Alignment Issues

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

Well' date=' such a person would be wrong. Without laws, you only get what you can take by physical force.[/b']

It's exactly that kind of response that explains why Law and Chaos fight.

I fully accept Robyn's revision to my statement: "Without laws, you only keep what you can protect by physical force." Is that better? It also explains why Chaos and Chaos fight, and why Law and Law do not fight.

 

The lawful point of view tends to be "Know your place in society and work to fill it". The chaotic point of view tends to be, "Any boy can be King"...if he's tough enough.

If we're truly talking about Law/Chaos as a separate axis from Good/Evil, there is nothing inherent in Law that says a person can't change his place in society. That would be a matter of goodness. And the chaotic point of view also tends to be, "Any boy can kill the king, steal from the king, or anyone else" ...if he gets away with it.

 

Please tell us: what are your definitions of Lawful and Chaotic? Here too, I think we are using different definitions.

 

Yep. That's a utopian vision, all right. A real chaotic society would be a tribal organization where leadership roles are purely the result of physical might,

Physical might IS competence (in war) and that's important.

But physical might has nothing to do with competence in other areas of leadership. There's a lot more to government than war.

 

But that doesn't mean a chaotic society would not have a place of respect for their shaman or their bard, or the guy who is simply their oldest member.

They could, but it wouldn't be a function of their chaoticness. They might just as easily not have any such respect for those people. A lawful society on the other hand, establishes what respect is due to whom.

 

It's up to the GM to decide how adjudicate his own biases towards Good or Lawfulness.

I don't know what you mean by this.

 

But as I said Chaotic societies still have laws. Just not so many.

So then what is it that makes them Chaotic? Again definitions would help. I've given mine in my previous post.

 

The Gauls weren't all that Good either.

I didn't say they were. If, as you claim, the Gauls had more freedom (assuming we mean the same thing by that term), then at least in that one respect, the Gauls were more Good than the Romans.

 

Really? I stayed awake in class and I have stood in lines and filled out forms willingly. Am I so rare? Understand that when I say "hate" I do not mean "does not love". I mean "hate". As in "enrages you".

Again, I'm going to need some clarification about your definitions. To me, alignments are about actions, not emotions. I'd say there are plenty of people who hate to stand in line and do paperwork and are still Lawful.

 

Because he's Chaotic Good. If he was Chaotic Neutral he'd steal just because he wanted the money and didn't respect authority.

I'd say that would make him Chaotic Evil.

 

Note that the earliest versions of Robin DID steal just because he didn't respect authority and wanted the money. But a Lawful person wouldn't generally stake out a piece of turf and then just start robbing people as a response to an evil administration. Consider the Camber series by Katherine Kurtz for how Lawful Good types respond to an Evil King. Do they start a series of robberies and random guerilla attacks against the Evil guys? Not hardly. They look for a survivor from the previous dynasty who might be considered more legitimate and then they pull off a coup d'etat which is as bloodless as possible to install a new and better King. It's a difference in philosophy, and one that can create real conflicts when a hypothetical Ivanhoe runs into a hypothetical Robin Hood.

I've never heard of these "earliest versions," but everything else you say here seems to agree with my point. Lawful Good tends to work within the law to remove corruption. Chaotic Good goes outside of the law to remove the corruption.

 

You can't imagine the Sheriff not having any evil purposes but just doing his job as it was assigned to him by his boss?

Sure, I can. I can imagine lots of things. Doesn't make his purposes any less evil. The Nuremburg defense, "I was only following orders," doesn't change the morality of your actions.

 

Who follows the Lawful gods in Moorcock, and why?

Mostly people under attack by people backed by the Chaotic gods.

It sounds like a completely arbitrary distiction. Like a sporting event. Both sides cheer on their team, but it has nothing to do with "alignment."

 

Are there any good guys in Moorcock?

Sometimes, but their goodness or evil has little bearing on how they relate to magic because there are no supernatural entities of "good" or "evil". If either Law or Chaos wins in a given universe, everyone (mortal) dies as the natural laws of said universe collapse. The closest they get to gods of good are the beings of Balance, but they are only "good" in the sense that they work to prevent that outcome. They're basically cold and pragmatic beings.

So there are multiple universes in Moorcock? And Moorcock himself has decided that they shall constantly be at war or be destroyed? It seems like the names of the two teams could have just as easily been "Yankees" and "Dodgers," instead of Law and Chaos.

 

What do they do? If neither side in Amber is good, why do they want stability/flexibility respectively? What's the point?

The point is to increase their sides power and their personal comfort. That does NOT mean that you wouldn't take a side in their battles because if the Courts of Chaos were to win in your universe it would change in ways that you would find extremely uncomfortable, not mention hard to survive, unless you picked up mastery of self-mutation.

So the world becomes less comfortable and less survivable if "Chaos" wins. That sounds more like Evil, to me. And you also seem to be saying that either side's quality of life improves if they win, so again, it's totally arbitrary. Call the two sides "Scylla" and "Charybdis" and the story remains the same.

[Shike019]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

Lawful tries to impose order on the univers (or their own small portion there of) and Chaos "goes with the flow" Laws can be evil in nature (there could be a low that dictates the binding of feet for females. Or sacrificing your third child, etc.) These would be "lawful" but definately evil.

[David Johnston]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

I fully accept Robyn's revision to my statement: "Without laws, you only keep what you can protect by physical force."

 

But it isn't true. Assuming that you have a society of Good people...like say, Elves. That's not to say that these people are all Good, but the people who aren't Good are an exception to the rule. Try to take someone else's stuff by force or stealth, and the other members of the tribe will stop you if they find out. Because they're Good, and they look out for each other. They'll take you before the council of elders, let's say, or maybe an individual who is respected enough to get the role of judging disputes, or aor they'll just vote as a tribe on how to resolve the dispute. They don't need a formulated set of rules to do this because by and large they are good, neighbourly people who know each other well and can deal with the problem flexibly and individually. They can decide each case individually. This can and does work

 

...provided of course that your society is small and close-knit enough that everyone knows everyone else as an individual. It doesn't work so well in a large city which is exactly why the first codified systems of justice coincide with the rise of the first cities large enough that most of the people were strangers to each other and the populations were large enough that even a small proportion of misbehavers would turn into a large number of misbehavers.

Is that better? It also explains why Chaos and Chaos fight, and why Law and Law do not fight.

 

Unless they do, which they will when their respective organisations come into conflict. It's less likely but not impossible.

 

If we're truly talking about Law/Chaos as a separate axis from Good/Evil, there is nothing inherent in Law that says a person can't change his place in society. That would be a matter of goodness.

 

No it isn't. "Good" by the D&D definition will tell you not to take advantage of your higher position on the totem pole to cause pain and suffering. But it doesn't say that your position is up for grabs to someone smarter or more popular.

And the chaotic point of view also tends to be, "Any boy can kill the king, steal from the king, or anyone else" ...if he gets away with it.

But he probably won't be able to get away with it as long as the king is respected.

Please tell us: what are your definitions of Lawful and Chaotic? Here too, I think we are using different definitions.

 

Y'know, I already gave my definitions of Chaotic.

 

Freedom, egalitarianism, a willingness to make up the rules as you go along and to abandon traditions no longer seem to serve a practical purpose, a refusal to respect the position when you don't respect the man, a love of change for change's sake, and a low boredom threshold. Those are Chaotic values.

 

 

Lawful is of course the reverse. Or rather someone who by and large demonstrates the reverse of those kind of traits is Lawful.

 

 

But physical might has nothing to do with competence in other areas of leadership. There's a lot more to government than war.

 

Actually, not a lot more in a Chaotic society. For a minarchist, government is there to protect the people from violence, death and the loss of freedom and nothing else, and that's closest to the position of a Chaotic Good character.

