Do alignments improve the gaming experience?

[pemerton]

What I do find problematic is that any explanation of why I don't find its use to be fruitful in my games is treated as a personal affront. I think we need to be extroadinarily careful about throwing around terms like bad roleplay and poor GMing as if there were some sort of platonic ideal of what a roleplaying game should be.

I'm not saying that this isn't happening in the thread, but is this happening often in this thread?

For me, it underscores the bulk of my participation for the past 1300 posts.

Upthread, at post 42, I posted as follows:

suppose a GM decides that (say) inadvertantly killing someone in a context of defence of others is not evil. And then a paladin PC inadvertantly kills someone, and the player of that PC takes a different view from the GM (s/he has a stricter view about the impermissibility of various forms of non-intentinal homicide, either for real, or as part of his/her conception of his/her PC). Now there is a gap between the value framework within which the player is conceiving of his/her PC, and the value framework that the GM is applying - the player expects that his/her paladin should be subject to divine sanction, but the GM doesn't deliver. How is that improving the play experience or the depth of either character, or player's engagement with the game?

The above example is not purely hypothetical - it came up in my game. Because I don't use alignment, as GM rather than imposing my own moral judgement I followed my player's lead and made the character's response to (what he took to be) his PC's moral error a focus of play in that particular session.

Here's another example from actual play. The player of a paladin (and the other players as well), in the course of the game, form the view that the ancient pacts that had been reached between the gods, the demons and the lords of karma in order to bring stability to the heavens amounted, in effect, to an unfair sacrifice of the interests (in life and wellbeing) of present-day mortals. So they took it upon themselves to disregard the pacts, to ally with the one god who had been exiled from the heavens for taking a similar view, and to use an artefact borrowed from that god to rewrite the heavenly and karmic order to produce a new solution to the cosmological problems that also ensured that the mortal realm did not suffer as it otherwise would have.

My own view is that nothing would have been added to that arc of play (which unfolded over several years) by having me, as GM, assign an alignment to the gods (and thereby foreclose the issue of whether their decisions and agreements were good or bad) and then judging the behaviour of the PCs (including the paladin PC) by reference to that labelling of cosmological forces.

<snip>

For example of play to which an alignment system would be an impediment, see the two provided earlier in this post.​

That it to say, I gave examples that answered the thread question - examples, with explanations, of episodes of play in my game to which alignment would have been an impediment.

At post 56 I received this reply:

Can't agree with that - it seems like the challenges to the character's belief can easily facilitate great role playing, rather than impede it.

Which is to say, another poster told me that I was wrong in my own understanding and interpretation of my own play experience, and that alignment would not have been an impediment to my play experience after all, and the only reason that I think it would have been is because I don't understand how alignment should be used.

I understand perfectly well how alignment could be used. I have seen it in play. I have read much about its use, including (but by no means limited to) this thread. It remains the case that alignment would have been an impediment to my play experience in the episodes of play described above, because alignment requires me, as GM, to substitute my moral judgement (be it real, or merely imagined for the purposes of the game) for that of the players, by deciding whether or not their behaviour conforms to the requirements (of virtue, of honour) that they have set for themselves in playing their PCs.

Replace "why I don't find" with "why I do find" and your statement is just as true.

It is not an affront to me that you enjoy playing with alignment. What is an affront to me is to be told - in post 56 and continuing, repeatedly, over 1300-odd posts - that I am mistaken in my own assessment of my own play experiences. (Other things that I have been told is that because I don't use alignment my game must lack moral or thematic depth, and also that because I don't use alignment my game must lack consequences - as if every non-alignment-using RPG - which is practically all of them except D&D - must lack these things.)

The following post - number 97 upthread - remains true for me. Whether others find it useful for understanding and developing their own RPGing is up to them:

The reason that alignment is an active impediment for me, as opposed to merely a waste of time, is that by pigeonholing behaviour into pre-determined moral categories questions are answered by stipulation that I don't want to answer by stipulation.

And I certainly don't need aligment as a roleplaying guide. If I, or one of my players, wants to play a paladin, or a sneaky thief, or a chaotically tainted drow, or whatever, no guide in the form of alignments is needed. Having decided what to play, we just play it - and then let the character evolve in play

<snip>

This doesn't relate to playing with jerks. I play with people whose company I enjoy. It doesn't mean that we have the same moral outlook, or have the same ideas about how to develop PCs or respond to situations posed in play. Sometimes I'm shocked by the things my players have their PCs do. I can express that shock by saying as much - I don't need to do anything additional like telling them "By the way, that shows that your PC is evil".

This is exactly what I mean by the player having to subordinate his/her judgement to that of the GM: this is the GM telling the player how his/her PC should act, given that the player wants his/her PC to do the right thing.

I personally don't see the attraction of that sort of play. As a GM I want the players to play their PCs, and as a player I want to play my own PC. If we are assuming that the player is playing sincerely, then why should the GM's opinion as to what is right be given priority over the player's?

<snip>

For me, as far as evaluation is concerned, I similarly want the players to make action declarations for their PCs, which prompt judgements by them and by the other participants, which might then lead those others to have their characters do certain things in the game - and the overall situation, and its value, is the outcome of those choices and their intersection. I don't want it predetermined either via consensus or via GM stipulation.

<snip>

the issue is, for me, one of who decides what happens in the game, and what its value is.

<snip>

the question [about value] does not have to be decided as part of the mechanical resolution of play. It is about provoking real evaluative judgements and motivations in the participants.

 

[pemerton]

4e is set up with multiple barriers to your poison scenario

<snip>

The only way I can see this poison issue coming up in any regular way is a paladin being in play alongside an executioner assassin. If a group have worked out how to make that viable for them - along the lines of a superman-batman team-up - then go for it. It shouldn't be any more overpowered than the paladin teaming up with a fighter, so it's not as if the player of the paladin has a reason to angle for a poison-using buddy rather than someone else.

He has access to the poison. He chooses to use it. Does he, or does he not, gain a mechanical action? Is the use of poison deemed "honourable" because the player says it is so, or is it not?

<snip>

If my character is an honourable warrior, truly concerned with fighting a fair fight, is that consistent with continuing to work with this poisoner

Neither question makes much sense to me.

If the group has worked out how to make the paladin-assassin team-up viable within their play expectations and campaign set-up, then why am I asking whether honour is consistent with working with the poisoner? I'm already positing that the group has sorted this issue out to their satisfaction. They don't need me, or anyone else as far as I can see, sticking his/her bib in to tell them that in fact they've got things wrong.

