Alignment questions

beckylunatic

This is partly inspired by Elemental Evil and partly because I've been re-reading Order of the Stick.

I know that D&D has moved away from alignments, or rather changed it so that the player's choices determine what kind of person the character is, rather than the player trying to take actions that fit into a character's pre-chosen alignment.

What I'm curious about is how this fits into labelling, and self-perception.

We have Zarifrax the lich admiring Valindra's "dedication to evil", but since his character is comic relief, I'm not sure if this is just a bit of playing with the 4th wall.

We have Cults of Elemental Evil, but I don't know if this is a name they've chosen, one they've been saddled with by their opponents, or is just marketing and won't actually be used to refer to the collective cults in-game (since there are four with actual names). On a related note... all these cults referring to themselves as cults. I don't think a group like the Branch Davidians ever does that. It's the outside world that labels them as a cult. Order of the Crashing Wave, sure.

Do characters self-identify as evil? Or some of them do evil for evil's sake, and might therefore be ok with being called evil. But others feel their own ideological motivations are in the right, as much as they are at odds with others, and would therefore consider themselves to be trying to do good?

We have figures like Lord Neverember, who have helped righteous causes but not without a whole pile of self-interested reasons that bring in the morally grey shadings.

I know it's not our world, but a lot of our ideas of morality apply, just with a whole lot more magic involved, and gods that mortals know are real.

I guess the tl;dr version is... how self-aware is Evil?

mithvahkar7

I think if falls to the reason and methods a person uses. Here's an example, most people call Robin Hood chaotic good, but this is faulty as Robin Hood has no problem with law or order, his reasoning being is his fight against corruption, thus making him Neutral Good and he won't do the same if the kingdom was just and peaceful. This might also be hard reasoning because it would be hard to understand what chaotic good can be. For an example of that, a person was arrested but will be put to trial first to prove their innocence, the chaotic good player would break them out before the trial even begins if believe that person is truly innocent. Or another example, a thief could be stealing for the rich but rich that aren't corrupt just to feed the poor, and would do this knowing the rich person wouldn't really be affected.
But this is an explanation for chaotic to lawful, so how is it from good to evil is what you want, and it's still in this idea. Evil is generally based if the character is doing what they are doing without caring for the innocent involved and also depending on how much they are doing it for themselves. Yes, this is the part where it can be confusing if a character is doing something for their own gain but not involving innocents to problems or dangers, but here the question is why are they not involving innocents? Is it because they don't want the problems that will come with it or it because they want to keep them safe? If it's the second the character is still good because they put those not involved before themselves, their ambitions and beliefs.

I guess the short version would be evil is one doing something for themselves whether it be gain, ambition or belief without caring it s/he puts those not involved into danger or problems. Of course let me still give an example for something that might come up, you are passing by a village in danger and you have the ability to save it and have nothing else urgent, but you refuse to help because it doesn't concern you, this is still evil, it doesn't have to be you doing the evil deed, but you're still fulfilling your own disconcern of not caring. There is also the scenario where you may be afraid to die or be hurt and won't help because of that. You would be neutral, but possibly good depending on how pure the reason is for that.
Someone following a evil doer because they believe in what they are doing would be evil but one following out of fear would be neutral to an extent.

Well, I'm not sure if this I explained this well and I hope I explained it right

vaelynx

I know that D&D has moved away from alignments, or rather changed it so that the player's choices determine what kind of person the character is, rather than the player trying to take actions that fit into a character's pre-chosen alignment.

Honestly, as far as I'm concerned, this is using allignments poorly.
In my view and how 3.5 has been played among my group and stuff, allignments are descriptive, rather than prescriptive, and really influence stuff with respect to your relationship to planes and extraplanar beings. Really, if your allignment actually prescribes your reaction, then you're probably a celestial or a fiend.
Which also meant a lot of allignment shifts through the games, like say, my old PC, Inquisitor Miron Steelsprocket going from LN to LE slowly as a particularly nasty episode through the story unraveled, where the circumstances really brought out the worst in him. Fun fact - since the endpart involved fighting devils, he actually benefitted somewhat x3.

zebular

Alignments are back in 5th edition as a core rule. They never went away, it was just 4th edition that made them be an optional rule. There's still a section on "alignments and personalities" in 4th edition rule books.

myles08807

The Cult of Elemental Evil are dedicated to killing the gods and reverting the world to a less organized elemental state. Their primordial leaders are pawns of Tharizdun, the Not-named God, who wishes to unmake all of reality. It don't get any more chaotic evil than that: the wish to destroy everything, not to start over, but to end it.

beckylunatic

But does a person (or organization) say, "I am evil. I have evil goals. I am comfortable with my evilness. I named my group "Cult of Evil Stuff That is Totally Evil, Like You Wouldn't Even Believe."

