D&D 5E A different take on Alignment

[Maxperson]

No, that's DM's banning disruptive labels.

Do you really think that if there were no alignments that they would let evil PCs disrupt the game?

 

[Einlanzer0]

Sounds very White Wolf-y.
I have introduced Sanity, Reputation (as opposed to Honour) and Piety.
And I felt it easier to include Conditions that play into Courage/Composure other than the Fear Condition.

Allure and perhaps Style sounds like it would supplant some of Charisma's terrain and I'm not a fan of a Luck/Fate ability.

Empathy is an interesting one though.

It really depends on how you philosophically approach the ability scores. I'm not actually fan of boxing a bunch of different barely related things into an ability score, which is basically what the 6 score system does - especially for Wisdom and Charisma which are really just "doens't fit elsewhere" scores. Although arguably the main miss here is associating Willpower with Wisdom instead of Charisma which has historically been the norm.

Allure is a good example of this. Allure and general charisma really don't have that much correlation with one another. It's not only possible, but is even common for someone to not have a strong force of personality but to have a lot of seductive charm, as is the opposite. The main difference is that one of them is extremely useful to life while the other one is situationally useful. Hence the distinction between primary and secondary scores. It's an example of why I really like the system.

Luck is probably the most throw-away of them on the surface, but looking at it as "Fate" actually makes a lot of sense given considering the power deities and cosmic forces wield over most D&D worlds.

 

[Chaosmancer]

And again either you go too far or not enough in your analysis.
The alignments are not the end and all means to play a monster or an NPC. They are a tool. A tool. Don't you understand? Sometimes, when you build something, you need a hammer, other times you need a screedriver or even a demolition mace. Alignment is a basic tool for any DM and even players to start playing both characters and monsters in certain ways.

I certainly play a LE critter way differently than a CN or a CE one. Good creatures do not play like evil ones and lawful ones differs from chaotic ones.
If you can't understand that, I can't even try to help you.

As for the:" because clearly two letters is better than actually talking about their character.... "
That is utter BS. You are again putting words in my mouth (and a lot of others by the way). We never said that. NEVER EVER! Ideals, Bonds and Flaws are also on the character's sheet you know that yes???? Again, alignment is ONE of the TOOLS given to both players and DM to play out characters and NPC and monsters. IF you don't want to use that tool for reasons. Then do not use it. That is your prerogative. But from what you wrote, implying that two letters are enough for a character, you clearly do not understand (or do not want to ) what alignments are. A tool.

/Sarcastic example incoming

Yes, it is a tool. A TOOL, don't I understand?

Like you use a hammer to drive nails.
You use a screwdriver is used to screw in screws.
You use a measuring tape to measure distances.

So, what useful function does Alignment provide me?

Well, it allows me, to take a good character or creature.... and say that they are good.

mindblown

I can even take someone who is evil and cares about keeping his word, and then say that he is lawful evil... which you know, saying it out loud, sounds kind of like sorting through a big pile of colored balls, and taking the blue ball, and putting it in the blue slot, to confirm that it is blue.


After all, how could I possibly tell if something is good or evil, if I didn't have alignment to tell me if they were good or evil?

/Sarcasm ending

I know that was a bit harsh, but really, alignment is recursive. It labels something as evil, so that we know it is evil, so that we can label it as evil. As a DM or player making something, I need to decide that it is evil first, so alignment is no help at all.

AHA! People might shout, but what if you open a book and see a new monster, one you've never seen before! What would you do then without that ever useful tool of alignment!

(cough, sorry, still some sarcasm stuck in my throat)

I'd read the monster description.

I know that I'm unique in feeling perfectly fine reading three to seven paragraphs to learn about a new monster in a 300 page book I spent $60 to own, but I find that these descriptions give me so much more information. They tell me where the monster might be found, who its allies might be, what some basic tactics are, why it has some of those abilities it has, all of these other... oh what is a good term... tools, all of these other tools I might want to use. And usually includes enough information to also let me run it, without the need for alignment.

