's a psychological loading associated with actively adopting the label 'evil' versus doing evil things without actively adopting the label that matters for out-of-character table dynamics. So I'd much rather say e.g. 'the court shaman cast a spell, you failed the save, so please tell me whether for your immediate next decision you intend to fulfill the wording of your promise to the king - if you say yes or no you will be held to it, and if you say undecided you can do whatever, but the spellcaster will get to know your answer' than 'the court shaman cast a spell, is your character a good or evil person - and whatever you say you will be held to'.

The latter creates a necessity to quibble over the nature of good and evil, like quibbling over whether you can 'play dumb' during a Dominate effect in order to accidentally help the party or things like that. It's a bad incentive structure and can encourage doubling down or taking more extreme stances. The former is more concrete and also gives an out.

[Tanarii]

Absolutely not. The DM is merely telling the player what alignment his PC's behavior fits. The player still has complete freedom to do whatever he wishes. He just can't play a chaotic evil character and call him lawful good.

The DM can already talk reasonably to a player doing that. Dictating Alignment is either telling them:
- they must use the associated typical behavior for this other alignment instead of the one they're currently using
- they don't know how to roleplay their alignment, or are intentionally ignoring it

If the latter is the problem, dictating specific alignment changes is the worst possible way to resolve the issue. That's just the DM picking a guaranteed table fight for no good reason. There is no chance it is going to end well.

Especially since alignment is subjective at the DM/Player level.

[Segev]

The DM can already talk reasonably to a player doing that. Dictating Alignment is either telling them:
- they must use the associated typical behavior for this other alignment instead of the one they're currently using
- they don't know how to roleplay their alignment, or are intentionally ignoring it

If the latter is the problem, dictating specific alignment changes is the worst possible way to resolve the issue. That's just the DM picking a guaranteed table fight for no good reason. There is no chance it is going to end well.

Especially since alignment is subjective at the DM/Player level.

This presumes the player mindset is wedded to an alignment label and has a distinctly different vision of the alignment from the DM. Generally, this seems to me to be easiest to resolve by players having the attitude that if they have a disagreement over the boundaries of an alignment with the DM, they can just be labeled a different alignment. Unless it's critical to the mechanics (e.g. paladins), this shouldn't be a big deal.

[Tanarii]

This presumes the player mindset is wedded to an alignment label and has a distinctly different vision of the alignment from the DM. Generally, this seems to me to be easiest to resolve by players having the attitude that if they have a disagreement over the boundaries of an alignment with the DM, they can just be labeled a different alignment. Unless it's critical to the mechanics (e.g. paladins), this shouldn't be a big deal.

Sure but how it more normally goes

Player: "my overall background is that I work according to a strong code of tradition, Lawful Neutral. But my ideal, bond and flaw all come into play too."

DM: "you killed someone that wasn't a greenblood. Neutral Evil!"

This may possibly the first case I've heard where the "PC" is still being played as evil with plenty of other factors, and the DM is insisting they're neutral because they haven't killed someone in an evil way recently.

[Segev]

Sure but how it more normally goes

Player: "my overall background is that I work according to a strong code of tradition, Lawful Neutral. But my ideal, bond and flaw all come into play too."

DM: "you killed someone that wasn't a greenblood. Neutral Evil!"

This may possibly the first case I've heard where the "PC" is still being played as evil with plenty of other factors, and the DM is insisting they're neutral because they haven't killed someone in an evil way recently.

Eh, I haven't really seen that, but I'll take your word for it that it's "how it more normally goes." I think a player who encountered that should shrug and say, "Okay. Not how I think NE works, but if you want to say that, whatever. My ideal, bond, and flaw still come into play, and I'll just keep playing him this way." The label of NE doesn't force a change of any sort. It's just the DM revealing how he views the alignments.

[ezekielraiden]

Sure but how it more normally goes

Player: "my overall background is that I work according to a strong code of tradition, Lawful Neutral. But my ideal, bond and flaw all come into play too."

DM: "you killed someone that wasn't a greenblood. Neutral Evil!"

Alternatively...
Player: Man, this spider-bot thing is really cool. How's it made?
DM: It's powered by the imprisoned soul of a dead person. Since it doesn't work anymore, presumably the soul has been released.
Player: Can I have one?
DM: ...no, you can't, because that's blatantly Evil and I'm not really capable of running a game for blatantly Evil PCs.
Player: Yeah, but I'm Lawful. Can't I have one? I'm not trying to side with the bad guys.
DM: No, sorry man, not happening.

