Quote from: talysman;647824I use Law and Chaos (and not Good and Evil,) but I imagine most people would consider my interpretation pretty paleolithic. I don't approve of alignment as behavioral constraint; it's a behavior suggestion for monsters who have no other listed behavior, but otherwise has nothing to do with how anyone acts.

Instead, Law is an ideal of cosmic order and Civilization in the broadest sense, but not necessarily in the specific sense. In other words, obsessive-compulsives or highly disciplined characters aren't necessarily Lawful. Chaos is a supernatural taint that undermines cosmic order; some intelligent beings embrace Chaos voluntarily because they believe in "might makes right". Neutral isn't really an alignment, it's a lack of alignment. Neutrals are the people who put mundane concerns (good or bad) ahead of cosmic issues.

This is very, very close to how I play it. I downplay alignment as a behavioral guideline, and I'm a firmly believer in Jeff Rients' Threefold Apocalyptic Alignment System. I've seen it called the "Team Jersey" approach to alignment, but I like it; I also like to tie it into a Grand Unified Theory of D&D's Universe, marrying Moorcock's (and really Poul Anderson's) Law/Chaos divide to Robert E. Howard's dichotomy of civilization and barbarism. They are not synonimous, but civilization and savagery are often the tools of choice of Law and Chaos, though that does not preclude the silver-tongued and urbane Chaotic agent, or the noble savage stalwart of Law. Gary's introduction to B2 Keep on the Borderlands profoundly colours my vision of the matter.

However I do like to divide Neutral characters into (a) people whose concerns (typically but not necessarily self-centered) keep them out of the Cosmic Struggle, and (b) people who preach Balance between Law and Chaos a la Moorcock's Eternal Champion(s).

Quote from: talysman;647824

• Alignment isn't enforced; it mainly just controls how cleric spells and aligned magic items work, and how some creatures react to others.
  
• Chaos isn't necessarily freedom, nor is it randomness. Pretty much everything that goes against nature is Chaotic, though. Like undead.
  
• Neutral isn't selfishness. If anything, Chaos is selfishness, although I suppose you could distinguish mundane self-interest from sociopathic self-absorption.
  
• Anyone can be good, evil, or either, all the time or only in specific situations/towards specific individuals. No moustache twirlers!
  
• Neutral Clerics aren't druids. They're just guys who think of the priesthood as more of a job. Neutral clerics can't reach name level.
• Chaotic clerics are heretics or demon-worshipers. They're in it for personal power. Demon-worship is more a matter of bargains and pacts, rather than admiration.
  
• Druids can theoretically be any alignment, but I exclude them from Law, because my game world uses them as rebels against the major civilization.
• Civic law isn't Law. You can believe that the local laws go against higher principals. Therefore, I allow Lawful thieves. Robin Hood is my example of a Lawful thief.
  

I've bolded the points that are exactly how I play.

However, I do have Neutral deities (whose portfolios may be important for mortals but have little bearing on the conflicts of Law and Chaos), and Chaotic deities (gods of sin and madness and horror, who may be portrayed as demon lords, Cthulhoid elder beings, etc.). I keep Druids Neutral, being essentially "specialty priests" for a subset of cthonic Neutral gods (running the gamut from bountiful Eostre to harsh, vicious Xipe Totec in real-world inspirations).

Quote from: talysman;647975Hannibal Lector, likewise, is just an ordinary evil little man. Not Lawful (did he ever work a miracle?) or Chaotic (did he display demonic powers?) Just Neutral.

In my typical D&D setting, I'd say Lecter does the work of forces of Chaos, whether he realizes it or not, by spreading pain and death and madness.

Quote from: talysman;647824Some side-effects of my interpretation:
[LIST=7]

• Druids can theoretically be any alignment, but I exclude them from Law, because my game world uses them as rebels against the major civilization.
• Civic law isn't Law. You can believe that the local laws go against higher principals. Therefore, I allow Lawful thieves. Robin Hood is my example of a Lawful thief.

