Alignment: which one suits you?
diskhate
Member Posts: 12
Alignment is probably one of the best tools that "true" roleplaying (video)games give us to set the standards of how our avatar is on a personal level.
In my experience throughout gaming i've noticed that, even tho most of the fun about alignments comes from trying out different things, a lot of people tend to have favorites.
What is the alignment that is more natural for you to roleplay as? Maybe it is on a subconscious level, because it reppresents you, or just because you think it's more fun.
Personally i love Chaotic Good characters..i love the kind and good hearted people that, in the end, sees and lives with a critical eye and doesn't see the world as black and white and which has to "shift the rules" a bit at times just to obtain what he-she thinks is right.
That said i also like playing Lawfull good characters, who think that following the rules of the status quo is the only right way to live, and that sees any small infraction to the rules as a spark that could spread anarchy in the world.
I rarely play Evil characters..i did a bit more when i was younger, but now i simply lack interest in it for some reason.
What about you?
PS: I tried to look for a similar discussion and i was surprised that there wasn't..i hope that it wasn't a mistake on my part not seeing it
In my experience throughout gaming i've noticed that, even tho most of the fun about alignments comes from trying out different things, a lot of people tend to have favorites.
What is the alignment that is more natural for you to roleplay as? Maybe it is on a subconscious level, because it reppresents you, or just because you think it's more fun.
Personally i love Chaotic Good characters..i love the kind and good hearted people that, in the end, sees and lives with a critical eye and doesn't see the world as black and white and which has to "shift the rules" a bit at times just to obtain what he-she thinks is right.
That said i also like playing Lawfull good characters, who think that following the rules of the status quo is the only right way to live, and that sees any small infraction to the rules as a spark that could spread anarchy in the world.
I rarely play Evil characters..i did a bit more when i was younger, but now i simply lack interest in it for some reason.
What about you?
PS: I tried to look for a similar discussion and i was surprised that there wasn't..i hope that it wasn't a mistake on my part not seeing it
5
Comments
Going from chaotic-good characters when I was younger (I smash heads and rescue damsels, who cares about rules) to neutral-evil (I smash heads, capture damsels and break every rule I can find to amass as much coin as possible) and nowadays it's neutral-good (I only smash heads if provoked or if I have to defend a damsel and I don't care about rules or laws enough to either break them or withhold them and prefer to live outside or on the fringes of society).
The law has some inherent value for me, eg I wold obey speeding limits that I see as stupid even if there is no chance for me to be caught. Only if the law conflicts with an important good then it needs to be resisted and broken, e.g. execution for theft of bread by a starving child.
And when talkin about "real life" i doubt the quantity of "real neutral" people.. just as in d'n'd being neutral would be a concept far harder to apply than most of us probably can imagine; it would mean, for example, that if tomorrow a war was to happen you'd have to first fight with one army and then the other just to re equilibrate the balance (this is an example straight from Baldur's Gate btw)
Well, I rather avoid lawful characters, because there are way to many locks to pick.
As for the "real life", I remember reading Player Manual for 3e, where was given an example of wizard, who is Truly Neutral, because "ethical debates bore her". While I don't get bored by debates, I'm still rather unwilling to say any strong statements. So I figured Neutral is right for me. I might be wrong though.
On the whole True Neutral thing, I think DnD takes it a tad bit too far with how it works; I could see a true netural person fighting on the side of a disadvantaged army just enough to get something he/she wants/needs, and then leaving the army when that army starts to get it's footing against the superior army. I doubt a neutral character is honestly gonna take the side of the weaker army until that weaker army is then the stronger army and then flip sides unless he is a "Character of Extreme Importance."
There's D&D alignment tests to be found however online, that judge me as Lawful Good. I guess it's because I think society is best off by everyone obeying the law. I stop for a red sign even is there's no other traffic coming usually, out of principle.
There's situations however when good trumps the law (no pun intend, god, that sob president really tainted the word), I'm much in favour of civil disobedience as a means to attain justice if the law leads to unjust consequences, for instance if the law benefits multinational corporations instead of the rights of indigenous people. In such cases it's definitely good to defy the law in the name of good.
