Alternate Alignment System - the Color Wheel [P.E.A.C.H.]

[Leliel]

Actually I could see Black secondary paladins still being altruistic and kind knights in shining armor.

Think of Renegade Sheppard in Mass Effect-while he is, quite simply, a major in-your-face cowboy cop, he has a strong conscience and is genuinely devoted to the ideal of universal peace and safety for humanity. "I do what I want, and what I want is for humanity to become a Council race."

Thus, I think that beyond having White as a primary alignment, there should be no restrictions on Paladin alignment.

[Kensen]

Although it has been pointed out in the thread a number of times, I think it is fair to mention early on in the first post that the alignment/color wheel isn't your original idea, but rather, you're expanding on ideas from MtG. For those who haven't played MtG, it's very hard to differentiate between your IP and WotC's IP, and you probably want people to comment on your ideas.

Anyway, good work, this might work well in some D&D games, especially those set in the MtG universe.

[Lord_Gareth]

Wow, that's a lotta comments while I was away ^_^

So:

On the Subject of Black: I'd originally included Death as the "Platonic" form because Black is linked to Death in M:tG. Based on the comments here - and the fact that none of the other colors have recieved complaints - I'm going to change that to Entropy, which should fit much better.

I've already been thinking on the subject of the undead, and I do believe I have a way to handle it. Spells and abilities which manipulate negative energy are likely going to be Black (Negative energy is an entropic force), but their products don't necessarily have to be. Thus, the only undead with an alignment subtype are the ones made purely of negative energy, such as Nightstalkers and Shadows.

And the DM Said, "Let there be Clerics," and saw that it was Broken: I'm of two minds on clerics. Y'see, since alignment no longer represents moral absolutes of RIGHT vs. WRONG, the deities as-written.../shift/. As unimaginably powerful beings locked into cosmic roles not of their own choosing, deities are trapped in a form of extremism that probably makes the alignment of their followers irrelevant.

Thus, I have two ideas - 1. Clerics draw power directly from their Color(s), and the gods are just an excuse/explanation.

2. A Cleric's Primary color must match one of his deity's colors; the Cleric may possess any Secondary colors he wishes.

Thoughts? Comments?

Paladins: I thought I'd already answered this question - Paladins are required to have White somewhere in their alignment mix at all times. Though they might believe otherwise (it's certainly a hallmark of White philosiphy), Paladins are no longer pure champions of COSMIC RIGHTEOUSNESS; they're martial characters dedicated to order and the idea of the common good. There's a world of difference.

Coming Up Soon: Alignment Wars - Why Enemy Colors Clash

[Latronis]

So will they no longer directly channel positive\negative energy? But rather WUBRG energy?

[Lord_Gareth]

I'm not certain; it makes little sense for, say, a Blue cleric to do much to the undead just 'cause he's a cleric, but I'm not certain what I'd change things with. So: Until I come up with a better idea, W and/or G clerics channel positive energy, B and/or Red clerics channel negative energy, and U gets to choose.

In the event that there's more than one option (a B/W cleric), primary color takes precedence.

Enemy Color Conflicts

Spoiler

Show

Black vs. White - Amorality vs. Morality: The core of the conflict between Black and White - even beyond the idea of Individual vs. Society - is the idea of morality. White believes firmly in the idea that there is Right, and then there is Wrong, and that failure to do Right is, by elimination, Wrong. Serving the needs of the whole over your own needs is Right, to White; after all, the whole will protect even its weakest member. Does this mean that all White characters are paragons of their virtues? No. But they either strive to be, or believe they already are.

Black, on the other hand, is amoral. Note the important difference between the terms "amoral" and "immoral"; Black does not believe in the concepts of Good and Evil. Black believes it's a cold, stark universe and that when push comes to shove, you can be damn sure that people are going to prioritize themselves. To Black, the ideas of Right and Wrong are, at best, tools used to manipulate others and at worst justifications for horrid atrocities, and as far as Black's concerned that's just low. If you're going to slaughter thousands of innocent people for power, at least have the courtesy to say so.

What this means is that White sees Black as a threat to the common good - a maverick at best and a foul source of infernal corruption at worst. Black, on the other hand, sees White as foolish, naive, and a threat to its freedom. It's interesting to note that, in a way, Black is less concerned with White than White is with Black; Black doesn't care if you choose to live your life kowtowing to someone else's set of rules, which often makes White the aggressor in their conflicts.

