When "it's what my character would do" is actually true.

[Batcathat]

While it's usually not too much a problem in practice, I've yet to see what alignment adds to the game. You can still have paladins and demon armies and scheming viziers and conflicts between loyalists and reformers and revolutionaries, and in fact many of those things work better without an absolute tag which can be easily checked.

So what is alignment providing? A "stab the mobs with red outlines" shortcut? Besides the question whether that's even a desirable thing, many gods would be happy to give their opinion on who needs a smiting - the Cleric casts "Detect Foes of Pelor" instead of Detect Evil and you end up stabbing the Lich either way.

Yeah, this. I've yet to see a use for alignment that doesn't fall somewhere between "useless" and "harmful".

EDIT: Well, I suppose that's not entirely fair. If the setting has objective morality, alignments or something like it has a place. It's more from a roleplaying perspective they seem pointless at best.

[Vahnavoi]

While it's usually not too much a problem in practice, I've yet to see what alignment adds to the game. You can still have paladins and demon armies and scheming viziers and conflicts between loyalists and reformers and revolutionaries, and in fact many of those things work better without an absolute tag which can be easily checked.

So what is alignment providing? A "stab the mobs with red outlines" shortcut? Besides the question whether that's even a desirable thing, many gods would be happy to give their opinion on who needs a smiting - the Cleric casts "Detect Foes of Pelor" instead of Detect Evil and you end up stabbing the Lich either way.

I've already answered this but apparently it bears repeating:

If all you want is the game mechanical effects, you can do that by adding a (huge) number of isolated clauses for each detail. This is all carefully dancing around the point that those details stem from and are explained by a background belief in a moral universe. Alignment is one such background belief system, and that's what alignment and systems like it exist to facilitate.

From a roleplaying perspective, the point is simple: there's a difference between a person who has memorized a list of interactions as pieces of isolated trivia versus someone who is reasoning these interactions from a set of fundamental beliefs and internalized worldview. It's the difference of knowing the correct answers in Trivial Pursuit because you memorized what's on the question cards, versus deducing the correct answer from a broader body of knowledge you have due to lived life; the difference between knowing vampires cannot cross running water versus knowing why vampires cannot cross running water & believing in it.

[KorvinStarmast]

The original L/N/C scheme was quite flexible, and useful. But, for a certain sector of the gaming audience it wasn't 'rules' enough.
It raised enough questions among the gamers who game and who thus need a rule for their game (one of four kinds of player types identified in the early SF&F/RPG scene) that those answering the mail (game authors) provided an answer. And then another answer. In time it grew into the two axis scheme.

I note that Barker, in Empire of the Petal Throne, took a similar-but-different (and very playable) approach that didn't end up with the same mess D&D ended up with. His approach was aided by his game being built into a setting (Tekumel) that was, fiction-wise, pretty coherent before the game itself was published.

[RandomPeasant]

I'm reasonably confident that if I actually pitched the icecream game to people, few to none would bother quibling about the rules like you just did.

That's because it's simple to the point it's not a roleplaying game. I don't have an issue with Candyland saying the goal must be to free the Candy King (or whatever the goal there is supposed to be), because Candyland is a children's game with no meaningful decisions. But making those sorts of declarations in an RPG is bad, because the point of an RPG is that people have a range of meaningful choice.

Characters having a plurality of moral systems in a game with alignment is completely normal, some of them are simply a priori wrong and sometimes to a degree that leads to them becoming non-Good or Evil.

And this is the sophistry. Because you're just abusing "wrong" to mean "will go to a specific afterlife" when that's not what people care about. A Utilitarian doesn't have their beliefs about morality because they will get them into Arcadia or Ysgard or whatever, so whether or not they do does not make them wrong. It's a category error. It's like saying that the guy who has decided to do meth is "a priori wrong" because you happen to value having teeth more that he does.

it doesn't even prove alignment wrong.

