Playing with: alignment-based race

So in some fantasy settings, there are races that are "always evil" or "always good". Instead of having the race be always good or evil, I think it would be interesting to play with the other axis of D&D's alignment system.

So, in this setting, there would be 2 non-human races. One of them is impulsive by nature, and tend to be Chaotic. They can be Chaotic Good, Neutral, or Evil, but they're almost always Chaotic. Contrasting them would be a race of stoics who are almost always lawful.

i do remember playing with this.

in my setting there are shapeshifters. in all timelines except the current one, they were just inherently chaotic, favoring neither extreme on the other axis.

in the move from timeline 3 to 4 though, something seems to have changed in them; this world's shapeshifters are just as overwhelmingly powerful and hard to kill as before, only now they're exclusively chaotic evil, and only interact with others for the sake of causing damage. in all timelines their origins are the same- they're the amalgamation of 5 or more souls who had a close connection in life and died in anguish- and yet their behavior is inexplicably different, and not even the setting's equivelent to god can figure out why. it is fairly certain however that they're not really evil, but that they no longer have the (admittedly confused) sapience they had before and they're probably being controlled by a higher power.

the demon races also were largely considered inherently chaotic both in terms of society and form, and could very easily fall into a chaotic mindset too- not anymore, they've since settled down in every way, though there remain some smallish groups of demons who cling to the old ways.

It's an interesting idea to play around with, but the one thing I always recommend when playing a narrative trope across an entire group is to figure out why they're that way.

The Lawful race would be pretty easy to construct because we already have countless well-documented examples in our own world, with stuff like organized religion, political systems, empires, etc.

But the bigger questions are with the Chaotic race. Why are they chaotic? Is it because of some values in their society? Do they have some kind of tradition based on chaos? Do they even have a clearly-defined culture? How do these people look at free will? How do they measure morality? There's a strong argument to be had about For Happiness, and I could see their version of a Big Bad being "the guy who wants to set everything in a predefined place," or for the Evil Empire to be, well, evil.

What even is civilization, to these people? World historians have figured out that some groups would migrate to hills and mountains to get away from the "oppressive" valley-settling order-makers, so how does that play into this group's culture? Is there a hill-and-valley divide between these races? Are the chaotic ones mostly hunter-gatherers and nomadic groups, or have some of them made more structured societies? How would the other groups in that race view the structured group?

There's definitely a lot you could play around with here, and even a lot you could do well. But if you're going to make it work you'll have to think long and hard about who these people are, what ideas they come from, and where they might go.

Just a brief surmise of the setting: The story takes place on a world where human colonists (having fled a dying Earth) colonized an alien world, which already has a sentient, hunter-gatherer race on it, which is the chaotic race (the lawful race being the robots humanity brought with them).

The chaotic race (Xerians) mostly live in hunter-gathering tribes. They're a younger species than humanity, so they haven't really become "civilized" yet.

They're chaotic for a few reasons: 1. The deities they worship (in a physical religion) are mostly chaotic neutral trickster gods who help whoever amuses them the most.

2. Simple brain chemistry. They're rather emotional by nature, and tend to come across somewhat as cloud cuckoolanders to humans as a result.

3. Their race has been in conflict with groups that consider themselves "more civilized" than they, which has led the term to lead a sour taste in their mouth. As such, their tribes tend to follow slightly anti-authoritarian views.

The villains of the setting are a neutral evil cult, BTW.

For the record, the questions I asked were rhetorical. To be completely honest, I'm not interested in infodumps about a work-in-progress. Those questions I gave are just things for you, as a creator, to think about.

Although I don't think having gods would work at all, since worshipping any kind of deity would mean there's at least some order in their group, which would go against their core morality of "do what you want".

A question I think is relevant here: can you characterise them as such without making them into a Planet of Hats?

Even traditional Always Chaotic Evil races have organization. Such as the orcs, who get formed into army for the dark lord of the week's bidding. And dark elves have an entire system for killing people and getting away with it.

There's complete chaos, but there can also be organized chaos.

Excellent point, sir. I was kinda trying to get at that myself, but that's better said than I could do.