More to be edited into the first post!

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

Why not simply channel your primary color of energy, hurting those of opposed colors? So a White/Green Paladin could heal White, Green, or Blue, and hurt Black and Red. If a creature has both aspects (the Paladin's Blue/Red wizard buddy, for example), the Paladin can choose whether to heal or hurt.

[Lord_Gareth]

An interesting idea, Djinn - very interesting indeed. Thoughts/feelings on that, everyone?

On the subject of U/W: Blue is the color of change, yes, but it's the color of purposeful, logical change. Both Blue and White are, for the most part, reactionary colors; that's why stagnation is U/W's greatest weakness. Putting oneself out there - ACTING - is dangerous without careful planning and backup, and very often U/W will choose to do nothing rather than take a risk.

[Latronis]

An interesting idea, Djinn - very interesting indeed. Thoughts/feelings on that, everyone?

That's an interesting way of doing it, saves having to think up what each colour would do.

Mind you to such direct colour hosing doesn't really fit all the colours either.

On the subject of U/W: Blue is the color of change, yes, but it's the color of purposeful, logical change. Both Blue and White are, for the most part, reactionary colors; that's why stagnation is U/W's greatest weakness. Putting oneself out there - ACTING - is dangerous without careful planning and backup, and very often U/W will choose to do nothing rather than take a risk.

Stagnation isn't a very good way of putting it. Over-analyzing instead of acting certainly.

[Lord_Gareth]

And the Color Conflicts are UP on the first post! I also added Latronis' "Additional Reading".

[Devils_Advocate]

Oh, hey, I totally forgot that Blue is biased towards thought and away from action in Magic! Which is funny, because that's one of the main reasons that I identified Blue as my own Color. (I took an online test, and it gave me a different result. Like, White or somethin'. Pffft! Clearly it was a poorly-designed test. ) Probably because you didn't include that aspect of Blue in your description of it.

Anyway... Green/White and Blue/White could both be described as "conservative", but Green/White in the traditionalist sense and Blue/White in the risk-adverse sense. Which I guess could lead to stagnation of a sort in both cases, though I think more in the long term for Green and more in the short term for Blue.

[erikun]

White - I think you've got White pretty good here. To be fair, "Order and Community" is something we're all familiar with, and is modeled in D&D fairly well. Lawful alignment and the Inevitable type of outsiders are pretty classic White stereotypes.

Pure White lands are probably one of the deadest, though - unrestrained, crystaline order has no use for the everchanging life cycles of humans, if it can do without them.

Blue - One thing I disagree with is that Blue represents "Change". Yes, Blue is willing to adapt to new ideas, but this isn't really them changing their viewpoint as much as expanding on what they already know. Blue rarely changes, perhaps less so than other colors, because Blue rationalizes its actions against its vast library of knowledge.

If anything, Blue is more Knowledge and Learning than Knowledge and Change. Blue is about knowing, but it's also about knowing something new, discovering something unknown, or exploring another horizon. I suppose you could also call it Knowledge and Discovery.

Pure Blue isn't change. It's difficult for me to say what exactly, but it's more like Apathy. Blue doesn't care about others, it doesn't care about the world, it doesn't even care about itself (beyond being restricted). All it cares about is its own learnings and knowledge. The rest of the world could destroy itself and pure Blue would simply analyze the process. Pure Blue could be the one destroying the world and simply not care.

Black - It is pretty easy for me to see Power and Individuality in Black, and I do agree that it makes sense. On the other hand, pure Black isn't quite Entropy. To use a likely unpopular term, it is Psychopathy. Pure Black is so individualistic that it no longer cares for others, seeing them as little more than tools to be used. (or it does see that they have emotions, and just doesn't care)

Consider Phyrexia, or Demons and Devils. Neither is exactly Entropic - Phyrexia is teeming with life, albeit deadly life ready to be used at a general's whim. Both Baator and the Abyss are full of "life", constantly moving and plotting in their home planes - not something you would an Entropic, dying world.

Now, I wouldn't have a problem with changing Black to entropy. And if you wanted to use Psychopathy, you'll probably want to use a less-loaded synonym. On the other hand, it should be a concious change to make Black into entropy. Realize that a number of things most people would consider "Black-aligned" from Magic aren't going to apply anymore.

