Arelith

Mr_Rieper wrote: Wed Jun 26, 2019 8:25 am

xanrael wrote: Tue Jun 25, 2019 4:48 pm I could see a neutral alignment Outcast. Imagine a doctor that kidnaps, kills, and dissects the downtrodden and sick they cannot seem to save to learn more about anatomy and the treatment of diseases. At the same time they employ that knowledge to save the lives they can and begin to write research texts on it.

lol it's fairly prevalent to see people think that the Neutral alignment means "morally questionable but still wants to help people."

When in reality, neutral is the exact opposite.

What you are describing is not neutral.

Chaotic neutral maybe with heavy evil tendencies

Mr_Rieper wrote: Wed Jun 26, 2019 8:25 am

xanrael wrote: Tue Jun 25, 2019 4:48 pm I could see a neutral alignment Outcast. Imagine a doctor that kidnaps, kills, and dissects the downtrodden and sick they cannot seem to save to learn more about anatomy and the treatment of diseases. At the same time they employ that knowledge to save the lives they can and begin to write research texts on it.

lol it's fairly prevalent to see people think that the Neutral alignment means "morally questionable but still wants to help people."

When in reality, neutral is the exact opposite.

What you are describing is not neutral.

Ok sure, but that's not what I typed. My example was a character that was devoted to advancing their craft (medicine) and being amoral about it. I picked a helpful craft to avoid discussions on shifting things cosmically towards evil for those who view alignment at the cosmic level only.

I will take a moment to speak on what you and others said though. Some people feel that characters that commit evil acts regardless of motivation or other actions means that character is evil. Others believe that evil acts can be counterbalanced by good acts. Heck even Gygax said:
"Alignment does not preclude actions which typify a different alignment, but such actions will necessarily affect the position of the character performing them, and the class or the alignment of the character in question can change due to such actions, unless counter-deeds are performed to balance things. The player-character who continually follows any alignment (save neutrality) to the absolute letter of its definition must eventually move off the chart..."

from: THE MEANING OF LAW AND CHAOS IN DUNGEONS & DRAGONS AND THEIR RELATIONSHIPS TO GOOD AND EVIL by Gary Gygax FEBRUARY 1976

I'm not trying to convince anyone here that it has to be viewed as the latter, and you can find evidence to support the former too. Nor am I saying that those are the only interpretations. Views on alignment are kind of like those on religion or politics where people tend to only pay attention to data that supports their own beliefs.

In Forgotten Realms good and evil are objective.
In Real Life good and evil are pretty subjective.
However as Players and DMs we can only go by our own Rl alignments. What I as a player might consider a good action, another player may not.
The size of the game we're playing in means that micromanaging alignments is frankly impossible. It's only really possible for us to go off braud strokes. Anything else is too difficult, work intensive, unfun, unimaginative, and generally silly.