What would be some interesting alignment systems other than the classic good-evil/law-chaos?
/tg/'s homebrew Zelda RPG used the 3 divine virtues of the triforce -- power, courage, and wisdom. This works well, because it's quite straightforward to interpret an action according to these virtues -- if you're acting with brute force, that's power. If you're acting based on careful calculation and reasoning, that's wisdom. If you're acting despite great great risk, or otherwise acting in such a way that synthesizes the other two virtues to overcome adversity, that's courage. It's a bit confusing in theory, but quite simple in practice.
An idea I had that has probably been used somewhere, but that I've never seen is Heart and Mind. Rhyme and Reason. Romanticism and Enlightenment. The right and left hemispheres of the brain. These are roughly analogous to chaos and law, but they're still distinct in that they're on a bit of a deeper level -- it's more about personality than philosophy.I may or may not have been listening to way too much Rush lately.
One idea that I've thought up recently is a threefold alignment system consisting of science, religion and esotericism. There can be conflict between them, but no one is intrinsically opposed to any other. Religion and science together is things like catholic scientist monks. Esotericism and science is things like hermetic alchemy. Esotericism and religion is things the kabbalah.
What have you got, /tg/?
Revolution, harmony, and discord.
>>43957500
I'm not sure how relevant that spiel is to the task at hand.
>>43957646
Just some fag replying to everything on the board, ignore and move on.
>>43957572
Harmony and discord make sense, but how does revolution fit neatly into the cycle?
>>43957408
I, personally, go for a 3 dimensional alignment grid.
Selfless <->Selfish (I care about others; I care about me)
Formal <-> Direct (I respect laws and policy; I get shit done)
Pragmatic <-> Virtuous (I focus on what is; I focus on what ought to be)
>>43957408
The most interesting character alingment would be dropping the alignments alltogether. You don't need a set of numbers to describe your character's personality.
>>43959834
>Implying people can't be quantified
It takes a lot of numbers, but it's possible all the same.
>>43959862
They can. But it takes WAY too many numbers. I get enough excel sheets in my day job.
>>43959917
>Not doing spreadsheets for fun
What are you, autistic?
What I had in mind wasnt set aligments, but tendency:
Think of 4 points and everything inbetween them, according to how your character acts, the tendency changes
>>43957408
Here, let me tell you the system I use; I've tried to make it mimic reality as closely as I could.
There are three components to the alignment, or as I call it, Ideology system:
1. Prudence
2. Enlightenment
3. Ideology
Prudence is a measure of how much the character in question wants to be correct, and by extension how much they will look for morally challenging information. A character with very low prudence is narrow-minded, and will condemn people who disagree with them. A narrow-minded character will also be resistant to ideological conversion. A character with medium prudence is open-minded: they will listen to challenging information, but they will not actively seek it. A character with high prudence will actively look for challenging information in order to reform their views.
Enlightenment is a measure of how much progress a given character has made. Characters with higher prudence gain enlightenment more quickly, and characters with lower prudence gain enlightenment slowly. Characters with high enlightenment are more resistant to ideological conversion because they are familiar with rhetorical and philosophical tropes and how to respond to them wisely.
The next part is what you're probably asking for...
>>43960105
Ideology is a hierarchy of values. There are no explicitly good or evil values. Some of these values can be split into new values or combined into new values. Here's my list, in no particular order:
1. Life
2. Duty
3. Logical coherence
4. Relief (aka negative hedonism)
5. Fun (a type of positive hedonism)
6. Pride (the kind of feeling that you've done what's right; also a kind of positive hedonism)
7. Equality
8. Compensation
9. Retribution*
10. Non-aggression (or as some like to call it, 'peace')
11. Privacy
12. Tradition (also religion)
13. Common sense (aka prejudice, instinct, intuition, etc.)
14. Self-determination
15. Greatness (or ascension)
16. Reward*
*can be combined into what could be called reciprocation
Q: Where's muh freedom on the list?
A: Freedom is on the list, either as non-aggression, self-determination, and/or greatness, depending on your definition.
This list is not exhaustive; these are just ideals that I normally think people have.
>>43960130
Q: Where's muh justice?
A: Justice is on the list, either as relief, pride, equality, compensation, retribution, reward, and/or non-aggression, depending on your definition.
>>43960130
One more thing. Each time a character's enlightenment increases, their value hierarchy changes. Characters are predisposed to have different ideologies at the same levels of enlightenment due to various factors including their physiology, upbringing, media, and personal experiences.
>>43959795
>>43959834
>>43960105
>using alignment as a personality statement
Alignment systems have one purpose, and one purpose only: To model cosmic forces that play a major role in shaping the campaign and the world it takes place in.
If it's just a way of describing your character's personality, there's a better way to do that. It's called wirting a fucking backstory and outlining your character's worldview and motivations. No need for systematic rules bullshit.
The only time you need systematic rules is to interact with other systematic rules, and the only time systematic rules should interact with your character's beliefs and behaviours are when that's an explicit factor of the setting.
Yes, this means D&D has been doing it wrong more often than not. Doesn't matter, the idea still has merit when done right. The thing is, this also means that you should probably have completely different alignments for most every setting, or even every campaign within a setting. If it's not a metaphysical force that plays a strong enough role in the campaign that you're likely to encounter effects that care whether or not you're lined up with that force, it shouldn't be systematized into rules.