I really have a hard time understanding why the servants of a given Dark Lord are Always Chaotic Evil. Like if they're following a single leader, that means they have some sense of order. In fact, that very page says

Which is why I think you, Protagonist506, should think long and hard about what "chaos" really means, and how chaos-as-an-ideal would affect the culture of a race like this.

i always figured a truly chaotic society simply wouldnt exist. i could see a purely chaotic race trying, and then promptly failing to keep their society going because no rules are being followed and there are simply no real benefits to banding together under normal circumstances when theres not really going to be anything holding the society together.

An always chaotic race is going to be a race of solitary (when they're not breeding and whatnot) beings who may or may not be nomadic and may or may not be impulsive. They won't have much of a community but culture is about how you survive and thrive in a given time and place. If evolution is a thing, this race would probably be lethal enough that they don't need communities to continue existing, like tigers or rhinos. They'll probably have low-level technologies, no writing, and no "high" art.

An always lawful race is going to be a race of social beings, likely settled and probably disciplined rather than impulsive. Their culture would be much richer than a chaotic race's.

The dark elves in Warhammer have always bothered me - how do you even HAVE a functional society, or even functional family units, where EVERYONE is a cruel torturing bastard.

No one would develop to a point where they could functionally contribute, operate within a military unit, provide healing, be a trader. The society would collapse.

And I've Read the novels with the Uber-Bastard Malus. Who can apparently do backflips in plate armour, so I should probably temper my irritation.

I normally use this argument for why the lawful-chaotic axis is rubbish to begin with, but it applies here too.

The more laws a society have, the more loopholes and exceptions and conflicting jurisdictions and objectives it will have, by necessity, which makes adapting to developments and gaming the system a critical life skill. Conversely, life in a nomadic or agrarian society with a few rules, duties, and norms that everyone knows and accepts is much more routine and predictable.

How I was going to structure the "Chaotic vs. Lawful" axis was that Chaotics are more hedonistic, where as Lawfuls are more "Code-Based".

So, for example, a chaotic good character would be someone who does good things "because it's fun".

You could have Chaotic characters work together in a group in theory, if they found each other's presence amusing or wanted to stave of loneliness.

Depending on how you portray it, that seems like it may have the problems mentioned above, if each individual does whatever they feel like at the moment. It may have difficulty developing agriculture (which means sweating over a field for an entire year through whatever weather may come, for food that doesn't taste great but you're less likely to starve) or engineering (kilns and forges are hot, stone is heavy, and craftsmanship takes patience and a lot of mistakes).

Does hedonism in this society allow for "planned pleasure" (like Epicureanism or utilitarianism)? That would allow for short-term sacrifices in hope of more happiness in the long run ("this is going to hurt but the bone will heal faster" or "I'll work in your vineyard if I get some of the wine at the harvest in addition to my wages"), while still having a distinct feel (...expecting on all sides that the worker can decide they don't like it and leave whenever they want to, and the vineyard owner will just have to deal with it).

D&D's alignment system falls apart if you spend even 30 seconds digging into it, and is a terrible reference for real-world morality in general. Please stop using it.

Also, pigeonholing an entire race of people as either Chaotic or Lawful, or Good or Evil, or any other stereotype, is naive, childish and the textbook definition of racism. Please stop doing it.

Chilling out might be helpful, dude.

First, research what real racism really is.

There are REAL biological and psychological differences between an elf and an orc. That isn't racism. Not by a long shot.

Racism is behaving as if the apparent differences between members of the same species constitute real differences. I may be black and my friend may be white, but we're still both homo sapien sapien, and that means our bodies and minds are the same under the integument.

Second, how else are we supposed to simulate morality in a pen-and-paper roleplaying game? Real life is too damn complicated to try that. There's a perfectly good reason D&D came up with the nine-alignment system: it's as good as we're gonna get.

edited 10th Mar '15 10:33:27 AM by nekomoon14

That argument only works if I start with statements like "X real world culture is inherently evil. Or Y Race trends towards being Chaotic good."

Dara O'Brien does an entire skit around reducing nationaliities to one or two term steroetypes - Vanuatans end up being "Shite at smalltalk and angry." Go watch it, it's a nice skew on how such systems work if you apply them to the "real world".