 

 

They could, but it wouldn't be a function of their chaoticness.

 

It wouldn't be a function of lawfulness either. But that's what means the generalisation that only the tough guys would have power is wrong.

They might just as easily not have any such respect for those people. A lawful society on the other hand, establishes what respect is due to whom.

 

Or not. Depends on the laws.

Quote:

It's up to the GM to decide how adjudicate his own biases towards Good or Lawfulness.

 

I don't know what you mean by this.

 

What that means is, you are as free to decide that Chaos is wrong as you are to decide that Evil (or Good) is wrong.

Quote:

But as I said Chaotic societies still have laws. Just not so many.

So then what is it that makes them Chaotic?

 

What makes the left wing the left wing, and the right wing the right wing? It's not perfect adherence to their tendencies, because almost nobody has that and those who do are total madmen. Chaotics prefer to get by with less organisation than Lawfuls, and see the degree of regulation that their Lawful counterparts would enact to be "oppressive" or "stifling" or even "tyrannical".

Again definitions would help. I've given mine in my previous post.

 

Quote:

The Gauls weren't all that Good either.

I didn't say they were. If, as you claim, the Gauls had more freedom (assuming we mean the same thing by that term), then at least in that one respect, the Gauls were more Good than the Romans.

 

No, they weren't. They were just less organised. They didn't have more freedom because of their benevolent concern for their fellow man. They had more freedom because they would refuse to accept the degree of regulation for themselves that the Romans positively admired. At least until the Romans kicked their tails and made them swallow their medicine,.

 

Again, I'm going to need some clarification about your definitions. To me, alignments are about actions, not emotions.

 

To the game, alignments are about attitudes, not actions. Paladins and chaotic evil marauders both kill. The LG Paladin may actually rack up a faster death toll than the CE guy but he remains LG as long as he's killing for the right reasons. While actions may make it clear that your attitude is not in fact consistent with your supposed alignment, it is in fact your attitude, and not your actions that alignment measures. The "purity of your soul" or lack of same, so to speak.

I'd say there are plenty of people who hate to stand in line and do paperwork and are still Lawful.

 

They can't hate it that much if they do it on a regular basis. And of course if you have one unLawful trait and many Lawful traits, the result character will still by and large be Lawful.

Quote:

Because he's Chaotic Good. If he was Chaotic Neutral he'd steal just because he wanted the money and didn't respect authority.

I'd say that would make him Chaotic Evil.

 

All he's doing is stealing. A Chaotic Evil Robin Hood would probably be murdering the men and raping the women.

 

Quote:

You can't imagine the Sheriff not having any evil purposes but just doing his job as it was assigned to him by his boss?

Sure, I can. I can imagine lots of things. Doesn't make his purposes any less evil.

 

How is capturing a thief evil?

(In re Moorcock)

 

It sounds like a completely arbitrary distiction. Like a sporting event.

 

More like politics. Would you characterise either Republicans or Democrats as really evil? You might if you were a really rabid partisan (just as Lawful person would so characterise a Chaotic or vice versa), but they aren't. That doesn't mean the differences between them don't matter.

Both sides cheer on their team, but it has nothing to do with "alignment."

 

Having a side IS alignment. That's what the word means.

(in re Amber)

So the world becomes less comfortable and less survivable if "Chaos" wins.

 

For you, probably.

That sounds more like Evil, to me.

 

Only as long as you ignore that the Amberites winning makes life less comfortable and more dangerous for other kinds of creatures, more chaotic creatures than you. And who knows, maybe you will learn self-mutation if your universe becomes more chaotic. That's one of the things the Chaos side offers you if they win. It's just that you might die learning how.

And you also seem to be saying that either side's quality of life improves if they win, so again, it's totally arbitrary.

 

No more than Liberal versus Conservative. It all depends on the kind of world you want to live in.

[Robyn]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

I may be misunderstanding you here' date=' but it seems to me the only narrowness of the definition is to exclude the unrealistic and implausible.[/quote']

 

By the standards of Law, which is in no position to enforce its preconceptions upon Chaos.

 

In other words, the Law/Chaos debate soon devolves to:

Law: "Chaos is bad!"

Chaos: "Why?"

Law: "Because, by nature, Chaotic individuals must do . . . "

Chaos: "Who says?"

 

The rest of your post leads me to beleive we're using very different definitions of these terms, so I will wait for you to clarify the difinitions you are using (as I requested above).

 

I'll offer a more detailed definition later, after I get some sleep

 

For now, I'll just make a few brief responses to the more notable replies in this thread:

 

You can certainly enjoy freedom if your stronger, lawless neighbor hasn't gotten around to conquering you yet!

 

This presupposes a definition of Chaotic where "lawless" inevitably means "evil"; or perhaps I misunderstood your definition?

 

Chaotic (society) = one in which there is no formal legal system; where problems, conflicts, and disputes among the people are decided in a more-or-less arbitrary fashion by whomever has the power to do so. Those who have authority/power can do pretty much anything they want, and need not take into consideration the needs/wishes or the rest of the people. Those without power/authority have only those rights/recourses granted by the whim or grace of those in power.

 

Physical force is one type of power, but economic power can also factor into how "strong" someone is. If you produce something valuable (like food: everyone needs to eat!), especially something that noone else can, you (may) have the power to withhold it from others, and that is a power all your own! It may not be the power to harm or kill other people, but even without such ability (directly or by proxy of "authority"), one can be "in power".

 

How's that?

 

First there's Lawful: he follows a personal code (if he deviates from it, well, the Dark Side isn't known for mercy), strives to maintain order (by crushing the rebels who would dare seed dissent in the name of revolution!), and wants to spread it further. Then there's Good: not greedy or selfish at all, his first loyalty is to the Empire but that's not his only loyalty; he also loves his son and doesn't seem entirely happy with bringing Luke before the Emperor.

 

If we're truly talking about Law/Chaos as a separate axis from Good/Evil' date=' there is nothing inherent in Law that says a person can't change his place in society.[/quote']

 

Some time ago, in India, a village made up a story about how their ancestor was royalty. They couldn't change their caste, but they did change the rank of their caste. Not by much, and such shifts are certainly rare, but since a caste system seems like a very Lawful society, I thought it deserved mention.

 

They could, but it wouldn't be a function of their chaoticness. They might just as easily not have any such respect for those people.

 

But then, is this not a function of Chaotic alignment? To have the freedom to respect, or not, as they (individually) choose?

 

A lawful society on the other hand, establishes what respect is due to whom.

 

On the other hand, a Lawful society doesn't force people to have respect. Come to think of it, in a Lawful society, people might still respect someone, even when such respect hasn't been formally established as due.

 

Sure, I can. I can imagine lots of things. Doesn't make his purposes any less evil. The Nuremburg defense, "I was only following orders," doesn't change the morality of your actions.

 

So if you were playing a paladin, you'd essentially be a pacifist? (Can't slaughter those orcs, even if they are evil, even if your church ordered you to do it; that would be murder, just like Darth Vader did to those rebels.)

 

They can't hate it that much if they do it on a regular basis.

 

Isn't that what "supporting the Lawful society" means, though? They grit their teeth and do it anyway, because that's the law?

 

All he's doing is stealing. A Chaotic Evil Robin Hood would probably be murdering the men and raping the women.

 

Careful - but for that "probably", you're falling into the habit of doing exactly what Phil did, stereotyping alignments without regard to their personal interest.

 

A thought - if Robin Hood were Lawful Evil, he would probably have listened to society while growing up, heard that people like him (evil) were murderers and rapists, respected that, and become a murderer and rapist! But if he were Chaotic Evil, he would have heard what society said, and then another factor would have entered the equation: his own, personal, desires (if he wasn't interested in those, he wouldn't have felt compelled to engage in them anyway).

