a game without alignments: my own experience

[eXodus]

hey folks.

i have recently started playing in a game without alignments. we are a party of four multiclassed rogues. there is a human rogue2/fighter1 who fights with a ranseur, a dwarf rogue3 who is the trap and lock man, human rogue2/cleric1, and my human rogue2/bard1 who is the brains and the face.

well the dm decided he wanted to run a game without alignment. we are two sessions into it and here are some of my thoughts:

we are all playing chaotic evil characters. sure i know we are all rogues in a thieves guild but we tend to be overly violent, prone to lies, larceny, lecherous, and vile folks.

i wonder if we had alignments to fill if we would play these characters any differently. i would have chosen chaotic neutral for my own character and i think that my own character would not be so quick to kill prisoners, torture for information, and maim for the sheer joys of it.

it will be very interesting to see how it all turns out. perhaps as difficult as the nine alignments can be sometimes to deal with they have a place.

we are hardly heroes. i cannot wait to see how it all plays out...

 

[Corwyn]

My experience with this sort of play is that the underlying nature of the players surfaces. Not realy their nature but more in the line of their unconsius urge to express their darker side.
In this case it is also modified by the fact that you're all playing rogues in a guild.

Ofcourse this could have gone a different way if you had all wanted to play the hero's and goodguy's.

The alignments make you think in specific way's this encourages people to play the role they chose.

Hmmmm just me rumbling here a bit....

 

[Umbran]

*shrug*. I think perhaps your group is being a bit reactionary. They've been told, "There is no alignment, so alignment does not matter", so they are experimenting with behavior that they would not have used before. It probably isn't so much that they are playing without alignment, as it is the first time they are doing so. A kind of backlash, if you will.

Many games have some small preferences towards certain moral behavior in the character, but few have direct analogs to alignments. But you don't see folks playing "chaotic evil" willy-nilly in those games.

I'd be wary if I were you - even without alignments, actions can have consequences. Playing without alignment does not mean playing without morals. If your DM has any wit, your enemies will learn that you are nasty people, and treat you accordingly. And your behavior will earn you new enemies. It isn't quite so much fun when the whole town is out ot get you...

 

[Zappo]

I've always played D&D with alignments. However, I have also played and DMed many other games where alignments don't exist, and I've never witnessed any difference in the behaviour of the players. It's probably because in my campaigns, personality determines alignment and not vice versa.

 

[willpax]

As Umbran pointed out, a world without alignments is not a world without consequences.

If I were the DM, I would probably be creating some moral dilemmas. If your behavior is normal for the city you're in, it must be a really horrible place to live. What if others treated your family the way you treat others? What would you do if some outside force came to "clean up" the city and impose some wholesome order on such a cesspool?

On the other hand, if your behavior is extreme for your community, then you should be getting increasingly stronger warnings about your behavior. Eventually, the group will torture or kill someone with powerful friends; life on the run can make for exhilarating adventure.

I've never played with alignments, but the players are aware that their actions have consequences. I've never had a problem with the group becoming too vicious (although a recent encounter involved a revenge killing in cold blood done without the knowledge of the group's rather moral leader).

 

[MarauderX]

I have DMed with the 'no alignment' idea, and it turned out kinda iffy at best. I felt sometimes like I was pushing the characters to do certain things in an adventure when they would just become indifferent as they didn't seem to want to willingly do good.

There was a lot of multiple personalities as players would want to look good in the public eye by helping the good guys protect a trade route, but then would act evil by assaulting the next merchant caravan to get some extra cash. Overall I think that party was Lawful Evil.

Since then I have asked players to choose a specific alignment, then just ask that they stick with basically good or evil, and what they want the direction of the character to be.

 

[Desdichado]

I've never DMed D&D without alignment before, although I've also never DMed D&D in which alignment was something that really made any difference whatsoever.

I've GMed plenty of games that don't have any alignment at all. I can't imagine that I'd really be interested in ever using alignment again, unless I somehow featured it as an important aspect of the campaign, as in Planescape or something.

 

[fusangite]

With the exception of my two recent D&D campaigns, I haven't run or played in a game with an alignment system since I was 14.

I'm stunned that the absence of an alignment system is modifying people's behaviour in the way you describe.

It sounds to me like the reason you're having this trouble is that your GM is not filling the void left by removing alignment with anything else -- political ideology, theology, etc. It sounds to me as though the cure for your GM to present appealing ideologies/groups for your characters to associate with.

 

[Celebrim]

I have no particular love of the alignment system. I don't find it particularly elegant, and I don't think it does enough to encourage the players to role play.

The primary reason I've never abandoned it is that most peoples problems with the system seem to have more to do with thier own beliefs about morality, than any particular failure of the system to contribute to the game.

It always seems as if the most vocal opponents of the alignment system are those that want to play thier characters as Chaotic Evil (or at least Chaotic Greedy), but don't want the label 'evil' applied to thier actions for whatever reason. And generally, player who don't want an alignment system are hoping that it means - "There won't be any consequence to my actions."

It's always annoying to me, because I really don't believe that the alignment system adequetely reflects real problems of good and evil. But every time I make that claim, some player comes along and justifies that the system can indeed be applied to real people in meaningful ways. For instance, the alignment system invokes a enherently ordered universe of absolute moral principals. The alignment system therefore espouses the belief that the universe is an orderly place. Invariably, when some player comes along and says that he doesn't like the alignment system, it always turns out that the fundamental reason is that they don't believe that moral principals are orderly absolutes or that real people have any such beliefs. Which makes me want to pull my hair out.

So I don't ditch alignment because it would just be too much work for too little gain, given that the system by its very vagueness tends to be more broadly applicable than you would first think.

 

[barsoomcore]

There's no alignment in Barsoom. No problem.

If characters do anti-social things, they'll receive anti-social consequences. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't.

I don't see alignment as a big problem, it's just not right for all campaigns. It's perfect for some. This line, though, kills me:

posted by eXodus
i wonder if we had alignments to fill if we would play these characters any differently. i would have chosen chaotic neutral for my own character and i think that my own character would not be so quick to kill prisoners, torture for information, and maim for the sheer joys of it.

You find joy in maiming people and you think an alignment system would help?

Why not play a character who doesn't take joy in maiming others? Such a personality doesn't require a particular alignment, just a non-sociopathic outlook on life. Sheesh.