I mean, sure, I might have no idea that there are evil beings who are selfish and only care about their own gain if I didn't have the alignment chart to tell me that, but somehow, I think reading about how a monstrous being used to be a human before being twisted by their lust for power into something monstrous might give me the same idea.

Yes, Alignment is a tool. A single tool in my toolbox. And it is a poor tool, outstripped by an entire second tool box provided alongside every monster that people refuse to use because they must defend the honor of Alignment. A single tool.

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Why? It's not as if alignment has anything other than a very small handful of artifacts that even uses it. It literally doesn't matter if the DM and players don't agree on alignment. The disagreement has no effect on the PCs.

Psychological.

People are going to react to you staring you in the face and telling you "You are not a Good Person." because they are judging your actions.

People don't like that, especially when they are doing the best they can. Or, you get the person who doesn't care what label you put on them and in that case, why are you wasting your breath?

 

[Oofta]

No, that's DM's banning disruptive labels. They rarely ban classic lawful characters who boss other characters around for example. And if the only definition of 'evil' is disruptive, then again it's a terrible useless definition.

And... no one influenced by one edition plays in another?

It's not like 5e revoked the garbage fire ideas of the past or offered actual replacements. After all 'everyone' knows what good means, right?

Using it to be a douche seems to be one of the documented uses for alignment I can confirm having seen in the wild. Mostly LG though. I've never seen a campaign crash and burn faster than in the hands of a 3e Paladin, fueled by their stupid alignment restriction and alignment-based code that tells them not to play well with others.

Do you really think alignment has anything to do with being a jackass? Because I guarantee that I've encountered people that didn't need an excuse to be a jerk, it just came naturally.

Whether that's LG or evil (I don't allow evil PCs even if alignment not part of the game), it's the player that's the problem not the alignment of the PC. On The other hand I just make it clear I don't allow disruptive players. he only time it was ever an issue was back in 2E when CN meant freakin' insane and had a player that embraced the insanity. As in the first fight, decided to help the bad guys run away. Then again, he also thought he was a werewolf in real life, so there's that.

 

[pemerton]

if the party comes across a hungry red dragon or a hungry gold dragon I know quite a bit about how the encounter is going to play out with each one assuming I haven't changed the default alignment.

This would also be true if you were using DW descriptors as per @Manbearcat's post above.

Or if the standard stat block included a Personality/Motivation line which for Red Dragons said aggressive and cruel and for Gold Dragons said kind but aloof.

 

[Oofta]

This would also be true if you were using DW descriptors as per @Manbearcat's post above.

Or if the standard stat block included a Personality/Motivation line which for Red Dragons said aggressive and cruel and for Gold Dragons said kind but aloof.

Or we could just have alignment. If we're just substituting one set of words for another I don't see why it matters.

 

[TheSword]

This would also be true if you were using DW descriptors as per @Manbearcat's post above.

Or if the standard stat block included a Personality/Motivation line which for Red Dragons said aggressive and cruel and for Gold Dragons said kind but aloof.

Those terms are extremely specific. And do little to convey how the creatures feel about other things.

I’m getting crazy deja vu here.

 

[Maxperson]

Psychological.

People are going to react to you staring you in the face and telling you "You are not a Good Person." because they are judging your actions.

I don't buy that in the slightest. First, it's not you, it's your PC. Someone so fragile that they 1) can't tell the difference between a PC and a person, and 2) feel hurt that the PC's actions are being judged have deep issues and probably ought not to be playing a fantasy game and instead should be seeking professional mental health treatment.

38 years playing this game and I haven't encountered someone like that yet. I've seen disagreements about whether an act was good, neutral or evil, but never seen someone take it personally that they were being judged as "not a good person."

 

[Oofta]

Yeah, things like aggressive and cruel are useful descriptors. But they don't replace CE.

In addition, the whole kerfluffle about alignment basically boils down to "you can't categorize people with negative language". I don't see that getting rid of alignment changes anything if you're still going to have verbiage that describes monsters as the bad guys.

 

[Hriston]

Then, just like Max above, you are using 4e's model. Because anyone who isn't a complete psychopath is Lawful to enough of a degree that no one is Chaotic. Everyone has social bonds. If Aladdin and his monkey constitutes enough of a group to support Aladdin being lawful, then the only Chaotic people are those who stand completely alone and care nothing for order and organization.

