Been thinking about this recently as a lot of people seem to just use the terms good and evil as blanket terms, they consider the church and crown "good" and all pirates, darkbloods, bandits, grief worshippers "evil". Which is why it needs a little disambiguation.
Truth be told there a lot more to it than that, in Dungeons and Dragons there are two types alignments to let people better define this but in Altera I think we actually need three.
Good - Neutral - Evil.
Your characters personality and way you choose to conduct yourself. Both good and evil gods are present in the cathedral and it isn't a crime to worship them, true your more likely to be somewhat of a villain but I've seen evil characters who do very well for themselves without ever getting into fights with guards.
Lawful - Neutral - Chaotic
Your characters choices when it comes to obeying the laws of the silver crown, If your lawful your probably aligned with the crown and not rebellious, if your chaotic your probably rebelling or a criminal and will end up getting into scraps with the silver cloaks on occasion however it is still possible to be good or evil regardless of your choice here.
And now the magical third choice that Altera seems to need.
Guardians of Altera - Neutral - Agents of Grief
Which side your on in the true war against grief. Its possible to be against grief whilst still being a blood thirsty Kilrox worshipping savage just as its possible for you to side with grief and be a lawful character. Siding with grief however does sort of spin you towards being evil not that you can worship the gods if your a grief agent.
The silver cloaks and royal guards only chase people are chaotic, the church only chase people who are Agents of grief.
The High church is actually aligned in this system as Neutral - Neutral - Guardian. We worship both the good and evil gods and the laws of the crown are unimportant to us though we choose to follow them most of the time as common courtesy.
(That said not every member of the church will be exactly the same, the first arbiter was in fact an Evil - Neutral - Guardian as shown in the massacre of Daggerfall cathedral story)
The Crown is Neutral - Lawful - Guardian as I see it as though their primary concern is ruling Altera politically this particular crown is firmly against grief. (Though again not every one working with the crown will follow this exactly)
Hopefully if everyone starts distinguishing good and evil better then there can be a lot less blind hate towards other groups and people won't be surprised when the church chooses to work with pirates, bandits or assassins.
Thoughts?
Truth be told there a lot more to it than that, in Dungeons and Dragons there are two types alignments to let people better define this but in Altera I think we actually need three.
Good - Neutral - Evil.
Your characters personality and way you choose to conduct yourself. Both good and evil gods are present in the cathedral and it isn't a crime to worship them, true your more likely to be somewhat of a villain but I've seen evil characters who do very well for themselves without ever getting into fights with guards.
Lawful - Neutral - Chaotic
Your characters choices when it comes to obeying the laws of the silver crown, If your lawful your probably aligned with the crown and not rebellious, if your chaotic your probably rebelling or a criminal and will end up getting into scraps with the silver cloaks on occasion however it is still possible to be good or evil regardless of your choice here.
And now the magical third choice that Altera seems to need.
Guardians of Altera - Neutral - Agents of Grief
Which side your on in the true war against grief. Its possible to be against grief whilst still being a blood thirsty Kilrox worshipping savage just as its possible for you to side with grief and be a lawful character. Siding with grief however does sort of spin you towards being evil not that you can worship the gods if your a grief agent.
The silver cloaks and royal guards only chase people are chaotic, the church only chase people who are Agents of grief.
The High church is actually aligned in this system as Neutral - Neutral - Guardian. We worship both the good and evil gods and the laws of the crown are unimportant to us though we choose to follow them most of the time as common courtesy.
(That said not every member of the church will be exactly the same, the first arbiter was in fact an Evil - Neutral - Guardian as shown in the massacre of Daggerfall cathedral story)
The Crown is Neutral - Lawful - Guardian as I see it as though their primary concern is ruling Altera politically this particular crown is firmly against grief. (Though again not every one working with the crown will follow this exactly)
Hopefully if everyone starts distinguishing good and evil better then there can be a lot less blind hate towards other groups and people won't be surprised when the church chooses to work with pirates, bandits or assassins.
Thoughts?
