If selfishness is inherently capital E Evil under D&D alignments, then does that mean a hermit who lives in the middle of nowhere and concerns themselves only with their own personal affairs is capital E Evil?
Is selfishness capital E Evil only when it becomes callousness or injustice upon others?
Selfishness is neutrality, OP
Evil in D&D can b summed up as "It is not enough that I should succeed, others should fail"
Yeah thar hermit be neutral, lass
Those horns are asking to be touched
Selfishness at the expense of others can be evil. It isn't always.
Disgaea's netherworld is a "good" example of creatures that are inherently evil, but not usually extremely evil. Most of the demons in the netherworld don't understand things that aren't selfish.
Choosing to live out in the middle of nowhere isn't 'selfish' or 'evil'. Choosing to live out in the middle of nowhere in order to gain sole access to a fountain of youth still isn't necessarily evil - though murdering others simply so they cant also access it pushes it into the 'evil' area.
Ultimately the alignment system is deeply flawed and you shouldn't take it seriously.
Hermits are druids almost by definition.
It's not that deeply flawed, it's just that people are overthinking it. They get into some convoluted philosophical debates whilst all you need is to take a side in the conflict of the cosmic forces or say 'fuck that' and be neutral.
>whilst all you need is to take a side in the conflict of the cosmic forces
Mortal worlds are full of berks who have no idea about any of this "Outer Planes" business and still get alignments.
But as long as the Outer Planes have any interest in them, they can get an alignment, as it's always good to have another foot soldier for the cause. And if they are completely disconnected from the conflict, there isn't even a need to give them an alignment.
That still means most folk get alignments anyway.
Then you can take 10 seconds to slap a label on them and go on with the game. What I'm meaning to say is, alignments are just a mechanic, mostly useful for some spells and magical items like muh holy avengers, paying so much attention to them is a waste of time when you can just label things without giving it much thought and perhaps if something goes visibly wrong (hitler becomes the holy avenger wielder because of a badly assigned alignment) you can just change the label.
Less philosophy, more kobold genocide.
What if you happen to be in Planescape?
The hermit would be neutral. Evil involves being selfish, but in a way where you're actively causing harm to other people to get what you want. Retiring to the middle of nowhere because you just want to live in peace and not deal with other people is not evil, but stealing other peoples stuff because you want it for yourself is.
Now, if the hermit had the macguffin needed to stop the dragon terrorizing the land, or whatever, but refused to hand it over because he doesn't give a fuck about people, then you can make a point of him being evil, as his actions (or inaction, as it may be) is perpetuating the usffering of people.
Please no touch.
Believe myself into a different setting
Idk I'd still go murder some barbaric or mindless creatures because that's what D&D ruleset is best for.
Alignments need to die and stay die.
I'd say that's more self-centeredness than selfishness. The hermit isn't causing anyone harm in order to focus only on his own needs. It's only when you start hurting other people to get your own way that it crosses into evil selfishness.
Selfishness at the expense of others.
>>salt
>>negative.
Selfishness is taking more than you need or deserve at the expense of others.
If the hermit had the macguffin and refused to hand it over specifically because people are fucked without it, he's acting in malice and should be counted as evil.
If it's just a useful backscratcher and he doesn't give a shit, then that's just dickish neutrality.
>Please no touch.
i'm gonna do it