Orcs for example, would be lawful. They have social bounds, and an order and organization they follow. They follow their chief and their chief has his duties to the tribe. If this is our definition, then it is worse than useless, because it only comes into play when dealing with singular individuals who it will be fairly obvious whether or not they are chaotic.

Well, 1E orcs are lawful! When I play 5E, though, I use 5E orcs which are chaotic. In my 5E games, orcs work together out of fear of being annihilated by the strongest among them, either an orc chief or a dark lord of some sort. CE societies are held together through bullying and threats. That's why orcs are proficient in Intimidation which makes them about as effective as more lawful societies which lack such social proficiencies.

See, but that was the point.

When you are working within the laws, within the norms of society, you don't need Charisma to accomplish a goal. A situation that required Charisma and would have challenged and developed those skills, turns into a by the book procedure that doesn't challenge Aladdin. Because it is far harder to convince people to break with their lawful and expected behaviors, than to just... do the thing they were doing.

Additionally, if you want to enforce lawful behavior... you appeal to authority. If Aladdin wanted to insist on the Laws being followed, he may have tried making an impassioned speech, but he would also be just as well served calling the guards, whose job it is to enforce the Laws.

Now, if you want to call that the reason for your boost, then we run into a lot of other issues. For example, why do Chaotic characters not get the same boost? If the reasoning is that it is easier to convince people to follow the structures they are encouraged to follow do to external authority, or that they can call upon the authorities to enforce that position, then the boost would apply not to the character, but to any action that calls upon those authorities. And, many times, I would say that approaching enforcers whose job it is to enforce, and asking them publically to do their job, is going to be an auto-result, because that is their role. And if a roll is needed... I'm not giving a Lawful character a boost, because the very fact that they need to roll tells everyone that these people are not swayed by merely the facet of law.


In short, it would seem to make more sense to boost the roll for the situation, rather for an alignment, because that seems to be where the actual easing of conditions happens, not because of whether or not the person making the roll believes in law and order.

1. You seem to be saying that lawful characters don't use charisma to interact socially with others to achieve their goals. That would be something I disagree with. I would think that many of the strong leaders found in both history and fiction would be thought of as lawful in D&D terms.

2. The alignments of the individuals involved -- both the speaker and the audience -- are part of the situation. Alignment is more than what a character believes, at least it is in my game. It is an unseen metaphysical energy with which one is aligned.

Here is the rub though, that relies on knowing the character.

The fiction of the Paladin being trusted has nothing to do with whether an individual Paladin is Lawful, it is the same that people are more likely to trust a doctor than they are a bystander. It is the authority of the badge/uniform. And that would be the same no matter what, if your Chaotic Barbarian is famously part of a tribe who would die before breaking their word, then whether or not the Barbarian will keep his word isn't the point, the point is his people are famous for trustworthiness.

And if the Barbarian or the Paladin are known to be liars or cheats... then people react to the person they know, and not the uniform. Which again, becomes about knowing the person, not their alignment. If the Barbarian has a reputation of following through with threats, and he threatens someone, then people are going to believe him. Because his behavior is in this matter is consistent, if he says he will punch you in the face, he will punch you in the face.


I remember you mentioning something about tuning forks and people being magnetized by alignment, so maybe in your mind everyone who encounters the Paladin can feel the "Lawfullness" radiating off of him, and therefore know that he is a person who always keeps his word.... but first off, again, that doesn't change the same bonus you are talking about applying to any situation where the character is well known, and secondly, that is a vast change to how the game works. Because if everyone has a constant "Detect Alignment" sensor then you can't have infiltrators, or evil cults, or anything of the like, because the moment someone met them, they'd know they were evil and untrustworthy.

