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CG? Discworld witches generally, and Granny Weatherwax specifically, are almost always good without usually being very nice. They also display a general understanding that rules and laws exist, but can't agree what they actually are or whether they're meaningfully rules at all, and don't (or won't) follow them anyway unless they feel like it. Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 14:02 on Jun 6, 2019 |
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Jun 6, 2019 08:46
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ACAB, including Sam Vimes, and he knows it. Still LG though, because he's a fantasy cop.
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Jun 6, 2019 08:52
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Liquid Communism posted:I admire Vimes. He knows, deep down in his cardboard soles, that it would be so easy to be the bad guy and nobody else would blame him. Every day, he gets up, stares himself in the face, and says 'gently caress that', because the one person who would is looking back at him. I love how this is the same logic he uses to make sure he always reads Young Sam a bedtime story each night.
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Jun 6, 2019 13:57
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:It was invented by a brokebrain libertarian whose idea of lawful good actually was pretty close to the negative example someone gave earlier, and has persisted as a mechanic only out of sheer momentum.
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Jun 6, 2019 14:14
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He should have put YHWH and Lucifer as well
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Jun 6, 2019 15:01
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:It's not so much that any alignment is hard to conceptualize/roleplay as it is that alignment is loving stupid and bears no relationship to how people, cultures, or allegiances actually work. More than invented by a brokebrain libertarian, it was stolen from other people and hastily scribbled into a published notebook by a brokebrain libertarian, and passed through multiple levels of patching and reinterpretations by other people and the same man. In the very first edition of D&D, there is Law, Chaos, and Neutrality, but there also exists 'evil' (and by contrast, good) but it's not entirely clear if Chaos is evil, or if evil is separate from Alignment. It appears that the intent was for Law and Good, and Chaos and Evil, to be synonymous... ...but when Holmes tried to edit D&D for TSR, he understood there to be an Evil-Good axis and a Lawful/Chaotic axis, with Neutrality as a fifth position - and TSR was willing to publish this despite contradicting other D&D books. Then, in AD&D 1e, Gygax for some reason decides to expand this to the nine-alignment grid. But that's a post hoc change to the game: he clearly intended Chaos and Evil to be the same at first. In fact, an older Gygax coming back to explain the concept seems to consider the idea of lawful and good coming into conflict as almost inherently absurd: justice is good and benevolence is good, even if the laws are malign. Bizarrely, to make a judgement about whether the law is just is something you can only do if you're not Good: Gygax' Good man follows the law and dispenses justice, and only someone who's not Good would doubt the law. The Good man who doesn't follow the law does so out of mercy, not because he doesn't believe the law is wrong. Bizarre Morals Man posted:Paladins are not stupid, and in general there is no rule of Lawful Good against killing enemies. The old adage about nits making lice applies. Also, as I have often noted, a paladin can freely dispatch prisoners of Evil alignment that have surrendered and renounced that alignment in favor of Lawful Good. They are then sent on to their reward before they can backslide.
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Jun 6, 2019 16:46
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Alignment was originally just a very simple matter of "Will this creature attack me on sight?" The more people extrapolated from that, the dumber it got. Until Planescape.
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Jun 6, 2019 17:21
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Halloween Jack posted:Alignment was originally just a very simple matter of "Will this creature attack me on sight?" The more people extrapolated from that, the dumber it got. Until Planescape. Alignment was never even that because of reaction rolls, at least in B/X.
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Jun 6, 2019 17:30
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Big fan of summarily executing prisoners of war who have converted to my religion at swordpoint under the reasoning that if they're dead they can't sin, something which I'm sure everyone will agree is an unequivocally morally just and selfless act.
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Jun 6, 2019 17:42
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Lemon-Lime posted:Big fan of summarily executing prisoners of war who have converted to my religion at swordpoint under the reasoning that if they're dead they can't sin, something which I'm sure everyone will agree is an unequivocally morally just and selfless act. One should really, really not take one's moral cues from the loving Albigensian Crusade.
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Jun 6, 2019 17:45
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Halloween Jack posted:Alignment was originally just a very simple matter of "Will this creature attack me on sight?" The more people extrapolated from that, the dumber it got. Until Planescape. I miss Planescape.
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Jun 6, 2019 17:46
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Lemon-Lime posted:Big fan of summarily executing prisoners of war who have converted to my religion at swordpoint under the reasoning that if they're dead they can't sin, something which I'm sure everyone will agree is an unequivocally morally just and selfless act. I mean several religious groups did that historically and were supported by part of their society, nobody in the world actually agrees on what is good, moral or just so maybe the "Good" alignment should work like what you see yourself instead of what you actually are.