As for the paladin's poison use, as I said the scenario you describe is not going to come up in 4e for multiple reasons. How is the paladin going to have access to the poison? Why would s/he spend 250 gp or more buying a poison when s/he has other options? Why would the GM place poison as a treasure for a paladin?

If the player of a paladin, for whatever reason, decides to make poisons part of his/her schtick (perhaps s/he's playing a drow paladin?) then we are back in the territory of asking whose conception of honour is determinative for play purposes. Why wouldn't it be the player's?

Why can’t the player believe that the Paladin honestly believes that the use of poison to facilitate the defeat of an evil opponent is an acceptable and justifiable tactic?

No, he cited an example where the use of a less than honourable tactic by a 4e Paladin would provide him with a mechanical advantage.

Which is it?

If the player sincerely believes that the action declared is honourable, then who is deciding that in fact it is "less than honouable"? And why is that other person's decision authoritative?

It is both. A dishonourable tactic is being employed to achieve a desired end. The desired end is benevolent, the tactics used to achieve it less so.

Who has decided that the tactic is not benevolent, or is dishonourable?

If the player takes the view that his/her PC is being dishonourable, and the player takes the view that his/her PC must do penance of some sort, or otherwise suffer, for acting dishonourably, then there is no need for GM intervention via mechanical alignment, is there? The player will (presumably, at least in my experience) play out the penance. I gave an actual play example along these lines upthread, in posts 42 and 97.

But if the player does not take the view that the behaviour is "less than honourable" or "less than benevolent", then why must the GM's view prevail? I have stated my reasons for preferring the player's view to prevail in such circumstances.

do the cosmological forces of Good see through such rationalizations and they are not Good, however loud and long they may protest because the character's actions speak louder than the player's words?

<snip>

In our world, we can have endless debates, but Good is not a cosmological force which directly influences our world. And if Good is a cosmological force, then it has an answer to these questions.

First, you are making assertions about our world which I believe are not permitted by board rules.

Second, who at the gaming table decides that these are rationalisations? Presumably the GM. Which takes me back to my core question - why would I, as GM, want to substitute my own judgement (whether real, or imagined for the purposes of gameplay) for that of the players?

And what's the solution for a player consistently playing their character out of alignment?

Who is judging that the character is out of alignment?

The tangible cosmological forces of Law, Chaos, Good and Evil which, as they are not PC's, are managed by the GM.

I would have hoped that the context of my question - in response to [MENTION=6762594]Dannorn[/MENTION] referring to players who consistently play their PCs out of alignment - made it clear that I was not asking who, in the fiction, makes such a judgement about the PC. I am asking who, at the gaming table, makes such a judgement about the player's play of his/her PC.

The answer you give is that the GM does (wearing the hat of the "cosmological forces"). I am not interested in doing such a thing in the course of play. It impedes my play experience. Hence mechanical alignment, which - as you state - requires making such judgements as GM, is an impediment to my play experience. For this reason, my game does not include "cosmological forces of Law, Chaos, Good and Evil". It contains gods, demons, devils, primordials, lords of karma, and like cosmological entities, around whom the PCs organise themselves and in relation to whom the players frame their PCs' loyalties and opposition.

In my current game, the player of the chaos sorcerer regards some of the Arcomentals - the so-called Elemental Rulers of Good - as benevolent beings worthy of respect. The player of the Rod of Law-wielding, Erathis-worshipping invoker/wizard takes a more dim view of them. Which of those character is correct? That is not a question on which I take a view as GM in the course of adjudicating the game. It is a question which is a prime focus of play. The conclusion of the campaign may lead to some resolution - or may not, depending on how things proceed.

Those posters who are indicating that the Paladin would not use a less than honourable tactic such as this in their games appear to be deciding it is less than honourable.

I have personal views about the morality of warfare and related matters. They are available in print for anyone who is interested in them. But they are not part of my adjudication of the game. If a player plays his PC according to a moral conception that I personally do not share, I - along with anyone else at the table who takes a different view - might say as much. As I said upthread in post 97, I might express my shock. But that has nothing to do with adjudicating the game, whether it comes from me or another player.

The point that [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] and I are trying to convey is that, if a player agrees that the tactic in question is less than honourable, then in our experience there is no reason to suppose that he will declare it as an action for his/her PC - or, if s/he does do so, then presumably s/he is ready to do whatever penance or endure whatever punishments might follow.

But our other point is that, if the player does not agree that the tactic is dishonourable, then as GMs we are not going to intervene to impose our evaluation (be that real or imagined) upon the character.

Two issues seem juxtaposed here.

<snip>

Second is whether the characters are decent people - ie of Good alignment - because the players say they are. That is, they routinely kill the prisoners, torture townsfolk for information, etc., rationalizing that it is all for the Greater Good - do they get to declare they are still Good, and we all accept that because this is the player's character, so the player gets to dictate whether they are good?

Why not?

If this is the players' sincere belief, within the context of the game, how would it improve my play experience, as GM, to second-guess them?

Of course, I personally doubt that there are many people in the world, or at least that part of it that I interact with for RPGing purposes, who would sincerely take that view - who would sincerely put forward, as decent people, murderers and torturers. So I don't think the example really has much bite. It's like asking what would I do if the player of a paladin wanted to play his/her PC as a white supremacist - I don't need to form an opinion on that because I'm pretty sure it's not going to happen to me.

I actually don't think the two issues are as distinct as you think they are. My view is that one reason why players who are otherwise decent might tend to have their characters resort to the sort of behaviour you describe is because the GM routinely adjudicates and frames them into "no win" scenarios, where being decent is an obstacle to success. Hence my point about prisoners who break their word when released on parole - if the GM routinely has prisoners keep their word when paroled, or exchange information for release on parole, than the players have considerably less incentive, from the point of view of succeeding at the game, to play their PCs as vicious.

both you and Hussar have repeatedly claimed that no sincere player, and no player you game with, has ever, or would ever, play their character in a manner remotely similar to the examples raised where mechanical alignment would come into play.

That's because I don't think many such players exist in my gaming circles. Presumably you agree with us, because (as far as I know) you have never seen such players either, and hence (as far as I have followed your posts) do not need to use mechanical alignment to keep them in line.

If I have misunderstood, and if in fact you do play with (or have played with) such players, and you did use mechanical alignment to keep them in line, then I would be very interested in reading a post about how that worked.

