Shattered Kingdoms

You pretty much nailed it, SeraKyla.

Gray auras are typically classified as "selfish." Dogmatic would be a thematic exception to this rule, as these characters are interested in upholding laws over even their own interests, at times. There is a little bit of wiggle room even in that, though. Dogmatics may choose to uphold specific laws based upon religion or nation while looking down upon the dictates of others around him or her, but it's also valid to just be a guy or girl that flies the straight and narrow regardless of the surroundings.

Okay, good =) So what I understand is that a dogmatic will 'always' uphold the laws without importance as to whether that law is good/back or indifferent whereas an unprincipled would respect and uphold the laws AS LONG as the laws don't infringe on the personal freedom that they so strive for while an anarchist couldn't care less about the laws in any regard and will always only do what they feel like at the moment. If that so happens to be in line with the laws, then great... if not, who cares. All three, nevertheless, don't care about aura of the lighties or darkies... and I am assuming neither do they care about the other greyies either?

Is that a good breakdown then of the levels of greyness?

Again, spot on.

Note, however, that the actions and affiliations of a gray character may be classified by both lighties and darkies as adverse to their own agenda, and they will act accordingly. Gray auras have successfully made both enemies and allies of everyone around them.

Dogmatic is still selfish. Dogmatic people uphold the law because they believe it benefits them to do so. If you were upholding the law for the benefit of the good of the people, you'd want to choose Principled. Dogmatic people will have no problem upholding laws in evil countries.

I feel like this needs to be quoted for truth. Some members of both alignment extremes will see active aid to or participation in the activities of the opposite extreme as alliance and association with said extreme. So even while playing grey, you can get associated with dark or light depending on the actions your character makes. Some of both alignment extremes may overlook occasional fence-crossing, but there are hardliners of both sides that probably won't.

Awesome... thanks for helping me understand the differences. Like I said, for me the lighties and darkies are quite easily identified as to how they should act though I recognize that there are some small subtle differences between the types of each that I don't entirely understand yet your interpretation as of yet... but the greys were the hardest to get my head around - especially now that I see you guys taking a slightly altered approach to alignments from the way I have generally been used to playing in table-top games.

Actually, your help files are pretty much right in line with what my interpretation of the alignments would be... the problem that I find is that the attitude of the characters is out of line with the definitions provided by the help files are. For example, you guys treat the alignments as if they were two teams on opposite sides of a field playing a game. Neither side could ever truly work with the other except for the greyies who can 'favor' one side or the other as they see fit based on what will work out best for them. However, the help files don't necessarily state that to be the case. (NOTE: I am only stating my opinion based on the evidence that I see and do not mean it in any way against SK at all. I really enjoy this game quite a bit and you guys have created a fun atmosphere in which to play. I am only working to understand where the truth lies in order to best play my current character as well as future characters.)

For example, your definition of diabolic is as follows:


With this idea, that means that the darkies of this nature would be just as likely to kill another darkie as they would a lightie or greyie. They would not be a team player in any sense of the term but only in the objective and as far as it would take to advance their own personal goal. They could be friendly and even helpful IF it advanced their own goal, but if another darkie had something they wanted, they would turn on them as fast if not faster than they would a lightie. Thus I see this group as being able to level on darkies just as much as lighties.



Again, like the diabolics, this group would just as easily turn on another darkie as they would a greyie or lightie if that meant they could gain more wealth. Furthermore, they would not join a tribunal at all unless they were the leader of the tribunal or had some chance of directly influencing the decisions of the tribunal. So while they could effectively 'team up' against the lighties, that team would be unorderly and difficult to manage unless the miscreant was the leader and the one making the decisions. Again, this group would level on darkies just as much as lighties.



These are the ones I can see as actually 'teaming up' against the lighties, but not BECAUSE they are lighties but because they view it as revenge for the years of lightie attack on them. These are also the ones I could see as being in a team with a miscreant leader provided that the leader's goal was bent on an honorable revenge. These guys could actually work with a lightie too if said lightie was acting against a miscreant or diabolic that had wronged the aberrant at some point in the past as that would be viewed as an act of revenge and thus using the force and intimidation of the lightie to their advantage. Technically, this group couldn't level against anyone unless there was some historical reason why said group was against the aberrant.