(This may be a summarized version of something that actually happened once, and I may have been the DM saying these things. AKA, I'm saying this 'cause we don't want to treat it as the DM randomly calling out alignment weirdness, it may also be a player legitimately not seeing how a blatantly Evil act is blatantly Evil.)

This may possibly the first case I've heard where the "PC" is still being played as evil with plenty of other factors, and the DM is insisting they're neutral because they haven't killed someone in an evil way recently.

This, on the other hand, I can fully agree with. I've never seen the argument that being forced to turn down opportunities to fulfill your alignment that you really would like to take, if you could, counts as a Neutral-izing act.

Again, as I said earlier: This is exactly analogous to saying that a bound and gagged Good person, forced to watch the death of an innocent third party, is now Neutral simply because they didn't stop an Evil action from occurring in their presence. Either the two must go together, both yes or both no, or someone needs to articulate why "forced to not take opportunities to fulfill your alignment" turns Evil people Neutral but doesn't turn Good people Neutral.

(To forestall one likely but flawed rebuttal: The only difference between being physically bound and gagged, and being coerced by violence or abandonment, is that the coercion is explicitly physical rather than implicitly so. Coercion is still coercion, whether it is "we will take from you the benefits of the cooperation you have invested into" or "we will take from you your freedom" or even "we will take from you your life.")

[Liquor Box]

I know that good and evil characters hate each other and they're always fighting all the time but is it possible that they can get along?

Yes, they clearly can. The most obvious case would be if the good character didn't know the evil character was evil. But even if they did know they could get along.

A real life example would be the people who correspond with people in prison. Many of those people would be good folk, and many of the prisoners would be evil people, yet I think they can probably be described as "getting along"

[Satinavian]

Alternatively...
Player: Man, this spider-bot thing is really cool. How's it made?
DM: It's powered by the imprisoned soul of a dead person. Since it doesn't work anymore, presumably the soul has been released.
Player: Can I have one?
DM: ...no, you can't, because that's blatantly Evil and I'm not really capable of running a game for blatantly Evil PCs.
Player: Yeah, but I'm Lawful. Can't I have one? I'm not trying to side with the bad guys.
DM: No, sorry man, not happening.

(This may be a summarized version of something that actually happened once, and I may have been the DM saying these things. AKA, I'm saying this 'cause we don't want to treat it as the DM randomly calling out alignment weirdness, it may also be a player legitimately not seeing how a blatantly Evil act is blatantly Evil.)

What would have happened if you instead had said "sure, you can have one. But it is evil to do so.", the PC had made their spiderbot and proceeded to otherwise follow the adventure as planned ?

Sure, you might have declared the PC evil for doing so, but would have it stopped him from cooperating with the other PCs as before ? Wouldn't you just have had good and evil PCs working fine with each other as the TO asks about ?

[ezekielraiden]

What would have happened if you instead had said "sure, you can have one. But it is evil to do so.", the PC had made their spiderbot and proceeded to otherwise follow the adventure as planned ?

That...pretty much couldn't have happened. Three reasons:
1. To make it, you'd have to kill someone and trap their soul in it. The original makers are a heretical murder-cult; they specifically do their thing by killing an unsuspecting victim. The player didn't look for an alternate means to get a buddy, and was totally cool with the expected "murder a random person" thing, which is what I was specifically saying "no" to. Had he looked, I'd have supported it. (As I have for other pets.)
2. Wider context: for the previous couple sessions, that player had wanted to "hear their side" from said murder-cult. (A cult that tried to kill the whole group. Twice.) I said point-blank, you might learn new things from these guys but they're REAL bad people...and he was still okay with "hearing their story." I doubted the char WOULD just avoid future evil behavior.
3. They learned how it worked from a pair of allies generally beloved by the party, who are pretty thoroughly LG. (The allies are actually engaged, and all of my players have been Shippers On Deck as it were.) It almost certainly would have severely damaged the party's relationship with these allies if they, y'know, murdered someone and tortuously bound the victim's soul to a mechanical body just to have one as a buddy.