[Lucius]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

I fully accept Robyn's revision to my statement: "Without laws, you only keep what you can protect by physical force." Is that better?

 

No. Because WITH laws, you can only keep what you can protect by physical force.

 

There are people who would happily knock you in the head and take away what’s yours, but they are inhibited from doing so by the existence of a numerous and organized police force that would arrest them and a system of courts that would forcefully deprive them of their freedom.

 

Remember, at the heart of the words law enforcement is the word “force.”

 

It also explains why Chaos and Chaos fight, and why Law and Law do not fight.

 

It is not in any way, shape, or form the case the Law and Law do not fight. If your rules and binding agreements compel you to fight, then if you are Lawful, you will fight.

 

Consider two lawful kingdoms, each part of a different alliance. Two of their allies declare war. Each comes to the defense of their ally, which inevitably brings them in conflict with other as they fulfill their treaty obligations. It is their lawfulness in this case that COMPELS them to fight one another.

 

Chaos and Chaos may fight, but it is not mandatory. At the very least, there is never a rule compelling them to do so.

 

 

On the other hand, a Lawful society doesn't force people to have respect. Come to think of it, in a Lawful society, people might still respect someone, even when such respect hasn't been formally established as due.

 

Perhaps not, but a lawful society does EXPECT and encourage respect where it is deemed “appropriate” and it CAN force you to at least ACT respectfully.

 

What makes the left wing the left wing, and the right wing the right wing? It's not perfect adherence to their tendencies, because almost nobody has that and those who do are total madmen. Chaotics prefer to get by with less organisation than Lawfuls, and see the degree of regulation that their Lawful counterparts would enact to be "oppressive" or "stifling" or even "tyrannical".

……….

More like politics. Would you characterise either Republicans or Democrats as really evil? You might if you were a really rabid partisan (just as Lawful person would so characterise a Chaotic or vice versa), but they aren't. That doesn't mean the differences between them don't matter.

 

Sometimes I’m inclined to characterize BOTH as “really evil…”

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary asks again why I get involved…..

[assault]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

Actually' date=' not a lot more in a Chaotic society. For a minarchist, government is there to protect the people from violence, death and the loss of freedom and nothing else, and that's closest to the position of a Chaotic Good character.[/quote']

 

A sane, functional, Chaotic society could have leaders aside from war leaders. They would probably have clan elders of some sort and almost certainly some kind of religious leaders. These two roles might well overlap.

 

Of course, such a society would actually have "laws" of a sort, dealing with kinship and property, if nothing else. "You are married to someone from this village, therefore you are entitled to live here and help farm our fields" kind of stuff, or "you can't marry him, because he's a member of the Turtle totem lodge and thus is considered your brother".

 

War leaders might possibly only be chosen when they are required.

 

Obviously the more extremist varieties of "Chaotic" are less human-friendly. But so are the extremist varieties of "Law".

[Robyn]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

A sane' date=' functional, Chaotic society [i']could[/i] have leaders aside from war leaders. They would probably have clan elders of some sort and almost certainly some kind of religious leaders. These two roles might well overlap.

 

Of course, such a society would actually have "laws" of a sort, dealing with kinship and property, if nothing else. "You are married to someone from this village, therefore you are entitled to live here and help farm our fields" kind of stuff, or "you can't marry him, because he's a member of the Turtle totem lodge and thus is considered your brother".

 

Another contradiction: if someone has power, isn't it Chaotic to use it? At least, in a consistent manner? The truly Chaotic warlord would alternate between seizing power and giving it all away to charity. Only a Lawful warlord would use force to dictate how other people should behave

[Kristopher]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

While I don't want to bring a real-world political debate into this thread, I do think that a couple of real-world concepts are being expressed in some posts -- there seems to be an undercurrent of "libertarian" (chaos) vs "statist" (law) in those posts.

[David Johnston]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

 

First there's Lawful: he follows a personal code (if he deviates from it, well, the Dark Side isn't known for mercy), strives to maintain order (by crushing the rebels who would dare seed dissent in the name of revolution!), and wants to spread it further. Then there's Good: not greedy or selfish at all, his first loyalty is to the Empire but that's not his only loyalty; he also loves his son and doesn't seem entirely happy with bringing Luke before the Emperor.

 

Darth Vader would kill someone for being rude to or disappointing him. You don't get much more selfish than that. Yes, he loved his wife, (and strangled her). Yes, he loved his son (and cut his hand off). But he was still filled with hatred enough to drive him to commit multiple massacres of defenseless victims. That his ambition wasn't personal isn't enough to make him Good. Evil also includes swarms of fanatical followers who will commit any atrocity on behalf of their leader/cause.

 

Perhaps not, but a lawful society does EXPECT and encourage respect where it is deemed “appropriate” and it CAN force you to at least ACT respectfully.

 

So can a Chaotic society. Disrespect the tribal elders and see what happens. The difference is that the Lawful society probably would have decided in advance what the punishment is, and the Chaotic society might be more likely to decide on the punishment on the spot.

Careful - but for that "probably", you're falling into the habit of doing exactly what Phil did, stereotyping alignments without regard to their personal interest.

 

But it would be in his personal interest. Robin Hood is the leader of a group of bandits. A Chaotic Evil version of the Merry Men needs the raping to stay merry. And as for the murders, it's a heck of a lot easier to be a robber if you aren't careful to minimise casualties.

[Robyn]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

Darth Vader would kill someone for being rude to or disappointing him. You don't get much more selfish than that.

 

He would punish someone for insubordination or failing him. You don't get much more professional than that

[assault]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

there seems to be an undercurrent of "libertarian" (chaos) vs "statist" (law) in those posts.

 

Yes. That's one of the things making the discussion more complicated than it actually is. People are processing it through irrelevant political filters.

 

I think this stuff is better understood through historical examples, but that doesn't work when people don't know much history. Or anthropology, for that matter.

 

Than again... Looking at it through Moorcock doesn't really help either. After all, both the Dark Empire in the Hawkmoon books and the Melnibonean empire in the Elric ones were highly organised and structured states who were under the patronage of Chaos. (Explicitly in the Melnibonean case, implicitly in the Granbretanian one.)

 

Actually, we're kind of sunk. There's no real way we can come up with truly satisfactory interpretations of Law and Chaos. Then again, we can demonstrate that they are distinct from Good and Evil, which is the main point.

 

A "Chaotic" (low-structure) society is viable, stable and may be "less Evil" than a more organised "Lawful" counterpart. This is demonstrable from historical equivalents. The early Germans versus the Romans is a good example. Then again, the early Germans would occasionally engage in mass migrations of the "invading barbarian horde" type, which probably fits the definition of "Evil", at least from the Roman viewpoint. (Example: the invasions of the Teutones and Cimbri.

 

But this doesn't really scale down to an individual personality, does it?

[David Johnston]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

Yes. That's one of the things making the discussion more complicated than it actually is. People are processing it through irrelevant political filters.

 

I think this stuff is better understood through historical examples, but that doesn't work when people don't know much history. Or anthropology, for that matter.

 

Than again... Looking at it through Moorcock doesn't really help either. After all, both the Dark Empire in the Hawkmoon books and the Melnibonean empire in the Elric ones were highly organised and structured states who were under the patronage of Chaos. (Explicitly in the Melnibonean case, implicitly in the Granbretanian one.)

 

Ah...not so much. Melnibone called itself an empire and at one time it supposedly was, but by Elric's time it was a single mostly depopulated city surrounded by wilderness and ruled by an upperclass of whimsical and tyrannical slavemasters. There's no hint of any actual laws, although they do have some rather intricate manners. The only other Melnibonean city we are told of has already wiped itself out in civil war. The Stormbringer RPG claims that turning to a closer relationship to Chaos for greater power was both a symptom and a cause of the Empire's decline.

