From my blog: Concept for a True 20 Corebook

[Dragonspawn]

I actually like the rydan and alignment rules in blue rose. I hope they keep the alignment system in as an option.

As for corruption, I see no reason why it should be changed too drastically in a generic core rules product. Penalties for corruption are more setting specific.

Otherwise I think youve got some good ideas there.

Personally I'd like to see modern and futuristic rules and equipment integrated into the book as well... and it sounds like there will be a little modern stuff. I suppose I can use Gimmik's guide to gadgets for the rest.

[cynic_devine]

I don't really foresee them changing the alignments too much. After all they are basically inspired by good, evil, & neutrality from D20 proper. Now I would like to give options on how to use them in different ways. A Moorcookian view would be helpful too.

As to Corruption, I think there needs to be an expansion of the section to give the GM several ways of doing it (from BR to power's checks from Ravensloft to the warping nature of Chaos from Elric).

As a side note I have been thinking of running a T20 where Corruption is more similiar to Taint in UA & represents the step beyond evil. The Shadow nature can be as bad as say Hitler, Corruption gets into Cthulhu's realm.

The Arcana system needs to include more powerful magic common to higher fantasy IMHO. Between the generic core & the Companion, I am hoping for a ritual system that mirrors the Incantation system from D20 Modern. You know to save me the work of converting myself.

[cynic_devine]

I had initially thought to avoid this conversation; however, I believe it needs to happen now.

So, you disagree with my evaluation of True D20’s alignment system being inspired by D20’s standard alignment system. I will address this first & them move on to your other points. You seem here to confuse inspired with sameness. The Light/Twilight/Shadow dynamic is obviously a direct parallel to the Good/Neutrality/Evil axis in D&D. I am not stating that they are the same.

One interesting thing you seem to miss about “good” as defined by the PHB is the concept of altruism. Altruism is selflessness. It is putting others before one’s self interest, so believing in the “good of the community & the good of all over mere self-interest” fits well with the idea of altruism. Let’s look further, a being that has a “respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings” would welcome “peace & harmonious co-existence”. The “general good” is an idea that both alignment systems encourage in good characters. The idea that “there is sometimes disagreement as to what exactly is best for everyone”, is just an admittance of reality. Moral people do not always agree after all.

I notice you missed the word “generally” in the description of the light alignment or you are confusing it for the word always. Not every Light-aligned person acts or believes the same way. BR makes the effort to give the reader one view of morality. Remember the only absolute requirement for being Light-aligned is that the characters “follow their Light-nature, doing their best to overcome their Shadow nature.” That gives a lot of variation.

Also, I suggest you go & read the BoED & BoVD to truly grasp the concept of goodness & evil in D&D.

[cynic_devine]

Now as to some of you other comments:

You said:
"Light" characters in BR are people intent on denying their own flaws and faults and human nature, who think that "it takes a village" and self-interest is a "mere" thing that should be looked down upon, obsess themselves "tolerance" and "equality", and think THEY KNOW what is "best for everyone".

Unfortunately the text says none of this. You’re reading into the text. Attempting to overcome one’s darker side is not denying the existence of one’s flaws; it is trying to overcome them. Viewing altruism as greater then mere self interest is not saying self interest in all its forms is innately bad. It is saying that is greater to work for the common good then to only work for self advancement. If you have a problem with that idea then you really don’t understand the concept of heroism & ethics in general. As to your last comment, again you are reading into the text. Tolerance & equality are important to the characters of Aldis & that is heroic; however where does it say they obsess themselves with it? Also, no where does it say that a light aligned person has to believe they know what is best for everyone.

You said:
“One is your basic heroic dude, the other is a nightmare risen out of the ashes of nanny-state liberalism.”

Frankly you have demonstrated your lack of understanding of both alignment systems or some sort of personal bias you have. I don’t know which.

[Ether]

I agree that I'd like the alignment system tweaked, somewhat. BR's Light/Shadow scheme seems very campaign-specific, in my opinion. It seems to me that BR's alignments are presented in such a way as to push particular values as moral/good ("community = light nature" and "self-interest = shadow nature," for example). While I think this fits the genre, I don't think those particular ideas of morality fit all genres.

