Quote from: GeekyBugle;1133016But you're reverting now to Chainmail, which isn't part of the discussion, we're talking about D&D where Law/Order are shorthand for Good/Evil and are eminently and obviously religious since you have gods from both sides.

You even have classes that must follow the Lawful/Chaotic code to a T or loose their powers.

If the inherent conflict is among gods this makes the alignment issue a theological one (in world, I care little for IRL theology), and by extension, given a Medieval/Pseudo-Medieval setting, a moral one.

So a "Neutral" individual is one that put's his religious values, his morals side for profit/personal gain. Which doesn't really sound like something a good person would do from a POV of a Medieval/Pseudo-Medieval population.

For Chainmail, it's one thing. For a D&D game, it's a slightly different thing.  For my D&D game, it's a slightly different thing than someone else's D&D game.  Because it is a very coarse grained measurement.  Alignment has no exactly consistent meaning outside the setting--and thus these slightly different takes inform how it is supposed to work.  

Yes, for some settings, it can have a strong theological component.  If that's the way the setting works, then that's the way alignment works in that setting.  

I bring up Chainmail specifically because there's this lingering unspoken premise going on in much of this discussion as if D&D was a set thing--with alignment mostly unchanged across all versions of the game, never mind the settings. Pat's earlier statement about the guys with the white hats is I think much closer to the truth.

Isn't there an old quote from Gary Gygax himself to the effect that taking "alignment" as a philosophical or ethical framework is essentially shallow?

D&D campaigns runs fine without alignment. See my Majestic Wilderlands supplement for one way to make it work.

As for why it began in the first place it started with Dave Arneson's Blackmoor campaign. The side of Law defended Castle Blackmoor from the side of Chaos who were led by the evil Egg of Coot. The neutrals who those nearby that were not allied with either and could be recruited provided there was something in it for them.

Oh and unlike later campaigns both sides had PCs. I believe Dave Arneson handled the neutrals.

From Page 4 First Fantasy Campaign
[ATTACH=CONFIG]4543[/ATTACH]

Good find estar! Thank you!

Quote from: Ratman_tf;1133038So what happens in your game if the Paladin ever encounters a trolley problem?

Divine guidance is given if sought via a note to the player.

Quote from: Spinachcat;1133066Good find estar! Thank you!

No Problem.

I have to stress both sides were PCs. There wasn't a lot of NPCs as we understand it in the early days of Blackmoor. Dave was literally a referee between two nebulous groups of players. I say nebulous because player could and did switch sides as one player did (Dave Fant) when he became a Dracula style Vampire. Which was the most powerful creature in the campaign at the time.

And at one point, Blackmoor was lost because the players defending Blackmoor were too busy exploring the dungeon while the chaos players swooped in. As a result they were exiled to Lock Gloomen where they promptly started trying to find the local dungeon.

As for what happened later. What Gygax experienced and what inspired D&D was Dave bringing down the Blackmoor dungeon to run for the Lake Geneva crew. According to the story it was because out of all the things he did with Blackmoor it was most portable thing he could bring from the Twin cities to Lake Geneva.

So while Law and Chaos made it into D&D and the Greyhawk Campaign. What it meant at first was that Law was the upper world where the PCs hailed from and Chaos were all the monsters in the underworld trying to kill them. Unlike Dave and Blackmoor, it was the players and Gary running everything else as NPCs.

Of course the campaign expanded beyond the dungeon, both before and after D&D was published. Thus the old setup of your allies, neutrals, and enemies was too simplistic. Like many later editions and RPGs, people overthinked it and forgot what the original system was for and the nine-fold alignment system was born.

The way I "fixed" back in the day and now, was to jettison alignment. Paladin and clerics had a creed set by deity that I wrote up. Where it mattered "Evil" was interpreted as hostile intent. Some stuff like Protection from Evil were left virtually unchanged as specific types of creatures were named.

You can see some of this in the free basic rules I put out.
http://www.batintheattic.com/downloads/MW%20Majestic%20Fantasy%20Basic%20RPG%20Rev%2010.pdf

Quote from: estar;1133070As for what happened later. What Gygax experienced and what inspired D&D was Dave bringing down the Blackmoor dungeon to run for the Lake Geneva crew. According to the story it was because out of all the things he did with Blackmoor it was most portable thing he could bring from the Twin cities to Lake Geneva.

So while Law and Chaos made it into D&D and the Greyhawk Campaign. What it meant at first was that Law was the upper world where the PCs hailed from and Chaos were all the monsters in the underworld trying to kill them. Unlike Dave and Blackmoor, it was the players and Gary running everything else as NPCs.

Of course the campaign expanded beyond the dungeon, both before and after D&D was published. Thus the old setup of your allies, neutrals, and enemies was too simplistic. Like many later editions and RPGs, people overthinked it and forgot what the original system was for and the nine-fold alignment system was born.

The way I "fixed" back in the day and now, was to jettison alignment. Paladin and clerics had a creed set by deity that I wrote up. Where it mattered "Evil" was interpreted as hostile intent. Some stuff like Protection from Evil were left virtually unchanged as specific types of creatures were named.

You can see some of this in the free basic rules I put out.
http://www.batintheattic.com/downloads/MW%20Majestic%20Fantasy%20Basic%20RPG%20Rev%2010.pdf

Neat, thanks for the free rules, will read them and buy the paid ones when I have some disposable income.

That is one solution, a different one is to go with Good vs Evil with innocent civilians trapped in the middle.