 

I can't really remember too much about the administration of Granbretan, but then I'm not sure they have anything to do with Chaos anyway. They're just rotten. That series was the closest Moorcock ever got to a fight between good guys and bad guys. Note by the way, that the Stormbringer RPG assumes that Law like technology better and Chaos likes "magic" better, magic in this case mostly consisting of summoning "demons" to do your will. By their standards Granbretan would have probably swung Law-wards.

[AnotherSkip]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

the problem with D&D Alignment is some people think that it is Total Psy lim others think that it is Ego roll at -5 and others think that it is a slight.

 

Part of the problem is the thing about charting a players alignment. the more time you spend looking at something the worse it looks.

[Robyn]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

There's no hint of any actual laws' date=' although they do have some rather intricate manners.[/quote']

 

The elves in Orkworld have no actual laws.

 

Elven society has no laws. None.

 

Instead, a balance of power exists through Chaos (silly, I know, but read on), where it's not necessarily that you've attacked someone else's ally, but that they are no longer able to pretend that you can be trusted.

 

But there are no laws against murder, so if you can get away with it, go ahead.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

I wrote out a lost reply and tried to submit it, but when I clicked "submit," something decided that I was no longer logged in (even though I would have had to be to even write a reply in the first place), so my post was lost. I will look upon this as a blessing in disguise and post a more concise reply instead.

 

...provided of course that your society is small and close-knit enough that everyone knows everyone else as an individual. It doesn't work so well in a large city which is exactly why the first codified systems of justice coincide with the rise of the first cities large enough that most of the people were strangers to each other and the populations were large enough that even a small proportion of misbehavers would turn into a large number of misbehavers.

I think we're in complete agreement here. Such communities can work quite well "chaotically."

 

Unless they do, which they will when their respective organisations come into conflict. It's less likely but not impossible.

I may not have been clear here. I didn't say that Lawful societies *never* fight with each other, just that, being lawful, they can have a pre-arranged system (like a treaty) to deal with their differences peacefully.

 

No it isn't. "Good" by the D&D definition will tell you not to take advantage of your higher position on the totem pole to cause pain and suffering. But it doesn't say that your position is up for grabs to someone smarter or more popular.

That has nothing to do with what I was talking about. Robyn gave a good example.

 

Y'know, I already gave my definitions of Chaotic.

Yes, you did. Silly me, I forgot how we got started on this subject in the first place. I guess that really is the main source of out disagreement: To me, the values of freedom and egalitarianism have nothing to do with the Law/Chaos axis, and having a low boredom threshold is a personality trait having nothing to do with alignment.

 

But physical might has nothing to do with competence in other areas of leadership. There's a lot more to government than war.

Actually, not a lot more in a Chaotic society. For a minarchist, government is there to protect the people from violence, death and the loss of freedom and nothing else, and that's closest to the position of a Chaotic Good character.

What about disputes between individuals? Community-wide calamities? Investigation of crime? Defense of the accused? etc. True, a chaotic leader can choose to ignore all these issues, but then he really hasn't displayed any competence other than physical might.

 

They might just as easily not have any such respect for those people. A lawful society on the other hand, establishes what respect is due to whom.

Or not. Depends on the laws.

I've never heard of any lawful society that didn't.

 

It's up to the GM to decide how adjudicate his own biases towards Good or Lawfulness.

 

What that means is, you are as free to decide that Chaos is wrong as you are to decide that Evil (or Good) is wrong.

OK. I don't see what that has to do with anything we were talking about. I certainly haven't made any such decision. I'm not sure why you would think that I had. It seems some people on this thread are making some unfounded assumptions about me.

 

I didn't say they were. If, as you claim, the Gauls had more freedom (assuming we mean the same thing by that term), then at least in that one respect, the Gauls were more Good than the Romans.

No, they weren't. They were just less organised. They didn't have more freedom because of their benevolent concern for their fellow man. They had more freedom because they would refuse to accept the degree of regulation for themselves that the Romans positively admired.

I guess we really do have different definitions of "freedom" as well. I'm not an expert on the Gauls, so I'm taking your word for it. You said they had more freedom than the Romans. By that, did you simply mean they were less organized? To me, those aren't the same thing.

 

To me, alignments are about actions, not emotions.

To the game, alignments are about attitudes, not actions.

To *your* game, perhaps. I guess this is another main source of disagreement.

 

Paladins and chaotic evil marauders both kill. The LG Paladin may actually rack up a faster death toll than the CE guy but he remains LG as long as he's killing for the right reasons. While actions may make it clear that your attitude is not in fact consistent with your supposed alignment, it is in fact your attitude, and not your actions that alignment measures. The "purity of your soul" or lack of same, so to speak.

"Killing" is not a complete enough description of these actions. One kills innocent people, decreasing the amount of goodness in the world. One kills evil people, decreasing the amount of evil in the world. Attitude isn't what matters. To use a classic (and admittedly obvious) example, Hitler had a "good" attitude. He beleived he was improving the state of the world by removing undesirable elements from it. Yet he was clearly evil, because his actions were evil. (I hope we can at least agree on that!)

 

They can't hate it that much if they do it on a regular basis.[/Quote]

That strikes me as a rather bizarre statement. I hate going to the dentist, but I still go on a regular basis. Lots of people hate their jobs, but they still go five (or more) days a week.

 

All he's doing is stealing. A Chaotic Evil Robin Hood would probably be murdering the men and raping the women.

So you don't consider stealing to be an evil act? Sure, if he were also raping and murdering, he'd be even more evil. But stealing is already evil enough.

 

How is capturing a thief evil?[/Quote]

It isn't. But oppressing the poor is.

 

More like politics. Would you characterise either Republicans or Democrats as really evil? You might if you were a really rabid partisan (just as Lawful person would so characterise a Chaotic or vice versa), but they aren't. That doesn't mean the differences between them don't matter.

I'm not arguing, I'm just asking. As I said, I haven't read either Moorcock or Amber. So what actually is the difference, in those works, between Law and Chaos? You haven't yet given any examples of what those differences are other than it seems Chaotic folks prefer to live in small close-kint societies where everyone knows each other and they have little or no contact with outsiders, and Lawful folks want to have big cities and nations where not everyone knows each other and they can interact with other cities/nations. Is that it?

 

Having a side IS alignment. That's what the word means.

No it doesn't. "Yankee fan" and "Dodgers fan" are not alignments, yet people definitely take sides.

 

So the world becomes less comfortable and less survivable if "Chaos" wins.

For you, probably.

Oh, so I was meant to take your comment personally? What I want to know is: what happens if the Chaos side wins, in absolute terms, regardless of what you assume I personally think about it. And likewise, what happens if the lawful side wins.

 

Only as long as you ignore that the Amberites winning makes life less comfortable and more dangerous for other kinds of creatures, more chaotic creatures than you. And who knows, maybe you will learn self-mutation if your universe becomes more chaotic. That's one of the things the Chaos side offers you if they win. It's just that you might die learning how.

Well, maybe that's one slight hint. What is "self-mutation"? What about the Amberites winning makes the world more dangerous for the chaotics? What magic powers do the people get if they win?

 

And you also seem to be saying that either side's quality of life improves if they win, so again, it's totally arbitrary.

No more than Liberal versus Conservative. It all depends on the kind of world you want to live in.

No. Liberal and conservative both mean something specific. I look at both sides and choose the one that more closely matches my values. But just benefitting from being on the winning side doesn't tell me anything about what that side actually means. What is the actual "kind of world" that will be created by each side winning? I'm not arguing, I'm just asking. And keep the personal comments to yourself. They don't help this discussion.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

Physical force is one type of power' date=' but [i']economic[/i] power can also factor into how "strong" someone is. If you produce something valuable (like food: everyone needs to eat!), especially something that noone else can, you (may) have the power to withhold it from others, and that is a power all your own! It may not be the power to harm or kill other people, but even without such ability (directly or by proxy of "authority"), one can be "in power".

