My DM (dungeon master) came up with this alignment system after we made the leap from 3.5 to 4.0 and found that the new alignment system was just plain bad. We've been using it for a few months now and it works surprisingly well to explain actions and motivations.

True neutral, true good and true evil are the core of this system. A truly evil character has to follow laws, otherwise he is just crazy/psycho. A truly good character has to disobey laws as they are made by men and inherently flawed. Atheists and animals are true neutral as they have no objective reference to their moral values and as such they don't have moral values per say.

Now, fascism is trying to attain good for man but strictly following man-made rules, which makes it opposite of good on the good spectra. In the same way, liberalism is motivated by evil but disobeys all laws making it opposite of the true evil that exists. Communism and capitalism are neutral as they don't strive for good or evil but simply exist as a way of distributing resources. One does it lawfully and the other by enhancing freedom/liberty.

Good and evil doesn't need to be explained I think.

Now I know this might be a bit unorthodox especially since communism, capitalism, fascism and liberalism didn't exist during the dark ages, but we find that sacrificing a bit of realism can be worth it sometimes in moderation and as long as it's not immediately relevant to combat.

Any of you guys use your own systems or do you just take the one out of the book?