They keep telling us that examples posted of alignment issues would never happen in their games, not because the actions can be justified as being within the parameters of Lawful or Good behaviour by a sincere player, but because their players would never stoop to such machinations, and would never claim a character taking such actions is honourable, good, etc.

Frankly, this is because the examples you keep coming up with are contrived and have - as best I can tell - no basis in actual play. Where, for instance, is the player who regards eating babies in sacrifice to Orcus as justifiable for a paladin who is ostensibly implacably opposed to that demon lord; or who regards poisoning foes, or slaughtering and torturing prisoners, as honourable tactics? Perhaps such players are out there, but I personally have not met them. Hence, whatever stress they might place on a gaming table, I have not had to deal with it. Does mechanical alignment help cope with or defuse such stresses? (The poster who has come closest to answering this question, I think, is [MENTION=128]Mishihari Lord[/MENTION], but s/he did not indicate precisely what sorts of moral disagreements among posters s/he was using mechanical alignment to sidestep.)

The closest I have come, in play, to what you describe is a player who played a character who would lure men into compromising positions, then murder and mutilate them. The idea was that the PC was a type of avenger against men who subordinate women by soliciting prostitutes. Whatever the deeper moral merits (or otherwise) of the position expressed by that PC (and her player), there was no doubt that it pushed some other players' buttons as far as good taste in gaming is concerned. When the player in question realised this, the PC was retired and a new one, more conventional in outlook and activities, was introduced. For me, this therefore counts as an example of [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION]'s suggestion upthread that out-of-character, metagame-level communication is the more useful way to try and deal with these issues of value disagreement, rather than the ingame, in-play method of mechanical alignment.

Anyway, I have given some examples upthread that illustrate real moral differences among participants that did not need to be resolved out of game, because they provided excellent material to be the focus of play. For instance, there was the player of the paladin who regarded inadvertent killing in defence of others as a great wrong although I as GM did not. And I think I also mentioned the PC who slew unconscious hobgoblins on the battlefield, to the cheers of liberated villagers but the shock of his fellow PCs, who had become used to paroling prisoners. And I don't think this is the first post in this thread in which I have mentioned the conflict between the chaos sorcerer and the Erathis-worshipping rod-wielder. I don't recall you discussing how these examples might be adjudicated at your table. (Other than suggesting, in post 56, that a paladin might judge him-/herself more harshly than his/her deity - which makes no sense to me because, unless we are supposing that the deity is tempering the demby way of mercy, that would simply mean that the paladin is mistaken. Which still means that the player's conception of the relevant values in play is being subordinated to that of the GM as controller of the deity.)


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some players would view powerful NPC's who disagree with the PC's conception of morality as at least an equal "stick" to the alignment rules. If their characters are jeered in the street, criticized for their actions, or arrested for their crimes, that's just the heavy-handed GM trying to beat them into submission and play their characters the way he wants them played.

Well, that depends on how such circumstances are framed, and also on the resources that the players have to bring to bear. This is why I mentioned, in the post to which you are replying, that the availability of social conflict mechanics can play an important role here. Where such mechanics exist, the players can takes steps, via their PCs, to sway those NPCs to their side.

For me as a player, the way that a GM adjudicated an attempt by me as a player to have my PC win over jeering mobs would be an important test-case of that GM's style. If the GM allows it to be resolved in accordance with the social-resolution mechanics, I suspect that is my type of GM. If the GM stonewalls and railroads, then I know that the game is probably not for me, because the GM is trying to use those NPCs to beat me into submission. Which is not at all the sort of game I'm interested in playing. (Or in GMing, for that matter.)

Do the players have to be equally open to the possibility that the NPC's persuade them that their view is right, and their adverse judgement was appropriate

That very much depends on the system. In The Dying Earth, absolutely - being bamboozled by others is an important part of the play experience. In 4e D&D, which is the system I am currently GMing, no. There are no mechanics whereby the GM can obliged a player to regard his/her PC's mind as changed on some point.

But this question strikes me as having no bearing on whether or not a GM is a GM under whom I would want to play. Because it tells me nothing about whether or not a given GM is a stonewalling railroader.

Let's take that one step further, to the two player characters who disagree on whether torturing the mad bomber's sister is an acceptable tactic. They use their interaction skills, the social resolution mechanics are implemented, and one of the characters wins overwhelmingly. Is the other character now obliged to fervently believe that he was in error, and be grateful for being prevented from his inappropriate action and being set back on the True Path of Righteousness, regardless of how the player feels about the issue?

This also depends on the system. Burning Wheel absolutely encourages players to resolve these sorts of disagreements via the Duel of Wits. It also makes it clear that the outcome of a Duel of Wits is binding externally but not internally. The losing character (PC or NPC) is obliged to conform with the outcome until the relevant conditions change (as stipulated by the game rules). But s/he is permitted to remain inwardly opposed - the compliance may be merely coerced and external.

4e D&D has no comparable mechanic for resolving conflict between PCs, but I did ad hoc one on one occasion to bring to an end a debate among the players about which of two possible goals to pursue, after the debate had sucked up perhaps an hour or more of table time over two sessions. I mentioned the procedure used in this post, though not in any detail - from memory it was dX (d6? d10? I can't remember) + CHA, totalled for each side of the debate.

Does my character get to always be right because he invests lots of character resources into the ability to persuade others to see things his way

As I said above, that depends on the system. Of course, in The Dying Earth, which has the strongest persuasion mechanics of any system I'm familiar with, there is no assumption that persuasion equals rightness. The Dying Earth takes it for granted that the PCs are persuasive charlatans or crude buffoons. Cycnicism is inherent in the set-up for the game. (Consequently, of course it has no PCs comparable to paladins or clerics; it has only sorcerers, just like any sword-and-sorcery setting.)

You keep coming back to the player being prohibited from making choices

Yes. Because mechanical alignment precludes (some) choices. It precludes a player from choosing to play a character committed to a value set as interpreted by the player, because the interpretation of the relevant values is in the hands of the GM. (Who, via the cosmological forces of Good, Evil, Law and Chaos gets to decide what counts as honouring relevant values, and in the case of a cleric or paladin whether the player gets to continue playing the PC that s/he built.)

 

[JamesonCourage]

For me, it underscores the bulk of my participation for the past 1300 posts.

Upthread, at post 42, I posted as follows:

Not reading the whole thing, or I would've read the thread.

However, here's my thoughts on some of it. Please, add to this if I'm missing something, though.

