Out of curiosity, what's the harm in leaving them in as a crutch for newbies? I find that alignments can help new players with a number of situations they've never really considered before, but are fairly common in D&D.
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Bring back alignments?
- Thread starter wlmartin
- Start date
delericho
Legend
There's no huge harm, but in general I would be inclined to reduce the ruleset down to the minimum required. This is already a really complex game; if some rules can be cut, doing so is probably a good thing.
Plus, the 4e alignment rules are just unpleasant, and annoying, and bring nothing to the game. Cut them.
Personally, I believe it's better to teach new players to play without crutches from the beginning, rather than give them crutches and then try and ween them off of them later on.
But more specifically... if we are putting in a rules subset to help new players find a character and play it... why not just give a list of personality traits to choose from, rather than this morality chart that requires you to also explain what those choices mean? It's much easier and more comprehensible to play "helpful", "free", "honest" and "not bound by convention", than it is to play "Chaotic Good".
Neonchameleon
Legend
Ding dong the witch is dead!
Alignments were simplistic and very unclear (see the Lawful dichotomy). CG is an excuse of an alignment. It's basically the "Just Nice" alignment lambasted by the Witch in Into The Woods.
But the big problem with alignments was that they trashed plots. You couldn't have a Blackguard infiltrate Paladins - or if you did he was simple to find ("Find me the Paladin who can't Lay On Hands".)
And the mechanical enforcement was just wrong and counterproductive. Start telling players what they can't do and IME they will try to subvert it. But leave playing a moral code up to the players if they want one at all (or how to respond to their PC being charmed up to them) and they will play it to the hilt IME.
Alignments were simplistic and very unclear (see the Lawful dichotomy). CG is an excuse of an alignment. It's basically the "Just Nice" alignment lambasted by the Witch in Into The Woods.
But the big problem with alignments was that they trashed plots. You couldn't have a Blackguard infiltrate Paladins - or if you did he was simple to find ("Find me the Paladin who can't Lay On Hands".)
And the mechanical enforcement was just wrong and counterproductive. Start telling players what they can't do and IME they will try to subvert it. But leave playing a moral code up to the players if they want one at all (or how to respond to their PC being charmed up to them) and they will play it to the hilt IME.
malraux
First Post
As much as anything, I think the categories from the DMG are at least as useful as CG or LN. Especially as a newbie crutch, they help to answer the question of what do you as a player want out of the game.
As someone who prefers the nine-point alignment system to the current one... this thread is the sort of request that I find almost literally incomprehensible.
Because there isn't anything to bring back, or that was taken away.
The big change WotC made wasn't changing the alignments, it was divorcing alignment from mechanics. And that means that every time you play, you can use whatever alignment system you prefer.
If you like the nine-point alignment system, just go ahead and say your character is chaotic good. Or lawful evil. Or whatever. Roleplay them that way, and the problem is taken care of.
WotC consolidating the categories was not, I think, an attempt to avoid having parties of varying alignments. I think they genuinely felt that some of the categories overlapped in a way that was hard to explain to new players, and consolidating things would still reflect the full spectrum while being easier to explain. And there is some logic there, even though I prefer the nine-point system and the greater granularity it provides.
But the thing to understand is that their ultimate goal was to make alignment entirely an element that assist roleplay, rather than a mechanical element that can be used to aid or punish a character. As such, the alignment system is just a guide on how to operate your character.
And as long as that is all it is, there is nothing stopping you from being chaotic good or lawful evil. Or true neutral, or unaligned. Or whatever alignment you yourself want to represent.
If your character aren't chaotic good these days, that's a choice you made, not a decision WotC made for you.
Because there isn't anything to bring back, or that was taken away.
The big change WotC made wasn't changing the alignments, it was divorcing alignment from mechanics. And that means that every time you play, you can use whatever alignment system you prefer.
If you like the nine-point alignment system, just go ahead and say your character is chaotic good. Or lawful evil. Or whatever. Roleplay them that way, and the problem is taken care of.
WotC consolidating the categories was not, I think, an attempt to avoid having parties of varying alignments. I think they genuinely felt that some of the categories overlapped in a way that was hard to explain to new players, and consolidating things would still reflect the full spectrum while being easier to explain. And there is some logic there, even though I prefer the nine-point system and the greater granularity it provides.
