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Post by geneweigel on Sept 17, 2022 9:50:33 GMT -5
With all the talk Tolkien TV bringing us down, I think its time to get "brain dead" in our own idiom.
I was walking home thinking about all my game-oriented evil now that they are literally face to face with each other in real time because I'm actively wondering how they interact for the continued fiction. The feeling that I'm getting is that it was easier for me to create chaotic evil "villains" and/or "big boss" types than lawful evil.
This led me to Tolkien's characters. Are the evil characters all basically "D&D lawful evil" with no regard for the selfish independent side of evil? I'm thinking Gollum and Saruman as key examples.
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Post by GRWelsh on Sept 18, 2022 8:08:55 GMT -5
The D&D alignment system is archetypal and vague enough that it is possible to argue about it especially in regards to law and chaos. I'd say Gollum is chaotic evil since he is selfishly out for himself and doesn't seem to have a plan, other than to recover 'his precious' and is somewhat unpredictable and difficult to catch. He's the "agent of chaos" in the whole book by getting the One Ring back only to fall into the Cracks of Doom. Saruman is selfish but also orderly... He is himself the leader of an order of wizards, and a servant of the West, but abandons that in his desire for personal power and the One Ring... I'd call him neutral evil in the sense that he is in between order and chaos. Without reference to good or evil I think of chaotic individuals as the unpredictable, artistic, creative types and lawful individuals as the predictable, practical, "pay the bills on time" conservative types.
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Post by geneweigel on Sept 18, 2022 8:53:07 GMT -5
So with that line of thinking are they all just neutral evil (with tendencies) and not regarding law or chaos strictly in any way whatsoever?
Lets look at the obvious Chainmail to D&D tp AD&D shifts:
Orcs starting in Chainmail shifted from "chaos" to "chaos & neutral" in D&D to "lawful evil" in AD&D
Elves starting in Chainmail shifted from "neutral with a predisposition for law" to "law & neutral" in D&D to "chaotic good" in AD&D
So with this pattern which was a move to get it away from a "law suit" they decided to nix the inferred idea that Sauron is "chaos" and along with his representatives the orcs being instead "lawful evil".
Lets just say if the Tolkien "evil" world is just all "evil" is it therefore "neutral evil" and simply put in classic D&D terms: "CHAOS"?
Are we biased because we are translating from Tolkien to D&D which has Tolkien's patterns and then a move away from him?
Which then leads to the question: Is "chaos" just "evil" in Gary Gygax disguise? Poul Anderson's elves are not so nice.
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Post by GRWelsh on Sept 18, 2022 9:59:31 GMT -5
This is something I always wanted to talk to EGG about but never got the chance. The alignment system is supposed to be a tool to help people role play, but has caused a lot of confusion. I believe EGG liked the way Poul Anderson and Michael Moorcock (also influenced by Anderson) defined the conflict on the law versus chaos axis in their fiction and so that is how it entered CHAINMAIL and then D&D. There was that early theme of the spreading and upholding civilization versus the dangers of the wilderness and outlawry (i.e. being on the frontier or borderlands like in B2). When applied to Tolkien's world, it doesn't fit as well. The likes of Arioch in Moorcock and the elves of Faerie in Anderson are forces of chaos, but the same can't be said about Sauron and the Elves in Tolkien. My impression was that EGG added good and evil to the alignment system to allow more nuance (in AD&D) to address what was later was regarded an oversimplification (in D&D).
There is an article EGG wrote in the February 1976 issue of The Strategic Review titled "The Meaning of Law and Chaos in Dungeons & Dragons and Their Relationships to Good and Evil" that is worth revisiting.
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Post by geneweigel on Sept 18, 2022 12:14:27 GMT -5
For reference here are the Gary bits from DRAGON with my comments underneath:
Players concealing alignment the right way and then general handling of alignment interaction.
A more intense look at definitive AD&D evil.
A mirror of the evil article for AD&D good.
How all deities use the alignment system for direct profit.
The alignment evolution by legality first but a well prepared explanation after did not last intact in our post-modern gameplay view because when it hit bumps Gary wasn't there to iron them out.
In real game time, I would accept Sauron being of any alignment as long as the explanation was well presented. If I was to ram Sauron straight into the World of Greyhawk then there would be a problem. The Horned Society admixture of alignments with LE being the superficial basis but in actuality it being pure evil has given us all a raging headache to contemplate.
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Post by GRWelsh on Sept 19, 2022 9:31:44 GMT -5
I don't really lean into alignment anymore except for classes like paladins, clerics and those with a direct patron god, saint, demon, etc. Holy avengers are aligned to lawful good, but I don't do a version of that for every alignment, like swords and other magic items aligned to chaotic good, lawful neutral, neutral evil and so on. It reminds me of the DRAGON magazine articles of first the anti-paladin (#39) and later the paramander, lyan, myrikhan, arrikhan, garath, illrigger and fantra ("A Plethora of Paladins" in #106). I never understood the anti-paladin concept (even though it certainly looks cool) because to me the archetype of CE is a brigand. Being a paladin takes self-discipline, piety, training, etc. All you have to do to be a brigand is act on your worst impulses and have minimal self control -- anyone can be a brigand! So, there is an unequal dynamic among the alignments because they describe behavior moreso than nine equal and competing ethos. An exclamation like "I have found the Sword of Chaotic Evil, which cannot be wielded properly by those who are Lawful Evil or Neutral Evil!" just sounds off to me in a way that doesn't for Lawful Good. Magic items or classes attuned to specific gods or religions feel like a much better fit than devotion to a particular alignment.* If anything, evilly aligned things should be easier to use for those of any alignment so they can cause corruption... like with the One Ring!
*I might for example place an illrigger NPC in my campaign as worshipper of an evil power just to shake things up and confuse the players. I like the idea of an evil fighter with unexpected abilities and a special follower like a devil or imp.
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Post by GRWelsh on Sept 19, 2022 11:31:35 GMT -5
Sauron seems to like order and law enough, as long as it is under his control. And he was the willing servant of Morgoth. That may imply lawful evil. He seems like a long term planner with a lot of patience. Morgoth introducing discord into the Music of the Ainur and his propensity for destruction and mayhem (the Lamps, the Two Trees, stealing the Silmarils) make him seem like a force of chaos. Since I first leafed through the Monster Manual in the same year that I read THE HOBBIT and LOTR (1981) that made me internalize elves being chaotic good and dwarves being lawful good. If you really want to do that overlay, I'd say Durin's Folk, the Longbeards, are the ones that tend towards law and good, with other dwarf kindreds perhaps closer to neutral. Elves can work together and honor tradition and get together in big armies, which seems more lawful, but if you lean into Feanorian impulsiveness and the "Fa-La-La-Lally" whimsicalness you can map in the chaotic tendencies. The Noldor seem very lawful among themselves once they are in Middle Earth, but defying the Valar and committing the Kinslaying are totally chaotic acts done in the heat of the moment.
In the AD&D alignment system as envisioned it would be (hypothetically) possible for chaotic good elves and chaotic evil brigands to unite against some overwhelming force of law, and it has always been hard for me to imagine that. But then again...
"We'll work together, but only until we overthrow Sauron's scheme to impose a 40 hour work week in factories for everyone across Middle Earth!"
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