[EDIT] Now that I think about it, you used the term "Amorality" in the reference between White and Black. That might be a better term for pure Black than Psychopathy.

On Black and Undead: Changing Necromancy into a Black-aligned magic isn't necessarily a problem. It just means that everything based on Necromancy (Cause Wounds spells, Rebuking, undead) is inheritly Black-aligned. It means that mindless undead are going to act "entropic" on their own, without command. It also means that if you want to create something without the Black-aligned taint, you need to do so without Necromancy. For example, a pure White guardian spirit would be one that has chosen to stay after death, or who was bound by a White magic ritual - not by using Necromancy.

As above, you want to make sure that you are designing the system as you want it to be.

Red - I will admit, I have less focus with Red than most other colors. (I'm a White/Blue man myself.) Freedom, emotion, and chaos fit it really well.

Green - My only critique is that pure Green would be Instinct, not "Life". While a pure Green world would certainly contain a lot of life, the most telling thing about a Green creature is that it would live more off impulse than by thought. While a Red character might do whatever came to mind, a Green character would have max ranks in Sense Motive, and have an idea of what is going on around themselves.

Green/White is a hivemind, with the entire community working to raise children who fully participate in the community. Green/Red is the barbarian or instinctual savage. Green/Black is the cancer or plague, a ravenous living beast consuming everything. Green/Blue is the mutant of evolution, reinventing itself with each generation (or even before that) for the most suitable lifeform in its current environment.

[Swordgleam]

Until I come up with a better idea, W and/or G clerics channel positive energy, B and/or Red clerics channel negative energy, and U gets to choose.

Why not have White channel Radiant, Black channel Necrotic, Red channel Fire, Blue channel Cold (or psychic if you'd prefer) and Green channel Poison? Plenty of fire creatures are already weak against cold, and necrotic creatures weak against radiant, etc.

It doesn't fit perfectly with existing; you'd have to tweak some creatures' weaknesses to make sure the enemy color hurts them. Or not - maybe only the most hardcore of each color is hurt by its enemy, since why would a Red/white be hurt by white energy?

It gives each color its own flavor without having to make up any new kind of system. It's similar to Djinn's idea, but working within the existing energy types.

[Lord_Gareth]

You make some very good points, but what I'm trying to do is seperate the colors as philosiphies (your alignment) and colors as universal forces. A creature who was a paragon of Black ideals would probably be amoral to the point of committing idle atrocities, just as a purely Blue creature would be utterly apathetic. However, the "distilled" forms of the Colors are what happens when you have pure "colored" energy floating about. Thus, Blue's drive for perfection becomes Change, White's drive for peace becomes Order, Black's selfish nature bottoms out into Entropy, et cetera.

Creatures that represent the "elemental" form of the color don't necessarily have it as their alignment. Take, for example, a creature with the [Green] subtype, which represents the "elemental" form of Green. Perhaps its an endless fountain of life, forever spouting forth monsters and animals as a veritable tide before it - but the creature itself might forge those monsters into a cohesive society, betraying White tendencies.

Perhaps I should stress that alignment subtypes in this system indicate either the creature acting as a manifestation of the philosiphy OR that the creature is a sentient/semi-sentient incarnation of pure colored energy?

Another part of the reason I chose what I did is that I want to stick to things that can be reasonably be concieved of as universal concepts. Order may not be thought of as an intrinsic part of reality in the real world, but it's not too much of a stretch to define it as such - not the way it was with Good and Evil. It's hard to imagine Apathy as a cosmic force, or Instinct, but it's easy to imagine Change, Entropy, and Life.

Black and the Undead: I'm definitely thinking that Necromancy is going to end up Black, and why shouldn't it? Can you honestly tell me that a pure White creature is going to use it (likely violating all kinds of grave-desecration laws, not to mention holy writ, et cetera et cetera) or that a purely Green creature would? Blue and Red won't have issues, true, but they're Black's allies already.

[Owrtho]

Actually I could see white using necromancy. Especially as it concerns mindless undead. The main reason being that mindless undead follow orders exactly, don't require resources, and last indefinitely (at least until someone shows up and destroys them). As such they would be almost perfect to make up the backbone of a perfectly ordered society (constructs also could work).
I'd also think that the energy being used need not decide the resulting alignment. In the same way that a person might use what seems like black methods for a white cause, a black powered spell might have a white effect.