So? My definition does not preclude ecomonic or any other kind of power.

 

First there's Lawful: he follows a personal code (if he deviates from it, well, the Dark Side isn't known for mercy), strives to maintain order (by crushing the rebels who would dare seed dissent in the name of revolution!), and wants to spread it further. Then there's Good: not greedy or selfish at all, his first loyalty is to the Empire but that's not his only loyalty; he also loves his son and doesn't seem entirely happy with bringing Luke before the Emperor.

I agree that he's lawful, but it's not about a personal code. To me, Lawful is more about a societal code. But the fact that he murders people and is an integral part of a regime that oppresses and murders people makes him evil. I don't know why you think he isn't greedy or selfish. He's quite obviously greedy for power, that's why he turned to the dark side in the first place. But even aside from that, one's internal motivations (greedy or not, selfish or not) doesn't make one good or evil. Actions, not emotions. Loyalty doesn't make you good either. It depends on what you're loyal to. If you're loyalty is to an evil cause, you're evil.

 

Some time ago, in India, a village made up a story about how their ancestor was royalty. They couldn't change their caste, but they did change the rank of their caste. Not by much, and such shifts are certainly rare, but since a caste system seems like a very Lawful society, I thought it deserved mention.

A fine example.

 

On the other hand, a Lawful society doesn't force people to have respect. Come to think of it, in a Lawful society, people might still respect someone, even when such respect hasn't been formally established as due.

Irrelevent. Actions, not emotions. A lawful society establishes what respect is due to various persons. Whether people feel that respect in their hearts isn't what's important.

 

So if you were playing a paladin, you'd essentially be a pacifist? (Can't slaughter those orcs, even if they are evil, even if your church ordered you to do it; that would be murder, just like Darth Vader did to those rebels.)

Huh? I don't see the logic behind this, nor the need for making personal assumptions about me.

 

Careful - but for that "probably", you're falling into the habit of doing exactly what Phil did, stereotyping alignments without regard to their personal interest.

I'm not "stereotyping" alignments. I'm trying to find the definitions for them. And who's personal interest are you talking about? Fictitious characters in games and fiction? I'm sorry if I've offended Robin Hood, or Darth Vader or your D&D character.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

No. Because WITH laws, you can only keep what you can protect by physical force.

 

There are people who would happily knock you in the head and take away what’s yours, but they are inhibited from doing so by the existence of a numerous and organized police force that would arrest them and a system of courts that would forcefully deprive them of their freedom.

 

Remember, at the heart of the words law enforcement is the word “force.”

That was my point. In a lawful society, there are lawful authorities in place so you don't have to supply all the physical force yourself. The difference is what *you* have to protect, vs what the society, through the lawful authorities it establishes, protects.

 

It is not in any way, shape, or form the case the Law and Law do not fight. If your rules and binding agreements compel you to fight, then if you are Lawful, you will fight.

I didn't mean to imply otherwise. See my earlier post. However, it is precisely the existance of those lawful rules and binding agreements which can be used to prevent fighting in many cases. Chaotic societies, lacking these rules and agreements, don't have that recourse.

 

Chaos and Chaos may fight, but it is not mandatory. At the very least, there is never a rule compelling them to do so.

Nor is there a rule preventing (or even discouraging) them from doing so.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

Another contradiction: if someone has power' date=' isn't it Chaotic to [i']use[/i] it? At least, in a consistent manner?

How does that follow?

 

The truly Chaotic warlord would alternate between seizing power and giving it all away to charity.

No, that would be a Neurotic warlord.

 

Only a Lawful warlord would use force to dictate how other people should behave

No, that would be an Evil warlord.

 

Instead, a balance of power exists through Chaos (silly, I know, but read on), where it's not necessarily that you've attacked someone else's ally, but that they are no longer able to pretend that you can be trusted.

Not silly at all, just improbable. But perfectly possible, especially in a fantasy setting. It could work, it makes sense within certain assumptions that an author or GM might have for his mileu. In theory, it could even work in the real world, though it never has, and probably never will.

[Robyn]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

I wrote out a lost reply and tried to submit it' date=' but when I clicked "submit," something decided that I was no longer logged in (even though I would have had to be to even write a reply in the first place), so my post was lost. I will look upon this as a blessing in disguise and post a more concise reply instead.[/quote']

 

There was a length of time recently in which I frequently failed to connect to the server. This would happen even when I was attempting to post replies, with the result that my typing was lost. I resorted to saving my post just before sending it, and retreating to paste it and try again if I had to.

 

What I learned in the process was that I only have one Clipboard, and I had to exercise patience when posting so I didn't replace the long post with the short post while still waiting for the long post to load so I could confirm that it had

 

I guess that really is the main source of out disagreement: To me, the values of freedom and egalitarianism have nothing to do with the Law/Chaos axis, and having a low boredom threshold is a personality trait having nothing to do with alignment.

 

I'm preparing my own definition for your perusal. In the meantime, I'd like some additional clarification as to yours:

 

Lawful (individual) = one who is especially in favor of a lawful society.

Chaotic (individual) = one who is especially in favor of a chaotic society.

 

I took "in favor of" to mean "actively supports", because that was consistent with what you had been saying before, but perhaps that's why you felt clarification was needed. It is possible to be in favor of a society other than the one you are living in, but support the one you are living in because you recognize that your own life would fall apart if you tried to "go against the current", as it were.

 

What about disputes between individuals? Community-wide calamities? Investigation of crime? Defense of the accused? etc. True' date=' a chaotic leader can choose to ignore all these issues, but then he really hasn't displayed any competence other than physical might.[/quote']

 

Does he really need to?

 

In a "truly free-market economy" such as idealized by Objectivism, each of these would be taken care of by a specialized private company, all of which would be subject to competition if they were unfair or incompetent (lacking any laws to lock out new competitors in an artificial monopoly), and none of which would be afraid of competitors "shouldering" them out of the market through brute force (which the chaotic leader would enforce).

 

It's up to the GM to decide how adjudicate his own biases towards Good or Lawfulness.

 

What that means is, you are as free to decide that Chaos is wrong as you are to decide that Evil (or Good) is wrong.

OK. I don't see what that has to do with anything we were talking about. I certainly haven't made any such decision. I'm not sure why you would think that I had. It seems some people on this thread are making some unfounded assumptions about me.

 

You have made some assumptions of your own about Chaos - the problem is that these assumptions are founded in Law.

 

But if Chaos followed the principles of Law, it wouldn't be Chaos.

 

So you don't consider stealing to be an evil act? Sure, if he were also raping and murdering, he'd be even more evil. But stealing is already evil enough.

 

So, if someone steals money, it then rightfully belongs to them? Anyone who tries to take it back is now the thief, and can be punished as such?

 

Robin Hood believed that the taxes were unfair; they essentially constituted of stealing from the poor. He pursued justice in taking that money away from the tax collectors.

 

It isn't. But oppressing the poor is.

 

If the sheriff saw the poor as deserving their lot in life, he might not see what he did as oppression.

 

Additionally, didn't the Church teach a rather ascetic "hardship strengthens the soul, temptation leads to damnation" morality then? If the poor sheriff really fell for that line (and who wouldn't, seeing the rewards of wallowing in sin so that no one else would have to?), he might actually believe that he was doing the peasants a favor. To preserve their souls for heaven would be the ultimate grace, an act of Good.

 

No it doesn't. "Yankee fan" and "Dodgers fan" are not alignments, yet people definitely take sides.

