Comments on: Setting Design Report, Part 2: Moral Universe, Part 1

By: Richard Lorenz (DM Dad)

Richard Lorenz (DM Dad) — Wed, 23 May 2018 03:47:46 +0000

This makes me think of Tolkein’s views of progress & industrialization vs. the simple, country life, i.e. Sauron & Saruman vs the Shire.

I approve. If the Shire has wifi, it would be perfect.

By: Peter Martin

Peter Martin — Sat, 23 Dec 2017 04:44:30 +0000

I’m only passingly familiar with reboot, but it sounds like I should fix that one of these days.

By: Shannon Dickson

Shannon Dickson — Wed, 06 Dec 2017 13:02:12 +0000

The place that your setting brought immediately to mind was the world of ReBoot: a good place, with centres of opulent oppressors and downtrodden and enslaved commoners.

By: Doug Hagler

Doug Hagler — Wed, 22 Nov 2017 04:54:42 +0000

Awesome! Only getting to these like a week late, but still, glad to jump-start what sounds like a cool system. Reading through the next post in this series presently…

By: Peter Martin

Peter Martin — Tue, 14 Nov 2017 01:30:57 +0000

Brainstorming some ideas for the law/chaos axis’s respective traits (I think I’ll call these “priorities”). I also think I’ll call good vs. evil “Morality” and law vs. chaos “personality.”

Duty vs Freedom
Efficiency vs Artistry (I just renamed your function vs. beauty idea here)
[placeholder term for doing things properly] vs Expediency
Satisfaction vs Excitement
Tradition vs Progress

This will definitely be the basis for the next post in this series!

By: Peter Martin

Peter Martin — Tue, 14 Nov 2017 01:14:58 +0000

Well, credit where credit is due, because while I’m not going to use the exact system you suggested, you certainly got the ball rolling for me!

What I think I’m going to do about the good vs. evil axis is tying that component of alignment to ratings on the 7 deadlysins/heavenly virtues.

Each virtue/sin will have a rating of Saint, Seeker, Accepter, Indulger, or Monster. Saint represents a person who basically never struggles with that particular sin and always displays the corresponding virtue – they are someone who just plain isn’t greedy, for example. A Seeker is someone who does a pretty good job keeping that particular impulse in check, but may struggle with it, an accepter is someone who has decided that this is a part of their nature, but will try to avoid hurting people and doesn’t obsess about it, or alternately just isn’t particularly inclined to show the virtue, but maybe also doesn’t show the sin (someone who doesn’t have much of a temper but also may hold some old grudges for Wrath/Mercy for example). An Indulger is someone who indulges in that particular vice and doesn’t care, and a monster is someone who takes the vice and pushes it into something grotesque and actively harmful and often in a way that’s violating somehow – cannibalism for gluttony for example.

Saint and Monster ratings are mutually-exclusive – a character can only have one type or the other, but can otherwise have a mix. Figuring out where the exact thresholds for good, neutral and evil will lie with respect to those ratings is something I haven’t entirely worked out yet and would welcome feedback on. I’m tempted to use a point and multiplier system based on the heirarchy; low ratings in Pride/Humility or Envy/Kindness may override a character who is temperate and chaste, still allowing them to have an evil alignment – this would make for workable Judge Frolo types of characters, for example.

I like your idea for the law/chaos axis, but I think I’d also like it to have a bit more granularity. In any case, glad you’re enjoying the posts, and I really appreciate the feedback!

By: Doug Hagler

Doug Hagler — Mon, 13 Nov 2017 16:21:51 +0000

A thought about alignment – for all of my homebrew settings, I alter the axes of alignment from the D&D standard, and I think this might be helpful in a setting like what you’re describing as well. It’s too easy to align yourself with Good or Evil in a world that is already divided up. What are the moral axes that arise out of your setting and how people live in it? This also helps define what you mean when you say Good, which is very helpful in D&D, where a player might have their Paladin commit genocide against a group from a race that is described as evil in the Monster Manual, and then not understand why that wasn’t a “Lawful Good” thing to do.

Instead of good and evil, maybe generosity and selfishness. Either you value sharing, or you are out for yourself – I got those two themes from what you wrote above.

On the law and chaos axis, maybe (from the glimpse in your post) function and beauty. So, given those changes, for example:

LG becomes valuing generosity and function – something like a communist organizer, maybe; CG becomes valuing generosity and beauty, like a hippie who doesn’t believe in property but loves art.

I dunno, just a thought. It could be too simple, or even redundant, to have two strong poles that the players can just align themselves with without thinking much about how they are aligned.

It does sound like a cool setting, though :)