For the greys, I've already stated my interpretation in this thread a few posts back so I'll skip those for now.

For the lighties, these I can see following the 'team approach' much more than the darkies, BUT the fact that you guys view a lightie and a darkie as never being able to work together is where I have issues.



These guys in particular would be perfectly capable of teaming up with aberrant characters in a quest to bring down a diabolic or miscreant evil, particularly if they viewed the aberrant's evil as the lesser of the two with plans of their own to one day rid the world of that one as well. In fact, this alignment seems to me to be very VERY near to a grey alignment. This group could also level against anybody if meant advancing the greater goal though I agree they would seek out greyies or darkies for sure.



These folks as well would not necessarily shy away from working with someone just because they were a darkie, particularly if said darkie was one who "are not able to protect themselves" and have yet to truly show any signs of evil doing. In fact, they would most likely try to team up with a new darkie in the hopes of "attempting to reform them" and guiding them away from the evil that fate may have had in store for them. Still, i guess I can see where you guys use this one as the 'team' approach against the dark forces... This is the only one I could see as actually being restricted to leveling against darkies only but even then, the simple act of leveling would go against their idea of "value life and freedom above all else."

So my difficulty in connecting the two is where you guys have definitions of alignments that would allow for non-aligned forces to join when the circumstances dictate that it would be in the best interest of both involved, yet you basically enforce the rules as a soccer game with lighties on one side and darkies on the other. That's what I can see a real difference in interpretion from the table-top games that I've been involved in. There shouldn't be teams other than the kingdom/tribunal teams and the only ones who would truly be involved in those would be principled and maybe a scrupulous and aberrants with 'perhaps' a miscreant leader. But the fact that people can never 'change sides' when the RP would allow for it is where I see the difficulty lying. Would someone please explain how these definitions lead to the team-vs-team approach that seems so evident in SK?

Your read on the darkie alignments is pretty good. There's no RP restrictions against darkies killing other darkies, and it happens pretty regularly.

Having recently played a miscreant faction leader that "worked with" (read: used them for my own gain) lightie factions, it's possible for there to be crossover, but it's never a long-term thing and it will eventually lead to animosity between the groups.

The real thing is that the lighties shouldn't really be volunteering to work with evil, and certain factions should never be willing to and should argue persuasively with those lighties that are (See: Hammer of Light). If there is ever a cooperation between light and dark, it should always come from a manipulation of the lightie by the darkie, and it should always eventually end in an even more bitter rivalry for the fact that the lightie will eventually realize they're being used and react poorly.

Scrup has some wiggle room with who they work with, but even then, again, any kind of cooperation with darkies should be manipulative in nature. Scrup is more likely to work with certain grey alignments to see darkies done in, than to work with darkies against other darkies.

Most of the staff has made it pretty clear that each situation will be handled individually and judged according to various merits and flaws, but that ultimately the light v dark dichotomy should take priority in the long term. In other words, life long friendships between light and dark can't exist, but temporary situations where some evil dewd manipulates a lightie into doing XYZ is sometimes acceptable.

Now THAT makes a whole lot more sense! I was understanding that we were at the point where alignment crossovers were strictly forbidden. But now that you explain it in these terms, then I am wholly in agreement with that. Life-long friends between light and dark is impossible... but temporary manipulations should be quite commonplace. Nevertheless, my reading of the scrupulous would see that a manipulation of a lesser darkie by them would be just as likely as a manipulation of a scrupulous by a darkie. Still... I am relieved to see that my understanding based on discussion was misconstrued and the truth does lie within the definitions of each alignment. That makes the entire alignment spectrum open to my future RP =) Yah!!!!

Before you go off half-cocked, I'm going to quote and emphasize part of my post just so it's clear I'm not advocating a constant presence of grey areas in the interpretation of alignments: