Alignment in OD&D

[oakesspalding]

Well, I'm linking to my blog here, which I don't do THAT often, so I hope it's okay. I just embarked on a multi-part series here and here on alignment in OD&D and (eventually) Zylarthen. I'm including some juicy references from Jon Peterson's Playing at the World. We're still in the first stages. What I thought would be one post has now become probably five or more (argh! snore!). I would be interested in any comments or criticism, especially from players in the early days, such as @gronanofsimmerya.

The questions are:

1. In OD&D is alignment a moral outlook as opposed to (merely) an alliance with a "side"?
2. In OD&D Is Law vs. Chaos equivalent to, or does it at least track (in some fairly close sense) Good vs. Evil?

Or are there other important questions that I've missed?

[Porphyre]

Do you include some reference of Gygax' article in issue # 6 of the Strategic Review ? :

THE MEANING OF LAW AND CHAOS IN DUNGEONS & DRAGONS

AND THEIR RELATIONSHIPS TO GOOD AND EVIL

[tkdco2]

I started with B/X, so I tend to go with law = good, chaos = evil. That's not necessarily the case, but that explanation works well for beginning players.

[Finarvyn]

Dec 24, 2014 3:20:30 GMT -6 tkdco2 said:

I started with B/X, so I tend to go with law = good, chaos = evil. That's not necessarily the case, but that explanation works well for beginning players.

That's been my take on alignment since the mid-1970's and I think it works well for advanced players as well as beginning.

The confusion, of course, is that you get spells like "Protection from Evil" where no creature has been defined as evil. Two options come to mind:
(1) The assumption that law=good and chaos=evil.
(2) The assumption that evil is one of those "you know it when you see it" things and thus didn't need to be identified specifically as such.

Adding the additional axis of good-evil to the existing law-chaos one may be more "realistic" but I never felt like that layer added much to my campaign.

I think an easy comparrison is Star Wars (the movie) versus Star Wars (the epic of six movies). Star Wars (the movie) was all about good versus evil and it's pretty obvious who is on which side. Star Wars (the epic) is all about "a certain point of view" and a lot of gray area in between right and wrong. While I know that the original Blackmoor alignment system was designed to be "us" versus "them", I like the notion of the good guys versus the bad guys.

Anyway, I'm fine with the simple "Three Hearts and Three Lions" take on alignment where "us" is good/law and "them" is evil/chaos. I don't do much with alignment in my campaign beyond that, anyway.

My two coppers.

[Stormcrow]

Alignment in the original boxed set is pretty much just a continuation of the General Line-up from Chainmail, which says, "It is impossible to draw a distinct line between 'good' and 'evil' fantastic figures." The names Law and Chaos are obviously lifted from Three Hearts and Three Lions where Law is the side of civilization and order and Chaos is the side of wildness and magic. The lineup in Chainmail is actually mostly a division of Middle-earth figures into good guys, bad guys, and those who might be on either side, taking the names of Law and Chaos as approximately equal and adding a third descriptor, Neutral.

So alignment only represents moral stance in as much as your moral stance led you to choose a side. There's a connection, but alignment doesn't dictate your actions. Acting against your alignment is acting against the interests of your side; if you're neutral you can act against your side of the moment. In general, the figures listed under Law are considered good and the figures listed under Chaos are considered evil (know many non-evil wraiths?), but this doesn't make each character of an alignment conform to a strict rule of good or evil.

[oakesspalding]

That's largely true, especially if you only look at the alignment "lists" in Men & Magic. But then there's the stuff about clerics. If you're a cleric, then alignment does dictate some of your actions, at least when it comes to whether or not you can cast certain spells. So I think the seeds, at least, of alignment as a more personal thing, were there from the beginning. This would become explicit in Greyhawk, scarcely a year later.

[Deleted]

I think alignment is one of the most poorly explained and implemented components in the game. I think that's why most groups don't do much with it. From a war game aspect it can work well just like if you belong to the Axis or Allies side. But beyond that it becomes difficult to implement. I do like the examination of alignment that this person did here.

[Stormcrow]

Dec 24, 2014 13:01:34 GMT -6 oakesspalding said:

If you're a cleric, then alignment does dictate some of your actions, at least when it comes to whether or not you can cast certain spells.

Alignment dictates a cleric's abilities, not his actions. Lawful clerics get the normal spell list and can turn undead; chaotic clerics get the reversed spell list and can't turn undead.

[tetramorph]

oakesspalding, I tend to try to think end-game and work back from there. I think that alignment in 0e is not just P Anderson but also Tolkien and his "Monsters and the Critics."

I agree with others who say this is a wargame hang-over for a larger level of scale. On which side do you line up?

For my campaign I put it this way: on the Last Day at the Last Battle (think CSL), with whom are you lining up? Or, in pre-Christian mythic terms: at Raggnarock, are you with the gods or the giants?

You can be lawful and kind of a jerk. You can be lawful and spontaneous. You can be chaotic but very polite. You can be chaotic and extremely controlling.

So, for me, it is not the 1e moral / personality style axes. It is about "line up" at end game.

Are you for universal civilization and law? Are you for unleashing the beast for one last wild ride before we all go down? Are you for circling the wagons and staving off the chaos without anybody else's help? Law, chaos, neutral.

It is "moral," in the sense that it is ethical, but at a civilization level of scale. I do not look at it as moral at a personal level of scale. It therefore lines up with "good," and "evil," yes. But, again, for me, it is about level of scale.

That's all I got for now. After Christmas I may have more to reflect. By then the conversation will have gotten more interesting!

Thanks for starting this thread. Peace

[inkmeister]

I dislike alignment, and so I don't use it. I grew up in the 2e era where alignment was your character's personal code of ethics. Coming from that, it now seems to me that "alignment" is something that we see AFTER your character acts, not something that guides the character's action. Much like D&D is not a story game, but stories arise from PLAYING the game. Discard alignment, IMO. (I don't deny interest in the subject from a historical standpoint.)

[oakesspalding]

Dec 24, 2014 13:54:06 GMT -6 Stormcrow said:

Alignment dictates a cleric's abilities, not his actions. Lawful clerics get the normal spell list and can turn undead; chaotic clerics get the reversed spell list and can't turn undead.

Well, actually a Lawful Cleric, or in Men & Magic what is called simply a "Cleric" as opposed to what is variously described as an "evil Cleric" (p. 22) or an "Anti-Cleric" (p. 34) CAN use, say the Finger of Death spell. As the text puts it:

A Cleric-type may use this spell in a life-or-death situation, but misuse will immediately turn him into an Anti-Cleric.

Misuse? That sounds like a restriction on your actions to me, and it doesn't appear to have anything to do with acting for or against a particular "side", but rather whether you use the spell in a "moral" way, such as in absolutely necessary self-defense. If you don't, then poof, suddenly you can't turn undead or use healing spells anymore.

Look, this is only one aspect of one class. It's a long distance away from the almost totalitarian (!) conception Gygax would put forward in the Strategic Review a few years later (pre-Dragon magazine, obviously and pre-AD&D) where the referee is closely tracking, evaluating and measuring your actions on the moral continuum every week! But I did say, the seeds...

[tkdco2]

I'm okay with not using alignment; I rarely see it roleplayed well. I never believe what alignment is written in my group's character sheets. They're all chaotic, just like their players!


The whole cosmic struggle between Law and Chaos never figured in my games. The only fantasy books I was familiar with when I started playing were those of Tolkien and Lewis. I didn't read Anderson or Moorcock until after I'd been gaming for several years. My only other sources were the Greek and Norse myths, the Arthurian and Carolingian legends, and Robin Hood. I was familiar with the Three Musketeers and some Japanese history, but they didn't have an impact on my D&D games.

[Finarvyn]

Dec 24, 2014 15:24:03 GMT -6 inkmeister said:

it now seems to me that "alignment" is something that we see AFTER your character acts, not something that guides the character's action.

I think it can be both. While it's possible to say "well, I did X so my alignment should be Y" I think one can also say "well, my character has chosen a certain path in life and so would act as such...."

