Finally, bloody part two is done. Might need another edit job, but here it is so far

 

The only way to make sense of all this 

                                      Part 2, the Devil is in the Detail Details

All right, so you’ve learned the basics the morality system of 3rd edition D&D functions, or you think you do and have just kept on reading because you want to show off to your friends how smart you are. Regardless, either way you are going to be very confused, because I am going to try to make sense of the actual mechanics of the D&D alignment system, a goal only slightly less lofty and improbable than bringing peace to the Middle East, but, hey, I might as well begin with something big. Right. So, in D&D we have the two scales of morality: Good and Evil and Law and Chaos, with Neutral existing in between both scales and being generally irritating. Now as I already said, Good and Evil are objective, but right and wrong are subjective, so that is a very important concept you should keep in mind while reading this. I am going to have to reiterate that point half a hundred times in this series of alignment articles before people actually begin to grasp it.

Anyway, Good and Evil are absolutes in D&D. They are both Cosmic forces in the D&D reality, and aren’t simply philosophical concepts the way they are in real life. They are active forces that make up the world. Gods don’t make them, because gods are subject to the alignment rules as well. There is a clear-cut definition of what is good and what is evil. Wizards of the Coast, however, in their infinite wisdom, felt that the players weren’t worthy of understanding this complex system, and instead just gave us the stark notes in the Player’s Handbook, leading to endless frustration and arguments over the years, but that’s another gripe altogether.

Right, so let’s talk about how the system works. There are nine alignments all together. These alignments act as categories of morality and pretty much all moral choices fit within them some way or another (a few exceptions will be noted in the 4th part of this article series). The alignments are.

Lawful Good-LG

Neutral Good- NG

Chaotic Good-CG

Lawful Neutral-LN

Neutral-N

Chaotic Neutral- CN

Lawful Evil- LE

Neutral Evil- NE

Chaotic Evil- CE

As I’ve already explained, the four groupings are Law, Chaos, Good, and Evil, with Neutral again just being generally irritating right smack in the middle of it all. Now all of these categories operate on different scales of morality, so they will have some overlap. So for example, a lawful person can either be evil, neutral, or good; similar methods, different ideals. Likewise, a good person can be neutral, chaotic, lawful - same morality but different methods. Good and Evil define the morality behind a person, while Law and Chaos define the methods and mannerisms of the person, with neutral standing in the middle of both extremes.

Any character can exist within these nine categories. A person’s position on the scale is determined by their actions and motives. A person’s actions can change where they are on the scale. For example, Arthas from Warcraft III (Oh my gosh, a spoiler) starts out as a devoted paladin who is honestly dedicated to the virtues of honor, mercy, kindness and loyalty. However over time, his almost hopeless battle against the undead causes him to slowly abandon his principles and in the end his soul. He slips from Good to Evil due to his ruthless actions and his loss of faith. Likewise, Snape from everybody’s favorite guide to witchcraft, Harry Potter (again, spoilers) starts as a selfish, greedy, and nasty man, IE Neutral Evil, who eventually redeems himself and becomes… a selfish, greedy, nasty person who helps the good guys (Lawful Neutral).

It is important to note that these nine alignments aren’t listed in a linear fashion. A surprisingly common assumption is the system is based upon a scale of “Right and Wrong,” with Lawful Good being “best” alignment, and Chaotic Evil being the “worst”, when in reality, they are just nine different categories. With a few exceptions, which I will cover in a later article (poison, necromancy, mind control, ect) all moral backgrounds and viewpoints fit quite nicely into the nine different categories.   Alignments aren’t just nine monolithic ways of living; they are dynamic categories that contain many different variations of their tile, IE there is more than one way to be Lawful Good, so that one person might be a braggart, and yet another might be sweet, another passive, and another devout, but they all adhere to an underlying moral code known as Lawful Good. If people start acting differently, their alignment changes based upon their actions, but it takes a series of actions to shift them up or down this moral scale. For example, a normally good person who on one occasion steals money to help his family won’t automatically turn evil, through he will start down a slippery slope if he continues with manner of behavior.

Right, lets go from there: a person’s standing in the scales of morality is defined by their actions more than anything else. A person who only commits good actions on a regular basis is good and a person who commits evil actions is bad…if only it was that simple. It is worth noting that a single evil action will not change your alignment, but it will start you down a slippery slope.