Racism also sits around superiority of one race versus another or highlighting differences. And racism EXISTS within the roleplaying elements - the Dark Elves are all about despising light elves and all that.

Half of RP alignment systems are a PNP method of trying to filter a complex system down into easily digestible chunks. A warrior culture is "evil" because they show no mercy, but they're lawful because they have an honour code etc.

Also, it's a way of showing differences - if every race was the same, stats would be linear across the board with them being influenced, maybe, by background. In D&D it make sense to have variety which is a result, potentially of culture - Orcs are bulkier because their culture encourages more martial attitudes and not so much on education. You could argue "racism", but they're fictional races - it'd be akin to crying foul that elephants aren't rock climbers because it's discrimination - certain races may have, in the setting, evolved along certain lines and, if your narrative is cohesive enough, maybe show how such evolution could have also influenced their culture.

Do you have a better system? I mean, I admit there are a few tweaks I'd make, but there really isn't a significantly better system out there.

As for the racism argument, I can see how stating that a race is biologically good or evil (even when removed from their native culture or other factors) could be considered racist. But since I'm talking Lawful Vs. Chaotic here, and explaining the biological rationale behind it (robots are lawful because they're an artificial servant race with suppressed emotions. Aliens are chaotic because their alien brain chemistry makes them more emotional and cloud-cuckoolanderish).

You can simulate morality in pen-and-paper roleplaying games by roleplaying. By having your characters make moral and ethical decisions on their own terms. By getting into their heads and understanding what Right and Wrong mean to them personally. By engaging with all the wonderfully messy and human reasons people do good and bad things. Yeah it's hard, but it's a damned sight more realistic and interesting than simplifying all the complexities of moral thought down to a convenient 9-point chart.

And it's not even a very good chart, at that. D&D's alignment system has a million loopholes and edge cases that make a mockery of its simplicity, like the classic Orc Babies scenario. Under base D&D rules, all Orcs are Evil. Also under base D&D rules, killing Evil beings is Good. Therefore, killing all Orcs, even baby Orcs, is Good.

In three easy steps, you can justify genocide. D&D morality is terrible.

And if you divorce the alignment system from the specifics of any of the base D&D settings, you still face the problem that everyone has their own ideas what Lawful, Chaotic, Good, Evil and Neutral actually mean. This thread alone is proof of that. And if no-one can agree what any of the nine moral stances even mean, that pretty much renders the entire system pointless.

Also, there are plenty of Pn P RPG systems out there besides D&D, and most of them don't use alignment systems at all. How do you think players of Traveller, Shadowrun, Eclipse Phase, Engine Heart, or even GURPS manage to navigate the quagmire of morality? Not by relying on a vague 9-point chart, that's for sure, and yet they seem to do just fine. Hell, I've even heard of D&D groups abandoning the alignments with few problems. The system is nowhere near as universal or necessary as you seem to think.

As for my point about racism... yeah, I'm just gonna drop that. Can't form a solid argument to back it up right now, shouldn't have brought it up.

My involvement in this thread so far has been a thought experiment about "how would Chaotic traits work on a culture-wide level?" and I've come to realize that it really is impossible to pull off for any alignment, any race.

Chaotic doesn't work: Sure, you can have wandering bands of hunter-gatherers, but even then there's a sense of order, cooperation, and trust.
Lawful doesn't work: Everybody wants some sense of being unique. They want some special purpose. Having everything be orderly means nobody breaks from the mold, nothing changes, and nothing improves.
Good doesn't work because people will always find some way to deviate from the commonly-accepted measure of "good". It's part of the reason the Judeo-Christian Ten Commandments exist: pointing out how people will fail at being Good, even just some of the time.
Evil doesn't work because then everyone's stabbing each other in the back and nobody gets anything done. A truly Evil culture would effectively commit suicide.

And that's assuming these hypothetical cultures would exist in the first place. But no sane person would let that happen for the reasons I pointed out.

Bouncing off Tungsten's points, I say you should just figure out the story and develop a fun cast of characters. Alignment is pointless. What matters is the story.

