LogFAQs > #939720610

fantomas418 posted...

in real life, i think most people would be around neutral good / chaotic good

In real life, most people are True Neutral (or "Unaligned", if you go by 4e). Basically, you don't have strong enough opinions to hold an extreme stance, and tend to react to situations based on context.

The average person tends to obey laws they morally agree with, but will tend to break laws based on their own convenience, their chances of getting caught, and the degree to which they will be punished if they are caught. They're not rebels who completely disregard laws or codes of honor for moral or selfish reasons, but they're also not paragons of obedience, loyalty, and honor who are willing to always sacrifice self-interest to keep their word or follow the laws and rules of any organization, institution, or political entity they're a part of.

In the same way, no matter how much people would like to believe otherwise about themselves, most people aren't "Good" either. Good is self-sacrificing, and will generally judge other people's needs and well-being over their own. People can be good, but it's more often after they've satisfied their own hierarchy of needs and helped out friends and family. But they'll also overlook (or even facilitate) injustice or inequality as long as it benefits them.

Most of the alignments outside of True Neutral would be extremely rare in the real world. But that's the point - PCs are exceptional people who have taken up lives that the average person would never be able to maintain. They're driven, they have extremely strong opinions, and they're willing to fight for them, one way or another. So they can be incredibly heroes, rebellious champions, or even total monsters, in the way that Bob from Accounting really isn't going to be in the real world. It's part of why people love pretending to BE these fantasy characters so much.



streamofthesky posted...

and honestly only shy away from the CE they secretly lust for because of social stigma.

Even beside that, most DMs won't allow players to play Evil characters, either because they feel like epic fantasy adventures should be about heroes and not cruel and selfish villains, because they're afraid Evil characters will make party dynamics utterly terrible, or because either they or their players misunderstand what Evil IS.

Basically, you can be an Evil character without having to murder or betray everyone you meet at all times. Evil doesn't have to be impulsive and stupid (though obviously Chaotic Evil will tend to be). Evil characters can still obey rules, maintain alliances, or even love others without being a complete unsympathetic one-dimensional monster.

Evil and Chaotic generally have the same problem - with mature and experienced players, they're fine. It's only when you're playing with people who don't really understand Alignment or are just murderhobo munckhins who don't care about Alignment except as an excuse for disruptive behavior that they become problems. But those types of people are going to be problems no matter what Alignment they have (they're the same types who tend to play Lawful Good as uptight intolerant assholes).

Chaotic Neutral is really only a problem if someone uses it as an excuse to do whatever they want regardless of consequences or logic. Or if they go with the usual misinterpretation that Chaotic Neutral means spastic random idiot. But again, those are usually cases where the problem is the player, not the Alignment.
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