Simply put, it stops folks from just doing random things. If you've chosen a given path, good role-playing would dictate that you actually play the role you chose. If you don't want to choose that path you ought to choose a different one, but either way be consistent to your decision.

[Stormcrow]

Dec 24, 2014 18:11:00 GMT -6 oakesspalding said:

Well, actually a Lawful Cleric, or in Men & Magic what is called simply a "Cleric" as opposed to what is variously described as an "evil Cleric" (p. 22) or an "Anti-Cleric" (p. 34) CAN use, say the Finger of Death spell.

It's not "say." The Finger of Death is the ONLY anti-cleric spell that a normal cleric is said to be able to cast. It's the exception that proves the rule.

[geoffrey]

Dec 24, 2014 13:54:06 GMT -6 Stormcrow said:

Lawful clerics get the normal spell list and can turn undead; chaotic clerics get the reversed spell list and can't turn undead.

I love that stark dichotomy. I like to think of 1974 D&D having four character classes:

1. fighting-men
2. magic-users
3. clerics
4. anti-clerics

[oakesspalding]

Dec 24, 2014 19:32:49 GMT -6 Stormcrow said:

It's the exception that proves the rule.

Exceptions prove rules when they're designated as "exceptions" (obviously). "The exception proves the rule" was a logical and semantic claim first made in Classical times-exceptio probat regulam in casibus non excepts-that maps that claim. It's not a silly retort-perhaps when someone pokes a hole in one's argument-best suited to the pub. Talk about misuse.

Look, I think I said "That's largely true...but...because of this (the Cleric thing) the seeds were there. So, I'm not sure why you're arguing. Unless you just like to argue. But I wouldn't suggest that...

[oakesspalding]

Dec 24, 2014 14:57:02 GMT -6 tetramorph said:

On which side do you line up?

With Poul Anderson, of course!

I like the "sides" thing, though with some link to personal morality, following Anderson. That's what I explicitly tried to do in my game. But I'm also interested in the history and text of OD&D whether I "agree" with it or not. Merry Christmas, tetramorph!

[Red Baron]

Dec 24, 2014 7:20:01 GMT -6 Finarvyn said:

Enchanted creatures are explicitly mentioned, and ad&d changes that to summoned/enchanted creatures. I've always played that evil is synonymous with "enchanted/summoned creatures", ie. efriit, djiin, invisible stalkers, elementals, devils, demons, and undead.

Giant types and the like are merely chaotic. They fight lawfuls, lawfuls fight them. Real "evil" beings are anything out of space and time that some nit-wit magic-user decided it would be a good idea to call upon (from his iron tower).

[krusader74]

Sorry I can't help with the original meaning of Law/Chaos in OD&D. But I'd like to share my own perspective:

The English word "law" derives from the Old Norse word "lag." There are a couple of really good articles on Viking Law here and here. Any game of D&D could benefit from some of this background info.

There are some broad generalities that one could make not only about Viking Law, but also about other ancient law codes such as the Laws of Manu, the Torah, the Tang Code and so forth:

The Law typically has a divine origin. It was created by a god and given to his human children. The law often includes a creation story and a flood story.

Most importantly, these ancient codes setup a caste system: Warriors, Priests, Scribes, Merchants, and Commoners/Servants. Note that these castes conform with D&D's classes: Warriors = Fighters, Priests = Clerics, Scribes = Magic Users. Merchants and Commoners are typically NPCs.

The law furthermore prescribes duties for each of these roles. People who shirk their duties are judged by a court of law. In Viking Law, a court is called a "thing." The law defines the parameters for the trial: Adversarial System, Trial by Ordeal, or Inquisitional System. (The Tang Code has an interesting inquisitional system: The judge may torture the accused, up to 200 lashes, but if he still won't confess, then the judge tortures the accuser. If the accuser confesses to making up phoney charges, then he gets the same punishment the accused would have received.)

The worst crimes are called "abominations," and they carry the death penalty or exile. An exiled person becomes an outcast or outlaw. Quoting from the second linked article:

That person was put outside the law, banished from society and his property confiscated. They were to receive no help, no food and no support from anyone. Besides the terrible loneliness, these people could be killed by anyone. They often fled the country and tried to settle in some other location.