Also:

I hope you don't mind I quoted that for a Tumblr post. That's just amazing.

edited 11th Mar '15 8:07:44 PM by AwSamWeston

If I decide that every orc is always evil and can't choose any other way to be, then genocide IS justified - we're not talking about homo sapien sapiens remember? We're talking about another species that just happens to look a bit like us.

We commit genocide against bacteria and viruses, yet I doubt most people would see it as such because in Real Life "good" and "evil" are relative, subjective, and based on self-interest. We define anything harmful as "evil" and anything helpful as "good".

In fiction, good and evil CAN be absolute, objective, and factual to the extent that they have effects on the setting and characters outside of characters' perceptions. We have to stop treating fantasy like reality because even verisimilitude can be overdone (that's why we have tropes like Reality Is Unrealistic). If your orcs are analogues for real "races", then you already have a problem right there because you're treating real people like fictional people, and THAT's closer to true racism.

edited 12th Mar '15 3:28:48 AM by nekomoon14

Remind me to never ask for your advice on international politics.

But no, seriously. You're equating Orcs with microbes. That's the first step to dehumanizing the enemy. That is literally the thought process people use to justify genocide.

Think about it from the Orcs' perspective: "All these humans come in, slaughter our friends and family, and they say it's in service of some good cause? No sir! We just wanna do our thing with our own tribes."

Also, remember that (unlike real microbes) Orcs and other fantasy races have their own thought processes. They're intelligent. Sapient. Fantasy races are human-like for a reason: they were created as stand-ins for other, real-world cultures.

And I can't accept the argument that "it's just fiction" because, like it or not, our fiction influences how people behave in the real world. The books we read, the movies we watch, they all have an effect on our perception. White people once used Blackface to emphasize the negative stereotypes of black people, and to avoid casting a black person who wouldn't go along with the role. We as a species need to get past that.

So no. Orcs are not Evil by default. Humans and Elves are not Good by default. Everyone's just People. By. Default.

edited 12th Mar '15 7:17:37 AM by AwSamWeston

I think it depends on the state of the fiction you're writing - if it is a race with culture, then yes, lumping everyone in is a bit weird. But you can use the culture to stipulate why some people THINK said race are "evil".

It comes down to moral absolutes as well. Slavery is evil, but in a fantasy (And also in historical cultures) it was seen as a viable economic necessity.

I think this goes back to Tolkien, perhaps further, but he popularised it - the Orcs had no real culture, no trade or much beyond the fact they were purely BRED to be warriors, weapon smiths and brutish shadows of races. They were "paper people". Arguably not even really sentient, just perhaps sapient.

Now that does pose issues, but maybe you can look at it as a negative for the Big Bad - he creates a race that, ostensibly, have no free will. Yes, it means that there are no ramifications with killing them - they're basically organic automatons.

Now take the orcs, give them culture, families, ways of life etc and label them as evil, still issues, but that comes with moral relativism. Is the setting calling them evil? Why? And are there exceptions?

Remember, D&D started as a ruleset for adventuring, not really an in depth world building system. It's only as the setting has grown that you start to see the cracks. And yes, the morality system is basic, but again, it was for a "pick up and play" lego-style of building.

Here you're arguing a point - he doesn't equate, precisely, the Orc with a microbe, but with something that can "do harm". Neither are evil, but we say they are "bad" because they (in certain settings) want to to cause us harm. And the context is important as well - see my above point about whether the Orcs were even sapient. Which then raises issues about if you can even call them evil if they have no free will at all. WHOLE different can of worms...

Now, on the original question, can you realistically MAKE a race in fiction that is entirely alignment based? I'd agree - you can't, really, without potentially hitting some unfortunate analogies, or turning it into a sort of parody of said Planet of Hats mentality.

Long and the short: Real world morality is complex, people are complex, "races" (in fiction - which are really different species) are possibly biologically dispose to certain actions that could be seen as "good or evil" depending on the viewer. In reality, it tends to be societies and social constructs that are widely good or evil, not the species. And again, depending on the viewer.

We’re not talking about real-world politics, we’re talking about fantasy.