Your points 7 and 8 contridict each other.
Civic law isn;t law so Robin Hood appeals to a higher principle and can be Lawful.
However your druids can't be lawful becuase they are opposed to the major state civilisation, ie the Civic Law.
That your druids can't be lawful because they worship Herne or the Wild Hunt or whatever, no issue , but surely if they are defined as non-lawful because they oppose the hegemony and can't therefore be working towards a higher set of principles doesn't make any sense.

QuoteSome side-effects of my interpretation:
7. Druids can theoretically be any alignment, but I exclude them from Law, because my game world uses them as rebels against the major civilization.
8. Civic law isn't Law. You can believe that the local laws go against higher principals. Therefore, I allow Lawful thieves. Robin Hood is my example of a Lawful thief.

Quote from: jibbajibba;648005Your points 7 and 8 contridict each other.
Civic law isn;t law so Robin Hood appeals to a higher principle and can be Lawful.
However your druids can't be lawful becuase they are opposed to the major state civilisation, ie the Civic Law.
That your druids can't be lawful because they worship Herne or the Wild Hunt or whatever, no issue , but surely if they are defined as non-lawful because they oppose the hegemony and can't therefore be working towards a higher set of principles doesn't make any sense.

No, they don't contradict each other. They oppose civilization and have argued themselves into opposing Civilization. One does not necessarily follow the other, but what makes these guys "druids" in my setting is that they have jumped to that conclusion.

My druids seek power in nature not because they worship it, but because they have rejected everything else. Neutral druids are hippies. Chaos druids are guerrillas with an Earth First! vibe.

Quote from: The Traveller;647895Seems pretty straightforward and intuitive by the description I gave earlier, which is the generally accepted view in most fiction that uses Law and Chaos as opposing supernatural powers. I can't imagine anyone getting confused by that.

In physics there's still raging debate over whether or not anything can be unpredictable (playing dice with the universe works on a few levels here) chaos theory/M-theory/determinism notwithstanding, and if it's not unpredictable it's not chaos.

Yet Moorcock (Law and Chaos), Zelazny (Order and Chaos), and Anderson (Law and Chaos) don't use them in the same way. The inconsistency in the way Law and Chaos are used from rpg table to rpg table is also reflected in the source fictions.

Quote from: TristramEvans;647896Disorder, confusion, and discord I suppose.

How would your definitions play out in terms of PC or NPC behavior?

Quote from: Rincewind1;647973Well, you answered your own question in your own post, had you not? Nazi Germany, USSR from Stalin onward or Spanish Inquisition fit under Lawful Evil, as it was a purposeful, orderly regime, which fought against spread of new ideas within it's ranks, while committing terrible travesties.

He meant if all you use is Law/Chaos, without the good/evil axis.

Quote from: apparition13;648164Yet Moorcock (Law and Chaos), Zelazny (Order and Chaos), and Anderson (Law and Chaos) don't use them in the same way. The inconsistency in the way Law and Chaos are used from rpg table to rpg table is also reflected in the source fictions.

It's like I said back here:

Quote from: talysman;647712So: there's a core concept behind Law vs. Chaos, and the societal definitions relate to the stuff around the core, while Good vs. Evil at its core is just "what society values", but what those core values are changes. That's the sense in which Law/Chaos are more real than Good/Evil, but with the caveat that the universal definition of Law/Chaos is pretty fuzzy.

Science fiction writers from about the '40s through the '60s were obsessed with the idea of irrational, chaotic forces (like those that spawned World War II and the hippie revolution in the '60s) rising up to oppose rationality and science. At the core, that's all that the cosmic battle of Law and Chaos is about in Moorcock, Zelazny and Anderson (and Gordon R. Dickson.) However, each had unique things to say about that, so the borders around what constitutes Law or Chaos in each are fuzzy, and the *exact* definitions change, even though the *core* definitions don't. And Moorcock and Zelazny wrote about Law and Chaos for much longer, and their presentations changed as their opinions changed. Or, for that matter, the needs of the story.