Why would it prove alignment wrong? Tautologies aren't wrong, they're just pointless. Much like alignment.

So what is alignment providing? A "stab the mobs with red outlines" shortcut? Besides the question whether that's even a desirable thing, many gods would be happy to give their opinion on who needs a smiting - the Cleric casts "Detect Foes of Pelor" instead of Detect Evil and you end up stabbing the Lich either way.

I would say that most of what alignment provides that's worthwhile mechanically is how it works with Outsiders, and maybe Undead. Priests banishing demons makes sense. But the idea that banishing demons should imply spells that are more effective against murderers is not, despite claims to the contrary, consistent with any particular source material. And it's not really clear to me that priests should be constrained to only banish opposed-alignment outsiders.

If all you want is the game mechanical effects, you can do that by adding a (huge) number of isolated clauses for each detail.

You mean exactly like the game already does with silver, the thing you gave as an example of something that should have a generalized interaction with Evil to the point that you claimed that's what "silver bullet" means?

the difference between knowing vampires cannot cross running water versus knowing why vampires cannot cross running water & believing in it.

There is an enormous amount of vampire folklore. This encyclopedia is 200 pages long and covers 600 distinct types. Whatever rules you have about vampires are going to be arbitrary, and while they may well correspond to characters beliefs about a "moral universe", there's very little reason to expect they'll correspond to player's. From the perspective of the person who is making the decisions, the vampire is very much a collection of arbitrary rules that must be memorized.

[Tanarii]

Yeah, this. I've yet to see a use for alignment that doesn't fall somewhere between "useless" and "harmful".

The 5e personality system, which includes alignment as one of the 5 personality traits, is useful for roleplaying. It could of course have a shorthand for moral and social outlook replaced or removed as a category, if a table didn't want players to think about their character's moral and social attitudes when making decision for their character in the fantasy environment, aka roleplaying.

[Batcathat]

The 5e personality system, which includes alignment as one of the 5 personality traits, is useful for roleplaying. It could of course have a shorthand for moral and social outlook replaced or removed as a category, if a table didn't want players to think about their character's moral and social attitudes when making decision for their character in the fantasy environment, aka roleplaying.

Players thinking about their character's moral and social attitudes is great, but I've yet to see an implementation of alignment that helps with that. As I mentioned earlier, it seems to me that either an alignment describes a very specific type of person (in which case it's a useful description but very limiting) or it's a lot more vague (in which case it's basically meaningless, since you still have to explain how your specific character thinks and acts).

[RandomPeasant]

I think if you wanted a useful version of alignment, the thing to do would be to cut out the middle man and use the outer planes directly. "Believes in ruthless Social Darwinism were rules are enforced without regard for their fairness or benefit" is a coherent set of moral values that can guide a character's actions, but it is massively clearer if you refer to that as "Baatorian Values" rather than pretend it is "objectively Evil" and "objectively Lawful". Especially when there are other sets of values that you are also presenting as "objectively Evil" and/or "objectively Lawful" that are different.

[KorvinStarmast]

I think if you wanted a useful version of alignment, the thing to do would be to cut out the middle man and use the outer planes directly. "Believes in ruthless Social Darwinism were rules are enforced without regard for their fairness or benefit" is a coherent set of moral values that can guide a character's actions, but it is massively clearer if you refer to that as "Baatorian Values" rather than pretend it is "objectively Evil" and "objectively Lawful". Especially when there are other sets of values that you are also presenting as "objectively Evil" and/or "objectively Lawful" that are different.

In a game where only maidens of pure heart can ride a unicorn,
in a game where certain artifacts do damage to a character if their alignment (in the cosmic sense, not their sociological outlook sense) is out of synch with the item,
in a game where deities are objectively present and interfere to a lesser or greater extent in mundane matters,
alignment can either be a useful tool or a crutch, depending on what you want out of it.