My own view is that nothing would have been added to that arc of play (which unfolded over several years) by having me, as GM, assign an alignment to the gods (and thereby foreclose the issue of whether their decisions and agreements were good or bad)and then judging the behaviour of the PCs (including the paladin PC) by reference to that labelling of cosmological forces.

I've already talked about how I used alignment to define Good and Evil in my campaign, not right and wrong. With that in mind, I have a problem with you framing alignment as purely used as objectively defining something as good or bad. There was plenty of debate about what was right or wrong from my players during my campaign, and I even gave multiple in-play examples (as I know that you value them).

So, as I said, I have problem with your framing, here.

That it to say, I gave examples that answered the thread question - examples, with explanations, of episodes of play in my game to which alignment would have been an impediment.

At post 56 I received this reply:

Can't agree with that - it seems like the challenges to the character's belief can easily facilitate great role playing, rather than impede it.

When someone else uses the qualifiers "it seems" and "can easily", I guess I don't take it nearly as harsh as you do (jumping to "bad RP" and "poor GMing", neither of which was said in this reply).

Which is to say, another poster told me that I was wrong in my own understanding and interpretation of my own play experience, and that alignment would not have been an impediment to my play experience after all, and the only reason that I think it would have been is because I don't understand how alignment should be used.

Another poster seems to have written that they don't see things your way, and that they seem to think it could have gone just fine with alignment. They've made zero attack on your GMing skills, and haven't called your game "bad RP" or something similar. It looks like you're taking things personally, here, but like I said, if this has been most of the thread, I'm interested in hearing about it. I honestly haven't read the majority (and won't), so it could be. It's why I asked.

I understand perfectly well how alignment could be used. I have seen it in play. I have read much about its use, including (but by no means limited to) this thread. It remains the case that alignment would have been an impediment to my play experience in the episodes of play described above, because alignment requires me, as GM, to substitute my moral judgement (be it real, or merely imagined for the purposes of the game) for that of the players, by deciding whether or not their behaviour conforms to the requirements (of virtue, of honour) that they have set for themselves in playing their PCs.

Okay?

I never argued with that, man. I was curious if most of the thread had been accusations of poor GMing and bad RPing. I haven't seen it by any of the lingering major players of this thread, but I was curious.

I'm not here to debate you on alignment or if you've interpreted something as a personal attack. It's really not worth my time. No offense, but I've seen threads where you seem to jump on an innocent post, and I've seen times where you fight back against outright attacks on your play style. I don't know which case this one is yet, so I specifically asked Campbell (and not you or Hussar) because I trust that poster's judgment.

Yes. Because mechanical alignment precludes (some) choices. It precludes a player from choosing to play a character committed to a value set as interpreted by the player, because the interpretation of the relevant values is in the hands of the GM.

Just wanted to voice my objection to this framing, again.

 

[pemerton]

I've already talked about how I used alignment to define Good and Evil in my campaign, not right and wrong. With that in mind, I have a problem with you framing alignment as purely used as objectively defining something as good or bad.

This issues has been discussed at length upthread. We appear to see it differently. For me, "Good" is a general term of moral commendation of things, including actions; and "Evil" is a general term of moral condemnation. Hence, to say that an action is evil but nevertheless right is, in my view, contradictory. (Perhaps certain "dirty hands" scenarios are an exception, but I don't think anyone in this thread has invoked such scenarios.)

I recognise that, of course, a character might regard something as right which some or other divine power asserts is not good - but that just shows that the character and the god disagree. It doesn't show that the conduct in question is both (say) not good and yet right.

When someone else uses the qualifiers "it seems" and "can easily", I guess I don't take it nearly as harsh as you do

For me the real issue is this: the OP asked whether alignment improves the game experience. I explained, in some detail, why it impedes my experience. That another player has different experiences from me doesn't change that fact, nor undermine my explanation.

I find it quite interesting to hear how others might be playing the game differently from me. I find it frustrating (and a little bit affronting, although not all that affronting - but that was the verb that was put into play by some of the posts I was replying to) to have posters try to tell me that if only I knew how to use alignment properly than I would find it to improve my experience.

A core priority for me is sincere expressive and evaluative responses by the participants in the course of play. To have the GM - whether playing the gods, or the "cosmological forces of Good, Evil, Law and Chaos" or whatever else - tell the players that their conceptions of the demands of their PCs' convictions are mistaken is an obstacle to this. For faithful PCs, in particular, it means that either (i) it turns out that the PC's faith was misguided, if the player ends up having to conclude that the god's decrees do not align with what is right (in which case the god was "good" only in some notional or stipulated sense, but not in any substantive sense), or else (ii) it turns out that the PC's evaluative beliefs were misguided, if the player ends up having to conclude that s/he misunderstood what his/her PC's convictions required. Either of (i) or (ii) means that the player's response (in the case of (i), his/her affirmation of faith as a value; in the case of (ii), his/her interpretation of whatever particular value/convictions are in issue) is being subordinated to that of the GM.

The only other poster I have seen engage with the significance of faith, and the way that an alignment system has implications for a player's affirmation of faith as a value for his/her PC, is [MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION]. Other posters who have discussed the issue seem quite content with the idea that gods might make moral errors, or that religious PCs might find themselves in reasonable disagreement with their patron deities. For me, this is the model of paladin-as-warlock: it suggests to me that the paladin has made a pact, and does not really fit with my conception of what faith, as a value and a commitment, requires. (The only poster I can recall who has embraced the idea that the player really is expected to subordinate the judgement of rightness to the dictates of the gods - which by my lights does make sense of faith in the game, but does not satisfy my particular priorities for affirming expressive/evaluative responses by players - is [MENTION=128]Mishihari Lord[/MENTION]. To be honest I've been surprised that this is not a more widespread approach - to me it seems to be one pretty plausible interpretation of what 2nd ed AD&D alignment aims at, and also 3E alignment.)

Other posters in this thread seem to me to have other priorities in relation to some of these aspects of play. For instance, most of those other players, as best I can tell (eg [MENTION=85555]Bedrockgames[/MENTION], [MENTION=6681948]N'raac[/MENTION], probably others too), seem to prioritise consistency of the gods as NPCs adjudicated by the GM over affirming the expressive/evaluative responses of the players; and to draw (some version of) the distinction you also have drawn between "goodness" and "rightness". The upshot of this, such that when it comes to paladinhood and clerichood it is the judgement of the GM that has priority over the players' judgements, seems to be something they are happy to embrace.

That is all fine, of course: others can play as they wish. But it is not an argument that alignment is not an impediment to my gaming experience, because it gives me no reason to embrace those consequences of using mechanical alignment.

