Alignment

"'DARK SUN campaigns call upon players to roleplay their characters according to alignments, just as in AD&D campaigns ... consider alignment as a tool, not a straightjacket'" - 2e Dark Sun rulebook Unfortunately, alignment tends to end up as either completely ignored, an awkward roleplaying accessory, or as an inevitable "straightjacket".

Alignments are ultimately subjective
"'Then I heard the LORD say to the other men, “Follow him through the city and kill everyone whose forehead is not marked. Show no mercy; have no pity! Kill them all – old and young, girls and women and little children.  But do not touch anyone with the mark.  Begin your task right here at the Temple.”  So they began by killing the seventy leaders.  “Defile the Temple!” the LORD commanded.  “Fill its courtyards with the bodies of those you kill!  Go!”  So they went throughout the city and did as they were told.'" - Ezekiel 9:5-7 NLT. Sidenote: God was pissed because a bunch of people in that city were worshipping other gods. Pretend one of those men is a paladin (not a big ask given they were soldiers of God). Despite the fact that the Bible would widely be considered Good, I think you'd be hard pressed to find a DM who wouldn't strip that paladin of his class abilities for committing an Evil act (take your pick of genocide or infanticide; there are a few in there) if that paladin followed those orders. Though, admittedly, it would require a pretty malicious DM to have a paladin's god give him such orders in the first place.

Furthermore, two players (or even just one) can play two different paladin characters with vastly different definitions of what is Good and what is Lawful. One paladin might gladly slaughter a tribe of orcs while the other paladin might refuse on the fact that the orcs have done nothing wrong. One paladin might abide by legitimate authority's laws even though he doesn't agree with them while the other paladin might declare all authorities he doesn't agree with illegitimate and therefore break those laws with moral impunity. It's not a Bad Thing that two different paladins have different attitudes and behaviours, rather it is a Bad Thing to have an ill-defined alignment system which restricts player choices when DM and player might disagree on the definitions of the alignment axes. Worse is when they do disagree and the player is playing a class dependent on maintaining a certain alignment for their class abilities.

Alignments can restrict personality creation
"Donnie: Okay. But you're not listening to me. There are other things that need to be taken into account. Like the whole spectrum of human emotion. You can't just lump everything into these two categories and then just deny everything else. Kitty: If you don't complete the assignment you'll get a zero for the day." - Donnie Darko While it is certainly nicer to have two axes instead of one and the words at the ends of those axes are actually opposites (unlike fear and love), that still only leaves nine possible personality archetypes. And really only four of them are easily recognised: the Knight in Shining Armour, Robin Hood, the Tyrant, and the Destroyer. They're great archetypes, but they get old quickly and this often leads to making characters without regard to alignment (rendering alignment irrelevant) or trying to retrofit a personality into one of the nine boxes (leading to ambiguity, as below, or complexity issues in roleplaying; see next heading).

Suppose my character is a guardsman (tentatively LG at this stage yeah?) who plays fast and loose with the law to get his job done (now he's some flavour of Chaotic) and he sees his role in society as ultimately helping people (ah, the Good flavour of Chaotic). He goes the extra mile to bring the criminals in alive (definitely Good and a splash of Lawful: maybe NG?) unless they are rapists or murderers, where he generally brutally kills them (sounds like CN at this stage since, RAW, killing a sentient Evil creature is neither murder nor Evil). This guardsman probably follows the law almost all of the time and likely enforces other people to abide by it the majority of the time (CN + a big dash of Lawful = TN might be a better fit). He follows his own code with only very rare exceptions (maybe LN then) but his personal code is constantly being amended through his own experiences (more like CN if his code is so variable). He wouldn't enjoy it, but he'd readily kill an innocent for the greater good (killing innocents = instant Evil, so he's CE) such as if doing so would save multiple innocents. Finally, he's addicted to drugs (drugs=Evil and addiction=Evil according to the BoVD so a hearty double-dose of Evil) after having spent an extended period undercover in order to infiltrate a drug cartel. What alignment is my character?

Ultimately, I don't even want players to have more choice in personality archetype; I want them to choose the dimensions and properties of their character's alignment. In doing so, declaring both their characters' strongest motivations and the nature of their future moral dilemmas.

Alignments can discourage roleplaying character complexity
"'The Lawful cop whose heart causes him to make an exception for the hooker who needs to feed her kids, or the Chaotic cop who swears to his dying partner that he'll bring the bad guy in 'by the book' don't stop being lawful or chaotic just because they acted out of alignment once.'" - 1d4Chan on Alignment I want to provide the capacity for players to make characters who are still acting in character even if they're ostensibly breaking alignment much like in the quoted examples. Whether the reason the Lawful cop is letting the hooker off is out of respect of the difficulty of parenthood, having a soft spot for children, or he simply falls in love with every hooker he sleeps with, the Lawful cop is demonstrating there is more to his character than a two letter string in the alignment box and I'd like to strongly encourage this level of roleplaying.