What Barker did with his deities and their cohorts worked (half 'good' and half 'evil') but he didn't use a two axis model, and the 'good' and 'evil' didn't have this afterlife framework to add to the noise. (Well, not in the original EPT game, which is what I GM'd for three years). He also didn't have druids.
We didn't miss them.

[RandomPeasant]

In a game where only maidens of pure heart can ride a unicorn,

Doesn't the whole "maiden" bit suggest that the unicorn isn't really checking for alignment per se, but rather an idiosyncratic set of criteria that are specific to unicorns?

in a game where certain artifacts do damage to a character if their alignment (in the cosmic sense, not their sociological outlook sense) is out of synch with the item,

Yes, if you were jettisoning alignment, you would also jettison the Holy and Axiomatic weapon properties. It's really not a good fit for the source material, because the holy symbols that hurt demons do not generally also hurt orcs (even in those stories that include both demons and orcs).

in a game where deities are objectively present and interfere to a lesser or greater extent in mundane matters,

Do we really need to go into the absolute laundry list of stories with active deities and nothing remotely resembling alignment?

[KorvinStarmast]

Do we really need to go into the absolute laundry list of stories with active deities and nothing remotely resembling alignment?

That usually gets a smack from the mods since a great many of those stories are inextricably bound to RL religions that are not acceptable to mention at GiTP forums.

[RandomPeasant]

That usually gets a smack from the mods since a great many of those stories are inextricably bound to RL religions that are not acceptable to mention at GiTP forums.

I mean, there are plenty of stories on that list with totally fictional gods. As far as I'm aware, no one's out there worshipping Odium or Burn, nor has there ever been.

Plus, as far as it goes, the fact that you're using the plural of "religion" there sort of suggest that perhaps what's being discussed is not best represented by a single "objective Good" in any case.

[Segev]

To the OP: Why do you care what alignment your DM says you are? Play your character. If he determines your alignment to be something other than what you think it is, so what? Do you have class features that care?

[Psyren]

While I don't subscribe to everything he writes, I think AngryGM made a pretty well-written defense of the concept of alignment in D&D, complete with reasons for abolishing it but ultimately explaining why he keeps it around in his games. It contains (censored) swearing, but assuming his writing style doesn't put you off, I think it's worth a read.

[Jay R]

The original L/N/C scheme was quite flexible, and useful. But, for a certain sector of the gaming audience it wasn't 'rules' enough.
It raised enough questions among the gamers who game and who thus need a rule for their game (one of four kinds of player types identified in the early SF&F/RPG scene) that those answering the mail (game authors) provided an answer. And then another answer. In time it grew into the two axis scheme.

This is mostly correct, but leaves out the essential personality. "Those answering the mail" didn't provide the two-axis alignment. Gary Gygax did.

The original D&D was unambiguously trying to simulate fantasy literature. So a morality system was put in the simulation because the challenge of good vs. evil is a crucial aspect of many fantasies. The extremes were called "Law" and "Chaos" from Moorcock and Dunsany because it sounded cool, but they were clearly intended to represent good and evil. High level clerics were Patriarchs if Lawful and Evil High Priests if Chaotic, etc.

Eventually, enough people noticed the discrepancy that they had to fix it. They could:
1. change the words to "Good" and "Evil",
2. make the rules clear by explaining the gaming jargon, or
3. try to hide the mistake by inventing an unrealistic and overly complicated game mechanic.

For Gygax, this was always an easy choice

[Tanarii]

or it's a lot more vague (in which case it's basically meaningless, since you still have to explain how your specific character thinks and acts).

The second part doesn't follow from the first part.

[Batcathat]

The second part doesn't follow from the first part.

It doesn't? Because it seems to me that if the alignment system is vague enough to include every type of character, saying that someone is "Lawful Good" requires explaining just how this particular character is Lawful Good and how that impact its actions. This could be a couple of words, a few sentences or much more, but in any case I don't see what difference it makes to just remove those first two words, since they're superfluous at that point.