 

Or perhaps these alignments are simply not very meaningful? I tend to lean towards your view of this, but then, isn't the heart of our discourse that we disagree on which alignments are "meaningful"?

 

Irrelevent. Actions' date=' not emotions. A lawful society establishes what respect is due to various persons. Whether people feel that respect in their hearts isn't what's important.[/quote']

 

I was speaking about actions, not emotions. A society of Law may rule that you should bow to the king; this doesn't mean you will (and if you don't, you may get in trouble, but if lots of people don't, it may be the king who's in trouble). Furthermore, you may bow to someone even though there's no law saying you have to!

 

So, while a Lawful society may establish what respect is due, it doesn't necessarily do very much about ensuring that respect (cue the guards to come out and whack the condemned prisoner in the back of the knees, forcing him to "kneel").

 

Huh? I don't see the logic behind this, nor the need for making personal assumptions about me.

 

Are you just debating the theory of this, with no relation to your personal beliefs, or inclination to - as the saying goes - "practice what you preach"?

 

You said it yourself: the "Nuremburg defense", or "I was just following orders!", is no excuse for evil. Deliberately setting out to cold-bloodedly murder someone (or several someones!) is evil; or would you disagree?

 

Perhaps you would disagree. They are, after all, orcs; creatures inherently evil! Besides, it is your holy duty as a paladin to seek out and destroy evil.

 

As you said in your last post - "One kills evil people, decreasing the amount of evil in the world."

 

I'm not "stereotyping" alignments. I'm trying to find the definitions for them. And who's personal interest are you talking about? Fictitious characters in games and fiction? I'm sorry if I've offended Robin Hood, or Darth Vader or your D&D character.

 

See above for "defining Chaos according to the preconceptions of Law". My caution to David was about the "slippery slope" fallacy; just because Robin Hood stole, didn't mean he would support rape and murder as well!

 

David pointed out that it would be necessary to support the "Chaotic Evil band of Merry Men", who would insist on the rape; and that murder would be easiest for them. I'm still doubtful, though:

• Just because their leader is Chaotic Evil, doesn't mean (all) the followers are. Aside from Neutral, there could be Chaotic Good people following him because they believe that Law/Chaos supersedes Good/Evil; it is best, for society, to throw their lot in with the Evil so as to overthrow the sheriff and his Lawful lackeys.
  
• By adding people, the chances that at least one of them will be motivated to rape would be increased, but you'd need many to overcome any opposition (disapproval) from the Good followers.
  
• They were called the Merry "Men", but back then peasant females were encouraged to dress as androgenously as possible, so that nobility passing by did not see them and take them. It is entirely possible that females would be counted among these followers, and they might perceive it as being in their own best interest to discourage rape (lest they be subject to it themselves).

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

I took "in favor of" to mean "actively supports"' date=' because that was consistent with what you had been saying before, but perhaps that's why you felt clarification was needed. It is [i']possible[/i] to be in favor of a society other than the one you are living in, but support the one you are living in because you recognize that your own life would fall apart if you tried to "go against the current", as it were.

Yes. It usually doesn't serve one's own alignment or ideals to get killed/imprisoned opposing a society that doesn't share them. Which reminds me of another point: That one's alignment can change quite suddenly when the social structure around him changes. for example, a LG person in an LG society is perfectly happy, but if the society is corrupted from within its lawful structure, thus becoming LE, the LG citizen might suddenly find himself in strong opposition to the Law, making him CG. This might be sort of like the Robin Hood case.

 

Does he really need to?

Of course not. That was my point.

 

You have made some assumptions of your own about Chaos - the problem is that these assumptions are founded in Law.

 

But if Chaos followed the principles of Law, it wouldn't be Chaos.

I still don't understand what you mean by this. I've provided my definition of Chaos, which you are free to disagree with. But what assumption am I making exactly? What principle of Law am I assuming Chaos follows?

 

So, if someone steals money, it then rightfully belongs to them? Anyone who tries to take it back is now the thief, and can be punished as such?

 

Robin Hood believed that the taxes were unfair; they essentially constituted of stealing from the poor. He pursued justice in taking that money away from the tax collectors.

I think you've missed what was said. I was responding to David's alternate hypothetical Robin Hood who steals for his own profit.

 

If the sheriff saw the poor as deserving their lot in life, he might not see what he did as oppression.

It doesn't matter what he sees it as. If he's actively contributing to their oppression (which he was), that's evil.

 

Additionally, didn't the Church teach ... If the poor sheriff really fell for that line ... he might actually believe that he was doing the peasants a favor.

It doesn't matter what you believe, or what you were taught. To go back to what I've always considered the most obvious example. Hitler believe the Jews deserved to die. He believed he was doing good by eliminating them. Distinguishing Good from Evil is not always easy. Many teach Evil, and call it Good. You have to watch out for that.

 

Or perhaps these alignments are simply not very meaningful?

If they're not meaningful, then why call them "alignments"?

 

I was speaking about actions, not emotions. A society of Law may rule that you should bow to the king; this doesn't mean you will

So what? Lawful societies have all sorts of laws that get broken. The existence of lawbreakers within the society doesn't render the society non-lawful. I would have thought that was obvious.

 

Are you just debating the theory of this, with no relation to your personal beliefs, or inclination to - as the saying goes - "practice what you preach"?

Just to be clear: I am neither a Paladin, nor a Chaotic Evil Marauder. I am not "preaching" anything. I am not trying to tell anyone how to be a paladin or a marauder. I wouldn't even say that I'm debating theory. I'm just trying to arrive at some meaningful definitions.

 

You said it yourself: the "Nuremburg defense", or "I was just following orders!", is no excuse for evil. Deliberately setting out to cold-bloodedly murder someone (or several someones!) is evil; or would you disagree?

Yes, of course. But that isn't the example you gave. If you're at war with evil orcs, or if you're simply trying to remove the threat that evil orcs pose, killing them is not murder. Please let's not get onto yet another tangent about whether orcs are "inherently" evil. We've done that before.

[Robyn]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

Of course not. That was my point.

 

It was also David's - "government is there to protect the people from violence, death and the loss of freedom and nothing else". Since this position is legitimate in a Chaotic society, your point can't be reserved for Law alone.

 

I still don't understand what you mean by this. I've provided my definition of Chaos, which you are free to disagree with. But what assumption am I making exactly? What principle of Law am I assuming Chaos follows?

 

You might want to look back at your arguments thus far, a lot of which use "but Chaotic would . . . " assumptions, and very narrowly at that. I'll delve into this more deeply later tonight, but essentially, you are defining Chaos as the opposite of Law; only a Lawful society would always be "Chaotic", true Chaos by nature would not be limited to "must".

 

I think you've missed what was said. I was responding to David's alternate hypothetical Robin Hood who steals for his own profit.

 

David argued that Chaotic Good would be the proper alignment; you were the only one who argued for evil.

 

So, my question remains - if stealing is evil, does it not matter that the "victim" of a theft only possessed that property because they stole it from the rightful owners? Did their theft make them the rightful owners?

 

It doesn't matter what he sees it as. If he's actively contributing to their oppression (which he was), that's evil.

 

To use a modern example - Political Correctness: if I believe that you are oppressing me, is it still oppression? Is there an objective measurement of such things? If that "objective" measurement is backed up by your opinion, what makes your opinion any more qualified than mine?

 

We're getting dangerously close to subjectivist ethics here.

 

If they're not meaningful, then why call them "alignments"?

 

In other words, if you don't feel that they are - or should be - important, have them disqualified?

 

Again, we're but a short step here from subjectivist ethics.

 

So what?

 

So - your comparison to a Chaotic society weakens.

 

Just to be clear: I am neither a Paladin, nor a Chaotic Evil Marauder. I am not "preaching" anything. I am not trying to tell anyone how to be a paladin or a marauder. I wouldn't even say that I'm debating theory.