So the way I see Chaos, is that it consists of any being who lives outside the law or commits abominations. I imagine that in some possible worlds, Orcs and Goblins and other humanoid monsters may be descendants of human outcasts and outlaws who literally "went underground."

Moreover, ancient law codes didn't seem to distinguish between legalism, tradition or morality the way we do today. I'd postulate those distinctions arose as people began to see certain laws like slavery as being unjust. Today I think the main difference between Law and Morality is that

• Laws are are seen as something external to oneself, enforced through fear of punishment
• Morality OTOH is something we internalize, something that's part of our nature, that we do by habit, not out of compulsion or fear

[Porphyre]

Probably off-topic , but, lately I sometimes come to identify the thee alignments with the three main componenents of psyche in freudian psychanalysis, at least in terms of personal conduct:
- Law is the Superego: Lawful characters are led by their sense of moralityand obligation (towards others, towards the le Church, towards the Kings, etc.)
- Neutrality is the Ego: neutral characters care mostly about slf preservation and personnal interest
- Chaos is the Id : chaotic characters are motivated by their instincts.

But, to come back to the question of the alignment in the LBBs, I think that Law/Chaos looked just as anoter way to say Good Guys/Bad guys: Patriarchs vs. Evil High Priests; Elves vs. Orcs; Ents vs. Balrogs.

This equation is actually fairly sensible and exact as long as you want to create some tolkienian world: in Tolkien works, the "Good guys" are in the side of light (=Law), "Bad guys" on the side of doakness (=Chaos). The moment you start to slip the slippery slope of moral conduct, you tend to "change sides": Boromir betrays Frodo and the fellowship; Saruman betrays the White Council, etc.

One could argue that, in the case of Boromir, his betrayal was motivated by the best interest (in his eyes) of Gondor, and thus , that he still was "lawful" to his father and his country, but , in Tolkien's christian view, "no good tree bears bad fruit, nor again does a bad tree bear good fruit, for each tree is known by its own fruit", and that ultimately, this leads to despair, bertayal, and Madness (=Chaos), as in Denethor's case

[chicagowiz]

I use the Jeff Rient's model of Alignment:

Answer the quiz below to determine your alignment.

1) Ragnarok just started. Aligned on one side are the mythical of Thor, Odin, and the Vikings (for mankind) On the other side are Cthulhu and Shub-Niggurath (Lovecraftian horrors and all the dark dudes that will benefit). Where does your PC stand?

A) I fight alongside Thor! (Lawful)
B) I fight alongside Cthulhu! (Chaotic)
C) Where do I stand? Are you crazy? I get the hell out of there and find a place to hide! (Neutral)

No other behavior matters for alignment purposes. In short, Lawful and Chaotic are a decision (conscious or not) made by a character as to what side they are on in the grand cosmic throw-down.

Good and Evil usually indicate a temporary state of mind. Good and evil, for purposes of detection spells and such, measure intentions. A man with malice on his mind detects as evil, no matter how good his previous deeds. No one is bound to any particular code of conduct, unless they take such a code upon themselves.

[premmy]

I don't use the Lawful/Chaotic alignment system (or the 9-pronged one) in my games, but if I did, I'd use the following as a touchstone:

When the Final Battle comes, be that the Armageddon, Ragnarok or Dagor Dagorath, what will you character do?

If he runs for the hills, hides or begs to the Powers That Be for his life, he's Neutral. If he tries to wield ancient sorceries, forge arcane pacts or otherwise ally with the inhuman forces to ensure his continued existence in whatever comes after, he's Chaotic. And if he makes a final, uncompromising and doomed stand, he's lawful.

But make no mistake: Lawful is not Good, nor is Chaotic Evil. Many would join the forces of Chaos out of good intentions, and try to divert or subvert it, to prevent the end of the world by gaining control over what would destroy it. And many evil men will take the side of Law, where goodly knights, noble kings and lovable rogues will fight shoulder to sholder with amoral mercenaries, repugnant tyrants and pirate reavers, all banding together to preserve the World of Man.


EDIT: Tarnation, I got ninja'd by chicagowiz!

