Precisely. Most of the time, the ends don't justify the means. The actual action is weighted as good or bad.

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Whomst've'll'd'mn't I play:
Salema Nefahri :: A penny for your thots
Zrae'a'stra'fryn :: That which nightmares are made of
Khasir :: From the East a storm is coming

everyone can judge it, its called detect alignment 8P

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-Ja'acira Arrows'R'Us
-Balorin Wolfhammer- A dwarf so old he remember when the Beer stein was invented
Saisha Jai'diem Knight of bahamut, and abit of a looker

Provided you agree to be detected, or don't have an item to block the detection.

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Your items don't matter.

Aurelius judges you anyway.

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Aernoud Van Brabant: Heir of the House. Proprietor of the Beer Wagon.
"Go to the Mayfields, have a pint, and wait for this to blow over."
Aurelius: Sunmaster of Amaunator. Contemplative. Aspirant to Transcendance.
"Sol Invictus"

Did you just go all Dredd on me? Uncool, man.

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Right. So I record "Lawful Good" on my character sheet. Then I go around committing Chaotic and Evil acts, but as long as I have a glib response OOC ("My personal code", "The greater good", "I thought they were evil"), no one else, even the DMs, can say "No, that was Evil, not Good."?

I mean, the alignment system is terrible. That's a given. But the current situation, where your character's alignment cannot be touched without your approval, keeps the worst parts of it and throws out the parts that at least make it work as a system. We enforce alignment restrictions, but don't hold actions to those guidelines. Not to mention it lets people sidestep certain mechanics, recording 'neutral' but acting evil (or good).

Alignment is supposed to be a reflection and record of the character's past actions, not a rulebook for it's future ones. Descriptive, not prescriptive.

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Pretty sure alignment is determined by something even greater than the gods, for they too are subject to their alignments! So if you're Lawful Good but commit horrible deeds of wanton evil, you'll be cast down to Chaotic Evil.

I have a theory it might be the weave, personally. The only IC context of there being any sort of alignment system existing is certain spells, such as Protection from X alignment or Detect X alignment, etc. But there's nothing really to go off officially.

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Elwyn Sabel - Laura Jarshall - Mordoc Ebonhand

Discord: Bhaalorian#5715

Wasn't the Weave created by the gods (or the god of magic way back when at least)? I think so, and those spells just tap into the cosmic forces behind alignment. At least, it's always just been depicted as 'the Cosmos judges alignment'; hence why killing in cold blood is always an Evil act. Doesn't mean you will immediately be Evil aligned for doing it once or twice, but a pattern will start corrupting your soul. Just like a selfless act of sacrifice is likely going to be deemed as Good by the Cosmos.

And what Lascer said. Otherwise paladins should be able to go around killing whenever they want.

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Whomst've'll'd'mn't I play:
Salema Nefahri :: A penny for your thots
Zrae'a'stra'fryn :: That which nightmares are made of
Khasir :: From the East a storm is coming

The weave was created by Selune when she tore off a piece of her essence to attack Shar with it, thus birthing Mystryl who was the first physical embodiment of magic. There was presumably a notion of 'good' and 'evil' before then.

If anyone can be said to define a universal constant of good or evil it would have been Ao when he created the universe, and its corresponding alignment based planes.

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Player of:
Asya Goodmonsdottir - Knight of Lesser Gods.
-Winner of 2014's "Razored Tongue" Award, and Emcee's pick "Authoritarian of the year".
Jannah Vindle - Mistress of Coin.

I was thinking Ao, but couldn't recall if he actually created everything or if he just created/spawned/whatever the other deities. That's good to know, and yeah I would think he would be the likely candidate. The stogy old bastard, lol

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Whomst've'll'd'mn't I play:
Salema Nefahri :: A penny for your thots
Zrae'a'stra'fryn :: That which nightmares are made of
Khasir :: From the East a storm is coming

Most of my characters have been neutral, chaotic or evil, or a combination of the three.

I've only ever had 2 good aligned characters, out of ... 17 I think I'm up to now.

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Adair - Druid and part time treant cosplayer