With those things in mind, I have cobbled together these rules...

The loyalties system
When you use the loyalties system to build a character, whether a PC or an NPC, decide on three (zero to five are the hard caps) loyalties. These can represent ideals, people, organisations, or anything else to which the character is loyal, and might be as abstract as "my honour" or as concrete as "my beloved mother". Optionally, rank these loyalties from strongest to weakest. One easy way to decide the order is to ask yourself what your character would do if these loyalties came into conflict. These loyalties then replace alignment as the standard by which characters' motivations are measured.

During play, a character might take an action that causes him to change loyalties, just as a character in a game with alignment might have to change alignment. Whether this has any mechanical impact depends on how the GM has chosen to deal with loyalty-based restrictions and effects.

Classes

 * Barbarian: Remove the alignment restriction. A barbarian may not have a loyalty to law, order, or any similar concepts.
 * Cleric: Remove the alignment restriction. Clerics must have a loyalty to their element.
 * Druid: Remove the alignment restriction. Druids must have a loyalty involving nature or the druidic code of conduct.

Spells, magic items, damage reduction: Subjective Morality
You can make your world extremely complex by replacing all alignment-based effects with subjective morality based on loyalties. In this kind of game, everyone is the hero of their own story.

The only alignment-based items and spells that exist are the ones named after the good alignment (such as holy weapons and holy word) plus detect evil. However, these effects apply not to good in the usual sense, but instead depend on the loyalties of their users. When someone uses detect evil, it detects others who have loyalties that oppose the caster's. When a character wields a holy weapon, it deals extra damage to those with conflicting loyalties, and so on.

It's up to the GM to decide when loyalties conflict. For instance, if a magus decides that his primary loyalty is to himself, he could not reasonably claim that everything that ever attacks him has a conflicting loyalty, but an enemy who constantly abused him in the past might have a conflicting loyalty. Against this enemy, the magus' holy attacks would strike true.

Example loyalties
I'd like to emphasise that loyalties can be anything. But, if that is leaving you with decision paralysis, maybe these can serve as food for thought...


 * Person or Group: This includes a leader or superior, a family, a group of linked individuals (such as a band of adventurers or a cell of secret agents), or a discrete unit within a larger organisation (such as members of the character's squad or platoon, or individuals whose safety the character is responsible for).
 * Organisation: This may be a company or corporation, a gathering of like-minded individuals, a fraternal brotherhood, a secret society, a branch of the armed forces, a local, state, or national government, a university, an employer, or an otherwise established authority.
 * Nation: This may or may not be the nation that the hero currently resides in. It may be where the individual was born, or where the hero resides after emigrating to a new home.
 * Belief System: This is usually a particular faith or religion, but can also be a specific philosophy or school of thought. Belief systems could also include political beliefs or philosophical outlooks.
 * Moral or Ethical Philosophy: This one deserves its own subheading, see 'Motivations' below.

Motivations
Schwartz theorises that there are ten motivations that act as guides for action in life.
 * Self-Direction - Independent thought and action; choosing, creating, exploring. Associated single values are: freedom, creativity, independence, choosing one's own goals, being curious, having self-respect.
 * Stimulation - Excitement, novelty, and challenge in life. Associate single values are: having an exciting and varied life, being daring.
 * Hedonism - Pleasure and sensuous gratification for oneself. Associated single values are: experiencing pleasure and enjoying life.
 * Achievement - Personal success through demonstrating competence according to social standards. Associated single values are: being ambitious, influential, capable, successful, intelligence, and having self-respect.
 * Power - Social status and prestige, control or dominance over people and resources. Associate single values are: having social power, wealth, and authority, preserving one's own public image, and having social recognition.
 * Security - Safety, harmony, and stability of society, of relationships, and of self. Associate single values are: ensuring national security, reciprocation of favours, ensuring family security, having a sense of belonging, preserving the social order, being healthy and clean.
 * Conformity - Restraint of actions, inclinations, and impulses likely to upset or harm others and violate social expectations or norms. Associated single values are: being obedient, having self-discipline, being polite, honouring parents and elders.
 * Tradition - Respect, commitment, and acceptance of the customs and ideas that traditional culture or religion provide the self. Associated single values are: respecting tradition, being devout, accepting one's own portion in life, being humble, and taking life in moderation.
 * Benevolence - Preserving and enhancing the welfare of those with whom one is in frequent personal contact (the "in-group"). Associated single values are: being helpful, responsible, forgiving, honest loyal, and having mature love for others and true friendships.
 * Universalism - Understanding, appreciation, tolerance, and protection for the welfare of all people and for nature. Associated single values are: advancing equality, being one with nature, having wisdom, filling the world with beauty, advancing social justice, being broad-minded, protecting the environment, and see the world at peace.

