D&D General Do you use Alignment in your D&D games?

[Maxperson]

They don't have autonomy though. You take their character away if you don't like how they're acting.

Call it 'consequences' all you want, but it's removing autonomy.

But it only comes into play if your constantly acting in another alignment and failing to act within the one selected. If the DM is changing alignment just because you step outside of the one written, that's an abuse of authority, not adhering to RAW which allows you to step out of your alignment.

 

[Lyxen]

3.5 says it's fine and expected that players will deviate some from the claimed alignment, but if they do so regularly the DM should change their alignment. By 3.5 RAW, you explicitly can't play someone fairly consistently as a different alignment than what is written on the sheet without the DM stepping in.

That's normal, you can't play a character with 12 strength as if he had 18 strength.

 

[Cadence]

The lack of permissions, though were irrelevant, since you could by game permission make an eco terrorist druid and a bard with a personal code. The optimal build isn't one you had to take. And the artifact alignment change wasn't really relevant since you are allowed to act outside of your alignment, so it isn't as if you could be forced to always act LN. Alignments are just the box you fit in most of the time. So as long as you were playing LN 51% of the time, you could play anything else the remaining 49% of the time and still be acting according to LN. Hell, if you were willing to lose a level you could just change alignments to whatever you want.

I'm also curious what the alignment of the PC was before the alignment change.

If 51% LN and 49% CE is LN, and 49% LN and 51% CE is CE, then the system sure seems useless and inane.

Edit: Now, if they were adjacent alignments, that would feel different. 51% LN/49%LG. But even then wouldn't LN with Good tendencies be a common phrasing? And LN with G tendencies doesn't seem that different from LG with LN tendencies.

 

[Lyxen]

Again. General. Thread.

This thread has a ton of DMs in it saying they're specifically using it as a stick to enforce behavior. 'No Evil', 'preventing murder hobos', 'making them reflect on their actions'.

No, we are using table rules and session 0 to make sure that people are on the same line. The "no evil PC" is just a table rule, and people have told you that this exists in games where there is no alignment.

 

[Vaalingrade]

The lack of permissions, though were irrelevant, since you could by game permission make an eco terrorist druid and a bard with a personal code.

Technically the game allows a CN druid, but tell people here they are bad DMs for disallowing an alignment. I dare you.

And the bard was LN in the DM's eyes. Full stop. If they entered play, I could theoretically play them as non-boring, but I'd be an Ex-Bard until the change happens per RAW.

The optimal build isn't one you had to take.

Have you seen the 3e Fighter and Unarmed fighting rules?

And the artifact alignment change wasn't really relevant since you are allowed to act outside of your alignment, so it isn't as if you could be forced to always act LN.

The Balance card says you have to play the new alignment.

Alignments are just the box you fit in most of the time. So as long as you were playing LN 51% of the time, you could play anything else the remaining 49% of the time and still be acting according to LN. Hell, if you were willing to lose a level you could just change alignments to whatever you want.

1) level loss is not a rule in 3e for alignment.
2) Level 1 loses a level. Okay.

I'm also curious what the alignment of the PC was before the alignment change.

Like I said in the post, CG because it was one of only 3 I had any interest to play from CG, NG, and CN. The book itself you shouldn't play evil without saying you can't play evil.

 

[Oofta]

??

Why do you keep asking this weird, leading question? We have table agreements, but we don't have or need alignment to beat that into anyone or apply in-game 'consequences'.

I keep asking because you refuse to answer a simple question. It sounds like we both draw lines, we just draw them differently.

No evil isn't about alignment. It's something I tell people when I invite them to the game, I would have the same restriction in any TTRPG. I don't want to play a game where the protagonists thugs or anti-heroes.

 

[Vaalingrade]

No, we are using table rules and session 0 to make sure that people are on the same line. The "no evil PC" is just a table rule, and people have told you that this exists in games where there is no alignment.

You mean the people who expressly say they use alignment for this purpose? They're not using alignment?

 

[Oofta]

You mean the people who expressly say they use alignment for this purpose? They're not using alignment?

People know what I mean when I say no evil. It would apply to any TTRPG I was game master for.

 

[Cadence]

You mean the people who expressly say they use alignment for this purpose? They're not using alignment?

Evil also has a "plain English" dictionary definition outside of the game. Presumably when people describe a genocidal monster in the news as evil they aren't generally conjuring up D&D alignment rules in their heads.

That being said, it does feel like in a D&D thread that assuming one means D&D alignment isn't a stretch.

 

[Vaalingrade]

People know what I mean when I say no evil. It would apply to any TTRPG I was game master for.

You're not the only respondent to the thread who has said this.

There are people who have said 'I use alignment to..", leaving no ambiguity.