Steve Jackson Games - Site Navigation
Home General Info Follow Us Search Illuminator Store Forums What's New Other Games Ogre GURPS Munchkin Our Games: Home

Go Back   Steve Jackson Games Forums > Roleplaying > The Fantasy Trip > The Fantasy Trip: House Rules

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
Old 03-17-2020, 05:32 AM   #11
zot
 
Join Date: May 2018
Default Re: TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D

Not everyone wants morality as a theme in their game but rather than creating a rigid, simplistic system, alignments can actually provide an interesting playground for complex moral questions and dilemmas if you use the full background presented in AD&D's PH and DMG. AD&D alignments make morality a "thing" in the game that you can play with and make game rules about -- this works well in "high trust" games where the DM acts as a "story teller" but it might work poorly in "low trust" games where the DM acts as a "referee" and the story is supposed to be emergent.

One thing I've found that people really misunderstand about AD&D alignments is that they are tied not to cultures, but to the planes. Alignments are supposed to be like the medieval elements; a PC's "moral composition" is like matter from a medieval point of view, made from law, chaos, good, and evil instead of earth, air, fire, and water. A character's alignment determines which of the 16 outer planes they're most closely associated with.

Because alignments are made from this "ideal material", cultural ideas of law, chaos, good, and evil don't always line up with them. Some players are confused, for example, about what happens if a paladin comes from a culture that reveres brutality. A culture can have "unlawful laws" which a lawful character can, and should, break or it can have "good" definitions for "actions". So a character that a culture that says that balance is the highest good might call someone "lawful good" who is actually lawful neutral. A chaotic character might be obliged to follow a "chaotic law"; you could argue that Aleister Crowley's "do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law" is a "chaotic neutral law". So a brutal culture might normally produce antipaladins, rather than paladins, but call them just paladins.

The planes actually form a continuum with "gray areas" that blend into each other at the "edges" of the planes (2D diagrams don't capture multidimensional relationships well). In AD&D, cosmic "location" in the outer planes determines the "alignment value" at that point. The DM's guide also says the outer planes have their nature because they are home to creatures of their alignment but this actually makes it an interdependent relationship. Original D&D, btw, only had Moorcock's (Jungian) concept of law and chaos, which D&D 4e more or less went back to.

The planes came from Moorcock's writing but AD&D's concept was actually different from his idea. Moorcock's planes are mutable and change depending on how much power the gods of law or chaos have on them. "Purveyors of Dichotomy" in "Beyond Countless Doorways" does put Moorcock's idea into D&D, btw, and actually generalizes the concept beyond Moorcock's law and chaos (and beyond AD&D's addition of good, and evil).

In high school, I had some good experiences playing a lawful good monk in but overall I'd say my experiences with alignment (as played out by high school DMs) was bad. We preferred TFT to D&D but I'd say that in almost every high school game (D&D, TFT, Traveller, etc.) we all played "murder hobos", so morality actually wasn't part of our games at all.

Nowadays though, we play out morality a LOT but it's normally in the context of Fate aspects instead of D&D alignment. I have sometimes used a "Fate version of D&D" where each PC has a high concept aspect tagged with an alignment and I've found that to work quite well.
zot is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-17-2020, 05:54 AM   #12
hcobb
 
hcobb's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Pacheco, California
Default Re: TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D

Bring "absolute" good and evil into TFT by crossing it with In Nomine.
__________________
-HJC
hcobb is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-25-2020, 02:36 PM   #13
KevinJ
 
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: Arizona
Default Re: TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D

Turn the chart so that Neutral Good is at the very top. Neutral good is the most good, since it is not adulterated with such concepts as authoritarianism or anarchy. Just chuck out Law and Chaos and you're all good.
__________________
So you've got the tiger by the tail. Now what?
KevinJ is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-26-2020, 09:18 AM   #14
zot
 
Join Date: May 2018
Default Re: TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D

Quote:
Originally Posted by KevinJ View Post
Turn the chart so that Neutral Good is at the very top. Neutral good is the most good, since it is not adulterated with such concepts as authoritarianism or anarchy. Just chuck out Law and Chaos and you're all good.
Unless you want Moorcock's cosmology -- law and chaos are very interesting in his books...
zot is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-28-2020, 02:54 AM   #15
KevinJ
 
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: Arizona
Default Re: TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D

Quote:
Originally Posted by zot View Post
Unless you want Moorcock's cosmology -- law and chaos are very interesting in his books...
I've read most of Moorcocks's works and his Law vs Chaos was interesting within the context of his continuity, but I never liked the idea outside those books.
__________________
So you've got the tiger by the tail. Now what?
KevinJ is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-28-2020, 04:24 AM   #16
DarkPumpkin
 
Join Date: Jan 2018
Location: Cidri (exact location withheld)
Default Re: TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D

"TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D".

Well, OK. Except that it doesn't. At all.
DarkPumpkin is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-28-2020, 02:23 PM   #17
Skarg
 
Join Date: May 2015
Default Re: TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D

Quote:
Originally Posted by DarkPumpkin View Post
"TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D".

Well, OK. Except that it doesn't. At all.
Exactly. Unfortunately, the crazy threads get a lot of attention.
Skarg is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-31-2020, 12:11 PM   #18
KevinJ
 
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: Arizona
Default Re: TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D

Quote:
Originally Posted by DarkPumpkin View Post
"TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D".

Well, OK. Except that it doesn't. At all.
Yes, there is no alignment system within the RAW, but a group can choose to use them if they wish. Any group who cannot play a game that doesn't include rules like alignment are just limiting themselves without knowing that they are. I see this in so many players who have only played games like D&D and find anything not D&D confusing and scary.
__________________
So you've got the tiger by the tail. Now what?
KevinJ is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 03-31-2020, 12:20 PM   #19
Terquem
 
Join Date: Apr 2018
Location: Idaho Falls
Default Re: TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D

A lot depends on your campaign style preferences.

The rules themselves do not have a "system" for establishing the effect playing a "good" or "evil" character will have on the accumulation of experience points (as 1e D&D did) or the acquisition of special skills/spells/abilities.

There is no prohibition on introducing such rules into your own campaign. Many players enjoy deep inter-dimensional "good" vs "evil," "law" vs "chaos," style campaigns that might warrant these kinds of rules.

But, inferring, from your own reading of the rules, that the game already has this system, because you see it that way, seems a strange thing to suggest unless you just want to argue with others about how the rules are "supposed" to be understood.
Terquem is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 04-23-2020, 01:48 PM   #20
KevinJ
 
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: Arizona
Default Re: TFT has the same alignment system as AD&D

Quote:
Originally Posted by zot View Post
Unless you want Moorcock's cosmology -- law and chaos are very interesting in his books...
Turning the chart also puts Law Neutral and Chaotic neutral on the opposing points on the Diamond, better reflecting that balance.
__________________
So you've got the tiger by the tail. Now what?
KevinJ is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Fnords are Off
[IMG] code is Off
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -6. The time now is 02:38 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.9
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.