So let’s go into some detail about each alignment, shall we, and then let's call it a day. Originally I planned to make this article much longer, and also explain the specifics of what is evil and what is good, but I realized that is what was slowing me down so much, so I instead decided to simply explain the system first, by briefly covering what each alignment means, including the quotes from the Wizards' website.

“Lawful Good, "Crusader"

“A lawful good character acts as a good person is expected or required to act. She combines a commitment to oppose evil with the discipline to fight relentlessly. She tells the truth, keeps her word, helps those in need, and speaks out against injustice. A lawful good character hates to see the guilty go unpunished.”

A nice, generic description, that. It is worth noting that Lawful good isn’t the “Best” alignment, or any more goody two shoes than the other two good alignments. It just means that you combine good with a sense of order and lawfulness. It doesn’t make you better nor does it make you stupid, just honorable. The biggest fallacy of this alignment is the idea that LG people are absurdly uptight and utterly humorless.   Honestly, anybody can be uptight and utterly humorless; law and good have nothing to do with that. Lawful good people tend to hold morals to a very high extreme, but try to be moral in a consistent organized fashion, and hold their morals to a steady set of principles.

Sample LG people: Roy Greenhilt (Order of the stick), Dr. Wilson (House), Mr. Stone (Early Law and Order), Gandhi, Atticus Finch (To Kill a Mocking Bird), Sokka (Avatar), Alphonse Elric (Full Metal Alchemist)

“Neutral Good, "Benefactor"

A neutral good character does the best that a good person can do. He is devoted to helping others. He works with kings and magistrates but does not feel beholden to them.”

Yeah, because that’s a detailed explanation. Anyways, NG is just kinda of the “generally good person” sort of thing. They are generally honorable, but not devotedly so. Um, yeah, generally good…there isn’t really very much more to say briefly about it. The biggest fallacy I suppose is that NG people don’t devote themselves to a cause. Again, that isn’t true, it just means they have a much more fluid manner of dealing with the problem. Basically, their methods vary depending on the specific problem, rather than a set code, but they do act honorable generally. NG can often get mixed up with lawful good, somewhat understandably, as they are very much alike in demeanor. The best way to tell the difference is that Lawful Good tends to act honorably all the time, while NG is prone to be honorable (by the Law definition of the word, not the personal one) most of the time, but not all the time.

Oliver Twist (you figure it out), Pip (Great Expectations), Jim (Huckleberry Finn)

“Chaotic Good, "Rebel"

“A chaotic good character acts as his conscience directs him with little regard for what others expect of him. He makes his own way, but he’s kind and benevolent. He believes in goodness and right but has little use for laws and regulations. He hates it when people try to intimidate others and tell them what to do. He follows his own moral compass, which, although good, may not agree with that of society. “

Acts for good on their own terms and protects it in their own manner, society’s rules be damned. Chaotic Good may be honorable, but they follow their personal view on honor more than anything else. CG has two main fallacies. 1) That they can get away with evil act for a good cause. CG people are still good, they can’t torture, murder or abuse people even for a “good” cause. They still abide by the ideals of good, they just come up with their own way of dealing with it. 2) That Chaotic Good people are somehow more carefree and happy. Well this might be so on a general basis, but this is far from absolute. It is perfectly reasonable that a CG might be a close-minded conservative. Though unlikely.

Edward Elric (Full Metal Alchemist), Haley Starshine (Order of the Stick)

First off, the definition of good and evil actions can boggle the mind at first. In the Player’s handbook the description of good is extremely vague, basically just “nice, altruistic, virtuous” and doesn’t go into detail about what really makes a good person good. Luckily for us, later two  books, Book of Vile Darkness and Book of Exalted Deeds (warning: mature) go into more detail about this and brings us up to date. Basically, a person’s standing on the alignment is decided by their actions and deeds. For example, torture is defined as an absolute evil act, and so any good character that resorts to torture for information will eventually cease to be good. It is worth noting however that Alignments aren’t personalities: normally, a good person can commit an occasional evil act without falling, and good people are allowed the occasional slip, with paladins and exalted being the exception. Neutral people are anywhere in-between the two different scales. However percent wise, I would imagine they would be more care free than other Lawful Good or Neutral good proportionally.

