The forth alignment

P.S.
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Why does almost every ethical decision exist only to punish any attempt to be good. Some decisions only provide bonuses if you select Neutral, or Evil, while leaving Good with nothing. Others, provide penalties if you select Good. I don't mind losing some predefined cash sum here and there such as -600 bc, but an interest (Economics) penalty can really hurt.

Also, why must there be 3 choices. Can't there be some magical 4th choice that might benefit good players? It isn't a sin to be Good, so why must we be punished for it?

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Maybe I'll write a post about it once I sort my thoughts.

Because good choices often have the effect of requiring some personal sacrifice.

If you were to make the good and right choice all the time at work, for example, you might just lose your job.
Case in point, try being a car salesperson and never lie to or mislead your potential customers.

Looks like Obvious Guy has come to save the day. Thanks, DivineWrath!

// end sarcasm

There is no fourth alignment and there sure isn't a "forth" alignment. You are either good, evil or neutral, period. If you make neutral decisions during random events, you have made... wait for it... a NEUTRAL decision. That qualifies as a _choice_.

Maybe you never took Philosophy 101. The only choice you don't make is not making a choice. There's no such thing as undecided.

While I can't say I disagree with your points, Wheeloffire, you're borderline flaming with a post written like that.

My observation: As fantastic and outright fascinating as GCII and DA are, they are games. I know a precocious 11 year old girl who would make Hitler and Stalin look like crybabies if you went by how she plays the game. Philosophically speaking, the alignment question does preclude that you realize a game is being played. Neutral really gets you nowhere, good is a struggle, and evil makes the other races seem to want to kill you faster. When the Drengin want to ally with you, you've hit evil.  

Because there has to be some disadvantage to being good, and without that there really isn't. If you're evil, you are going to have some substantive diplomatic problems. If you're good, you're going to have some unpleasant event choices. If you're neutral, you're going to be so-so across the board. It's the way the game's balanced, and I think it works pretty well.

I suspect rating aligntment choices depends on your play style, e.g. preferred win types. I like huge maps and I don't think I've ever bothered with a military win. Neutral is swell for me b/c I'm obssessed with tech superiority and, even in "nerfed" form in DA, the the tile upgrades are a big boost.

1. Sorry about the spelling error, I ussaully catch these things before I post.
2. I was making a point. You can remain undecided, by not researching "Xeno ethics", throughout the entire game, and possibly be stronger for it.



Actually, I've taken Philosophy 101 and passed. I'm taking 102 right now. My teacher makes the point of teaching us some of the more advanced material which includes reading the reprints of the original books, and not the books written by people who read the reprints and think they know the stuff. He had us take an oath not to google anything about philosophy while taking his class. He said that would only end up getting confused.

Heck, one of our assignments was to act like Socrates for 24 hours. If you heard anyone say that they know something, you were to ask them why. He also warned us that most people would probally be insulted, so be prepared for people react negatively, such as geting a cup of water thrown in your face.

Thats part of the reason why I'm having a problem. The game only provides 3 limited choices, with good almost always being bad. There is more than one good choice you can possible make. Some of those choices I'm thinking about might require more effort, but I can see how to make my "sacrifices" benefical.

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*Sigh* I'm probally going to make a new post about this...

Sounds like you might have a really good instructor. The no-Google oath makes much sense to me. I can get a bit lost poking around things like their articles on the U.S. Constitution, and I've got a Master's in Gov't (from a decent school, even!).



Don't give up just b/c Wheel rolled by the thread. He's apparently still working out some anger issues in psuedo-public . Fine points of formal philosophy aside, I think you've brought up a pretty interesting game question that I haven't seen directly addressed.

In complete sincerity, you can't. In the late stages of the game, it helps to have Xeno Ethics. It's best if you're the first one to get it. With military superiority and Xeno Ethics you can force all your opponents to choose by gifting the tech. That makes the political situation clearer so everyone can die with greater efficiency.

If you like random events, that's a preference. It doesn't make you part of some secret "fr0th" alignment.



Wow. Please specify if you want a medal or a chest to pin it on.