Owrtho

[Lord_Gareth]

Keep in mind that White believes in Right and Wrong. Tell me, how many people - especially your average dumbass - consider walking corpses to be Right? Especially when they think, "Hey, that could be ME!" White's defining virtue may be charity, but it's defining vice is Pride. Constructs, yes. Shambling, rotting slaves? No.

Besides, White doesn't necessarily believe in mindless order. White doesn't have to be stupid. An army of skeletons is only as smart as its captains, and a lot of White organizations wouldn't want to have to deal with mindless troops who take their commands ultra-literally.

[Owrtho]

But it might not be considered wrong in the culture. Even if our culture considers it to be, a white culture might not. It could be considered as continuing to act for the good of the community even after death. Also the corpse need not be rotting. They could use various methods from also preserving them to just making them skeletons. I also never mentioned them being an army. I said the backbone of the community. They could be used to perform all the simple menial jobs that are ever so necessary to keep the community running. And in a pure white community where the good of the community is completely placed above ones self, I could easily see the members looking at a mindless undead working to accomplish its task that keeps the community functioning smoothly and thinking "I hope that i can be as useful to the community as that when I die."

Owrtho

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

Keep in mind that White believes in Right and Wrong. Tell me, how many people - especially your average dumbass - consider walking corpses to be Right? Especially when they think, "Hey, that could be ME!" White's defining virtue may be charity, but it's defining vice is Pride. Constructs, yes. Shambling, rotting slaves? No.

Besides, White doesn't necessarily believe in mindless order. White doesn't have to be stupid. An army of skeletons is only as smart as its captains, and a lot of White organizations wouldn't want to have to deal with mindless troops who take their commands ultra-literally.

I have to disagree. I don't think necromancy should be color-coded, if you will...I can think of White uses for necromancy as surely as I can think of Black uses or even Green uses. If even one person considers a shambling corpse to be Right, then necromancy can be a White spell.

In short, if feels like you're creating an alignment system free of the problems created by a Good/Evil alignment system, and then trying to artificially inject Good and Evil back into it by forcing spells and people into stereotypes. Just remove those thoughts, and don't classify spells by color, nor mention Good/Evil is the color descriptions.

[Shyftir]

Just a note:

If you totally remove the concepts of Good and Evil your game will fall apart in your players heads. Even morally-grey games are designed to make you think about Good vs. Evil. At its core Fantasy and Fantasy gaming is about the struggle between Good and Evil. M:tG represents this through White and Black more than anything, with other colors being more representative of other forces brought into the fray.

Let me put it this way. Does it sould evil, nasty and horrifying? It's probably Black. Does it sound pure, good, and honest? It's probably White. These are things you can count on in M:tG pretty steadily. White is Good with a side of lawful. Black is evil in all its myriad forms.

What you achieve cannot be the removal of the concept of good vs. evil, you'll lose 3/4ths of Fantasy fans that way. What's needed is to remove the mechanic of Good vs. Evil. Magic partially achieves that, WoW mostly achieves that, standard D&D wallows in that mechanic. (I personally don't mind that mechanic, but I'm trying to go with the mood of the discussion.)


[rant] BtW DnD annoys me with making healing conjuration. It's still necromancy (or vivomancy.) Just because it uses it to help people makes it no less magic dealing with life force/energy. [/rant]

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

If you totally remove the concepts of Good and Evil your game will fall apart in your players heads. Even morally-grey games are designed to make you think about Good vs. Evil. At its core Fantasy and Fantasy gaming is about the struggle between Good and Evil. M:tG represents this through White and Black more than anything, with other colors being more representative of other forces brought into the fray.

Again, I must disagree. We're removing the concepts from the rules, not from the game. You can still include good and evil actions and intents, but they don't need to be physically represented in the ruleset itself.

[Krazddndfreek]

But it might not be considered wrong in the culture. Even if our culture considers it to be, a white culture might not. It could be considered as continuing to act for the good of the community even after death. Also the corpse need not be rotting. They could use various methods from also preserving them to just making them skeletons. I also never mentioned them being an army. I said the backbone of the community. They could be used to perform all the simple menial jobs that are ever so necessary to keep the community running. And in a pure white community where the good of the community is completely placed above ones self, I could easily see the members looking at a mindless undead working to accomplish its task that keeps the community functioning smoothly and thinking "I hope that i can be as useful to the community as that when I die."