None of this is ever a problem in my game. Some of the things you mention about second-hand knowledge or past experience of an individual can also modify the DC of a Charisma check either in the same or opposite direction of any adjustment due to alignment. The interaction itself is an opportunity to get to know the character by their speech, their mannerisms, etc., and the unseen hand of Alignment does play a part in forming alliances and creating conflict. This in no way implies that anyone in the fiction has a detect alignment ability (unless they do). What it means is that Alignment is a real force within the fiction that the game creates. Otherwise, I see no point in using alignment at all. I don't think it's needed (or does a good job) as an aid to roleplaying, and it's worthless (IMO) as a "shorthand" for a character's psychology. What it's good for is what it was originally designed for, defining the sides in a game-spanning conflict. If those aren't the sides in your game, and alignment isn't a real thing in the fiction of your game with mechanical teeth, then don't use it.

But in fiction, all else is never equal. This is like saying that Heroes are stronger than Villains in the MCU, all else being equal. Which is false, because the Villains tend to be stronger, that's why the heroes work as a team. You are giving a boost to Lawful characters under an assumption that they should get a boost, that they should be more effective, and you didn't say something like "lawful characters get a boost when trying to persuade other lawful characters in a lawful course of action" You said that lawful characters get a boost to charisma, because they are better at working with people in a group.

That is a very different claim, and it isn't one that make sense, when Chaotic people not only form groups (and that seems to be enough to make them Lawful all of a sudden) but they form groups to oppose the entrenched lawful society. Something far harder, and yet done with regularity in fiction.

We don't find out if they're better until they succeed or fail on a check. Chaotic characters can form groups, but their cohesion and stability are more tenuous. I don't think that's a controversial understanding of alignment.

IF people can't look at a list of characters and figure out their alignment, then how does alignment help us define characters in any meaningful way?

I don't agree that it's for defining characters in any deep, naturalistic, or psychological way. I think it's for defining the sides of a game and for answering the question: What side is this character on?

So, again, Moorcock has nothing to do with the current thing I'm complaining about. They didn't have Good Law and Evil Law, which was codified in DnD. Once you have made a split into Good Law and Evil Law, then Moorcockian Law no longer applies, because it is a nonsensical divide to that perspective.

Maybe, maybe you could make a case that Moorcock's version of Law and Chaos was the norm for three years. But then Gygax and Arnenson and the rest of TSR added Good and Evil to the mix, and therefore changed the definition of Law and Chaos. Because you must then have a split between these sides. You can't have Pure Law or Pure Good. You must have Lawful Good and Chaotic Good, Lawful Evil and Chaotic Evil, because those are now the factions.

In Moorcock (or at least a derivative) ultimate pure Law is a static world. Nothing moves or changes, it is Dead and still. Now, look at DnD's "Plane of Pure Law" Mechanus is a plane of movement, constant movement. Ordered, sure, but it is machinery, constantly moving, changing, documenting, The Modrons even can be Chaotic, it breaks them, but in Moorcock's version of Ultimate Law, things don't break. They can't, they are perfectly ordered and precise.

So, once more, and with feeling. Moorcock's version of Law has nothing to do with DnD's version of Law. It may have inspired it, it may have been the source of it for three years, but DnD abandoned that concept pretty early on and took on its own conception of Law and Chaos. So, blaming Moorcock for what DnD did is nonsensical. Again, I might as well blame Homer, Socrates and Plato, who also envisioned the law and order of society in opposition to the chaotic wilderness of monsters and beasts, with both good and evil capable of being found in both places. Moorcock didn't event that conflict, he just made a single famous version of it.

I'm sorry, so you changed what you were complaining about? Because this whole exchange began with you complaining about Law being badly named because I said it doesn't have anything to do with following the laws of whatever legal authority you live under. You now seem to be complaining about something else, although I can't tell from what you've written here what that is. Also, I don't think Dave Arneson had anything to do with adding the good-evil axis. That was all Gygax, beginning with the Dragon article where he introduced the concept of five-point alignment. It was then adopted into Holmes Basic and AD&D with the publication of the Monster Manual, both in 1977. Then, with the publication of the PHB and DMG, it was expanded into nine-point alignment in 1978/79. I don't know what any of that has to do with having a lawful alignment meaning something different than being law-abiding. It doesn't mean that in Moorcock, and it doesn't mean that in D&D.