Magic versus mundane: why the distinction?

A while ago I read an essay titled "Breaking out of Scientific Magic Systems" which discussed, among other things, the tendency for tabletop role playing games to segregate magic from mundane physics and offered alternatives to doing so.

On Alignment

Alignment simply does not work as a measurement of morality, at least not in any world that does not adhere to Saturday morning cartoon logic. Alignments, when you get right down to it, are glorified political parties. No sane individual nor society in all of history has ever considered themselves evil and tried to advance the cause of evil. Yet in the typical D&D campaign setting, religions of evil are commonplace. Some settings have turned this on its head, such as Scarred Lands making the evil alignments another faction of the "good guys." Nonetheless, it is too controversial for this blog to adopt.

So I am going back to the source: ancient religions and Michael Moorcock.

In most ancient religions, no distinction was made between good and order. The gods were the enforcers of cosmic order and goodness. There were never really evil gods, at least not in the sense that they were actively worshiped. Evil forces like Apep and Angra Mainyu were never seen as objects of worship. The judge-gods of the the underworld, such as Osiris and Yen-Lo, were seen as good for serving the cosmic order.

Star of Chaos: "freedom"

Medieval Christianity and its allegations that its opponents worshiped Satan is probably the origin of the modern concept of the religion of evil, regardless of how nonsensical it is. All of the evilest people in our history sincerely believed they were doing good, or simply didn't care about the consequences to others. In no event did any of history's monsters aspire to be evil.

Michael Moorcock's Stormbringer series of novels utilizing a similar conflict between the cosmic forces of Law and Chaos. Unlike in our ancient religions, here the two do not map to good and evil but to political right and left. At their extremes they become evil, while harmony between the two is good. This scheme is what shall inform my subsequent depictions of my fantasy universe.

How is alignment relevant to the characters?

Arrow of Law: "control"

Alignment is a useful shorthand for describing a character's general values and attitude towards themselves and society. For the purposes of this blog we will use neutrality as the common reference point. Most people are neutral, having no strong bias towards one value system and willing to pick and choose those values on a situational basis. This avoids logical problems like people in real life generally falling into Lawful Good and Neutral Good based on how D&D defines alignments.

There are several ways to divide values among alignments. Under the two axis model one may divvy values at the ends of each spectrum and allow for varying levels of adherence. One might use a ring model that divides values more equitably. In any case it is best to avoid any binary labels of good or evil and instead allow any value system to become evil when taken to extremes or hypocrisy.

How is alignment relevant to the game's cosmology?

Taijitu: "harmony"

This blog will be adopting the original Moorcock model of law, chaos and neutrality. While generally appearing to follow the mythological view of law and good being united chaos and evil, as explained before law is not necessarily good.

There are two (technically three) cosmic forces in the fantasy universe. The White Lords of Order seek to impose the rigid hierarchy of law upon the universe, while the Black Lords of Chaos reject it and seek to restore the universe to its natural state of chaos. Both sides are too hostile to allow life as we know it to exist, so it falls to the Grey Lords of Balance and the Beast Lords to maintain the harmony that allows life to exist.

Sources

http://www.easydamus.com/alignmentreal.html
wordofthenerdonline.com/2013/08/the-beard-speaks-revising-good-and-evil
https://alzrius.wordpress.com/2010/11/01/removing-alignment-from-pathfinder-part-one-classes/

http://knowdirectionpodcast.com/2014/10/aligning-alignment/
http://www.tangledwilderness.org/lawful-aint-good/
http://theangrygm.com/alignment-in-dd-5e-s-or-get-off-the-pot/

https://alexandraerin.dreamwidth.org/553757.html
http://www.campaignmastery.com/blog/the-hell-of-evil-in-dnd/
http://www.tor.com/2012/11/27/if-i-ruled-the-multiverse/