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Musings on the "Lawful Jerk" Paladin
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<blockquote data-quote="iserith" data-source="post: 7349296" data-attributes="member: 97077"><p>I think D&D 5e paladins are more about their <em>oaths</em> than they are whatever nebulous thing they imagine alignment means, which is often in my experience colored by how they did things in other games or how alignment was explained to them by their older cousin in 1985.</p><p></p><p>"Lawful good" means "can be counted on to do the right thing as expected by society." "Lawful Neutral" means "act in accordance with law, tradition, or personal codes." But this just describes "typical behavior." In addition, "few people are perfectly and consistently faithful to the precepts of their alignment." There's a lot of wiggle room here. Not to mention, there is no default incentive for playing to alignment at all, unlike playing to one's personality traits, ideal, bond, or flaw which can net the player some sweet, sweet Inspiration.</p><p></p><p>So, given that paladins are more about oaths than alignment, alignment only "broadly describes its moral and personal attitudes," and playing to alignment isn't worth Inspiration except with a house rule, anyone trying to use alignment as an excuse for play that is not fun for others really has no leg to stand on, especially since, in order to achieve the goals of play, a player is required to pass all choices through the lens of what is fun for everyone and what helps create an exciting, memorable story. To do otherwise is to lose at D&D.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="iserith, post: 7349296, member: 97077"] I think D&D 5e paladins are more about their [I]oaths[/I] than they are whatever nebulous thing they imagine alignment means, which is often in my experience colored by how they did things in other games or how alignment was explained to them by their older cousin in 1985. "Lawful good" means "can be counted on to do the right thing as expected by society." "Lawful Neutral" means "act in accordance with law, tradition, or personal codes." But this just describes "typical behavior." In addition, "few people are perfectly and consistently faithful to the precepts of their alignment." There's a lot of wiggle room here. Not to mention, there is no default incentive for playing to alignment at all, unlike playing to one's personality traits, ideal, bond, or flaw which can net the player some sweet, sweet Inspiration. So, given that paladins are more about oaths than alignment, alignment only "broadly describes its moral and personal attitudes," and playing to alignment isn't worth Inspiration except with a house rule, anyone trying to use alignment as an excuse for play that is not fun for others really has no leg to stand on, especially since, in order to achieve the goals of play, a player is required to pass all choices through the lens of what is fun for everyone and what helps create an exciting, memorable story. To do otherwise is to lose at D&D. [/QUOTE]
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