in regards to things like morality-alignments like chaotic-good/true neutral/lawful evil how do you determine what counts as lawful, or chaotic, or even good or evil? is it the perspective & intentions of individual being assigned a designation, such that they could be chaotic good while doing evil things if they truly believe that it’s right or is it an assignment solely from the observer’s viewpoint?
lawful follows strict rules e.g. devils are lawful evil due to their adherence to contracts and the like whereas chaotic is more of a “do what you feel” instinctual approach to things
i’d be inclined to say good/evil are from an objective standpoint due to the fact that angels lose their connection to their deity if they commit an evil act even if it’s unintentional or they’ve been tricked into doing so
good and evil also occupy a pretty broad spectrum of acts
a good character will, at least sometimes, go out of their way to help people
an evil character will act in a selfish manner and only do what’s right for them even if it means destroying lives to further their goals
a neutral character will just sort of go with the flow, helping themselves but not at the expense of others
As a strong proponent for “there is no cosmic good and evil” there is one important thing to remember. D&D exists in worlds where gods exist and war against one another, within view of mortals, and empower their followers with fractions of their strength. Good and evil are factions. A character could mean well and still do something evil from the perspective of another. It’s all about whether they act in a way that good supports, or the way evil supports, regardless of what the individual supports. This is further evidenced by the existence of things like chaotic good gods (instead of chaotic meaning the rejection of).
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gunzomi reblogged this from iamonlykidding and added:
in the tabletop universes of DnD and pathfinder good and evil are actual planes of existence from which angels, Devils,...
whataspiffyblog answered: Generally, the way I have seen is is that The law/chaos axis is more Society/Self and good.evil is more respect for life/disregard for life. I find that helps it a bit easier to classify even though alignments are pretty much bullshit
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mistercreeps reblogged this from dreamofhircine and added:
That was always one of the failings of the alignment system. I think the idea is that what alignment is actually comes...
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As a strong proponent for “there is no cosmic good and evil” there is one important thing to remember. D&D exists in...
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mida-k answered: Well, imho If you set the point between what’s good or bad there’s no way to be fooled, even if the character could think to do something “rightful”. Of course when you tell a story you choose a side, so our hero could be the villan for someone else.
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darklordreasonable answered: I always thought that Lawful-Chaotic was basically “i have a code to follow which is more important than whatever i may feel about a situation at the time” vs “i do what i want”. Good and Evil is just inherently incoherent, though.
iamonlykidding reblogged this from tamamoland and added:
good and evil also occupy a pretty broad spectrum of actsa good character will, at least sometimes, go out of their way...
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