But I guess I've sort of answered your question anyway. The party would have had problems with some of their allies, and would either have to keep the spiderbot secret, or risk being exposed as heretics themselves by the dominant religious group of the region (which would be Very Bad). Some of the factions in the world would take it as a sign that the party had allied with the murder-cult. The murder-cult would probably be Upset that someone had stolen their secrets, implicitly to be used against them. That said, potentially it could have led to more positive relations with said murder-cult, but the party would definitely have to surprise me to do that without doing more Evil things.

Sure, you might have declared the PC evil for doing so, but would have it stopped him from cooperating with the other PCs as before ? Wouldn't you just have had good and evil PCs working fine with each other as the TO asks about ?

I'm dead certain "murder an unsuspecting victim," even if they deserve it, JUST to get a shadowy spider-bot as a pet, would have NOT gone over well with the rest of the party. One other player might have been okay with it (always hard to guess their responses), but the other two would be "uh...no" and "HELL no" respectively. There's minor evil acts, or unwise/impulsive choices*...and then there's this.

Also, to be clear, I have told every player before they enter the game that I'm not okay with running a game for Evil PCs. It has far more to do with me and what I'm capable of than anything to do with them or party dynamics (though that also matters). I'm definitely okay with my players doing the occasional shady thing. We've had deals with devils, "creative" interrogation techniques (spoken only, but still, creepy), theft, that sort of thing. I just, personally, struggle a lot with doing reasonable things WRT "evil" motives and interests. I would not be able to produce as interesting and involving an experience for an Evil PC or party as I would for a non-Evil one. I welcome complex characters, characters that struggle or make bad decisions or who flirt with darkness without going over the edge. I don't welcome characters that murder random people for use as raw materials--because that does cross a moral event horizon, as far as I'm concerned.

More to the point? It was NOT meant to be an example for the whole thread topic. I was only rebutting the implication that it is only DMs who have weird alignment notions.

*An example being when the Druid agreed to a contract with a devil for information. The party wobbled, but held together. In part because the contract was designed to be something heroes would want to fulfill, even if it was still distasteful: assassinating prominent fiend-worshippers who had done Very Bad Things, especially if it could be done in a symbolic way. Symbolic and vicarious victories matter to the hellish hierarchy. Devils aren't stupid in my world. They essentially never make contracts they don't want to see fulfilled, and they never write contracts with the intent to swindle people. That's bad for business!

[Jason]

This, on the other hand, I can fully agree with. I've never seen the argument that being forced to turn down opportunities to fulfill your alignment that you really would like to take, if you could, counts as a Neutral-izing act.

Alignment has a sort of "moral reversion to the mean". Fail to take actions that are clearly good or evil (or lawful or chaotic) long enough and you revert towards the neutral "uncommitted" alignment.

Again, as I said earlier: This is exactly analogous to saying that a bound and gagged Good person, forced to watch the death of an innocent third party, is now Neutral simply because they didn't stop an Evil action from occurring in their presence. Either the two must go together, both yes or both no, or someone needs to articulate why "forced to not take opportunities to fulfill your alignment" turns Evil people Neutral but doesn't turn Good people Neutral.

(To forestall one likely but flawed rebuttal: The only difference between being physically bound and gagged, and being coerced by violence or abandonment, is that the coercion is explicitly physical rather than implicitly so. Coercion is still coercion, whether it is "we will take from you the benefits of the cooperation you have invested into" or "we will take from you your freedom" or even "we will take from you your life.")

Really? You see no moral difference between:

1. Inaction because you are physically restrained to the point of being incapable of taking any action.
2. Inaction because choosing to act would result in physical danger to yourself.
3. Inaction because choosing to act would forfeit promised personal benefits.

I would think that the moral differences between those three positions are fairly obvious.
I would not argue that a good-aligned person physically restrained from saving innocents is now neutral.

[hamishspence]

Alignment has a sort of "moral reversion to the mean". Fail to take actions that are clearly good or evil (or lawful or chaotic) long enough and you revert towards the neutral "uncommitted" alignment.

IMO "negligent inaction" is only really applicable to Good. Put a Good person in situations where a good act is called for, and if they don't take it, it's a potential warning sign of future alignment change, if it keeps happening.


Not so with Evil. A lazy but unrepentant evildoer is still evil even when they "fail to take opportunities".

[Jason]

IMO "negligent inaction" is only really applicable to Good. Put a Good person in situations where a good act is called for, and if they don't take it, it's a potential warning sign of future alignment change, if it keeps happening.