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Jun 6, 2019 17:47
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As far as I can divine from OD&D, if and only if a monster has the same alignment as you, you can roll to determine whether it'll be hostile, neutral towards you, or willing to work for you. Then later it says monsters attack on sight unless significantly outnumbered, so either Gygax was just writing down arbitrary and contradictory rules and passing it off as a product worth money (very likely), or he intended it so that you can only roll for reactions if you outnumber the monster enough to make it hold off on attacking. Alignment also does one important thing: because spells can detect or protect you from evil, you can use it to defend against Chaos-aligned monsters. And also some intelligent swords and other artifacts will attempt to kill you if you touch them with the wrong alignment, because Gygax was a terrible and capricious referee.
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Jun 6, 2019 17:47
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Ah yes, Straight, the opposite of... Weird. Also Government, the opposite of ... Communist? That can't be right.
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Jun 6, 2019 17:50
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theironjef posted:Ah yes, Straight, the opposite of... Weird. Also Government, the opposite of ... Communist? That can't be right. If it helps, Illuminati is using a definition of 'straight' derived from the old-school Bob Dobbs Subgenius types. (It does not help.)
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Jun 6, 2019 17:54
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theironjef posted:Ah yes, Straight, the opposite of... Weird. Also Government, the opposite of ... Communist? That can't be right. Government/Communist only makes sense if you assume "Government" is shorthand for "US Government". SJG is a an odd mixture of out-of-date progressivism (see: stale hippy in-jokes) and parochialism (see: assuming every player's going to have a basically USAian point of view). Warthur fucked around with this message at 17:56 on Jun 6, 2019 |
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Jun 6, 2019 17:54
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theironjef posted:Ah yes, Straight, the opposite of... Weird. Also Government, the opposite of ... Communist? That can't be right. If you assume 60s america then 'Communist infiltration of america' would make sense as opposing Gov/Com lines. straight just means 'conventional' in this context. it's a slightly old now meaning but isn't esp wacky
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Jun 6, 2019 17:57
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My alignment is Phone Company Video Store.
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Jun 6, 2019 18:01
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LatwPIAT posted:...but when Holmes tried to edit D&D for TSR, he understood there to be an Evil-Good axis and a Lawful/Chaotic axis, with Neutrality as a fifth position - and TSR was willing to publish this despite contradicting other D&D books. Then, in AD&D 1e, Gygax for some reason decides to expand this to the nine-alignment grid. But that's a post hoc change to the game: he clearly intended Chaos and Evil to be the same at first. Just to expand on this, here's the prototype 9 alignment grid. (I posted this picture ages ago.) The first time I saw it, I thought it really was the fully developed version, but now that I return to it, it looks like you're right: only the 5 defined regions are supposed to contain characters, with the 4 "pure" regions not actually usable alignments? I wouldn't bother posting this except Holmes hasn't been put out in PDF yet to my knowledge, so this is an odd bit of history that few people have access to. I was lucky to find a cheap used copy.  Dr Holmes posted:Characters may be lawful (good or evil), neutral or chaotic (good or evil). Lawful characters always act according to a highly regulated code of behavior, whether for good or evil. Chaotic characters are quite unpredictable and cannot be depended upon to do anything except the unexpected -- they are often, but not always, evil. Neutral characters, such as all thieves, are motivated by self interest and may steal from their companions or betray them if it is in their own best interests. Players may choose any alignment they want and need not reveal it to others. ... If the Dungeon Master feels that a character has begun to behave in a manner inconsistent with his declared alignment he may rule that he or she has changed alignment and penalize the character with a loss of experience points.
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Jun 6, 2019 18:13
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By 2nd or 3rd edition, D&D's good vs. evil alignment axis was basically straightforward and comprehensible (you'll go out of your way to help others, you'll stop short of harming others unless your hand is forced, you'll harm others). However, the law vs. chaos axis remains meaningless nonsense that, because it hinges at least in part on a character's internal rationale, can be used to retroactively describe any behavior in any context as lawful or chaotic or neither or both. In a perverse way, this was good for gameplay, since certain classes mandated or forbade some positions on the law/chaos axis and if you couldn't bullshit your way around it you wouldn't be able to play certain characters, but it would've been much better to delete that axis entirely.
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Jun 6, 2019 18:20
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Monokeros deAstris posted:Just to expand on this, here's the prototype 9 alignment grid. (I posted this picture ages ago.) The first time I saw it, I thought it really was the fully developed version, but now that I return to it, it looks like you're right: only the 5 defined regions are supposed to contain characters, with the 4 "pure" regions not actually usable alignments?
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Jun 6, 2019 18:21
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Other way around, extremely good dogs = can teleport.
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Jun 6, 2019 18:23
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I like how the 3e corebooks gave examples for given ability scores. STR 9, INT 16? You're a strong as a quasit and as smart as a trumpet archon! Hope that means anything to you!
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Jun 6, 2019 18:33
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Warthur posted:Straight/Weird makes sense given that the game's riffing on a cult novel riffing on a hippy in-joke, and "Straight" as a synonym for "square" was in vogue back then.