An additional aspect of the discussion that comes through mostly in [MENTION=6681948]N'raac[/MENTION]'s posts, and that reminds me of some aspects of the long Fighters vs Spellcasters thread, is what seems to be an ongoing attempt to show that [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] and I are really doing the very thing that we say we don't want to do, namely, to show that we really are policing player choices and subordinating player's evaluative judgements to the GM's judgement. This is the only rationale I can see for the comments about hive minds, being picky about whom we play with, etc. It is also the only rationale I can see for the many posts attempting to argue that my adjudication of a particular event involving the invoker PC in my game thwarting Vecna was really a case of me as GM adjudicating a player's evaluative judgement as expressed via an action declaration for his/her PC.

I personally don't find that a very productive way of proceeding. When I read a poster describing asserting that s/he doesn't like or use some feature of play (eg martial metagame mechanics), I tend to start from the assumption that this is true. I don't tend to assume that his/her game is really, in mechanical and broader aspects of play, just the same as my 4e game. (And the next question, of course, is to find out exactly how s/he uses the hit point mechanic!) Likewise when I read a poster saying that s/he likes adventure paths, or that s/he likes sandboxing, or whatever, I tend to start from the assumption that this is true. I don't tend to assume that his/her game is really a scene-framing game of the sort I tend to prefer.

Similarly, in this thread, when someone posts that s/he likes mechanical alignment, I tend to take him/her at her word and assume that s/he likes and is making use of some of the features that I associated with mechanical alignment, such as GM authority over what counts as satisfying particular values/ideals. (Given that D&D has always defined alignment in relation to various values and ideals.) I don't set out to try and show that s/he really doesn't value those things, and is in fact running a game just like mine without realising it.

And if in fact some of those other posters are running games in which players' evaluative judgements take priority over the GM's in respect of those values, including faith, to which the PCs in question are committed, then in what way are they using mechanical alignment? For instance, if they really are playing in such a way, how does the GM have any role in tracking alignment? I'd be happy to have this explained, but so far the only posters (that I can recall) who have said that they use alignment in this particular way are Hussar and [MENTION=89537]Jacob Marley[/MENTION], and they have both disavowed using mechanical alignment in favour of player-driven purely descriptive alignment.

 

[N'raac]

But, you are playing with objective alignment. As a DM you must have a right or wrong answer. Otherwise, the system doesn't work. You keep complaining about a lack of consistency, but, when pressed to actually give an answer, you prevaricate and say that there is no definitive answer. Which is it? Is alignment objective or not? Does the DM decide where something falls on the alignment spectrum or not?

As seems typically, you take a very binary vision.

Taking a life is an evil act. Defending the innocent is a good act. So is taking a life to defend an innocent, or risking an innocent’s safety in order to preserve a life good or evil? It contains elements of both, and thus it is not a binary “one or the other”. Our Paladin, faced with the choice, cannot make an entirely good, nor a fully evil, decision in that snapshot moment, so my answer to the question of “Is the choice the character made Good or Evil” is “NO”. That is, the choice the character made is neither good nor evil. The other choice would also have been neither good nor evil. It falls between the two on the alignment spectrum.

Now, the PC values come into play. One might feel the only proper action is to take a life to defend the innocent. Another may feel that act is improper, and accepting the risk to innocents to preserve that life is the only proper action. Neither, however, feels that the innocent are unworthy of any protection, nor that it is appropriate to engage in wanton slaughter. In other words, moral conflict between two viewpoints, both falling within the broad spectrum of Good.

In your own example, which paladin do you judge is correct in interpreting alignment and which one is wrong? Because, under mechanical alignment, in order to be consistent, you must decide. And the players must abide by your decision. That has been your constant refrain throughout this thread. Are you now refusing to decide, and thus alignment is no longer objective?

“Neither action is fully consistent, nor wholly inconsistent, with the precepts of LG” is itself a decision. And I believe I have said numerous times thoughout this thread that grey areas and close calls should be a subject of group discussion. You seem to interpret any situation – hardly restricted to alignment – where the GM makes the ultimate call as a situation where the GM should accept no input, no challenge and no question to his decisions, ruling as a dictator over the gaming table with an iron fist.

Now, if the NG fighter is killing prisoners, yeah, I'm allowed to have an opinion and I would certainly see this as out of character. So, I would pull the player aside and see why he thinks this is acceptable.

As has been stated upthread, this is just as much an imposition of your judgment as the application of alignment rules. I contrast this with [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION]’s approach, as I believe he would accept that the NG fighter truly and sincerely believes that the compromise of the prisoner’s right to live is justified by the protection of the innocent, including the PC’s, in this instance, and that the player sincerely believes this compromise falls within the Good alignment (or does not compromise it to the point the character, on balance, is not Good).

And, in game, this certainly could have consequences - if it's known that the fighter kills prisoners, no one will surrender to him anymore. People will obviously treat him differently. Again, there's no problem with in game consequences. Additionally, the other players might react as well. They are allowed to have opinions on the matter.

Sure. In alignment games, those “other people” can include deities and cosmological forces, which are real and tangible in the D&D game world.

But, you are advocating the DM as the dictator of alignment. Let's not lose sight of that. Throughout this thread, you have repeatedly stated that it is the DM and no one else, who decides morality in the game. Full stop. How is that not "alignment dictator?"

As I have said a few times before, I don’t believe I have seen anyone in the pro-alignment posters advocate for GM as alignment dictator. But then, I don’t see the GM as a dictator when I ask whether some position of advantage provides me with a bonus to hit and he decides it does not, either. There is a lot of scope between “makes the final adjudication” and “dictator, which again seems imperceptible in your binary world.

As for the paladin's poison use, as I said the scenario you describe is not going to come up in 4e for multiple reasons. How is the paladin going to have access to the poison? Why would s/he spend 250 gp or more buying a poison when s/he has other options? Why would the GM place poison as a treasure for a paladin?

How does anyone else have access? 250 gold coins is not that expensive in any D&D game I’ve played. And why is it impossible a defeated enemy would have a store of poisons which the PC’s might choose to sell, destroy or keep? Sometimes, the PC’s find items not perfectly suited for their own use (or items the GM thought they might sell, but they choose to keep).

Who has decided that the tactic is not benevolent, or is dishonourable?

Every poster who has said “a Paladin would not do that in my games”. That’s how we got on to the topic.

