How about alignment?

[pemerton]

Because, and this is strictly IMO, that archetype just doesn't work without the LG-only restriction.

Sure, you can play a heroic warrior archetype without the restriction if you want... but in practice, the very instant the Paladin's code becomes an inconvenience the player will suddenly decide that it's just not worth the effort. The code has to have mechanical backing, or it is meaningless.

I have a feeling that we've had this conversation before - but my experience on this is 100% the opposite.

I have never experience satisfactory play of priests or paladins in a "strong alignment" environment - because the game degenerates into one of "second guess the GM".

Whereas in alignment-free environments I have seen repeated instances of top notch priest and paladin play from a range of players. The key, in my experience, is to set up a situation in which the stakes matter to the player.

Just one example: Not too many sessions ago, the fighter-priest in my game found himself obliged to insist that a prisoner the PCs had captured by imprisoned rather than executed - despite knowing that, as a priestess of Torog (the god of jailers) she would probably enjoy herself in prison and soon find her freedom. This came about because (i) the other PCs tricked her into handing over information in return for a promise, on the absent warrior-priest's behalf, that she would be spared in return, and (ii) the warrior-priest came into the interrogation room, and was therefore informed by the prisoner of the promise that had been made, before the other PCs could execute her in disregard of the promise by which they did not feel bound. (The lead interrogating PC was also pissed off, because having been more-or-less deputised to lead a successful interrogation, his best efforts were thwarted when the "paladin" came back into the room and therefore undid the good work of the interrogator's skillful duplicity.)

Now we do not use mechanical alignment (it's a 4e game). There is no mechanical stake in the PC breaking his word, whether given by him or by his companions on his behalf. And there is no denying it would have been more expedient for the PCs to have executed the prisoner in any event. But the player wants to play a certain sort of PC - an honourable warpriest of Moradin - and the whole situation in the game is set up around the PC having that persona (he is the party's leader, for example, when dealing with external political and social actors). It is part of the story of the PC, and the player doesn't want to derail it. It's not part of the PC's story - as conceived of and developed by the player - that he be an expedient breaker of promises given in his name.

Convesely, if the game is set up so that only expedience matters, then naturally players will be expedient. But that is already a game in which the paladin archetype makes no sense, and you can't change that around just by turning up the alignment dial.

 

[delericho]

I have a feeling that we've had this conversation before

I'm pretty sure we have. That being the case, shall we agree to disagree?

 

[pemerton]

I'm pretty sure we have. That being the case, shall we agree to disagree?

Well, I'm happy to agree that we've had different experiences.

But you don't feel that mabye, since your experience is not universal, that WotC might have a reason to offer the paladin as a playable class independently of its offering of mechanical alignment? (I am guessing that the core will still have some sort of alignment-as-flavour, like 4e and Basic.)

 

[delericho]

But you don't feel that mabye, since your experience is not universal, that WotC might have a reason to offer the paladin as a playable class independently of its offering of mechanical alignment?

But... wouldn't that mean losing an argument on the internetz?

Honestly, my preference is very strongly for LG-only Paladins. But if WotC go a different way, that's fine too - it's not an issue I'm going to make a deal-breaker. So, I guess, in answer to your question, "well, okay."

 

[pemerton]

Honestly, my preference is very strongly for LG-only Paladins.

I think that one of the Essentials paladins is LG only, although, being 4e, there is no mechanical dimension to this.

I would expect the D&Dnext paladin to be LG only also, given the genearlly nostalgic tenor of what's coming out of WotC at the moment, but probably in this flavour way rather than in the AD&D/3E mechanical way.

EDIT to add: in 4e, I don't mind LG and U paladins. I find the idea of good paladins a bit wishy-washy. And Evil/CE paladins are more properly thought of as anti-paladins or fallen paladins, I think. I know there are duergar paladins of Asmodeus in one module - I think these would be better as U than E, because E suggests sufficiently disregarding of the expectations of others about honour, propriety etc that "paladin" is no longer the proper label.

 

[tlantl]

Well, regardless of whether there are alignments in the core rules or not, I'm going to continue to use them.

I don't think you can have a pantheon of deities without something to distinguish their differences as well as the alignments do.