Lloyd (Tales of Symphionia),

“Lawful Neutral, "Judge"

A lawful neutral character acts as law, tradition, or a personal code directs her. Order and organization are paramount to her. She may believe in personal order and live by a code or standard, or she may believe in order for all and favor a strong, organized government.”

Lawful Neutral is what I personally imagine my self: a good person in terms of my beliefs, but not necessarily good in my actions. Alternatively, LG people could simply be people who act extremely lawful and orderly by nature. Again, it could just mean somebody who is more honorable than anything else. The greatest fallacy with Lawful Neutral is that they are totally law abidding to the local laws. For example, people might say that Inspector Javart is LN, when in reality he is LE, because he commits evil acts in the process. LN does not mean you follow the kingdom’s law to the letter, it means you act in a generally lawful and honorable manner. Lawful Neutral can be passionate and strong believers, but they just don’t quite fill the good quota, but are certainly not evil.

“Neutral, “Undecided”: A neutral character does what seems to be a good idea. She doesn’t feel strongly one way or the other when it comes to good vs. evil or law vs. chaos. Most neutral characters exhibit a lack of conviction or bias rather than a commitment to neutrality. Such a character thinks of good as better than evil—after all, she would rather have good neighbors and rulers than evil ones. Still, she’s not personally committed to upholding good in any abstract or universal way.

Some neutral characters, on the other hand, commit themselves philosophically to neutrality. They see good, evil, law, and chaos as prejudices and dangerous extremes. They advocate the middle way of neutrality as the best, most balanced road in the long run”

Neutral Basically is well…neutral. Not totally evil, not totally good (wow, that’s hard to figure out, isn’t it). The greatest fallacy of neutral is that they are totally uncaring and don’t involve themselves in anything. That isn’t quite true; a neutral person just hasn’t committed enough good or evil actions to push him or herself over the edge either way. A neutral person might be an local thief who steals, but never maliciously, only to feed his family, a solider who guards potentially innocent prisoners (doesn’t abuse or mistreat them through) for pay, a merchant who just focuses upon making money. The idea of neutrality just means you aren’t fitting within either category of good and evil, but you are still part of the alignment system. Technically, creatures that aren’t able to make moral choices, like mindless oozes and animals are neutral as well. A bear that kills a human in its territory isn’t being evil; it’s just being a bear, doing what bears do. Which is why they are the greatest threat to America today. On the same note, a human who is mentally ill to such an extent that they are almost animals themselves (opposed to other mental defaults, like dyslexia or being a sociopath), IE having an intelligence score of less than 3, are also neural under the same bearing. But I personally want to have a separate article for animals and the mentally disabled, so I’m going to cover that in part 3, under the section “Unaligned”.

Chaotic Neutral, “Free Spirit”: A chaotic neutral character follows his whims. He is an individualist first and last. He values his own liberty but doesn’t strive to protect others’ freedom. He avoids authority, resents restrictions, and challenges traditions. A chaotic neutral character does not intentionally disrupt organizations as part of a campaign of anarchy. To do so, he would have to be motivated either by good (and a desire to liberate others) or evil (and a desire to make those different from himself suffer). A chaotic neutral character may be unpredictable, but his behavior is not totally random. He is not as likely to jump off a bridge as to cross it.”

Chaotic Neural is sort of like True Neutral in that they are caught in-between good and evil, but where Neutral are essentially good just not radical, CN are basically more selfish, one might say. The greatest fallacy with Chaotic Neutral is that people often assume that they basically act completely evil using the fact they are acting for their own best interest to justify evil actions. It is worth noting that despite the fact CN aren’t saints that doesn’t allow them to commit a series of evil actions and get away with it scott free, they are still able to become evil. Another thing about CN is that they like personal freedom and to an extent chaos, but this doesn’t make them all anarchists, just people who like personal freedom. CN is always treading a fine line. On one hand, they can be selfish, but if they act too selfishly, they will become Neutral Evil, going into pure selfishness. (The reason for the loss of the ‘chaos’ descriptor is because they stop acting out of freedom, just out of selfishness.) In the case of embracing chaos for the sake of chaos a bit too much, you slip into chaotic evil, as you are hurting others in your embrace of evil. CN is very much an in-between alignment so you have to careful with this one. Oh, its work noting that Belkar is Chaotic Evil