These ten motivations also show patterns of compatibility and conflict. The following compatibilities have been noted:
 * Power and Achievement - both emphasise social superiority and esteem.
 * Achievement and Hedonism - both are concerned with self-indulgence and self-centeredness.
 * Hedonism and Stimulation - both entail a desire for affectively pleasant arousal.
 * Stimulation and Self-Direction - both involve intrinsic motivation for mastery and openness for change.
 * Self-Direction and Universalism - both express reliance on one's own judgement and comfort with the diversity of existence.
 * Universalism and Benevolence - both are concerned with enhancement of others and transcendence of selfish interests.
 * Benevolence and Tradition/Conformity - both promote devotion to one's in-group.
 * Tradition and Conformity - both stress self-restraint and submission. These two are combined by Schwartz in later versions of the theory.
 * Tradition/Conformity and Security - both emphasise conservation of order and harmony in relations.
 * Security and Power - both stress avoiding or overcoming the threat of uncertainties by controlling relationships and resources.

Linking these motivations to D&D's alignment system
If you plot these motivations in a circle by grouping similar ones together and overlay a ring of alignments, separated by half-step alignments (eg. good-leaning lawful neutral and lawful-leaning neutral good), you get this matching:


 * Righteous (Lawful Good) - Conformity/Tradition and Benevolence
 * Humane (Neutral Good) - Benevolence and Universalism
 * Transcendent (Chaotic Good) - Universalism and Self-Direction
 * Autonomous (Chaotic Neutral) - Self-Direction and Stimulation
 * Sybaritic (Chaotic Evil) - Hedonism
 * Ambitious (Neutral Evil) - Achievement and Power
 * Ascendent (Lawful Evil) - Power and Security
 * Orthodox (Lawful Neutral) - Security and Conformity/Tradition
 * Pragmatic (True Neutral) - (any values)

It should be noted that although the primary motivations are likely to be those listed above, they are not necessarily the only motivations (indeed, all apply to some extent for many people). The motivations for a character become less likely the further they are from the character's alignment. For example, a lawful good character could be motivated by Universalism or Security (as well as Tradition/Conformity and Benevolence) but these motivations are less likely. It is very unlikely that this character would be motivated by Power or Self-Direction and extremely unlikely that they would be motivated by Achievement, Hedonism, or Stimulation. eg. a paladin generally wouldn't turn down a quest to save innocents simply because the quest wasn't prestigious, enjoyable, or challenging enough for her.

And it must be said that although this overlay shows that the "evil" alignments are motivated by Security, Power, Achievement, and Hedonism, in real life, these motivations do not necessarily produce "evil" individuals in the D&D sense. In fact, many people are certainly motivated to provide for their own Security and increase their own Power within society; these pursuits do not make them lawful evil (like a D&D villain). This is why it is important to change the terminology for naming the alignments if all alignments are to become playable.

But I like the idea of Law vs Chaos and Good vs Evil!
Great. Since loyalties can be anything, you can pick those if you want to.

Here's my deliberately slim definitions of the alignments:


 * Law: Thinks people following the law is a good thing and that society benefits from having people in charge.
 * Chaos: Thinks individuals should think for themselves, not having other people telling them what to do.
 * Good: Thinks "we're all in this together". They'll help someone out whether or not they benefit from it or expect reciprocation.
 * Evil: Thinks "it's every man for himself". They're prepared to hurt or kill someone especially if it will benefit them.

Neutral, in the loyalties system, would simply be a lack of loyalties. Though, you could have a loyalty to "balance" or something... you might need to elaborate on exactly how your character is dedicated to the concept of balance.

Also, you could specify a particular type of eg. Good to have as a loyalty. For example benevolence, mercy, or charity. Or you could pick a "Good aligned" person or organisation (Greenpeace or Ghandi) in which case you'd be supportive of their moral outlook but more dedicated to the entity than their views.

Given this, you could pick a mixture of traditionally Good and Evil things (provided it somehow made sense). Eg. you have a loyalty to charity and Evil, so you'd happily hurt or kill someone then donate your victim's possessions to the needy. You'll probably need some reasoning to explain things that would otherwise be in conflict. In this example, are you a misguided priest, tormented and confused by God's violent and contradictory instructions in the Bible? Are you the owner of an orphanage, and bankrupcy has forced you to take desperate measures to feed the children in your care?