Holothuroid has a post on bespoke alignments with three precepts, with six sample alignments appropriate for heroic characters.
More of these
(Note that unlike the originals some of these are less appropriate for heroes than villains or civilians - though I’ve tried to give all potential for each - and some may contradict each other.)
Axe
- Everything in time grows decrepit, decadent, or obsolete; and must be cleared away.
- Hack not at the branches, save to get to the roots.
- Do not worry about what new things arise in place of the old; the earth is bountiful and mortals ingenious.
Banner
- Study the true doctrine and persuade others to it by rational argument.
- Conform your personal life to the true doctrine.
- Be prepared to overcome your personal moral reservations and other selfish concerns for the demands of what is objectively right.
Bell
- Convivality is a state of mind and does not require any money or other resources. Convivality can be two old men singing in a gutter without coin to drink or one good leg to hop on. However, once the party has started, indifference to spending resources is essential; lack of coin will not stop the party but stinginess will.
- If someone wants to join the convivality, welcome them. Once inside it, let no quarrel pass between people; if quarrel arises, help it be resolved smoothly.
- External considerations may sometimes force the party to be paused. But "serious" life is a gap in and serves the party, not the other way around.
Censer
- The world most of us experience is in some way fundamentally fake; do not let yourself be too immersed in it.
- Seek out experiences of contact with deeper reality, though these experiences may not be pleasant or advantageous in any traditional sense.
- The majority will never seek to walk your path, but accept those who are willing as students and fellow travelers.
Coin
- Always fulfill your contract.
- Don’t question the purposes towards which you’re used, but do insist on going about them in a way you can be proud of.
- Don’t slander or hold a vendetta against someone else in the business. If you feel the need to hold something against them, do it better.
Crown
- Some people have a great destiny. If you are someone with a great destiny you must not forget that you have one, if someone around you does you must not let them forget it.
- It is not wrong for someone with a great destiny to prioritize the accumulation of skill, resources, allies. They will need those to accomplish it.
- It is not wrong for someone with a great destiny to prioritize the preservation of their life. They will need that accomplish it.
Dirk
- Never let anybody push you around.
- Friends sometimes fight, but they never judge each other.
- Friends share risks and rewards.
Escutcheon
- Society is held together by bonds of deference and affection. An insult to you, however little you may “privately” care, is an attack on society that must not be tolerated.
- That you should not maintain your accustomed standard of living, or that you should work by the sweat of your brow to do so, is an insult to you.
- That those whose labor feeds and clothes you should come to harm is an insult to you.
Lamp
- Share known truths.
- Seek unknown truths.
- When one challenges you, welcome it as a sign of their health.
Lyre
- Create culture for everyone to enjoy, regardless of whether it wins you commercial success or popular acclaim in your lifetime.
- Seek out unusual experiences so you have more to draw on and express.
- Seek a sympathetic understanding of why everyone acts and thinks the way they do, especially when it is initially disturbing.
Noose
- All are liable to evil, which is kept at bay by terror.
- Violence must be terrifying, in response to a clear wrongdoing, and regular.
- You are no better than any person at heart; hold yourself in terror to another that you yourself are restrained.
Plow
- The best of all lives is to live to a ripe old age with many grandchildren. Anything more sophisticated is a fleeting ghost and chicanery.
- The realms of men must be extended.
- So that their community can live good lives, all decent people engage in patient labor, and young women and men step up to fight the outside chaos that would attack the community, even if they would thus live short lives.
Robe
- Preserve those rites and cults which have been kept since time immemorial; they may needs be adapted, but never abolished or forgotten.
- Rebuke men when they do not give what is due to the divine.
- Rebuke the divine when they do not give what is due to men.
Rose
- Make yourself genuinely worthy of the love and approval of _______.
- Permit no insult to their name or honor.
- Even if they are alive, never ask if you have achieved worthiness, and assume you have not.
Trowel
- Contribute to the building of things that will last beyond your lifetime.
- Tear down nothing that has been built by generations before, unless you build something better in its stead.
- Take part in no conflicts save when one side unambiguously threatens what you build, and the other promises to protect it.
Uses
(Free square: paladin oaths, etc.)
Experience
My favorite form of experience is checklist experience, the kind you see in Apocalypse World or Into the Depths. I’d say you can check something off when: you could have checked off some deed but didn’t because it would violate your principles, or when another PC checks something off because they approached things your way rather than in the way they were used to.
Character prompts
Obviously, you can just plug these into your favorite generator. My preferred way to exploit these, however would be to exploit how most of these have a narrow obvious route to go on and then a wider set of interpretations that are more stretches and don’t announce themselves. Most of us (more or less by definition) live rather mediocre lives, but comfort ourselves with more heroic narratives on top of it. That innkeeper is the last person who should be an adherent of the Escutcheon (he doesn’t even own the inn), but inwardly that’s his narrative: he’s a pillar of the community, he has a bit of a chip on his shoulder, he likes the day-to-day aspects of the job that it’s not “real” work, and he takes it as a real responsibility to protect those drinking there. He’d never call himself a lord, but treat him just a bit like one and he’ll always be on your good side. Or someone is living a more extraordinary life you’d stereotypically associate with another path, but the narrative is different.
Or unlikely allies and enemies: two people may pursue the same goal for very different reasons. A fanatical religious movement may summon genuine religious energies from adherents of the Censer, Robe, Noose, Rose.
Also: everybody needs people to care for them, and most of these ideals involve looking out for someone (either someone weaker, stronger, or on the same level as you.) We're all subconsciously rewarding each other and encouraging certain values. What does it mean to get by by inspiring others to one ideal vs. another?
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