And that's assuming the people involved have matching expectations about the alignments, maybe what you think is Lawful Good I think is Lawful Neutral or Neutral Good, in which case the alignment label is actively making it harder for me to properly understand your character.

To me, it seems like asking someone what their character is like and being told "Lawful Good" is a lot like asking someone where they live and being told "North". It's not nothing, but it's also not very helpful under most circumstances.

[Mechalich]

It doesn't? Because it seems to me that if the alignment system is vague enough to include every type of character, saying that someone is "Lawful Good" requires explaining just how this particular character is Lawful Good and how that impact its actions. This could be a couple of words, a few sentences or much more, but in any case I don't see what difference it makes to just remove those first two words, since they're superfluous at that point.

The problem is more that the universe of D&D includes every possible type of sapient being and that means the universe encompassed by a supposedly 'universal' objective moral system is uncomfortably vast.

When you take a moral system designed for humans (and very human-like species like Elves, Dwarves, and Halflings) and try to apply it to sapient plants (Treants), hegemonizing swarms (Formians), sapient-obligate parasitoids (Illithids), and on and on it becomes a gigantic, incomprehensible mess.

A world that had only humans that used some kind of alignment-like system would probably divide up Lawful Good, Lawful Neutral, and Neutral Good (the overwhelming majority of all humans have one of these alignments) into subcategories to provide a greater degree of nuance and at the same time might compress together rare alignments like Neutral Evil and Chaotic Evil (the difference between psychopaths and sociopaths being somewhat contentious already).

[Mastikator]

I think what's funny about the discussion of alignment is that it's already deprecated. It has two functions, both have been replaced with better options.

One is the roleplaying aspect, which needs to be supplemented with things like personality traits, ideals, bonds, flaws. But we have those already. If you fill out the trait/ideal/bond/flaw you're done. You can't freely skip alignment with no loss at that point.

The second one is cosmic morality, but here we have the dnd setting eberron that proved almost two decades ago that you can skip the alignment part and instead focus on the ideal of the plane.
If we transpose this idea to forgotten realms cosmology then we can do without alignment here as well.
9 hells is the plane of tyranny, limbo is the plane of chaos, arcadia is the plane of serene beauty, etc. They don't need alignment. And are better off without it

[KorvinStarmast]

3. try to hide the mistake by inventing an unrealistic and overly complicated game mechanic.

For Gygax, this was always an easy choice

Cackled, I did.

Yes, EGG was the only one answering the mail, I suppose, given that his first hire (Tim Kask) was trying to make heads or tails out of the pile of notes that became the Blackmoor supplement.

2. make the rules clear by explaining the gaming jargon, or

I wish they'd have done that, since I like the Law / Chaos structure better than the G/E. It seems to capture the never ending struggle to promote civilization and order versus entropy, anarchy, and chaos while staying in the secondary world.

You can argue that this tension is a never ending struggle for mankind (both real and fantastic). The chaos/disorder of the Dark Ages/Feudal times/early Middle Ages are the sweet spot for the D&D simulation at the campaign level, just add magic, demons, dragons, and other mythical monsters.

Spoiler: curious RL parallels, almost Cthulhu ish as regards the Black Death

Show

I've been digging through some historical stuff lately, and cross referencing Tuchman's A Distant Mirror, and the breakdowns in civilization that the Black Death brought with it ...)

@Mastikator
It's interesting that a problem statement that was more or less a self reporting of "My Guy Syndrome" has devolved, or maybe branched, into arguments about alignments in the game system(s) ...

@Psyren
Yeah, Angry did the topic justice there.

[Tanarii]

It doesn't? Because it seems to me that if the alignment system is vague enough to include every type of character, saying that someone is "Lawful Good" requires explaining just how this particular character is Lawful Good and how that impact its actions. This could be a couple of words, a few sentences or much more, but in any case I don't see what difference it makes to just remove those first two words, since they're superfluous at that point.