[Stormcrow]

But neutrals don't necessarily run and hide; they may choose sides temporarily. If knights and peasants are cutting down forest to make farmland, druids and wood-elves will join the forces of Chaos to stop them. If orcs and witches are planning to destroy a human village living at peace in the eaves of the forest, those same druids and wood-elves will join the forces of Law to stop them.

Neutrals have the opportunity to remain uninvolved, of course, but then they aren't a factor in the situation.

[tetramorph]

oakesspalding, Merry Christmas and happy Feast of Stephen to you!

Two things. a.) it seems like you want alignment to mean more than what some of us on the thread are saying, esp for your 7VZ (what was the abbr. you finally came down on?). That is cool. Just say it and roll with it. I am sure I will like and learn from whatever you come up with for your campaign.

But, b.) I want to clarify what I mean and don't mean by trying to get it off of the personality style / personal morality axes. I do NOT mean that I don't care about morality in play. Quite the contrary. I am all grown up now and I do not have any fun with a bunch of idiot "let's pretend we're mean" kind of play. Most of the time I require my players to be lawful -- I just don't give options for this. I expect the team to stick together, work together, and attempt to bring order out of chaos.

But like ability scores, alignment describes a character it does not prescribe or define. I try to follow my own religion as best I can but fail daily. The best lawful PC is going to have some quirks. And lawful alignment doesn't mean they can't be a little crazy, kookie or go gonzo in a given scenario. It just means, as folks above have reiterated, when Iluvatar / Aslan / Odin / etc., show up, whose side are you on?

This MUST affect personal morality, but not always at the level of minutiae.

Finally, another way I might put it would be that I dislike modern, principle-based ethics and I am convinced by MacIntyre, et al., to retrieve a more ancient and pre-modern virtue-ethics model. I think it is both more anthropologically realistic and more philosophically sound. So I hate it when D&D alignment seems like a game-i-fication of Kant or Mill! It is not about "principles," but virtues and vices, habits: good and bad. That means characters can develop over time by the way in which their players play them. Alignment changes, like the way habits change, not by some magic "poof," but through slowly building up over time.

Okay now I am really going on and on, but I can hear you say: what about curses and magic spells that automatically change alignment? Well, what part of fantasy do we not understand here? In fantasy land things that take years of habit to form can happen as soon as we touch the hilt of a sword. But I still would not let this limit play. Let me explain what I mean.

I have a lawful 7th lvl FM (whom I am way too attached to. That is always stupid) named Nimrod. Once he decided to pick up a jet-black sword. Guess what? He "turned chaotic." But the way I played it was that his conscience was burdened by this. He was just searing with angst. I role-played this so much my referee let Nimrod find a cleric so that he could confess and seek absolution. The cleric restored him to law. If I had been the referee, I would have demanded a quest as penance, but I had a lenient ref. I "played" chaotic for Nimrod. He wanted to get re-alligned for the last battle before it was too late!

Okay, enough rambling. Again, thanks for starting this thread.

[Mushgnome]

The only time I use alignment in my campaigns is when I'm DM'ing here on odd74 forums. Haven't used it in my home games for over a decade.

[oakesspalding]

Hello tetramorph. Not to burden you with my personal travails but everyone in our house is sick, so we'e all sort of huddled around the couch and one of the beds. My daughter (who is the least sick) is watching the Complete Dungeons & Dragons cartoon episodes, which I bought at Reckless Records for $3.99. She also herded all the stuffed animals together so they could watch it too.

I need to ponder more on what you said, especially your take on those philosophers. But I suspect we are pretty much in agreement. Again, there are two questions: 1) What does D&D (or OD&D, or the three little brown books) actually say, and 2) What do we think about that?

So far on this thread I have confined myself to 1 (except for the small nod to you and Anderson in the last post).

The plan for my silly blog series was to answer both questions, though so far I'm only half-way through 1.

But to skip ahead to 2 and quickly make a few assertions without arguing for them. I'm against alignment as a moral outlook for a number of reasons.

