About a month or so ago, Dael Kingsmill on Youtube produced a video discussing alignment, and used the Shakespeare play Julius Caesar to make a new alignment chart. I was really taken by the idea, and after playing with it a bit I prefer to use it in my games. Highly recommend the video if you have time. Here's a link to it.
Her idea takes away the Good/Evil and Lawful/Chaotic dichotomies and rebrands them to be more... Neutrally described?
Good becomes Altruistic, and Evil becomes Selfish. I've commonly heard them described that way, but taking away the overtly evocative words 'Good' and 'Evil' makes the world perhaps more morally grey--
Chaotic and Lawful, on the more interesting hand, become Passion and Reason. I love this for many reasons, but mostly for two: (1) Chaotic characters have more grounding, and are less to just be raging psychopaths because their 'chaotic'; (2) You remove morality from both sides to make it more relatable. "Lawful" has an inherent bent to it that becomes complex to divorce. Reason on the other hand has no implicit moral bias, and Passion doesn't mean you're an unpredictable mess that does things 'just because'.
It's not for everyone, nor every campaign. A classic hero story is served very well by Good/Evil, and many groups love the Lawful/Chaotic-- But I do think her proposal is really interesting, and it got me to care about alignment again! The magic of "repackaging" something without truly changing it.
To aid with using it in my own campaigns, I decided to make up a chart my players could more easily reference-- So I thought I'd share it here! I made mine into a spectrum, since I also find that far more attractive for alignment.
I actually just did this in my campaign. I told the players that no evil characters were allowed, since in the past we would always play with 5 to 7 and the party was always fractured by an evil character or two splitting the party up.
I had them roll the typical alignment, then asked them to do this sub-alignment. The sub-alignment colors their main alignment. For example, doing the introduction campaign, they must have a loyalty to their patron Gundren Rockseeker. If their character is self-interested, then maybe Gundren is simply a guarantee for a good paying job and has always been generous to them in a world where good money is hard to come by. If their character is compassionate, maybe they believe in Gundren's ambitions and want to help him succeed.
The players ended up with a Good / Rational / Altruist Monk, Good / Passionate / Altruist Warlock, and a Neutral / Rational / Self-Interested Bard.
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About a month or so ago, Dael Kingsmill on Youtube produced a video discussing alignment, and used the Shakespeare play Julius Caesar to make a new alignment chart. I was really taken by the idea, and after playing with it a bit I prefer to use it in my games. Highly recommend the video if you have time. Here's a link to it.
Her idea takes away the Good/Evil and Lawful/Chaotic dichotomies and rebrands them to be more... Neutrally described?
Good becomes Altruistic, and Evil becomes Selfish. I've commonly heard them described that way, but taking away the overtly evocative words 'Good' and 'Evil' makes the world perhaps more morally grey--
Chaotic and Lawful, on the more interesting hand, become Passion and Reason. I love this for many reasons, but mostly for two: (1) Chaotic characters have more grounding, and are less to just be raging psychopaths because their 'chaotic'; (2) You remove morality from both sides to make it more relatable. "Lawful" has an inherent bent to it that becomes complex to divorce. Reason on the other hand has no implicit moral bias, and Passion doesn't mean you're an unpredictable mess that does things 'just because'.
It's not for everyone, nor every campaign. A classic hero story is served very well by Good/Evil, and many groups love the Lawful/Chaotic-- But I do think her proposal is really interesting, and it got me to care about alignment again! The magic of "repackaging" something without truly changing it.
To aid with using it in my own campaigns, I decided to make up a chart my players could more easily reference-- So I thought I'd share it here! I made mine into a spectrum, since I also find that far more attractive for alignment.
Where would you place your character?
I like it. I'll remember this.
I actually just did this in my campaign. I told the players that no evil characters were allowed, since in the past we would always play with 5 to 7 and the party was always fractured by an evil character or two splitting the party up.
I had them roll the typical alignment, then asked them to do this sub-alignment. The sub-alignment colors their main alignment. For example, doing the introduction campaign, they must have a loyalty to their patron Gundren Rockseeker. If their character is self-interested, then maybe Gundren is simply a guarantee for a good paying job and has always been generous to them in a world where good money is hard to come by. If their character is compassionate, maybe they believe in Gundren's ambitions and want to help him succeed.
The players ended up with a Good / Rational / Altruist Monk, Good / Passionate / Altruist Warlock, and a Neutral / Rational / Self-Interested Bard.