Should D&D alignment morality be a triangle instead? Lawful Good and Chaotic Good aren't really different, since Good is just plain Good, a Good society will inevitably end up being both orderly and free since if it slid into authoritarianism or anarchy that would make it not Good at all. So ultimately, there is no "Lawful Good" or "Chaotic Good" at all, there is simply Good.
That being said, Lawful Evil and Chaotic Evil are still very much two separate things, one embodying the evil of totalitarian tyranny at its most extreme and the other embodying violent anarchism at its end.
Have you ever actually played a game before?
Or, like, read a rulebook?
$1000000 question.
OP still has to answer.
It should be abandoned entirely, for it does nothing and was useless piece of shit since it was introduced. Like all Gygax ideas
fpbp
>a Good society
utterly irrelevant, since alignment is applied to a creature, not a society
fpbp AND trips of truth
>alignment is applied to a creature
actually, it's applied to whole races, religions, and cultures
>alignment is bad unless I can use it to browbeat players
bad gm detected
>its yet another alignment thread
My, now thats something new!
>Should D&D alignment morality be a triangle instead?
No
>Lawful Good and Chaotic Good aren't really different, since Good is just plain Good, a Good society will inevitably end up being both orderly and free since if it slid into authoritarianism or anarchy that would make it not Good at all.
No
>So ultimately, there is no "Lawful Good" or "Chaotic Good" at all, there is simply Good.
No
Thanks for listening to my TED talk
Lawful Good is unattainable harmonious utopia.
Chaotic Good is terrorists with good enough excuse to be called freedom fighters.
Pretty much. Lot of times in games I played in or observed the good guys are responsible for most atrocious stuff.
>since if it slid into authoritarianism or anarchy that would make it not Good at all
What makes you think this?
There are good authoritarian societies, they enforce good through strict law.
There are good anarchist societies, they respect each other's freedoms but band together for common defense.
I like how you forgot Neutral existed.
>There are good authoritarian societies, they enforce good through strict law.
Name one.
Mendev from Parhfinder 1e
Holy Orders.
Holy Orders.
They are neither good or holy.
Alignment Threads of /tg/
The only people who seem to have a problem with D&D Alignment are Literal morons, Philosophy 101 Autists or people who are blatantly evil under the system disliking being called out as vile frickwits.
Every thread on Alignment reveals these three every single time.
Literal morons have issues with the rules and their reading comprehension tends to be shit. They misinterpret simple language and are often pigheadedly obstinate when it comes to correcting their moronic ideas.
Phil 101 Autists are worse than Literal morons. Unable to ignore their newfound knowledge, they argue incessantly about how the system must work within all these ideas they just learned (or have only ever learned) and blatantly ignore the conditions for D&D's Objective Alignment. They only seem capable of arguing about the system as it relates to modern day, real world, Earth and not the Fantasy universe it comes from, a common aliment for certain types of shit speckled, muppet farts ala Caster/Martial disparity.
Evil motherfrickers are the worst. Quite simply they will argue at length and with every bad faith argument they have to not be labelled the monstrous things they are. From fascists trying to not have their genocidal movements called out as the evil they are, from people who like to cause others suffering not being properly labelled, to other types who all want to be Good but are so far from it with their beliefs and actions and are unable to reconcile it with the way the system labels them.
Anyone remember the "slavery can be Lawful Good" anon from 2019/2020?
If Slavery is evil Usury (which includes all interest-based moneylending) should be evil too
Usury is more of a Neutral action. It's clearly self-interested, but not at the expense of other people. Slavery on the other hand explicitly requires the subjugation of others in order to operate.
How is Usury not at the expense of other people? It's literally subjugation.
Slavery can be voluntarily entered. Most slaves were indentured servants, but that doesn't mean it's not evil.
>How is Usury not at the expense of other people?
Because in many cases it's done so that both parties can benefit. Some guy needs money to open a store, a person loans them that money, the person uses the money to create the store then pays back the loan with interest, both parties end up profiting in the end.
Now if we do want to count lesser forms of servitude as slavery I'll concede on that front, I just didn't consider indentured servants to be true slavery.
I see JIDF really never slepps
Usury is to loans as murder is to killing. It's the Evil form of a Neutral action.
All loans with interest charged are evil. Simple as.
As unhelpful and pointless as saying all killing is evil.
Why? What's useless and unhelpful about saying all killing is evil and then holding others to that standard?
Btw, in traditional christian morality some killing is justifiable but moneylending for profit never is
>Btw, in traditional christian morality some killing is justifiable but moneylending for profit never is
In traditional Christian morality all slavery is moral too, probably not the best example to follow
penal labour is both slavery and technically good
Friendly reminder that all objectivists fall in the latter category
No, on my end it's the absurdities arising from some by-fiat cases. Back in 3.5, it's Evil to use Poison *at all*, in *any* case, even if the entire point of it is that it's a painless paralytic *completely* breaking the given reason that poisons cause "unnecesary suffering". Meanwhile, lethal Bludgeoning damage isn't despite being entirely about the breaking of bones and internal bleeding.
On the "Philosophy 101 Autism" end, it's the dysfunctions from Slavery *at large* being Evil rather than a Law/Chaos debate. Strict ownership as a mere beast of burden, sure, but that's one very specific subset of chattel slavery. And the instant you bring personal liberty in you've already lit the Law/Chaos axis on fire.