It does not. A broad strokes description of typical but not always required behavior associated with each alignment gives a player something to think about, but doesn't constantly conflict with other personality traits. It's not a straight jacket but it is a touch point to consider when trying to decide on a PCs actions in the fantasy environment,

That makes somewhat vague associated behaviors extremely useful in combination with other categories of personality traits. Not useless.

And that's assuming the people involved have matching expectations about the alignments, maybe what you think is Lawful Good I think is Lawful Neutral or Neutral Good, in which case the alignment label is actively making it harder for me to properly understand your character.

Nobody else's assumptions matter. Alignment in 5e is one of several motivations used by the player to help with roleplaying a PC. Not for a different player or the DM to "understand" the character.

If a DM wants to dictate alignment in 5e somehow, they need to specifically override that assumption. For example, when I banned evil alignments, I had to phrase it as "No evil alignments, which means no characters regularly behaving like any of the evil alignment associated behaviors, in my judgement."

[Batcathat]

It does not. A broad strokes description of typical but not always required behavior associated with each alignment gives a player something to think about, but doesn't constantly conflict with other personality traits. It's not a straight jacket but it is a touch point to consider when trying to decide on a PCs actions in the fantasy environment,

That makes somewhat vague associated behaviors extremely useful in combination with other categories of personality traits. Not useless.

Nobody else's assumptions matter. Alignment in 5e is one of several motivations used by the player to help with roleplaying a PC. Not for a different player or the DM to "understand" the character.

If a DM wants to dictate alignment in 5e somehow, they need to specifically override that assumption. For example, when I banned evil alignments, I had to phrase it as "No evil alignments, which means no characters regularly behaving like any of the evil alignment associated behaviors, in my judgement."

I don't see how "pick one of these nine super vague collections of morals" is in any way more useful than just "decide roughly what your character is like" but I suppose it's a matter of taste. If it helps some people that's good. Though considering how many issues seem to come up as a result of alignments (see this thread and about a billion others) I suspect the end result is negative.

Of course, it could be argued that the majority of these issues comes from people thinking alignment is something it isn't, but as long as the supposed advantages of alignments can be achieved without it, it seems easier to me to just remove the system in its entirety.

[RandomPeasant]

I don't see how "pick one of these nine super vague collections of morals" is in any way more useful than just "decide roughly what your character is like" but I suppose it's a matter of taste.

I think there is value in having a set of moral systems for players to pick from. My issues with alignment in that context are A) calling those things "Lawful Good" or "Neutral Evil" is not a useful set of descriptions B) there's really no reason to limit it to nine and C) it's absolutely unforgivable to not have a custom/opt-out choice, especially when it's mechanically meaningless. Don't say "some characters are Lawful Good" and then explain that you think Lawful Good means following a categorical imperative (or whatever it is you think it means), just say "some characters follow a categorical imperative". That's clearer and it makes it way easier to expand your system without having to declare "actually these contradictory moral systems are both objectively Lawful Good because I don't understand what 'objectively' means".

[LibraryOgre]

I think there is value in having a set of moral systems for players to pick from. My issues with alignment in that context are A) calling those things "Lawful Good" or "Neutral Evil" is not a useful set of descriptions B) there's really no reason to limit it to nine and C) it's absolutely unforgivable to not have a custom/opt-out choice, especially when it's mechanically meaningless.

a) This is part of why I advocate for definitions of the pieces that work in most cases... what is Lawful? What is Evil? You still need an example of what Lawful and Evil looks like in combination, but that's easier to build if you know what Lawful means, and it meaningfully opposes the viewpoint of Chaotic. To an extent, some editions of the game have done this, but I think any given definition tends to get muddled.

b) The limit of nine really comes from having a two-axis system, with a delineation of three groups on each axis. 3² is 9. To get more complicated, you'd either need to add another axis, or further delineation on the two axes... and I can't see what you would do with the second. I could see "subtle" v. "direct" as a good addition, but I am comfortable with the current "Means" v. "Ends" definitions I have.

c) I liked that 4e introduced "unaligned" as distinct from True Neutral; AD&D had True Neutral as a philosophical position, except when it came to animals, but I can also see "**** it" as a viable alignment category... until you get to the metaphysics of the universe, and the assumption that the souls of the dead go to their planar correspondence. Which is where my "planar" explanation comes in... characters who trend one way go to a place that matches that trend.