1. Alignment as a moral point of view doesn't get the moral psychology or moral philosophy right. No one, even those at the extremes--Hitler, Mother Theresa, etc.--picks an alignment (considered as a moral outlook) at the age of reason or whatever and then tries to follow it consistently. It just doesn't work that way. No psychological or theological/moral theory that I am aware of has ever claimed that it did. So why do it in D&D. What does it get you?

2. I don't think D&D should be about moral choices on the main. But certainly there is a subset of play that features them in a small way. Note, I'm not talking about grotesque moral choices (do we torture the Orc children to find the treasure). I don't want those in my game. But there are more benign ones. Should we be at first friendly to the Orcs or just attack them on sight (because, you know, they're Orcs)? But I think these are more interesting without alignments. In other words, it's more fun to just decide what do do than decide based on "what would a Chaotic Neutral, or whatever, do?"

3. The prospect of the referee watching your every move to see if you're acting according to your alignment (telegraphed by Gygax in the Strategic Review in 1976) on a weekly basis (to see whether or not you'll be docked experience points) is freaking totalitarian. Even the negative caricatures of Catholicism or Christian fundamentalism or whatever doesn't go anywhere near that far. And, arguably, the nine-point alignment system is so confusing that right off the bat you're starting at a disadvantage.

4. I don't want my player-characters playing bad guys (especially in a game written partly for children). I know this is a somewhat controversial claim. And a lot of people would say that it is in itself totalitarian. I'm going to just leave it there for the moment and not argue for it.

5. So, for those reasons and others I think alignment should be a side, but one with (implicit) links ( in some form) to personal moral actions. Here are the relevant passages from Zylarthen:


The Ancient Wars that ravaged Old Earth were an attempt by the one who called himself the Liberator (known by others as Mendax) to consolidate his power over all of material creation. In those struggles, nations and races were often grouped into alignments—the forces of Chaos under the Liberator, the forces of Law that opposed him, and those that chose a middle ground either out of per-ceived self-interest or the perception that the principles and aims fought over did not concern them. As always, individuals within those groups were free to make their own determinations—leaving ample room for high acts of heroism as well as low betrayals.

The effects of the Wars remain, represented among other things in the old alignment languages, still understood by some, if less frequently used for actual communication. Scholars utilize the language of Law, while Chaos is used to in-scribe black magic incantations and cursed scrolls. Many exotic and rare creatures know Neutrality—a relative of the language of Elves.

Many would claim that the struggle between Law and Chaos continues today just as fiercely, if less obviously or visibly as before, and with as much at stake as ever. To the extent that this is true, intelligent races and monsters will usually be identified with an alignment. Creatures of animal or lower intelligence, or who are mere animated entities will always be identified with “Neutrality”. A partial list of creatures and their alignments follows: (Here follows a list similar to that contained in Men & Magic.)

Each player character is presumed to be a partisan of Law, whatever his class or background. It is assumed that players will generally not attempt to have their characters perform actions that are gravely evil (Thieves do not of course consider simple thievery to be such) or that obviously aid the forces of Chaos. From the point of view of a successful and enjoyable game, cooperation among party mem-bers is essential. That doesn’t mean that the opinions, interests and goals of each party member will necessarily be completely aligned, or that the morally superior choice or action (if that is what is desired) will always be clear or agreed upon.


Cheers! I'm going back to the huddle now.

[derv]

Stormcrow has already pointed out that Alignment was originally drawn directly from Chainmails pages. From what I can tell, Arneson continued to use this same simple division of Law, Neutrality, & Chaos. In that context I believe tkdco2 and Finarvyn's observation are accurate in that Law = good and Chaos = evil. It was a choosing of sides.

I tend to tie alignment more closely to a "world view" then to a particular system of morality. What I mean by "world view" is what you're character thinks makes the world go round or which side he thinks will win in the end kind of thing. It may or may not affect his actions and/or moral choices, but it will cause him to choose a side. I think the further complexity of the alignment system was a result of Gygaxian design in relation to his developing D&D cosmology.

