Fuzzy Alignments and You

[Denaes]

Fun stuff on that other Poison/Assassin thread, but I had a spinoff thought.

Put aside the notion of choosing an alignment and trying to force your ideals into it for a second and approach it from the opposite side.

You have your ideals (you or your character) and you need to find out what alignment that would be. How do you decide?

I mean these alignments are pretty rigid. They say how you behave in like 10+ cases. What if you follow 3 ideals of Principaled, 3 ideals of Scrupulus and 3 ideals of anarchist? or whatever combination. How do you figure out your alignment?

Are you automatically the worst (further towards evil) of the set?

What if you have absolutely no qualms about killing someone who is trying to kill you, but you're loyal to your friends and always help strangers for free and care about how others feel. Are you automatically Anarchist with Playing out of Character leanings towards good? Or are you good with Anarchist leanings in regards to those who try to kill you or yours.

After some good points in that other thread, I'm looking at most the "heros" on TV and in Palladium they'd be classified as Miscreant or Abberant or maybe Anarchist.

Then again, funnily enough, in a game like Palladium I normally don't even bother with Alignments. They're good on NPCs because they say 10+ things about how they act with one word, but for the most part, as a GM I just let players play the characters they want, not the ones the book approves of. If they want to play a palladin, then they can have a code to follow. If they want to be a Priest of Good, then they can deal with having to keep their God(s) happy.

Really, as a player or GM, nothing really pisses me off more than hearing a player say "I really don't want to do this, but my alignment says I have to..."

[Sentinel]

When making the determination about my characters alignments (both PCs and NPCs) I try to consider what the character is supposed to accomplish in the campaign story, what role they serve (antagonist, protagonist, plot-device, etc), and also their disposition.
A Scrupulous Paladin can be noble and good, but still be a braggart, or over-confident, or vain and arrogant.
Killing someone is not out of good alignment: killing a helpless opponent in cold blood is.

[Nekira Sudacne]

Fun stuff on that other Poison/Assassin thread, but I had a spinoff thought.

Put aside the notion of choosing an alignment and trying to force your ideals into it for a second and approach it from the opposite side.

You have your ideals (you or your character) and you need to find out what alignment that would be. How do you decide?

I mean these alignments are pretty rigid. They say how you behave in like 10+ cases. What if you follow 3 ideals of Principaled, 3 ideals of Scrupulus and 3 ideals of anarchist? or whatever combination. How do you figure out your alignment?

Are you automatically the worst (further towards evil) of the set?

What if you have absolutely no qualms about killing someone who is trying to kill you, but you're loyal to your friends and always help strangers for free and care about how others feel. Are you automatically Anarchist with Playing out of Character leanings towards good? Or are you good with Anarchist leanings in regards to those who try to kill you or yours.

After some good points in that other thread, I'm looking at most the "heros" on TV and in Palladium they'd be classified as Miscreant or Abberant or maybe Anarchist.

Then again, funnily enough, in a game like Palladium I normally don't even bother with Alignments. They're good on NPCs because they say 10+ things about how they act with one word, but for the most part, as a GM I just let players play the characters they want, not the ones the book approves of. If they want to play a palladin, then they can have a code to follow. If they want to be a Priest of Good, then they can deal with having to keep their God(s) happy.

Really, as a player or GM, nothing really pisses me off more than hearing a player say "I really don't want to do this, but my alignment says I have to..."

I've always used Abberant as the "catch all" for people with alignments that only fit a few things in any given section

[count zero]

I don't make my players choose alignments for their characters. In fact, I've abandoned alignments altogether. It all seems rather antiquated to me. I'm much more concerned with the players acting in ways consistent with how they've defined their characters than according to some rigid moral (or immoral ) code as defined in the rules.

pax
Ø

[Thinyser]

I've always used Abberant as the "catch all" for people with alignments that only fit a few things in any given section

Aye!! Abberant is probably the most flexible when it comes down to it. Wanna help the old lady across the street? Okay. Wanna teach hoops to the downtrodden little boy? Okay. Wanna kill the local drug dealer slowly and painfully? Alrighty then. Aberrant is your mark.

I sort of look at it like this.....

Principled/Scrupulous -- The line is defined by society, and I won't cross the line.

Unprincipled/Anarchist -- The line is defined by society, and I'll step across when I want, but not too far.

Miscreant -- The line is defined by society, and I'll cross it when I want.

Diabolic -- What line??

Aberrant -- I won't cross the line, but I say where the line is, not society.

Hmmm I kinda like these descriptions but what stops the aberrant person from simply redrawing the lines whenever they need/want to? Something like: "I wont cross then line but the line is mine to draw and if I feel too constrained by my line I reserve the right to redraw it and erase the old line and if you don't like it you can go eff your self!"... I dont think thats how an aberrant character should be played but if they draw the line then its kinda open to this abuse.