In my current game, the player of the chaos sorcerer regards some of the Arcomentals - the so-called Elemental Rulers of Good - as benevolent beings worthy of respect. The player of the Rod of Law-wielding, Erathis-worshipping invoker/wizard takes a more dim view of them. Which of those character is correct? That is not a question on which I take a view as GM in the course of adjudicating the game. It is a question which is a prime focus of play. The conclusion of the campaign may lead to some resolution - or may not, depending on how things proceed.

For myself, I don’t see a character deciding that Law is more important than Good being inconsistent with the alignment rules. An LN character would typically feel that way. And LN is, of course, the best alignment, for reasons including not letting sentimentality over “good” and “evil” get in the way of pure, perfect order.

But our other point is that, if the player does not agree that the tactic is dishonourable, then as GMs we are not going to intervene to impose our evaluation (be that real or imagined) upon the character.

Yet your posts, and those of several anti-alignment posters, upthread contain numerous examples of things that a Good character, or an honourable one, would just never do in your games. That indicates that you have formed an evaluative decision of those actions. These are mixed liberally with your statements that the GM does not form an evaluative judgment (by extension, I assume the players cannot form such an evaluative judgment as well, although their characters certainly can and will, although I don’t believe that has ever been stated).

Of course, I personally doubt that there are many people in the world, or at least that part of it that I interact with for RPGing purposes, who would sincerely take that view - who would sincerely put forward, as decent people, murderers and torturers.

Then why is this thread, among other commentaries, filled with NG fighters killing prisoners, Paladins considering torture to locate the Mad Bomber, and whether leaving the villain to die is an evil act which would mean Batman isn’t a Paladin?

Add up the typical Paladin’s body count and tell me again that he would not be a murderer in modern parlance. We clearly accept that killing, if not torture, is not at all inconsistent with a Good alignment in the D&D world.

The closest I have come, in play, to what you describe is a player who played a character who would lure men into compromising positions, then murder and mutilate them. The idea was that the PC was a type of avenger against men who subordinate women by soliciting prostitutes. Whatever the deeper moral merits (or otherwise) of the position expressed by that PC (and her player), there was no doubt that it pushed some other players' buttons as far as good taste in gaming is concerned. When the player in question realised this, the PC was retired and a new one, more conventional in outlook and activities, was introduced.

So there was an evaluative judgment of that character made at the table, then. I thought you didn’t pass evaluative judgments on sincere players or their characters at all. To be clear, I agree the methodology used was not one of mechanical alignment

Anyway, I have given some examples upthread that illustrate real moral differences among participants that did not need to be resolved out of game, because they provided excellent material to be the focus of play.

You and I don’t agree on whether alignment prevents this play. Examples

For instance, there was the player of the paladin who regarded inadvertent killing in defence of others as a great wrong although I as GM did not. (Other than suggesting, in post 56, that a paladin might judge him-/herself more harshly than his/her deity - which makes no sense to me because, unless we are supposing that the deity is tempering the demby way of mercy, that would simply mean that the paladin is mistaken. Which still means that the player's conception of the relevant values in play is being subordinated to that of the GM as controller of the deity.)

You note what the player and PC thought, and what you the GM thought. You make no mention of what the deity thought. And yes, the Paladin may hold himself to a higher standard than he might hold others, and regret not keeping more strictly to his principals, even when his superiors feel his actions can be forgiven. How is it that such a difference in viewpoints of this nature can never be excellent material to be the focus of play?

And I think I also mentioned the PC who slew unconscious hobgoblins on the battlefield, to the cheers of liberated villagers but the shock of his fellow PCs, who had become used to paroling prisoners.

Could this be good role playing? Sure. Would it mean immediate alignment change? Why should it? Even if I accept that killing helpless prisoners is an evil act (and let’s review that typical Paladin body count again…), a Good person will undoubtedly fail to fully live up to the precepts of Good on some occasions. Could Good PC’s disagree on the fate of hobgoblin prisoners? Absolutely. The “shock of his fellow PC’s” seems like an evaluative judgment, by the way. Whether the action is, or is not, “Good” in no way prevents the PC taking it, arguing that it was the appropriate action, or maintaining a Good alignment. Unless we think causing the death of an enemy is always Evil, in which case no D&D character can lay any claim to a Good alignment.

And I don't think this is the first post in this thread in which I have mentioned the conflict between the chaos sorcerer and the Erathis-worshipping rod-wielder. I don't recall you discussing how these examples might be adjudicated at your table.

Is someone arguing the Chaos Sorcerer is Lawful, or the Erathis worshipper is not?

That very much depends on the system. In The Dying Earth, absolutely - being bamboozled by others is an important part of the play experience.

This doesn’t suggest the one who succeeded on the social skill actually was in the moral right, but that he was able to argue his way out of it. It actually suggests a predetermination he was in the wrong – that is, that an evaluative judgment had already been made.

In 4e D&D, which is the system I am currently GMing, no. There are no mechanics whereby the GM can obliged a player to regard his/her PC's mind as changed on some point.

Then why should it be a simple die roll to impose such results on the rest of the world? I dislike PC’s who are somehow immune to the forces which the rest of the world are subject.

Yes. Because mechanical alignment precludes (some) choices.

You have indicated some choices upthread which would be precluded in your game, as well. Murder in the name of the Raven Queen comes to mind (yet she herself rose to power by murdering her predecessor, did she not?)

It precludes a player from choosing to play a character committed to a value set as interpreted by the player, because the interpretation of the relevant values is in the hands of the GM. (Who, via the cosmological forces of Good, Evil, Law and Chaos gets to decide what counts as honouring relevant values, and in the case of a cleric or paladin whether the player gets to continue playing the PC that s/he built.)

It prevents the player from unilaterally deciding the label to be placed on his or her values. I don’t think that is actually precluded in your games either – or does the fact that the poisonous Paladin feels his actions are honourable mean that no one, PC or NPC, may disagree (or that their disagreement can never be correct)?

Just wanted to voice my objection to this framing, again.

Quoting only one line from an excellent post to ad my agreement with the concise and well written comments. XP if I can (probably can’t).

It is also the only rationale I can see for the many posts attempting to argue that my adjudication of a particular event involving the invoker PC in my game thwarting Vecna was really a case of me as GM adjudicating a player's evaluative judgement as expressed via an action declaration for his/her PC.

Since we keep coming back to this, let’s try again. Your earlier posts read, to me, like a statement that PC resources should not be removed for PC behaviour. That view was inconsistent with the Vecna/familiar scene. Your later explanations clarified (I think!) your view is restricted to removal of PC resources for evaluative judgments as to whether the PC was behaving consistently with his own values, differentiating the familiar/Vecna scene.