On a practical level, this is another area people discard from their games. There is the rare occurence of alignment specific magic items that might make it somehow important. But, it could be brought back into ones games in a more practical way if one chose to continue with Arneson's example. D&D has reaction tables (p.12 of M&M and p.12 of U&WA) which randomly determine how an encounter might unfold. The results are somewhat unpredictable regardless of alignment and requires DM interpretation. In AiF, Arneson has a similiar system that is entirely based on alignment with some modifiers for "deployment". It's called a Hostility Table.

Law vs Law 10% vs N 50% vs Chaos 100%
N vs Law 30% vs N 30% vs Chaos 30%
Chaos vs Law 80% vs N 50% vs Chaos 20%

With this system it's clear that if you don't pick a side and instead prefer to remain Neutral, you are more of a target. The choice of Law actually seems the most logical choice based on these tables considering Chaotics will attack their own 20% of the time right off the back.

I thought this was interesting.

[jcstephens]

Conflict is the essence of drama, and alignment gives a pre-existing conflict for players to react to. In my games, it's more an adventure building tool for me than a character building tool for players.

[tetramorph]

oakesspalding, so sad to read you guys are all sick at Christmas time. What a bummer! Get well soon, y'all.

Thanks for the excerpt from Zylarthen. It is a rad approach.

In terms of your q. #1: perhaps we'll never know. It may just be one of those things that is so cool about 0e: it is so open to interpretation for one's own campaign. I think that it is linked to magic items is important. I think that it is not linked to spells (detect evil, not chaos, etc.) is also important. I think the back link to Chainmail is more important than any forward links, esp to 1e. That would define for me the interpretive boundaries within which to discern an answer to your #1.

In terms of your q. #2: how do we think about it? Again, I like your approach and it is very similar to my own, so, well, cool. Again, I think this may be one of those: "make it work for your campaign" kind of things that is so cool about 0e. Heck yes to every one of your points. For what it is worth, below I quote my current description for my campaign world:

Alignment


The abstraction of “Alignment,” corresponds to the battle “line up,” drawn by the King of Heaven for the Last Battle. Alignment is therefore archetypal and mythomorphic. The primordial chaos monster, Mater Chaos, is Leviathan, Tiamat, Yam, Cyclone. Monsters and Fell are her wicked spawn and brood. Given the campaign “hook,” player characters start out Lawful, although argument may be made for Neutral characters, especially in the case of magi and “scouts” (my class-neutral re-write of "thieves"). At higher levels of play players may take on certain key Chaotic characters within the campaign. As with old school play in general, alignment is descriptive rather than prescriptive for characters. Thus alignment changes easily based upon character decision.


• Lawful = good for flourishing of all free races, e.g., both human and fay, thus implying a kind of "universalism:" “Universal Law of heaven against the Chaos”

• Neutral = good for local family unit, clan group, in-group and thus a kind of tribalism, still trying to keep chaos at bay: “pagan struggle with immanent forces for survival”

• Chaotic = bad for the flourishing of free races and therefore monstrous, fell: “of or having to do with the primordial chaos and the entropy of things”


Alignment terminology does not describe a character’s personality or their relative predictability, as in Advanced Edition Rules. Lawful is definitely not “goody two-shoes.” The Lawful often rule with an iron fist (some of them, sometimes). Do they want to slay the primordial chaos monster and establish cosmos out of chaos? Then they are Lawful. Do they want to unleash the primordial chaos monster and revel in the supposed riches unleashed and go down in flames as long as that might last? Then they are Chaotic. Have they not yet heard that there is such a thing as a universal Law (still pagan), or are they skeptical of this new "universalism," worrying that it might wash out what is unique about their tribe or race or people? Then they are Neutral.

Again, hope you feel better soon. Enjoy all that video time with the fam!

[waysoftheearth]

Dec 26, 2014 18:43:15 GMT -6 derv said:

D&D has reaction tables (p.12 of M&M and p.12 of U&WA) which randomly determine how an encounter might unfold. The results are somewhat unpredictable regardless of alignment and requires DM interpretation.

M&M also says:

One can attempt to communicate through the common tongue, language particular to a creature class, or one of the divisional languages (law, etc.). While not understanding the language, creatures who speak a divisional tongue will recognize a hostile one and attack.

So speaking the wrong alignment tongue is a dire blasphemy worth spilling blood over