In terms of alignments I'm just particularly comfortable RPing (beyond NG), CG and CN are easy for me to play. I understand the mindset behind those alignments a lot better than I do others, probably because I understand what it's like to have all the rules stacked against you and I was more CN as a kid. I pretty much never, ever play evil characters, though. Even in the specifically evil campaign a friend of mine ran a few months ago, my character was technically CN.
My personality?:
This doesn't mean I won't do a good deed, pretending to be a nice guy is a great way to increase ones social status (or to simply not be hassled by do-gooders). Loyalty means a lot to me, I hate breaking the law or my word. I don't believe in equality and enjoy a system of hierarchy. I like the ideal of honor, not for the good intentions but merely because it appeals to my sense of vanity (i.e it puts me above common thugs who lack principle).
Compared to the official Lawful Evil description it is almost identical. (The minor exceptions I highlighted in
stroke throughand bold)notaccording to their actionsbutAND according to race, religion, homeland, or social rank. He is loath to break laws or promises.This reluctance comes partly from his nature and partly because he depends on order to protect himself from those who oppose him on moral grounds. Some lawful evil villains have particular taboos, such as not killing in cold blood, or not letting children come to harm. They imagine that these compunctions put them above unprincipled villains.
If for some reason I am not allowed to play lawful evil in video game and/or PnP then I will pick a semi-psychotic carefree Chaotic Neutral. For some reason I role play that one quite well especially in PnP
Most behaviors are never as straightforward as they seem, there's always underlying reasons. That said, it doesn't worry me at all if you have to kill somebody because letting them live is too much trouble for the rest of the society and not worth the hassle.
So a true neutral tempered with a large dose of pragmatism. Also not particularly moved by appeals to "morality", whose morality?
The morality of people living a thousand years ago, 500 years ago, 100 years ago, last year, now, in a hundred years time, a thousands years time?
Don't see how you can base anything on something so shifty.
I stick to chaotics, though. Ever since I realized that all Lawful is Evil. I would probably be Chaotic Neutral, actually, but it's easier to declare yourself as bad as they can believe it. Leaves you more leeway to actually be kind if you are so inclined. So it's the black leathers of CE for me. As for other alignments, sure, I could role-play all kinds, I have come up with elaborate persnonae, but the problem is, where to play them? Not in the computer adaptations, surely. And it has been ages since my modest exposure to PnP, and the campaign was pretty stupid anyway. Maybe if there were many player groups around, if those people played something other than the banal and cliche 3E, 4E, 5E... I'm ready to get carried away and I'm ready to make waves, but there is no ocean. Not even a lake.
On law-chaos, there are good parts of both and bad parts of both. Law can be about honesty and keeping your word, but it can also be about harshly enforcing conformity. Chaos can be about freedom from conformity and freedom from being stuck in a bad situation. But chaos can also mean being unreliable, betraying people, and lying a lot.
You only get two results? I have gotten every single one depending on test. And how I even answer each test depends on what the society around me would be like as some societies are better than others and some societies are very dystopian.
For instance, let's say they have a law saying you have to pay a tax on shopping bags. If you don't pay it, that's theft and there's a warrant for you. If you refuse to come to jail for the warrant (sometimes it takes a while for police to serve a warrant but eventually they do), then the police send more. If you keep resisting they will either subdue you or kill you.
Same for a traffic rule. You have to stop your car for the police or more and more will chase you. And if you refuse to come in they will forcibly subdue you until you're either subdued or dead.
For a dragon, it would be like a law against dragons eating people. And if a human in society was a cannibal then police would send in a team to stop the person very aggressively.
A lot of times in role-playing games, a major part of the game is you going around to people's homes and looting them for valuables. This is both medieval fantasy and for instance Star Wars Knights of The Old Republic 1. A person doing this kind of stuff in real life is a crazy kleptomaniac.
Pretty much how I play most games, as well (like Mass Effect, NWN, Dragon Age, etc) where such choices are available.
In real life ...
"I've never done good things
I've never done bad things
I never did anything out of the blue . . ."
Which I think makes me Lawful Neutral.