As for mechanically meaningless? That's relatively recent. AD&D had a lot of penalties for alignment change, with 1e going so far as to have alignment languages (which were pointless, in practice). 3e leaned heavily into alignment as part of magic. That I recall, 4e didn't have a lot to do with alignment as a descriptor

[KorvinStarmast]

I think there is value in having a set of moral systems for players to pick from.

None of the alignments in D&D are moral systems, though. And if I can confine myself to the current edition, alignment is descriptive, not prescriptive.

[Telok]

I've slways had good results from the Palladium/Rifts alignment system. It has a nice distinction between scrupulous & principled. Avoids, mostly, loaded baggage words like "good" & "evil". Works well as actual codes of conduct & social norms.

Also in one campaign I implemented d&d alignment as an explicitly supernatural aura based on specific magics & powerful outsiders (and usually 100% optional for most characters). That one worked perfectly because the players still said "good", "evil", "law", "chaos" when the alignments were explicitly light, dark, order, cheeseburger*. That matched the popular public relations, common misunderstandings, & massive over simplifications most people like to engage in about alignment type stuff. Best of all I didn't need to change anything from the books. Even the d&d 3.x screwups of putting idiotic alignment mismatch tags on spells & items worked in its favor. Stuff like having a "evil"/dark spell telling you if an ally is wounded, or a "good"/light spell causing hideous agony & protracted nasty death, it was all a good fit.

The fact that setting documents explicitly laid out the difference, had a light-order god that rewarded you (piety & boon system) for declaring people 'evil' then setting them on fire and had a protector/death/rebirth god of dark-yardsale* alignment, was completely missed by everyone who didn't play a divine caster. Worked perfectly. Players acted like non-philosophers who took priest advertising at face value because of years of d&d alignment screwballing.

* commonly referred to as "chaos", but I open a dictionary to a random page and pick the first noun I find just to be really accurate.

[Psyren]

This is mostly correct, but leaves out the essential personality. "Those answering the mail" didn't provide the two-axis alignment. Gary Gygax did.

The original D&D was unambiguously trying to simulate fantasy literature. So a morality system was put in the simulation because the challenge of good vs. evil is a crucial aspect of many fantasies. The extremes were called "Law" and "Chaos" from Moorcock and Dunsany because it sounded cool, but they were clearly intended to represent good and evil. High level clerics were Patriarchs if Lawful and Evil High Priests if Chaotic, etc.

Eventually, enough people noticed the discrepancy that they had to fix it. They could:
1. change the words to "Good" and "Evil",
2. make the rules clear by explaining the gaming jargon, or
3. try to hide the mistake by inventing an unrealistic and overly complicated game mechanic.

For Gygax, this was always an easy choice

It was also the right choice imo. For all its flaws, a two-axis system does a much better job of explaining, for example, what differentiates Robin Hood's morality from that of Steve Rogers. Gygax himself may not have done the best job of fleshing it out, but I think it's come a long way.

Also, we tried to move toward a single axis with 4e and it was yet another one of that edition's colossal mistakes.

I think what's funny about the discussion of alignment is that it's already deprecated. It has two functions, both have been replaced with better options.

One is the roleplaying aspect, which needs to be supplemented with things like personality traits, ideals, bonds, flaws. But we have those already. If you fill out the trait/ideal/bond/flaw you're done. You can't freely skip alignment with no loss at that point.