For me, one of the major Light/Shadow-Good/Evil sticking points is that word "community." I realize that for a lot of people, hearing phrases like "... believe in community" and "... the good of all" sound really... good. But personally, knowing what I know of the way people are when they get together to form communities, I can't quite make that association. To me, that kind of ideology isn't so much moral or "good," if you will, as it is socially functional. Now, I won't complain about functionalism in relation to social policy, but incorporating these ideas into a moral schematic is, in my mind, not general enough to fit multiple settings. Not every campaign world has a mystic god-beast to keep the community honest.

By a non-BR definition, it's plausible for a "good" individual to have a set moral standard that conflicts with or could even ultimately bring ruin to a majority in a given community (world/region/etc.), perhaps even a fairly good or "twilight" community. I wouldn't say that good is always what's best for everyone or even almost everyone. The 3.0 PHB describes Lawful Good as someone with... "a commitment to oppose evil with the discipline to fight relentlessly." This definition conflicts with BR's idea of seeking "peace, harmonious co-existence..." etc. The former statement involving "fight relentlessly" does not imply that you want it to stop someday, as does the latter, according to which one must "seek peace." In a campaign set against a Norse or African backdrop, which definition would you prefer? The problem, for me, is that BR tends to explain "good" using more absolutes in outlook, associating particular points of view with the concept. There's a significant difference between making "personal sacrifices to help others" (PHB) and "[believing] in the good of all over mere self-interest... [seeking] peace... and the general good."

I do think that the Light/Twilight/Shadow system is, in some (small) ways, similar to the G/N/E alignment system in D&D. I'm just hoping that its more particular details and definitions remain specific to BR. I don't want to have to deal with that in the Iron Kingdoms or Rokugan or the Young Kingdoms.

That said, I can always chuck alignments completely or just tweak 'em myself. It's not that big a deal. I just wanted to lay down my beef with the system.

[cynic_devine]

Ether,

I think you repsonse represents a well though out beef IMHO. I agree that the alignment does need some tweaking for a more general core book. As I said in my orginal post, I want ways to use the alignments system to fit different types of setting.

I do agree that BR does define goodness & therefore does by definition present moral values. They are fairly genre specific. Fantasy heroes are those who generally put the needs of others before themselves. The whole community=good is really just a way to describe that.

Really, heroism is putting the community/others over oneself in reality as well. That is what real life heroes do. Martin Luther King, Gandhi, Mother Theresa, etc. are all examples of this. Also, this idea is at the root of most religious systems as well. Self interest is not bad innately, BR never says that. What BR does say is that self interest is not as moral as altruism. Someone who falls to Shadow "are typically selfish & solely interested in satifying their own desires and goals" (BR pg 72), which is taking self interest to an extreme.

One interesting thing BR did do is inject some fairly modern sensiblities into their morality system. A big one is that moral people tend to prefer peace to war. This is a fairly modern idea.

One thing I have really notice is that BR's alignment system is far loser then I orginal pictured. The only real requirement to be Light-aligned is to tend to follow one's Light Nature. So you could have the Determined Light side Nature, follow it & be a real jerk & still be light-aligned. By the same token you could have the Inhibited Shadow Nature, follow it & be a nice person & still be shadow-aligned (never do anything on the hierarchy of sins either).

As I said though, I do think there needs to be some revision for a general game.

[Ether]

Great discussion, here.

First I'll quote cynic_devine:

One interesting thing BR did do is inject some fairly modern sensiblities into their morality system. A big one is that moral people tend to prefer peace to war. This is a fairly modern idea.

For the most part, I agree. Methinks humanity's gotten a bit soft.

Question, though... has this viewpoint significantly changed over the centuries? Even people who war often claim that it's something they'd rather not be doing (even when this is blatantly untrue... ignoring all real-world current events, right now). Are they moral? Furthermore, are people who genuinely do want to live in peace necessarily moral? I think the idea is modern in that it's a somewhat recent thing that to be considered "good people," (and I hear many people speak almost daily of the overwhelming number of "good people" here, though I regularly see evidence to the contrary) individuals need only "not hurt anything" (analagous, in my mind to living peacefully).