Not so with Evil. A lazy but unrepentant evildoer is still evil even when they "fail to take opportunities".

Hmmmm. No, I would say it works for either good or evil. To be Neutral you have basically two options: 1) do lots of actions, but enough of each of good and evil that they roughly cancel each other out or 2) don't do enough actions, either good or evil, to move you out of "neutral". Being "lazy" gives you the same results as option 2.

If you were very evil in the past it would take a long period of inactivity to move you into neutral, but enough inactivity will eventually move you there.

[hamishspence]

There's no statute of limitations on aligned actions - commit 9+ pts of Corrupt acts as a young adult, and nothing Corrupt between then and old age, but never repent or attempt to atone, and (if Lawful) you will go to the Nine Hells after death (Fiendish Codex 2).

The corruption accrued by acts, doesn't expire. It can only be removed through atonement.

I'd say similar principles apply to alignment as do to Corruption points. No amount of inactivity will change an Evil alignment to Neutral - only a change of attitude will - and to change attitude away from Evil, you need to repent of Evil.

[Jason]

There's no statute of limitations on aligned actions - commit 9+ pts of Corrupt acts as a young adult, and nothing Corrupt between then and old age, but never repent or attempt to atone, and (if Lawful) you will go to the Nine Hells after death (Fiendish Codex 2).

The corruption accrued by acts, doesn't expire. It can only be removed through atonement.

But you argued that inactivity would mean forfeiture of good alignment. So you would argue that the "purification" of good acts does expire? Commit 9+ fantastic good acts in your youth and never do anything in old age and you don't get to go to the Seven Heavens?

I'd say similar principles apply to alignment as do to Corruption points. No amount of inactivity will change an Evil alignment to Neutral - only a change of attitude will - and to change attitude away from Evil, you need to repent of Evil.

The argument can be made that choosing inactivity is a change of attitude towards Neutral, whether you started either evil or good.

[kyoryu]

Sure but how it more normally goes

Player: "my overall background is that I work according to a strong code of tradition, Lawful Neutral. But my ideal, bond and flaw all come into play too."

DM: "you killed someone that wasn't a greenblood. Neutral Evil!"

This may possibly the first case I've heard where the "PC" is still being played as evil with plenty of other factors, and the DM is insisting they're neutral because they haven't killed someone in an evil way recently.

A big part of that, I think, is "this is how alignment works in my game. This is how I will categorize things. I'm not saying this is objectively accurate, and you don't have to agree with me that this is how it would work in real life. But this is how it will be ruled in this game. I will let you know when you're doing things that don't align with your currently stated alignment. You can still do them, of course, but your alignment may shift over time or even immediately based on the action."

Unfortunately, I think that there's enough differing ideas of morality that you really kind of do need to have that discussion in a game with alignment, especially if you get consequentialists vs. rules-based people at the same table. One model needs to be picked, but you need to be explicit that you're not saying that it is, real-world, morally correct.

Alignment has a sort of "moral reversion to the mean". Fail to take actions that are clearly good or evil (or lawful or chaotic) long enough and you revert towards the neutral "uncommitted" alignment.


Really? You see no moral difference between:

1. Inaction because you are physically restrained to the point of being incapable of taking any action.
2. Inaction because choosing to act would result in physical danger to yourself.
3. Inaction because choosing to act would forfeit promised personal benefits.

I would think that the moral differences between those three positions are fairly obvious.
I would not argue that a good-aligned person physically restrained from saving innocents is now neutral.

To a great extent, it's the choice that matters. No choice, no moral value. There was a whole book and movie about that.

Hmmmm. No, I would say it works for either good or evil. To be Neutral you have basically two options: 1) do lots of actions, but enough of each of good and evil that they roughly cancel each other out or 2) don't do enough actions, either good or evil, to move you out of "neutral". Being "lazy" gives you the same results as option 2.

I strongly disagree with that. If you're willing to harm others for your benefit, you're Evil. Regardless of whether or not you give money to orphanages. I don't really buy into the "moral credit card" model.

If you were very evil in the past it would take a long period of inactivity to move you into neutral, but enough inactivity will eventually move you there.

I don't think so. I think it takes recognition that harming others is, you know, wrong. Which would be hard to get to without some level of repentance.