Quote from: talysman;648113No, they don't contradict each other. They oppose civilization and have argued themselves into opposing Civilization. One does not necessarily follow the other, but what makes these guys "druids" in my setting is that they have jumped to that conclusion.

My druids seek power in nature not because they worship it, but because they have rejected everything else. Neutral druids are hippies. Chaos druids are guerrillas with an Earth First! vibe.

Ah.
Okay, this clears up my earlier mistrust of what you were going for with it.

Quote from: apparition13;648164How would your definitions play out in terms of PC or NPC behavior?
.

Not at all. I am firmly of the belief that a character's choices, personality, emotions and morals should all firmly be in the hands of the player.

My two cents -

I personally feel that Gygaxian 9 spoke alignment sucks donkey balls, due to the fact that Gary could never decide if Lawful meant either someone who adheres to societal mores or someone who had a great degree of self discipline. Miyamato Musashi was a great example of a dude who broke society' laws constantly but had great internal self discipline. Another great fictional example (although I personally find objectivism juvenile) is John Galt, who was a rebel but had great personal discipline and loyalty to consistent ideals. 9 spoke alignment is horribly broken and an interminable source of arguments due to its poor handling of the societal/internal divide.

I much prefer the OD&D Law vs Chaos split, with an eye towards Moorcock's writings. I leave good and evil as subjective things, as they were in the old S&S classics.

Law (order) and chaos are visible in nature.  "good" and "evil" are only relative to culture.

Quote from: RPGPundit;648340Law (order) and chaos are visible in nature.  "good" and "evil" are only relative to culture.

The Physical Law of the Conservation of Information dictates that there is no such thing as chaos.
Every eventual end state, however chaotic it appears, can be deduced from the initial setting and the application of physical laws.(here discussed in relation to the black hole paradox and Hawking radiation - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_hole_information_paradox)

Whereas raping a 5 year old girl and leaving her to die is Evil - http://www.cnn.com/2013/04/22/world/asia/india-child-rape/index.html

Quote from: jibbajibba;648344The Physical Law of the Conservation of Information dictates that there is no such thing as chaos.
Every eventual end state, however chaotic it appears, can be deduced from the initial setting and the application of physical laws.(here discussed in relation to the black hole paradox and Hawking radiation - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_hole_information_paradox)

Bad citation: it says at the start that this isn't a law, merely a "commonly assumed tenet" - in other words, precisely the sort of thing science ought to test.

Also, it depends on unitarity, and as the article itself shows you can propose (and Roger Penrose has proposed) ways in which unitarity can be lost without us rethinking physics.

Also, the uncertainty principle states that omniscient knowledge of all aspects of a physical situation is impossible and you have to compromise certainty in one area to get any information about other areas. So, you can have a setup where Law operates to the extent where you have certainty, and Chaos operates within the uncertainty.

Also applying real world physics to fantastical cosmology and metaphysics = get the hell out of here dammit and come back when you've left behind your hard science baggage, this is a fantasy game.

Chaos is merely the unknown, and Law is merely the known. Patterns are our inventions. The world is just the world, and it goes on it's merry way.

Quote from: RPGPundit;648340Law (order) and chaos are visible in nature.  "good" and "evil" are only relative to culture.

Unless you support the concept of Natural Law, which pretty much is predicated on the notion that there is a natural "right" and a natural "wrong," e.g. "good" and "evil".

What it really comes down to with RPGs is that who gives a fuck what you think about how our world works with regards to God or lack thereof, physics or what-have-you.

Can you imagine a universe/cosmology that works in another way?

Quote from: CRKrueger;648442What it really comes down to with RPGs is that who gives a fuck what you think about how our world works with regards to God or lack thereof, physics or what-have-you.

Can you imagine a universe/cosmology that works in another way?

I can. In case of DnD alignments, one just has to Learn To Love The Bomb. I personally dislike the notion that Law is just a different variety of Good, and Chaos is so closely connected to the bad/evil things.