But what constitutes "hurt" or "peace?" If I were to "cheat" on my girlfriend, she wouldn't combust or anything, but (if she cared) it might hurt her or ruin her day (possibly "breaking her peace"). And if it were something I really wanted to do, she and I would likely have different ideas of what "hurt" and "peace" meant. My understanding is that books on law generally have huge chunks of pure word definitions, precisely to avoid this problem. I think it's fairly recent that we, as a society can get away with somewhat vague ideas as indicators of morality (because we don't like lawyers). I give GR serious props for breaking the typical Good/Evil mold, especially given BR's genre, which I think they hit dead on. I just couldn't bring myself to use those definitions for my games. But I'm pretty cynical.


Then I'll quote Nisarg:

I want an alignment system that shows the good and the bad of both ideologies, "law" and "chaos". Hence my advocating the "elric" alignments.

This was an interesting idea I meant to comment on earlier. I really like the way alignments are set up in Stormbringer/Elric!, though I have questions as to how well they could work in a generic system. Concepts of Law & Chaos as guiding behavioral forces, while certainly not specific to Moorcock's literature, doesn't often appear to be central to a lot of fantasy settings. I suppose one can argue that it's there, but just for me, it's not something that generally catches center stage as it does in the Elric/Corum/Eternal Champion/etc. books. Also, while I like the Moorcockian concept of evil coming out of taking a good idea to an extreme, I have trouble differenciating it from, again, campaign-specific definitions of morality. Is this mechanic less specific and "preachy" than any other alignment system? Well, we assume it's less preachy than BR (I'm not complaining about that; as I said, BR's alignment system fits the genre), because, as you, Nisarg, have pointed out, Moorcockian cosmology at least provides the possibility for both sides of a major ethical conflict (Law/Chaos) to go "wrong," but... what if we look at the Extremist/Moderate aspect of the idea as the Evil/Good analogue? Is it possible for someone to be so moderate, or balanced that they can do great evil? Perhaps... I suppose it depends on how one defines "balanced" (see above for more on definitions, law, and interests). Just some (to my mind) interesting questions.

Personally, I'd like to see an alignment system that doesn't tell me what "good" is. I think a good Corruption system similar to that of Decipher's LotR game, would work for me. Instead of worrying over defining who's good/better/best, we would just keep track of how bad people are based on the kinds of things they've done (so we can just look at bad/worse). Maybe it would just measure mental, physical, and spiritual corruption, where certain kinds of actions increase certain aspects, and exposure to ideas, magics, or experiences could vastly increase all of these things. Just brainstorming, here... my wishlist, if anything. This idea has a lot of holes... but what about a system that allows players to choose and rank their own pseudo-specific values (family, law, love, "tolerance," selflessness, etc.), then procedes penalize them based on their (lack of) adherence to said values...? Too complicated? Probably...

[cynic_devine]

Nisarg to your first post.....

As I said in my posts, BR does give an idea of what goodness is & it is influenced by it the genre it seeks to emulate. I agree a general adventure book needs to include a variety or ways to use alignments.

As to D&D go read the BoED, D&D ideas about goodness are far less general then you think.

[cynic_devine]

Nisarg,

As to your second post…..

You said:
One particular way, a somewhat crappy way. "Community" doesn't equal "good" always, in fact, it does so only rarely. There are countless other ways to define a hero, on much more personal levels. The real hero isn't who serves a set collective, its someone who fights for an ideal or helps people on an individual basis. The Fellowship of the Ring went out to stop Sauron for the sake of defending civilization, not in the service of the corrupt Squire of Gondor.
If "the community" had run the Fellowship, they'd never have gotten past the elven council, they'd have sat there arguing the whole time. Or the beaurocrats would have agreed that it was best for the community to give the ring to the Squire or something. It was by striking out as individuals that they got things done.
And if the foremost value in Star Wars was "service to the community", Luke and Leia and company would be faithful servants of the LEGALLY EMPOWERED Emperor, and Han would be off to re-education for social dysfunction.

Firstly in both of your examples both groups served their communities. The Rebel Alliance was attempting to free their community from tyranny. Serving it required that they oppose the government. Breaking the law does is not a corrupting act (see BR pg 126). The Fellowship of the Ring was trying to save their community from the Dark Lord. You can be very individualist & still serves others & the community as whole.