Insults? You mean like, "You, your teacher and everyone participating in your Socratic dialectic project can visualize my middle finger!"?

Yes, I can see how that's a challenging task.

I like the idea and have used it in the past. I kind of alternate between getting xeno ethics ASAP so that I can build the Mind Control Center or deferring the ethics choice until after the colony rush.

It's sufficient to wait for the colony rush to be over before declaring an alignment. Once everything is pretty much colonized there's not much additional benefit to wait. I find the MCC if I'm evil (mostly) or the 10% approval bonus of being neutral far too rewarding to let this choice slide by too far. However, with that being said it's tough to pass up those 44% starship bonuses or 58% production bonuses that you get by not having declared your alignment (and selecting evil colonization event choices).

I always choose good or neutral. I tried evil once or twice, and the Altarians used my evil alignment as an excuse to declare war on me. If you want to be evil, take Altarians out of the game because they do punish you for it.

Evil is a bit tougher because you do become more of a target. However even if you're good or neutral but you're weak you can be just as big a target as if you're evil. The secret to being evil is to be prepared for war at all times. That's actually good advice regardless of your alignment.

Although this is off topic, I've never found a reason to be good (in the game that is). You're as likely to be attacked by a good race as you are an evil race. And your "good" allies don't do much but sit around if you're in a war with an evil race until you begin to gain the upper hand then they swoop in and capture your opponents planets and mining resources from under your nose. Some friends, with friends like these who needs enemies. At least if you're evil you aren't deluded into believing that you have any "friends".

Although outside of the game being evil for evil's sake just seems a little bit childish.

*Stares at Wheeloffire*
You're trying to pick a fight, aren't you.
...
...
I'm going to ignore you now.



That example only started to bug me about 10 minutes after I read it. Being a moral car salesperson who never lies is difficult because its how the profession is designed. I forget the terminlogy, but doesn't a car salespersons get paid by commision? Aka, they get a percentage of the profits of what ever they sell. This means that they will attempt to sell potential customers a really expensive car every possible chance they get. If they don't, they miss a chance to get some money, and it makes them feel bad when they don't do a good job.

So we have a profession that will attempt to sell you something that makes them the most money, and not something that is worth your money and could make you happy. Do you really need a car that has every possible feature: built in tv, seat warmers, faster engines (what do you need those for, getting a speeding ticket more often?), hands free phone (just as bad as a cell phone), etc... Or do you only need a car that gets you from point A to B.

The transition from evil to good can difficult, and in many cases, sacrifices might need to be made. The problem is, there is no benefit for being good. Sure you would probally lose some money by replacing efficient car salespersons with moral ones, but wouldn't the morale of your civilization be greater. Not only would there not be any car salespersons trying to scam them, but they would probally have more money in their pockets and less likely be in dept. Shouldn't losing some money be a worthy exchange for increased morale?

Salesman is a very tough job. You should have at least tried it once in your own life before you can criticize someone that does this for a living. I tried it once and failed miserably, plus dealing with the rejection does indeed take a very strong personality (try cold calling door to door sometime). I have come across a number of salesmen in my life and the best ones are not what one would consider the normal "high pressure" salesman. That really doesn't work. A calm explanation of the features and benefits of the product with no extra pressure to buy is the best thing that they can do to win a sale, like the game; to win you must be willing to lose.

I grabbed this random event from:
https://www.galciv.wikia.com/wiki/Random_event



I'll be using this one as an example of how you can be good, and yet, not stupid.

This example is a colonization event where you find some worm like creatures that exists on your newly colonized planet. You're given only 3 options, and they are limited to: leaving them alone, moving them, or exterminating them.

Here is my issue with this one


They can communicate by using seismic vibrations. What does this mean? Hmm... maybe if we research universal translator, we might be able to talk to them. Maybe we'll learn that most of these worms don't actually like where they are rooted at, and would appreciate it if we moved them elsewhere, thus freeing up some of the soil for us to use. That would reduce some of the penalties for being good.

