Alignment. Who needs it?

If player characters have a rich personality, then alignment is not necessary.

And personality can be complex. The black and white (and grey) of alignment will never be able to "perfectly" define it.

A personality might be black with grey streaks, it might be white with black speckles.

Take, for example, a character who is just, caring, and honest. However, whenever he meets Purple Things he turns his nose up in disdain -- even though these Purple Things are innocent and do not deserve his contempt. If the Purple Things need help, the PC says, "Go somewhere else! You'll get no kindness from me!"

Now, what "alignment" is this guy? Is he good because 99.9% of the time his personality is that of a "good" person (ie. just, caring, honest); or is he "evil" because 0.1% of the time he is a bigot and this "stains the whole"; or is he "neutral" because the good and the bad counter-act each other?

I say he is none of these. The rigid alignment system cannot portray what this complex PC is. He is kind of "white with black speckles."

So, I've ditched alignment in my game. This has been a great move because it has forced my players to focus on personality traits and quirks. GURPs is a good system because it "forces" players to play personality traits/quirks with its advantages/disadvantages system (oh, yeah, it has no pesky alignment).

Anyway, this works for my game; it may not work for yours. Just some thoughts of mine . . .

You'll have to change a lot of spells like Detect Good/Evil and Unholy Blight etc. I've just made all these spells detect/affect the "enemy".

P.S. I unruffled some feathers with my last posting: "Why we love D&D but hate d20". Sorry, I've being properly reprimanded. But, thanks "Author of Crystalmancy" for your support.

Alignment depends on GENERAL actions and how people act MOST of the time. Its not some set strict thing, but fluid and changing with the character. From what I see, most of the problems people have with Alignment is that players let alignment shape thier characters, instead of characters shaping alignment.

Your alignment does not determine how the character acts. Alignment is a RESULT of the acts. For your example, the person sounds Neutral Good to me.

And on a side note...how does the traits/quirks thing happen to be good? Can't the same arguements against Alignment be applied to a traits/flaws system? I mean, it limits how the character acts and restricts roleplaying...

Have you waited the required amount of time since the last "I don't understand alignments therefore I don't use them" thread?


Aaron

Aaron2 said:

Have you waited the required amount of time since the last "I don't understand alignments therefore I don't use them" thread?


Aaron

Click to expand...

I think that law got repealed or something...

That is one of the things I am looking forward to about Eberron. It blurs the alignments nicely while still keeping the same general catagories as D&D has.

A person is good if his behavior is generally alturistic and noble. Of course people slip now and again or have a cultural emnity, but that isn't enough to push them over the edge.

If a person generally looks out for themselves first, but doesn't actively seek to screw anybody over then they are pretty much neutral. Sure they might steal bread from a rich merchant to feed their family, but probably not from a poor person.

Then there are the evil people who generally seek to scrounge whatever advantage they can without concern for others.

Now even these come in varying shades. The innkeeper who finds every excuse to over charge wherever possible for any reason might be evil, but just edging over because of the persistant greed. Hardly a reason to smite the poor guy and it would be criminal to do so.

I keep the alignment system in D&D because it is D&D and to do otherwise kind of spoils the feel for me. I might as well play GURPS for that matter (and often do actually). I just don't take it as seriously or as rigid as some.

Stone Dog said:

A person is good if his behavior is generally alturistic and noble. Of course people slip now and again or have a cultural emnity, but that isn't enough to push them over the edge.

If a person generally looks out for themselves first, but doesn't actively seek to screw anybody over then they are pretty much neutral. Sure they might steal bread from a rich merchant to feed their family, but probably not from a poor person.

Then there are the evil people who generally seek to scrounge whatever advantage they can without concern for others.

Click to expand...

How is this different from normal D&D?


Aaron (hasn't had his daily recomended allowance of alignment flame wars)

I have never really understood the need for alignment; Monte's Arcana Unearthed, if no other game, showed that you don't need alignment in D20.

But some people feel very comfortable with it. I would never deny such rules to those who want them; I dropped alignment back in the 80s and have never looked back.

Personal tastes, I suppose.

Alignment is great for a new player as it gives an immediate concept to base your role-playing on; the same as for races and classes. If I'm a Lawful Good Human Fighter, it describes a lot about how I act, which will be quite different to a Chaotic Evil Halfling Rogue.

It also allows the deities to be more active in the game - and to set up the conflict between the fiends (Evil) and angels (Good), and other such things that help the campaign world. It provides a method for determining the effect that such powers can have on the PCs.

Does every group need alignment? No. However, it's a very handy tool.

Cheers!

Wombat said:

I have never really understood the need for alignment; Monte's Arcana Unearthed, if no other game, showed that you don't need alignment in D20.

Click to expand...

That is a fine book. I like it a lot and you are right in that nothing really needs alignment. It is just a style thing that feels right about actual D&D just as much as abstract hit points and levels. They aren't needed for a good system, but they just feel better for certain set ups to me.

Alignment is fine, it's just pretty superfluous IMO. It's a shortcut. Fully fleshed out characters have no need for it.

That doesn't make it bad, just not necessary in many instances.