You said:
Surely you kid, right?
MLK and Gandhi didn't serve "the community", they fought to free their people FROM "the community" that was oppresing them.
If they had been servants of "the community" MLK would have been a good uncle tom and Gandhi a loyal servant of the King.
Most of the real heros we venerate are people who have been rebels, who have fought AGAINST the current tide, and stood up for their liberty and the liberty of their bretheren against the oppresive culture/society they were confronted with.
The "Founding Fathers" of the United States were that.. they didn't say "be good, pay your taxes", they said "liberty or death.. don't tread on me", and they were heroes for it.
Simon Bolivar, Che Guevara, Nelson Mandela; even religious figures like Jesus Christ and the Buddha struggled against the oppresiveness of the dominant culture.

Serving your community does not mean submitting to tyranny. Tyranny isn’t good for communities. Liberty & personal dignity are good for communities & history demonstrates this time & again. That is why democracy works. When Martin Luther King Jr stood up, he was not just trying to make things better for himself or African Americans. He was trying to make things better for all Americans. Racism is damaging to us all. In truth, revolutionaries are even serving their oppressors.

Serving your community often means bucking the system. It is how communities are changed for the better. Gandhi was working for the freedom of his community from the tyranny of another community. The Founding Fathers were not just fighting for their personal liberty, but the liberty of their whole community (i.e. the Colonies). Serving your own community by battling the injustice of another community is heroic & in the long serves the other community as well. Justice is good for any community.

Heroism can arise from self-interest, but it cannot stay there. Fighting for an ideal is fighting to make the community better & therefore serving the community. When someone stands up for their liberty, they are really standing for all our liberty. I agree that heroism often arise out of self-interest; however when it transcends it is when it becomes heroism. None of this violates being light-aligned.

You sad:
There is the "Heroism" of fraterity and friendship, the heroism of love, the heroism of wanderlust, the heroism of fighting for a cause, for God, or for an ideal. None of those are covered by the Blue Rose alignments.

It is true that BR’s alignment system does not cover the heroics of wanderlust. This is because wanderlust is not innately heroic; anymore then staying in one place is villainous. As to the rest the alignment system can handle all quite well, especially when used in conjunction with the Natures & Calling systems.

You said:
Well, my point, from a purely practical rpg perspective is that it would be far more flexible to use a system that shows both extremes.

So then maybe I am missing your complaint here. Is it that BR’s definition of good is off or that you want an alignment system that demonstrates a continuum from total slave to the collective to selfish individualist?

You said:
You're saying that in blue rose you can play a self-interested guy who isn't extreme (which would still be "twilight" I guess, so you're still accusing them of being a lesser evil) OR you could play a self-interested guy who takes it all the way and is really really evil (a sociopath).
Well, the only problem is BR DOESN'T do that the other way. You can play a community-minded guy who is good (one who cares about order and the common good) but there is NO ROOM in the BR alignment scale for a guy who is community-minded to the extreme, which is to say an autocratic fascist. Because BR pretends, as you so aptly put it, that "community = good", when in reality it rarely does, and thus BR ignores the countless cases and possiblities of people obsessed with "the community" (Ie. The State, The Pure Race, The Will of the People, whatever you want to call it) that act in a covertly or blatantly fascist way.

Firstly, autocratic fascist are shadow aligned. This is due to the fact people support such views because it generally benefits them. Just because you are obsessed with community does not mean you are light-aligned. The people who are fanatics for any particular group are fanatics because they are a part of said group & therefore benefit by its advancement (or at least the individuals believe so).

Secondly the good of the community is often actually good. Notice I didn’t say that it was expedient or even easy. America is better off not slaughtering Native Americans or allowing slavery. Germany is better off without Hitler.


You said:
There are many countries today where people are being told that for the "safety" of the country, for "freedom", they have to ironically give up their own rights, and give the government more and more power. There have always been men who have used that, in the real world and in most fantasy settings. In BR that issue doesn't come up only because of the magic deer, and the presumption in feminist fiction that an activist community is always a force of good

Were to begin…..
Firstly, safety is good & so is personal freedom. Both created healthy thriving communities. Individuals with less then perfect motives can use these good things to promote immoral agendas. That does not invalidate the innate goodness of both. BR doesn't deal with that issue in the core book (although it may later), that is true. I think the difference that the genre presents good societies from the point of view of their creators & BR is trying to emulate that genre. Is Aldis an activist community? There is no doubt; however, the real question is what does Aldis fight for. We all have to decide if those moral values are truly moral.


