Stupid Alignments

From 2d4chan
Jump to navigation Jump to search

In the universe of tabletop games, there are the alignments - systems to determine the moral leanings of the characters within each world, if applicable. Most will recognize the "standard" axes of Good-to-Evil and Lawful-to-Chaotic, with what each of these scales entail and an idea of where certain actions fall on this chart. The general purpose of alignment is to guide and inform the direction of a player's character with regards to personality and behavior.

...And then there's doing it wrong.

Behold, the Stupid Alignments: the result of what happens when players either don't understand the role they've chosen or else try to play into it too hard.

We won't go TOO in-depth on them, of course, since each of them already HAVE their own articles. We WILL, however, give links to those articles along with a short sweet summary of each concept and their variants.

List of 'Stupid' Alignments

  • Stupid Good - These Boy Scouts never refuse the chance to do a good deed (or what they think constitutes a good deed) even if it kills them - or someone else, refusing to see the forest for the trees. Alternatively, the "I did what I had to do" fanatic who commits atrocities in the name of a nebulous greater good and actually believes that their misdeeds are legitimately for a morally good cause, refusing to see trees for the forest, or an edgy asshole who while aware of the fact that what they are doing is bad still thinks that as long as the outcome is good the deed, however evil, is either an acceptable necessity or morally justified.
  • Stupid Neutral - When a player thinks there's actually zero difference between good & bad things (aka horseshoe theory), or else treats morality as some sort of binary scale to be "balanced" in a cosmic checkbook. Otherwise, the lazy character who behaves like a foreign civilian with no stake in the conflict. Technically includes anyone behaving like a non-sentient living or programmed being that is incapable of recognizing the Good-Evil and Order-Chaos axes and just acts because that is what they are.
  • Chaotic Stupid - Pretty much the worst, most obnoxious do-what-I-want-because-I-can flavors of 'lolrandom' you can imagine, with no sense of basic pragmatism or even self-preservation.
  • Stupid Evil - Pretty much the worst, most obnoxious do-what-I-want-because-it's-Evil™ flavors of-- wait a minute... Tends to treat villainy as a glorified checklist.

Gallery