Owrtho

This would probably be considered white/blue maybe a splash of black in there. White basically means that you believe in things like life after death and taking care of peoples' dead bodies. When they're being used to serve you... it doesn't seem so right. Blue however, would be the philosophy backing "useful to the community after death" and could be twisted into the white philosophy of caring for others as what you suggested, "I hope that i can be as useful to the community as that when I die."

just my two cents.

[Swordgleam]

Again, I must disagree. We're removing the concepts from the rules, not from the game. You can still include good and evil actions and intents, but they don't need to be physically represented in the ruleset itself.

Agreed. I've played in plenty of systems with no alignment mechanic whatsoever, but still strong good and evil themes in the game. Saying "necromancy and selfishness aren't equivalent to evil and healing and order aren't equivalent to good in every game that uses these rules" doesn't remove those elements from the game itself.

[Latronis]

This would probably be considered white/blue maybe a splash of black in there. White basically means that you believe in things like life after death and taking care of peoples' dead bodies. When they're being used to serve you... it doesn't seem so right. Blue however, would be the philosophy backing "useful to the community after death" and could be twisted into the white philosophy of caring for others as what you suggested, "I hope that i can be as useful to the community as that when I die."

just my two cents.

No white believes in a system of morality.. NOT what that system is. Often Dictating it to others though.

If you totally remove the concepts of Good and Evil your game will fall apart in your players heads. Even morally-grey games are designed to make you think about Good vs. Evil. At its core Fantasy and Fantasy gaming is about the struggle between Good and Evil. M:tG represents this through White and Black more than anything, with other colors being more representative of other forces brought into the fray.

Let me put it this way. Does it sould evil, nasty and horrifying? It's probably Black. Does it sound pure, good, and honest? It's probably White. These are things you can count on in M:tG pretty steadily. White is Good with a side of lawful. Black is evil in all its myriad forms.

White =\= Good. Black =\= Evil.

[imp_fireball]

Sounds cool, I can imagine already paladins dedicated to the purging of heretics, with no need of the law (Red/white)

And they can be exceptionally cruel while doing it (tortures victims, brutally slays those that beg for mercy or to be redeemed and then spits on the corpse considering it 'pathetic' that they begged), perhaps justifying them for Neutral Evil or some other alignment (Chaotic Evil?). Thus the paladin is tied to cause and deity rather than 'the rigid definition of whatever the hell good means'. Un-flawed heroes are fake anyway.

And of course it gets rid of the cliches.

At its core Fantasy and Fantasy gaming is about the struggle between Good and Evil

You couldn't be more wrong. Fantasy, at its core, is about escapism, nothing more.

I can't believe people still argue this. We don't live in the 40s of pure comic book heroes any more (ironically, hardly any of us were even born in the 40s, I bet).

The game won't drastically change if you remove alignment and all concepts of black and white. Trust me on this one.

Although personally, I still like to use alignment even if none of the black and white is involved - that way, Good isn't Good and Evil isn't Evil. Instead, good is merely nice (the desire to want to get people to like you, pretty much) and evil can be as petty as cynicism (you don't care if people don't like you; quite often you end up selfish, mean, and so uncaring that people think of you as 'evil'; and that's really all that matters in a story, character perception). Neutral is a little of both. You want people to like you, but at the same time you get involved with the wrong crowd. Or you are a cynic who feels obliged to do what he's told.

The biggest conundrum (at least for me) though, is that alignment is taken in a very human way. Too human, considering its use among those characters that aren't human, and should logically not think in the same way that humans do. The exception of course, applies to creatures like vampires whom may have used to be human.

[Lord_Gareth]

I have to disagree. I don't think necromancy should be color-coded, if you will...I can think of White uses for necromancy as surely as I can think of Black uses or even Green uses. If even one person considers a shambling corpse to be Right, then necromancy can be a White spell.

In short, if feels like you're creating an alignment system free of the problems created by a Good/Evil alignment system, and then trying to artificially inject Good and Evil back into it by forcing spells and people into stereotypes. Just remove those thoughts, and don't classify spells by color, nor mention Good/Evil is the color descriptions.