Lastly, I think you seem to be saying that the good of the community is rarely if ever truly good. This is a fallacy. History shows that personal liberty, justice, equality, & all those things we all really want in a society are good for the community. Just because the government says an action is good, doesn’t mean it really is. Civil disobedience is often the only way you can truly serve you community & sometimes revolution is.

[cynic_devine]

Of topic a bit....

Nisarg,

I want to thank you for being very civil in the discusion. It is making for better discussion in my & apparently Ether's opinion.

[cynic_devine]

Interest thoughts Ether & I agree it is a good discussion.

Firstly, you said:
Question, though... has this viewpoint significantly changed over the centuries? Even people who war often claim that it's something they'd rather not be doing (even when this is blatantly untrue... ignoring all real-world current events, right now). Are they moral? Furthermore, are people who genuinely do want to live in peace necessarily moral? I think the idea is modern in that it's a somewhat recent thing that to be considered "good people," (and I hear many people speak almost daily of the overwhelming number of "good people" here, though I regularly see evidence to the contrary) individuals need only "not hurt anything" (analogous, in my mind to living peacefully).

Well, I would say a desire for peace can be moral. It is not innately so. In the context of BR it is not the only defining quality of goodness, but one of them.

You also said
But what constitutes "hurt" or "peace?" If I were to "cheat" on my girlfriend, she wouldn't combust or anything, but (if she cared) it might hurt her or ruin her day (possibly "breaking her peace"). And if it were something I really wanted to do, she and I would likely have different ideas of what "hurt" and "peace" meant. My understanding is that books on law generally have huge chunks of pure word definitions, precisely to avoid this problem. I think it's fairly recent that we, as a society can get away with somewhat vague ideas as indicators of morality (because we don't like lawyers). I give GR serious props for breaking the typical Good/Evil mold, especially given BR's genre, which I think they hit dead on. I just couldn't bring myself to use those definitions for my games. But I'm pretty cynical.

I think generally BR is using peace to represent a lack of conflict & injuring to others. Really the sense I got was more a lack of war really. I think also it boils to getting along with your neighbors if possible.

As to Moorcock’s, cosmology remember that Law & Chaos are not behaviors. They are cosmic forces. Too much of either is bad for humanity. Really if I were going to something like Elric, I would even use an alignment system at all, just something like the taint system in UA to represent the tainting influence of Chaos.

You said:
Personally, I'd like to see an alignment system that doesn't tell me what "good" is. I think a good Corruption system similar to that of Decipher's LotR game, would work for me. Instead of worrying over defining who's good/better/best, we would just keep track of how bad people are based on the kinds of things they've done (so we can just look at bad/worse). Maybe it would just measure mental, physical, and spiritual corruption, where certain kinds of actions increase certain aspects, and exposure to ideas, magics, or experiences could vastly increase all of these things. Just brainstorming, here... my wishlist, if anything. This idea has a lot of holes... but what about a system that allows players to choose and rank their own pseudo-specific values (family, law, love, "tolerance," selflessness, etc.), then procedes penalize them based on their (lack of) adherence to said values...? Too complicated? Probably...

I think something like this could work easily. Combine a hierarchy of sins idea from White Wolf with the taint mechanic from UA.

[Denaes]

Just to put my .02 in, I don't believe in alignments in RPGs.

D&D's system is ok, as far as that goes...

I'd just ask the players some questions and have them answer them. Thats how their character would behave.

I agree in a system where you have ramifications for players misbehaving and not playing in a cookie cutter alignment, then they would be needed.

To me as a GM, the only use of alignments is to get a good idea of where everyone sits in regards to each other. If someone is Chaotic Evil, you get the sense that they probobly won't tell the truth and will double cross you.

In this sense they're an effecient & useful way for game designers to get across general behaviors in a few words.

In real life people trade in morals and morrays (individual and community/cultural beliefs and social values).

I'm not saying alignments are awful or stupid. I just don't see the point of using them with players. They're not accurate for players and help trap them in a pidgeon hole and from a game stand point, I could deal without a system of alignment infractions and whatnot like in 2e.

[ravenspoe]

Denaes,

I agree with you to a degree...
I think certian classes or proffesions within a game do need to be kept in check with an Alignment to make sure the character acts the way its supposed to. Palidan and Jedi are two that can get so abused, and without some sort of restrainment to thier actions, you might as well not even have the class. Alignemnt keeps the Paladin from killing all his defeated opponents, or a Jedi from using the mind trick to get hot babes into his bedroom.