We can have a general societal consensus that people or organizations are evil because of their actions, but in a D&D setting, do they actually identify that way?

In Order of the Stick, everyone knows they have an alignment, but they also know they have skill points and saving throws and level up from earning XP.

zebular

It all depends, some do, some don't. It's all how they perceive themselves, how others perceive them, and how they perceive others perception of themself. Generally, a Lawful Evil character won't see themselves as evil, they'll see all their actions as being for some "greater good" that any good aligned person would view as evil. A Chaotic Evil character will most likely know that their actions are perceived as vile and evil, and they just won't care and will go along with it.

Generally:
Lawful Good/Evil = Knows right and wrong to the letter.
Chaotic Good/Evil = The line is blurred based upon circumstance and whim but their actions will generally fall to their alignment of either good or evil.
Chaotic Neutral = They're clinically insane, see above for CG/CE. It doesn't matter how they perceive themselves. Others will generally view them as evil.
True Neutral = Has a strong sense of good and evil and the balance to maintain. Their actions can be viewed either as good or evil, for they do what they must to uphold their sense of the balance.

beckylunatic

Ok, so if the Cult of Elemental Evil is chaotic and bent on destruction, then it's in keeping with the idea of Chaotic Evil being self-aware that they'd just call themselves an EEEEEVIL cult and have no problem upholding that image.

azlanfox

Alignments exist for the purely mechanical reason that without a set of rules, players act out however they want. In the PnP world players look for every advantage to be better then the challenges and their fellow players. Alignment is one way, among many, that restrict how effectively players can apply the power of their class/race/feat build combinations. There are many other factors in restricting player "power", but this is just one of many tools DMs have. A good DM can use alignment as a way to hamper, restrict, punish, and challenge players no matter what their choices or intentions.

Aside from the munchkins, alignment represents a roleplaying opportunity and challenge. Whereas a number of players use alignment as a means to skirt morality, defend their own selfishness, and have fun at the expense of others, many of us see it as an opportunity to roleplay, act, and as a guide to assist making those tough choices (and many as a excuse not to make that tough choice).

Unfortunately, most D&D worlds are built around fairly rigid view points and very unrealistic uses of good, evil, neutral, law, and chaos. Most creatures that are 'evil' are just evil for the sake of being evil. It is a classic "well they are evil, so they are your enemy" excuse. Do they view themselves as evil? Well, that is usually just a morality challenge designed to give the characters pause and in some cases 'punish' them with no right answer scenarios. For example, if the players are tasked with clearing out an orc den, inevitably you will be faced with the dilemma of orc children. If the players kill the orc children, then they are impacted by the 'are they really evil by nature, or is it learned?' Invariably, other orcs discover that adventurers slayed their fellows and even children and use that as a motivation to attack and murder civilians. It is now justified. If the players do not, then those orcs grow up to become normal orcs that raid, murder, pillage. It is now the players' fault that this happened. So the simple answer is yes, they view themselves as evil, unless it is more inconvenient for the players that they don't.

This is not how I do things, but this has been my experience in games over the last 30 years. Exceptions exist, frequently, and in varying terms of strength and commitment.

clericalist

beckylunatic wrote: »

We can have a general societal consensus that people or organizations are evil because of their actions, but in a D&D setting, do they actually identify that way?

I would think its the opposite, in the real world there are very few people that openly identify themselves as evil, other than some deranged serial killers. For the worlds famous mass murderers they all viewed their enemies as evil and themselves good.

For the D&D setting, I am guessing that characters like Valindra are more the like the comic book villains, they are "evil" because heroes need evil villains that do evil laughs and look evil.

vaelynx

@azlanfox
Eh. A good GM can do all of those things even without allignments, as the world react to your actions.
I mean, if the PCs cleanse a village for little reason, or rob a noble, there'll be a bounty on their heads sooner or later regardless of whether the allignment system pegs them as Evil.

Really, the purpose of this sort of thing is to interface with the planes, which are built on particular allignments, because their residents have rigid, otherworldly views and principles.