I've always thought this was stupid as well. At worst it is ungentlemanly to use poison to dispatch an enemy even if it is a non-lethal one with the intent of merely rendering unconscious. Could say it is unchivalrous but is it evil? Frick no. That's stupid.
But then how would you have good vs good conflicts, OP?
Besides, you could merge both evils into anarchotyranny the same way.
Depends on the on the setting.
No, you're just another moron in a long line of morons who don't understand how alignments work.
You should learn how alignment was actually played at one time.
9-point alignment originally existed as a) an explicit tool for judging roleplaying (the DMG has an entire section on rating your players to determine how long their characters have to train when leveling up) and b) as an implicit tool to decide what monster groups would fight together in larger battles.
Just read Chainmail to see what I mean about the second point. Fantasy armies could be Chaotic, Lawful or Neutral, and could have some units from the neighbouring list. 9-point alignment just expands this. And offers more in the way of adjudicating diplomatic outcomes.
Still, I agree with your philosophy
>rating your players to determine how long their characters have to train when leveling up
that sounds like completely asspull mechanic and I'm happy that more recent iterations of the system abandoned it
Want to know how I know you're a millennial?
Don't worry, not even grogs used that trash.
You say this, but then you're a no-game who hasn't had to deal with moronic player characters constantly.
AD&D naturally filters out dumb characters, it' great.
You can also apply the same concept to game that suggest giving out experience for roleplaying. E.g., VtM (pre-V5 garbo) has an attribute called 'demeanor'. Basically its a personality archetype a character presents to the world. While its counter part, 'nature,' generates willpower when you fulfill it in game (i.e., by indulging your "true self"), demeanor has no mechanics tied to it. Or does it- if you take these alignment-like traits to be the characters role, you can judge whether to give out the rp exp based on how well they followed that role.
Alignment is an archaic and nonsensical holdover from the primordial era of role playing games. The solution isnt changing it to be different, its getting rid of it all together. The only reason holding me back from doing so in my own games is because I can use it as a cudgel to beat my paladin player over the head that paladins are supposed to be lawful good when he acts like a khorne worshipper.
>paladins are supposed to be lawful good when he acts like a khorne worshipper
The only difference between a chaos knight of khorne and a lawful good Paladin is that the chaos knight has license to kill everyone he meets while the lawful good paladin only has permission to genocide SOME people
gygax was a jehovah's witness so that gives you some indication as to what "Lawful, Good" is supposed to mean
the Good/Evil morality axis wasn't created by Gygax, he only had Law/Neutral/Chaos. Hargrave added Good and Evil.
... what if he's the paladin of khorne? Seems nonsensica to punish him, especially since you are aware how moronic alignments are.
Because he's not, he's a paladin of the god of honour, chivalry and fairness. Which makes it even more egregious when the paladins solution to literally every problem is to use violence like a stereotype of a barbarian. Rather then a chivalrous knight
>a Good society will inevitably end up being both orderly and free since
no such thing
taxes are orderly and can be used for good, but I’m sure as frick not free if I’m extorted under threat of violence and/or loss of freedom
Free as in speech, not as in beer. You mong.
free as in freedom, you stupid Black person
what part of extortion under threat of force I am forbidden from using is freedom?
a good society would be neither orderly nor free since absolute order and absolute freedom are both bad
A free society must, to some extent, be lawful, otherwise there's no protections of your freedoms in the first place. A nightwatchman state still requires a state to be the nightwatchman after all.
>a “free” society must…
were the society good, there wouldn’t need to exist measures to protect your freedom by preemptively curtailing your freedom
4e almost had it right with its straight-line morality, but it was backwards.
It should have gone:
>Chaotic Good
>Good
>Neutral
>Evil
>Lawful Evil
Your post is so stupid im impressed you had the gal to make it.
Way to prove why there are 9 alignments and even those could be broken into more if anything.
Damm poozers who havent played a single session in their worthless lives.
I think you really just need Good and Evil. Law vs Chaos is really just motivations vs lol randum in practice and doesn't mean anything but setting fluff like different flavors of demons and devils or whatever...
Oh look. Another alignment thread.
Use RIFTS alignment if you must use alignment. It will save you the headaches from "this is what good character would do" and "I'm chaotic neutral"
https://imgur.com/gallery/DmKvb
>Lawful good
National Socialism
>Neutral good
Fascism
>Chaotic good
Eco-fascism
>Lawful neutral
Monarchism
>True neutral
>Reactionary conservatism
>Chaotic neutral
Libertarianism
>Lawful evil
Communism
>Neutral evil
Liberalism
>Chaotic evil
Anarchism
>lawful good
me, stopping at a stop sign
>good
me
>chaotic good
me, pissing on
>lawful neutral
sage, and not announcing it
>neutral
no sage
>chaotic neutral
sage, and announcing it
>lawful evil
solving the captcha
>evil
>chaotic evil
buying a pass so he can make more terrible posts per minute
>lawful good
Germans
>good
Italians
>chaotic good
Anglos
>lawful neutral
Russians
>neutral
Japanese
>chaotic neutral
Native Americans
>lawful evil
Chinese
>evil
Arabs
>chaotic evil
Black people
>anglos
>good
>Should D&D alignment morality be a triangle instead?
only if this would make it more fun or interesting
not because of moralising or philosophy
alignment threads with no original ideas please leave
The very original 1974 version of D&D had a three-point alignment (Law, Neutrality, Chaos). It worked pretty well. Leave good and evil to subjective human morals, far, far beneath the cosmic struggles of Moorwiener's law and chaos.