Presumably, had the player laid claim to ultimate service to the provider of the familiar and to Vecna, and that his actions were consistent with such service, his claims would be accepted as true and no negative consequences would arise at the hand of any of those patrons. Clearly, however, he made no such claim.

[And this still, in no way, indicates the mechanics were consistent with 4e rules, if you want to go back to that, however I am hopeful we are done with that discussion.]

 

[JamesonCourage]

This issues has been discussed at length upthread. We appear to see it differently. For me, "Good" is a general term of moral commendation of things, including actions; and "Evil" is a general term of moral condemnation.

I'm having a hard time grasping how you saying this is much different than N'rrac saying that he sees things differently in your post. I understand your point of view (even if I think mine is easy to grasp after my explanation), but I don't think you're saying I'm a poor GM or inflicting bad RP on my group.

I find it quite interesting to hear how others might be playing the game differently from me. I find it frustrating (and a little bit affronting, although not all that affronting - but that was the verb that was put into play by some of the posts I was replying to) to have posters try to tell me that if only I knew how to use alignment properly than I would find it to improve my experience.

Out of curiosity, has this happened by the major players in this discussion? I don't know if it's happening or not, I just know that I never saw it when I poked my head in, but that was only for maybe one page every 10-15 that went by.

(i)(ii)(i)(ii)(i)(ii)

I'm going to admit to skipping any paragraph where this is a thing. No offense, it's not personal. I do it to Manbearcat as well. (I think he's noted as such, and gracefully avoids them in posts to me.)

I skimmed the next few paragraphs. Nothing I feel interested in replying to.

An additional aspect of the discussion that comes through mostly in @N'raac's posts, and that reminds me of some aspects of the long Fighters vs Spellcasters thread, is what seems to be an ongoing attempt to show that @Hussar and I are really doing the very thing that we say we don't want to do, namely, to show that we really are policing player choices and subordinating player's evaluative judgements to the GM's judgement.

I think this is the case, yes. I'm not sure if he sees that as a particularly bad thing (since he's basically trying to do a "gotcha" with your own interpretation of "policing the players" or something similar), but it seems to be the same argumentative debate on both sides that I see certain posters get into again and again. And it's one of the reasons I'm skimming when I decide to read at all.

Read the next couple of paragraphs, and nothing in there makes me want to reply. Maybe some of this will help other posters here, but all I can say is "okay."

 

[pemerton]

I'm having a hard time grasping how you saying this is much different than N'rrac saying that he sees things differently in your post.

The difference is that I'm not telling you to change your meta-ethical framework so as to realise that alignment is really impeding your game. That I cannot make useful sense of a framework that you are using is - from your point of view - a mere biographical fact about me which (I would have thought) has no bearing on the utility of that framework for you.

A comparable point is that [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] and [MENTION=89537]Jacob Marley[/MENTION] both use descriptive alignment. Whereas I ignore alignment altogether - unlike them I find it unhelpful even as a general description (particularly because, as was discussed way upthread, I cannot make any useful sense of Law and Chaos in the way that AD&D and 3E deploy those notions). I am not trying to tell them that they are doing it wrong.

I find it frustrating (and a little bit affronting, although not all that affronting - but that was the verb that was put into play by some of the posts I was replying to) to have posters try to tell me that if only I knew how to use alignment properly than I would find it to improve my experience.

Out of curiosity, has this happened by the major players in this discussion?

Yes. I would say it is the single most prominent strand in the posts in this thread from [MENTION=48965]Imaro[/MENTION] and [MENTION=6681948]N'raac[/MENTION]. It crops up in others' posts also.

 

[pemerton]

I contrast this with pemerton’s approach, as I believe he would accept that the NG fighter truly and sincerely believes that the compromise of the prisoner’s right to live is justified by the protection of the innocent, including the PC’s, in this instance, and that the player sincerely believes this compromise falls within the Good alignment (or does not compromise it to the point the character, on balance, is not Good).

I don't play a game with alignment. The notion of "NG" does no work at my table. The PC in question is neither NG nor not-NG, because those descriptions are not part of the framework of my game.

“Neither action is fully consistent, nor wholly inconsistent, with the precepts of LG” is itself a decision. And I believe I have said numerous times thoughout this thread that grey areas and close calls should be a subject of group discussion.

There is something on which I lack a firm grasp, that was raised by [MENTION=2205]Hobo[/MENTION] at around post 50 or so upthread: in what circumstances does the use of mechanical alignment actually matter, in your game, if all these questions that actually come up in play are not resolved by reference to it?

Or if that is not so, and if some questions are resolved by reference to it, could you provide an example?

How does anyone else have access?

In the case of an executioner assassin, by way of class ability. In the case of other PCs, they might purchase it.

why is it impossible a defeated enemy would have a store of poisons which the PC’s might choose to sell, destroy or keep?

If the paladin chooses to destroy it, then it was not a treasure parcel for that player, and hence s/he can expect to find something else. If the paladin chooses to keep it, then it was a treasure parcel for that player. Why would the player of a paladin, who thought using poison was dishonourable, choose to cash in his/her treasure parcels in this way?

This metagame rationing of treasures found is part of what I am referring to when I talk about those features of 4e that mean that the player of the paladin has no incentive to have his/her PC use poison. Of course, if you depart from those features then the incentive structure might change - but a GM who sets up such an incentive structure (eg where PCs have an incentive to loot because there is no metagame cap on how much loot they can collect) should hardly be surprised that it leads to corruption on the part of the PCs! (After all, why should a player in a game be expected to deliberately underpower his/her playing piece just to make an imaginary moral point? This is why Gygax gave the paladin more powers - so that s/he wasn't underpowering him-/herself. But post-AD&D paladins are not more poweful than any other PC of the same level.

Who has decided that the tactic is not benevolent, or is dishonourable?

Every poster who has said “a Paladin would not do that in my games”. That’s how we got on to the topic.

You have misunderstood my question. I am asking who, in the course of playing and adjudicating the game, makes that decision?

I have never encountered a player who regards baby-eating as honourable. So in my game, it is the player who decides that such behaviour is not honourable, and hence who - if playing an honourable PC - refrains from it. What I am trying to ascertain is whether you regard that decision as one to be made by the player, or by the GM, in the course of play.

I don’t see a character deciding that Law is more important than Good being inconsistent with the alignment rules.

