If WH40K got the Bioware Treatment...

[Carry2]

I dislike Mass Effect's system where you can have Renegade and Paragon at the same time. Which didn't make any sense.

Possibly, but it does make sense here. There are alien races out there who have no particular faith in the Emperor and don't follow the laws of the Imperium, but their not corrupted either.

What? Allying with Xenos is definitely against the Law, and most certainly is a social moor. Have some corruption Lose some reputation. Whatever you want to call it, the system still needs to be there.

But corruption isn't about your reputation. It's supposed to be an intrinsic psychological/metaphysical aspect of your character. It's not how others perceive you, it's how you actually are. You might have a completely unblemished reputation, while being rotten to core.

I wonder. One of the Biowareisms that I get tired of is the inevitable dualistic morality scale element.
Would a Space Marine Shooter-RPG perhaps do better if the difficult choices (instead of being between giving money away to orphans and kicking treasure out of puppy-dogs) were about tough tactical choices and the kinds of dilemmas the Space Marines actually do face? (Especially say in the context of something like the Deathwatch).

Conflicting secondary objectives, the choice whether to limit collatoral damage or not, rivalries (inside the team or with other Kill-teams), conflicting loyalties between home chapter and the Deathwatch, etc.

Yes! Yes! This! Exactly! More to the point, if an SM division were obliged to operate in isolation from the larger chain of command for an extended period, they might be obliged to assume diplomatic/admin duties for which they have little training, which also raises some interesting quandaries.

Also, part of the point I'm making is that Faith/Corruption isn't about good/evil, it's solely about order(obedience/stasis/group) vs. chaos(change/individual/freedom). You can take orderly actions that are arguably evil, and chaotic actions that are arguably good... even if does make you sprout a third arm.

First off, let's lose the 2 point morality system, as despite 40k's strong focus on the Chaos/Purity scale, that's not all there is, and some things don't really make sense with regards to it. I'd suggest a 4 point scale. You have the standard Corruption/Faith, which represents falling/dealing with Chaos, or rising above it's influence/staying true to the emperor.

Then you have another scale, which needs descriptors, but involves choices that aren't dealing with Laws and Social Mores. This is where stuff like temporary Xenos alliances would fall.

I don't think there inherently needs to be a particular scale or rating for these things, because the consequence of these choices is already encapsulated in... well... their consequences. If you, for example, decide to team up an Eldar farseer against a Tyranid splinter fleet, the benefit is that you're more likely to dispatch the 'nids. The downside is they might, afterwards, turn on you if your casualties are too great.

The only need I see for an explicit guage on the order/chaos scale is because it has specific metaphysical effects within the setting, with mutations and madness and wotnot.

However, what I might suggest is that Faith and Corruption be rated separately, rather than intrinsically summing to a fixed total. So, for example, disobeying an order would reduce your Faith, but wouldn't intrinsically raise your Corruption. Conversely, some actions (like gunning down defenceless civilians 'by the book') might increase your personal faith, but inflicting collateral damage on a civilian populace is a great way to make chaos cults more popular, so it also boosts your corruption.