Other than that I think Alignments are an outdated mechanic, perhaps a moral code can be assigned if the player wishes as a disadvantage for points or abilities, but once it is breached those extra perks can be ripped away.

[Dragonspawn]

As you guys have already distinguished, The view of good people ALWAYS stiving for peace is a somewhat modern concept.

Does this mean humanity has "gottren soft"? No, not necessarily.

It has more to do with a change in how warfare is conducted.

When war was fought with swords and crossbows, or before that with clubs and spears, it is very easy for "good" or "noble" warriors to only target their enemy who if not "evil" is at least a combatant, and by definition not innocent or helpless. In this way it is possible to conduct a crusade (or Jihad or whatever you want to call it) in the name of good without killing many innocents at all (maybe a few might get hit by stray arrows or mistaken for combatants or something). So long as soldiers arent specifically attacking civilians and burning their homes, civilian casualties can be largely avoided.

Today war is much more indiscriminate by nature. Nowadays with bombs that misfire and kill hundreds of civilians (even with the newest computer targeting devices). War has a devastating effect on everyone in the modern day to a much greater degree than ever before. Wars used to be spectator sports in some cultures in the past from tribal battles where the women and children watched from a safe distance to the american civil war where onlookers picknicked on the sidelines.
Today this is not possible, as anyone within several city blocks of the warzone is lible to get incinerated, or killed by stray machinegun fire or step on a landmine.

In a high magic setting fireballs and meteor showers could replace bombs, repeating crossbows could replace machineguns and explosive runes could replace landmines. War could be just as indiscriminate in a fantasy setting as it is in the modern day.

However True20 is a more low-magic rules system, so war may still be such that a "good" warrior could seek to make war on evil all his life without much fear of bringing harm to civilians and innocent bystanders. He will probably want peace to come eventually because war is no picnic in any age, but there just isn't the same sense of urgency to achieve peace in order to stop civilian casualties from piling up (provided that civilians are not being specifically targeted by the soldiers under the "good" warrior's command).

[Denaes]

Denaes,

I agree with you to a degree...
I think certian classes or proffesions within a game do need to be kept in check with an Alignment to make sure the character acts the way its supposed to. Palidan and Jedi are two that can get so abused, and without some sort of restrainment to thier actions, you might as well not even have the class. Alignemnt keeps the Paladin from killing all his defeated opponents, or a Jedi from using the mind trick to get hot babes into his bedroom.

Other than that I think Alignments are an outdated mechanic, perhaps a moral code can be assigned if the player wishes as a disadvantage for points or abilities, but once it is breached those extra perks can be ripped away.

Alignment doesn't factor into Jedi or Paladins. Codes of Honor do.

The Jedi follow the Code of the Jedi or whatever it's called. It stipulates a great many things that alignment in these games never mention, such as fear and aquiring personal power.

Same with Paladin. A Paladin follows a more stringent path than that of Lawful Good. They're Lawful Good + more.

I'm not saying that granted powers shouldn't have strings - they should have full implications that the players are aware of. Even if there are no alignments, Paladins have a code to follow or they loose their powers.

I'm also not saying that players should just go willy nilly as they feel all over the board and wreck your game because they slaughter a town even thought they had been acting good recently.

I'm just saying a player should define how they'll play and stick with it the majority of the time - there are always exceptions rather than try to force their character into predefined boiled down notiong of right-wrong, good-evil.

All of these are just abstract notions that people of different cultures apply to actions. What is evil in one land is justice in another and compassion in yet another.

[Dragonspawn]

Its easy to get past this limitation of BR alignments Nisarg...

I just allow my PCs to make up their own light and dark natures, using the list provided as an example of one way to look at them.

A wanderer character could pick "discovery" as his calling, "Curiosity" as his light nature and "driven" or as his shadow nature (driven here means bordering on obsession to reach his goals despite any cost).

So when he follows his light nature, his curiosity leads him to travel and explore for the sheer exhileration of discovery... while his shadow nature might call him to explore for personal gains such as fame and fortune in a way that causes him to be careless of the safety of others.

[Nikchick]

Surely you kid, right?
MLK and Gandhi didn't serve "the community", they fought to free their people FROM "the community" that was oppresing them.