Alternatively, they could be much more intellegent, and much more advanced form of life than we thought. Perhaps they a nack for science and would enjoy helping you with your research (It must be boring being rooted to the ground). In time, after you research soil enhancements or something, they might suggest that it might be possible to make some modifications to that tech. These modifications might convert soil that you couldn't possibly use, and convert it to something that they could use, thus providing more room to move them to, and freeing up more room for yourself.

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The points I'm trying to make is, you don't have to be stupid to be good. I'll write up so more examples latter.

I'll keep that in mind.

DivineWrath,

Maybe I went a little too far on mocking your Socrates project. Socratic dialectics can be devastating against people if you learn to use them with subtlety. I think Socrates was far more sophisticated than portrayed in the dialectics. Besides having been written over 2500 years ago and translated from an ancient dialect of Greek, I believe Plato wrote them for people not quite as intelligent as himself or Socrates. The dialectics are a teaching tool.

You can do the real deal and not get insulted or beaten up. Done right, people are left wondering about their intellectual capacities. They won't have the inclination to blame you for pointing out flaws in their comprehension.

Peace.

The great thing about playing a 'leaning toward good' race is that you can take several seriously evil moral choices before you begin to lean toward evil. In DL it used to take about three evil choices to drop below the neutral midpoint, but in my current DA game I made about eight evil choices (two hideous ones gave me my manufacturing and tech capital planets) and one neutral, and still ended up leaning good by the end of the colonization phase.

Neutral choices do not move you toward Neutral, which is strange. they just leave you right where you are. Unless you have a really, really long colonization phase, and need to compensate to keep yourself leaning good or neutral, there's no reason to ever choose good for any reason.



You work for the government?   

Perhaps I over reacted. I was pointing out that I wasn't just some random person who after after reading a little wikipedia, thought that I knew everything about philosophy or, in this case, ethics. I had actually read and studied various philosophers such as Socrates, Aristotle, Hobes, and Kant.

Oh well... Thanks for the apology Wheeloffire, and sorry if I over reacted.

Shhh...
keep it down.

It's a secret.

In this example, we have a bunch of rouge scientist who managed to discover a method to... raise the dead. Ooh... scary!

Any how, to my point. The good option basically destroys all of the research (questionable), imprisons the rouge scientists (acceptable), and then make sure that the rest of the science community keep with the views of society (acceptable, maybe). The Neutral option simply doesn't use it (acceptable). The Evil option uses the research (Clearly evil).

The first problem I'm having is, why must the data be destroyed as part of the good decision? So long as they didn't actually create one of these creatures, I wouldn't have a problem with keeping the data intact, or even archieved. Second, if they were kind enough to not create any undead, and merely inform me, I would be willing to help them stop being rogue. As for their research, walking dead that suffers a tormented existance isn't what I would call good or humane, but I would be willing to let them play with their research so that they may come up with something better.

One of the better things you might be able to use the research for is for medical applications. If we can eliminate the suffering, and find a way switch someone from a person to zombie and back again, it could be used for medicine. Think about it, if these zombies are as tough as they portrayed in the movies (as in not technically alive so they don't die as easily), they could be put through medical proceedures that would dangerous, or highly fatal for a normal person. Once done, we could turn them back.

So, from dead, to zombie, then back to dead.

Switching a living person to a zombie?
That would first require the persons death, and then the conversion to zombie - since the procedure brings the dead back to some kind of 'life'.

All in all, it does not sound too promising.
Or smart.
Or sane.

Responding to the question of being a good race, there is one advantage: good/good diplomacy. In some cases, you could practically demand everything but the kitchen sink virtually for free and the good races will happily agree to your deals. Heck, you could even ask for freebies as well, and they will most likely hand them over too, no questions asked.

NOTE: Does not work with planets!!!

There are advantages to being good-aligned, which I do not dispute. What I said above only applies to the ethical choices you make when colonizing planets. As a good race, you can make several evil choices, then switch to making neutral choices once your alignment leaning has moved as far as you want - there is no reason to take the 'good' ethical choices unless you have made too many evil choices and want to compensate back toward good.