The second one is cosmic morality, but here we have the dnd setting eberron that proved almost two decades ago that you can skip the alignment part and instead focus on the ideal of the plane.
If we transpose this idea to forgotten realms cosmology then we can do without alignment here as well.
9 hells is the plane of tyranny, limbo is the plane of chaos, arcadia is the plane of serene beauty, etc. They don't need alignment. And are better off without it

1) Eberron's cosmology/afterlife is not some kind of ideal to be aspired to. It works for their morally-ambiguous pulpy setting, but if it was the only or even the primary one for D&D, the game would be a lot worse off.

2) Traits, Ideals, Bonds and Flaws are powerful tools, but saying alignment no longer has value because they exist is a bridge too far. Alignment on your sheet represents an aspiration, and those aspirations can help you figure out how your character might act in a situation that doesn't cleanly align (natch) to your BIFTs.

Though considering how many issues seem to come up as a result of alignments (see this thread and about a billion others) I suspect the end result is negative.

"Threads exist" is not enough to conclude on a net negative. It's not like the hundreds if not thousands of playgroups who do find it helpful have reason to rush to message boards to proclaim so.

[BRC]

It was also the right choice imo. For all its flaws, a two-axis system does a much better job of explaining, for example, what differentiates Robin Hood's morality from that of Steve Rogers. Gygax himself may not have done the best job of fleshing it out, but I think it's come a long way.

Also, we tried to move toward a single axis with 4e and it was yet another one of that edition's colossal mistakes.

For all it's flaws, the 2-axis alignment system is a great Descriptive system.

If I say "The King is Lawful Evil" that's a very loaded phrase that gives you a lot of information about The King.

The problem is always when you have to take a character and then precisely pin them into one of nine boxes. Is the Sheriff of Nottingham Lawful Evil, or just Lawful Neutral. Robin Hood and the Merry Men are Outlaws after all, does the Sheriff need to be evil to try to stop them?

Which is a fine question until you need to determine if Friar Tuck's Spell affects the Sheriff as an Evil Creature, and suddenly you need a hard-and-fast answer about the true nature of the Sheriff of Nottingham.

[GloatingSwine]

Most Thieves Guilds are usually envisioned as some kind of organize crime -alike, with some kind of code of tradition/honor. That's associated with Lawful Neutral or Lawful Evil, not chaotic anything.

Being (in effect) a strong-arm or charismatic gang leader heading up your own "guild" wouldn't be though.

Any thieves guild which didn't *at least* adhere to some sort of Omertà would last about fifteen seconds before the first knife slipped between the first set of ribs to keep a secret.

[Keltest]

Any thieves guild which didn't *at least* adhere to some sort of Omertà would last about fifteen seconds before the first knife slipped between the first set of ribs to keep a secret.

Indeed. Chaotic beings can cooperate and organize, they just do so because they all individually decided its for the best in this specific circumstance, not because they think organization is intrinsically superior or anything like that.

[BRC]

Indeed. Chaotic beings can cooperate and organize, they just do so because they all individually decided its for the best in this specific circumstance, not because they think organization is intrinsically superior or anything like that.

I'm always of the opinion that "Neutral" and "Chaotic" are the most confusing points on the alignment chart.

Neutral is just a question of, like, is it enough to be not especially one way or another, or is Neutrality an aspiration in of itself?
Similarly, is "Chaotic" merely a rejection of Law, or do you have to value the absence of Law? Can you be Chaotic without being some sort of philosopher on the subject.


A Thieves Guild could adopt Omerta simply as a survival strategy, rather than because they inherently value the idea of following rules. Snitching isn't seen as a betrayal of the Guild's code, so much as just a stupid thing to do because the rest of the guild will murder you for it. The rest of the guild murders you for it, not because they see it as WRONG, but because the way they discourage people from snitching is to murder anybody who snitches.

But even that isn't necessarily "Chaotic", just not Lawful.