“Lawful Evil, “Dominator”: A lawful evil villain methodically takes what he wants within the limits of his code of conduct without regard for whom it hurts. He cares about tradition, loyalty, and order but not about freedom, dignity, or life. He plays by the rules but without mercy or compassion. He is comfortable in a hierarchy and would like to rule, but is willing to serve. He condemns others not according to their actions but according to race, religion, homeland, or social rank. He is loath to break laws or promises. This reluctance comes partly from his nature and partly because he depends on order to protect himself from those who oppose him on moral grounds. Some lawful evil villains have particular taboos, such as not killing in cold blood (but having underlings do it) or not letting children come to harm (if it can be helped). They imagine that these compunctions put them above unprincipled villains.”

Some lawful evil people and creatures commit themselves to evil with a zeal like that of a crusader committed to good. Beyond being willing to hurt others for their own ends, they take pleasure in spreading evil as an end unto itself. They may also see doing evil as part of a duty to an evil deity or master.

Lawful evil is sometimes called “diabolical,” because devils are the epitome of lawful evil.”

The idea of lawful evil is that they are evil that follows their own lawful way of doing things. The biggest fallacy of Lawful Evil is an interesting one. It is that Lawful Evil is somehow more disciplined or more principled than other evil people. That isn’t entirely the case. Chaotic evil people can be perfectly moral in their own way, it’s what they believe. Lawful evil is more principled in terms of having a consistent basis for their morals, but they aren’t necessarily more or less moral than any other form of evil. Lawful evil people have a consistent basis to their evil nature and tend to be rather organized and focused in their way of handling things. Their biggest trait is that they are very honorable, however, so while they might not be more principled, they will hold themselves to a standard.

“Neutral Evil, "Malefactor"

“A neutral evil villain does whatever she can get away with. She is out for herself, pure and simple. She sheds no tears for those she kills, whether for profit, sport, or convenience. She has no love of order and holds no illusion that following law, traditions, or codes would make her any better or nobler. On the other hand, she doesn’t have the restless nature or love of conflict that a chaotic evil villain has. Some neutral evil villains hold up evil as an ideal, committing evil for its own sake. Most often, such villains are devoted to evil deities or secret societies.”

Neutral Evil, as one might expect, is the neutral version of evil. They aren’t quite as impulsive as Chaotic Evil, but they aren’t as honorable as Lawful Evil. Like all of the other neutrals, they fill that annoying grey area in-between. The point remains that they are what you might call “normal” evil. Neutral evil’s greatest fallacy is that they are simply the most selfish of all the evils, witch isn’t quite true, they just use different methods. It is true however that an evil person who’s methods vary a lot and seems more focused on self interest than anything else (Blackadder) would go under this category.

“Chaotic Evil, "Destroyer"

A chaotic evil character does whatever his greed, hatred, and lust for destruction drive him to do. He is hot-tempered, vicious, arbitrarily violent, and unpredictable. If he is simply out for whatever he can get, he is ruthless and brutal. If he is committed to the spread of evil and chaos, he is even worse. Thankfully, his plans are haphazard, and any groups he joins or forms are poorly organized. Typically, chaotic evil people can be made to work together only by force, and their leader lasts only as long as he can thwart attempts to topple or assassinate him.

Chaotic evil is sometimes called "demonic" because demons are the epitome of chaotic evil.”

Quite frankly, Chaotic evil is basically evil without any morals. Unlike the other evils, who have at least some morals based upon law and honor. Chaotic Evil just does what ever they feel like doing at the time. They are simply motivated by whim and their own desires. While they certainly can have their own code of beliefs, and values, but they don’t have any thing to hold themselves to that standard other than their own feelings at the time. The biggest fallacy of Chaotic Evil is that they are a bunch of raging psychopaths. While most raging psychopaths would fit into this category (The Joker, duh), CE people might have their own moral ideals, they just are more loose and chaotic about it. Their standards are based upon their whims, not a specific code, but they aren’t quite insane, just emotionally driven. The biggest thing about Chaotic Evil is that they do pretty much what they feel like doing at the time.

All right, I hope that clarifies things for the people who don’t play D&D much. I’ll go into more detail at some later date I suppose. Think this is confusing? Just wait till we get to the specifics.

From

EE