You can't really have the good and righteous paladin or the malevolent blackguard if there isn't a system to define those differing aspects of personality and beliefs.

I also have issue with those professing to be unaligned. Although yu may claim not to have an alignment you certainly fall into one of those alignment groups through your actions. There may not be any significant penalties for moving from one alignment or another but since most characters don't need to worry about it it doesn't really matter. A good DM is always tracking each character's actions and knows w how the will react in certain situations. those classes that rely upon their alignments to maintain their classes or receive their spells are more important than the chaotic something fighter who is more good than bad.

I don't like the idea of alignment wars in my normal game world. I don't use aligned weapons in these games as they don't fit with my vision of the world.

I do like the planescape setting where "philosophers with clubs" is the basis of the setting. You have to admit that without alignments this entire concept goes the way of the dodo.

The question is should neophyte D&Ders coming into the game without the benefit of an experienced DM or players to teach them all they need to know about the game be denied one of the games iconic themes?

Regardless of whether you like them or not the alignments are one of the things about D&D that sets it apart from other games systems.

 

[Mattachine]

In Planescape, the factions weren't really alignment based, and gods did not always live on planes that were strictly one alignment or another.

As far as deities concerned, portfolios seem a better organizing principle than alignment in real world pantheons, and in the pantheons found in fantasy literature.


In any case, providing several alignment systems with brief descriptions seems a good choice and a likely choice, much as how example pantheons can be presented, or example cosmologies:

*Alignment is a way to describe the character's world view, etc.
*Here is a two-axis, nine-alignment system . . .
*Here is a single-axis, five-alignment systems. . .
*Here is a system that de-emphasizes alignment . . .

 

[frankthedm]

Definitely like the d20 Modern Allegiance system. Flexible enough to be useful to those who want it and ignorable for those who don't.

 

[jsaving]

Also law is totally ethnocentric. Barbarians may have their own cultural norms that they heed, their own notions of appropriate behaviour that do not fit with the cultural norms of say a city environment. Think about the laws of a drow society. Completely different idea of lawful behaviour. It's not that they aren't obeying the law ... it's that they have different laws.

Depends on whether you're talking about law or Law.

If you're simply talking about following laws or traditions or customs or codes, then yes, it will be totally ethnocentric and setting-dependent. You wouldn't have any idea what a "lawful" person would do in any particular setting until you first studied the relevant laws, traditions, customs, and codes to see which direction they pointed. And woe to you if there are disagreements amongst the various laws and traditions and customs and codes, because then you would also need a full-fledged allegiance system so you could rank which sources of authority take precedence.

But to my way of thinking, this would be a very unsatisfactory way to define Law in 5th edition. The reason is that, in the past, Law and Chaos have been distinct and almost personal forces around which armies have rallied and fought and died, in the best Moorcockian/Gygaxian tradition. If Law is nothing more than people having codes or following traditions, then lawful people wouldn't have much of anything in common and you'd lose the sense of conflict that's animated the lawful/chaotic alignment axis.

To be sure, James Wyatt (the 4th edition designer in charge of alignment) wanted to lose it for precisely this reason, because he thought it was too complicated and "muddied the waters" in ways that were undesirable. Good characters of all stripes should immediately understand, in the view of the 4e team, that they're all on the same side and should work together against uniformly sinister enemies similarly bound by the Evil part of their alignment tag.

But assuming one does want to salvage Law as embodying universal values rather than being ethnocentric, there are things one can take from various editions of the game to do this. One example is modron-like perpetual stagnancy. Another is keeping your word and not using poison. Another is valuing societal order over individual freedom. Some of those might work better than others, but they would provide unifying principles around which people could rally, just as "sacrificing on behalf of others" has generally done for the Good-aligned.

As to the issue of whether paladins should be LG in the new edition, is it even possible to answer that question before we know what being LG will mean?

 

[jbear]

I can't think of any universal law that would support the idea that use of poison is unlawful. I know many lawful pest exterminators.

A thief can keep his word and it makes him no more lawful. He may only give it on the rarest of occasions.

History of D&D aside ,what universal laws can we really say exist, that everyone agrees upon and would have relevance to culture in a D&D setting?

Anyway, I'm probably just splitting hairs. Like I said, each to their own. It's such an easy one to 'do how you like'.