 

Would you agree, then, that - when playing one yourself - only your beliefs about Good and Evil, about Law and Chaos, would be relevant?

 

If you are not arguing merely in theory, then commit to your beliefs - not just a hypothetical situation where you will accept what is necessary for the sake of argument, but a realistic situation where your beliefs alone are applicable, and they are needed to determine what will happen: you are playing a character. It is your character. How would you play its alignment?

 

Yes, of course. But that isn't the example you gave. If you're at war with evil orcs, or if you're simply trying to remove the threat that evil orcs pose, killing them is not murder.

 

Emphasis mine. You're going in circles now - they "are" evil, however that was determined, therefore killing them isn't. In much the same way, Darth Vader was not evil when killing the rebels, because they were demonstratably Chaotic; they were seeking to overthrow the established order.

 

I could probably make a good case for the rebels being Evil, too. Detonating the Death Star - did they make any effort to prevent civilian casualties before doing that? Or was it "necessary"? The ends justify the means? You can't make an omulet without breaking a few eggs? Smaller evils are outweighed when counted against the greater good?

[Robyn]

Definitions, stereotypes, and propaganda

 

Law:

 

Definition:

A = A. This is the Law of Identity: everything has a singular nature, which always determines its qualities. A rock is never a sponge or an elephant; it is only itself. A rock does not float on the breeze, nor does it grow when exposed to sunlight. A rock has a very high MTBF; it does not fail to be a rock.

 

From a metaphysical perspective, Law is about consistency. From a personal perspective, Law is about integrity. From a social perspective, Law is about everyone obeying the same rules.

 

Stereotypes:

Inflexible. Emotionless. Cold and logical. Robotic.

 

Those who follow Law have given up their free will; they achieve integrity not through discipline, continually choosing the same thing, but through an inability to make any undesirable choice. Their nature binds them, restricts them.

 

Propaganda:

A = A. All things, even Chaos, must have a singular nature; therefore, Chaotic systems and individuals will inevitably follow certain patterns. Only their own lack of intelligence prevents them from seeing the beautiful complexity of their behaviors; they only call it Chaos, and only because they do not realize that no such thing can exist. Remember: A equals A.

 

Chaos:

 

Definition:

Quantum mechanics and the Uncertainty principle. Statistics and probability; flipping a coin that lands tails-up does not influence what the next flip will be, one way or another. Actualizing a single moment of potential does not dictate the outcome of all future waveform states.

 

From a metaphysical perspective, Chaos is about randomness. From a personal perspective, Chaos is about free will. From a social perspective, Chaos is about change.

 

Stereotypes:

Unpredictable, unreliable, untrustworthy. Insane.

 

Those who follow Chaos are unable to pursue any sort of long-term plans; they change their minds partway through. They are irresponsible, escaping obligations the same way.

 

Propaganda:

So-called "patterns" are illusions, straws grasped at by minds too feeble to get by without such crutches. The string "11111111" is just as likely as "10101010"; both are equally significant, equally meaningless for predicting the ninth binary value.

 

Good & Evil will be tackled tomorrow, I need to sleep again.

[David Johnston]

Re: Alignment Issues

 

Quote:

Y'know, I already gave my definitions of Chaotic.

Yes, you did. Silly me, I forgot how we got started on this subject in the first place. I guess that really is the main source of out disagreement: To me, the values of freedom and egalitarianism have nothing to do with the Law/Chaos axis, and having a low boredom threshold is a personality trait having nothing to do with alignment.

 

But weren't you having trouble figuring out what did have something to do with the law/chaos axis?

r.

Actually, not a lot more in a Chaotic society. For a minarchist, government is there to protect the people from violence, death and the loss of freedom and nothing else, and that's closest to the position of a Chaotic Good character.

What about disputes between individuals?

 

What about them? They weren't generally settled by the war leader, but by the eldest person, or a council of the elderly, or the religious leader.

Community-wide calamities?

 

One of the advantages of not having a highly organised logistical framework is that while you can't support as large a population, when calamity happens, it's much easier to rebuild.

Investigation of crime?

 

In close-knit communities where everyone knows everyone well, finding out who did what isn't very difficult.

Defense of the accused? etc.

 

The accused can speak up for himself.

That's not to say that a Chaotic structure will necessarily handle every problem well. It won't. Sometimes that means that people who are Chaotically inclined will make compromises with reality, particularly when survival is at stake. But a lot of the things a Lawful person would see as necessary to run a society properly, a Chaotic person would regard as superfluous

 

Quote:

They might just as easily not have any such respect for those people. A lawful society on the other hand, establishes what respect is due to whom.

Or not. Depends on the laws.

I've never heard of any lawful society that didn't.

 

What I meant was, that there were plenty of laws that positively mandated a lack of respect.

Quote:

It's up to the GM to decide how adjudicate his own biases towards Good or Lawfulness.

 

What that means is, you are as free to decide that Chaos is wrong as you are to decide that Evil (or Good) is wrong.

OK. I don't see what that has to do with anything we were talking about. I certainly haven't made any such decision.

 

Isn't this discussion about how to adjudicate an alignment system modelled on that of D&D?

Quote:

I didn't say they were. If, as you claim, the Gauls had more freedom (assuming we mean the same thing by that term), then at least in that one respect, the Gauls were more Good than the Romans.

No, they weren't. They were just less organised. They didn't have more freedom because of their benevolent concern for their fellow man. They had more freedom because they would refuse to accept the degree of regulation for themselves that the Romans positively admired.

I guess we really do have different definitions of "freedom" as well. I'm not an expert on the Gauls, so I'm taking your word for it. You said they had more freedom than the Romans. By that, did you simply mean they were less organized? To me, those aren't the same thing.

 

No I mean they were less restricted because they were less organised.

Quote:

To me, alignments are about actions, not emotions.

To the game, alignments are about attitudes, not actions.

To *your* game, perhaps.

 

Actually I was speaking of D&D. However if alignment doesn't represent something about the character above and beyond what they happen to be doing at a particular moment, then of course alignment doesn't really matter.

Quote:

Paladins and chaotic evil marauders both kill. The LG Paladin may actually rack up a faster death toll than the CE guy but he remains LG as long as he's killing for the right reasons. While actions may make it clear that your attitude is not in fact consistent with your supposed alignment, it is in fact your attitude, and not your actions that alignment measures. The "purity of your soul" or lack of same, so to speak.

"Killing" is not a complete enough description of these actions. One kills innocent people, decreasing the amount of goodness in the world. One kills evil people, decreasing the amount of evil in the

world. Attitude isn't what matters.

 

If attitude doesn't matter, on basis can you characterise anyone as "evil" if they aren't doing anything bad at this moment?

To use a classic (and admittedly obvious) example, Hitler had a "good" attitude.

 

No, he really didn't. Hitler was driven by hatred and envy and didn't care who he hurt to get what he wanted.

Quote:

They can't hate it that much if they do it on a regular basis.

That strikes me as a rather bizarre statement. I hate going to the dentist, but I still go on a regular basis.

 

So obviously you don't hate it that much. You consider it worth doing even if it is unpleasant while you are doing it. What I was talking about was someone who, say, faced with filling out a form in order to be allowed to drive a car, would instead crumple up the form, toss it away and drive anyway.

Quote:

All he's doing is stealing. A Chaotic Evil Robin Hood would probably be murdering the men and raping the women.

So you don't consider stealing to be an evil act?

 

No, not really. It's not a very nice thing to do, but evil as I see it, is a good deal more than just "not very nice". More importantly in this context, however, is that it doesn't (generally) match the criteria for the Evil alignment.