Alright, alright, you sold me - though I'd love to hear your idea for a pure G use of animate dead, what with it raping the circle of life and all.

The biggest conundrum (at least for me) though, is that alignment is taken in a very human way. Too human, considering its use among those characters that aren't human, and should logically not think in the same way that humans do. The exception of course, applies to creatures like vampires whom may have used to be human.

Oh, I definitely think that you can create an inhuman being using this alignment system. Take, let's say, the Buggers (of Ender's Game fame) - a race of competing hiveminds, each one controlled by a single queen (the only truly intelligent being in the entire hivemind). Buggers communicate solely through a form of racial telepathy, which only they can understand. Killing any individual Bugger is like destroying a camera or smashing a gun to them - just getting rid of a tool - but killing a queen is murder, because it cuts off a genetic line. Totally inhuman, right?

They're G/W.

I'm going with Djinn's idea on cleric channeling. Until I come up with a better idea, clerics can choose between turning and rebuking the undead. Such direct color-hosing may not be in accordance to the mechanics of Magic, but it is in accordance to the idea of clerics, and I am, after all, developing this for D&D.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

Alright, alright, you sold me - though I'd love to hear your idea for a pure G use of animate dead, what with it raping the circle of life and all.

Green believes that everything was made perfect as it is. Nature has already given you all the tools and weapons you need to survive, thrive, and excel - all one has to do is find one's place in Nature, accept it, and embrace it. Green opposes artifice and encroachment upon nature; direct, physical solutions, instinct, and enhancing magic are all hallmarks of Green's philosiphy. Important to note is that Green believes in destiny and predestination - but also that these forces can be violated (hence Green's violent opposition of what others might call progress). At its best, Green creates peaceful, group-oriented societies that live in harmony with nature.

Take the humble Sorcerer: a being granted magical power through forces of nature. One such man, finding his powers naturally bend towards necromancy, realizes in a flash of insight that nature has made him part of the next natural cycle: one of complete rebirth in a new (and in his mind, naturally enhanced) form. Nature has given him the means to a new end: a continuation of life after the old natural death.

This could be pure Green, although Green with a touch of either Red, Blue, or Black could also work, depending on how you look at his thoughts.

[Lord_Gareth]

Eh, I see that as G/B personally, but I definitely see the angle you're playin' at. You win :P

Alright, I have some suggested mechanical changes up. I'm also going to have to completely rewrite the standard cosmology, so expect that at some point as well (suggestions appreciated).

Your comments, critique, debate, and questions continue to be GREATLY appreciated. Keep it coming!

@Imp: The following is a nitpick - even PHB paladins don't need gods. Go ahead and read the class entry. Power flows to a Paladin directly from the Code. Gods completely optional.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

For the mechanical changes, you might want to mention that positive and negative energy no longer exist: otherwise it interacts oddly when you try to heal/harm undead of your alignment. Currently a Black Cleric can only trade in spells to case cure spells on allies...if he's working with Black aligned undead, all he can do is damage them.

[lightningcat]

Alright, I have some suggested mechanical changes up. I'm also going to have to completely rewrite the standard cosmology, so expect that at some point as well (suggestions appreciated).

I never liked the standard D&D cosmology myself, so in my game I have 24 planes based on various concepts: Air, Balance, Chaos, Darkness, Death, Dragons, Dreams, Earth, Fire, Hunt, Library, Life, Light, Nightmares, Order, Peace, Roads, Shadow, Storms, Summer, War, Water, Wild, and Winter. And there are both good and evil deities associated with each of them. So the color wheel alignment system would be a nice addition to my game as it would give me a better way to unify my cosmology.

[Lord_Gareth]

Alright, I can go a few ways with the cosmology changes here:

Option One: The Madlands - The cosmology is basically a giant soup. There's the Prime Material/Ethereal/Shadow, floating amidst a great sea of random colored energy that expresses itself, occasionally, as bubbles similar to demiplanes. Outsiders/Elementals/Suchlike are formed in those bubbles. Only the hardiest manage to survive.

Option Two: Reinventing the Wheel - It's the Great Wheel...but different. Planes get re-named, re-vamped, and condensed. Same cliched idea, different expression.

Option Three: Go Nuts - Give alternate ideas! Mirrodin's moons! Eberron's weird circling demi-planes! Ravenloftian interference!