In my campaign, there is a morally-laden cosmological question at issue - heavenly order vs primordial chaos. I don't think the alignment mechanics have anything to say to it at all, because the alignment mechanics do not tell me whether law or chaos is more desirable (and I do not see why a LN character should oppose a CN one any more than a peanut-butter eater should oppose a chocolate-eater). That's just one way in which the alignment mechanics do not contribute to my game.

if the player does not agree that the tactic is dishonourable, then as GMs we are not going to intervene to impose our evaluation (be that real or imagined) upon the character.

Yet your posts, and those of several anti-alignment posters, upthread contain numerous examples of things that a Good character, or an honourable one, would just never do in your games. That indicates that you have formed an evaluative decision of those actions.

<snip>

So there was an evaluative judgment of that character made at the table, then. I thought you didn’t pass evaluative judgments on sincere players or their characters at all.

This has been discussed, extensively, upthread.

I have never denied having evaluative responses. In fact, in post 97 upthread, I indicated that I have them and may well share them with my players - eg expressing shock at actions they declare for their PCs. But these are not part of my adjudication of the game as GM. There is no difference between me having a shocked reaction, another player having a shocked reaction, or a third party observer of play having a shocked reaction.

the typical Paladin’s body count and tell me again that he would not be a murderer in modern parlance.

In modern parlance the paladin is a soldier, not a murderer. Some soldiers kill very many other people. To say that this makes them murderers is highly contentious.

You and I don’t agree on whether alignment prevents this play.

I reiterate that you have no evidential basis on which to judge that alignment is not an impediment to my enjoyment of those episodes of play. I aslo reiterate that you tend to conceive of "an episode of play" purely in terms of the fictional events that occurred during that episode, whereas I am referring also to the emotional and other experience of the participants. The same fictional events could have been achieved via GM railroad, but that doesn't mean that the presence or absence of GM railroading has no bearing on my enjoyment of the play experience.

You make no mention of what the deity thought.

This is because, in my approach to play in relation to these sorts of situations, the deity is not being played as an independent entity. The player and GM in concert are shaping the deity's responses through the unfolding of the paladin PC at the table.

Could this be good role playing? Sure. Would it mean immediate alignment change? Why should it?

I don't know - I'm not the one who uses alignment.

What I do know is that I do not want to use a system which makes me wonder whether or not this is an evil act that may (or may not) prompt an alignment change. Deploying that framework contributes nothing to my game, and detracts from those aspects that I enjoy.

I dislike PC’s who are somehow immune to the forces which the rest of the world are subject.

PCs in 4e are not immune to being persuaded. But the mechanical resolution is different - the player gets to decide (whereas for NPCs the matter is determined via skill checks).

Your earlier posts read, to me, like a statement that PC resources should not be removed for PC behaviour.

As I have repeated stately, PCs lose hit points as a result of their behaviour. Hence, unless you somehow inferred that PCs in my game never lose hp, I don't see how you ever came to this conclusion.

 

[JamesonCourage]

The difference is that I'm not telling you to change your meta-ethical framework so as to realise that alignment is really impeding your game.

Are the major players in this thread accusing you of "poor GMing" and "bad RP"? That's what I asked about.

I also haven't seen posts where they tell you to change how you play, but simply challenge your framing of alignment as unhelpful in a certain type of play that involves exploring morality. If they are saying that, then they shouldn't. I just haven't seen it. Any idea where that was said?

A comparable point is that @Hussar and @Jacob Marley both use descriptive alignment. Whereas I ignore alignment altogether - unlike them I find it unhelpful even as a general description (particularly because, as was discussed way upthread, I cannot make any useful sense of Law and Chaos in the way that AD&D and 3E deploy those notions). I am not trying to tell them that they are doing it wrong.

I'm going to resort to "okay" again.

Yes. I would say it is the single most prominent strand in the posts in this thread from @Imaro and @N'raac. It crops up in others' posts also.

When was this? This still isn't an accusation of "poor GMing" or "bad RP", but it shouldn't go on. I haven't seen it, but I'd like to voice my disapproval if it is indeed happening.

 

[Hussar]

As seems typically, you take a very binary vision.

Taking a life is an evil act. Defending the innocent is a good act. So is taking a life to defend an innocent, or risking an innocent’s safety in order to preserve a life good or evil? It contains elements of both, and thus it is not a binary “one or the other”. Our Paladin, faced with the choice, cannot make an entirely good, nor a fully evil, decision in that snapshot moment, so my answer to the question of “Is the choice the character made Good or Evil” is “NO”. That is, the choice the character made is neither good nor evil. The other choice would also have been neither good nor evil. It falls between the two on the alignment spectrum.

Now, the PC values come into play. One might feel the only proper action is to take a life to defend the innocent. Another may feel that act is improper, and accepting the risk to innocents to preserve that life is the only proper action. Neither, however, feels that the innocent are unworthy of any protection, nor that it is appropriate to engage in wanton slaughter. In other words, moral conflict between two viewpoints, both falling within the broad spectrum of Good.

/snip

But, you the DM, wearing the hat of "cosmological forces" has to make a decision. How can it be good and not good at the same time? That's exactly the problem you accuse me of by not using mechanical alignment in the first place. It's inconsistent.

The mechanics force you to make a decision as a DM. Because if it's not evil, then the paladin can do it with no consequence, but, if it is evil, then the paladin must face mechanical consequences. Way, way back, there was the example of the badly wounded paladin leaving the child to be eaten by the giant.

Evil or not?

And the point is, if you simply waffle and say, "Well, it could be either" then alignment is no longer objective. That's the very definition of subjective alignment. Which is no problem for me, but, you've been pretty consistent with claims that the DM must make an adjudication. That alignment must be set by the DM.

But apparently when the rubber meets the road, that gets set aside? When do you decide if something is "falling within the broad spectrum of Good" and when it falls outside? And how is your game improved by ensuring that the DM and only the DM can make that determination?

See, [MENTION=37609]Jameson[/MENTION] Courage, I've been told very, very often in this thread that without mechanical alignment, my games will devolve into chaos with players doing whatever and apparently arguing that players play in good faith to their chosen characters is submitting everyone to a "hive mind" where there is no disagreement. But, as soon as we start talking about the other side of the equation, no one seems to be able to say how their game is improved. There are exceptions all over the place. Alignment is good apparently, until it's not good in which case, the DM, after talking it out with the players, makes a ruling. Me, I just skip to the end. The players tell me if something is good or not.