Quote:

More like politics. Would you characterise either Republicans or Democrats as really evil? You might if you were a really rabid partisan (just as Lawful person would so characterise a Chaotic or vice versa), but they aren't. That doesn't mean the differences between them don't matter.

I'm not arguing, I'm just asking. As I said, I haven't read either Moorcock or Amber. So what actually is the difference, in those works, between Law and Chaos?

 

In Moorcock's Elric, Law were a bunch of rigid and humourless stiffs who opposed change and wanted to establish a permanent status quo from which would ever change. Chaos were self indulgent sybarites who lived for pleasure, power and novelty. I could of course phrase both of those definitions much more kindly, but since the Elric series is very cynical, I don't see a reason to.

 

In Zelazny's Amber they were fighting over the fundamental laws of the universe. "Pattern" wanted reality to be stable and immutable. "Chaos" wanted reality to be exciting and mutable.

 

You haven't yet given any examples of what those differences are other than it seems Chaotic folks prefer to live in small close-kint societies

 

By and large that's the pattern I'd expect a stable Chaotic Good society to take but Chaotics who weren't so good could just as easily form a gigantic marauding barbarian horde. And of course a Chaotic of any persuasion could and would live in a predominantly Lawful society. He could be a criminal, a revolutionary, an agitator for greater civil liberties, or he could just be someone who lived on the fringes of socity not bothering to participate. The "small close-knit community" I mentioned was just a way to make a Chaotic society work without being oppressive.

Quote:

Having a side IS alignment. That's what the word means.

No it doesn't. "Yankee fan" and "Dodgers fan" are not alignments, yet people definitely take sides.

 

Yes and no. In the game sense, they are not alignments because there are no "Detect Yankee fan" spells and no magic bats that burn the hands of Dodgers fans, unless you are playing a very bizarre game. But if there were, then those would be alignments.

Quote:

So the world becomes less comfortable and less survivable if "Chaos" wins.

For you, probably.

Oh, so I was meant to take your comment personally?

 

No, really I mean humanity in general. You, me, people like us.

What I want to know is: what happens if the Chaos side wins, in absolute terms, regardless of what you assume I personally think about it.

 

In that particular fictional universe, what would happen is that natural laws would become more like suggestions. Gravity might reverse itself in places, life forms would turn into other stranger things, lead might turn to gold or vice versa, the same walk over the same route at the same speed might take varying times. This could happen spontaneously, or, if you had a strong enough will, you might be able to make it happen for you under your control. (Ie. you would be able to do "magic"). How extreme this effect gets depends on how much extra influence Chaos gets.

And likewise, what happens if the lawful side wins.

 

Simply put, everything behaves more consistently. "Magic" stops working.

Quote:

Only as long as you ignore that the Amberites winning makes life less comfortable and more dangerous for other kinds of creatures, more chaotic creatures than you. And who knows, maybe you will learn self-mutation if your universe becomes more chaotic. That's one of the things the Chaos side offers you if they win. It's just that you might die learning how.

Well, maybe that's one slight hint. What is "self-mutation"?

 

Shapeshifting.

What about the Amberites winning makes the world more dangerous for the chaotics?

 

They'd lose their powers and might end up trapped in a form that was no longer viable.

[Lucius]

Godwin's Law, or is that Godwin's Chaos?

 

While I don't want to bring a real-world political debate into this thread' date=' I do think that a couple of real-world concepts are being expressed in some posts -- there seems to be an undercurrent of "libertarian" (chaos) vs "statist" (law) in those posts.[/quote']

 

 

Yes. That's one of the things making the discussion more complicated than it actually is. People are processing it through irrelevant political filters. .

 

Irrelevant?

 

 

I wrote out a lost reply and tried to submit it, but when I clicked "submit," something decided that I was no longer logged in (even though I would have had to be to even write a reply in the first place), so my post was lost. I will look upon this as a blessing in disguise and post a more concise reply instead.

 

Two hints.

 

I hit “quote” then copy and paste over to a WORD document. Sometimes (like this time) several times so I can quote several people. I compose in Word, then copy and hit “reply” and paste it all at once.

 

If I am just working on the site and lose my reply as you did, I log in then hit the “back” button a few times. This takes me back to my “lost” post and this time, when I hit “submit” it goes through because I just logged in.

 

 

Hitler had a "good" attitude.

 

Well, so much for this conversation. It’s over now.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary asks Mr. Fleischmann: “Can we quote you on that? Oh, pardon us, we just did.”

[Markdoc]

Re: Godwin's Law, or is that Godwin's Chaos?

 

Irrelevant?

 

Irrelevant in that people seem to be confusing "law" - meaning a system of judicial rules, with "law" as it is used in the Moorcock stories (which is where Gygax lifted the concept from) which refers to the state of the universe.

 

The two are only peripherally related and in their extreme forms either is inimical to humans - the two big "Law vs Chaos" story arcs ended with the Champion of Law (Corum) betraying the cause of law to opt for balance and the champion of Chaos (Elric) betraying Chaos - opting for Law, and ending up with balance anyway.

 

The more metaphysical meaning of law in that setting only has meaning in the sense of alignment in that the "Gods of Law" promote an unchanging universe with rigid, absolute natural laws. Societies and people are "lawful" only inasmuch as they try to resist the tendency of the universe towards entropy (in other words they work towards maintaining a stable society). In that regard, *most* societies are to some extent lawful.

 

That, at least, is always how I understood and ran it. Han Solo is Chaotic Neutral (later changing alignment to Chaotic good) - he's perfectly happy making a living by illegal means and could care a big fat zero about the shape of society. Luke Skywalker is Lawful Good - he's a rebel, but not by choice - he wishes to restore the old society, because he thinks it's "gooder" - but he doesn't wish to tear society down and build a new even more just (even more "good") society.

 

Same with Robin Hood. He's not chaotic because he breaks the law. In fact, he's perfectly Lawful - he opposes the Sheriff of Nottingham because the Sheriff's stealing tax money, supporting the usurping John, and is generally evil, plus the Sheriff wants to boink the Lady Marian, not because he's chaotic. As soon as the rightful king turns up, Robin Hood immediately bends the knee, turns over his loot and cheerfully consigns half the merry men to death in battle in support of the returned king. In the Hollywood version, you can bet he moves back into Locksley hall and takes an official position, afterwards, too. (In the original version, he dies and the Sheriff's side wins, but that's another story)

 

Admittedly, I don't use alignment for players any more - I prefer a few good juicy psych lim.s.

 

I do however still use it for the multiverse. It has two axes - past/future and Law/Chaos. As you move law-wards through the multiverse, physical laws change and become more consistent - at the extreme you reach a steady-state universe, where matter is evenly distributed across infinate space - meaning there's a universe mostly empty apart from the very, very occasional mote of dust. Probbality doesn't exist because nothing ever changes. At the other end, you have a universe, where the most unlikley events can occur. Probablity is meaningless - a baby universe could burst into being in your living room - if there were beings there who could have living rooms - changing the current one and its physical laws at any point. Indeed, that's essentially happening continuously. Along that axis, the physical univers becomes ever more mutable, so that magic becomes both possible and then ever more powerful. Technology operates in the opposite direction.

 

Along the time axis, time proceeds - although at what speed and how flexible causuality is depends on how far along the law/chaos axis you are. The time axis actually loops back on itself and since in both the universe of total law and that of total chaos, there is essentially not-time, you can view the resulting time/order graph as two opposed asymptotic graphs touching at their infinately distant and infinately small ends. That infinately small period of time is the life span of your hypothetical universe from big bang to collapse back into a big crunch - which moving down the time axis is the same process in reverse.

 

I sound likethe TimeCube guy without the CAPITALIZATIONS don't I?

 

I do however find it useful for visualising my game universe to deal with dimension/time travel.

 

cheers, Mark