I think it would be more like this:
Aberrant-- I wont cross the line, I don't know where the line came from, and I don't effing care, but I like the line where it is, cuz it works for me, so I'm keeping it... if society doesn't like my line then they can eff off!

[maasenstodt]

An interesting conversation. While many have praised Palladium for its alignments versus traditional AD&D, I've always found the lawful-neutral-chaotic/good-neutral-evil paradigm to be more realistic and useful.

Something that various posts here have helped me see is that not only are Chaotic Good and Unprincipled (Selfish) possibly synonymous, but Aberrant (Evil) could quite possibly be the same thing as well. Indeed, after reading the descriptions for Unprincipled and Aberrant side by side, I'm left wonder what the real difference is (besides semantics).

I'm running a Castles & Crusades game right now, and that game uses the traditional AD&D alignment system. I do have my players choose alignments because, quite simply, I don't want characters with certain alignments in certain of my games. The alignment system is a solid way to enforce that rule when one's players aren't always paragons of maturity.

Moreover, I find that alignments are very helpful in determining NPC actions. Between writing a two letter abbreviation for alignment and a one word adjective for personality, I can make credible, consistent, and, most importantly, fast sketches of even the lowliest personas in my campaigns. Add a name (I always keep my dictionary of Saints handy for quick, random, flavorful names) and an occupation and in less than a line of paper and 15 seconds I have all I need to play that character.

[Eryk Stormbright]

i personally like Aberrant. it just gives me more freedom to do what i see as right. the only time alignments Really matter are like in the cases of Cyber-Knights, and Cosmo-Knights and classes like that. where they have a set of rules that they can Not brake, whether they see themselves in the right or not, they just can't do it or Else.

[Yisterwald]

Really, as a player or GM, nothing really pisses me off more than hearing a player say "I really don't want to do this, but my alignment says I have to..."

Well, that's the sort of thing that could easily happen to you in real life, if you ever found yourself in the kind of extreme circumstances that RPG character routinely do. Frankly, sometimes it happens to me even when circumstances aren't that extreme. My alignment (my sense of morality and ethics) prevents me doing all kinds of things that might provide me with gain or satisfaction. Yours too, I would imagine.

Wrestling with one's beliefs, ethics, and morals makes for tension and dramatic play, and can only add to the story. Characters who are bound by nothing, who have nothing to struggle with or to define them, add little to nothing to a campaign. They're simply boring and juvenile.

[Nekira Sudacne]

i personally like Aberrant. it just gives me more freedom to do what i see as right. the only time alignments Really matter are like in the cases of Cyber-Knights, and Cosmo-Knights and classes like that. where they have a set of rules that they can Not brake, whether they see themselves in the right or not, they just can't do it or Else.

technically a cyber knight suffers no penalties if he breaks the code.

[Eryk Stormbright]

i personally like Aberrant. it just gives me more freedom to do what i see as right. the only time alignments Really matter are like in the cases of Cyber-Knights, and Cosmo-Knights and classes like that. where they have a set of rules that they can Not brake, whether they see themselves in the right or not, they just can't do it or Else.

technically a cyber knight suffers no penalties if he breaks the code.

yeah well if the Otherr Cyber Knights catch wind of one of their own acting in a way that brakes their code, i'm sure somthing would be done.

[Nekira Sudacne]

i personally like Aberrant. it just gives me more freedom to do what i see as right. the only time alignments Really matter are like in the cases of Cyber-Knights, and Cosmo-Knights and classes like that. where they have a set of rules that they can Not brake, whether they see themselves in the right or not, they just can't do it or Else.

technically a cyber knight suffers no penalties if he breaks the code.

yeah well if the Otherr Cyber Knights catch wind of one of their own acting in a way that brakes their code, i'm sure somthing would be done.

No more than any other evildoer. Heck, knights who break their code have formed their own organizations

[Eryk Stormbright]

i personally like Aberrant. it just gives me more freedom to do what i see as right. the only time alignments Really matter are like in the cases of Cyber-Knights, and Cosmo-Knights and classes like that. where they have a set of rules that they can Not brake, whether they see themselves in the right or not, they just can't do it or Else.

technically a cyber knight suffers no penalties if he breaks the code.

yeah well if the Otherr Cyber Knights catch wind of one of their own acting in a way that brakes their code, i'm sure somthing would be done.

No more than any other evildoer. Heck, knights who break their code have formed their own organizations

*g* yeah and they are hunted down more than just any evil doer, least they put them at the top of the list whenever possable.