Quote from: HappyDaze;1133052I gave you the example of the Lawful Neutral Modrons. These guys are all about totalitarian order without care whether that order achieves good or evil. I also mentioned he Slaadi, poster children for Chaotic Neutral. They are about promoting total chaos without concern for good or evil.
....
While we're at it, the Daemons/Yugoloths are Neutral Evil personified. They are no less evil than Demons or Devils, and they pursue their evil ends without any concern for whether it promotes order or chaos (that's just an incidental).

Which are made up planar beings from a game that works backwards from the idea that alignment can be an objective force (within the game world) that can shape the planes, or some crap like that. That doesn't prove that alignment makes sense or is an effective RP tool. Only that the designers have made an effort to include planar creatures of every alignment.

I also gave specific reasons why I thought that Nazis couldn't be neutral on the Law/Chaos axis specifically.

Quote from: HappyDaze;1133052You may not buy the "bullshit notion" of this, but it's been in D&D for decades.

And the correct interpretation and usefulness of alignment has been debated throughout that entire time (often ending many a game session in the process). This thread isn't the first time this dead horse has been powdered to dust, and alignment has been so well received throughout D&D's history that it's even been progressively demoted in importance for the last three editions. But sacred cows never die.

Quote from: HappyDaze;1133052By your description, you make the Nazis sound as though they (as a generalization) are an example of Lawful Neutral intent that became Lawful Evil in practice.

I don't think that Nazis neatly fit into any alignment, cuz I don't think alignments make sense or can properly represent human nature. But almost nobody in real life sees themselves as "evil" and sets out to promote evil specifically. Rather they tend to be motivated by something else, which may ultimately lead to "evil".

Nazism is a form of fascism, which are authoritarian nationalistic ideologies that are opposed to liberty and seek to control every aspect of society through intimidation and force, and the establishment of dictatorial regimes. Which I suppose could be considered "lawful" in D&D (it certainly isn't "neutral"), except Nazis also came to power through chaos, and their ranks were often highly disorganized with everyone tripping over themselves trying to anticipate and satisfy Hitler's whims, which sounds very "chaotic", and has lead some (in this thread even) to classify them as such in D&D terms.

Personally, I think it just proves how alignment is incapable of encompassing the complexities of human nature, because as far as I can tell the Nazis were both; highly controlling and highly chaotic in the extreme. It wasn't that they were trying to find a balance between order and chaos (actual Law/Chaos neutrality), but that they were obsessed with order and driven by chaos. So they were constantly fluctuating between the two at extreme levels.

Quote from: Shasarak;1133053If the Players are "doing it be default" then maybe they really are grasping alignment easily.  Maybe you could say intuitively even.

Almost like they don't need it spelled out for them in their character sheets. But the only one axis of the two they intuitively understand is Good/Evil. The Law/Chaos axis is counterintuitive nonsense. Which was the point of the OP.

Quote from: VisionStorm;1133072Almost like they don't need it spelled out for them in their character sheets. But the only one axis of the two they intuitively understand is Good/Evil. The Law/Chaos axis is counterintuitive nonsense. Which was the point of the OP.

I would agree that Law/Chaos is the weakest of the two axis and on the other hand was no more complicated to understand then you would expect for someone aged 11 and up.

I liked this, too.

http://easydamus.com/alignmentreal.html

"I'm not neutral evil, I'm just... ambitious!"

Quote from: VisionStorm;1133072That doesn't prove that alignment makes sense or is an effective RP tool.

I won't argue that Alignment makes sense. Like Hit Points, its a game mechanic that tries to achieve a goal. In this case, it's goal is to be an effective RP tool. For me, Alignment is an excellent shorthand. Players know where their PC stands in the grand scheme of things. It gives them a basic premise for how their PC sees the world.

As I run mostly public games and often one-shots with strangers, the table swiftly gets in sync when we know who the Lawful, Neutral and Chaotic characters are. It's an easy touchstone for them and we're off to the races. Also, it declares the lines of division in the party which encourages banter, rivalry and drama.

Can you achieve this without alignment? Sure, but Alignment is a shorthand like white, gray, and black hats in a Western.

Alignment is proof that D&D is inescapable.  Even after 4 decades of alternatives, some people itch to say the same things they've said negatively about it since it first assigned a label they disagreed with.  There will be gamers arguing about alignment on their deathbeds, as if alignment could hear them and change to suit them; focused not on the games serving their needs, but on the one they most wish did (in this area) but doesn't.

I find the concept silly myself. Something fit to a Masters of the Universe cartoon.

Quote from: Itachi;1133106I find the concept silly myself. Something fit to a Masters of the Universe cartoon.

Or one of the myriad of fantasy novels that inspired D&D.

Quote from: Spinachcat;1133081I won't argue that Alignment makes sense. Like Hit Points, its a game mechanic that tries to achieve a goal. In this case, it's goal is to be an effective RP tool. For me, Alignment is an excellent shorthand. Players know where their PC stands in the grand scheme of things. It gives them a basic premise for how their PC sees the world.

As I run mostly public games and often one-shots with strangers, the table swiftly gets in sync when we know who the Lawful, Neutral and Chaotic characters are. It's an easy touchstone for them and we're off to the races. Also, it declares the lines of division in the party which encourages banter, rivalry and drama.

Can you achieve this without alignment? Sure, but Alignment is a shorthand like white, gray, and black hats in a Western.

I find that the shorthand doesn't particularly shorten anything. As the disagreement over nazi alignment earlier shows, even experienced D&D players often don't have clear conceptions about what different alignments mean beyond the obvious. Using plain English like "selfish bastard" is much more clear than the supposed shorthand of alignment.

Lots of games use hit points. But even among fantasy games, alignment is a D&Dism -- like beholders or mind flayers. To the extent that it appears in other games at all, it seems more like a holdover.