If, in a particular setting, orcs are IN FACT inherently and invariably evil, then their eradication only makes sense. Remember, we’re not talking about people MISTAKING them for evil, we’re talking about them basically being Made of Evil. If my orcs are IN FACT always evil, then nobody in the setting should care what they think because all they want to do is kill, maim, torture, and terrorize other species (and probably members of their own species).

Intelligence doesn’t equal virtue, neither does sapience. And I don’t think ANY fantasy “race” should be based on a real-life ethnicity because REAL racism sneaks its way in and you get elves who are always white unless they’re evil, and everyone knows that elves are always better. That’s why I don’t like how Eurocentric the fantasy genre is. See, when you bring real racism into a conversation about fantasy you diminish the real struggles of real people. I don’t know how to make this clearer: racism can only exist within a species – Fantastic Racism is not REALLY racism at all (it’s certainly related, but it’s not the same thing exactly) and to treat it as such is irresponsible.

Please stop treating fantasy like reality, because then you’ll treat reality like fantasy, and that’s dangerous. In real life, there don’t seem to be any flesh-and-blood elves and orcs running around, but there are people who view others as essentially “other than human”.

If I decide to make my orcs Always Chaotic Evil, that’s what they are, whether it’s “politically correct” or not. So no, they aren’t “just people”, they’re whatever I decide to make them because they, unlike real people (who are all homo sapien sapiens), are NOT REAL. I don’t know how to reinforce my points any more than to say that fiction is fiction and should not be treated as if it is equal to reality in any way – for one thing, fiction always makes sense (if it’s done well), while reality almost never makes sense.

There are no moral “absolutes” because our morality is relative and subjective and inconsistent at the best of times. Slavery isn’t “evil”, it’s not even “wrong”, it’s just something nobody wants to have to experience, so we CALL it wrong and evil. I don’t want to be enslaved and neither do you, so we agree (usually) that it’s not okay to do it. Culture doesn’t equal virtue. Family doesn’t equal virtue. “Evil” people have cultures and families, but that doesn’t make them any less vicious.

In D&D, the alignment system tries to present the players with building blocks and roleplaying is supposed to fill in all the blanks. You’re not really supposed to play it as is because things don’t always work as well in reality as they do on paper.

In fantasy, evil is an objectively real force in the setting (most of the time), so a species of evil beings will produce an evil culture because evil is their essential nature, and it will function in the only way an evil culture can according to the paradigm of the setting.

I feel like I have to reiterate that we’re not talking about REAL people or REAL morality or REAL cultures, we’re talking about fictional ones. And I can’t overemphasize that fiction is not reality and shouldn’t be treated as such.

edited 12th Mar '15 11:10:12 PM by nekomoon14

I agree with you. I think the ONLY place where such an argument for "racism" (OR specisim in fiction) would be if, as you say, an author / worldbuilder is drawing blatant parallels with real world races to make some sort of ham fisted point.

And as I said, there are no moral absolutes so 100% with you on that!

From a narrative perspective, villains with motive are always more compelling than just "rar evulz"; otherwise you've got a race of sadists. With Orcs and Trollocs, or whatever, then they are just a narrative obstacle potentially not even really a threat - cannon fodder. I would hesitate to call them a "race" - it'd be like calling golems a race. Or automata.

So how to structure a society around it, or even a character? The fair folk of Irish and Celtic myth are pretty much anarchic, chaotic beings, even though they have a form of "hierarchy" - so there's an example. Greek gods, also.

Your "evil" culture could be more a warrior, nomadic one, with the chaos arising around how they measure success or strength - challenges for combat, or regular martial activity interrupted by the massive horde halting on the plains for ad hoc hunting - no fixed city state (Akin to the Mongols, maybe?)

Your lawful bunch? Again, it's down to a society. I liked Planescape's way of looking at this, with the Baatezu being all about contracts and legally binding ways of doing things. Because they're part magical (Being demons) it's actually part of their nature, moreso than maybe regular organic beings.

Protagonist506, it sounds like the chaotic characters make up a society of "jokers" but with a form of morality / honour? Your lawful guys being a society of "batmen"?