D&D 5E RIP alignment

[Maxperson]

No, it's on the game when the game manages to use it poorly and do that stuff. Again, making certain humanoid races just intrinsically evil is a good example of that.

Then it's a good thing the game never did that stuff with alignment. And again, making humanoid races an evil alignment(only demons, devils and the like were ever intrinsically evil) is not racist and never has been. The entire issue with orcs is the lore language used about them being savages, etc., not alignment.

What you're arguing is that whips are racist, because whips got used on slaves, which is ridiculous. The alignment tool is and always has been just that. A tool. Only some players made it racist through their actions, not TSR or WotC.

 

[Hatmatter]

Sure, but sometimes features just age out. THAC0 is a good example.

You may be correct in essence. But THAC0 was a simplification of the "to hit" tables in first system. I played with it and the game was fine...actually THAC0 sped up our game because we didn't need to consult tables when attacking. I think the present d20 method of handling attacks is better, but I never regarded THAC0 as a feature intrinsic to the system. Maybe, for me, a better analogy would be Armor Class. I am sure superior systems can be developed for determining if either a blow or series of blows strike a target, but for me, D&D uses Armor Class. Or, perhaps the the class-based approach to character design is another feature of the game that might be categorically similar to alignment.

When it comes to alignment, it has become a trope that has extended in pop culture beyond even D&D, with people speculating on the alignments of Star Trek or comic book or other fictional characters.

D&D derives from fiction and mythology that often contain a moral or ethical perspective and the alignment system is one way of describing and including that morality.

 

[Maxperson]

The whole "Alignment is a tool for getting something across quick" doesn't work if you've managed to be on a D&D messageboard for more than a day. Alignment is like the opposite of a shared language; it's really more of a Rorschach test, where everyone has a different idea of what each term means.

That doesn't matter, though. Alignment works best as a DM tool. If I think CE means X, Y and Z and run my CE creatures that way, it doesn't matter what you or the players think. At all.

What you think about alignment only matters for your character, and in D&D you can play your character any way you feel like. It's not like alignment has any teeth anymore. Hell, I haven't required my players to use it since some time during 3e.

 

[jerryrice4949]

The way I like to use alignment is that the alignment you write on your character sheet is your character’s ideals. What they believe is right, regardless of whether they successfully live up to their own moral and political standards. On the other hand, for any effects that care what your character’s alignment is, your actual behavior determines what alignment that effect treats your character as, not your ideals.

The thing is, there are almost no effects in 5e that care what your character’s alignment is, so I don’t see anything of value being lost by removing alignment altogether. Either make alignment matter, or ditch it, but trying to have it both ways isn’t working.

Agreed. I think ditching alignment will have literally no effect on gameplay.

 

[Justice and Rule]

Funny thing is, everyone I've ever discussed this with in person had a close-enough definition of alignment that it was useful.

It's only because of message boards that I would ever know anyone has an issue with it. It's not a hard concept for any real person I've ever discussed it with.

I know I've had long discussion with what different alignments might mean with different people. I have people ranging from teens to the 70s at my tables, and it definitely influences how people look at things. I remember someone describing a society, mentioning had slaves. A younger kid responded "Oh, so they're evil" and one of the older guys was like "Well, not necessarily..."

Like, that you don't have these problems at your table doesn't really tell me these problems don't exist.

Then it's a good thing the game never did that stuff with alignment. And again, making humanoid races an evil alignment(only demons, devils and the like were ever intrinsically evil) is not racist and never has been. The entire issue with orcs is the lore language used about them being savages, etc., not alignment.

The alignment part totally plays a part in that.

What you're arguing that whips are racist, because whips got used on slaves, which is ridiculous. The alignment tool is and always has been just that. A tool. Only some players made it racist through their actions, not TSR or WotC.

No, and I can't stress this enough: a tool is not inherently racist, but it can totally take on racist meaning. Like a whip is a rather longstanding symbol of slavery, and it is typically used by villains because of that. To not recognize hundreds (even thousands) of years of imagery built up around that is jaw-dropping.

Now can heroes use whips? Sure. But just because Indiana Jones exists doesn't mean that there is totally a lot of imagery associated with slavery and whips, to the point that we even make up colloquialism based around it, like "Crack the whip".

 

[Hatmatter]

Except here's the thing... he didn't.

He copied the core cosmic conflict from Moorecook where Law and chaos are opposing factions and tessellated that to include Good and Evil.

It was only later that people started stapling on an ethical system.

Yes, I know that the alignment derived from Moorcock, a well as Poul Anderson and some others, but it was also used by Gygax as moral and ethical descriptors as well as a framework for a cosmology.

 

[Maxperson]

Sure, but sometimes features just age out. THAC0 is a good example.

THAC0 was around until 4e. 3e just packaged it differently.

 

[cbwjm]

I do like having a general alignment for monstrous races because I like to be able to say "These are the baddies" and players will generally understand that because that's also what they've known since the beginning of the game. Still this change isn't really going to change much, my players will still be cutting down orcs and hobgoblins and ogres, large hordes of undead, and demon incursions. It's not really going to change much in my games and I know when it comes to my own PCs, I rarely actually write down the alignment and I don't even know what my player's have written down as their alignment on the character sheets because it really doesn't matter much anymore, very few things in the game interact with alignment (I think there's some planar stuff that does, but that's all I know of).

 

[Scribe]

Aligmment was the excuse to go out slaughtering orcs on sight...

And...so? That is an argument at that table, for that group. How one defines 'Evil' in their setting, at their table, is going to dictate the response to that kind of behavior.

The society might have a chaotic evil structure. An individual might act according to that general trend or might defy it.
A very nice representation can be found in star trek discovery. How does someone from an evil society behave if you show them a different way.

OK, and again, so? The Alignment is CLEARLY there to be subverted if one desires. It is a general guideline, a suggestion at most. Do we need to go look at the Alignment sections on PC Lineages again?

We're not on the same page because you keep strawmanning the argument: people aren't saying that it's inherently racist, people are saying that the way it's used currently can sometimes fuel racist tropes. That's very different, but you keep trying to avoid it because I think it makes your argument much more difficult.

Fine dude. "I find that people saying it can sometimes maybe be used by racists to fuel racist tropes, is a weak argument for removal."

I'm not interested in the debate. Its simply one more thing being axed for dubious results.

 

[Justice and Rule]

You may be correct in essence. But THAC0 was a simplification of the "to hit" tables in first system. I played with it and the game was fine...actually THAC0 sped up our game because we didn't need to consult tables when attacking. I think the present d20 method of handling attacks is better, but I never regarded THAC0 as a feature intrinsic to the system. Maybe, for me, a better analogy would be Armor Class. I am sure superior systems can be developed for determining if either a blow or series of blows strike a target, but for me, D&D uses Armor Class. Or, perhaps the the class-based approach to character design is another feature of the game that might be categorically similar to alignment.

When it comes to alignment, it has become a trope that has extended in pop culture beyond even D&D, with people speculating on the alignments of Star Trek or comic book or other fictional characters.

D&D derives from fiction and mythology that often contain a moral or ethical perspective and the alignment system is one way of describing and including that morality.

But the thing is that "alignment" is simply a stand in for ethical values that would be easily explained by a few sentences rather than trying to hammer it into a two-axis system. The Great Wheel can exist without alignment because they can be explained through ethics and philosophy fairly easily.