Buddha's New D&D Thread is Groovy, Man.

[saskganesh]

LE never really made much sense to me.  I had the same problem with Chaotic Good (which seemed to be the second most popular choice of alignment for players behind CN).

LE: think Nazi's. Himmler. "the truest of the true". think of the Templars in Kingdom of Heaven. "let's kill Saladin's unarmed sister". Sherriff of Nottingham.
CG: Greenpeace. always doing "good", but always getting arrested. however, some of them are more chaotic than anything. Shane the movie cowboy: (saves the village, then moves on with the frontier). Robin Hood.

[saskganesh]

a very interesting LN character would be an oathkeeper. someone who swears of oaths and follows them to the letter, because breaking an oath would be breaking word with God.

of course what you do then is arrange for oathkeeper to have conflicting oaths.  "I have sworn to defend King Alfred but I have also sworn not to take arms against Harold the Boneless. wtf do I do now?" it's RP gold.

my last game we dropped alignments as an overt thing, but kept them as a general guide to behavior.

[Barrister]

my last game we dropped alignments as an overt thing, but kept them as a general guide to behavior.

I always took alignments to be a descriptor of your character, and not the driving force.

That is to say, you decided on what your character was like, then figured out which alignment he would fall under, rather than nive-versa.

But then again almost all of my D&D playing was under "Basic" D&D, so all we ever worried about was Lawful/Neutral/Chaotic. 

[saskganesh]

sure. usually a player didn't know how we would play a character until he started playing him. then it became important.

but with some thought, the old 9 point (10 if you counted N and TN as separate*) system was a rich motivator for PC/NPCS and scenarios. 

* I played Neutral as most of the commoner peeps who were not strongly motivated by anything really and True Neutral for the Druids and Mages who would mutter metathoughts about teh Preserving the Balance and what not. worked well.

[Neil]

* I played Neutral as most of the commoner peeps who were not strongly motivated by anything really and True Neutral for the Druids and Mages who would mutter metathoughts about teh Preserving the Balance and what not. worked well.

I never formally split it out like that, but I had the same idea about flavours of Neutral.

[crazy canuck]

Nobody wanted to play LN in one of my games.  It made things awefully boring for them - not wanting to take a position that might upset the balance or that might be contrary to some code of conduct and all.

It's best not to treat alignment like handcuffs.  I've always seen LN as being concerned primarily with order, and less about morality.  The average LN character just wants a safe, orderly place to live, and doesn't care if people have to be waterboarded to do it.  Compare that to LG, who want that orderly living, but prefer to avoid torture (although LG has no problem resorting to violence when opposed), or LE, where the torture is an integral part of the orderly society.

Eventually I just dropped the whole notion of alignments and found them all to be silly.  On your point, the best description I ever read of LN was someone who wishes to live in a world of grey stillness.

If they didnt care if people had to be waterboarded to do it, they wouldnt be Lawful they would have to be chaotic.  I always interpreted Lawful as confining ones self to the rule of law.  The law might be terrible but it must be obeyed.

[Neil]

Nobody wanted to play LN in one of my games.  It made things awefully boring for them - not wanting to take a position that might upset the balance or that might be contrary to some code of conduct and all.

It's best not to treat alignment like handcuffs.  I've always seen LN as being concerned primarily with order, and less about morality.  The average LN character just wants a safe, orderly place to live, and doesn't care if people have to be waterboarded to do it.  Compare that to LG, who want that orderly living, but prefer to avoid torture (although LG has no problem resorting to violence when opposed), or LE, where the torture is an integral part of the orderly society.

Eventually I just dropped the whole notion of alignments and found them all to be silly.  On your point, the best description I ever read of LN was someone who wishes to live in a world of grey stillness.

If they didnt care if people had to be waterboarded to do it, they wouldnt be Lawful they would have to be chaotic.  I always interpreted Lawful as confining ones self to the rule of law.  The law might be terrible but it must be obeyed.

See, I think you're making too narrow an interpretation.  The lawful alignments have always been constructive and orderly, not hidebound by law.  Otherwise, lawful evil characters would be extremely limited as to what they could do.

[Oexmelin]

I always thought Pendragon's opposing traits made much more sense as a guide. 

You have the following traits which are opposed: Chaste / Lustful; Energetic / Lazy; Forgiving / Vengeful; Generous / Selfish; Honest / Deceitful ; Just / Arbitrary ; Merciful / Cruel ; Modest / Proud ; Pious / Worldly ; Prudent / Reckless ; Temperate / Indulgent ; Trusting / Suspicious ; Valorous / Cowardly

Each time you behave according to a trait, you receive a check, which can result in a trait going up (and the opposite going down), which means that your character's morality and behaviour evolves as a player plays it.

When situations demand a roll, you roll against both traits. Usually, the higher one wins out and your character has to succumb to his trait (i.e., act selfish or generously, despite the player's preference). If your die roll is higher than both traits, you are free to chose your course of action.

Pendragon makes you roll for all these traits, but I have let my players pick out their traits, because it makes for interesting character creation (the courageous but greedy knight, the deceitful but merciful hero) and interesting progression (as players are often unable to play to the high standards they set for themselves at the start, evolving from a naive young hero full of ideals to a jaded mercenary...).

[BuddhaRhubarb]

cool, an alignment discussion. I've always gravitated to NG for my characters, out of laziness mostly. I've never played a game actually where someone really made any alignment slips that big... gradual drifting sure but that's realistic. If we had such things in real life it would change and morph as you aged and experience things. CN as a teen to CE, or LG as you get into old age.

[Eddie Teach]

http://www.okcupid.com/tests/the-d-d-alignment-test

I am: Neutral Good

[garbon]

quizzes!

I am : True Neutral

[Hansmeister]

Lawful Good
You scored 82% Law vs Chaos and 72% Good vs Evil!

[Valmy]

Lawful Good

[saskganesh]

I always thought Pendragon's opposing traits made much more sense as a guide. 

You have the following traits which are opposed: Chaste / Lustful; Energetic / Lazy; Forgiving / Vengeful; Generous / Selfish; Honest / Deceitful ; Just / Arbitrary ; Merciful / Cruel ; Modest / Proud ; Pious / Worldly ; Prudent / Reckless ; Temperate / Indulgent ; Trusting / Suspicious ; Valorous / Cowardly

hm, fun system.

and I never realised before that CK cribbed this.

[saskganesh]

Lawful Good

I did one of those tests. apparently I am Chaotic Neutral because I don't like being overtaxed and I usually don't give money to panhandlers.