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Jun 6, 2019 18:35
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My alignment is WWBDD (What Would Blink Dogs Do)
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Jun 6, 2019 18:38
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Zereth posted:The game that's from is like, decades old at this point, too, isn't it? 1980s, so the 1960s vernacular would have been more well-remembered.
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Jun 6, 2019 19:01
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Monokeros deAstris posted:Just to expand on this, here's the prototype 9 alignment grid. (I posted this picture ages ago.) The first time I saw it, I thought it really was the fully developed version, but now that I return to it, it looks like you're right: only the 5 defined regions are supposed to contain characters, with the 4 "pure" regions not actually usable alignments? I was thinking of this, which is even more clear on the matter:  Lawful Good, Chaotic Good, Lawful Evil, Chaotic Evil, and in the centre, Neutral. Warthur posted:1980s, so the 1960s vernacular would have been more well-remembered. And the game was licensed from the Illuminatus! trilogy, which was written in 1969-1971 and is about 1960s counterculture, so it's thematically appropriate language. LatwPIAT fucked around with this message at 19:12 on Jun 6, 2019 |
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Jun 6, 2019 19:09
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So in that grid is separation from the center relevant? Like a beholder is slightly less lawful evil than a blue dragon? And they couldn't think of an equivalent slot of for the only sorta chaotic good monster? (Centaur guys, c'mon!)
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Jun 6, 2019 19:12
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Warthur posted:Straight/Weird makes sense given that the game's riffing on a cult novel riffing on a hippy in-joke, and "Straight" as a synonym for "square" was in vogue back then. SJG makes a lot more sense when you read their source material, namely Robert Anton Wilson’s ILLUMINATUS trilogy.
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Jun 6, 2019 19:13
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I went to a Neutral Ape Cockatrice show in Baltimore a few years ago, pretty good set but sometimes the bassist would start yelling about how it's actually fine and cool to kill orc babies? Kinda soured the whole mood.
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Jun 6, 2019 19:16
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theironjef posted:So in that grid is separation from the center relevant? Like a beholder is slightly less lawful evil than a blue dragon? And they couldn't think of an equivalent slot of for the only sorta chaotic good monster? (Centaur guys, c'mon!) The Centaur of the graph is already taken by the band Neutral Ape Cockatrice
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Jun 6, 2019 19:26
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:Other way around, extremely good dogs = can teleport. But this is all dogs 
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Jun 6, 2019 19:42
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They can, but don't so they can be with us more.
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Jun 6, 2019 19:45
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Rhandhali posted:SJG makes a lot more sense when you read their source material, namely Robert Anton Wilson’s ILLUMINATUS trilogy. IMHO the real problem with Illuminati is that the whole "crazy people and their insane grand unified conspiracy explanations of everything" motif is a lot less funny here in the mass-shooting/Qanon/alt-right late 2010s then it was back when it was designed.
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Jun 6, 2019 19:47
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LatwPIAT posted:More than invented by a brokebrain libertarian, it was stolen from other people and hastily scribbled into a published notebook by a brokebrain libertarian, and passed through multiple levels of patching and reinterpretations by other people and the same man. In the very first edition of D&D, there is Law, Chaos, and Neutrality, but there also exists 'evil' (and by contrast, good) but it's not entirely clear if Chaos is evil, or if evil is separate from Alignment. It appears that the intent was for Law and Good, and Chaos and Evil, to be synonymous... The law/chaos dichotomy was stolen out of Three Hearts and Three Lions, so once again we can blame all of our problems on isekai
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Jun 6, 2019 19:49
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Jun 6, 2019 20:12
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Warthur posted:SJG is a an odd mixture of out-of-date progressivism (see: stale hippy in-jokes) and parochialism (see: assuming every player's going to have a basically USAian point of view). Overall I bring it up because it's the board for Brainwash, easily the worst of the Illuminati supplements, but also because it's this complex system where you can adjust the effect of each alignment or change its opposition to another alignment... and it's just a needlessly fiddly expansion to an already fiddly game, and there's a reason practically nobody plays with it. A lot of alignment / morality systems generally strike me as seeming like a good idea on their face, but when removed, you'd hardly ever notice their absence.
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Jun 6, 2019 20:54
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So do apes have a slight alignment towards Good, while cockatrices have a slight alignment towards Evil? Should all the evil humanoid races be replaced with creatures evolutionarily derived and modified from the cockatrice?
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Jun 6, 2019 22:09
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The alignment grid is pretty awesome when it comes to world-building (13th age's Icons and Planescape's Wheel and Factions), but awful when used as a sort of horoscope or modus operandi for individual characters. I recently picked up Stormbringer 4th Edition, and I'm considering porting over it's allegiance system (to law and chaos) as an alternative to the d&d alignments. That way it becomes less about how you scored on the libertarian political test and more about who you're obligated to and who owes you back.
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Jun 6, 2019 23:07
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Was Three Hearts and Three Lions messing around with Law/Chaos before Moorcock did?
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Jun 6, 2019 23:32
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