So, in reply to OP (who actually seems to sort of be on the right track):
>>43957408
Classical elements. Yes, as alignments. Earth is not just rocks and metal and shit, but also stability, immutability, fortitude, melancholy, nurturing, and decay. Air isn't just wind and lightning, it's cheerfulness and creativity and impulsiveness and swiftness and intangibility and deception and plague. Water isn't just liquid and cold, it's adaptability, passivity, reaction, go-with-the-flow, cleansing, life-source, isolation (think depths of the ocean/remote islands). Fire isn't just heat and flame, it's passion, activity, initiation, force, change, invention, light, glory, destruction. Get metaphysical with this shit.
>>43960695
And Chinese elements are also cool, I've just had a nerboner for the Greek ones since forever.
Also pretty nifty as alignments: Yin and Yang. Dark/negative/cold/passive/feminine and light/positive/warm/active/masculine. Could potentially even work as a replacement of the good/evil axis to combine with a law/chaos axis for a more morally-ambiguous setting.
>>43960695
>Alignment systems have one purpose, and one purpose only: To model cosmic forces that play a major role in shaping the campaign and the world it takes place in.
Well, my system can be adapted to that purpose. You can determine for yourself what the primary, fundamental, elementary values are, and they can be metaphysical forces. There may even be a god representing each value, and different substances associated with each value as well.
Also, in the setting for this alignment system, converting people to your ideology can help you achieve various victories (by giving certain bonuses), one of which is the ideological victory wherein everyone is in agreement. The setting is more of a civilization builder than DnD; I think it is important to note.
The point is, good/evil is naive, and law/chaos is a false dichotomy. Classic DnD morality is shit and needs to be replaced, and I am offering my solution.
I don't see how the classic elements and four humors are relevant to morality at all, which is typically what alignment refers to. Why would people care about your temperament and magic preferences so much that they'd have to divide into warring factions? It's very absurd, in my opinion, though I'll allow you to persuade me of the merits of your proposal.
>>43960894
It's not about what factions people form amongst themselves, it's about how the universe works on a metaphysical cosmic level.
It doesn't matter one bit, game mechanics-wise, how people divide themselves up on the basis of ideology and morality if that isn't reflected in higher cosmic powers that make their effects tangibly present in the form of divine blessings upon the righteous, holy relics usable only by the pure in heart, etc. On the other hand, even if people mingle with each other with no regard for eleemntal affinity, if your universe runs on the four classical elements and water elemental shit hits fire-dominant people something fierce, that is absolutely something that deserves to be enshrined in game mechanics.
If there are elements of one's personality that correspond to grand cosmic forces in the setting (personal or impersonal) that support those who fit with their ethos and smite those opposing them, then cool, make an alignment tag out of that for mechanical effects to latch onto. If it's purely a matter of cultural alliances and social factionalization, or psychological/personality description and categorization, leave that to the realm of fluff only. Describing worldviews and motivations is a matter for fluff; crunch is for describing abilities and effects.
spontaneous <---> calculating
how much the character thinks things through, how much they tend to manipulate others, whether they favour setting traps or using improvised weapons etc
distributing <---> centralising
whether the character prefers to distribute power/wealth among the masses or to the elite, whether they favour cities and other settlements, how much the character defers to authority
>>43960695
>Alignment systems have one purpose
In D&D they do, sure. We're not talking about D&D here.
>>43957408
Magic color pie
>>43959738
>Posting redditball
>>43957408
>What would be some interesting alignment systems other than the classic good-evil/law-chaos?
https://rpgcharacters.wordpress.com/2011/06/27/alternate-alignments/
Pendragon.
>>43964125
No, they have one purpose in games in general. No matter how nuanced and comprehensive your "alignments" system in describing character personality, if that's ALL it does, it's a waste of time and page space. Unless there's a damn good reason why those character details should matter in mechanical terms given the nature of the setting (or the intended tone for a game that drives at a particular narrative theme), all writing them down does is impose needless restrictions and generate arguments. Because no system of describing and categorizing human beliefs and behaviour can ever be 100% complete, accurate, and precise.
If you absolutely must provide a crutch for characterization, make it an open-ended questionnaire to prompt players to think about important aspects of their character. Using fixed categories is just stupid. Alignment is a game mechanic, and no mechanic should exist without good purpose.
>>43965612
Alignment doesn't impose restrictions unless the supernatural is involved, which makes sense considering it's a -cosmic force-.
It's not a crutch, it's a statistic like hitpoints, and is subject to change.
>>43965661
If it's a statistic that doesn't impact gameplay, it's at most a characterization crutch, or at worst entirely useless; in either case, it's a waste of time.
If it's a statistic that does impact gameplay, there needs to be a reason why. And it will always, at least to some degree, be restricting, because the entire purpose of gameplay statistics is to define the limits of how your character can interact with the game world. If your game (for whatever reason) uses Myers-Briggs personality type as alignment, and treats alignment as an actual game statistic with mechanical significance, then that means that your INTJ is going to be treated differently by some rules than an otherwise-identical ESFP. He will have access to different options, be affected differently by certain effects, or affect others differently with some of his own abilities. Even if it's subject to change, it's still going to limit, because the whole point of game statsistics is to define and limit.
And whether or not it's intended to be restricting, that doesn't change the fact that a good chunk of people will inevitably come to view it that way. D&D is the perfect example: D&D alignments, even though they do point toward cosmic metaphysical forces, aren't intended to be binding, immutable, straitjacket rules, and many people understand that. But plenty of people don't, and that's a major source of the alignment frustration and debates out there. You need to consider not only how it's *intended* to be used, but how people are likely to *actually* perceive and respond to it in practice. And people have a tendency to stupidly oversimplify.
Don't get me wrong, I like categorizing things as much as the next nerd, but there's a time and a place for that sort of thing, and as a mandatory part of chargen is not it if the categorization is all you're doing with it.
>>43957408
>too much Rush
there is no such thing