But the thing to understand is that their ultimate goal was to make alignment entirely an element that assist roleplay, rather than a mechanical element that can be used to aid or punish a character. As such, the alignment system is just a guide on how to operate your character.
And as long as that is all it is, there is nothing stopping you from being chaotic good or lawful evil. Or true neutral, or unaligned. Or whatever alignment you yourself want to represent.
If your character aren't chaotic good these days, that's a choice you made, not a decision WotC made for you.
Nemesis Destiny
Adventurer
Personally, I'm glad that the alignment concept has been completely divorced from the mechanics.
Detect Alignment spells felt cheesy and very metagame. I wasn't uncreative enough as a DM to figure out how to make plots work, that was not the issue at all, I just hated what they did for immersion.
Forcing character classes into alignment pigeonholes felt unnecessarily restrictive and limited character concepts.
Then there are the players with an Authoritarian personality type that liked playing the Lawful characters to give them an excuse to tell other players how to act. Or those who played CN as an excuse to behave like a sociopath. I gamed with a few too many of those players from either category.
As it stands now, there is nothing preventing you from using the old alignment system, or a different one entirely, if you like that better, but thankfully doesn't force it upon the community at large.
Detect Alignment spells felt cheesy and very metagame. I wasn't uncreative enough as a DM to figure out how to make plots work, that was not the issue at all, I just hated what they did for immersion.
Forcing character classes into alignment pigeonholes felt unnecessarily restrictive and limited character concepts.
Then there are the players with an Authoritarian personality type that liked playing the Lawful characters to give them an excuse to tell other players how to act. Or those who played CN as an excuse to behave like a sociopath. I gamed with a few too many of those players from either category.
As it stands now, there is nothing preventing you from using the old alignment system, or a different one entirely, if you like that better, but thankfully doesn't force it upon the community at large.
Gort
Explorer
Every single player in my campaign has chosen the not-alignment - unaligned. They all like not being straight-jacketed by the alignment system. If you were going to actually think about how they play, they all play in the good to neutral range anyway. I like never having to hear, "You can't/shouldn't do that, you're good-aligned!"
I guess I'd be okay with there being an alignment system but ONLY if it was completely divorced from any mechanics. I remember being prevented from gaining any more levels in bard in the Neverwinter Nights computer game because I "wasn't chaotic enough". I had to go and unleash a plague of imps on the city before I could continue playing magic music. It was so stupid.
I guess I'd be okay with there being an alignment system but ONLY if it was completely divorced from any mechanics. I remember being prevented from gaining any more levels in bard in the Neverwinter Nights computer game because I "wasn't chaotic enough". I had to go and unleash a plague of imps on the city before I could continue playing magic music. It was so stupid.
That is simply untrue: at the very least, the mechanical effects ensconced in certain abilities- Protection from ________, Detect ________, Smite ________, etc.- are gone, and given the way the AEDU system constrains variety for most classes, it is not something you can easily bring back.
While some could return via Rituals- arguably, as an overall mechanical improvement- others would not be so easily returned to the game.
Having alignment divorced from the mechanics of the game was one of the best things introduced in 4e.
If a player want to play the Super Goody Two Shoes of Light and Holiness, they can. They don't have to worry about being put in a Catch 22 situation, where if they do something against their 'code', they lose all of their powers, but if they don't, they die.
I would rather it be the player's choice as to the ramifications of their actions and work with the DM to see that reparations are made.
It also benefits the group as well. I've seen our Paladin fall from grace, and then have to help him Atone. At the time, we were under time constraints to accomplish a mission, but we wouldn't have been able to complete it without the paladin at full power. Granted, the DM could have done something about the situation, but still it wasn't very fun to put the current adventure on hold to go do a side mission.
If a player want to play the Super Goody Two Shoes of Light and Holiness, they can. They don't have to worry about being put in a Catch 22 situation, where if they do something against their 'code', they lose all of their powers, but if they don't, they die.
I would rather it be the player's choice as to the ramifications of their actions and work with the DM to see that reparations are made.
It also benefits the group as well. I've seen our Paladin fall from grace, and then have to help him Atone. At the time, we were under time constraints to accomplish a mission, but we wouldn't have been able to complete it without the paladin at full power. Granted, the DM could have done something about the situation, but still it wasn't very fun to put the current adventure on hold to go do a side mission.
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