They served on behalf of *their* communities, which you freely admit were being oppressed. Merely being in the minority, or being in the majority but not holding power politically does not mean that they were suddenly dark aligned.

cynic_devine has it right, taking things in the spirit they were intended.


Please tread carefully with these conversations and beware of straying into anything not specifically True20 game-related. I am enforcing a very narrow definition of "on topic" for these forums, keeping in mind the baiting and counter-baiting of previous threads and behaviors exhibited on our forums and elsewhere. These are not the forums to explore general complaints with feminism or cultural relativism.

Keep it specifically to True20, please.

[Ether]

Serving your community does not mean submitting to tyranny. Tyranny isn’t good for communities. Liberty & personal dignity are good for communities & history demonstrates this time & again. That is why democracy works. When Martin Luther King Jr stood up, he was not just trying to make things better for himself or African Americans. He was trying to make things better for all Americans. Racism is damaging to us all. In truth, revolutionaries are even serving their oppressors.

Nice, thoughtful response, cynic! However... while, personally, I agree with you that tyranny and racism are bad, I wouldn't say that liberty and personal dignity are good or the reasons for societal success. Actually, I would submit that we have yet to see a society that really offers a system that promotes personal dignity. That said, democracy is the most effective peacetime system of government (during war, IIRC, fascism is more effective), but this effectiveness, in my mind, is more a result of keeping a majority content (and it's definitely possible to do so without being moral). Also, while I think racism is damaging (to some), dangerous, and outright evil, I don't think I could say that it's really "damaging to us all." Without going into a lot of RL detail, a lot of people benefit from racist social structures (from job and education availability/selection to criminal justice/punitive measures). Which is why they're in place (see my above statement involving personal dignity). While one could argue that the ramifications of such structures (increased crime rates, dissatisfaction amongst minorities, etc.) are harmful to society at large (and thus, "us all"), to me, this stance is somewhat biased. Damaging to a collective isn't necessary damaging to everyone in the collective. "Black on black crime" (trite phrase, I know... but...) is a killer, but do folk "up on the hill" really care? Only when it spills into their territory, at which point the legislative, political, and social structures they've put into place can deal with them. They have a certain degree of protection. So, in short (and wheeling around back to the topic), I think an alignment system that pushes values like liberty, societal welfare, etc. as definitions of a "good" equivalent alignment is somewhat "loaded" (biased?) and only works for certain genres wherein the moral fallibility of those structures is ignored. In a world more similar to the real world, where a truly moral society does not exist, this system couldn't function (in my opinion).

They served on behalf of *their* communities, which you freely admit were being oppressed. Merely being in the minority, or being in the majority but not holding power politically does not mean that they were suddenly dark aligned.

While, to a degree, I agree with this standpoint, it does touch on another interesting question involving one's definitions of "law" and "morality." It has been argued that both laws and morals are established within a community precisely for the purpose of establishing an "evil other" (a "shadow-aligned" minority, if you will, that allows the "good" majority to feel safer, be stronger, maintain power). Being in a minority makes it much easier for one to be considered evil/wrong/mean/depraved/dark-aligned, as a majority can easily overtake a minority, politically speaking. "Two wolves and a sheep" and all that jazz. Socially speaking, in many cases, right and wrong are both matters of who holds power at a particular time. And in many communities, whoever can sway the most people end up with the most power and wind up being the ones who define morality. I think ignoring this in favor of describing exactly what constitutes moral behavior might limit the value of an alignment system.

As you've said, though, diverging from the majority doesn't necessarily make a person evil, and this entire idea isn't pertinent to many high fantasy settings. Again, in a generic system book, I'd just prefer for there to be more room for a hero with ideas that don't revolve around one particular mindset. In Exalted, for example, a Dragon-Blooded Dynast (decadent noble class, for those unfamiliar with the genre) with a Paragon Nature is somewhat different from a Lunar Exalt (outlandish barbarian-type who often, but not always, believes that might makes right) with a Paragon Nature. Both are, in their respective communities, the pinnacle of "good," but the system makes no judgment on which is the "right good." If that makes sense.

(I'm not trying to be confrontational or nit-picky, Nikchick, and if I come off that way, let me know, and I can try to tone down... I just find this kind of question interesting... hope all this ties together in such a way as to be "on topic")