There's no statute of limitations on aligned actions - commit 9+ pts of Corrupt acts as a young adult, and nothing Corrupt between then and old age, but never repent or attempt to atone, and (if Lawful) you will go to the Nine Hells after death (Fiendish Codex 2).

The corruption accrued by acts, doesn't expire. It can only be removed through atonement.

I'd say similar principles apply to alignment as do to Corruption points. No amount of inactivity will change an Evil alignment to Neutral - only a change of attitude will - and to change attitude away from Evil, you need to repent of Evil.

Right, but conscious decisions to avoid Evil actions, especially in cases where it's an overall benefit to do so, might well indicate some level of change of attitude. Given freedom to act, and opportunities that make sense to act upon, attitude should beget actions.

[OldTrees1]

Really? You see no moral difference between:

1. Inaction because you are physically restrained to the point of being incapable of taking any action.
2. Inaction because choosing to act would result in physical danger to yourself.
3. Inaction because choosing to act would forfeit promised personal benefits.

I would think that the moral differences between those three positions are fairly obvious.
I would not argue that a good-aligned person physically restrained from saving innocents is now neutral.

Actually no, there it little moral difference there assuming we are presuming to analyze this from high stages of moral development.

While technically being physically incapable would be stage 0, there is not much value to be given to the limitations adopted in stage 1 either.


If Murder is immoral, it is not immoral merely because:
A) You physically can't do it
B) Murder is punished
C) Murder is punished
Rather murder, if immoral, is immoral because ____ (answer depends on the moral framework that happens to be true in that reality)

[hamishspence]

The argument can be made that choosing inactivity is a change of attitude towards Neutral, whether you started either evil or good.

D&D 3.5 subscribes to "Seven Deadly Sins" morality - and one of those sins is sloth. It's mentioned in the Dragon Magazine Demonomicon: Malcanthet article (written by the same person that wrote Fiendish Codex 1) that Akilith demons are formed from sloth.

"Failing to do good deeds when you have plenty of opportunity" is sloth - evil.

There's no direct mirror to that as a virtue.

[Jason]

To a great extent, it's the choice that matters. No choice, no moral value. There was a whole book and movie about that.

I agree. Being physically restrained means you have no choice, therefore no moral values are involved. The other two positions do have moral value, because a choice is being made. "I chose not to act because I will get hurt otherwise" and "I chose not to act because I won't get paid otherwise" are choices with differing levels of moral value.

I strongly disagree with that. If you're willing to harm others for your benefit, you're Evil. Regardless of whether or not you give money to orphanages. I don't really buy into the "moral credit card" model.

I think you have a point. But how then do we classify the person who does little petty evil acts all the time but does big good acts when necessary? Someone like Severus Snape, for instance?

[hamishspence]

Neutral, if the DM feels generous.

[Democratus]

There's also the case of the careful schemer - who can spend months or years without doing evil as part of a very long-term plan.

Would be silly to claim that they aren't evil because their master plan hasn't hit the final phase, destroying everything around them.

[Jason]

There's also the case of the careful schemer - who can spend months or years without doing evil as part of a very long-term plan.

Would be silly to claim that they aren't evil because their master plan hasn't hit the final phase, destroying everything around them.

I am reminded of the classic Twilight Zone episode "A Penny for Your Thoughts" where a bank clerk (played by Richard York of Bewitched) gains the ability to read thoughts because when he pays for a newspaper the coin lands on end. He hears the thoughts of another employee, Smithers, planning how he will rob the bank today in detail. He tries to catch him in the act, but there is no evidence and the mind reader gets fired instead. Smithers later admits he fantasizes about robbing the bank every day, but he would never actually do it. He just likes to think about it.

Edit: Apparently you can't say Mr. York's first name on this forum, so I have substituted "Richard".

[Democratus]

I am reminded of the classic Twilight Zone episode "A Penny for Your Thoughts" where a bank clerk (played by **** York of Bewitched) gains the ability to read thoughts because when he pays for a newspaper the coin lands on end. He hears the thoughts of another employee, Smithers, planning how he will rob the bank today in detail. He tries to catch him in the act, but their is no evidence and the mind reader gets fired instead. Smithers later admits he fantasizes about robbing the bank every day, but he would never actually do it. He just likes to think about it.

Twilight Zone is the gift that keeps on giving.

There's an episode relevant to just about anything!