[Devils_Advocate]

Doesn't the fact that, by design, you can go and combine any two colors seem to suggest that they're not so fundamentally incompatible with each other as all that? I mean, sure, each has its own preferred means and ends -- freedom and self-expression, doing things the "natural" way, harmony through law, manipulation through understanding, power however they can get it -- but I don't think that many things are gonna be exclusive to one color or even beyond the reach of one particular color. People of every Color are going to find it useful to form coalitions, order things to their liking, learn things, change things, consolidate power, destroy stuff, disrupt enemies, cultivate resources, and a bunch of other stuff.

The argument that necromancy shouldn't be Black seems like an instance of the broader argument that almost nothing should be any Color. A Color in Magic isn't just a unifying philosophy, but includes a bundle of stuff that meshes well together thematically; a given thingy isn't part of the Color it's part of because other things about the Colors demand that it be in there. The relevant tropes for animating corpses are "immoral" and "unnatural", so it fits best in Black and worst in Green and White. It's the sort of thing that people who favor the "moral" and "natural" will tend to oppose.

There may not be any single thing that all of the thingies associated with a given Color have in common. Rather, they may simply share a family resemblance. This is basically politics as usual.

If you want to give each Color a big ol' bag o' goodies but also want to avoid conflating different things with each other, I recommend simply clearly distinguishing between what a Color inherently is and what it merely has an affinity for. Black magic doesn't have to be Black-aligned to be easiest for Black characters.

(Think how much better the D&D alignment system would work if they had explicitly specified what each of Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos inherently are.)

Let me put it this way. Does it sould evil, nasty and horrifying? It's probably Black. Does it sound pure, good, and honest? It's probably White.

Exactly; Black is amoral and White is moralistic. White isn't inherently kind and even has the capacity to be horrifyingly cruel. One of the problems with White is a definite tendency care way too much precisely about whether things sound evil, nasty and horrifying or sound pure, good, and honest; and not care nearly enough about whether the things are actually good or bad for people. To borrow from a smarter person than myself: One of the non-obvious potential off-switches for someone's conscience is the concept of "morality".

These are things you can count on in M:tG pretty steadily. White is Good with a side of lawful. Black is evil in all its myriad forms.

Hahahaha no. Black is selfishness. Selfishness can motivate someone to do evil, but so can many other causes. On the other hand, selfishness can motivate someone to be very nice to you, so long as he expects to get something out of it in return.

"White is not good and Black is not evil" has been repeated in every official description of the Magic Colors that I've read. The official position on this issue has consistently been that each Color is capable of both good and evil. The whole classic Good vs. Evil conflict isn't dismissed as irrelevant; it's embraced as an essential part of fantasy. Too essential to confine it to the conflict between White and Black.

Now, if you want to talk about D&D alignments and Magic Colors in terms of each other...

• By their very natures, Law is White and White is Lawful. White also has a propensity for Good if you throw stuff like fondness for fairness and peace into the mix, but not so great a propensity that it's incapable of Evil.
• Stereotypical selfish Evil is Black. Non-stereotypical non-selfish Evil isn't Black. Black is the most easily Evil Color because it has no moral compunctions about harming others.
• Red is hella Chaotic. Chaos can be Red, but it doesn't have to be unless you have a very narrow view of Chaos.
• Law need not be Blue. Some people think that Law means Blue instead of White, but these people are wrong. Blue seems fairly compatible with all of the nine alignments, unless you think that Blue is inherently duplicitous and Law is inherently honest.
• Green basically corresponds to druidism in D&D, with the accompanying tendency towards Neutrality because nature is Neutral. Like White, it has some Good stuff thrown in, but nothing so central to it that it can't be Evil (especially considering that Green wants break into your house and smash up your electronics).
• Good obviously need not be White because Chaotic Good characters aren't White.

[rant] BtW DnD annoys me with making healing conjuration. It's still necromancy (or vivomancy.) Just because it uses it to help people makes it no less magic dealing with life force/energy. [/rant]

It used to be, but they changed it for 3rd Edition under the theory that necromancy is naughty and healing is nice, so obviously healing can't be necromancy.

Seriously, I'm pretty sure that that was their actual reason. They seem to have decided that they needed to actively make the Necromancy school more dark and sinister.