D&D Alignments as Aspects
Someone on Google+ I think (I’m sorry I can’t remember who or find the original post) suggested in response to one of my previous All About Aspects articles that the concept of D&D alignments could be used for aspects.
Whether you love or hate them alignments have been part of the world’s most popular RPG since the year dot.
We’ve explained the basic formatting for our high concept aspects in one of our previous post, in this post I provide a single descriptions table (that can be used instead of the ones in previous articles) to add an alignment descriptor.
Descriptions
Please note: These descriptions use the standard 9-alignment model as described in most versions of D&D, using these does rely somewhat on both players and GMs being aware of what the alignments represent, some guidance is included below.
| No. | Description | When to invoke | When to compel |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lawful Good | When obeying the letter of the law or the dictates of an appropriate authority or when sacrificing to help others. | Compel to have a character adhere to the letter of the law rather than the spirit. |
| 2 | Neutral Good | When attempting to help others. | Compel to have the character forced into a situation because other people need their help or to have others come to them with problems. |
| 3 | Chaotic Good | When going against figures of authority or striking a blow for personal freedom, also when sacrificing to help others. | Compel a character to strike out against the law or edicts imposed on them, or to flaunt social mores even when doing so will cause them great complications in the future. |
| 4 | Lawful Neutral | Invoke when obeying the letter of the law or the dictates of an appropriate authority. | Compel to have a character follow the letter of the law despite what he believes in his heart. |
| 5 | (True) Neutral | Invoke when carrying out actions designed to preserve the fragile balance between law and chaos, good and evil. | Compel to have a character behave in the opposite manner to the prevailing mood (if a lot of good acts have been a committed a true neutral character might feel compelled to commit an evil act to balance them out. |
| 6 | Chaotic Neutral | When going against figures of authority or striking a blow for personal freedom. | Compel to have a character lash out or flaunt authority in a delicate situation. |
| 7 | Lawful Evil | When obeying the letter of the law or the dictates of an appropriate authority or when harming/taking advantage of others for your own benefit. | Compel to have the character manipulate the laws of the land to cause harm to others, even when such an expression of power might not be in their long-term best interests. |
| 8 | Neutral Evil | Invoke when helping yourself at the expense of others. | Compel to have the character seize a momentary advantage or opportunity that might cause them problems in the long-run. |
| 9 | Chaotic Evil | When going against figures of authority or striking a blow for personal freedom, also when harming/taking advantage of others for your own benefit. | Compel to have the character lash out at/harm those around him, causing further complications, particularly if the person is in a position of authority. |
Coming next for All About Aspects: Modern Day High Concepts
Circuit board tree image designed by Mastermindsro, you can see the full design here; used under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.
Personally I would use the Descriptors from http://easydamus.com/alignmentreal.html in the Aspect, so that Lawful-Good is rendered as Righteous & Chaotic Evil as Hedonist, which would allow for packing more bang into the Aspect.
That’s a great idea Li, rendering the alignments as more descriptive terms would certainly make it easier to know when invoking/compelling was possible (especially if your players aren’t as familiar with the D&D alignment system) 🙂